The girls sat there, crying, as their mother did her best to console them. "You'll be alright, kids," she said, in as soothing a tone as she could manage. "I'm sure this seems pretty awful now, but aside from adjusting to your major physical changes, there's not really that much that has to change about your lives, unless you want it to."
Mikey sniffled and snuggled in closer to her mother. "What do you m-mean?" she moaned. "We're girls now! How is that not going to ch-change things?"
Mrs. Madison nodded. "You're right," she said. "You're girls, and that is going to change some things. It's going to change the way you take care of yourselves. It's going to change the way people look at you, and the way you look at people. But what it doesn't have to change is who you are. You can be the same person as a girl that you were as a boy; there's nothing about being female that would prevent that. Or you might find that you want to be a different sort of person now that you're a young woman. That's up to you, and either way is absolutely fine."
Jon nodded, tears streaming down her face as she was held to her mother's chest. "So what do now?" she asked quietly.
"Well," her mother said, "there's a few things that need figuring out. All your paperwork has been taken care of, but I'm not sure you're going to want new names yet; I think we'll let you two focus on adjusting for a while before we worry about that. Jon, I bought some new clothes for you, and I tried to keep from getting anything too feminine for now."
"Th-thanks, mom," Jon said, flitting over to the kitchen table and hauling the bag of clothes up to her room. Mikey's mother turned to her.
"Mikey, dear," she said, "I knowyou don't like the idea of wearing skirts, but that's all that's available for harpies, so I'm going to need you to wear them."
"Nuh-uh," Mikey replied, folding her armsover her chest. "If they only make girly clothes to fit me, I'm going naked."
Her mother sighed. "If you feel that strongly about it, I'll compromise. I'm told that most harpies consider tge down in the private area to be sufficient covering for the lower body, and considering you're mostly complaining about the skirts, I can agree to that. But I want you at least wearing a shirt when you go out. Inside the house, though, you can dressany way you want. Deal?"
Mikey thought for a minute. "Deal."
"Good," Mrs. Madison said. "Besides, once those breasts of yours start growing, I think you're going to find a brassiere useful, anyway."
