Amy 7: Amy In "Bunny Hoppin'!" free porn video

Amy 7: Amy in "Bunny Hoppin'!" by Amy Komori The original characters and plot of this story are the property of the author. No infringement of pre-existing copyright is intended. This story is copyright (c) 2010 Amy Komori. All rights reserved. Chapter One: In the Grand Tetons I'd been a girl for almost a year. Well, not really a girl per se. One thing I'd learned since this whole bizarro transformation deal was how physical sex and gender weren't always the same. Well, in most people, they were. For me, though, I wasn't sure what I was now. Or even who I was. Okay, so I was pretty certain I was a human named Amy Komori. But who was Amy Komori? A girl with a boy's soul? A boy with a girl's body? People reacted to me based on their perception that I was a girl kid, and I was definitely living the life, which affected the way I perceived myself and presented me with certain choices, things I'd never had to deal with before. At the same time, I couldn't be sure if my new brain topography wasn't affecting my thoughts, and my body chemistry my emotions. Or vice versa, for that matter. I mean, I had all my old memories and a sense of continuity of self, but my consciousness had been stuffed into a different container, and like water going from a pitcher to a glass or back again, was maybe even reshaping itself to fit. But what I really thought of as newness started with that container for my liquid soul. You know?my body. First, the hardest thing to get used to wasn't the being-female- physically part, but the size and strength part that went along with my re-set age. I was much smaller and much weaker than most people. And everyone around me?family, friends, teachers, classmates and random strangers-- constantly reinforced this, deliberately or accidentally. And if not people, then architecture and geography. I stood just under 5 feet tall according to the tape measure, felt majorly alarmed at how scrawny I was, and apparently possessed the muscle power of a kitten, or maybe two. Actually, for all I knew, I might have been stronger than all other girls approximately my size, but it's not like we shorties all got together and had power lifting competitions. Although that might have been pretty fun, come to think of it. There were tons of things I couldn't do now, many of which I learned in front of other girls in PE class that spring. Chin-ups, for example. Ms. Washington, our coach/teacher stood beside me and tried to coax even one from me. "C'mon, Komori. Just give me one. Just one, baby. Just one." I hung there, my face red, my neck tendons about to pop like guitar strings. I pulled, I really did. I tried so hard, the bands in my arms strained against skin. I kicked my feet. "One, Komori! You can do it!" But I couldn't hang on; my palms were burning. I let go and dropped to the floor, standing there, gaping at Ms. Washington, waiting for her to tell me to jump up and try again. Instead, she laughed, popped me on the back with her clipboard and said, "That's it, Komori. We'll get 'em tomorrow, right?" "Right, Coach!" I shouted as I sprinted over to the bleachers, so happy not to be making a fool of myself anymore. Sitting down, I looked at my hands. There on the pads of my right hand, skin had pulled loose. I sucked at it tasting salt and watched Sarah fail even more spectacularly, falling and landing on her ass when she leaped up to grab the bar. I could only do about 10 man-style push ups before pooping out, too. The many other physical impossibilities came to me courtesy of life itself. Lifting half a sofa for moving it. Picking up a TV set. Opening jelly jars with metal lids. Occasionally even candy wrappers kicked my ass. All the shit that had never amazed me in the least-- my birthright due to age, to biology and sexual dimorphism-- were now beyond my wildest dreams of strength and muscle capacity. Second, I was learning this body meant I possessed all these freaky new skill sets. Getting air on the vert; I could go higher than any of the skateboard guys and girls. I was amazingly flexible and limber. I mean, I couldn't do a split or anything but I could bend over backwards and put my hands on the floor behind me. I liked to freak Mrs. Komori out with my "Exorcist" impression, crab-walking that way down the hall at home. And if I happened to be feeling it that day, I could slowly bring my legs over the top and come back to a standing position, thanks to Sarah, who showed me how?she'd learned in dance classes, even though she'd mostly let her own ability atrophy in the two or three years since she gave up toe shoes for more piano lessons. I could turn either foot almost 180 degrees around from the other foot. The more I skated, the more sure of my center of gravity I became and as a result, I'd discovered in myself this amazing gracefulness. I just seemed to flow, the opposite of clumsy. Skating was for being explosive, for violent and abrupt moves and I could do all that, too, but we spent part of PE learning tumbling and cartwheels and to Ms. Washington's delight, it turned out I was maybe third best in the class behind Ashleigh Bodine and Kathleen Dennison, both of whom had taken gymnastics when they were kids. They could do real backflips, though, something I didn't dare try even on the mats. Somehow my skating-based recklessness did not translate to throwing my body end over end in reverse in a gym with a lot of kids watching. Going forward, though, I was the shit and I knew it. Third, I was definitely being re-shaped by the being-female-physically part. Obviously, I had girl reproductive parts. Working ones. So I had to learn the care and feeding of the human vagina. My vagina. It's like I could go for a few days without even considering my vagina, and then suddenly I'd be peeing or taking a shower or something and there it was: TVA, or total vaginal awareness. I sneaked peaks at the encyclopedias in the school library, and the health textbooks. As a guy, I'd been pretty interested in getting into a vagina, but not having a vagina get into me. Now as I learned all the technical terms for the secret flesh orchid I was inside, I was fascinated. Vulva, labia majora and minora, clitoris, vagina going into me, past my cervix, my uterus, up the fallopian tubes and so on, all those amazing things secretly hidden deep inside me right up into my ovaries, of which I apparently had the standard issue two. Wow, I thought. I'm stuffed with... with... stuff! And not only that, I was starting to sprout hair down there. Not so many, but there they