A fascination for women's clothes takes Denis out of his comfort zone and into the realms of Strangefellows Day...
Big R-r-r-r-respect to Kris again for proofing and adding some nice touches.
I have added a few lines to make a certain aspect a little more obvious. My fault, I couldn't see the wood for the trees and was being far too subtle!
Part I
Denis
Denis Robson was the floor manager of Fellows department store and ever since his promotion eighteen months ago, had been wrestling with a problem.
The problem was that his responsibility was for the men’s and ladies wear floor and every day he went to work, he was forced to walk through the ladies section, past the dresses, skirts and blouses that sparkled and shimmered in the carefully placed lights.
He’d walk on past the shoes in pretty, bright shades, past the upturned ‘legs’ with toes pointed, covered in glossy stockings, their lace tops in intricately woven patterns beckoning to him as he made his way towards the men’s section.
The worst (or best) part was still to come - the lingerie. Panties, suspender-belts, corsets, basques and bras with their delicate detailing and silkiness were just crying out to be worn and as much as he tried, he just could not get the idea of seeing himself encased in silk or nylon or lace out of his head.
There it was. For a year and a half, Denis had managed to suppress the urge to touch the delicate gossamer nightwear, brush against the silk slips and other under-things. How he had managed to keep his desires from his assistants, Lisa, Natalie and Cynthia, was a minor miracle. They seemed to notice everything else.
He was tired; his sleep constantly troubled with visions of himself in the guise of a woman, rolling sheer stockings up smooth legs; fastening a suspender belt around his waist and attaching the straps to the lace tops of the stockings before sliding the almost transparent thong up nylon-covered thighs…
Oh how he dreamed of that day...
“Sir? Sir?” said the tall lady and Denis’s jolt back into reality was like being hit by an express train.
“Er, yes, yes. How can I help madam?”
“Miss.” she corrected.
“Sorry. How may I help, Miss?”
“I’d like to try this on.” she said, handing him a diaphanous ivory coloured night-gown.
“I’ll see if there’s someone available to help.”
“But they’re all busy and I really am in a hurry. Can’t you help?” she asked, thrusting the night-gown at him.
Sparks seemed to shoot up his arm as he took the garment, feeling how fine the fabric was and the definite effect it was having. He led the woman to an empty changing room, hoping he had shrugged off the feeling without her noticing and handed back the night-gown.
“If you would like any further assistance Miss, I shall be just here.”
“Thank you.” she said and pulled the curtain across, leaving it just short of closed. Denis averted his eyes as he noticed the reflection in the changing room mirror and could see her dress starting to fall away, exposing a cup of her delicately embroidered bra.
He had barely turned when he heard the woman call for help.
“There’s no room in here, can you hold this?”
“Certainly Miss.” he said automatically and reached out to take her dress. It was expensive, light and silky to the touch, even nicer than the gown had been. The smell of her perfume — expensive and heady drifted to his nostrils.
“That’s what I would wear if I were a woman too.” he thought, blinking anxiously for thinking such a thing.
More sparks.
Then came the bra.
“Er, Miss I…” he said turning a rather fetching crimson.
“Thanks.” she said absently and poor Denis didn’t know where to look or what to think. He could feel the temperature rising and desperately wanted to drop her clothing and run, but Denis was the consummate professional.
The cubicle curtain had been left open about a third of the way and the woman was just in the process of pulling the night-gown over her head, her curvaceous body in perfect view.
She seemed totally oblivious to the fact that Denis could see everything. He turned away, his face deepening in shades of crimson as his eyes met with a perfect vision of her firm breasts, jutting from her chest, each surmounted by a dark pink nipple.
Her arms dropped as the garment slid silently over her shoulders and she turned this way and that to see in the mirror, her body clearly visible through the filmy fabric.
“I think this is too big. Do you have one in a smaller size?” she asked and less than a heartbeat later she had pulled the night-gown over her head and thrust it at Denis, standing before him in nothing but a smile.
“I-I-I…” he stammered then coughed. “I’ll see.” he said handing back her clothes before taking the night-gown away.
En route, he saw Cynthia.
“Cynthia, would you mind finding this in a smaller size please and attend the lady in the changing cubical over there?” he said motioning in the direction of the naked woman, the memory of her totally hairless body still smouldering in his mind.
“Certainly Mr. Denis.” she answered, wondering what could possibly have happened to get Mr. Denis into such a state.
Denis could feel the wave of relief wash over him as she took the gown from him and he made a bee-line for his office.
“Was there a smaller size? Oh.” said the woman as instead of Denis, Cynthia was stood proffering the garment. She snatched the night-gown from Cynthia and nearly pulled the curtain off its hooks as she dragged it across its track, grimacing and muttering.
“Ah.” said Cynthia, realising what had happened.
Denis felt that the bigger embarrassment was the way they laughed over his reactions once the lady had gone.
“I think she had the hots for you.” said Cynthia and Denis blushed to the roots of his hair, unable to stop the women from poking fun at him.
“It’s not right.” he said, trying to loosen his collar. “Not right at all.”
“Why?” asked Lisa, trying to goad him into more blushing.
“It’s not the way a woman should behave.”
“Don’t men do things to attract the attentions of women then?” asked Natalie.
“Not like that.” he said, puffing himself up. “We would buy flowers or take her to dinner or to the theatre. I certainly would not parade around naked for a woman I didn’t even know.”
“Spoilsport!” said Lisa.
He called a halt to the conversation at that point, knowing that he had lost the battle and that the women knew it too.
At home that night, he thought about his encounter with the brazen lady.
The more he thought, the more he figured that she had done it on purpose; that she knew he could see her and that that was precisely what she wanted. It was odd, but although he found her attractive, at the time that it was happening, he was more envious of her body than attracted to it, although he was most definitely attracted to it, er, her.
The fact was that his keenly analytical mind was trying to adjust to the fact that his main focus was how he would feel in a body such as that.
“How strange…” he thought.
“Good morning Ladies.” said Denis brightly, giving the lingerie-draped shelves as wide a berth as was possible. “Don’t let them see you looking at those.” he thought.
“Morning Mr. Denis.” intoned the others as they fussed about their stations.
Denis went into his ‘office’, which was really nothing more than a cubby-hole at the back of the men’s section. He felt safe in there, especially after the event of the previous day. The wool worsted suits, sensible Y-fronts and button-down shirts making a welcome buffer between him and that area.
He switched on the PC, placed his brief-case on the small desk, took off his jacket and sat on the chair to wait for the computer to boot up, sighing as he looked across the floor to the brightly-coloured tops, skirts, shoes — oh those shoes with their tall, slender heels…
Despite his close encounter of the female kind, he found that the feelings he had been fighting so hard, were now stronger than ever and the memory of that woman and her body still fresh in his mind, just gave him something more to focus on. Now, he wasn’t thinking of him in women’s clothes, but him with a body like hers and woman’s clothes.
It was getting worse. Oh dear.
He jumped up, quietly closed the door and then went back to his desk.
Within minutes, he was answering phone calls and entering numbers into the company database, quietly grateful for his mind to be elsewhere other than on the clothing that almost called to him from the other side of the shop.
Later that evening, Denis considered his position. His proximity to the ladies accoutrements was doing nothing for his state of mind. Every day it worsened, every day he wanted more and more to indulge his desire, his fantasy — no, his need. Perhaps he ought to apply for a transfer or even find another job elsewhere.
He ran himself a bath and undressed as the tub filled, the sound of the water splashing receding further into the background as he studied himself, naked in the mirror.
Who was he trying to kid? He loved working at Fellows. There was no way he wanted to work anywhere else
His eyes ran up and down his reflection in the glass, the thoughts of the lingerie department in the forefront of his mind as he mentally superimposed the woman’s body over his own, but the dark hair that sprouted from his chest, spreading across his belly and continuing down beyond his crotch, down his legs to his ankles, saddened him. It was impossible to imagine himself as anything other than a short, skinny, man.
It struck him that perhaps he could do something about that and with trembling hand (never a good way to start), he reached for his razor.
He placed the head of the razor against his chest and was about to draw it across.
What was he doing?
“What! Are you some kind of a pervert or something?” he said aloud and he replaced the razor into its holder behind the taps on the sink.
He sank into the bath, numb.
Why was this happening to him? Why was he having these thoughts?
He had no idea. It wasn’t something he had always had to deal with, not some out of control fantasy. Although it did feel as though it was heading that way.
There had to be something he could do.
The next day at work was much more subdued. The woman didn’t make another appearance (thankfully) and Denis didn’t even have time to really pay any attention to his ‘nemesis’ area.
The evening however wasn’t nearly so straightforward.
He had sat and cogitated over his dilemma for hours. He hadn’t even changed out of his work clothes or eaten anything. He’d just sat there, elbows on the table, head in hands, his waking nightmare prodding all the right (or wrong) buttons.
“This is no good.” he said and looked at the clock. It was half past eleven and he had work the next morning. “Shit!” he mumbled softly.
He dragged himself into the bathroom. Perhaps a nice hot bath and straight to bed would be best for now. He could catch up with something to eat in the morning.
He set the plug into the plughole of the bathtub and started the taps running. A dusty-looking bottle caught his eye from the shelf and he read the label.
Delicately perfumed with minerals and essential oils
to relax tired muscles and calm the mind.
It was something an old girlfriend of his had left behind. Up until this point, he had only ever considered throwing it out, but now it seemed a most welcome sight. He was tense and really did need to unwind. Why not give it a go?
It smelt somewhat flowery; curiously appealing and as the bubbles started to form in the running water, the real smells started to waft around the bathroom and it really did seem to have a relaxing effect.
He started to strip and once again found himself looking in the mirror as he did so.
“Not a bad shape” he thought; perhaps a little short and skinny for a man but certainly not anything that could be described as ‘ruggedly masculine’.
He started shave his face imagining again what he would look like in the silky attire of a woman, the body of the woman again superimposed over his own, but once again, his hairy body made that impossible. He finished shaving his face and studied his body critically.
Suddenly he began lathering himself across the chest, under the arms, right down to his navel and reached once again for his razor. He looked at his slender frame in the mirror, his hand starting to tremble and took a deep breath.
“It’ll always grow back.” he mused and drew the shaving implement across his chest.
A wide strip of bare flesh appeared behind the razor and then another and another.
Carefully, he shaved around his nipples, rinsing the razor often as the course hair clogged in between the blades and finished by shaving under his arms.
