I thought about posting all these separately, but that’d be a pain in the ass.   This loosely covers Qing Yaun’s first few days of life, although none of it is particularly canon unless Dragon decides he likes it.

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This is my first diary entry.  Xian Li Chang made all those other ones.  I’m Qing Yaun Chang.  (Legally, I won’t be Qing Yaun for a few months, but it’ll happen.)  I don’t really feel like a new person yet, but Delia says that will come.

Some things have certainly changed, though.  My hair, my face, my boobs.  My hair is long and white and keeps getting in my way.  Delia offered to braid it this evening.  The rest looks different but the same.  Softer, but not weaker really.  Maybe that’s a message.  Maybe the River’s trying to tell me what I need to be.  Softer like water is softer than stone.  Or maybe it’s just one of those things.

These fits of giggling really have to go.  I feel all bubbly.  I want to be around people and music.  I want to dance.  Not many nightclubs around here, though.  And no electronic devices, which includes my iPhone.

Then again, I also want to lay here on this rock and sun myself like a lizard.  I want to be connected to this place, to see it and hear it and breathe it.  Delia loves it here.  I can tell.  In town, she always seems a little uncomfortable.  Out in the park, she’s better, but she’d still rather be somewhere else.

That’s one of the coolest things about this change.  I can feel the Tower of the Stone Book like I could if I was in a Hallow.  The River flows from the Watchtower through me and brings me its power.

Okay, enough introspection.  I need to go do something.

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[next day]

So I found something to do.  Delia flew off to go talk to Quixote, so I had most of the day to myself.  I Went hiking down the river and ran into a group of other campers a good four miles from our camp.  They were science students from Arizona State who had a considerably less primitive camp site than Delia and me.  The group was mixed.  They’d pooled their resources to set up the trip and do some research.  Mostly a wildlife survey, which I cheated to help them out with a little.

We talked as we worked.  There was this one girl, Gina.  Straight as an arrow, more’s the pity.  But then again, I have the hottest babe in Mythic waiting for me back home.  She was there with friends, and talking about how pissed off her boyfriend was going to be when she got back.  He was a business student, and she didn’t say as much, but he was abusing her.  Once I got suspicious, I could see all the old injuries – bruises that hid under the surface.  She was black, so her skin hid the abuse a little anyway.  Broken bones, too.  A spiral fracture on her right arm, but it dated much earlier than college.

I didn’t know what to do.  I tried all day to subtly boost her confidence.  She’s been abused for years, probably her whole life.  As the light faded, everybody got together for dinner.  They’d packed in some pretty good food.  They rafted in, so they had more cargo capacity than Delia and me.  She would have nixed the satellite phone and the laptop, too.  The laptop had speakers and a big collection of MP3s.  Some bands I hadn’t heard of.  This neat rockabilly/blues girl duo I’ll have to check out when I get home.

Some of the other kids started pairing off for the night.  (When did I start thinking people a year or two younger than me were kids?)  I managed to get one of Gina’s friends alone – for perfectly innocent reasons – and she knew.  She said she’d tried to talk to Gina, too, but she was in deep denial.  But she gave me the boy’s name.  I didn’t have a card, but I gave her my email and phone number.

As it was getting dark and I needed to get back to camp, I decided to talk to Gina.  I kind of eased into the topic.  It was easy since she was sharp enough to have noticed that I was really good with animals.  She asked me what my secret was.

First I told her “magic,” because we Mages are deeply immature and we love that joke.  But then I told her I’d always had a connection to the natural world, and I couldn’t really explain better than that.  But part of it was just being observant.  Like noticing partially healed bruises.

I’ve worked with battered women before, but usually after they’ve reached the point when they’ve decided they want help.  I knew that was something she’d have to do for herself, but maybe I could give her a little nudge in the right direction.

Of course she gave me a story about a sports injury.  But maybe she heard me.  Maybe.  I changed the subject, asked her what she was doing in the canyon – what her research was.  She was aiming for a degree in natural history.  She really liked the outdoors.  She asked me what I was doing, and I gave her the sleeper-safe version of my story with Delia.  “She’s my spiritual teacher.  We’re here on a retreat for a few days.”  That gave me an opening to talk about my spiritual path and my work, particularly what I did for the MCCA.

Then it was nearly dark, so I had to get back to camp.  Besides, I’d pushed her as far as I could without turning her against me.

Delia agreed, when I told her, so I guess I did okay.  But now I’m wondering about a trip to ASU.  I could find Deon Whithers and kick the crap out of him.  It wouldn’t make Gina find her courage, and if I didn’t do permenant damage, it wouldn’t stop him from hitting women.  It might make him worse.

But it’d make me feel good for a while.

Delia says I should work on that.  But then she said she should work on it, too.

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[A week later, more or less]

Hello from Flagstaff.  I kissed Delia goodbye in the restaurant hanging out over the south rim at dinner.  Then I stopped briefly in Williams to take a shower at a truck stop.  By the time I got to Flagstaff, it was getting late, so I found a hotel and took another really long shower.  Then I totally meant to go to bed and get up early, but I forgot to set a wakeup call, so I slept for hours.  I guess I really needed it.  The last couple nights, I couldn’t sleep well because I was too far from home.  Now that I’m going back, the pressure’s off.

I’ll get back late now, but that’s okay.  While I was back in civilization, I had to do a few things.  My hair needed styling.  I thought about getting it all cut short again, but when I got there, I wimped out and just had the ends trimmed a little and got some advice on taking care of it (which confused the hairdresser, but he was sweet about it).  Then I went shopping for some new clothes.  My bras are all just a little uncomfortable now, but the mall in Flagstaff has a Victoria’s Secret, so that was okay.  Then I don’t know why, but I decided to buy some new clothes.  There was a little botique in the mall that had some cool stuff like a chimise with a solid bust, but a sheer body.  Not my usual style, but I liked it.  And I got some neat cowboy boots with a little more heel than I normally wear to go with it.

And that was enough souviners for me.  I had some for everyone else from the giftshop at the Canyon, and a nice little wolf pendant in copper from a roadside stand outside of Williams for Theresa.

I decided it was time for a lunch that wasn’t remotely healthy or packable, so I went to the mall foodcourt, which is where I am now.  Then I noticed something.  I’m really hot.

I guess I always was really hot, and I knew that.  But it was a butch kind of hot.  Or maybe not.  Because other than the hair, I don’t really look all THAT much different.  (Okay, and the boobs.  But they’re only like C cups now.)  I can see people looking at me, and then looking away.  I always thought they were intimidated by my muscles, and that pissed me off.  Now I think – something else.

I’m really hot, and people are intimidated by that.  Like they’re not worthy of me.  That’s silly enough that I just giggled, and a little kid eating a happy meal just grinned at me and pointed at my hair.

Nobody should be intimidated by me, except bad people, who I want to scare.  Maybe it’s always been me, pushing people away.  After Hank, and after Michael, I changed.  I never wanted to admit it, because I never really want to admit anything can hurt me, but I did.

But hey, now I just changed again.  I can choose to be different, and to make what I want out of the differences I didn’t choose.  (Cause let’s be honest here, Qing Yaun Chang, you’re not all together sure you want to be a sex object, but the River is leading you that way.)  My appearance is different now, and I have a chance to be different now, more open and welcoming.  Softer.  Like the water instead of the stone.

Wow.  That was profound.  I just giggled again.  I gotta get back on the road.