were. I'd already experienced a few periods by then, too. I still wasn't super-regular, but I already knew tons about panty liners and pads and light days and heavy flows. I knew what cramps were. And bloating. These things had always been kind of mysterious to me when I'd encounter them in TV commercial voice overs. These anonymous but friendly women seemed to think I needed the confidence to do yoga or wear skimpy bikini bottoms even on my heaviest days. I wasn't convinced I did, but now their soothing voices were speaking to me directly in a language in which I was quickly gaining fluency. Mrs. Komori was my guide in this stuff. I didn't feel so comfortable talking any of it over with Emily?I could talk to her about gender roles and things that pissed me off as a girl or things I was finding out I kind of enjoyed, but having fucked her way back as a guy made me really skittish about asking her about menstruation and whatnot now that I was living as her sister. Also because she was Emily Komori, Princess Smart Ass Supreme. Like when we first noticed I had boobs. Not big ones. But... ones. Emily and I were watching a movie one Friday night in the early spring, not too long before Easter, just sitting on the sofa together. Ordinarily, Emily would have been out at the Lava Lamp or one of the other clubs with her friends, but she wasn't feeling all that well. I was kind of nursing her a little, bringing her sodas from the kitchen when she was thirsty, fluffing her pillows when she got up to use the bathroom. I was actually really enjoying myself when, out of nowhere, Emily reached over and pinched my chest really hard. "Owww! What the fuck?" I shouted, throwing myself back away from her. "I knew it!" Emily said in triumph. "Knew what?" "You gots titties, Honey Bunny!" "You lie! You're such a fuckin' liar!" "The mirror doesn't lie!" Then she started singing a Who song, kind of: "Go the mirror, girl! Go to the mirror, girl!" We'd been listening to "Tommy" a lot lately, my innovation because Emily wasn't that into the Who, although she tickled herself by calling them the What. Instead of taking Emily's asshole advice, I crossed my arms over my chest and sat as far away from her on the sofa as I could, the TV screen at an uncomfortable angle. On my next pee trip to the bathroom I lifted up my shirt and confirmed Emily's observation. They'd snuck up on me. Which would've been easy for them; I mean, there wasn't much to see. I had stealth boobs. Mostly just my tan lines, which were starting to come back full force because I was skating a lot again now that I'd cleared probation and Mrs. Komori had sprung for these kick ass Salomon ST 80 skates (not the best, but my first "real" pair and so much better than the crappy ones I'd been using) for me. Just a little puffiness upstairs. Oh fuck, I thought, they're kinda pointy, too. Then it hit me. Way back during summer, during all the changes, I'd noticed like this really hard knot under one of my nipples. My first thought was I had gotten cancer along with my girl body, but in all the insanity, I totally forgot all about it. And I couldn't remember if the same thing had happened to the other one. I took off my shirt to see if they were caused by how I was standing, or the cotton tee bunching up and pushing skin, muscle or fat. Nope. I had them. I put my shirt back on and pulled it down as much as I could to make it really cling in front without flattening my chest. Now I could see what Emily had seen, and I felt really aware of them, even as small as they were. My shirt was barely the teensiest bit bumped, but I kept thinking observant people at school must have been staring at them all this time while I was just happily oblivious. Or had the looseness of my t-shirts and tops hidden them? I felt like they probably weren't that noticeable unless you were my big sister and studied me constantly but I couldn't be sure and in that uncertainty, self-consciousness blossomed. You know, along with everything else, apparently. I immediately decided I didn't want anyone looking at me as anything other than me. It was as if they were just going to see me as a walking pair of boobs now. That was just about all the skater guys talked about when they thought I couldn't hear them. Boobs, boobies, breasts, tits, titties and more boobs. Was I like that before? Yeah, definitely. Gross. Guys? including the old me-- were fucking sick-ass perverts, I concluded. It wasn't that breasts were bad, or that appreciating them was evil, it was that I realized now guys put way too much importance on them-- to the point of making you feel less than whole. I crossed my arms over my chest again and walked back to finish the movie with Emily. I must have been scowling something fierce, because Emily told me she was sorry. "I don't wanna talk about it." "Them." "Them. It. Whatever. New topic." "You're growing up so fast! Hey, I'll bet you've had them all along and they're just kinda... you know... slow growers." "God, Emily. Shut the fuck up about my boobs!" Mrs. Komori chose that moment to walk in on us. "Amy, one of these days that mouth is going to be the death of you," Mrs. Komori said, smiling sweetly. She wasn't shocked to hear my cursing and all, but mostly she was just concerned about my development. Especially since I was skating almost every weekend. Which meant an unexpected new piece of equipment to go along with my helmet, skates and armor. And this one was something Mrs. Komori had to go with me to buy since she was something of an expert on the topic. We bought my first bra?well, bras, really?at Target the next day. Regular ones for school and some sports bras and some special tanks for skating. That wiped out a whole day down at the skatepark, and Sunday I made excuses not to go. By Monday, I was feeling a little bit better about the whole thing but not entirely sure of myself. "Why are you holding your book in front like that?" Sarah asked when I met up with her that morning outside our first class. "Like what?" I replied. Doo dee doo, what are you talking about, Sarah? Doo dee doo, holding my book like I normally do. Hugged against my chest. For the first time since I'd known her, I found myself checking out Sarah's body. And for the first time, I realized she had pretty big knockers already at her age. Okay, it's normal, I told myself. This is just nature and there's nothing wrong with it. But how does she deal with being so developed? How do any of these girls? Some of them were a year or more older than I was. Was I going to be like that in a year or so? I looked