It felt weird and looked strange too, but in a way that brought a flush to his cheeks and a strange feeling of satisfaction.
He’d not seen himself devoid of body hair in years. His milk-white skin almost shone in the light and after drying himself, he ran his hand over the normally hairy area, the smoothness intoxicating.
From the waist up, he was now completely hairless — well except for his head anyway and he was on a roll. He turned off the bath taps, lathered around his crotch then down each leg and went back to work, his excitement mounting with each stroke, barely able to contain himself.
It took perhaps ninety minutes and another razor, but by the time he had finished, he stood before the mirror and gasped.
“My God!” he exclaimed, turning this way and that, looking at every inch of his body, smooth, pale and surprisingly soft. “That’s amazing.”
The image reflected in the mirror was far less masculine without hair than he imagined it would be. Apart from his face, he looked like a teenager in that stage of androgyny that so many go through. With no bulging muscles and his slight frame, his perception of ‘man’ was being erased and replaced by another, one that closer embodied the soft and flowing lines of a more feminine form.
Were his eyes playing tricks on him or was that what was really there?
“This is fantastic! I never thought…” he said slightly breathless, buzzing from the feelings that seemed to engulf him and were about to get even more intense as he lowered himself into the scented bubble bath.
The softened water caressed while the sensual perfumes relaxed him and allowed him to let the day’s stresses just slip away as he lay back and surrendered to the warm waters.
It was well after one in the morning of Thursday 29th of April by the time he got to bed, but there was something different this time — he was relaxed and ready to enjoy a good night’s sleep.
He was in for yet another shock as he climbed between the sheets. Bed was something else again. The soft Egyptian cotton sheets seemed different as his hairless body slipped between them and he drifted off to sleep, fervently wishing that these feelings would remain, that this would last forever.
Outside, something chuckled quietly. Something that gave off a vague smell of brimstone and walked on cloven hoof.
Yes the Devil himself was abroad. Today was one of those special days when Old Nick could walk on the face of the earth and grant wishes.
“By the end of tomorrow Denis Robson," he said with a deep, hollow voice. "You will have all you wanted. Oh yes, - ALL!”
But we all know what happens when the Devil grants wishes, don't we?
The next morning was the first morning in a long time that he had woken after a whole night’s sleep. He felt refreshed and was reminded of his escapades the night before when he looked into the bathroom mirror.
Gone was the drawn and gaunt face that usually looked back at him, replaced with a much more relaxed person. He lifted his arm and a hairless pit looked back at him.
He touched it.
“Oh my G…” he started. “What have I done?”
Cleaning his teeth before dressing, he became more accustomed to his new look. The smooth skin looked good, which surprised him. It felt good too and he was filled with an anxious excitement, not sure that he’d made the right decision; less sure that he wanted that mat of fuzz back, but comfortable that it would always grow back anyway.
It looked and felt a lot more feminine and Denis was momentarily paralysed with the fear of someone finding out.
“You plonker!” he admonished. “Who’s going to find out?”
His walk into work was odd to say the least. He could almost feel every thread in his trousers; every seam in his shirt and his crotch had never been so sensitive, yet was strangely non responsive, almost passive.
He too was subtly different. He found himself loose and happy to bimble along gently. He even found that by the time he reached the side door of Fellows Department Store, he was humming away to himself.
Today was to be a different day in a lot of respects. Fellows were launching “Fellows Online”, an internet-based ordering system. They prided themselves on their service and wanted to extend that service to providing home deliveries and an on-line ordering system.
They realised that there was no substitute for being able to see and try, but incidentals such as everyday underwear, tights, stockings and makeup products would be very popular. No doubt there would be others, but they were sure they had enough to start with.
Denis had more to think about than ever, but he was happy. He didn’t know why exactly, but he was.
He was printing another order from the PC when an idea struck him. He could add a few things of his own to a “new” order after the girls had gone home. No-one would know and he could pay by credit card, which meant not having to worry about the cash register. It was so simple, what could possibly go wrong?
This new regime required to staff to make up orders as they came in, ready for shipping at close of business. Posters to this effect had been all over every floor of the store for weeks, and the advertising paid off, with more orders waiting by opening time than they ever hoped for.
It meant more work for all of them, so when they weren’t dealing directly with the customers, they were assembling orders for the post and by mid morning, the girls were looking at one another wondering whether this onslaught was going to continue at the same pace, or once the novelty of it all wore off, things would return to normal.
When lunch finally arrived, they were all glad of a short rest. Denis came up in the conversation.
“I can’t say I’m too sure about this. He’s not himself.” said Cynthia.
“What? The man’s just having a good day.” said Natalie.
“Oh come on. He’s always been a stickler for the rules. Do this; don’t do that. No outbreaks of good humour. This just isn’t like him.”
“Well don’t shout too loud. I like him just as he is. He hasn’t bothered me once today and it’s been fine. Even the customer’s have noticed the difference.” said Lisa defensively.
“You’re not wrong Lisa, I’ve been left to my own devices all day and I have to say, I’ve got more done than any other time.” said Natalie, nodding enthusiastically.
Not wishing to upset the applecart, the colleagues left him well alone for the most of the day and it turned out to be one of the best they’d had, aside from when he was on holiday that is.
It got to near closing time and the three women were on tender-hooks.
There had been no indication that there was anything ‘wrong’ as far as Denis was concerned and yet each of them was itching to know what it was that was going on.
“You go, Cyn.” said Lisa.
“No fear. This could all just be a ruse. Something’s bound to be wrong. I’m not going anywhere near him or his office.”
“I’ll go.” said Nat. “I can’t stand this any longer and I’m buggered if I’m going home with this on my mind. I won’t be able to concentrate on the soaps if I do. There’s got to be a reason why he’s been so happy today and did you smell him as he went past? If that’s what I think it is, it’s bloody expensive, that new aromatherapy stuff.”
“Never!” said Cynthia.
“I think she’s right.” said Lisa. “I smelt it too and what about the humming?”
“This just ain’t right.” said Cynthia shaking her head.
The girls seemed a lot more attentive by the time closing-time arrived. Denis was a little curious as to why.
“You sure you’re alright?” asked Natalie, trying to look nonchalant.
“I’m fine thank you. I just have some last minute orders to prepare. You just run along and I’ll see you tomorrow.”
Three jaws dropped open simultaneously.
“What?” asked Denis, seeing the three stunned women standing before him, mouths open catching flies.
“Er, nothing. Well if you’re sure you’re okay, we’ll be off, won’t we girls?” said Natalie not wishing to look a gift horse in the mouth and grabbing the other two by the forearms she led them forcibly out of the immediate vicinity towards the stairs and away.
“’Night girls. See you in the morning.” called Denis cheerfully, going back to humming gently.
This was going to be easy.
In fact it was all going swimmingly.
As per his statement to the girls, Denis had some orders to fill and began walking round the various aisles and shelves with a cart, his clipboard and a biro behind his ear.
He assembled all five orders, none of which were particularly big and went and sat in his office to fill out the paperwork and enter it onto the system.
The butterflies were getting restless again as Denis realised that this was it. This was the time he’d been waiting for all day or longer and he went out onto the shop floor once again to gather the items he wanted.
The lingerie was simple as most of the garments were fairly obvious if one knew the conversion (approximate of course) as he did, between men’s sizes and women’s or vice-versa. He knew his own vital statistics so was able to pull underwear from the various racks, shelves and tables with no problem.
The difference was though, these were for him and as he reached for the first item — a pack of sheer 20 denier black stockings with a lace top — he could see his hands shaking and the closer his fingers got to that packet, the more they shook.
“This is stupid! Just pick them up!” he muttered and grabbed at the packet. “See? That’s not so bad is it?”
He had had his eye on a thong too; nearly transparent, just like in his fantasy. It hung on a rack on a tiny hanger and as soon as his fingers touched the sheer material, it nearly sent him over the edge.
This was something he was unlikely to get used to and yet filling orders, no matter what the contents, was not a bother for him. Why was that?
A suspender belt next and the temperature was definitely rising. Beads of perspiration stood from his forehead and his breathing was becoming laboured, but he got the one he wanted. Finally there was the bra. A sheer number to match the thong and with trebling hands, legs, well everything really, he made his way back to the office.
Putting the garments on the desk, he studied them carefully, still wrapped, hung or generally packeted.
He was having second thoughts.
This was bad.
The sweat was now running down his face and although he had every intention to pay for the items and any further items he felt appropriate, it still felt wrong. Something inside him was telling him that this wasn’t a good idea, but the rest was telling him to give it a go; to get it out of his system.
He looked at the bra, along with the thong, the only items not wrapped or in packets. He could see the cups standing proud of the rest of the garment and suddenly he realised that although it would go around him, he had nothing to speak of to put inside it!
He knew just the things and almost sprinted across the floor to the counter, picking up a packet with two transparent blobs inside and smiled, repeating the sprint process back to the office.
Breathless, he looked again at his inventory.
Form the corner of his eye, he could see his reflection in a glass panel and his short hair, flattened down over his head seemed particularly inappropriate.
Back out of the office he headed at a dead run. Up the stairs he went to the next floor, staying only long enough to yank something off of a shelf, complete with the polystyrene ‘thing’ it rested on and leaping down stairs several at a time, hurtled back to the office.
Now he had something to sweat about.
Indeed he did. He even found he was enjoying himself. Perhaps it was the ‘hunt-the-thimble’ aspect of it all, but he was definitely enjoying it.
His pile on the table was now considerably larger now than it had been. The items he had retrieved from the various shelves and racks around the ladies section were small compared to the last and he hadn’t even thought about shoes.
Shoes?
“Oh crap!”
Back he went to the ladies section.
There was a pair of stilettos in black that had always appealed and in two shakes of a lamb’s tail, he was there with his shoes off, trying to force his foot into the high-heeled footwear he had taken from the shelf.
The socks weren’t helping, but one doesn’t try shoes on with bare feet.
He ran back to the office and fairly shredded the packet containing the stockings, dropping his trousers immediately after. Stepping out of them and yanking at one of his socks he bounced around in circles on one foot. The sock came free and flew off, landing who knew where in the small office. He repeated the procedure for the other sock, right down to bouncing around in circles, barely keeping balance.
Carefully, he rolled a stocking up one leg, until he had stretched it as far as it would comfortably go.
“Bugger!” he muttered as he realised that these particular stockings required a suspender belt, just as he had intended. What he hadn’t intended, was to have to get all kitted out in the shop and had forgotten too, about trying shoes on.
