Blue Moon 7.0

by Donna Lamb

 

Richard stuck his head in, "Yeah, I need to head to the airport pretty quickly. Patch will send another driver to meet us with my car but Lorio has to come up from Torrance so the client at the airport may be ready to ride before he can get there." He paused. "Nice glasses."

Jo frowned at him. "I don't know how to w-wear contacts, so I don't have much choice."

"I wasn't kidding, they look nice. But you don't really need them unless you're driving or working on a computer, huh?"

"I guess so, though it's nice to actually see stuff without f-feeling like I need to squint." She pulled the glasses off and looked at him. "Anything further than arm's length is b-blurry and at ten feet or so, I start seeing double."

"Well, I guess you traded your twenty-twenty for that body," said Richard then ducked back through the door as she looked for something to throw at him. "Just kidding. Think you can find some black slacks and jacket and a white blouse in that warehouse?"

"I guess so. B-be good to get out of this short skirt," said Jo. "Do I have time for a quick shower?"

Richard, still on the other side of the door considered. "No. You're a girl now, there's no such thing as a quick shower for a girl."

"All right f-for you, Richard," she threatened but without conviction. Taking a shower had been a momentary impulse and she really did think she might dawdle to explore if she had the time. Now that she felt convinced she would probably be female for the rest of her life.... Wait. When did I decide that?

"Hey," Richard called through the door. "You've got a regular studio in here." He'd found the long room full of musical instruments and electronics.

"Later," she said. She found the light switch in the walk-in closet and began to search though the clothing, looking for some full-length black slacks and a jacket.

Richard explored the studio, finding the equipment to be mostly new, expensive and of high quality -- as far as he could tell, at any rate. A large studio-style soundboard with computer monitor and keyboard dominated one corner with cables snaking to various stations around the room. The walls and windows had been covered in some thick, but detachable sound-proofing and the ceiling rehung about a foot lower than the rest of the top floor. Sound could apparently be recorded and mixed both acoustically and electronically. Half a million dollars, at least, Richard guessed.

He sat at the drums and tapped out a thoughtful rhythm, feeling for the skill he'd once been proud of. He'd never been a stylist or a real professional but a good, amateur drummer who'd begun to make a living at it before his band self-destructed. He set a strong backbeat on the bass and played with the snare and cymbals like he might while warming up a crowd. And he smiled. After a bit he ventured into a drum solo, using the toms and cymbals. He'd left the door to the bedroom propped open in case Jo called him.

In the walk-in, Jo finally found a full-length pair of lightweight black trousers. Half a dozen pairs had either been too short or too heavy. "Oh, my gosh, I think these are silk," she said, awed. A short jacket on the next hanger proved to be the match for the slacks but she could find no simple white shirt. The plainest shirt, okay, it's a blouse, had pleats down the front and a lacy self-bow at the collar. It too seemed to be made of some silken fabric, one Joel had never encountered.

The silky, sensuality of the cloth gave Jo a peculiar thrill. She felt her nipples crinkle just running the blouse though her fingers. "Damn it! I'm going to have to w-wear a b-b-bra w-with this!" With perfect timing, Richard did a drum roll ending with a clash of cymbals in the other room. "Oh, b-be quiet," Jo said. "I've got to start some time, I guess."

* * *

Jo found a drawer full of bras in the drawers under the vanity in the dressing room. A colorful assortment of styles and fabrics simply confused her. "I've only got two tits, why do I need so m-many b-b-bras?" There didn't seem to be any plain white ones, the nearest she could find being white with pale yellow decorative lace. The cups seemed very soft, even plush. "P-p-padding? I guess it w-wouldn't hurt," she said. "I'm not exactly P-pam Anderson up top."

Giggling a little, she stripped off the little black dress and examined her reflection in the full-length tri-fold mirrors. "W-w-wow," she murmured. "There's not a lot of m-me but what's there is cherce." She stared for a bit, then frowned. "I'm not the least turned on looking at a naked girl, b-because it's m-m-me?" She turned, trying a pose or two, recognizing the sexiness of her image but apparently immune to the impact.