down at myself. The front of my awesome black button-up three-quarter sleeve oxford?my favorite "dress up" shirt-- was as flat as a board, as the girls in my class said, probably. That still didn't make me feel like moving the book. "Are you okay?" Sarah asked. "Better than okay. Okay?" Sarah nodded. Wavy red hair dancing around her face, giant green eyes, pale and helpless. I was a talker, she was a listener. She enjoyed when I talked all about inline skating and the tricks I was trying to learn, empathetically shared the pain of my many crashes. I loved to hear her backwards-ass, digressive attempts at explaining even the simplest things; she was so afraid of offending, she often made two completely opposite yet totally endearing points at the same time. Before Sarah, it'd just been Amy Komori against the world. Now I was part of something outside myself. Sarah made things cool, made school bearable, and she became my audience for all the stupid stunts I pulled. "You're coming over after school, right?" she asked. We'd planned to do some of our science homework together. We shared a lot of classes this semester. While I had the advantage of having taken all this stuff before, Sarah was still out-pointing me on tests just by virtue of being some kind of mega-genius mathlete. "Oh yeah!" I said happily. Chapter Two: With Sarah and Her Mom I loved going over to Sarah's house after school. The McAvoys were fucking rad, as far as I was concerned. Sarah's dad was a musician who lived in Seattle with his new wife, but her mom was always super-nice to me and she ran a candy store, of all things. McAvoy's Joys. Even Sarah thought the name was stupid beyond stupid. Mrs. McAvoy also sold pencils and novelty items, like stickers and stuff, from this little shop in a strip shopping center that was half-empty, one of those places where stores close almost before anyone knows they're open. Dark storefronts and big ass "Please Rent This Pathetic Dump" signs in the windows. The Sanrio store out at the mall was kicking Mrs. McAvoy's ass, though. Hello Kitty was a juggernaut in our town among the elementary kids, and even some of the girls?and this one boy named Lee?at our school had Hello Kitty binders and erasers. So Mrs. McAvoy had this fun little idea, and I ended up involved in a major way. While her daughter and I were checking our notes and quizzing each other after doing all these boring study questions to turn in the next day, Mrs. McAvoy came stomping into the house, all enthusiastic and loud. "Oh, Amy! Amy Komori, the Devil Child," she said by way of greeting. She knew my insane love for my oxford, so she added, "My, what an awesome shirt you're wearing today." "Hi, Mrs. McAvoy," I said. "Thanks. It's my fave." I wore it twice a week at least. Thank Satan for color-safe laundry detergents and Mrs. Komori's skills at getting stuff clean in cold. "What are you girls doing? Homework?" "Yeah," Sarah sighed. "Well, I'm certainly glad to catch you two together." "Why's that, Mrs. McAvoy?" I asked in this put-on chipper way. She thought it was amusing when I tacked her name onto the end of all my sentences in this really obsequious way. We both knew I was just clowning around, playing off the creepily polite/secretly evil sitcom archetype. Actually, I was creepily evil/secretly polite, and she knew it. "Well, since you asked, Amy Komori, as you well know, it's almost Peter Cottontail's day to roar?" "The Easter Bunny roars?" "He does indeed roar, Amy Komori! He roars down the bunny trail on a Harley chopper painted pink." "Oh, that's so rad!" "I wanna marry the Easter Bunny," Sarah chirped. "Not 'til you're 18," Mrs. McAvoy said. "But we're getting ahead of ourselves. Since Monsieur Lapin will soon make his Easter egg run, the ownership group of our little strip mall has arranged for a local radio station?" "Which one, Mrs. McAvoy?" "?to do a live remote. And I'm not ignoring you, Devil Child, I've just forgotten. Anyway, they'll have some of their deejays there or something like that. And I thought if neither of you delightful gals are doing anything better that day, maybe you'd like to help me by handing out chocolate eggs." "I-I will," Sarah said, and she looked at me. I pretended to think it over while Mrs. McAvoy chimed in with the "Jeopardy" music. She had a surprisingly clear singing voice, even if the only lyric consisted of the word "bing." "Yeah, sure, I'll do it, too," I said when I felt I'd milked the suspense enough. "Trust me," Mrs. McAvoy said, "It will be so much fun! You might even become famous!" Chapter Three: My Girl Loves to Party All the Time When I wasn't being Emily's doll-sister or Sarah McAvoy's best friend, and even when I was, my other job was being a junior high girl. Which sometimes meant socializing with the mob. Obviously, Sarah and I weren't the two most popular girls in junior high, but we still got invited to birthday parties and stuff. I'm not sure why Sarah got so many invites, but for me, my very first time at one of these soirees back in winter, I overheard a couple of moms talking in the kitchen about feeling sorry for that "weird, burgeoning baby-dyke little Asian girl who looked like she could desperately use a friend." My face had burned with shame and I pretended I had a stomach ache until they called Mrs. Komori to come get me. Ever since then, I wanted to avoid these parties, but Sarah talked me into going with her to one in particular?the Butler Birthday Bash. Katie and Matthew Butler were fraternal twins, and they thought they were hot shit because they were both gorgeous and also in all the AP classes. They barely looked like brother and sister, but Sarah had it bad for Matt and would always insinuate him into our every conversation until it got to be a game with me to bet myself how long it would take her to suddenly go all soft-eyed and say his name and then present me with some less than fascinating bit of biographical trivia about him. Like his favorite ice cream flavor (green tea) or that he had a pale moon-shaped scar on his left knee where he fell off a swing in playschool. We got the invitations in first period and by fifth period art, Sarah and I were still discussing whether or not we were going. While we did this, we tried to draw this still life of plastic fruit in this cheap green bowl. Sarah mostly drew Sailor Moon faces and puppies. I gave up after doing the rough outline of the fruit and drew lots of different skate boots. "You have to go, Amy," she said, pleadingly. "Please?" "Please let's don't go, Sarah," I said. "But... I kinda want to