Once Dave was finally heading down the New Jersey Turnpike, through the ugliness of the industrial sprawl, he decided he'd better get his thoughts in order a little before seeing Eve.

The Shae question was again back on top of his list, which probably proved something in itself, he thought. In spite of everything it still seemed she might be pushing him a little hard. There were times it seemed like she was even obsessive about it. It was clear in his mind if he'd wanted, he could have been having sex with her this weekend, or even when she was in Bradford a couple weekends ago. He wasn't quite ready in his own mind just yet, but it was clear it wouldn't be far off if they kept up at this rate, too. And maybe he was being unfair to Shae in even suspecting it.

He'd been leery -- and rightfully so -- when she came onto him as hard as she did at his mother's house in Bradford back in September. In fact, cooling it off had been one of the things that had tipped the balance in his own mind toward the decision to return to Bradford at all. Her motives had been just a little different back then, to keep him in the city, so maybe it was premature. If it hadn't been for that episode, he probably wouldn't have worried much about it as close as they were getting now. It was definitely something to talk to Eve about -- but how much Eve would be willing to talk about Shae was open to question. Even though neither he nor Shae had a formal doctor-patient relationship with Eve, there was no telling how much it would enter into the equation. Maybe it was a moot point and he just needed to let nature take its course.

Despite the huge downer Friday, especially Friday night, Dave felt like he was getting his emotions about Julie back under control. The downer Friday came from ugly realities striking home, and he'd pretty much dealt with them. Though he knew there would be bad days to come, the worst seemed over with. But, there were a couple points that refused to go away.

The first was Shae again. No matter what the reality of the subject, he felt guilty about getting so close with Shae so soon after Julie's death. Once upon a time, it had been customary for a mourning period to last a year before getting serious about someone else, or marrying them, and if it was still custom, he'd broken it badly. It was still barely two months, after all; while he wasn't actually committed to Shae nor been intimate with her, neither seemed far away. She'd become something more than a friend and for practical intents a lover very quickly, and Dave just couldn't get shed of the feeling it was, as he'd told Shae, just too soon. Even Eve had cautioned about being in too much of a hurry to put something together after Julie's death.

The second point that refused to go away was the money. He'd known for years that Julie had her own brokerage accounts and played with them on the side, but about all he'd ever heard from her was "they were doing pretty well" with no specific numbers mentioned. Realistically, it was fine with him -- while he liked to have his bills paid and tried not to generate too many of them, he really wasn't a money person, not on that level. Finances on Julie's level were about as pidgin to him as editing fantasy had been to Julie. They could listen courteously to the other talk about their problems without understanding much.

The size of Julie's brokerage account back in September had been a shocker. He'd known his wife had made some money, but he had no idea it had been so much. The revelations from this trip, though, put that shock to shame. Without working too hard, he and Aaron and the brokerage had come up with twice again what he'd found out about in September, and all the nooks and crannies hadn't yet been investigated. It seemed likely the Internal Revenue Service was going to be getting a hell of a check from him next spring. In the past Dave had wondered about why Julie had insisted on filing separate returns, rather than a joint one. Now, he understood why.

But somehow, the money didn't seem real -- it was just numbers that were supposed to apply to him but he couldn't comprehend. It was Julie's money, and that was that. Maybe it was part of the denial he'd been feeling about Julie, and accounted for his mental refusal to step up to that reality. Even with Tietelbaum's help, he still only had a general idea of what was there, and no idea whatever of what the potential opportunities the money would have might be.

Dave had little trouble finding John and Eve's house. The gray brick ranch proved to be in a neat, upper middle class subdivision on the north side of Philadelphia.

Dave had only met John once previously, when the group moved him out of the apartment several weeks before, and so much had been happening then he hadn't gotten to know him very well. Over the last couple months Dave had still occasionally wondered just what kind of a guy would marry a transsexual, but John seemed totally normal as far as Dave could tell. He was short, not much taller than Eve, with dark hair. He was quite intelligent, a graduate engineer, and from what Dave saw, a bit of a nerd, a touch on the shy and quiet side, but genial and friendly. Dave had only heard the outline of the story of how he and Eve had gotten together and understood there was a fair amount of caring and pain involved.

