Page 38 of Private Exhibit
Devon froze. “Um.” He swallowed hard. “Shit,” he whispered, covering his face with both hands. “I…um…”
Andy stared at him. “Only men get Ashworth-Grahams,” he blurted out. That was a fact he knew all too well. Women could be carriers of the disease, but they never displayed any of the symptoms whatsoever. It only took one or the other parent to pass on the disease, and it always passed on without fail. Of course, most A-G patients didn't live long enough to father any children. The rare few who did, didn't live long enough to see their child grow up. But women could carry the disease and pass it on from mother to daughter for generations, never knowing about it until a son came along.
Except when theydidknow and gave birth to a son anyway.
Andy clenched his jaw, but even that old, familiar anger couldn't overwhelm the sudden curiosity of Devon's admission.
Devon was a transsexual. Born female, yet he had the disease. It was a complete anomaly. Something Andy hadn't encountered in his entire career, as far as this particular disease went. Transsexuals were a tiny subset of the population—maybe one percent at best—and Ashworth-Grahams was even morerare, so for someone to have both? It had to be something like a one-in-a-billion chance.
The revelation opened up a whole new potential avenue of investigation. A whole new set of data. Studies of transsexuals had proven that the structure and chemistry of the brain matched that of the patient's identity, not the body. In Devon's case, it meant being born with a female appearance, female hormones, and female reproductive organs while the brain and central nervous system were decidedly male. It was a form of chimerism: two distinct sets of DNA, one making up the brain and the other making up the rest of the body.
For twenty years, Andy had operated under the assumption that the effects of Ashworth-Grahams had something to do with the natural, biological differences between men and women. If it affected transmen, too, it only reinforced that fact, but in a different way. A transman with Ashworth-Grahams was the exception that proved the rule.
It could be the key to unlocking the cure.
Or it could lead to nothing, as had everything else. Andy couldn't bear to go down that path again. Couldn't bear to chase yet another theory that might ultimately end in utter failure.
Devon turned away and broke into a run.
“Devon!” Andy started to chase after the boy.
They didn't make it far. Devon tripped and fell, landing hard on the sidewalk. Andy reached for him, his fingertips just touching the boy's shoulders before he snatched his hands back.
“Devon?” Andy asked. “Is it an attack?”
The boy shook his head and sniffed as tears collected on his eyelashes. “No. I wasn't watching where I was going.” He started to turn around. “Ouch!” he gasped.
“What's wrong?” Andy demanded. “Show–” He broke off with a curse, barely stopping himself from saying,Show Daddy where it hurts. Andy coughed and said, “Show me.”
“It's nothing–”
“Show me,” Andy repeated, dropping his voice to a murmur.
Devon trembled, but he held out both hands. His palms were red from where he'd broken his fall, but the skin wasn't torn. He shifted and winced, then reached for his right pant leg.
“Let me,” Andy blurted out, reaching for the boy before he could think better of it. He felt like he was watching from the outside, unable to move in and stop himself as he grabbed the hem of Devon's jeans and inched it slowly up to the boy's knee.
A bruise was forming there, and the skin looked rough from the fall, but nothing was bleeding. Andy brushed his thumb gently across it and shuddered.Oh fuck. He shouldn't be touching the boy. Shouldn't be this close.
But the gods themselves would have had to swoop in to stop him. He couldn't seem to do so himself.
Andy moved his hand to the back of Devon's knee, then muttered a curse.Gods. He needed to focus. “Can you move it?” he asked. “Gently, now.” He supported Devon's leg while the boy carefully tested it, straightening it out and then bending it again. “We're not far from the hospital. We can go do a scan–”
“No,” Devon gasped. “Please, no. It doesn't hurt that bad. Really, I'm fine.”
Andy looked up, studying the boy's face. Devon almost managed eye-contact for about half a second before blushing and looking away again, but a familiar look was still there. The same look Andy had seen on Junior time and time again.
The one that said he couldn't bear to be a patient again. Not even for a second.
“Alright,” Andy murmured. He paused, watching Devon carefully ease his pant leg back down. “Are you up for walking a little more? Or would you rather I take you home?”
Devon paused in the midst of fussing with his pants, trying to get the fabric situated just right. “You still want to walk with me?”
Gods help me.“Yes.”
“Even though I'm–”
“Yes,” Andy repeated, his voice coming out in a husky growl.Damn it.
