"I just don't see why it's this big a deal to you," Emma said, running a comb through her hair. She'd gotten it cut back to just short of jaw-length and was trying out different styles; she had yet to settle on one. "So she wants to dress you up, so what? Outfit goes on, outfit comes off. It's not like she's plotting to burn the rest of your wardrobe or something."

I sighed. Anne had been failing to keep from dropping hints about this for a week now since the party, and my quiet grousing to nobody over it had morphed into the present conversation when I didn't realize that Emma left her head on her desk while she got her hair implements from the bathroom. She was getting disturbingly good at navigating the suite by touch and proprioception...

Anyway, I didn't honestly think she'd do anything like that, but Anne was so socially awkward that the part of my brain dealing in movie clichés couldn't help conjuring up visions of it anyway. Maybe it'd be timid Anne, having talked herself into believing that she was doing me a favor and we could be friends this way - or maybe it'd be gamer-Anne, quick-witted and confident, deciding to take my lousy fashion sense into her own hands and-

No. No, not going there. There was no good reason to suspect that, and indulging the notion just because she came off a little weird wasn't fair to her. Besides, if I was honest with myself, this was only tangentially about Anne, anyway.

"I, uh...look," I sighed, "it's fine if she's into all that stuff. It's just...it's not me."

"Do you even know what 'that stuff' is?" She seemed oddly cranky the last couple days, and I wasn't sure why.

I rolled my eyes. "C'mon, Emma. She's obsessed with dolls and cosplay. We both know it's quasi-Victorian Gothic stuff. The only question is whether it's sexy quasi-Victorian Gothic or just...I dunno, steampunk Jane Austen? That must be a thing somewhere on the Internet."

She groaned. "Austen was Regency. The Brontës were Victorian. Or, well, anti-Victorian, more like."

"I said quasi-Victorian," I replied. "I wasn't implying any kind of historical accuracy." Over in the other room, I heard the click and hum of an amplifier switching on and the first tentative notes as Tammy tuned up the bass she had stashed in the closet.

"So, corsets, crinolines, lace, and bustles, that's what you're getting at." She held up a lock of hair between two fingers as a makeshift pigtail, considered it for a moment, then thought better of it.

"And hair-ribbons and probably those ruffled undershirt things and a bunch of other nonsense, yes." My internal tempo was accelerating again, and I could feel something scraping against something else, somewhere inside me. Why was she even arguing this with me, anyway? As if I didn't know...

"Stu, you can just say it: girly nonsense."

I gritted my teeth, gears grinding audibly. "And?" I looked around to see if Lucky was anywhere within petting range, but it was midday and she was still under Emma's desk, probably "preening" again; she clearly recognized her own reflection, and didn't seem fraught with existential angst as she checked herself over for...whatever it was that mushrooms had to worry about. Was I the only person in the suite who wasn't entirely copacetic with what they saw in the mirror? Even Tammy seemed less upset than she had been...

Speaking of Tammy, she began plucking out a riff I knew I recognized, but couldn't place. Something about the music - about the rhythm - was strangely enthralling to me, but she fumbled a few measures in and started over.

"And I just don't get what you're so hung up over," Emma said. "I mean, what is your problem with women?"

"I don't have a problem with women!" I said, exasperated. "I just don't want to be one!"

"Why the hell not? It's not like it gets in the way of anything you care about. Christ, you don't even have to deal with mens-!" She stopped short; I could see her flustered expression in the mirror. I felt incensed at her trivializing my problems, and I wanted to fire back, but the sudden clarity on her bad mood distracted me.

It all just reminded me of what I didn't have. Why were we arguing about being a woman when I wasn't one, even now, in a pretty significant respect? Was this why we didn't understand each other? Was I doomed to be an outsider like this, always watching from behind glass, never really belonging to any one group? Would there always be these barriers, no matter what I looked like, or what I felt I was inside? Sure, I knew enough to sympathize, but the experience would remain alien to me. Not that I wanted it, God no, but if nothing else we could bond over shared misery...

There was a long, awkward silence, broken only by Tammy's playing. I fumed as much as I could with the emotion unable to really take control of me; I felt off-kilter again, some clutch in my chest skipping and catching, skipping and catching. Acting like she could read me like a book was one thing; even her teasing was more annoying than hurtful. But for her to try and tell me who I was, and what did or didn't matter to my own core understanding of myself... That was so far beyond the pale that I couldn't even find words for it.

And I still didn't understand why she had to press the matter. I knew she thought I should be dressing nicer, and she enjoyed teasing me, but why did she actually care about my gender identity? Okay, so we'd argued our way around to it by way of clothing, but she was the one who'd taken it there. Was it just orneriness due to...circumstances?

Emma spoke first, while I was still puzzling it over. "...Sorry," she said, picking her head up off the dresser and tipping it towards me in a conciliatory nod, then staring at the floor. "I shouldn't have said that."