Sergei and Milla were both right in the middle of their terrible twos. They were good-looking kids, but they were into everything. Both Eve and John had to spend some time keeping the little blonde tempests under something resembling control but seemed to enjoy themselves immensely doing it.

While Dave had things to discuss with Eve, there was time to be polite and do some catching up -- not that there was any real news, since most had been passed along from Shae, who had visited John and Eve the previous weekend. "We hear from Shae that you're getting yourself settled into Bradford pretty well," John commented.

"Yeah, I think I am," Dave admitted. "Of course, it helps to have friends and family there. I don't know what I would have done if I hadn't had Emily to get me settled in, though. The more I learn about her, the more amazed I am."

"She's quite a woman; there's no doubt about that," Eve replied. "We don't see her often enough. She and Kevin and Jason and Vicky were here the summer before last, and then we went to Bradford for Jason and Vicky's wedding a year ago September. So, even under the circumstances, it was nice to see her last September."

"I know she thinks very highly of you," Dave observed.

"I'm glad she does. Dave, you have no idea of the fear I had for years about what would happen if any of my classmates found out about me. Then, when it happened, it's all been very much a pleasant surprise. Now, I'm looking forward to seeing some of the gang again."

"Oh?" Dave asked. "You're planning on coming to Bradford?"

"It's a possibility," Eve admitted. "You get the chance to beat Emily to the punch on this. We only got it worked out this afternoon, but we're making plans to visit Chad and Cheryl around the holiday season, and there should be time to make a stop in Bradford."

"Let's see, Cheryl, she's your sister, John? And her husband?"

"Right," John said. "They're out in the Chicago area now. She's teaching math at Northwestern and he's doing it in a community college."

"Yes," Eve added, rather sharply. "I'll grant it was a good move for them, but I'm still rather upset about how it came about."

"How's that?" Dave asked, wondering if he was opening a can of worms he shouldn't.

Eve took a deep breath, perhaps to bring herself under control, and started to reply. "They were both working for the National Security Agency. There were some budget cutbacks and some layoffs. Cheryl's status as a 'T' made her security status questionable, and it was used as an excuse to force her out. It was blatant discrimination, and they have a lawsuit going."

Seeing that Eve was warming up for a rant, John broke in: "It didn't come down all at once, and they were both looking already, so it made things easy for them to jump when the opportunity came, and for more money. Besides, it's in the Chicago area, and they both like it there."

"Yes," Eve added, visibly calmer. "But now we only see them rarely, and we are quite close. That's why we're going to visit them there at Christmas. We're going to take the van, but I'm not so sure how I'm going to like going that far with a pair of two year olds."

"Speaking from experience, that's one of those things you have to put up with when you decide to become parents," Dave grinned. "The good news and the bad news is they don't stay two forever. Anyway, should I tell Emily? If you're going to be near Bradford she might like to organize some kind of get together."

"I'd better call her and tell her myself," Eve smiled. "I've needed an excuse to talk to her anyway."

After talking for a while, Eve commented they might as well get down to business, and suggested she and Dave go out on the enclosed back porch for their discussion. "Or," she added, "We could go out and get in the hot tub. It's harder for me to take notes but considerably more relaxing."

Even the thought of it sounded interesting to Dave. While a hot tub was not anything he and Julie had ever had, he'd always enjoyed them on the rare opportunities he'd been in them. "Sounds good to me, you're the doctor," he smiled.

"I should warn you," she grinned. "The house rules are no swimsuits in the hot tub."

"Shouldn't be a problem," Dave laughed. "Shae has been getting me used to it. She wants to take me to a nude beach sometime."

"Now why doesn't that surprise me?" Eve shook her head with a smile. "After all, she was the one who first took me to a nude beach. And she's mostly responsible for the house rule, anyway."