What if Richard could see me? she thought. Her nipples got instantly hard. Oh, crud, am I in trouble. And I'm definitely going to have to wear a bra.

In the studio, Richard stopped playing with the drums and looked at some of the other stuff in the room. He found a filing cabinet beside the sound board and opened it up. Mostly full of sheet music, a few bills, invoices, warranty papers and the like. The third drawer down, though seemed to be full of packets, nine-by-twelve manila envelopes, all stuffed to the same thickness. He pulled one out, noted a Burbank P.O. Box return address, opened the envelope and pulled out the contents to spread on the sound desk.

His eyes got very wide.

In the dressing room, Jo finally fastened the bra without putting it on, then pulled it down over her head like a t-shirt, putting her arms through the straps. It only worked because of the exceptionally stretchy material of the bra but she had tried three times to fasten it behind her while watching in a mirror and got it crooked, the wrong hooks in the wrong loops, every time.

She tugged and pushed at things until the bra seemed to fit. Not exactly the most comfortable thing in the world, she told herself, but at least my new body won't be trying to advertise while I'm wearing it. I'm just not ready to deal with this boy-girl thing until I get the girl thing sorted out.

The shirt went on next and she fumbled with the wrong-way buttons for a bit but that seemed like a simple matter of adjusting her perception of the problem. After realizing they were just backwards, the buttoning went more easily. The slacks went on smoothly, fitting tightly at the waist and falling like caresses over her new curves. Hoo boy! she told her reflection. You are so not a boy. She examined her rear elevation, "I don't think the p-pants make my b-butt look b-big, b-but I do think I've got a b-b-big b-b-b-butt," she said out loud. She giggled.

Noticing in the mirror that she hadn't tied the lace at her throat, she flipped it into a casual butterfly knot that looked elegant and efficient. Whoa? Where have I done that before? she wondered. She found a pair of silky white socks and some square-toed black half-boots with an inch-and-a-half heel that looked as if they had been bought just to go with the suit. The heels did not feel excessive or dangerous but very comfortable and ordinary. Most of the shoes in her closet had heels that high or higher.

Her reflection pleased her in several odd ways, but.... "M-my hair," she said aloud. The short not-blond, not-red, not-brown shag looked out of place with her elegant blouse, as if she'd been scalped in her sleep by a malicious kid brother. She remembered the wigs in the other room, picked up the jacket and left the dressing room.

Through the door into the studio she could see Richard peering at something on what might be a sound-mixing board. (And if it wasn't, why did she think it was?) "What are you looking at?" she asked, falling without effort into a graceful pose in the doorway.

Richard looked up. Did a momentary flash of guilt cross his face? "Nothing, really," he said."Just some sheet music your band might have been using?"

"I have a b-b-band?" Jo asked.

"Apparently." Richard shuffled some papers together and stuffed them into a large envelope that he tossed casually on top of a filing cabinet. "Wow," he said when he gave her a second look."You look fantastic, like you've been doing this for years."

Jo ran a hand through her hair, "Except for m-my hair?"

"Uh, well, yeah, that pretty much sucks," he agreed. "Too short and no style." He came towards her. "The glasses look okay, though, make you look more intelligent."

Jo scowled at him. "W-what? Not so m-much like a ditz?"

"Well, an intelligent ditz." He grinned, stopping in front of her.

"Except for the hair?"

"Except for the hair," he agreed again.

* * *

"I think you should wear the red one," said Richard. "Your natural hair color is red."

"Not that red," Jo objected. "And that's w-way too much hair." The fiery red wig had tresses that would almost reach her waist. "I'd trip over it or something. I like the short one."

"But that platinum color looks so fake," said Richard. "The other blonde would look better on you."

Jo sighed. The shoulder-length, curly, golden blonde wig did look the most natural. "Okay, okay. But, I really don't know how to p-put it on, so -- you know? -- it won't come off at the wrong time."