He pulled off the stocking and folded it neatly along with its twin, pushing it back into its packet and shot off onto the shop floor, shirt tails flapping behind him as his feet ‘slap, slap, slapped’ on the floor.
He quickly found what he was looking for, thought about it and returned them to the shelf.
“I don’t care how few times I might do this; I’m not wearing those knee-highs. They’re atrocious — even on women.”
He swapped them instead for a pair of hold-ups and bolted back to the shoe section. Once again, he started pulling the stockings on and trembled at the feeling, never mind the look, but he told himself sternly that he had to get past that to try the shoes and that there’d be plenty of time for admiring himself later.
This time the shoes slipped on with comparative ease and he stood up.
“How on earth do women wear these?” he asked as he wobbled and as soon as he tried to take a single step, he regretted it.
Sitting down with an almighty ‘thump’, he removed the shoes and carefully placed them to one side. Off he went to find an alternative and settled for a similar pair with no more than an inch and a half heel.
He was far less wobbly in those and he looked down at the first pair. They seemed almost mournful that they hadn’t been chosen and so, clutching both pairs, he slithered in his stocking covered feet to the office.
Denis was now just one item short on his list — a dress or maybe a skirt and blouse combination, he wasn’t sure.
It felt incredible wandering around the shop floor in the shoes and stockings, but he was painfully aware that whilst his lower half may have felt incredible, the top half in jacket, tie and shirt tails, looked ridiculous, but he didn’t care. There was no-one there to hinder his little sojourn into faux womanhood and browsing around looking at the plethora of colours, shapes, styles, lengths and everything else, he started to get an appreciation of why women enjoyed shopping so much.
What seemed like eons later, he finally selected a dress. He thought of it as playing it safe, but well, he knew the rule: “You can’t go wrong with a little black dress”.
He went back to the changing rooms and off came the jacket and shirt.
Slipping the dress over his head, he looked in the mirror. Somehow, the ‘safe’ bit didn’t seem to have worked. It hung on him like a sack. His smile turned to a frown as he plucked at the offending item here and there before he realised that the reason it looked so awful, was because he was short of a couple of important attributes that filled the dress in very specific places. In addition, no self respecting woman would dream of wearing a pair of boxer shorts under a dress.
Before he knew where he was, he was in the thong and bra too, and pulling the LBD over his head. He had stuffed the bra with the clear silicone ‘blobs’ he’d got earlier, which actually looked incredibly real, filling the bra to look real and not huge.
The one thing missing now was the hair and after he had run from the dressing room to the office and picked the wig off of the polystyrene ‘thing’ it was sat on, pulled it onto his head and brushed the hair off his face, he looked in the mirror and was truly satisfied — despite the lack of makeup.
He swished this way and that in front of the mirror and was thoroughly pleased with the effect. True, he wasn’t exactly going to win any beauty contests because he wasn’t going to be going out very often (at all and certainly not in that outfit), but now he felt that he could indulge his fantasies in style.
He went to the till with his jacket over his arm, pulled his wallet out of his inside pocket and removed the credit card. He swiped it through the card reader to make the purchase complete and though it was a small fortune, it was to him money well spent and he knew that this would not be the only time this outfit came out of the closet — even if he didn’t.
Outside, a shadowy figure stood in a darkened alley, tail swishing like that of a cat just ready to pounce, looking up at the windows chuckling.
“I think now should do.” it said darkly and almost negligently flicked its taloned fingers then moved deeper into the shadows on cloven hoof, a mist of brimstone permeating the late afternoon air and its hollow laughter unheard in the noise of the rush-hour traffic.
Part II
The intrusion
The card reader was taking its time as he stood there waiting and just before the receipt was printed, he heard a noise.
There was a strange feeling that accompanied it, but Denis was too absorbed in straining his ears to hear what was going on.
He wasn’t alone in the building, of that he was certain and he didn’t know what to do for the best. Should he hide, or should he go and investigate?
“Nice idea Den.” he said wryly. “But not in this outfit.”
The noise was that of a number of people trying to be quiet, failing then admonishing one another with “Shhhh!” noises. It was almost like a steam train going “pitter-patter-shhh, shhh, pitter-patter-shhh, shhh”, which was getting closer and closer.
“How many more flights?”
“Top floor, now shhh!”
Denis slipped his shoes off and using a mixture of running and sliding, got back to his office.
“Hey look at all this neat stuff.” said one of the intruders. “Bet Sally Jenkins wears these.” he said gyrating around with a little red satin thong held against his crotch.
“Suits you! Now put it down!” said another. “Let’s get upstairs.”
“I was just lookin’.” said the first.
“Yeah, well maybe there’ll be time for that later.”
Denis sat in his office. He had contemplated the possibility of changing back into his own clothes, well his masculine attire, but had to rethink on account of the fact that the leader of this particular posse, didn’t seem to have very much control over his crew and there was no telling when they would reappear or where.
At least the question of what could possibly go wrong had been answered.
From his office, Denis picked up the phone.
“Hello?”
“Emergency services. Which service do you want?”
“Police please.” said Denis, suddenly becoming only too aware that the voice with which he was speaking wasn’t the one he was used to hearing.
“And the address please?”
Denis gave the woman on the end of the line the address of the store.
“And to whom am I speaking?”
“You’re speaking to Denise Rob… I mean Den...Denise Robson, er…” What the hell was happening? Try as he might, he couldn’t say Denis. Each time he wanted to say it, but it came out as Denise.
“Are you on the premises Miss Robson?”
Miss? She called him Miss and he was completely thrown.
“Yes.” he said and started to tremble. “But they’re on the top floor — Electricals. I’m on the first floor — Ladies wear, Menswear and Hosiery. The police will probably find the side entrance open on the ground floor in Spring Street.”
“We’ll send someone round Miss. Please do not try and confront the intruders, just wait until help arrives.”
Well that was that then.
All he had to do was sit tight and all would be taken care of. Somehow that didn’t make him feel that much more secure.
He stuffed his suit and other clothes into a large “Fellows” carrier bag and set it down on the floor beside his desk.
“Just hold it for Christ’s sake.” muttered one of the intruders.
“But it’s heavy. Maybe I should go at the front.”
“I don’t believe this. Alright, let’s change places.”
Denis listened carefully. They appeared to be at the top of the stairs on his floor.
He snuck out of his office and was pleased that he was only wearing stockings. Although it made the going a bit slippery, he could be completely silent.
“OW! Gerroffmefoot!” yelled one of the intruders.
“Will you shut up? If there was anyone here, they’re sure to know we’re here now.”
“Does that mean we can stop whispering?”
“Like you even started. Let’s just get on with this. Old man Smart wants us out of here as soon as possible.
“Mr. Smart?” wondered Denis.
“THE Mr. Smart?” he wondered even more.
“The Mr. J. Henry Smart of Fellows?” he thought. “The same “Mr. J. Henry Smart” who signs my pay cheque every month?”
A thought was coming to Denis’s mind and he didn’t like where it was going — or for that matter where it had been.
“This means that the bungling buffoons wandering downstairs with the TV set are here on the orders of the owner. What did he possibly stand to gain from having a few electrical bits and pieces stolen?” thought Denis some more and the reasoning just didn’t add up.
“Unless,” he thought, a light bulb coming on over his head. “This is just a part of the plan and the real plan is something bigger.”
He liked where this thought was going even less than where the first went.
It was looking more and more like an insurance job and these oafs were just making it worth their while as it where. The question now was; what was the main thrust of their plan?
He planned on stopping thinking as soon as possible since each successive thought was darker than the previous, equally as plausible and despicable.
Denis slithered his way back to his office. So far, the intruders had gone up and down the stairs with three TV’s, a couple of stereos and umpteen DVD recorders, players and VCR’s. He didn’t think there was too much left for them to readily steal. Whatever the real part of the plan was would be sure to happen soon and there was still no sign of the police.
Denis put the shoes with the rest of his stuff in the bag and started out of the office. He went through the men’s section, through the ladies and towards the stairs and waited until he was reasonably sure that all the intruders were at least one floor above him.
From the noise they were making, it sounded like there were just the three of them and right at that time, all three were heading up to the second floor, one of them complaining loudly that this had better be the last trip as he was knackered.
Denis hurtled downstairs and stopped long enough to pull the low heels out of the bag, slip his feet in and exit.
Straight into the waiting grip of a policeman.
“Thank God you’re here officer. There are three men in there and they’re busy right now trying to empty the electrical section on the top floor, but I don’t think this is all they have in mind.”
“Right.” said the cop slowly. “And you were in there why?”
“I work there.”
“So I suppose, you do all your shopping after the store closes?”
“I, er, no. I mean, well sometimes, it’s just that this time, I wasn’t just shopping for me.”
“No I can see that. Perhaps you should have remembered to take the label off the dress next time you want to “buy” it.”
“But officer. I did pay for this.”
“Yeeeeees.” he drawled. “I suspect you probably did. Would that have been with Monopoly money, or did you just leave an IOU?”
“Credit card.”
“Uh-huh? And whose was it.”
“Mine! Denise, I mean Den-Den-Denise Robson.”
There it was again. Somehow, he just couldn’t say his own name. Why? What was happening?
And that wasn’t the worst of it either. Any check would reveal a Mr. D Robson had used his credit card, but not a Miss D. Robson. This might take some explaining.
He didn’t dare even wonder as to what else could possibly go wrong as he sat in the back of the police car, heading for the station.
“You’re making a big mistake officer. There are three men in there who are currently robbing the place. I overheard one of them saying that they had something else planned. That’s why I phoned for you lot in the first place.”
The policeman thought about it for a moment.
“I have a possible robbery at Fellows Department Store. I need someone to investigate.” he said. The radio crackled back something that Denis didn’t make out.
“Possibly three men and they may have something else planned — don’t know if they’re armed.” he replied and continued driving.
In the ten or fifteen minutes it took to get from Fellows to the police station, Denis considered his situation.
There had been no time to think about appearance, things had just happened so quickly. Now, the impact of being outside in public as a woman was starting to sink in.
God only knew what the police officer thought when he first clapped eyes on him and now the fear was rising, but at least the policeman took the robbery part seriously enough to radio it through.
“We got a shoplifter Sarge.” said the officer as he roughly pushed Denis forward towards the desk Sergeant. “Says she bought the clothes she was wearing, but the dress still has a ticket on it.”
