Season of Terror
by Tigger
Copyright 2002, All Rights Reserved

Chapter 18: What Do You Do with a Problem Like Victoria?

"Can you explain her behavior, Marie?  One minute she's helping you in the kitchen, without being ordered to do so, I might add, and the next, she is watching over her little sister like a broody hen."

"Jane, you're the one with the psychology degree.  All I know is that child is working as hard or harder than any student I can recall, except perhaps Darla.  It's like she is really trying to learn to be a girl, not just learn to act like a girl."

"But every time you turn around she is a DIFFERENT girl, Marie. I have NO idea what she'll do next.  For example, when she got here she was terrified by just the thought of riding.  Now? She's facing her fear of the horses like some Rebecca of Sunny Brook Farms clone."

"Fear?" Marie choked out a laugh. "Janey, you don't know the HALF of that one.  That girl has fallen in LOVE with those four-legged manure-makers. When she's not watching Penny, reading the fashion magazines and newspapers for your next mealtime quiz, studying her school lessons or keeping house, she's down at the stables subverting your livestock."

"It was a good deal easier to deal with her when she wasn't quite so brave.  Have you seen those hideous polyester stirrup pants she wears when she is going to see the horses?"

Now Marie did laugh, a big, bold laugh totally at odds with her usual role in Seasons House. "Seen them?  Jane, I *gave* them to her.  She'd tried going down there in skirts, but that didn't work.  She laddered three sets of hosiery, including a pair of silk stockings before going bare-legged.  Then the straw and hay made her break out into a rash.  She came to me because she figured that you might really have a fit if she ruined a pair of those Armani slacks mucking about down there because she doesn't have any jeans!"

"Armani to muck out a horse stall. Lord above," Jane sighed, shaking her head.  "Well, if she stays, we'll buy her some jeans.  IF she stays.

"Is that really a possibility?" Marie asked, once again serious.

"We've never had a child react like this, Marie.  On the one hand, I'm rather proud of her for standing up to the things she fears, but on the other hand, her sudden unpredictability poses a very real and dangerous threat just now."

"Danger?  Aren't you overstating the situation? I mean, we both think she's made the big turnaround, so where's the problem?"

"Penny is the problem, Marie, or at least, the root cause of the problem," Jane said simply.  "Our new student is TRULY unpredictable because none of the old rules apply to her. Why should she worry about being exposed publicly as a boy masquerading as a girl? She's already decided to kill herself once, and still isn't sure she shouldn't try it again. I can't trust my past experiences to foretell how she will react to my lessons. I have to able to give Penny my full attention at all times so I MUST know how Victoria is going to react and behave for the simple reason that I have no idea how Penny will."

"Then I think you need to explain to Victoria, very carefully and very precisely, just what you are doing and what you expect of her each time.  I mean, it is not like you dare to play this one by ear, is it?"

Jane shook her head sadly. "That's just it, dear.  Even if I plan everything, I HAVE to wing it with Penny because I am always guessing with her.  Suppose a situation with Penny gets. . .well, violent and it very well could unexpectedly.  If I anticipate Victoria acting like the prissy-missy and instead get the tough as nails warrior queen from the mall, things could go from worse to terrible very quickly."

"I see," Marie said.  "So what do you propose to do?  Graduate her?"

"It might be the best thing," Jane sighed, rubbing her knuckles against her temples.  "For Penny, at least.  Unfortunately, I told Victoria all about the 'big sister' function and she is now determined to be a great big sister."

"You're afraid Victoria might feel she'd failed you and Penny if you sent her away just now?"

"There is that," Jane agreed.  "And if I could just trust her reactions, three pairs of eyes to watch Penny is certainly better than two pairs.  I only wish I had more information on which to base my decision."

"Maybe if you got the whole group together?  Laid out the issues and got their collective insights?  They might be able to help you piece it together better."

"I've talked to them individually already."

"But they haven't discussed it among themselves," Marie replied.  "Aren't you the one who told me that sometimes it is the interaction that is important, not the dialogue?"

"It is a thought," Jane murmured.

~-----------~

"Well, I don't know why you think there is anything special about Victoria, Jane" Sandy grinned as she reached for another cheese cube.  "She reacts to me same as your other girls do.  She tries to sink into the salon chair and hide."

"That's true enough," Carolyn Beale agreed, as she nibbled a sweetly frosted cookie.  "Even after all these months, Victoria still gets very quiet and demure once she walks into Sandy's cubicle.

"And that's all?" Jane asked, "Nothing unexpected?"

"Not that I can tell," Sandy shrugged.

"Well, there was the make-up club. . . " Caro reflected.

"Yes?" Jane pounced.

