BlackFoxGun here! This is the second chapter, and I am realizing that the paragraphs and spacing are so screwed up! I also haven't known how to work with dialogue for the past years, so I will fix everything once I go back through it all, but for now please bear with me!

XXX

First I went to my late fathers room, went into the closet and found the box of clothes that he bought for me in secret, pretending that I was a boy, every year he did this, he got a new set of clothes for me, buying them as if I were a son, but he hid them, always keeping it from me and my mom.

But I had found them during this one time that he had asked me to get a shirt of his from his closet, and checked on them every year.

He had gotten this years clothes already, and he somehow got the sizes from mom. I took them out and brought them with me to the bathroom, changing into them slowly, reminding myself that there was no turning back from this.

The final step was my hair, I got my mothers hair cutting scissors and held up a lock of my hair, then closed my eyes as I cut it. Then I opened my eyes and quickly cut all the rest of my silky hair that I worked so hard to take care of, all of it falling gently on the rug I stood on, like snowflakes.

No, more like the blood that sprayed out of my parents bodies as they fell.

Finally, all my hair was short, and scruffy. I really did look like a boy now, lucky for me, my breasts hadn't started growing yet, so I didn't have to worry about that yet. I cleaned up after myself and padded to the kitchen, where the phone seemed to be waiting for me.

I picked it up and called the only person I could turn to now. I pressed the numbers, and waited. The phone rang three times before it was picked up. "Hello?"

I took a breath, " Hi grandma, its Rin, I need help." I let the breath out. " What is it sweetie?" I shut my eyes. "Mom and dad are dead," I heard her sharply intake.

"A man killed them, he shot them with a gun when we pulled in the driveway, when mom and dad got out to move some tires that blocked the garage door.

Then he took their money and valuables and ran, I was still in the car when it happened." "Rin, I am coming to get you right now, do not go out of the house, and do not call the police, wait until I get there. Do not turn the lights on. Wait for me."

My grandmother Kaede said in a very firm voice. "Ok, grandma." I said in a small voice. Then she hung up. I put the phone back on its charger and walked to the living room, where I waited for the next thirty minutes in the chair dad always used to sit in, counting the minutes as they passed on the digital clock next to the T.V.. 8:34, 8:39, 8:45, 8:51, 8:58, 9:00…

Then I heard a knocking on the door. I jumped up and ran to answer it, showing it to be my grandma, who engulfed me in a big hug. "Get a jacket," she said. "We're going now." I put on the one that was already tied around my waist and followed her to her Humvee, where she directed me to the front seat and told me to lay low for a bit until we got out of the city.

Then she pressed on the gas pedal and started out towards her house.

She didn't ask any questions of me, just drove as fast as she was allowed to in order to get to her house.

Finally we were out of the city and she told me to sit up, I pushed myself up so I was sitting properly on the seat, pausing for a second when I was done so that the rushing of blood to my head would stop sooner, and so that it would stop making my vision fuzzy.

I saw that were were on a gravel road, with trees all around us, and the moon was coming up, I could see it through the tree canopy and the separating clouds, it was a half moon tonight.

Everything up here always seemed peaceful, grandma lived up on a mountain, which we were in the middle of going up right now. After a few minutes of viewing trees, my grandmother's home came into sight.

She lives at an ancient shrine and also keeps a dojo that does archery, martial arts, and sword fighting, and she is the sensei. Her husband, and my grandfather passed away a few years ago, and he left everything of his to her, that including the military vehicle we were currently riding in.

We pulled up in front of the shrine and parked, then my grandma ushering me out of my seat and up the old cement steps, getting out her keys for the door and taking a few seconds to unlock it before letting me in the well taken care of old japanese style house.

Kaede locked the door behind us, took off her shoes as I did the same and showed me up to her room, also old japanese style. She pulled up and sat me down in a wicker chair, doing the same for herself as well. "Now Rin, tell me why are you dressed like that and why your hair is cut."

"Well," I said, sitting up straight and putting on a very serious face. "Father has always wanted me to be a son, he says that I should have been born a son just because of some of my masculine attributes.

And so, I myself decided that I would become a boy so that I can fulfill his wishes, and make him smile up wherever he is, at something I did, and so I can have something else to work on other than mourning, and to help me cope with the situation as well."

My grandmas currently stern face softened and she stood up, coming over to me and enveloping me in a big hug that was gentle and full of understanding. "I know how you feel, and so as of this moment, you are my grandson.

You will live with me and become a student at my dojo, and I will hire a tutor to homeschool you. Your name is now Ren." She let go of me and led me to my new room by one hand, our sock covered feet padding softly on the bamboo mats.

We just went up the hallway and took a left, then going all the way down this hallway and sliding open the door on the right. "This is your room now Ren, I will be off to bed now, I suggest that you do the same." I nodded and replied, "Good Night grandma."

She smiled, "Good Night Ren."

She slid the door shut and walked back to her room. I first noticed the small lantern that still glowed softly, providing enough light for me to see the whole room, hanging from a long slim hook on the wall.

The floor here was also covered with a large bamboo mat. In the corner, a light green futon was rolled up, with a white pillow on top, and on the other side of the room, there was a slide open closet.

I walked over to it and slowly slid it open, revealing multiple yukatas and a couple of mens kimonos on hangers, all of them being my size I found out, after trying several of each on and looking at myself in the mirror that was to the side, on the wall.

This must have been my fathers room when he was my age I realized, putting all the clothes back except for a dark blue yukata, which I kept on.