“Is this true?”
“Yes, I didn’t take the ticket off, but I did pay for it. I even have the receipt.”
“And where is it?”
“It’s in the bag with the rest of my clothes.” The receipt was retrieved and the Desk Sergeant looked at the police officer.
“So why are we holding her? This all seems to be in order. What time does the shop shut Miss Robson?”
“Six pm.”
“See? It has even registered going through after hours.”
“The shop was closed Sarge. I thought she had swiped the stuff.”
“What about this?” said the Sergeant, leaning forward over the desk and waving the crisp, new receipt in the policeman’s face.”
“I didn’t ask to see it.” The Desk Sergeant rolled his eyes heavenwards.
Denis felt like a side show attraction as he stood there in front of the Desk Sergeant. All dolled up in stockings and a party frock, the wig etcetera, but wondered why he didn’t feel uncomfortable.
It didn’t feel unnatural (although, he was feeling some discomfort from the chest area as the bra had become much tighter than it was when he first put it on), despite what his fears had prompted back at the shop. He felt quite good, given his current situation and was not sure how to deal with it.
“Sarge?” said a young woman who came through from the back.
“We’ve just had a report of that robbery at Fellows.”
The attention turned from Denis to the young woman.
Denis was released shortly thereafter amidst much patting on the back and abject apologies for having wasted her time and Denis wasn’t sure how to take constantly being called “Miss” or referred to in the feminine in other ways, though he did chuckle to himself for having passed so easily.
He left the police station and began the long walk home, carrier bag in hand.
He had not gone more than fifty yards before a call from behind stopped him.
It was the young woman.
“Denise? Wait up.” she called and Denis got a nice feeling from being called Denise.
He stopped and watched the young woman as she approached. He hadn’t really noticed her in the station, but out in the real world, he took a good look at her. She wasn’t as tall as him and her hair was short. Coupled with an angular sort of face, she had an impish look about her that appealed to Denis.
“I’m glad I caught you.” she said and the two of them continued down the road. “You were very brave.”
“I was?”
“Yes. Not many people have the presence of mind to do what you did.”
“Not many people have the stupidity to do what I have done either.” he said wryly.
“I don’t understand.”
“It’s alright. I think I’m beginning to see that it’s probably a good thing. Anyway, shouldn’t we be introduced? You know who I am, but I don’t know your name.”
“Sorry. I’m Stephanie; Stephanie Watkins.”
“I’m very pleased to meet you, Stephanie.”
The two carried on walking and Stephanie asked all about what had happened. Denis wasn’t sure how much to tell the pretty young thing and kept the masculine parts under wraps, even though for the first time in, well, ever, he wanted to tell her everything.
“Do you always chat up the shoplifters?” he asked and Stephanie laughed.
“But you’re not a shoplifter though are you? You’re a hero. I make a point of trying to get to know all the heroes I meet.”
“Do you meet many?”
“Oh, all the time. It’s an occupational hazard that comes with the job.”
“Are you hungry?” asked Denis. “I’m starving. No breakfast and nothing at lunchtime and here we are at — what time is it?”
“Just coming up to seven fifteen.”
“Well. Here we are at just-coming-up-to seven fifteen and suddenly I feel ravenous.”
“I really should get home.” said Stephanie.
“Shame. You’re the first person I have met today or in a long time that I wouldn’t mind spending more time with.”
“I am?”
“Yeah, well. I like my colleagues well enough, but they’re not really my type — if you know what I mean.”
Stephanie’s return look was somewhat startled and suddenly, Denis was mortified.
He realised what he had said and how that must have sounded to Stephanie. Somehow, Denis’s state of dress (not that the LBD was in a state) seemed to have become unimportant to him and now it was all-important.
For the first time, he had just chatted-up a woman, as a woman and that, he concluded, couldn’t be something that happened to Stephanie everyday despite all the heroes she encountered on a regular basis.
“I’m sorry. What must you be thinking? I didn’t mean it like that.” he said, unconsciously bowing his head in a very coquettish manner and blushing furiously.
“I think I’d like to join you.”
“That’s what I thought. I wasn’t thinking and … You would?”
“Yes! I would!” she said emphatically, linking arms with her new found friend and the two of them headed for the nearest café, restaurant or even a fish and chip caravan.
They sat down in a small Italian restaurant and Denis excused himself to go to the lavatory.
It wasn’t so much a mistake as an oversight when he pushed on the door of the gents. The waiter inside who was just doing up his flies was dumbstruck, frozen to the spot like a deer in the headlights.
In fact as he froze, so did Denis. The feeling of the dress’s hem against his thigh and his bare arms sort of gave the game away.
“Er, sorry. Wrong room!” he said and made a hasty exit, sliding across to the next door and almost pushing it off its hinges to get in before he had a complete meltdown.
He stood in the ladies, not knowing quite what to do. It wasn’t that he’d forgotten how to pee, but he hadn’t ever had occasion to use a ladies toilet before and was momentarily flummoxed. What felt like an eternity went by and he pushed his way into one of the cubicles.
He lifted the seat and hoiked up the dress to free his privates from their gossamer prison.
“Hell’s tits!” he yelled.
He felt around on the outside of the thong and was greeted with nothing, well nothing that felt in any way as it should and slipped his hand down the inside instead.
Nothing.
That’s not quite true. There wasn’t ‘nothing’ there at all, but what was there, could in no way constitute the tackle he’d been used to.
“What the…?”
He pulled down the thong, and held the hem of the dress up so that he could better see what was happening down there.
Perhaps it would insult your intelligence to describe what he saw. In the absence of a male conglomeration of bits and pieces and the fact that it has already been stated that there wasn’t ‘nothing’ there, the only thing left to expect was…
Yup, you guessed it.
He replaced the seat and plonked himself down, thong round his knees and dress round his waist.
Nature took its course, much to Denis’s bemusement, not having felt having a pee quite that way before. To all you women out there and probably post-ops too, this is not likely to be an alien concept, but when earlier in the day, you were peeing in a vertical position, only to have to sit down and experience the flow emanating from a completely different, er exit point later that same day, you can imagine it’s going to have something of a novelty value.
This was something else entirely and required Denis getting his head around the concept. There was the wiping afterwards, rather than just banging the end on the porcelain and tucking it back into one’s jockeys. Next there was the smoothing of the dress — ensuring that the back was not inadvertently tucked into the waist of the undergarments.
This was going to take some getting used to.
Something occurred to him at that point. If that had happened to his privates, what else had happened?
He felt around his chest and was astonished to find that the clear silicone ‘blobs’ that he had used to fill out the bra were actually augmented by something soft and round and - his. What he was feeling was his own although at that moment, ‘his’ didn’t really sound right.
He pulled the dress and bra aside and looked as one of the silicone ‘blobs’ dropped out and hit the floor with a ‘plop!’. He repeated the procedure on the other side and another ‘plop!’ was heard as the other ‘blob’ smacked against the tiled floor.
“My God!!” he spluttered. “They’re real.” and they were too.
He looked at himself in the mirror as he straightened his chest area and noticed stray hairs poking out in all directions from the wig, so he decided to do something about it.
As soon as he touched the wig, he realised that it wasn’t a wig at all.
He tugged on a handful of hair, but it didn’t shift.
He leant in towards the mirror and lifted some of the hair off his face. He could clearly see the hairline and the hair he had in his hand was equally clearly growing from his head.
Well, this was something he hadn’t expected. He sighed heavily, thinking that whatever he had chosen to do that was so simple and couldn’t possibly go wrong, had evidently gone wrong on more than a few levels already.
His chest was now infinitely more comfortable now that the ‘blobs’ had been removed. He held them in his hands discretely and headed back to the table.
Rather shamefaced, he rejoined Stephanie.
“You alright? You were gone for ages.”
“Yeah, I wasn’t feeling myself and there was something I needed to get off my chest.” he said, carefully dropping the silicone ‘blobs’ into the bag with his clothes.
The rest of the meal went without major incident and Denis paid for it all with cash, just in case he met with any resistance regarding his credit card.
It was now getting on for nine pm. Stephanie and Denis mosied along the road not really saying much.
He was actually getting quite cold. It had been a sunny day, perhaps better than the month warranted, but now that the sun was well and truly gone, it wasn’t so warm.
“Cold?”
“Yeah. I didn’t bring a coat and what I’ve got in here,” he said, hefting the bag. “Isn’t really appropriate.”
“Does that matter?”
“I suppose not.” he agreed and they stopped as Denis took his jacket out of the bag.
“Doesn’t really look your style.” said Stephanie.
“You have no idea.” he replied, giggling.
They walked together with Stephanie again linking arms and Denis felt more comfortable than he had ever felt before. Perhaps this change was for the better, but now was now and fun. He was enjoying this newness, this different-ness, but tomorrow might just be a whole different ball game.
Part III
Denise
Denis walked Stephanie back to her place, which wasn’t that far from the restaurant. He wasn’t sure how much he should tell her about how this came to be, if anything. As a result, they drifted along in silence until Stephanie broke it.
“You’re very quiet.”
“Yeah, I’m sorry. Today’s been a real eye-opener one way or another and being arrested wasn’t really top of my list of things to do.”
“I can imagine.”
“I’m not sure you can. The arrest was by far the least traumatic of the events.”
“It hasn’t been all bad has it?”
“No. I met someone really special today.” Immediately he let that part slip, he regretted it. He knew that if a woman had said that to a man, that man wouldn’t stop running until well after he’d passed the international date-line and possibly a couple of oceans too. “I mean, I think you’re a really nice person and if I ever needed a friend it’s now.”
“You already see me as a friend?”
“I hope so. I know we’ve only known one another for five minutes, but I really enjoy your company. I would like to think that this isn’t just a flash in the pan. I hope you don’t think I’m being too forward.”
“Not at all.” she said, giving his arm a squeeze. “I quite like the idea. Anyway, this is me.”
They stood at the end of the path and Denis didn’t know whether he was supposed to broach the subject of coffee or even if he wanted to put either of them in that position. In truth, he felt he just wanted to go home.
Stephanie took the lead and gave him a hug, no kiss, just a hug.
Denis felt that he got more than he deserved as he already felt as though he should have told Stephanie that he wasn’t what he appeared and all the way home, he gave himself a good talking to about it.
“You should have said something.” he muttered.
“What and frighten her off?”
“Better she knew from the beginning than to scare her away for good by telling her later.”