go..." She looked down at the floor. Then she looked back at me and whispered, "If you don't go... in the name of the moon, I will punish you!" Her voice got really high and tiny and mousy. "In the name of the moon, I will right wrong and triumph over evil... and that means you!" Stupid Sarah! I started laughing so hard, I couldn't stop. Mrs. Pirandello, our art teacher?who was usually pretty laid back and I felt sure smoked pot before every class?sent me to the office for disrupting class. By the time I got back, the bell had rung and Sarah was coming out the door with her bag and mine. "Okay, Sailor Moon," I said. "I'll go to your stupid party. But you have to tell this kid you like him. I swear I'll do something really horrible to you if you don't!" "L-like what?" "Like... In the name of the moon, I will right wrong and triumph over evil... and that means you!" I shouted. While bellowing in the hallway, I did this approximation of Sailor Moon's little salute move. Sarah laughed so hard she dropped our bags and when she bent to pick them up, her ass bumped Mrs. Pirandello-- who had come out to see what the commotion was?into knocking over this recycling bin behind her. While she gathered up all the spilled paper, we walked away as quickly as possible. Dude, parties and me-- Emily totally ate that up. She usually didn't give a shit if I acted like a traditional girl, but every once in a while if a situation came up where I might possibly be inclined to display my femme flag, she got all wicky-wacky on me. She thought it was funny and cute. I told her about the party and how I was going to support Sarah's love life, and Emily asked me if I wanted a new dress. "I don't particularly want the dresses I've got," I told her. "Fair enough," she replied. She knew I was only mostly telling the truth. But for this ordeal, I figured my trusty tank top or a tee and baggy jeans would do. It's what everyone expected of me, anyways. Then I found out Sarah wanted to really dress up. She was too shy to actually approach this junior high pimp-daddy, but she thought maybe if she glammed up or something, he'd notice her and it'd be like one of those John Hughes movies from the 80s she loved as much as Emily did. "Pretty in Pink" or "Sixteen Candles," which I was starting to really like, what with my fluff-accepting biology and all. Not that Sarah said all this to me. She was one of those "read my mind" people, but it was pretty obvious to me the way she kept asking me what I was going to wear on the big day, and then getting really quiet and mopey when I pointed at myself looking like a gay skater boy and said, "This." So a week before the big event, I quietly hinted to Mrs. Komori that I wouldn't be totally grossed out by a shopping expedition, but that I wasn't particularly enthused by the prospect, either. Big mistake, because Emily heard me and immediately it turned into this big deal. Amy's first party and all, even though it wasn't. We went to the mall and I picked out this ended up with this sleeveless black mesh party dress with these little roses embroidered on the front and above the darker, lacy hem and a pink lining. It was actually my first teen dress, the first one I'd ever owned that zipped in the back, and with it we also got my first pair of actual girl shoes?not counting the Teva sandals?a pair of black patent-finish mary janes with chunky heels that made me look almost normal height. "Aww... first you get boobies and now the most prettiest bestest littlest partiest party dress ever. You're growing up," Emily said. "Pretty soon we'll be here picking out your wedding dress." "Kiss my ass, bitch!" I snapped, sending Emily into gales of hilarity. "Amy. Language, language," Mrs. Komori warned. But she was smiling so I didn't take her seriously. I felt so stupid. Even if you took out the fact that I'd ever been a guy, and considered just the kind of girl I'd become, I'd still have felt stupid. It's not as though I'd never worn dresses or that I didn't like them. This was just different. It was very different. Specifically dressing this way to look good. Dressing this way to impress. Who? Well, to please Sarah, I guessed. Back home, I gussied up for practice and Emily even made up my face, for the first time ever. Nothing garish, or even particularly noticeable, just some mascara to lengthen my lashes and some lip gloss, but there you have it. I added the beaded bracelets and butterfly barrettes that had increasingly become my trademark. Stupid yeah, but checking myself out in the mirror I was kind of surprised. My hair was shiny. My eyes were huge and so dark they were almost black. Strong cheekbones, long nose, tiny mouth. This was the face I'd finally grown so accustomed to seeing everyday?which, no matter how hard I tried managed to look drippily pixie-like against my will?but now... different. A little older. The dress was like really flattering, too, just this majorly good choice.. And... I told Emily, "I actually don't look too bad. Nothing like myself, but actually sort of pretty." "Amy feels pretty? Oh shit, I never thought in a billion years I'd hear you say something like that!" "Don't bust my balls over this, Em. This is kind of a new feeling for me!" "I'm sorry, Honey Bunny. I swear to fucking God I'm not making fun of you. I'm just really kinda... surprised. Do you really like it?" "I don't know yet. I feel weird." Actually, I felt kind of fluttery in my stomach and really wanted to punch Mirror-Me in the face, maybe because I couldn't handle liking her so much. "I'd look pretty badass with a black eye," I said. "You're morbid," Emily said. "I learned it from you, okay!" I shouted, copying this stupid old anti- drug commercial. "I learned it from watching you!" Emily had me in a headlock before I could even react, but I shouted, "You're gonna ruin my stupid dress!" Mrs. Komori's face appeared in the door, looking confused. Emily let me go. Then I went and washed my face, got into my usual sort of clothes and put away all my new stuff so it wouldn't get wrinkled. Chapter Four: Happy Birthday! The day of the party, Sarah's mom picked us up. "Oh, Amy," she gushed, "You look so so soooo... adorable." "I'm a doll baby," I said. "All the boys love me. Not as much as they like Sarah, though." Sarah giggled nervously and I caught her mom giving me this weird look in the rearview mirror. I cringed at my total lack of inner editorial function. If this was how I was going to be, I decided a smart girl would keep her yap shut and just stare out the window. Sarah's mom dropped us off outside