I put my own clothing on top of a shelf inside the walk-in closet, and came out, shutting the door behind me. I went over and rolled out the futon, putting the pillow at the top, then blew out the candle in the slightly swaying lantern, and tucked myself into bed, falling asleep as soon as my head touched the pillow.

I woke to the sound of birds chirping and the warmth of the suns rays streaming through the window to land on my bed, and sat up.

I ran a hand through my hair lazily, stopping suddenly when I realized that it was all short, about three inches long all over.

"Oh." I murmured, remembering the events of last night. I was at grandmas house, and I was now a boy, my name was Ren.

I pulled myself from the warm cavern of blanket that I had somehow managed to create in my sleep on top of the futon, and rolled onto the also warm floor. I stretched my legs out slowly, going into a left split, all the way to floor, then turning right into a middle one, then rotating again into a right one, all of them.

I put my right arm behind my head and pulled on it with the other, then doing the same with the left as I scooted my left leg by my right and stood up, swinging my arms at my sides in a carefree manner, then stopping and bending over quickly to touch my hands to the floor for ten seconds and swinging my head up gracefully.

I readjusted my yukata that I still had on from last night and picked up my still warm blanket off the futon and spread it back over it evenly, then taking the pillow and putting it to the side so I could roll up the bed, then placing the pillow at its rightful place at the top of the roll.

I stood up from my kneeling position and sighed, "Well what will happen next?"

I quietly questioned myself, then walking the couple of feet to the door, which I slid open and shut as I passed through, walking down the necessary halls to reach my destination in my socks, and finally walking onto the tiled floor of the kitchen.

Grandmother was already at the table, making rice balls, the ones that I always loved as a child. She looked up with a wrinkly smile and said, "Do you want to help me make breakfast?

As part of your training you are going to have to do this every morning from now on, and you better learn to wake up early too." I pulled up a chair and sat at the bamboo table, scooping up a handful of rice and molding it into a roundish triangle around the filling, some of the sticky grains staying on my slim fingers when I put the rice ball on the plate.

"Today I will walk you through your training schedule, the one that you will be doing from now on in the morning before or during breakfast, you will start with the lighter practice until you get comfortable with it, then I will move you up to the next level of morning preparation, the one that will then be your permanent routine in the mornings."

She continued, still rolling the balls of rice around a mixture of salmon and some seasonings. I placed the last ball on the last spot of the plate, taking the dishes to the sink as Kaede drizzled a mustard/paprika sauce over the tops of the rice peaks in slow, gentle, releasing of color over the snow white grains, dripping down the sides till it pooled at the bottom, where the plate stopped its venture.

She handed the rest of the dirty dishes to me to wash in the sink by hand, then walking out to the kitchen balcony with the breakfast in her hands and sitting on the railing, where I joined her when I was done with the dishes. She had already started munching on one of the little creations we just made, not caring that her hands still had seasonings and sauce on them.

I sat beside her on the wide patio railing, swinging my legs from side to side as I ate the rice off the top first, then delving into the tasty center with my tongue and eating that with a couple bite of rice for each little bit of salmon.

I started to reach for a second one from the plate in grandmas lap, but then she abruptly stood up on the railing, took off her socks and jumped off into the tree right below us, holding the plate of food above her head. "First," she yelled,

"you have to jump into this tree right here and climb down after you take you socks off!" I slowly stood up on the slightly wobbling board that posed as the top of the railing and watched as she disappeared from sight between the oak leaves, I hesitated for a split second after taking off my socks, then jumped, not knowing what would happen, but I should be fine, right?

Surprisingly enough, I landed on a very wide and flat branch, unharmed. I looked down and saw grandma waving at me from about fifteen feet below, on the ground, I looked at the branches around me and jumped onto the closest one, then leaping and free falling for a second before I grabbed onto a smooth branch about five feet off the ground and swing around it once, then letting go of it and landing on the ground, ninja style.

"Good, but that was only the first step in your morning training, now you just need to follow me and do what I do, if you don't hurry, then I will eat all of the onigiri and you wont get any and will have to wait till lunch to get something to eat, alright?"

I nodded vigorously and followed her as she ran into the forest, the two of us darting between trees and the shafts of light streaming from the tree tops, then coming upon a river and hopping from rock to rock upstream, then going to the bank and walking across the river on a big slippery log, then going back over it and using a hanging vine to swing back across.

Grandma was fast, and had apparently done this course before, taking every step with absolute certainty, while I was trying to keep up and not fall.

When we finished, the plate of onigiri was not empty, and so I got to eat a couple more, while sitting in the top of a tree.

It felt good, swinging my feet up in a tree over fifty feet off the ground and letting the wind flow between my toes and caressing the bottoms of my feet, both of which had grass stains, damp dirt, and a little mud on them.

I had stepped on a few rocks, they weren't pokey or sharp, but I was running, so I ended up landing on them pretty hard, so my feet got a little sore from that.

When we had finished the onigiri, Kaede showed me how to swing on a vine, without falling or whamming into something, and so we used that mode of transportation to get back to the house, right swing, left swing, grab a vine, grab a vine, land on the kitchen patio.

I loved it! I wanted to do it again and again until my arms got sore and my fingers cramped up, but I had other things to learn.

I followed grandma through the house to the dojo, where for the rest of the day she taught me the basics of archery, martial arts, and sword fighting.

By the time the sun had gone down and the moon came up, I was dead tired, I got to meet all of her students, and they welcomed and treated me like an equal, and I enjoyed working with them. In a way, I was glad that I had decided to become a boy.

XXX

Well, I hope that you enjoy this, and please don't mind the crazy stuff with the paragraphs, I promise I will get it fixed!

Until next time,

BlackFoxGun