This is just a little character piece I wrote about my characters Harley and Mercedes. I thought it was time I gave them a bit more recognition/backstory. Enjoy!

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It wasn't the first time Holly had stormed into the apartment, shaking the entire building with the force of one slammed door, and it wouldn't be the last; but this particular slam had the extra quality of an uncertain future to it, so Mercedes decided perhaps she should investigate.

However, before she could stand up, much less leave the room, her work was made short for her by Holly yanking open the door to the twins' shared bedroom and storming in.

"Don't! Slam it," Mercedes warned, sitting up on her bed, where she had been flipping through a teen magazine she probably wasn't old enough for yet. Holly huffed angrily, but did as she was asked, shutting the door with a light click. Then she took a flying leap, diving onto her bed and somehow managing to make the action look infuriated.

"I can't believe this!" she yelled, pounding her fists into the mattress. Mercedes waited quietly; she had learned that if she allowed Holly time to yell herself out, she would learn what was going on much quicker than if she questioned her. And sure enough, after a short pause, Holly jumped up and began pacing beside her bed, gesturing angrily as she ranted.

"Those boys down the street were playing basketball again, and they said I couldn't play with them! I asked nicely and everything! And you know what they told me? Go play by yourself. You have a net." She sat down heavily on the floor beside her bed, crossing her arms and drawing her legs up to her chest. "They wouldn't let me play because I'm a girl!"

"Don't worry about them," Mercedes consoled, slipping off the edge of her bed and sitting cross-legged on the worn carpet in front of her sister, "They're just nasty kids."

"They're shitheads, you mean."

"Holly!" Mercedes exclaimed, "Mom says not to swear!"

"Dad swears all the time," countered Holly, "And besides, we're going into grade seven in two months. I think we're old enough."

Mercedes shook her head, but didn't say anything, because she had a suspicion her twin was right. After all, if a twelve-year old could read Seventeen, then a twelve-year old could probably swear, too.

"A lot of boys are like that," she said instead, "None of them think girls are good enough for anything."

"Wish I could prove it to them," Holly grumbled, chin on her knees.

"Maybe you could. Bet they wouldn't back down from a challenge like that."

"Yeah, but if I win they'd just say they were going easy on me," Holly sighed in reply, "And then they still wouldn't let me play with them."

"Why are people like that?" Mercedes wondered morosely.

"Dunno. Wish I could find out."

"They'd let you play if you were a boy."

"But I'm not a boy," Holly sighed rationally. There was a short silence, both girls pondering this question of unfairness. Then Holly's head lifted off her legs and cocked to the side. "I wonder..."

"What?" asked Mercedes curiously.

"Mercedes, I have an idea!" Holly's said excitedly, "We're moving to a new city in three weeks. No one there knows us. What if I showed up there and everyone thought I was a boy?"

"Why would you do that?" Mercedes asked skeptically.

"Because then I could test people! I could see how they treat me!"

"Do you really want to pretend to be a boy?" Mercedes wrinkled her nose.

"Not pretend, not really. Just... well, if I dress like a boy and act like a boy, people are going to think I'm a boy, right?" Holly explained earnestly, "I'd never tell them I was a boy, but they'd think it. And I could figure out why! I could figure out why boys and girls get treated different. People who first met me would think I was a boy, and people who know me longer would know I was a girl. Bet they wouldn't act the same to me."

"But you don't look like a boy. How would you fix that?" Mercedes asked, getting caught in the spirit of the thing despite herself.

"How much money do you have?"

"Well..." Mercedes pondered, "I have my birthday money from Granny still, and some of my allowance, so, fifty or something."

"I've got my birthday money, too, and some of my Christmas money, even. So, put together, that's more than a hundred."

"But I don't think you could get plastic surgery with that."

"Don't need to," Holly shook her head, "I really mean it. If I act like a boy and dress like a boy, people will think I'm a boy, even if I have a kinda girlie face. Some boys look like girls, anyway. Listen," she explained, "I'll sell you all my girlie clothes. All of 'em. Then we can take all our money and get me some new things. Boy things."

"All your clothes?" Mercedes gasped, eyes wide. Some of her sister's clothes were really nice, and Holly didn't wear them much anyway... what harm could it do? "Okay. You can have my money. But even together, that's not gonna get you a lot of clothes."

"Maybe not if we went to the mall, but we could go to some thrift stores," Holly suggested, "Stuff is a lot cheaper there."

"Okay. Let's tell mom and we can go now."

The girls lived right in the downtown core, so their mother didn't mind taking them down a few streets to the shopping plazas. She sat in the square, rocking their four-month old brother and playing with their five-year old sister while the girls entered the thrift store. Holly and Mercedes, girls on a mission, made immediately for the boys' section. Thankfully, Holly's shoes were mostly boys' shoes, as she found them more comfortable for playing in, so they didn't have to check the shoe section. They found several pairs of jeans and some baggy shirts. Holly also picked up a jacket, some plain white socks, and, much to Mercedes' dismay, a few pairs of boxers. Holy just shrugged, saying that if she was going to dress like a boy she might as well go all the way.

"What about your chest?" Mercedes asked as they were passing through the checkout, "It's not that big now, but when we get older it's going to grow. I mean, look at mom."

Holly grudgingly admitted that their mother did indeed have a rather large chest.

"I dunno," she said as they left the store, "I guess for now I'll just wear sports bras and loose shirts, and when I get older I can find some way to keep 'em down. Maybe get a minimizer or something. I'll worry about it when it happens."

Over the course of the next three weeks, Holly spent most of her time sitting quietly on benches in parks and shopping centres, watching boys her age and older teens when she could. They didn't do things like most girls did. Most of them hardly touched each other at all. They made fun of each other and laughed when they were made fun of. They were less adverse to getting dirt all over themselves. And they walked differently. Holly noticed that when her mom or Mercedes walked, there was a kind of sway to their hips which the boys just didn't have. She drove Mercedes insane walking around their room practising her "guy-walk."

The day before they drove out of the city for the last time, Holly and Mercedes lay awake in their hotel bed, talking quietly about the challenges of the future. Finally, Mercedes asked, "What about when you introduce yourself? What are you going to say, Miss Holly Erica Donovan? Even if people did think you were a boy, they'd kind of do a double take and start thinking you're maybe not a boy."

"You don't think I could pull it off?"

"No, you could," Mercedes explained, "As long as you don't act like a girl at all. But you don't look so much like a boy that you'd be able to do it if there was some doubt. I mean, we are identical, and no one's ever going to mistake me for a boy."

"That's because you don't act anything like one, Miss Mercedes Taylor Donovan," Holly teased, "But you're probably right. I'll think about it."

After that, they were quiet. Mercedes was just about to drift off to sleep, curled against the comforting warmth of her sister, when Holly spoke.

"Harley."

"Mh?"

"Harley Donovan," she replied, "That's what I'll say. Guys do nicknames like that. And if you can have the name of a cool car, why can't I have the name of a cool motorcycle?"

Mercedes smiled. "Go to sleep, Harley."

And she did.