Part of me wanted to push back, to really drive it home that no, she shouldn't have. But...I didn't want a fight. I didn't even want her to leave me alone, really; I just couldn't take being harangued over the exact thing that most distressed and confused me in all of this. I sighed, the tension of the moment draining out of me. "It's...okay," I said. "I can't pretend to really understand, but..."

Emma looked taken aback at that, and I wondered if I'd said something wrong. But she shook her head vigorously, mussing her hair back up. "No, look, don't be like that. It's not your fault I was being a bitch. Even if I do think you're circumscribing your horizons, that was out of line on my part."

"Um, yeah," I said. Was this still about the clothes, then? No, never mind, I didn't care; I just wanted this awkwardness to be over with. Lucky poked her head out from behind the corner of the dresser, and I knelt down and picked her up. "Apology accepted."

There was a thrumming of strings and an electric hum as Tammy set her instrument on the bed and came over to our side of the suite. "You all good here?" she asked. "Nobody needs a good wallop?"

Emma chuckled, but stepped back out of tail-range just in case. I shook my head. "Nah. We...we got it sorted out."

She smiled. "Good. Thought I was gonna have to bust some heads."

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"Even you couldn't put a dent in Stu's head," Emma laughed. I bit my lip, but couldn't entirely suppress a smirk.

Tammy chuckled. "Well, one of us'd have to go to the E.R."

"It'd just ruin all those plans we have for the weekend," I said dryly, rubbing Lucky's cap.

She got a funny look on her face. "Well, actually..."

"Uh-oh," Emma deadpanned.

"It's nothing major," she said. "Just, well...a chance to really see what I can do."

"A road test, as it were?" Emma said. Tammy grinned sheepishly.

"Wait," I said, "don't you already have the pool...?"

"Well, yeah," she said. "But...I don't want to worry about crashing into walls. One guy stupid enough to risk it there is plenty. I'd rather try this out where there's nothing to run into."

"So what'd you have in mind?" I asked, curious.

She shrugged and held out a flyer. Emma and I took a look over it, and Emma's eyes went wide.

"No way is that actually a thing."

----------------------------------------

The sun blazed down on the lake, but November had turned from fall into winter almost on a dime, and even in the afternoon it was still below freezing. The wind whipped across the ice, kicking up a wall of fresh powder that caught me full in the face. I could feel the cold and the sting of the snow on my "skin," but it didn't hurt.

I could feel pain like this, I'd discovered, but only when I risked being damaged. A slip with the scissors cutting up shirts was uncomfortable, since it could rip my fabric "skin;" clunking my shin against the bed frame might dent the hollow shell (unlikely) and impinge on the actuators inside my leg, so it hurt like the dickens. But having a slight crust of snow accumulate on the felt? That was just an annoyance.

Emma, however, was a little red in the face, and was trying to work out how to rub her cheeks for warmth without dropping herself. She couldn't manage it, and switched to huddling in her armpit and fumbling with a thermos of scalding-hot coffee which the organizers of the polar-bear plunge had provided for participants and spectators alike. "R-remind me ag-g-gain why we're d-d-doing this?" she chattered.

It wasn't the big swim in Lakeside; that wasn't scheduled until late December, when everything was really good and frozen over. We were across the state line, on the outskirts of Lac du Roi, where the smaller lakes were already safe to walk on. For most people, that meant ice-fishing,* but there were always a few nuts who insisted on doing this instead. It didn't make much more sense to me (though neither did ice-fishing,) but we weren't here for our sake.

* (And the odd contest wherein someone would park a dead K-car on a lake and take bets on when the spring thaw would send it through the ice.)

"Moral support," I replied. "You said it yourself, back at the start: we're all in this together." At least she's in a better mood today... I thought.

"I sh-shoulda put in an exemption for ins-s-sanity."

"C'mon," I said, a little bemused. "Aren't you like, a farm kid, apparently?"

"From Miss-ss-ss-ssouri, yeah." She took a long pull of coffee from a Styrofoam cup and sighed in relief. "Besides, there's a difference between going out into a blizzard to rescue a newborn calf and doing it for 'fun.' And it was my dad that did that part, anyway."

"'Blizzard?'" Tammy laughed. "This is the sunniest day we've had since September."

"And it's twenty-five degrees out," she groused, taking another gulp of coffee. "At one-thirty. You people are crazy."

Crazy or not, we weren't alone. There was a whole little crowd out on the lake, with a changing tent set up and a card table with coffee and cups on it. A couple guys with sledgehammers and ice saws were putting the finishing touches on a large hole they'd opened up, while others scooped the chunks out of the water and tossed them in a pile opposite the tent; other people were recording the proceeedings for, I assumed, some weirdo online community of ice-swimming enthusiasts.

Oddly enough, people were so focused on the event that we didn't attract that much attention. Considering how many stares I'd gotten on campus the last couple weeks, it was a little surreal. Did they just not notice the strange living doll with a giant brass key sticking out of its back...? The girl whose head was no longer attached to her body? Tammy was the most "normal" of us by a long shot, and even she stood out here; but nobody was saying anything.

