Morgan Berry’s mother had always wanted a daughter and when she gives birth to a son, she simply dresses him as a girl and treats him as she would a daughter. When he’s picked on and teased at kindergarten, she homeschools him herself. Morgan is eight when his mother brings home a new beau, a no-nonsense man called Dennis O’Rourke. He compliments his new ‘daughter’ on how pretty she is and when his mother doesn’t correct the man, Morgan flees the room in embarrassment. Naturally, Dennis eventually discovers Morgan isn’t a girl. From that moment on, he barely acknowledges Morgan’s existence and is, in fact, openly hostile to his cross-dressing step-son. On the eve of Morgan’s eighteenth birthday, Dennis, now an alcoholic, bashes his stepson until Morgan loses consciousness. Morgan wakes up outside. He has no idea how he came to be under a tree on top of a small hill beneath a starry sky. He’s trying to work it out when he meets Reginald Batt, of the Big River Batts. Morgan and Reginald become inseparable and together they experience worlds of wonder and awe. Morgan is shown sights he could never have imagined and in the process he learns many things about the world, and about himself -- the most important of which is a revelation indeed.

Stranger Things

“Wait,” I said, leaping to my feet. “Can I sleep with you tonight?”


“Of course you can,” Reginald replied. “What a cosy couple we’re becoming.”


He put his arms around me. “Are you ready?” he asked.


I had to do no more than think myself into the tree for the task to be accomplished. In a flash we were nestled in a small hollow where the three main branches met. We were lying back against the broadest branch, Reginald’s arm around me and my head resting gently on his chest. It was soft, and comforting. I snuggled in closer to him and closed my eyes. In a moment I was asleep. 5


“You have a choice to make today,” said Reginald. “We’ll get to do both, for one of them we have to do. We’ve given our word.”


We were back on terra firma and Reginald was stroking Duchess’s long neck.


“We can continue our search for Rosamond immediately, or, and this is just a suggestion, we can pay your mother a visit.”


Chapter 11