"Now that I think about it, that was really unexpected.  You know how the boys usually are when the girls are all there?  Like Sandy said, they sort of try to melt into the woodwork only we won't let them.  Not that they're at any risk so long as they do as they're told. As the model, the girls aren't seeing them so much as analyzing them, so they're actually safer than if they were part of the class group.  Still, getting them to interact at all during those sessions is always like pulling teeth without novocaine.  Painful and difficult."

"And Victoria was different?"

"She sort of, I don't know, grew into it.  In the beginning, she was stiff as a board and just as responsive, but then she began to loosen up. I just thought she was getting used to the game, kind of like Darla, you know?  Anyway, before the end of the session, she was chattering like magpie with the other girls."

"She whaaat?" Jane goggled.

"It was rather surprising because I never knew she acted like that.  I mean, she really was kind of , well, kind of a ditz. You know, like one of those teenage sitcom actresses or one of those teen pop artists.  Everything gesture and speech pattern really exaggerated," Caro demonstrated by swinging her hand about in broad, sweeping gesticulations, and then giggled. "Lord, that was funny, because some of girls were really put off by that act.  Oh, and some of the things she said," Caro shook her head at the memories.  "I particularly remember that one of the girls asked why she didn't have pierced ears.  She said that she was waiting until she could talk you into letting her pierce her navel at the same time.  I believe her exact words were 'My aunt would have a cow. . .'. I was going to offer to do the dirty deed for her during our next session - you know, as a class demonstration - but Marie showed up to whisk her away before I could say anything."

"Over my dead body!" Jane snapped before she could stop herself.  "Pierced navel, indeed.  What is it with these young people today.  Anything else?  Brenda?"

The sleek shop keeper frowned as she stirred her tea.  "Nothing I haven't already discussed with you, Jane.  You saw the dresses she chose when she was on her own.  Sweet Polly Purebread and the 'Lady in Red'.  Nothing in between.  Pure Priss and Pure Sex."

"Did you notice anything out of the ordinary about the way she interacted with the shop girl you sprung on her?"

"Sally?  What do you mean?"

"Like what Caro just said about how she behaved with the girls in the makeup class?"

"Oh, I understand.  Now that you mention it, Victoria seemed rather comfortable with Sally, or at least, as comfortable as any girl can be when she's stripping and dressing while a stranger watches.  I didn't have to prod her once to get a move on.  It was almost like. . . well, like she was your basic teenaged girl enjoying the experience of trying on all those clothes and seeing what she looked like wearing them."

"Oh god," Jane groaned as Marie reached over to take her friend's hand.  "Another Caitlyn?"

"You think she wants to be a girl?  A real girl?" Carolyn asked.

"I don't know.  What you've all just confirmed is that she's trying out personalities that are inherently feminine, but not necessarily the one I've tried to teach her.  Part of the very fussy clothing and over-the-top girlish affectations is that those behaviors tend to isolate the student, even among girls her own age.  I don't want my students learning to like the masquerade too much."

"Well, does she behave like your other students here at the mansion, or does she seem to emulate someone else?" Brenda Franson asked.

"Marie." "Jane." the two women of Seasons House said in unison, each pointing at the other.

"Oh, my goodness," Carolyn said wide-eyed as she selected a cookie from the plate Marie offered.  "Both of you?"

 "She doesn't emulate me," Jane snorted. "When she's not being 'the perfect Victorian Seasons House student', she's Mother Marie in miniature. You should see Victoria when she's trying to help Penny.  I can tell you, watching her try to mother a student who has more than six inches height advantage on her is something to see.  Sometimes, I swear, Victoria wants to diaper Penny, stick a pacifier in her mouth and rock her to sleep.  Like me, indeed."

"Hah!" Marie shot back.  "You don't see her as I do, then."

"Oh really? And who baked those lady-fingers this lot is so greedily scarfing down? From scratch, by the way, and we both know that baking is not among MY great accomplishments."

"As if you'd let any of our girls escape without learning how to cook, bake and properly present food.  As to the other, why, just yesterday, during the dress up exercises following the 30 minute bubble bath from hell?  In walks MISS, emphasis if you please on the *MISS*, Victoria, in a navy blue power suit no less, complete with three inch matching heels and that dark lion's mane of hers up in a killer chignon. And you should have seen the way Victoria ripped a piece off Penny when our new little sister blurted out a bad word.  All without using a single profanity herself, I might add, and in such a 'more in sorrow than in anger' mode that even Penny felt she must do better, rather than becoming even more depressed.  I wish I could have taped that lecture." 

"Jane to a 'T', eh," Caro asked, grinning.

"Exactly," Marie replied fervently.  "PERFECT diction, POINTED critiques - heavens, Jane, she even had your vocal inflections down perfectly.  And let me tell you, she got Penny's attention when I couldn't."