There were some awkward moments out in the back yard, but they were brief, mostly because there was a cold wind blowing and the sky was spitting occasional flakes of snow. Eve had come out of her and John's room wearing a shortie robe; John had offered a robe to Dave, but it was much too small, so Dave just wrapped a towel around himself and called it good enough. Of course, both the towel and the robe came off before they got in the hot tub, and Dave couldn't help but sneak a glance at Eve.

She figured him out easily. "It's all right, Dave," she laughed, taking her time at getting into the warm water. "You aren't the first person to be curious. There's no visible difference between me and a genetic woman. Back when I was trying out the new equipment, I went to bed with several guys who never knew the difference. Besides, you've seen me nude before, back in the boys' locker room at Bradford after phys. ed. class."

"Yeah, maybe," Dave shook his head. "But it was Denis I was seeing nude, not a beautiful babe. I don't know how to say this, but somehow, I can't manage to put the two of you together in my head. Denis must have been someone else."

"Thank you, Dave," she smiled. "That's very flattering of you to say. What's more, it gives me an opening for an observation maybe helpful to us: sometimes you have to be ready to accept what your eyes tell you is the truth, rather than what your knowledge and experience says is the truth, even if there's some question as to what the truth really is."

"Now, there's a murky statement," Dave smiled.

"Not really," Eve smiled as she sank neck deep in the water, covering up her nicely shaped breasts -- all natural, Dave had been told. "Truth is largely a matter of perception, after all, and I suspect we shall return to the subject. Now, I should probably tell you that Shae ratted you out. She called me while you were on your way here and gave me quite a detailed account of the problems you had this weekend and her perception of them. Now, I'd like to hear your side of the story."

Over the course of the next hour or so, Dave went back over the story of the weekend, especially Friday and Saturday, but also the analysis of it he had made on the drive down from the city. Several times he made a statement that seemed to catch Eve's attention, and they spent some time probing each of those statements and the things that lay behind them. As time went on, one or the other of them would get uncomfortably warm, and would climb up to sit on the edge of the hot tub to let the biting wind and the blowing snow cool them.

Finally, Dave felt wrung out and didn't feel as if he had much to add to what he already had said. "So, what do you think?" he asked.

"Dave," she smiled. "It's not a question of what I think; it's one of what you think. This is one of those times where I feel the lack of my note pad, but I guess that's what I get for suggesting we do this in the hot tub. However, I think it has been illuminating in other ways. Now, if I were to say you have concerns about missing Julie too much and still not missing her enough at the same time, would I be correct?"

"Yeah," he said thoughtfully after a couple moments reflection on the circular question. "That's probably a fair statement. It doesn't make sense, but it's about right."

"This is psychology, which is to say human nature, Dave," Eve smiled broadly. "That means it doesn't have to make sense. Now, can I ask, has your perception of missing Julie changed in the last few days?"

"I think so," he nodded. "It's like what I told you about having a belief deep down inside that this is all a dream or a bad joke or something, and I'll wake up and she'll be there. I'm beginning to realize this is the real thing. I mean, I knew it was real right from the beginning, but somehow I didn't want to believe it."

"Denial."

"Yeah," he nodded. "I haven't wanted to face up to the facts."

"Denial is sometimes useful," she smiled. "Selective denial can be a great aid in working things out, but it can be a great obstacle, too. Dave, I'm sure you're aware of what I'm doing to help you and Shae isn't really my field, and I'm just doing this as a friend, or else you'd be getting a big bill from Matthews, Barkley and Associates. Much of what I do is to counsel people with gender dysphoria, like I suffered from. Most of the rest of it is dealing with the families of and/or the people who have various, well, 'kinks' is the common term, and in some respects it's better than the professional one. In most cases, all of this involves adapting to reality and/or dealing with denial. I'm of the opinion that a psychologist can rarely fix a kink, so to speak, but instead have to help people learn to make an accommodation to it. That, by the way, is a view not necessarily appreciated by my colleagues. Your situation is considerably different, of course, but much the same in that you have to somehow make accommodation to the reality that's presented to you. Is that a fair statement?"