“Are you alright, Miss?” said another voice.
Denis stopped, thinking “What now?” and turned towards the source of the voice.
“Fine, thank you.” he said to the owner of the voice who had pulled up to the kerb in his car.
“Can I give you a lift somewhere?”
“Er, no thanks. It’s nice of you to offer, but I really haven’t that far to go and well, you know about talking to strangers.”
“So you think I’m strange?” said the voices owner with something of an edge to it. Denis couldn’t see the owner of the voice particularly well and suddenly didn’t feel as safe as he had.
“I didn’t say that. I don’t know you and you don’t know me. That makes us strangers and I’m sorry if you feel I’m being rude in not accepting your fine offer, but I think I need to walk.”
“Well fuck you, bitch!”
Denis blinked and watched as the man drove off. For the first time in his life, he felt the man’s stinging words hit a point in Denis’s brain that started tears welling up in his eyes. The sniffles followed as his eyes ran with tears and he found himself running as far as he was able in the shoes he was wearing to get home.
He managed to open and then almost slamming it leant against the closed door sobbing like a schoolgirl and slowly slid downwards until he was sitting on the floor.
“I never asked for this.” he wailed.
It was an unreal feeling for him. Not only was he not a particularly emotional sort, he’d never felt such an outpouring of emotion since he was a child and even then, it was generally only temper tantrums that produced such tears.
Picking himself up, he went to the bathroom to strip for bed.
His plan had been to go home and dress en-femme. Then he was going to spend time ogling his reflection in the mirror, but right then and there, he felt like shit.
He blew his nose and looked in the mirror above the basin.
His eyes were red and puffy and his hair was a complete mess.
He picked up a brush and began pulling it through the masses of hair he now had and began to relax. The more he pulled his brush through, the more relaxed he became and soon, all traces of having blubbed and sniffled, had gone.
He took off the dress and stared open-mouthed in the mirror at the person he had now become, though how was something he just couldn’t fathom.
Before him was a woman slightly taller than average with all the attributes to go with it; the waist, hips, breasts and just visible through the translucent material of the thong, the lips of very real female genitalia.
He trembled slightly as he reached between his legs to touch and gasped as what he felt was as real as what he saw. He removed his bra and watched as his breasts stood from his chest each surmounted by a dark, pink nipple just as the woman’s in the shop had and gently, he brushed his hands across with a shiver of excitement.
He slipped his thumbs into the waist of the thong and slid it down his legs to his knees whereupon, gravity took over and they dropped the rest of the way on their own. He stepped out and stood back a short way from the mirror, drinking in the vision before him.
“I certainly got the lot here.” he said smiling, despite the fact he had just spent better part of forty minutes solid, crying his eyes out. “Not bad.”
After a shower and a quick cup of coffee, he went to bed, though he was still perturbed by just how this had all come about.
The next morning Denis awoke and stretched. Once again he had slept the whole night and had not been troubled by dreams at all, which is not to say he didn’t dream, but the dream he did have wasn’t about him. No, this very pleasant dream was about Stephanie.
He still had a smile on his face too, which was a first. That was until he went to get out of bed and realised that the events of the day before had not been part of the dream. They had been real.
His hands went automatically to his breasts and he realised that all of it had been real. In fact, the only thing that hadn’t been was the dream he had just woken from. In the short time he took to consider this, the memory of whatever he and Stephanie had been doing had, thanks to his shock of realising that yes, he was a she, vanished.
“So I really am Denise.” he said finally. “Jesus, what am I going to do?”
Still where she had dropped it the night before, was the bag with Denis’s suit trousers, his shoes, two packs of stockings, two clear silicone ‘blobs’ and a pair of high heels. There was no more underwear, no more clothes. It was either the dress, stockings and maybe she could wash out the thong for today as well, but somehow, it didn’t seem right.
She needed some everyday wear; jeans, t-shirts and all those things women need that men seem to be able to do without. She needed a coat, trainers, sensible shoes, tights, panties and more bras. God, would the list ever end?
She needed help.
She thought about work and the people there. Maybe they’d be able to help, but then, who’d believe her?
The major thing about work was she was not going to be able to go in. That’s all there was to it. Getting picked up by the law the day before was one thing, as the copper had no idea who she was, but going in today meant facing the girls and as Denise, she really didn’t have the nerve.
She thought about other people who might be able to help, but aside from work, there wasn’t anyone. Denis had been the personification of the expression “you need to get out more” and besides, who would recognise him now?
There was always Stephanie.
“No.” she said firmly.
“And why not?” she asked.
“Because.” she replied, balling her fists and coming very close to a scream.
“Because why?”
“Because I don’t know her that well and I don’t know whether I can face telling a near stranger all this stuff about me.”
“That wasn’t so difficult was it?”
“Oh shut up!”
Denise went to the phone and picked up the receiver.
“Oooooooohhhhhhh!” she growled and slammed it back down again.
Denise padded about, the scowl on her face getting more and more intense.
“More coffee!” she said.
She opened the fridge for the milk and realised that she had used the last for the last cup she’d knocked back.
“Aaaaaaaaarghhhhhhh!” she screamed and went to the bedroom.
It was no good. She was going to have to go shopping at least, but first she had to wash out her smalls (which were scandalously small too) and then phone in to work and at let them know that she, or rather Denis wasn’t going to be present.
Somewhere else, someone was not impressed by the complete incompetence of a certain three guys.
“You told me they knew what they were doing.”
“Who told them they could take what they wanted then?” said the person on the other end of the line.
There was a momentary pause.
“Well they cocked it up big time. What if this gets back to me?”
“I told you, relax. There is nothing to link them to you, leastwise nothing that we can’t handle.”
“We? What do you mean ‘we’? This was all your doing and if the shit hits the fan, guess who it’s going to spray?”
“Ah yes, good point. I’ll deal with it at once.”
“You do that and find out who blew the whistle. Make damn sure they don’t blow any more. Is that clear?”
“Crystal.”
If you have ever tried doing anything in a hurry, you will be the first to realise that a) more haste means less speed and it invariably takes longer than you thought it would and b) in the case of Denise’s thong, it won’t dry that way — i.e., quickly. Our hero-cum-heroine hasn’t figured that one out yet, though she is about to…
Denise breathed a sigh of relief when she found out that Fellows was shut due to the break in and what later transpired to be an arson attempt.
“So it was an insurance job then, was it? Burn the place down and claim a fortune. I wonder if they’ve found out that old man Smart is behind it?”
Half an hour went past and about every forty-five seconds, Denise checked to see if her ‘small-bordering-on-not-worth-bothering-withs’ were dry and each time she checked, they seemed just as wet as they were before.
“Oh come on!” she cried. “There’s less of you than is reasonable and still you seem to take a month of Sunday’s to dry.”
She spent the next several minutes plodding round from one room to another and back like a fart in a trance before taking another look.
“It’s no good. I’ll just have to put them on damp.”
She turned them the right way out and stepped into the tiny briefs.
Pulling them up she realised that may have been a mistake she wouldn’t make again in a hurry.
“Eeeeeeeyeeeewwwwww!” she cringed, feeling the cold dampness around her tender bits. “That’s gross!”
After a few moments of walking around like she’d just spent ten years in the saddle, she kind of got used to it and was able to go about her business (though still with the occasional grimace).
Dressed as she was, she attracted attention. Most of it was good, some of it wasn’t, but by the time she’d walked to the shops, she was getting more acclimatised.
“It’s no wonder,” she thought. “Women get pissed-off with being ogled.”
The food shopping over and done with, she started to walk back and was looking in the windows of other shops as she did. Old habits being hard to break, she found looking difficult to begin with, but she knew that she needed more stuff. New panties, new tights or stockings: new everything.
She knew that Denis wasn’t exactly a fashion victim, but then he didn’t have much to be a victim for. Perhaps if he had, his life wouldn’t have been so boring. The one thing that she was looking forward to above all others was a pair of snug-fitting jeans, the sort that showed off the figure.
She stopped at one of the shops and looked in the window.
“Hello.” said a voice. She looked round and Stephanie was there.
“Hi!” said Denise, wanting to throw her arms round her and hug her tight, just for being there. It was or rather wasn’t necessarily because she fancied Stephanie something rotten although that was true, but because Stephanie was an ally; someone she knew so she didn’t have to go about this whole thing alone. She already felt that she’d been dropped in the deep end anyway. “Fancy giving me a hand finding some new clothes?”
“What’s in it for me?” she answered with nothing short of a mischievous look on her impish face.
“Dinner?”
“We did that last night.”
“Not at my place we didn’t. "
Stephanie’s face wasn’t exactly the picture of excitement. ”Alright, what about we go out, have a few drinks and then get dinner.”
That got the smile back on Stephanie’s face.
After about three hours and six shops (it was only a quick shop for a few things), the two women headed back each carrying at least six bags apiece. Denise had even treated Stephanie to something, which went down rather well.
“Excuse the mess.” said Denise. “It’s the maid’s day off.”
“Mess? What mess. My bathroom has more mess than this whole place.”
“Yeah well, my mother always said not to trust anyone who leaves their underwear on the floor for more than three days. I didn’t want to be labelled as one of those.” she answered with a broad grin.
What she failed to mention was that prior to this shopping expedition, she only had the one pair of panties anyway, which she was wearing and also failed to mention that Denis was anally compulsive about cleanliness; something she seemed to be losing her grasp of since last night’s bag was still where she left it.
They drank coffee, which Denise was absolutely gasping for, not having had one since well before she left to go shopping and sat at the kitchen table.
“I didn’t expect to see you again so soon.” said Denise.
“No, neither did I. You don’t mind do you?”
“No, not at all. In fact I wondered if you’d heard anything about what’s going down at Fellows. All I know is that it was closed today because of what happened yesterday.”
“Well, they found some incendiary devices — home made of course — in the van along with a whole load of electrical goods, just as you said, but we haven’t been able to fathom out why.”
“I think I can help, but needless to say, I can’t verify any of it. You might just want to drop a hint.”
“Go on.”
“Well, I overheard one of them going on about old man Smart wanting them out of there as quickly as possible.”
“Smart? Who’s he?”
“If it’s who I think it is, then it’s the owner.”
“You think it’s an insurance job then?”
“I don’t know. It’s just what I heard, but it does sound that way.” said Denise, knocking back the last of her coffee. “But hey, this isn’t the time to be talking shop. We’ve got to get ready.” and with that, she hustled Stephanie to the door.