the party house and promised to come get us in two hours, which wasn't very long but seemed an eternity to me. I felt like a prisoner in this stupid get up. But when Sarah got out of the car, I got my first real glimpse of what a beauty my friend could be. On the sunny walkway leading to the standard-issue red brick ranch house where Sarah would have her romantic destiny decided for all eternity, she looked beyond angelic. Sure, she was gawky and clumsy, and kind of toothy, but with her red curls and in her fluttery white tank and long baby-blue peasant skirt, it was so obvious she was going to grow up to be gorgeous. The only thing that spoiled it was her near-panic. "This is so stupid," she whispered as we walked up to the kid's house. I snorted, even though what Sarah had said was exactly what I was thinking. I told her, "What's stupid? This is what kids do. We're kids. Therefore, we're doing it." Actually, I was wrong and Sarah was right-- it was stupid, so I had to give Sarah credit for her precognitive abilities. We looked like little foxes, but none of the other kids were dressed up. Jeans and shorts. When I saw that, my insides clenched up and I was mildly annoyed with Sarah. But it was too late to go home and change, and I still had hope she'd make her Matt connection. Katie met us right at the door. "Amy!" she said. "Oh my god! I didn't expect you to come." "Hey, Amy looks like a girl," my erstwhile would-be boyfriend Patrick said. He was standing in the middle of the living room, just holding a plastic cup of soda like it was his party. We'd been hanging out while skating a little bit lately, a sort of truce prevailing between us, a lot like the one between the two Koreas. I bit the inside of my mouth to keep from saying something everyone would regret. But I made a mental note to remember I owed Patrick some serious payback next time at the skate park. "Hey, Amy," Matt said, and I stuck up my hand. I nudged Sarah to get her to go talk to him, but she looked at me like I'd literally told her to jump into a live volcano and dashed away, leaving me alone. Katie and one of her friends (Lizzie? Leslie? I didn't really pay attention to the introduction) led me over to the stereo and tried to get me into a discussion about N'Sync and the Backstreet Boys, and which was better. Katie was an N'Sync-er, while Liz-Lez couldn't decide, but mostly because she had various crushes on members of both groups. I told them I liked to listen to the Pixies, and they gaped at me. "Who?" Liz-Lez gasped. "Oh, I know them!" Katie said. "I saw a video on '120 Minutes!' I was like, 'Matt, this is that band Amy likes!' Right, Matt?" Matt had somehow crept up beside us. He nodded and took a drink of his soda. "Matt likes the Pixies, too. Right, Matt?" Katie said. Liz-Lez was looking lost. Matt just nodded and looked away. He started to leave, but Katie grabbed his sleeve and pulled him back. "Tell Amy what you were saying about the Pixies, Matt." "Uh... that I like them. I don't have like any of their CD's or anything but..." "Uh... yeah," I said, and nodded. I had no fucking idea if Katie and Matt were really that stupid or if they were making fun of me. And it was becoming painfully obvious I was incapable of communicating with most of my so-called peers on any level. I might as well have been speaking Japanese (which Emily was trying unsuccessfully to teach me, whenever she was around) to a couple of Peruvian goat herders. "I'm gonna go... mingle," I told them and slunk off feeling really creeped out. Ashleigh Bodine and her friend Denise were in the kitchen, and they gave me the cold shoulder. Kathleen Dennison-- not particularly a friend of either of them-- was friendly to me and we shot the shit for a little while, mostly about PE class and how funny and cool we both thought Ms. Washington was. Making my way back into the living room, I realized no one was talking to Sarah at all, and she was just sitting on the couch, watching the guys play video games. Which was totally unfair, because she looked so cute. Katie and sometimes even Patrick buzzed around me, and I hung out over by the snack tray, which was loaded. A giant Subway sandwich, all sliced up and laid out on little paper plates. A cake. Tostitos, Doritos, Baked Lays. Mountain Dew. "I think I'm feeling it," I said as I poured myself a fizzing cupful of soda. "Yeah, I'm definitely about to do it." "Do what?" Patrick asked. "You know... the Dew. The commercials?" "Oh. Those fuckin' Mountain Dew commercials. You think that shit's cool?" "Yeah. I mean, no. See, that was my joke that I... forget it." Katie, who was right at my elbow, suddenly blurted, "How come you never hang out with us at lunch, Amy?" Mouth full of Dew, I raised my eyebrows. Katie went off. "'Cause you're always welcome to. I think it's really cool how you skate and stuff. Heather thinks you're weird, but me and Leslie think you're really cool and stuff. I mean, you're practically the only Japanese girl in school, and you dress sort of punk, I guess." Katie and her friends knew fuck-all about the Pixies but somehow thought I was cool? And what was up with "Speed III: The Unstoppable Flapping Gums?" I picked up a loaded little paper plate and stuffed some Subway sandwich (Mmm... turkey!) in my mouth until my cheeks were huge and full like a hamster's, and asked her why she knew so much about me, when we'd never talked. I also made sure I sprayed wet crumbs everywhere, which Patrick and I thought was freaking hilarious. He started laughing his ass off, but I kept mine to just a quick crumb-blasting chuckle because I wanted to solve this mystery. Katie leaned over, glanced at her brother, then said, "Because Matt? He's got this huge crush on you." I nearly gagged on my Subway. I looked over at Matt, the ultra-good looking but kind of awkward with the girls suburban king with his sandy brown hair and his freckles and braces. Katie had the same color hair, but no freckles and no braces, having been gifted with white Chicklet teeth via the genetic lottery. Matty-matt had no idea his twin sister was spilling the beans to his dream object and probably main masturbation fantasy fodder. Patrick was furiously poking me in the back and wriggling his eyebrows, just loving the whole thing. I think my rejection of him put me into the category of "also a boy" as far as he was concerned?at least he'd kind of hinted at that being so during our treaty talks-- so this whole thing was probably gay-ly hilarious as far as he was concerned. Katie continued arguing Matt's case: "He talks about you all the