The necklace that Vivian put around Miles's neck had been a family heirloom passed down through the generations, given to each daughter on her sixteenth birthday. In real life, Grandma Nellie had given this very same necklace to her own daughter Molly when she had turned sixteen many years later, and Molly herself had been planning to give it to Hannah in a few years.
"You look ravishing in it, princess" said James happily as Miles blew out the candles on Nellie's scrumptious chocolate birthday cake.
**
Around 10:00 P.M, which was extremely early for Miles normally, he yawned and said that he was going to hit the hay.
Since this was too early even for the advent of television, which would become popularly available until two years later in 1954(The one thing that really bummed Miles out about his day today), James and Vivian spent the evening listening to pulpy radio mysteries and snuggling on the couch.
"Night sweetheart" said James warmly.
"Sweet dreams Elizabeth" added Vivian.
"Goodnight, all!" said Miles with a genuine smile from the stairwell, content for the first time in his life, despite being sixty years out of time and in the wrong body and gender. He walked back into Nellie's room and began to undress, removing her blouse and shorts and putting it in the laundry hamper right next to Nellie's bookshelf. Miles had almost taken off Nellie's bra and panties since he usually slept in the nude, but recalled from somewhere deep in the recess of his mind that most girls of the era didn't sleep in the nude, and decided to sleep in her underwear instead. He looked for the nightgown he had woke up in Nellie's wardrobe, and found that it was also in the laundry. Thankfully, Nellie had several nightgowns. Miles had decided on wearing a nice frilly baby blue one tonight. He put it against Nellie's body, as if he were self conscious about the way that he looked, an actual fear of Nellie's. He put it over his head, and the soft satiny feel against Nellie's smooth skin felt SO good.
He then turned the light off, climbed into bed, and just before he went to bed, he wondered what tomorrow would bring. He rolled around, now fully used to being in a girl's body, not even caring about feeling up her breasts, which he normally would have been.
He loved 1952.
**
What felt like hours later, a black formless void, Miles woke up in his own bedroom, in 2021. The sun shining in his face from his bedroom window had somehow felt more harsh than it had in the past. Or at least what he THOUGHT had been the past, right?
"Man, what a crazy dream" he muttered to himself, not speaking in Nellie's pleasant lilting voice, but his own already world-weary modern male one. He blinked a couple of times just to make sure that he was really there. He was. His flat screen TV was there, as was his PS4, hishis collection of games, his Funko Pops, and his posters. His wall, which was normally painted white, looked like it was turning somewhat pink...or peach, he couldn't tell, but he figured if he had had a dream THAT vivid, he still must be hungover from last night.
"Maybe I really did just imagine all that. I had to. Time travel isn't rea..."
That's when he climbed out of bed.
The necklace. The one that his mom...no, that NELLIE'S mom had given him in the dream, was hanging from his neck. This looked exactly like it had in the dream, a silver chain and oval locket with an emerald inside. Had he imagined everything? Did he somehow get this from someone for his own birthday yesterday, and added it into his dream? He thought that he recalled his own Mom wearing this once.
Miles began to stroke his hair in anxiety, but then realized to his horror that it was much longer than he normally kept it! He ran to the bathroom, fully clothed since he had basically passed out the previous night, and gazed in the mirror, seeing his now more than shoulder length dark hair with full bangs. He looked ridiculous!
Somehow, Miles recalled that it was called a Bettie Page haircut, named after the infamous pinup model. Tfhough he had loved being Nellie, he didn't want to wear his hair in the same way that she did. He desperately searched for a pair of scissors, not finding any where Mom usually kept them behind the mirror.
All of a sudden, Molly called from the stairwell.
"Miles! Ten minutes until schooltime!"
"Mom, where are the scissors!?"
"The what?"
"The scissors!?"
"Why do you need a pair of scissors?"
"My hair, it grew all of a sudden overnight, and I need to cut it!"
"You don't have time, mister! We'll get a haircut later. Now move your butt, birthday boy!"
Miles looked at his reflection again. His haircut was ostentatiously girly. He knew for a fact that he would get teased, even, no ESPECIALLY by his crowd of friends. His only option was to cut all of his hair off. He ran to Hannah's room and knocked vigorously. Miles' twelve year old sister opened the door and immediately giggled.
"Hello Katy Perry."
"Hannah, do you have a pair of scissors that I can borrow to chop this mop off?"
Hannah shook her head.
"I do have a hair tie!" she said. Hannah actually removed her own pink hair tie from the ponytail she was wearing and handed it to Miles.
"There you go, big brother" smiling, to which Miles groaned.
"Don't you have it in another color?"
"Five minutes, Miles!" shouted Molly from downstairs again.
"Coming!" he yelled in kind.
"Yes, I do, but since I'm enjoying this too much, not for you. Take it or leave it, buster."
"Fine" said Miles through gritted teeth. He tied his long hair into a ponytail and walked back to the bathroom to look in the mirror.
"Shit" he muttered.
Even after putting it into a ponytail, it still ended up looking quite girly.
"Mom, where's the scissors!" he screamed again.
"Honey, you look fine. If you are even more than one minute late, you're getting expelled!"
"Fine!" he whined. "I'll go to school with this monstrosity!"
He walked downstairs, grabbed his backpack. not even looking at his mother or his youngest sister Emma, who was eating cereal at the kitchen table, and marched to school.