Richard picked the wig off the stand. "If it's made for you, it will fit well enough not to worry about that. Hey! I think this one is real hair." He handed it to Jo. "Now I read somewhere that you put it on the way a baseball player puts on his cap, front to back. See? There are tabs in the back to pull the band down with."

"I never saw a b-ballplayer p-p-put on a w-wig like that."

"Not a wig, a ball cap. And that's the way all the pros do it, out in the outfield. They send them to the minors to learn how," he said, keeping a straight face.

She stared at him for a moment, then at the wig, sighed and turned to the mirror. Putting her head down, she pulled the wig on, front to back then tossed her head to get the loose strands out of her face. A glamorous blonde with tousled hair looked back at her from the mirror.

"Take off your glasses and put them back on," Richard suggested.

Realizing what he meant, she did so, adjusting the fit of the wig around her ears. "Shoot!" she exclaimed. "When did my ears get p-p-pierced?" She felt of the holes with a finger, turning her head side to side.

Richard leaned close to look. "Sonoffa? I know they weren't pierced earlier, we both looked."

Jo took a deep breath, having Richard so close disturbed her in several non-linear ways. "I'm still changing? W-what else has happened?"

"Your tits look bigger," said Richard.

"It's just the way the shirt f-fits," said Jo, momentarily crossing her arms over her chest.

"You're wearing a bra?"

"Uh, yes." She blushed. "How could you tell?"

"That shirt is pretty translucent, I can see itty-bitty yellow roses." And I can't see your nipples, you naughty girl. He grinned.

"Darn it! Get away from me!" She uncrossed her arms and grabbed a brush from the vanity to mess with her hair.

Richard watched her fluff and arrange locks as if she'd been doing it for years.

"You're m-making me nervous," she complained, putting the brush down.

"It's a padded bra, isn't it?"

"Yes! M-most of mine are, that aren't like b-barely there at all. I've got like sixty of them." She pushed at him with both hands; his chest felt amazingly solid under her hands.

He yielded, stepping away. "Sixty bras? Maybe you have a fetish. Wanna try some make-up? Just a little lipstick, huh?"

Jo sighed. When he stepped back, she'd had to resist following him. Can I really smell him and does he really smell that good? "Huh?" she said.

"Lipstick," he repeated. "You need a bit, for some color in your face."

"Have you seen how m-many lipsticks I've got? It's like a giant Crayola b-box, I wouldn't know which one to p-p-pick."

"Another fetish, you're a kinky girl. Look in your purse, I bet you keep your favorite there." He snatched the big straw bag off the bed and passed it to her. It had a huge yellow, white and green daisy on one side, orange, yellow and blue on the other.

"I don't have a f-f-f...." She grabbed the purse and plunged her hand into it, coming up immediately with a gleaming golden tube. Opening it she twisted the color up to get a look. "I don't know how to do this," she said.

"Just try it," he said. "And oh, I think I found some of the photos you may have sent to that agent." That ought to distract her from thinking about how to put on lipstick.

She hesitated.

"Just put it on like chapstick," he said. He waited till she began her motion. "You look really good in a bikini," he said.

She put the lipstick on in three quick movements, blotted with a tissue from the vanity, and reapplied, looking in the mirror while she thought about things to hit Richard with. The brush still lay at hand but the purse was bigger and heavier. The rosy-coral lipstick went well with her hair, skin and eyes. "You're teasing m-me."

"I'm teasing you?" Richard said. "That's just so unfair."

She couldn't help it, she giggled. "P-poor Richard. It m-must b-be hard f-f-for you." Then she giggled twice as much when she realized what she'd said.

"You have no idea," Richard said with a cartoonish moan.

"Stop it!" said Jo. "What time is it? Do we have to go? Can I see these photos?" She dropped the lipstick into her bag and retrieved a tiny bottle. Still without thinking about it, she sprayed her wrists then wiped each wrist on her neck behind her ears in an essentially awkward but very feminine gesture, patting and fluffing her hair slightly at the same time.