"A very fair statement," he replied. "Actually, I think I made a big step in that direction this weekend. An unpleasant step, but a big one."

"Accepting reality may not be pleasant, and sometimes it hurts," she replied. "But I think you're making progress, too. In fact, when you consider the amount of trauma and the fact that it's been just two months today, I think you've made a lot of progress. I'll admit I had my doubts about you taking the problem back to Bradford, but it seems to have been the therapy you needed."

"Shae has been a big help," he observed.

"Indeed she has," Eve smiled. "In fact, I think she's been a bigger help because of her distance than she would have been had she been able to persuade you to stay with her in Staten Island."

"I think I agree with you," he said thoughtfully. "Moving to Bradford has helped a lot in pulling the boys and me together as a family. I know I felt at the time we needed the definition of our family, and I don't think we'd have gotten it living with Shae. They would have accepted Shae as a mother substitute too readily, and there was a danger of them coming to resent it."

"Very perceptive," Eve smiled. "Tell me, and I know this is a hell of a question to ask under the circumstances, but have you compared Julie's track record as a mother in contrast to what Shae seems to be heading for?"

"Yes, I have," Dave replied, realizing it was just a bit of a lie. He really hadn't thought about the question in quite that way, but he'd been doing the comparison right along without facing a conclusion. "In many respects, Shae is doing a better job now than Julie was. Not that Julie didn't do well in her own way, but, well, Julie had a career that was important to her, and the boys were just another part of her life and at times not the most important one." He took a deep breath and contemplated his statement. It wasn't very nice to Julie, but damn it, it was the truth. From early on, he'd felt he was closer to the boys than Julie had been. "I think the money that's turned up proves it. She had a secret life she didn't share with us. Well, with me, the boys couldn't have fathomed it, anyway."

"Is this part of what's caused you to change your perception of Julie this weekend?"

"Well, maybe a little. I guess I'm still pretty much in denial about the money. It's a pot load, and I know there are things I could do with it, but I haven't yet considered it very real."

"Perhaps not, but you're taking steps in the direction to resolve the issue, which you weren't doing before," Eve pointed out. "In any case, I doubt you're going to go off half cocked and blow it. You've approached it conservatively so far, and I suspect you'll continue to do so to the best advantage for your family." She changed the subject so abruptly that he was barely aware of it. "So how does this weekend make you feel about Shae?"

"I wish I could answer you," Dave shook his head. "Don't get me wrong. I like Shae a lot. Maybe I love her, or at least will love her when I don't feel so tied to Julie. She's a very nice person, I think she could make a good mother to the boys, and she's fun to be with. On the other hand, she's been lonely and morose, and I can't help but wonder if maybe it's made her a little obsessive about me. I mean, here's a bird in the hand, I'd better not let go. And maybe I have the same feelings the other way."

"Most relationships go through that phase," Eve grinned. "From somewhere early in the relationship on to and often well past the wedding. It's not abnormal."

"You're saying you don't think she's pushing too hard?"

"Dave, you know I'm not going to tell you if I had a conclusion like that. I can't be judgmental, even though I'm being rather unprofessional in some of the things we've talked about. The question is, do you think she's pushing too hard?"

"I know she was pushing way too damn hard when we were in Bradford in September," he replied. "I told her that, too. But then, she was trying to get me to stay in New York. She backed off after that, but I don't think she's any less eager, and maybe it seems strange to me, I don't know. I know I haven't allowed us to go any further than I wanted to. I'm sure she would like to move faster; she's even come out and said it."

"Why do you think she feels that way?"

"Good question," Dave said thoughtfully. "Realistically, I know she's lonely as hell. She doesn't have much of a life up there in the city; she doesn't get out much, and no real friends except you and now me. From what I pick up from her, Avalon doesn't get her out and around much. When she was with WSN, she at least got out to games and could do outgoing things that interested her. Now she's pretty much stuck in a studio with people she sometimes doesn't like very much. I know she likes playing Shaella Sunrise, but I don't think she'd be sorry if Avalon folded its tents tomorrow. She might have some issues about what she was going to do next, but I think she'd be just as glad to have that stone from around her neck."