“I’ll be round for you between seven thirty and eight then.”
“I’ll be waiting.” said Stephanie who leant forward and gave Denise a quick and very chaste kiss.
Denise was shocked and her eyes went very wide, as she stood holding the door open and watching her friend disappear.
“Well don’t just stand there you dummy. Get ready!” called Steph between giggles.
Denise fussed in the bath, fussed out of the bath and then fussed some more. She had earlier complained about not having clothes and now she had more than she’d ever had. She had T-shirts by the half dozen, slinky bras, work bras, slinky panties and work panties, more thongs, jeans, skirts and Lord alone knew what else.
It had cost a small fortune and she couldn’t have cared less.
By the appointed time, she was ready in her new tight jeans and an equally tight t-shirt, some surprisingly comfortable mules and her hair bungeed back in a ponytail. It only took a few minutes before she was waiting with her new leather blouson over her knees for the taxi to take her to Stephanie’s place.
Knocking on the door she heard a faint voice shouting “just a minute” and she knew that Stephanie wasn’t ready. This was something that was going to happen to her too. Whether it happened sooner or later, didn’t matter. It would happen, just like it did with every other woman Denis had ever come into contact with.
The door opened and there she stood.
She fairly took Denise’s breath away.
“God! You look awesome!”
“Why thank you!” gushed Stephanie and curtseyed low, ushering her friend in.
“Thank you!” said Denise, inclining her head politely and walking into the hallway in a stately fashion, whereupon, both of them erupted into fits of giggles.
“You’re not wearing makeup?” asked Stephanie. Denise shrugged and looked guilty. “Well we can soon fix that.”
Stephanie dragged Denise into the bedroom where powders, tubes, bottles and practically the rest of a pharmaceutical dispensary appeared from drawers, shelves and bags.
“Sit!” Stephanie ordered and Denise did just as she was told.
To rather tuneless humming and a look of intense concentration, Stephanie fussed about in a veritable blur of bits of this a smidge of that and presto!
Denise looked in the mirror, stunned into absolute silence.
“Well?”
“I-I-I… It’s amazing! Thank you soooo much.” she said nearly bursting into tears. “I had no idea I could look like that.”
“Hey, hey! No blubbing, you’ll ruin the look.” admonished Stephanie and with a great deal of effort, Denise brought herself back under control and even laughed. “See? So much better.”
It took probably best part of another half an hour before Stephanie was completely ready and when she was, the two of them looked at themselves and each other, stood side by side in front of the mirror.
“Ready to knock ‘em dead?” Stephanie asked.
“I think so.” said Denise, less enthusiastically, but nevertheless game and off they went.
The pub Stephanie led them to, hummed with the usual noise and expectations of a Friday night. People stood, sat, laughed and drank in about equal quantities. Denise suddenly felt very conspicuous and apprehensive.
It seemed so simple to offer a night out earlier in the day in the anonymous shopping centre of town, but here in the confines of a pub where she only knew one person, well that was something else altogether. Let’s face it, she didn’t know Stephanie that well and had no real idea of what to expect.
It wasn’t long before she was confronted with something else she wasn’t used to — alcohol.
She was just about used to a glass of wine or two with a dinner, but she had had nothing but coffee throughout the day and when Stephanie handed her a drink, the feeling of apprehension rose.
“What’s this?”
“Malibu and pineapple with ice.” was the simple reply over the general hubbub. Denise took a small sip.
“Wow! That’s really nice.”
“I know. I drink it all the time.”
By the third, Denise was definitely a few degrees more mellow than hitherto and she wondered what her problem had been. Everyone seemed so friendly, like one big, happy family.
Next thing she knew, Stephanie was back, her arm wrapped around some big guy with a stubble-covered face and tattoos.
“Hey Denise. This is Paul.”
“Pleased to meet you.” said Denise, her eyes turning green. It seemed that Stephanie’s idea of going out together didn’t seem to have the same meaning as hers and this bloke was not something Denise had bargained for - at all!
“You don’t mind if we skip dinner do you?” said Stephanie, hanging off the arm of the big man. “Paul wants to take me to a club.”
In her semi-drunken state, Denise tried to reason this one out. There was supposed to have been a few drinks and dinner involved here wasn’t there? Now it seemed that some big lug with half of a book of ‘cartoonery’ on his arms (and who knew where else) was more preferable.
Did it matter if she minded or not?
No. Apparently not.
What mattered was she was being denied her night out with her friend who even after such a short time was already on her mind more often than not and it was about the fact that her friend evidently did not share those feelings.
“No I don’t mind. You go and have fun.” Stephanie shot her a look that Denise couldn’t quite fathom, but it looked as though she was a bit shocked or hurt or both. Perhaps it didn’t come out sounding the way Denise had thought it would. “It’s okay. I think I’m going to go home anyway. I haven’t eaten anything and feel a bit queasy — those Malibu’s went down a bit quickly — (Hic!)”
Stephanie’s face softened slightly, but still there was something there that Denise could see, that was suspicious.
For the second time in as many days, Denise sat on the floor against her door after a traumatic walk home, sobbing.
This time when she looked in the mirror, she looked like a bloody panda.
Makeup had run down her face, leaving black trails over her cheeks. She couldn’t help laughing, since it must have got progressively worse as she’d made her way from the pub.
“The things we do for love.” she said ruefully and then broke up laughing at the incongruity of it all.
Meanwhile, Stephanie and her ‘new friend’ were sitting in his car round the corner from Club Nero.
“So that’s her is it?”
“That’s her.”
“How much does she know?”
“Not much. She’s just speculating really. She overheard something about someone called Smart and well, she’s basically clutching at straws.”
“That’s enough though. You know what to do.”
“But Paul; she doesn’t know anything. She just thinks it was a heist that went wrong.”
“We can’t take that chance. Don’t let me down Stephanie or you know what’ll happen.” he said with a definite note of finality. She got out of the car and as soon as the door was closed, Paul pulled away and disappeared into the distance.
“Hi Steph.” said Joe, a bouncer outside of the club.
“Hey Joe.” she said, putting on a smile and walking in.
A couple of hours later Stephanie was standing outside a familiar door.
“Please be up.” she muttered. “Please be up.” She bashed on the door.
No answer.
She bashed again, a little harder, then lifted the letter flap and called through the door.
“Denise? Denise? Open up, this is important.”
A few moments later, a very sleep-worn Denise wobbled towards the door.
“What?” she asked a bit curtly. “What do you want?”
“I’m sorry to wake you. Can I come in?” Stephanie asked. Wordlessly, Denise opened the door further and stood aside as Stephanie walked in.
They sat in the kitchen and it was obvious that Denise had been crying.
“What happened?” Stephanie asked with genuine concern.
“It’s nothing. There are just a few things I’m not really used to is all.” Stephanie didn’t pretend to know what she meant and took a deep breath before taking her hand and launching into what had happened.
“I don’t know what you’ve got yourself into, but it seems to be pretty big.”
“You have no idea.” she replied, rubbing sleep and makeup remnants from her eyes.
“I’ve got some cream in my bag that’ll get that off.” said Stephanie helpfully and started to rummage around in her handbag.
“Thanks. Look, I was asleep before you came and I still have a head full of cotton wool. Can you wait to tell me until after some coffee perhaps?” she asked, filling the coffee machine and then grabbing a sheet of tissue to wipe the crud off her face.
“I could murder a cup.” she replied then realising what she’d said, giggled.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
Denise screwed her face up, having no idea what was going on. She didn’t know whether it was her semi-conscious state, but she thought she detected more than a little nervousness on Stephanie’s part; the fast talking, changing the subject, fidgeting. She figured it was to do with the fact that Steph felt guilty for having left her on her own in the pub.
Stephanie was equally unaware of Denise's situation; the whole, “having only been a female for two days and not being used to the pub scene anyway” thing, least of all from a woman’s perspective. She wasn’t to know what kind of a pickle Denise was in, how she felt and how she wasn’t even being given any time to get used to being “Denise” instead of Denis.
In due course, two cups of coffee were prepared and placed on the table. Denise asked Stephanie to start from the beginning.
“You’re in pretty deep.” she said taking another deep breath and looking distinctly uncomfortable. “I don’t know all the facts, but I do know that you’re not safe here.”
Well that was a bit of a revelation.
Stephanie worked for the police and surely, if they had got wind of anything nefarious with regards to her situation, they’d have informed her wouldn’t they?
“So what makes you think I’m not safe?”
“I heard it on the grapevine. Well more precisely, one of the bouncers heard that whoever was behind this was trying to tie up lose ends and didn’t want to take the chance that you knew about their plan.”
“I must go to the police.”
“You can’t!” said Stephanie jumping up and nearly knocking their coffees over. “Anyway, there’s no time.”
Part IV
RUN!
Denise was shocked to hear that her act of duty to the company had come back to bite her in the rear. Thwarting the plans of what appeared to be a bunch of half-arsed opportunist thieves, had turned into something much more; much, much more and she really was starting to worry for her own safety.
“What am I going to do?” she asked in a small voice, tears welling up in her eyes as she looked at Stephanie.
“Is there somewhere you can go?”
“No. I don’t think so. I don’t have any family and the only people I really know are those I work for or with. We get on alright at work, but I don’t think they’re the sort of people I can impose on at a time like this.”
“What about going somewhere for a couple of days, a sort of impromptu holiday or something?”
“You’re suggesting I run?”
“It does have its merits.” Denise couldn’t stop the tears.
“I never wanted any of this.” she cried and Stephanie could feel a lump in her own throat. It wasn’t what she wanted either.
“Look, I’d better go.” said Stephanie, already feeling that she was in deeper with Denise than she knew was good for her and she could feel herself drawn closer because she actually wanted to be friends with her, despite what she had to do.
“Do you have to go?”
What could she say? Denise looked so alone. Never mind looked, she was alone. It was just a case of her being in the wrong place at the wrong time. She didn’t intend to get involved with the shenanigans at Fellows; she was just unfortunate enough to have been there when it happened.
She didn’t really know anything either, however, from what Stephanie knew, she was probably closer to the truth than she knew. How could she leave her alone?
How could she not?
She knew what she had to do; what was expected of her and she was already putting herself in more danger by giving Denise the chance to run, but if Stephanie couldn’t find her, she couldn’t go through with it could she?
“Don’t go. It’s a lot to ask I know, I mean you don’t really know me and I shouldn’t be asking you; getting you involved more than you need to be, but please, even if it’s only until I get to sleep, I’ve got so much to think about I just need you to be there.”