time. Actually, he won't shut up about you. I was trying to get him to talk to you. I mean, he acts all big at school and stuff but I guess he's really kinda shy." "But..." I said through my sandwich. But? What was I going to protest? "Actually?and please don't tell her, I know you're like best friends and everything?the only reason we invited Sarah McAvoy was 'cuz we knew you wouldn't come without her. She's kinda... I dunno... like she doesn't have any personality or something. I mean, sorry, but it's true." I went "Blah..." and spit the big soggy gob of bread, meat, cheese and lettuce back onto the paper plate. Behind me, Patrick laughed and said, "Sick!" but I barely heard him. I was furious. Beyond furious. I was already starting to shake. No personality? Sarah had ten times the personality any of these other kids had. Fucking bad mouth the sweetest, nicest person I had ever met in my life, a girl with nothing but kindness for everyone even if she felt too shy to ever express it beyond maybe beaming good thoughts their way? Which she did constantly, having told me so because her mom taught her all about karma. "Please don't tell Sarah, okay?" Katie begged me. "Oh, and don't tell Matt I told you, either. Okay?" "What would I tell her? That you're a snobby little bitch and your brother's a fucking asshole who's too much of a pussy to speak for himself?" I shouted. A second later Mrs. Butler had me by the arm?her fingers digging into my bicep really hurt?and out the door I went. I didn't even get to say good-bye and thanks for the sandwich and soda. What I did get, however, was Mrs. Butler's long tirade about ingratitude and being invited into nice people's homes and toilet mouths and people with no class or manners, and how surprised and shocked she was because Mrs. Komori was such a nice woman. She said jackshit about hypocrisy, I noticed. Then she slammed the door, but not before I caught a glimpse of all these shocked faces staring out at me with their mouths little dark dots. There I stood, outside in the bright sunlight, in a stupid black mesh dress, and nowhere to go for at least an hour. Damn, my arm hurt too, and still had an angry red handprint on it. Curse my soft, puny, girly muscles, or lack thereof. After a few moments, Katie's mom came out and told me to come back in a call Mrs. Komori to come get me. She looked very embarrassed. "No thanks. I'll wait on the curb for Mrs. McAvoy. I don't want to filthy up your nice house," I said, but looking down at my shiny janes. "Suit yourself," Katie's mom said, then sniffed the sniff of the self- righteous. She shut the door quickly. Sweet Sarah came out and couldn't thank me enough. By then she knew the score, and thought I was the best friend ever. Then she told me in a nervous, almost tear-filled voice if I wanted to go after Matt, I could. "Why would I want to go after him? He's such a little dick." "But he's total cuteness." "You can do better than that, Sarah. God, and his sister's such a phony." I imitated Katie in this cloying, high-pitched voice, and gushed about how we were just dying to have Sarah sit at our table at lunch. When I got back home, I had to tell Mrs. Komori what a great party it'd been. I lied to her all the time. Mostly about how I felt about things. You know, I'm fine, everything's fine, the world's one giant, happy circus for me nowadays. I'd already put her through hell, so I figured the less she knew about what I did and how I felt inside, the better she'd feel. It was my Amy way of repaying her for all the cool stuff she'd done for me, all at her own expense. She really treated me like her own daughter. Emily knew I was full of shit, though. She always did. I ended up in her room, and told her the whole deal. "Wow," she said. "But that's pretty typical junior high political stuff." "Yeah, I guess. I didn't care much for it the first time I went through it. Girls are vicious." "Yeah, we suck sometimes." "I've had a crash course in that." Emily smiled. I loved her smile. Her eyes always turned into half- moons of dark, volcanic glass. Mine did too, for that matter. She sang softly, "Girl... you'll be a woman soon. Soon... you'll need a man..." I got very quiet after that, so much so that Emily apologized. I told her it was okay, that she was right. Then I told her I just didn't want to talk about it, which hurt her feelings a little bit. Neither of us talked, until I remembered the thing I was supposed to do for Sarah's mom. I told Emily about it, and then we started talking about Sarah and the whole party debacle just faded away to nothingness. Mostly, I told Emily that I'd found out about Sarah was she could sing. She knew exactly one song she could play on the piano, "Great Balls of Fire." Mrs. McAvoy had gotten her piano lessons when she was younger, and she could read music, but it had been a while. For some reason, though, she could play that one song from memory, and sing it in this really amazing voice. I told Emily about the first time it happened, which shocked the hell out of both me and Mrs. McAvoy, because ordinarily, Sarah was too self-conscious to even sing in front of her mom. The image of mousy Sarah plinking out "Great Balls of Fire" on the piano just about killed Emily and me. "She told me I brought out the best in Sarah," I told Emily through gales of silly giggles. "That Sarah's one weird little chick," Emily said when she caught her breath. For the next week, I had to deal with being the Cursing Girl. Some people thought it was cool, because Katie and her little lunch clique were the biggest gossips at school. Others really hated me for it. Whatever, it was yet another of my big splashes on the scene that year. And this one created ripples that lasted the rest of my school career. My former reputation as the Skater Whore had pretty much faded away after my infamous beat down of Bully Mike and some follow-up retractions by Patrick?still on damage control in the hopes of winning me somehow, I thought. Instead, was rapidly becoming known as the Scary Girl. No one could figure it out: She makes great grades, but she has all the other earmarks of someone who's headed for serious trouble. Chapter Five: The Great Rockin' Rachel "Hey, Amy," Sarah whispered to me at lunch one day. "Yes, Princess?" I asked, being my usual smart-assed self. I was feeling pretty full of myself because Katie had started a "Do you hate Amy Komori? Check Yes or No?" poll that morning. So far "No" was winning, but I was pulling for "Yes." Just because. "What size are you? Small?" "I guess. Yeah, lemme check my