"It sounds," Jane said finally, "as if she is trying very hard to behave like whatever girl best suits the situation. Almost as if she were practicing."

Brenda nodded.  "Or trying them all on in turn and seeing how they fit?" At Jane's dark glare, Brenda took another sip from her tea cup before continuing.  "But back to what Carolyn asked.  Does that mean you think she wants to be a girl?"

"Harmph," Sandy snorted. "Well, if that kid is planning on being a girl, she'll be a lot different in one key respect than Caitlyn, I can tell you that much!"

"How so?" Jane asked, almost hopefully.

"THIS kid likes females - a LOT! You know that Taylor girl, Caro, the blonde who's, ah, developed so suddenly in the last year?" Sandy's partner nodded.  "Well, just last week I had old Vickie-babe in my chair and Miss Whole Milk 2002 went bouncing past my cubicle on her way to the tanning booth, wearing her very-brief bikini. I thought I was going to have to pour some ice water on to Victoria's lap. I'll tell you what, if Victoria is going to be a full time girl, she's going to be a lesbian." 

"Will she indeed?" Jane asked, more than a touch of frost in her tones.

Sandy blushed, but continued.  "Look, Jane, she doesn't act like Caitlyn, at least not THAT way, okay?  I never got a single rise out of Caitie - not once in all the times I had her in my chair, and THAT makes her damned unique in my experience.  Now, Victoria, well, she still, umm, gets horn. . ., I mean, well, aroused!"

"The sheets, Jane," Marie said softly.  At Jane's cocked brow, the petite French Canadian blushed too, but held her gaze.  "I still have to change Victoria's sheets quite regularly." She swallowed delicately.  "Spotting.  Her nightgowns, too."

The other three women figured out what Marie was hinting at and began to laugh.  "Such involuntary emissions are usually," Jane said haughtily, "very reliable indicators that a boy has become comfortable in the feminine role and is therefore ready for my more demanding and public training situations."

"You mean he's no longer so terrified that he can't get a hard-on from all that satin rubbing up against him, right?" Sandy grinned.

Jane's scathing look did nothing to quell the irrepressible bottle-blonde stylist, so she simply nodded.  "Just so.  However, I still don't know what is going on in that child's mind.  I can't have her changing personalities on me like this.  One minute she's Pollyanna, the next Britney Spears, and the next who knows?"

"Is she still dangerous?" Carolyn asked.  "Victor was originally sent here because he beat up smaller children, right?"

The Mistress of Seasons House considered that and then shook her head.  "I don't believe Victoria is still a public danger. The way she walked into that confrontation at the mall the other day proves that.  In the very unlikely event that the old Victor would have involved himself, he would have gone in swinging, and hit those punks from behind.  Victoria, on the other hand, just marched into the middle of those hooligans and tried to stare them down."

"Gee," Sandy said, her merrily twinkling eyes locked on Jane.  "Wonder where she got the idea for THAT strategy?"

"*I*," Jane said with great self-assurance, "am somewhat more imposing than a five foot three inch tall teenaged girl in a First Communion dress.  She nearly got herself hurt!"

"But she saved the boy," Marie pointed out gently.  "And as you just pointed out, dear, that is not something *he* would have done a few months ago.  I think, Jane, that if you are still worried about her predictability as big sister, we can safely send her home so that you can fully concentrate on Penny.  She's changed and it is all to the good."
"And if she goes home and decides to become a girl?"

"Then perhaps, dear friend," Marie told her friend, "that is what was really wrong with her all along.  Maybe being a girl is what she found here that was missing in Victor."

"At least the kid has grown a pair of balls," Sandy noted as she reached for and took the last two cheese cubes from the tray.  "Or whatever it is girls grow for courage.  Took guts to do what she did in that mall."

"Yes, that's true.  The cowardice that led to Victor's bullying does seem to have come under Victoria's firm control.  Ever since she insisted on donating blood.  Well, ladies, thank you for coming.  Please excuse me.  I have to go relieve Victoria on the Penny-watch."

The four women sat quietly until Jane had left the room.  "She's really upset about this," Brenda observed.

"She's afraid that she's made some kind of error in Victoria's program; an error that has led Victor to only THINK he wants to be a girl," Marie said.

"He doesn't seem at all like Caitlyn," Carolyn reflected.  "A little more 'rough and ready' than Carlton, if you know what I mean."

"Boy or girl," Sandy put in, "I like this Victoria a lot more than I liked that snot Victor."

"I think, Sandy, that is part of what is bothering Jane," Marie observed softly.  "She likes Victoria, too, and is afraid that is clouding her judgement in this case.  She's afraid that her preference for the girl is influencing the boy."

"Oh."