Richard stared.

Jo started to put the spray bottle back. "What?" she asked.

"Is that Mille-something?"

Jo looked at the bottle and did a very cute double take. "Mille et Un Fleurs, it says. Did I just use this? How did you know what it w-was?"

"Fucking Barry," said Richard. He looked disgusted.

Jo dropped the little bottle back into her purse. "I hope the f-f-fuck not," she said.

* * *

Richard didn't hand her the manila envelope until they were in the limo on the way to the airport. "You f-found a bunch of these in the studio?" Jo asked.

"Yup, a whole file cabinet drawer full of them."

Jo put her big oversize purse in the floor and opened the envelope in her lap, pulling out about fifteen large photos. "Glossies," she said.

"Color glossies, mostly," added Richard.

The first three were headshots, one of Jo, or rather Melody, wearing the golden blonde wig she had just put on up in her room. One of the others showed her in the long red haired wig and the third showed her natural ginger-colored hair in a soft-textured tousle a bit shorter than the blonde wig. She had on makeup and jewelry in all of them and a big wide smile.

The next six showed her in an evening gown, a tennis skirt, a business suit, a sundress, a cheerleader outfit and a stage costume with a guitar, in various wigs and with her natural hair. "I m-must b-be a m-m-model," she said. In the next three she wore swimsuits, one a barely-there string bikini and in the last three she modeled lingerie. "Oh," she said quietly.

"I burned the nude ones," said Richard.

She looked at him and decided he was joking because he had such a completely serious expression. "M-moose chips, Richard," she said. "Why did you tell me these were sheet m-music at first?"

"Well, I did find lots of sheet music but I made you wait till we were in the car to look at these because you would have wanted to look at a lot more and there was lots of stuff in there and we didn't have the time."

"Okay, but I can tell when you're lying, you know." She tried to look smug.

"Oh? You never could before. What is it, feminine intuition?" Richard grinned and semaphored with his eyebrows.

"No. It's easier than that. When you lie your lips m-move." Jo kept a straight face and looked as serious as a doctor prescribing bed rest and daily enemas. Then she sudden grinned.

Richard laughed. "I should have been a politician, you're saying?"

"No, thank you. Already got one of those in m-my life." She shuddered, thinking of Barry Aronhaus's kiss. And then how she had kissed Richard in retaliation. And how she'd like to try that again. Just to see. If.... She tried to stop thinking of it.

"So," said Richard, helping without knowing it. "This Harmon guy has these pics of you, is he with a modeling agency?"

"I kind of hope so."

"Well, he might handle musical talent, I suppose, but the only photo of you with an instrument, it's a guitar. And you don't play the guitar regular."

Jo knew what he meant. She looked at her hands. "I've got short nails b-but no guitar calluses."

"Uh huh. So why would you pose with a guitar? Do you even play one?"

"I used to be able to strum a few chords. I wish we had had time to check that guy out on the 'net. I've got this terrible f-f-feeling what he does."

"What?" asked Richard.

"If it's not m-modeling then the only other thing that f-fits."

"Oh, shit," said Richard, realizing.

Jo nodded. "Escort service." She shivered but one part of her wondered, what would that be like?

* * *

They didn't say much else on the trip to the Burbank airport, and Richard slipped into the line of waiting limos with only a nod at the security guard. The poor man probably strained his neck doing a double take when he spotted Melody in the shotgun seat. She smiled and waved at him with just her fingers. The older man beamed and waved back.

"Are you flirting with Nacho the guard?" asked Richard.

"No," said Jo, "just being friendly."

"Uh huh, sure," Richard said.

Jo grinned at him. "Jealous?"

"Uh? I dunno. Maybe. I mean...." He trailed off, unable to think of a way to keep it light and funny. Something painful had pinged inside him. "He's old enough to be your grandfather," he finished.

"You are jealous," said Jo. "How 'b-bout that?" She giggled.

