IN NOCKTON VALE - Man: Wanted - Final Chapter - Epilogue

And Sangeeta and I, basically, lived happily ever after. That’s all you need to know.

But if you’d like a little bit more detail then I’m happy to oblige. Life is good for me now; very good; and it just goes to show that sometimes the hardest and most painful decisions can lead to the greatest peace long-term.

I had thought it would be horrifying to give up my female body and identity, but it wasn’t really, once that decision was made.

Of course the thing that made this easiest was the effect of the ring.

It had always been the case that becoming Geoff had been entirely immersive. I’d been male in mind as well as body. This continued to be the case after I finally gave up on resisting and decided to live my man’s life to the full.

I still kind of remembered how happy I’d been to be a woman but the contentment I felt as Geoff was greater. Without wasting any more pointless energy I leapt into my new masculinity with passionate abandon. Getting the house sorted was only the work of a couple of weeks, and that was on top of building my contracting business from the ground up.

Word of mouth is a beautiful thing, and the ring had seen to it that my skills and credentials were first class. These things combined, started a steadily increasing trickle of business that slowly became a gush. Within a month I had two guys working for me. In three months I was sub-contracting a broad team of workmen and managing projects; placing my organisational skills and technical finesse exactly where it was most needed.

And my dad would have been proud. I got his old Morris Minor going at last. It needed quite a lot of parts but they weren’t too hard to requisition. Sangeeta and I use it to go out on jaunts at the weekend, or in the evening if I take her the long way round up to the Oliver Spragg for a drink.

Sangeeta and I are very happy. She gave up her flat after a few months and moved in with me at the house and she gave up her beauty booth. But we’re looking into renting a unit in a much more prominent position for her to set up a proper beauty parlour with a team of staff and a line of mirrored stations. She’s looking into the marketing now and sifting through CVs for her staff. My business is doing well enough to give us enough spare cash for the start-up. She’s got big plans for it and I am behind her every step of the way.

Things are going well for us and I still feel the same way I did on the night I declared my love for her. It’s a different kind of love from the needy desperation I had toward Billy. It’s more mature and more affectionate. It’s something that makes us both very happy and, I suspect, something that will last many many years.

But you may be wondering what happened in the end with regard to my transformation, and I can tell you that it did come to an end one day.

It was only days really before the slow slide of the reality shift finally did away with my former self. The letters stopped coming and the last of the female accoutrements around the house dematerialised. And not long after that it became clear that people didn’t quite remember I had a sister. I was good mates with John across the road by this time – I still am – and he was my test case. From time to time I would mention her name and as the weeks went on he seemed to remember her less and less; until one day he remembered her not at all.

I still remember her and I think I probably always will and; perhaps because she witnessed the transformation first-hand; Sangeeta remembers her too.

I think of her often, and Sangeeta and I chat about her sometimes; but we always speak and think of her fondly, with very little regret.

Of course I sometimes wonder “what if...” But Alison didn’t die. She turned into a man. I’m Alison. And I’m Geoff. And I’m very very happy.

It was four months since that last transformation that I dared to take the ring off, holding my breath in anticipation. And there wasn’t so much as a flicker of magical light. No transformation back at all.

I stayed a man; even when a day had gone by; and another.

I still wear the ring though. I like it. I probably always will.

Or maybe one day I’ll pass it on. Who knows?

But not everything was tied up perfectly. Some mysteries remain; and I doubt now if I’ll ever get to the bottom of them.

I had wondered what happened to Rasheed that night after he saw me change and then leave.

The way Sangeeta told it, after I'd gone, he tried to use the fact I was secretly a woman to wheedle his way back in. Until a quick knee in the groin set him straight on the matter.

That’s my girl. One of a kind.

Rasheed didn’t hang around and he didn’t even come back when Sangeeta’s father finally turned up.

And it was a trauma for Sangeeta to face up to her dad after so many years of feeling his disapproval. But she did it. And she laid it out to him exactly what she wanted from her life.

Me basically.

And to his credit, he did his best to understand... while disapproving his ass off.

I’m confident they’ll reconcile in time. I could see how much he loved her, even behind his glare. And he can see how happy she is.

No, Rasheed never turned up again. He didn’t even return to London. Sangeeta tried to look him up to show him there were no hard feelings but his friends hadn’t seen him since he left for Nockton Vale.

I can only hope he’s found somewhere else where he can be happy and live the kind of life he always wanted to. He was a dick, but I didn’t really have anything against the guy. I wish him exactly as much luck as he deserves.

And there’s a saying in Nockton Vale, that people always get what they deserve eventually.

Which makes me think of Billy – the infamous ex-husband; the bane of my life and the doorway into my new one.

I’m grateful to him in a way. Without him there being such an irritatingly charming cock I might never have had the courage to go through with things and take the plunge into my new life.

And that’s a plunge I’m so glad I decided to make.

There may be ups and downs along the way – that’s life – but I like to foresee good things for Sangeeta and me. I see marriage. I see handsome sons and beautiful daughters. I see long years of happiness and bliss. I see two thriving businesses and a happy couple who will stand by one another against anyone and anything that chooses to come up against them.

Which makes me think of poor Billy again. Because that is the other mystery.

He got back to Coventry to that whore of a mistress of his – I heard as much from old friends of Alison’s, now new friends of mine.

But both he and Tia vanished off the face of the earth right afterwards.

Where they went is a mystery I will never understand but maybe there’s truth in that other saying of Nockton Vale...

That you don’t come to this fair town of ours without leaving it changed.