Stephanie looked into Denise’s eyes and couldn’t refuse.
“Okay, but I will probably go as soon as you’re asleep, then you’re going to have to get away. Promise me you’ll do that?”
“I promise.”
Saturday morning dawned bright and cheerful and Denise awoke feeling cosy and snug.
Even before she had opened her eyes, she knew Stephanie hadn’t gone home after all.
There was a weight on her chest that seemed to be pushing her boobs aside, but it was so wonderfully warm and pleasant, that she didn’t want to do anything about it. It was a long time since she’d felt… No forget that, it was a long time since she'd been that close to anyone and alright, it was plain that Stephanie wasn’t into her in that way, but it didn’t seem to stop her getting snugly with her.
She gently opened an eye and peered down to see the sleeping form of Stephanie lying there between her breasts, eyes closed and arm draped over her stomach. In fact, it seemed that Stephanie was pressed against her the whole way down her body and she could feel the crotch of her panties pressing against her thigh.
“God, what a turn-on.” she thought.
Denise just lay there soaking up the feeling, the closeness; the subconscious hug. Okay, so Stephanie probably wasn’t aware that she was snuggled up against her, but it didn’t matter. Everyone needs a hug from time to time and whether it was designed specifically for her or not, this was Denise’s and she was making the most of it.
She could feel the pressure in her bladder building up and knew that sooner rather than later, she would need to go and relieve herself, but she was going to stave it off for as long as possible to get the full effect of this snuggle.
Ten minutes or so later, Stephanie started to stir.
She let out a quiet little groan and adjusted her head a little, but didn’t take it away. The feeling of wanting to pee was starting to get overtaken by the feeling that maybe Stephanie was that way inclined after all and things would just — well, happen.
Stephanie turned her head on Denise’s chest, looked up at her and smiled.
“Hmm.” she said. “Morning.”
Now Denise’s need for a pee was second in the queue behind something else. She smiled back and started to stroke Stephanie’s hair, brushing a few hairs from her face and listening to the even and gentle rhythm of Stephanie’s breathing.
“Good morning to you too.” said Denise, hoping she could hang on just a bit longer, but it wasn’t to be. “Ohh, I gotta pee!” she said and almost leapt out of bed and hurtled towards the toilet.
“Please be there when I get back, please!!” she thought as she did her thing in the bathroom, but when she got back, Stephanie was already getting dressed.
“Bollocks!” thought Denise.
Denise went into the bathroom. She was feeling like she’d never felt before, tingling all over and just about all of her was buzzing.
She splashed some cold water on her face, but it had no effect whatsoever.
She could see her nipples, hard and erect in the mirror and much of that tingling sensation was emanating from them. She touched one with her finger and thumb and gasped turning her attention to the other.
Now it wasn’t just her breasts that were tingling, it seemed to be coming from ‘down there’ too and nervously, she brushed her middle finger across the soft folds of skin and nearly fainted. Her body was starting to spasm and the tingling sensation increased.
Soon, she had found the root cause of the tingling or rather causes and was trying to address each at the same time.
It took no time before she was gritting her teeth and in the throes of something almost magical as she manipulated her nipples alternately with one hand and continued to rub the increasingly wet area between her legs with the other.
Then it struck, like a thunderbolt and her whole body seized as she gasped for air, gulping down mouthfuls between spasms, clamping her right hand between her inner thighs, whilst at the same time, trying with little success to remove it before her fingers actually broke.
She sat on the bath, trembling like a leaf, trying hard to be quiet and hoping to God that Stephanie hadn’t heard what had happened.
A few moments later, she was running the water and although still slightly wobbly, she tried to clean her teeth, putting her shakes to some good use.
“Jesus! That was fan-fucking-tastic!” she thought. “I've gotta try that again.”
“Where’s the coffee?” called Stephanie from the kitchen.
“In the cupboard over the worktop on the left.” she responded, her mouth full of toothpaste bubbles.
“Thanks.”
Perhaps she didn’t hear and Denise was able to relax a bit, but could see the flush from the experience still showed on her cheeks as she grinned at herself in the mirror.
The initially light atmosphere disappeared with the realisation that today was important. Getting to a safe distance was the prime objective and where that was going to be was as yet a complete mystery.
They sat and drank their coffees in near silence. Stephanie didn’t want to speak. She knew what was coming and Denise was too wrapped up in the fear of what it was she had got herself into and how she could possibly get herself back out of it again.
She was thinking too, about where she should go. Whether it would be better to go somewhere where there were plenty of people or not so many, should she head for London for instance, with plenty of places to get lost in a crowd…
“I guess this is it then.” she said at last, putting her coffee cup onto the table and looking at Stephanie.
“Guess so.”
Denise was sure there was much in that brief look that said more than a mere “goodbye” and hoped that it was true. There was, she felt, a bond between them and she was more interested in fostering that bond than breaking it after such a short time.
She stood and picked up a rucksack of bits and pieces she’d put together for the journey.
“I don’t want to do this.” she said softly.
“It’s not for long. I’m sure the guys at the station will sort this out in no time and you can go back to normal.”
“Yeah, but then again…”
“Enough of the negatives; just get going and be safe.”
They were about to close the front door and go their separate ways and Denise took the bull by the horns.
Grabbing Stephanie round the waist, she pulled her to her and hugged tight.
“I was so hoping this was going to go further and I know it can’t.” she said and buried her head in Stephanie’s neck. Stephanie stood, tears starting from her own eyes and did nothing until as Denise pulled away, she leant in close and kissed her.
It was going to be a quick one, but neither girl wanted to break away from the other. The kiss deepened, Denise opening her mouth and without thinking, started to push her tongue past Stephanie’s warm, soft lips.
“No!” said Stephanie, pulling away. “No!” she said again, seemingly panicked and ran off down the road. Denise watched as she ran; regret the only thing that remained.
It was with heavy heart that Denise locked the door behind her and made her way in the opposite direction to Stephanie, towards town centre and the railway station.
It was difficult for her to think. That last kiss had started that tingling sensation with a vengeance and only made what she had to do all the more difficult. It was one thing to have to do something like this. Quite another to do it with the thought of what she was leaving behind, especially since what she had to do, she had to do alone.
She trudged into the station and was about to go to the ticket window, when she remembered that her cards all described her as Mr and not Miss. She went to a hole in the wall and withdrew all the cash she could from all her cards. It was a tidy sum and hopefully would last well past the time all this idiocy was over.
She looked up at the boards to see what trains were immediately available and the destinations they offered.
“Hmm. London? What about Brighton?”
“Are you alright Miss?”
“Can’t decide.” she said. The man looked at her quizzically and left her to it.
She went back to the ticket office and bought herself a ticket to Brighton. London was out as she really didn’t like the idea of that many people. Brighton although still a city (along with Hove that is), seemed a lot less imposing and besides, it had the seaside to pass the time and was busy enough so she could lose herself in a crowd.
Hefting the heavy rucksack over her shoulder, she started off down the platform towards the front carriage and onto the train, pulled the door closed behind her, a feeling of melancholy descending as she finally realised that this was really happening as she dropped the rucksack on the seat and opened the window.
Leaning out as the train sat at the station, she watched people on the other platforms all going about their business, oblivious that not more than a few hundred yards away, she was running for her life.
A commotion at the gate caught her eye and she could see the guard dealing with someone although the angle didn’t allow her to see who. At the same time, she could hear shouts across the concourse as several men appeared to be running in the direction of her train. She stood back from the window as, did her eyes deceive her, or was that Paul heading up the running men?
The train jerked as it started up the tracks and looking back out of the window, she could clearly see Paul along with a number of others looking well annoyed as the train picked up speed and they got smaller and smaller until the train had rounded the curve in the track, putting them out of sight.
She sat down and contemplated where this incredible journey was taking her, but before she could even get the facts lined up in her head, a voice asked if the seat was taken.
“No.” she replied without even looking up and instead of sitting opposite as she expected, the person moved the rucksack and plonked down beside her. Denise was about to ask the person to move when she realised that she had been duped. It was Stephanie.
“I didn’t recognise the voice.” she exclaimed looking at her friend. “What made you change your mind?”
“Let’s just say that I had some help.”
“Paul?”
“How did you know?”
“I saw him running over towards the train. I must say, you only just made it and he looked pretty pissed-off that you managed to get on and he didn’t.”
“That’s not the only thing he was pissed-off about, believe me.” she said grinning. “I think it might be a wise move to get off this train one or two stops before Brighton, just in case Paul’s arranged a reception.”
“There’s stuff you’re not telling me isn’t there?”
“Stuff that it’s best you continue not to know; for the time being.”
It was all getting very cloak and dagger. While some of it almost scared the pants off Denise, she was surprised at how much excitement it also brought, although, having said that, she would have preferred to have had her safe, boring life back. At least, she thought so.
Part V
Oh I do like to be beside the seaside…
It was about three in the afternoon by the time the two girls got off the number forty-nine bus at Churchill Square. It was packed with shoppers, all of whom had little or no interest in either of them.
They headed for the phone boxes on the opposite side of the road and leafed through the directory to find somewhere for the night.
They chose one, just off St. James’ Street. The phone had been answered by someone who sounded extremely effeminate and Denise thought that this might be a place that wouldn’t ask too many questions about two girls sharing a room.
“It’ll have to be a double, I’m afraid.” said the man, who looked a lot like Jimmy Somerville from the Communards and even had a voice to match.
“It’ll have to do.” said Stephanie sounding a bit dubious.
“Well don’t get over excited luv.”
Stephanie scowled at the man who pointedly ignored her facial expression by pursing his lips, thrusting his nose in the air and mince, mince, minced out to the room at the back. Denise couldn’t help laughing.
Once they’d dropped their stuff (the one rucksack was all the two of them were carrying between them, apart from a small clutch-bag that Stephanie (had) had from the night before), they left the hotel and ate a belated lunch at a small café in West Street, before wandering along the promenade.
“Oh smell that sea air.” said Denise.
“What, you mean the air tinged with more than a fair chunk of rotting fish?”
“Have you no sole?” asked Denise, with more than part of her tongue thrust into her cheek. Stephanie groaned. “Sorry. I couldn’t resist!”
The sea front was littered with curiosity shops, shops selling candies, fish and chips shops and even a shop that was marked “Palmist”.