"Not of Nacho," said Richard. "But I...." He stopped himself, popped the trunk and got out to put the magnetic sign identifying his limo as "Paragon" on the roof. "Want the fare to be able to find us," he said as he got back in.

Neither of them said anything about what they had been talking about. At least, not out loud. They settled back in the seats and stared out at traffic and the lost-looking pedestrians one sees everywhere around airports.

Richard wondered, I can't be feeling serious about my old roomie just because he's now a gorgeousity. That's Joel, the guy who gets obsessive about which way the toilet paper turns on the roll. The one who got me a pigtail electric extension cord for my birthday. Okay, I needed that for the rotary drill I was using to polish the limo but that is a supergeeky birthday present.

He glanced sideways at her. She had a fingertip in her mouth, not chewing on her nail, just -- is she sucking on her finger? Jeez! Does she know what that does to a guy to watch that? What the heck is she thinking about?

Jo stared out the limo's windshield, not really seeing anything. This is the new me, she thought. Melody Jo Thierry, rich, spoiled, and -- beautiful. That's not ego, I know what I look like now. But who am I? What do I want to do with my life? She put a finger in her mouth, nibbling gently on the pad, not the cuticle. It was a gesture teachers and schoolmates had broken Joel of back in junior high but Melody Jo had continued to get away with it for years because she looked so darn cute with a finger in her mouth.

Richard is watching me, she realized. She stopped nibbling on her finger and just sucked on it a moment, thinking. What am I going to do with Richard? I know what my body wants to do -- and I'm starting to feel a lot less gay about it. I'm a girl, why shouldn't I jump his bone? Bones. She blushed.

She knows I'm watching, thought Richard, seeing her blush.

He knows I know he's watching, thought Jo.

Now what do we do?

The tap on the roof of the limo caught them both by surprise.

* * *

In a black limo on a the road to hell, Sophie glared at Ted who glared back.

"One of yours?" they both asked.

"Iynx, vos debeo mihi una ampulla de Coca," said Bill.

* * *

Richard and Jo both scrambled out of the car after the rap on the roof.

An enormous black man standing on the sidewalk in a fashionable London business suit (that must have cost more than the limo) looked down at Jo. He grinned through a mass of pockmarks and tribal scars and peered at her out of coke-bottle thick glasses. Not just tall or fat, he stood close to seven feet tall and probably weighed over five hundred pounds. He also carried two massive, ivory tipped canes, one of which he had just withdrawn from using to rap the limo roof.

"I am the delight of being to greet you, Miss Paragon," said the black man. "It is to have the graceful pleasure of naming me Rightly Revered Dar Gmunro. Service to you. To be venturing I am from my country home yclept Dnuro, a state of nation island by the Hornishness of Africa." He made a motion that looked a bit like a bow made by someone who did not bend in the middle.

Behind the oversize fare stood two redcaps, pushing a cart laden with black leather suitcases, brass appurtenanced trunks and odd-shaped containers without names. The air porters rolled their eyes and grinned wide enough to nearly match the expression of their patron. "Wanna help us put this junk inna trunk, Paragon?" one of them asked.

"Sure," said Richard, starting around the rear of the limo. "Jo, get the door for Mr. Monroe, will you?"

"Yes, sir," said Jo, a tiny bit awed by the size and majesty of their fare and confused by his syntactical gyrations. She moved to open both of the doors to the rear compartment, figuring the massive man would need the room.

"Gmunro," said the giant, looking at Richard. Then to Jo, "It is thou art naming to be called that Joe?"

"Uh, it's M-melody Jo, actually." She stood aside and Gmunro bent slightly to try to peer inside. No wonder they said they'd need the bus for this guy, Jo thought.

"Ah," he said after inspecting the space. "M-melody. A naming of beauty to be meeting music. Delightful am I to acquaint me unto thyself." Everything he said came out with such a rotund profundity that it took Jo a moment or more to work out the sense of it from the fractured syntax. "Verily and forsooth, art thou not a M-melody of Angels in a civitation of angels?" He waggled curly black eyebrows at her.