underwear." I was just kidding around, and forgot all about Sarah's question until early the next Saturday when Emily dropped me off at the strip mall so I could help Mrs. McAvoy. When I arrived, Sarah seemed unusually flighty and quiet, but her mom got all excited. Sort of spazzy, actually. She hustled me into the back room and showed me this big white cardboard box. "Well, here it is," she said. I stared at her while I waited for her to tell me what "it" was, and it took her a while to get the message. McFly? Hello, McFly? "You're going to look so adorable," Mrs. McAvoy told me, and opened the box. I blinked. I tried to say something, and couldn't. I almost left immediately. Inside the box was this velour bunny costume. This baby blue, sleeveless shortall thingy, with a white puffy tail. And a matching hood that had long ears with flexible wires in them so you could adjust them like the TV antenna style some people called, oddly enough, rabbit ears. Mrs. McAvoy pulled it out and turned it around so I could drink in all the fuzzy-wuzzy fucked-up-ness. Then she held it up against me, sort of sizing me up. "I-Is this for me?" I asked. Evidently my expression was one of pure horror because Mrs. McAvoy's smile immediately vanished. "Well, I thought..." Mrs. McAvoy said, her voice fading out. Sarah and her mom expected me to wear this horrible thing. But that was crazy. No non-mentally ill person would attempt to put Amy Komori, the cursing, completely evil, aggressive skating girl into a dippy, dorky bunny suit in a bad remake of the climax to "A Christmas Story," only at Easter. I totally lost the ability to speak just considering it. "If you don't want to," Mrs. McAvoy said. No banter, no joking. Just crushing disappointment. Ugh. I frowned, my heart at war with my brain. Id, ego, super-ego playing Three Stooges routines?wear the bunny suit, porcupine! I don't wanna! SLAP! POKE! PUNCH! I looked from Sarah to Mrs. McAvoy. I really didn't want to do this, but there was no way out. No way to decline without hurting a McAvoy. "No, it's cool," I said, none too convincingly. "No, I shouldn't rented it without consulting you, Amy Komori," Mrs. McAvoy said with forced cheerfulness. "You and Sarah can?" "No, Mrs. McAvoy, I think I should wear it." I couldn't believe my own ears. "I mean, if it'll help your store and all." "Are you sure, Amy Komori?" "Oh yeah, it'll be fun!" God, the things you do for friends. Mrs. McAvoy put the bunny suit back into the box, and she and Sarah left me alone in the back room, just staring. Staring at the costume, dreading the rest of the afternoon. This really sucks, I told myself. Sigh. I stripped out of my regular clothes and turned myself into a baby blue bunny rabbit. It took practically all my willpower to step out into the store again. It really did. And Mrs. McAvoy wasn't the psychic her only child was-- I didn't look adorable at all; I looked ridiculous. There was a mirror on the door so I took a long look. A baby blue bunny with dark eyes stared back at me, looking desperately unhappy. My black hair stuck out from inside the hood, and the whole thing was uncomfortably hot. Taking a deep breath for strength, I opened the door. When I finally emerged and made my tentative appearance as Amy Bunny, my face felt like it was under a heat lamp, and I had little nerve- needles pricking my back all over. Even Sarah turned a couple of shades of red. "You're turning violet, Violet," I said, but Sarah's responding smile looked kind of sickly, and even I didn't feel much like laughing. Mrs. McAvoy kept giggling, all self-conscious. Still, I figured hardly anyone would see me like this, live remote by Rock 101FM notwithstanding. "Okay, Devil Child," Mrs. McAvoy said, handing me this big wicker Easter basket full of foil-covered chocolate eggs in green plastic grass. "Just stand out front and hand these out. Simple enough, huh?" "Yeah," I said. I took the basket, looked over my shoulder at Sarah who looked absolutely dumbstruck now. Her big green eyes were white and her lips looked kind of slack. I grimaced at her and waggled my ass so she could see my puffy tail, giving her a show so she wouldn't feel too bad for me. Then I hopped to the door shouting, "Boingy! Boingy! Boingy!" in this high-pitched voice that was supposed to be my Dot Warner impression; I had no idea where that shit came from sometimes. Poor Sarah followed me out while Mrs. McAvoy applauded. Simple, huh? Never underestimate the attraction a shiny-cheeked, skinny Asian chick dressed like a bunny rabbit has for old women and sticky-faced children. And live remote deejays. "You don't have to act like that, Amy," Sarah whispered. "I'm helping your mom, Sarah," I said. "Don't worry about it." "God, I'm so so sorry..." "Stop. Lemme just do this, okay?" Here came the crowd. Well, the few people who were there. "Hey, I just want to say it's a great afternoon down here at the Colonial Promenade on this sunny Saturday, where you'll find not only amazing bargains and great people, but you'll also find little Miss Patricia Cottontail," the deejay, Rockin' Rachel said, schmoozing her listeners over the microphone. She was this bleached-blonde chick wearing a Rock 101FM T-shirt. Funny, I'd heard Rockin' Rachel's voice plenty of times, and I always pictured someone older. I mean, her voice had this smoky, raspy quality, which I guess was sexy in a way and sounded all worldly, like she'd been everywhere and had seen it all and now wanted to play corporately programmed hits radio play lists to get over it. But she was probably only in her mid-20s. For the remote, she and her engineer operated mostly out of this tent, with a garishly painted van parked next to it. It had "Rock 101FM" painted on the side in these 3D looking letters bursting from some clouds with stars. Sort of cheesy and 70s-ish. But she had a set up that let her roam the promenade at will, and her will directed her towards me with an uncanny precision. "It is Patricia, right? Not Peter?" she asked me, just the inane sort of prattle deejays practiced that passed for wit. "It... it's Amy," I told her. I sounded drunk. But then, despite my bravado with Sarah, I was still a little stunned by my predicament. Mrs. McAvoy beamed all her hopes at me from inside McAvoy's Joys, so I reluctantly tried to play along. We'd still had no paying customers. In fact, the turnout wasn't appreciably more than on a typical Saturday, despite a balloon release and "all the latest hits, played by the greatest station, Rock 101FM!" "And what do little bunny rabbits do during the off