"Seriously," said Emma, "I don't get it. Stu I can understand, but how are you not freezing to death?"

Tammy regarded herself. She was wearing a jacket, hat, and gloves on her human half, but her tail was uncovered aside from the usual skirt. She frowned, thought about it, and shrugged. "I dunno," she said. "It's just...not that cold." She looked to me. "Stu?"

"A lot of internal thermoregulation mechanisms; plus, uh, insulation," I said. I realized now why Tammy looked different after her change, less sculpted and more girl-next-door; she had a new layer of baby fat softening out her old facial structure. "Plus some handy antifreeze proteins and the higher mass-to-surface-area ratio of the tail."

Emma whistled. "You're built to take it now. Lucky dog."

"It's a necessity," I said. "Not many parts of the world where the water's actually warm year-round." I felt a bit jealous myself; I wasn't feeling uncomfortable, but the lower my temperature dropped, the harder it felt like my mechanisms had to work. Was there some internal lubricant that was thickening in the cold? Maybe we should've cut up a jacket for me after all; well, I had Emma here to wind me up, if needed...

Finally, the organizers finished their hole and satisfied themselves that the edges weren't going to give way under the crowd or anything. One of the older guys announced that people were free to join in, but would we please take turns with the tent and not crowd too many people in at once so folks had room to come up for air. Well, a mermaid wouldn't need to worry about that, anyway.

"So," I asked, "d'you have any specific plan here?"

Tammy shook her head. "I dunno. I figure I'll jump in, and if I don't immediately feel like jumping back out, I'll have a look around. I guess I'll come up and check in with you guys first if I'm gonna be down there a while."

"Sounds good."

She wheeled up near the edge of the hole, but didn't brake-and-launch like at the pool, not wanting to take any chances with her chair going into the lake. Instead, she parked, stripped to her swimsuit top, and slid out of her seat. She winced at the cold, but planted her hands on the ice and leaned forward, putting her weight on her shoulders, then heaved her tail around to the water's edge; it wasn't graceful, but she was still new to moving around like this. She dipped her caudal fin towards the water, hesitated, and thought better of it; instead, she pulled her tail back, squared her shoulders, and threw herself in all at once.

A moment later she shot back to the surface, so quickly that she was fully two-thirds out of the water before gravity took her back down. "Shyeeeeeee!!!" she shrieked, a whole lungful of air behind the sound. It took me - well, everyone - by surprise; I knew that merfolk had a pretty good set of pipes, but this was the first time I'd heard the results. It wasn't ear-splitting, not outdoors, but the richer, broader range of harmonics was startling; I'd heard a bit of that in her speaking voice, but it was in full effect here.

And people were staring for real now. Tammy glanced at the other swimmers sheepishly, as surprised by the sound that'd come out of her as everyone else, but one of the old guys in the water laughed it off. "First-timer, dontchaknow." He gave her a friendly wave. "Hang in dere, miss, it's not as cold as it feels at first, yah?"

Tammy didn't look too convinced; she huddled by the edge of the hole, hyperventilating - but not shivering. "Jesus," she said at last. "He's probably right, but...gahhh."

"You gonna be okay?" I asked, kneeling as close to the edge, down by the water, as I dared; I probably couldn't drown as such, but my chances of being able to swim like this were nil, and I had no idea how much I had to worry about rust. Emma kept her distance, too, and I noticed her keeping a tight grip on her head.

She nodded. "...Yeah. Whew. I, uh, I guess I might as well stick with the plan. I'm gonna go try this out for a while; I'll figure on meeting you back here at..." She glanced at the waterproof watch she'd bought for the occasion. "...uh, around two-thirty?"

"Okay," I said. "Hey, uh...ease into it, okay? Mermaids can get muscle cramps too."

"Copy that." She gave me a wry smile and slipped below the surface. The water was surprisingly smooth for having a bunch of people crowded into a small space, and I caught fractured glimpses of myself as I stared after her.

2:30 sounded all well and good, but that was nearly forty minutes for us to kill out here on the ice while Tammy did...whatever tearing around underwater she felt like. I turned to Emma. "Um...you wanna go up on shore?"

She nodded. "Heck yes. The coffee's helping, but boy do I need to be out of this wind."

One of the women in the crowd of bystanders came over to us. "If you're gonna wait for your friend," she said, "they're making aebleskivers up in the pavilion."

Emma cocked an eyebrow. "Aebleskivers?"

"It's like a donut-hole pancake thing," I said. "C'mon, you'll like 'em." Not for the first time, I wished I could still eat - or at least wished I knew whether I couldn't "eat" without gumming up the works. I didn't feel hungry, but I remembered liking the things, dammit.

Still, it was a good way to kill a half-hour. Emma liked them just fine, and I could at least enjoy the smell of frying batter and warm maple syrup. Having a windbreak helped, too, though I still felt sluggish in the cold; I was only minimizing heat loss, not actually warming up...