She shook her head, giggling and squeaking in embarrassment like some obscure British dessert. Mr. Gmunro beamed even wider as he attempted to negotiate the task of inserting his bulk into the backseat of the limo. The problem seemed to be that the limo sat on the tarmac some six inches below the level of the sidewalk and this height differential required an inconsiderate amount of bending by the man-mammoth.

"Oh, dear," said Jo.

"To be regretted I am, should have I not engorged to be fed myself on a troop of monkeys," said Mr. Gmuno. He said this in a sad and lugubrious tone, as if officiating at a state funeral.

Jo couldn't work that one out at all, not being sure whether Mr. Gmunro desired to damn himself to be eaten by simians or regretted having devoured an entire troop of little beasts at his last meal. She stood transfixed by the contemplation of sheer unbending girth, trying not to giggle. Did they bring him here in a cargo plane? Jo wondered. Maybe we need a derrick to get him in and out?

Dar Gmunro, Rightly Revered, leaned on his canes with an air of fatalism, as if this sort of indignity were his usual lot and things would eventually work out. "Miss M-Melody Jo Paragon, to have thy contentment may be greater pleasingness to this Gmunro at lunch?"

"Uh," said Jo.

"Not the cuisine's nativeness unto my spaceful abandon, endeavor to be introduced in my person to own thy liking," he said.

"You w-want to eat local f-food? Sir?" Jo guessed.

He nodded like a mountain casting a benediction. "In its various entirety, to the great orifice of one poor ensample, to wit, this carcase before thy beauteous envelope."

Jo had great difficulty suppressing an explosion of mirth while blushing. "Hamburgers, p-pizza, b-burritos?"

"Bring the plethoras, those ravening fishes, my peckishness has not to be situated since engrossing the South Atlantic River," said the huge man. His enormous belly growled an agreement.

"Oh, dear," said Jo. That almost made sense. "Richard, M-mr. G'm-munro says he hasn't eaten in hours."

Richard, who'd been involved in stowing the luggage looked up, surprised to see the huge African gentleman still standing beside the limo. Well, at least he hasn't turned the car over trying to get in.

One of the porters mumbled, "Careful he don't eat that blonde."

"I will, if he don't want her," offered the other. They traded porterish leers.

Glaring, Richard dismissed them after giving each a tip for helping load the trunk. "What's the problem?" he asked Jo, stepping around to the passenger side of the big vehicle. Guh-gug guh-jub! I didn't know they had walruses in Africa! He tried not to stare but up close the guy was overwhelming.

"Must I be to chastise and Atkinsize to the insertion of the estimable?" asked Gmunro.

Jo made little cappuchino machine noises while Richard took in his fare's great girth and the immobility implied by the two canes. He'd driven a limo for five years and he'd seen a lot but never anyone with Mr. Gmunro's set of problems. At least, he seems to understand English, even if you couldn't really say he's speaking it. "I can move the car, so you don't have so far to bend over to get in, sir," he said after a bit.

"To the devotion of sanctified raisins, Mr. Paragon. Thanks be," said Mr. Gmunro. He stepped backward, using his canes to steady himself. People on the walkway went wide around him, though several stopped to stare at a respectful distance. He beamed at the crowd with the same ferocious good cheer he'd shown to Jo. One child, his hand tightly clasped in his mother's burst into tears and the little family hurried away, their retreat guarded by the apprehensive father. "Ah, splendiferous Bank of the River Bur, where encounters to one might such Angels," he said beaming at Jo.

Shaking her head and grinning, she helped Richard close the passenger side doors. "I'll w-wait with Mr. G'm-munro," she said.

"Okay," said Richard dashing around to the driver's side. By backing and filling, he would be able to move the limo away from the curb to give the giant more maneuvering room.

"It'll just be a m-minute, sir," said Jo as Mr. Gmunro moved forward to stand beside her.

He nodded, looking down at her with an avuncular kindness. "In which gleeful propinquity dost thou to contemplate thy third wish?" he asked.