season, after Easter? Party with Santa's elves?" "Uh..." I looked through the store window at Mrs. McAvoy for encouragement. She gave me this "please" look. As in, please try, Amy. "Yeah, that's what we do... all right. We party with... you know. What you said." "Elves?" "Yeah." Please leave me now. This whole thing demeans us both. And now we're crapping on two holidays at the same time. Efficient, but humiliating. Finally, Rockin' Rachel got around to interviewing Mrs. McAvoy. She had me wave her out of the store and she came out her face pinking up becomingly like her daughter's. A few people had gathered around, and these kids kept snatching at my ears, and pulling my cottontail thingy. It was worse than having a huge cloud of mosquitoes or gnats in your face, just worrying. I tried to put up with them, but they were really working my nerves. "Would you just look at her skinny little legs," this purple-haired old woman said, right in front of me, as if I couldn't hear, or I was some sort of mannequin or something. "She's so cute. I just want to squeeze her to death! I think she's the cutest thing I have ever seen. Aren't you the cutest little thing?" "Are you asking me if I think I'm cute?" I asked her with this real sarcastic attitude before I could stop myself. She didn't reply, but her smile faded. I put on a little angel face and offered her some chocolate eggs. She took one for herself, then three more she said were for her granddaughter, who was getting a manicure down at the tacky fancy nails salon, which was about the only place doing any business. The gold jewelry store run by the Pakistani brothers sure wasn't. And all through her little radio interview, Mrs. McAvoy's place had exactly two browsers, and I was pretty sure one of them stole some erasers. "I'm sorry, Amy," Sarah whimpered. "I didn't know until last night she was gonna do this." "If anybody from school finds out about this..." I didn't finish. What was I going to do, threaten Sarah? It wasn't her fault. I couldn't even really blame her mom, either. Ever since Sarah's dad split, they'd really depended on the candy store for their income. Plus, Sarah'd slipped up once and told me how they had to borrow money from her grandparents. "God, Amy," Sarah said. "If you never speak to me again, I'll... I'll totally understand." "Forget it, Sarah. We're cool. Anyways, what would I do without my best friend? You're like the best audience I ever had." Still, I ate lunch in the storeroom (Papa John's pizza and sodas, courtesy Mrs. McAvoy), kind of hiding out from anyone who might see me. The whole time we three acted like I wasn't dressed in a ridiculous outfit, but at least I got to take off my ears. Sarah volunteered to do the after lunch shift, but of course there was no way she could fit into the suit. Damn, I hated being so short. In my old life, I'd have towered over both Sarah and her mom. I took a deep breath, and went back outside. All I had was another hour or so, but by now, the shoppers were out in force. Not that they were buying much, but they were taking free samples and fawning over Rockin' Rachel. Parents kept asking me if I'd let their kids sit on my lap and make Easter wishes. "I don't think I'm supposed to," I told some of them. "I'm Jewish." That got a couple of looks, and was good for a private laugh. Rockin' Rachel decided to come back to talk to me again (she told me I was adorable, too, and I wanted to kick her), and it was definitely the wrong time. I felt hot, tired, and my good humor and sense of helpfulness were running short. Plus, this really round little fat kid (he looked like Cartman from "South Park," but in a Popsicle-stained tee that read "Bull Shirt") was driving me out of my mind by pulling my tail. I kept swatting him away. "This is Rockin' Rachel, back with little Amy Bunny in front of McAvoy's Joys, the greatest candy story here at the great 103FM live remote at Colonial Promenade. Come by for great bargains and lots of great fun, great door prizes and other great giveaways," she said. Yeah, she had an awesome voice, one that might have melted my creamy center if I'd been old enough, but I wondered if she could possibly say "great" a few more times. "Stop pulling my tail," I told the Cart-Kid. "So, Amy Bunny, what's the best part of being an Easter Bunny? Great perks, or great pay?" Rockin' Rachel asked. "GODAMMIT! WILL YOU STOP PULLING MY TAIL YOU FUCKING LITTLE ASSHOLE!" I shouted with the microphone right in my face. The next few moments were kind of messy. Cart-Kid let out an alarming wail and just would not stop, like a French ambulance, Rockin' Rachel didn't find me so amusing anymore, and neither did Cart-Kid's parents. Or any of the other people standing around, so to avoid a general riot, Mrs. McAvoy hustled me back inside her store. She looked pale, like she'd just seen a cat run over by a lawnmower or something, and she didn't seem to care that I'd dropped the candy basket on the sidewalk. The upshot was, Rockin' Rachel of Rock 101FM didn't do anymore live remotes for a year. In fact, the FCC almost suspended Rock101FM's license, according the newspapers. I wasn't the direct cause of McAvoy's Joys going under shortly thereafter, but I guess I contributed in some small way. Sarah wasn't allowed to talk to me for weeks, but by the time the store closed and her mom got a new job (which actually turned into a step up and a steadier income... after a few hard months), we were back hanging around again. Sarah told me she'd been miserable and extra-withdrawn until her mom gave in. "A-and, anyways, Mom really does like you, Amy," Sarah explained. We were sitting together at lunch for the first time since the radio remote. "Plus, she kinda blames herself for the whole thing." "That's cool. I mean, not that she blames herself. It's cool that she likes me," I told her. Then, I felt like I should say something nice about her mom, because I really felt protective of them both, in a weird way. "The bunny suit was such a stupid idea, but I think you're mom's really cool, too. Do I say cool too much?" Katie and her friends?now with 100% more Ashleigh Bodine-- walked by with their lunch trays. In an extremely snotty voice, even for her, Ashleigh Bodine said, "Hey, look... it's Amy Bunny!" They giggled like the little bitchy morons they were. So I shot Ashleigh Bodine and Katie a couple of birds, double fisted and right there in the open. Big mistake. Mr. Tanner, the assistant principal just happened to be looking my way. "Ms. Komori," he called. "Care to join me in my office for a moment?"