"Perceptive observations," Eve smiled. "What do you think she wants out of life?"

"Dumb question," he snorted. "She wants a family, friends, kids, a husband, a normal life."

"As do most single people her age," Eve nodded. "What do you make of it, based on what we've just talked about?"

"I don't think 'bird in the hand' gets too far away from it," he said. "You're asking me if I think she feels desperate where she is now, and seeing a way out of it, she can't help but reach for it."

"I'm not asking," Eve smiled. "But there may be some truth to the statement. Why do you think she hasn't been able to accomplish those goals in the past?"

"Good question," Dave said. "She complained to me one time that too many guys she met were attracted to her because they saw her as the dominant in a femdom scene."

"Hmmmmm, I'm a little surprised she told you that," Eve said unguardedly. "Not that I doubt her, though. I know she's been around the scene a little. We used to see some of it way back when, mostly in high school and early in college when we were hanging around Dress to Desire and that crowd. I know there have been some occasions since, but it's something she hasn't told even me much about. I know she's not very happy about the scene and even less happy with the people she's met in it."

"This all came out when we were driving to Bradford in September," Dave said, for the first time feeling he'd broken through Eve's professional reserve a little bit. "If I recall correctly, she said she doesn't understand it. Oh, she understands it as a kink, but not a gut understanding. I have to say I agree with her on it. I can see how some people might get off on it, but I'm not one of them."

"Interesting," Eve smiled. "Now how does it work as a point of her interest in you?"

Dave shrugged. "I guess it means she knows I'm not interested in her that way," he said. "Maybe it's because she knows me from high school, back before she got involved in the scene, to whatever extent she was involved in it."

"An interesting theory," Eve said thoughtfully but impassively.

"You know more than you're telling me and you're not going to tell me, are you?" Dave smiled.

"Yes," Eve grinned. "But God knows I'm giving you enough hints. Dave, let me cut through all of the beating around the bush and just tell you a couple things I think I'm correct on. I honestly think you're right on your 'bird in the hand' theory about Shae. I don't think it's anything malevolent. However, I do think you have to be as involved as she is in where you want your relationship to go. Up to this point you've basically been along for the ride, except where you've drawn limits, and those limits are fading, right?"

"Yeah, I guess."

"It wouldn't hurt for you to be a little more pro-active," she said. "Don't get me wrong, Shae is my best friend; she has been for years and years, and I literally owe my life to her in many ways. I want the best for her, and I'm definitely aware her life as it is now does not reflect the best it could be for her. However, I can't be the one to make the decision for her to do something, especially about you. Realistically, it's even hard for me to offer an opinion because of my professional status. In a personal sense, I don't think I'd mind seeing the two of you get together because I think you have a number of ways you could be very good for each other. But then, I've been wrong before, too. A lot, in fact. Nothing is certain in my profession. It's an art, not a science, and it's built on opinion. What works for one situation doesn't necessarily work for the next."

"But overall, you're for it?"

"Yes, with the provision that it's the opinion of a friend, and I hope it's as a friend of both of you. But I have to add the opinion it would be nice if the two of you could slow it down a little. It won't hurt her to wait a little, and I'll tell her that again. You mentioned waiting for a year, and that might not be a bad idea. On the other hand, it may not be possible, given where you are now. I can't tell you for sure."

"Eve," Dave grinned. "For being very helpful, sometimes you're not much help."

"I realize that," she grinned, putting her hands on the sides of the hot tub and giving a heave upwards, so she was again sitting on the edge of the hot tub, with steam rolling off her nude body in the cold air. She was facing Dave, and her legs were spread wide enough that he had a clear view of her sex, and as far as he could see at this distance there was nothing abnormal about it. "Like I just said, it's an inexact science since human beings are involved."

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