Returning home.

Returning home, after a rather awkward car journey with no one saying very much, you helped your dad with the bags from the car and let your mother go on in (being extremely anxious to see your brother and sister again). As your dad thanked you for the hand and closed the car door, mumbling something about how not having the van anymore was "gonna be a real pain in the ass", you took this small opportunity to check to see if he was alright.

"Me? Yeah sure, I'm fine," he told you, batting away the question, clearly not in the mood to talk about what was troubling him, not with you anyway. Though you and your father had a fairly good relationship, you'd never really been 'close' close; your dad not really being the sit down and talk about his feelings kind of type (though truthfully, neither were you). No, he was more of the strong silent type who just did what had to be done and tried not to complain too much. This was clearly what he was doing now you figured, having a hard time sorting out all this stuff with your mom and her new body, and the last thing he probably wanted was to appear emotional (and therefore weak) in front of his own teenage son.

So deciding to leave it for now, reminding yourself that your parents had been together for 20 years, and had always had a pretty rock solid marriage, you turned your attention to other things as you then headed into the house, namely getting a great big hug from your little sister, Tabitha and a half sort of 'welcome home' grin and a punch on the arm from your brother, both of them clearly happy to see you, as you were to see them.

Once you were all back in the house, you caught up with your siblings, hearing about all the things you'd missed while you were in the hospital, while your dad went and busied himself in his study, saying that he had important hospital bills and insurance forms that needed taken care of. Your mom meanwhile floated around in sort of a strange daze for a while, clearly feeling odd to be in familiar surroundings in an unfamiliar body (which was admittedly as equally strange for you - seeing Amber Knights walking around your front room). Though your brother and sister had obviously had more contact with your mom than you had since the accident, you could tell that they were slightly perturbed by the situation as well, glancing at her peculiarly from time to time as if for a moment forgetting who she was, and reacting slightly nervously when she spoke. Eventually this seemed to get the better of her, there being a strange, awkward sort of tension in the air that you couldn't explain now that you were out of the hospital and 'family life' had once again resumed, and excusing herself, she then headed upstairs to unpack her things.

"This is kinda weird, huh?" David eventually piped up after she'd left, bringing up the elephant in the room and saying what you'd all clearly been thinking.

"Yeah. It's gonna take a lot of getting used to that's for sure," you replied (that being the understatement of the year), before asking, "How do you guys feel about all this...y'know pretending mom died and her being in that body and stuff?", having not yet had a chance to discuss it with them.

"It sucks!" your brother immediately informed you, not mincing his words, "I mean we're gonna have to keep it up for the rest of our lives. You know how hard that's gonna be, lying to everyone?"

"It's for the best though, that's what mom said. So we don't have film crews following us around all the time," Tabitha told him, having clearly been given the same speech that you had.

David didn't really have much of a comeback to this, and instead just shrugged in his usual angsty-teen way. "I know. Can you imagine having to explain to people that she's your mom? We'd be a total laughing stock. She looks ridiculous!"

Ridiculous wasn't quite the term you would use, but this was your weird emo little brother talking; his idea of an attractive figure being all pale and boney with bits of metal sticking out of every pore, having never seemed to have appreciated the tanned, fake tittied bimbo look that you did (not that you and him ever really shared porn stories or anything, it just being obvious from the posters on his bedroom wall, as well as the girl he had just recently started dating).

"She doesn't look ridiculous. She just looks, sort of...different that's all," you replied, finding no better way to say this, without revealing your own conflicting feelings about your mother's new body.

"Different? Yeah right! That's an understatement," he snorted disparagingly, before going on to ask, almost whispering as he leaned forward in his chair, "You know what she is...I mean what she was; that Stephanie woman, don't you? Mom never said anything but it's pretty damn obvious."

Well aware what he was driving at, obviously having worked out what Stephanie Burke had done for a living (not that it was all that hard to guess), you gave him a swift kick with your foot, telling him, "David, seriously, shut up!", and indicating towards your younger sister who you didn't really want hearing about this.

"What? It's not like I can't guess," Tabitha replied, "I'm not a little kid you know. I know what a porn star is."

"Jesus!" you said, feeling more than a little shocked and embarrassed to hear your 14 year old sister so casual blurt it out; nobody having actually used that phrase since the transplant had happened, and having certainly not expected it to come from her (still thinking of your little sister as being all innocent an naive), "Will you guys not...I mean, she's not..." Pausing and letting out a sigh, realizing that you were becoming unnecessarily flustered, and seeing as you were the eldest here, you were the one who was supposed to be setting the example to your siblings. "Look, okay, her new body might be a little ridiculous, and it might have done some...y'know, porn stuff in the past," you told them, a little more calm and collected now, wanting to very much drive this point home, "But it's mom's now and she's got to live with it. So you guys are just gonna have to shut up with that crap. Don't go spouting anything like that in front of her, okay?"

"We wouldn't," Tabitha said, the sentiment echoed immediately after by your brother. "Yeah of course we wouldn't. We're not idiots!"

"Good, cause as weird as all this is for us, it's got to be at least a hundred times worse for her. So the sooner we all get used to it and stop acting so awkward and uncomfortable around her, the easier it'll be for everyone."

And with that, after having given your siblings one of your extremely rare older brother talks (having not done so since your grandfather's funeral three years ago), you decided to head upstairs as well to your room, needing a bit of time on your own to let this whole thing sink in, hoping that you would be able to practice what you preached, what with having felt slightly hypocritical at times back there; having had some of the very same thoughts David and Tabitha had yourself.

As you climbed the stairs and made you way across the hall towards your room however, you noticed your parents door ajar and couldn't help but peer in, catching a glimpse of your mother standing in front of her large vanity mirror, sighing deeply to herself as she stared at her new reflection.