“Let’s go in, it’ll be a laugh.” said Denise and dragged a protesting Stephanie into the shop with her.
“Good Avternoon girls.” said the woman as they entered. “I’ve been expecting you.”
Stephanie and Denise exchanged glances.
“It’s alright Stephanie. I know you don’t believe in people like me.” Stephanie sat down with a thud. Denise went pale and sat down beside her.
Madam Sylvie went to the door, turned the “open” sign to “closed” and turned the key, locking the three of them in. She also adjusted the Venetian blinds and the room was plunged into a kind of red half-light. The two girls got noticeably agitated.
“Please. Do not vorry. I heff no desire to do you harm.” she said, returning to a large gaudy-coloured chair opposite where the two girls were sat.
“I can see zat sings are not quvite vot zey seem, no?” Neither girl said anything.
“No? Vel anyvay, zey are not. You heff secrets, zat is off no matter. Evorybuddy heff secratz. I can see all.” she said turning tarot cards over with a flourish forming a cross-shaped arrangement.
“Ah, zo, Denise, or should I purhap call you Denis?” Denise paled.
“Denis?” said Stephanie, shocked.
“Vell, she used to be. She’s not now, ess you ken see. Heff you heard of Strange Fellows Day? No? Vell, it ees zer day ven zer Devil eemself ees said to valk zer streets, granting vishes zat are not alvays zee true vishes ov whouvver ist choozen.”
Denise was busy examining the toe of one trainer as this was being said and Stephanie was looking daggers.
“It vould seem zat our friend ‘ere made a vish zat vos granted. Ees zat not true?”
“I guess it must be.” said Denise in a barely audible voice and then turned to Stephanie with a look of abject apology on her face, mouthing the words, “I was going to tell you…”
Denise though couldn’t remember actually wishing for a change. She could vaguely remember wishing that the feelings wouldn’t end after shaving and getting into bed. Perhaps that could have been interpreted as a wish, at a stretch.
“Don’t blame ‘er, Stephanie. She vos goink to tell you, but sings heff been moving too quickly.” She laid another card.
“Ah, but eet seems zat you heff secrets too, no?” she said looking Stephanie square in the eye. This time, it was Stephanie that saw something on her shoe that needed investigation.
“It seems zat Stephanie ‘ass not told you zer truce eizer.” she said raising an eyebrow and sending shivers down both girls’ spines. “But it vud seem zat she could not do vot she vos supposed to do and she ees een big trouble now, no?”
Stephanie nodded.
“Zo Denise,” the strange woman continued. “You heff been turned into zer girl no?” Denise nodded. “You vill need to ect quickly eef you vont to go back.” Denise blushed and looked mighty uncomfortable. “Ah. Ziss iss not zo velcome, no?”
She shook her head and once again Stephanie looked shocked, annoyed and more than a little puzzled.
“Eets not zo unusual. You didn’t know zis vos goink to ‘appen did you?” she asked and again Denise shook her head.
“Stephanie. You are in zer greatest danger. Zer men who seek you out are angry. You make zer bargain no? And now you heff broken zat bargain. But you broke zer bargain for luff.” she looked up and gave her a big wide smile, then looked at Denise. “Ahh, young luff. I remember such times, ven I vos much, much younger; zo, maybe not zo long ago really.”
“Zer rest of zis iss not clear. You need to find a smart man ‘oo, ees not so smart and not so old eizer. Eet ees ‘im ‘oo ees be’ind all zis. Zer police are useless. You need to get to ziss sing’s bottom as zey say.”
Stood outside, the two girls were completely gobsmacked. Stephanie wouldn’t look at Denise as, as far as she was concerned, Denise had lied and Denise wouldn’t look at Stephanie, for exactly the same reason.
Stephanie broke the silence first.
“I need a drink.”
“I think I could do with one too - maybe two too.”
They walked together past the Palace Pier and across the road to the Hungry Years. Complete with drinks, they say opposite one another at a table.
“Denis?” said Stephanie after a while. Denise blushed.
“So it’s true?”
“What about you and who are you in luff, er, love with?”
Silence and more blushes from the other side of the table.
“You want to stay like that?” asked Stephanie.
“You want to tell me what you were supposed to do?”
More silence.
“I’ll get us some more drinks shall I.” said Denise and went to the bar.
“Okay, truce.” said Denise, feeling the weight of all that had been revealed pressing down. “I used to be Denis up until two days ago…” She told the whole story to Stephanie, who sat with her mouth open most of the way through.
“So now it’s your turn.”
“You want to stay as Denise?”
“Well yes. I don’t know, but I feel it suits me better. There are some things I’m not so sure about and I have a lot to learn about being a girl, er, woman, but…” she shrugged. “And you?”
“I’ve always been a girl.”
“No silly, what’s your story?”
“My brother got into trouble. It was drugs mainly, then some petty theft as well. Next thing we knew, he was into this gang or something and owed them money. I bailed him out once, our parents bailed him out too, more than once, but it got worse.
“Anyway, he died about a year ago of an overdose, but I didn’t believe it. He’d been getting himself together, trying to kick the habit and then out of the blue, he was dead.
“Next thing I know, I am being held responsible for his debt. They told me that I could either come up with fifty thousand or I would have to work to pay off the debt. They said that they just wanted information and I didn’t think that would hurt anyone, so I agreed.
“When the robbery happened at Fellows, I told them about you and last night, Paul, who was the one who I’ve been working for told me I had to silence you. At first I thought I could do it, but I realised that I couldn’t. I don’t know whether it’s love or not, but I couldn’t do it and I couldn’t let them either.”
“Why couldn’t we go to the police?”
“Because I would have to admit to leaking information for the last year or so.”
“Thank you anyway and if it helps, the feeling’s mutual.”
At this point, both girls went red and started examining marks on the table before them.
“I’ll get some more drinks.” said Denise and made a bee-line for the bar.
They stayed in the pub for some time, well hours actually, neither knowing quite what to say to the other as conversations started and stopped, each of them trying to avoid the gaze of the other.
Stephanie couldn’t get her head round the fact that Denise was really a bloke, although she knew that wasn’t strictly true. The fact was he used to be a bloke and now he was, apparently a fully functioning ‘she’, although Stephanie wasn’t to know it to that kind of detail.
Denise on the other hand couldn’t believe that Stephanie would even consider the idea of ‘silencing’ someone and whilst she didn’t quite know what being silenced entailed, she was sure it wasn’t likely to be anything nice and possibly decidedly unpleasant — terminally so.
They staggered back to the hotel and were greeted by the same man who had been there earlier.
“Oooh. Look what the cat dragged in.”
“I could get to thoroughly dislike that man.” said Stephanie.
“Easy tiger. I might let you tear him to pieces tomorrow.” said Denise, giving the man a sly wink.
Denise set about the complementary instant coffee in their room as soon as the door had started to close.
“Would you really have killed me?” she asked.
“Dunno. I might.”
“You’re heading for a nights sleep under the pier, you know that don’t you?”
“No. Of course I wouldn’t. I didn’t know that’s what they would ask me to do and then when faced with it, I tried to tell myself that it was no big deal; that people do it all the time.”
“Most people don’t.” said Denise, shocked at the casualness of Stephanie’s statement.
“No well, most people haven’t got a bunch of heavies ready to break bones or kill them either. I thought at first ‘kill or be killed’, but when it came to it, I couldn’t.”
“You have no idea how comforting that sounds.” said Denise dryly going back to making the coffee and spraying creamer all over the place whilst trying to get the little foil lid off the plastic container.
“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you about Denis. It’s just that every time I tried to say something, something else turned up. It’s been non stop since Fellows and I really haven’t even had time to get used to being Denise yet.”
“You seem to be doing a pretty good job so far.”
“I haven’t had much choice. It was never my intention to let things go like they have. I only found out that I had changed as it were when we were in the Italian restaurant. I went to have a pee and couldn’t find, well, you know.”
“No. Do tell.”
“Alright I realised I hadn’t got a willy.” said Denise, going the default shade of crimson.
“Really?” said Stephanie sitting up. “Go on.”
“Then I discovered that my breasts were my own and the wig had become my own hair too.”
“Just like that?” said Stephanie sceptically.
“It seems so. I wouldn’t have believed it, but that’s honestly how it happened.”
“Can I see?”
“What?”
“Your bits.”
“Bits?” asked Denise almost sweating with the heat she was generating from blushing.
“Yeah.” said Stephanie and pointed to the area just below Denise’s waist.
“I-I don’t know, I mean you’ll laugh. It’s embarrassing.”
“Why? I’ve got one.”
“Bet yours isn’t shaved though.”
“You didn’t.”
“I did, but not yesterday. I shaved everything from my head hair down before this all happened. It seemed to carry over to when the change took place.”
“Well aren’t you just the dark horse.”
“It’s a bit more ‘Pale Rider’ now I think.” said Denise giggling. She couldn’t deny, this talking about it was getting her pretty hot and wondered whether this qualified as oral sex — sitting around and talking about it.
“Go on. Show me. I’ll show you mine.”
This was getting to sound a bit like a game of doctors and nurses between two young children, but it was certainly upping the temperature.
Denise thought “what the hell” and pulled down her jeans and panties.
“Well your shape is definitely not male.”
“Well duh!”
Slowly, the two garments descended past the thighs and when Denise stood back up, Stephanie had a look that was nothing short of wonder on her face and scooted across, kneeling before Denise on the floor. Denise was trembling and wondered what was next.
“Wow, cool.” said Stephanie and reached across to touch her mons veneris. Denise couldn’t help but gasp slightly, an involuntary spasm causing her to jerk. “Sorry. Are my fingers cold?”
“N-no. Don’t stop.”
Stop?
Stephanie hadn’t even got started and already Denise was like a bitch in heat.
“God, it’s so soft and smooth. I’ve always wondered what it would be like, but never had the guts to try, I mean I do my bikini line and keep it trim, but wow, this is awesome.”
Denise couldn’t believe the feelings that were coming from Stephanie just lightly stroking the top of her sex. She hadn’t got anywhere near the interesting bits yet and already, her knees were only just holding up. She could feel the warm wetness and it was starting to trickle slowly down her inner thighs. Eyes closed, Denise let her head hang back as she stared unseeing at the ceiling and just let Stephanie indulge her curiosity.
“That’s amazing Denise. I don’t suppose mine’s going to be nearly so interesting, but well, here goes.”
Denise slowly tilted her head forward, wondering why the nice feelings suddenly stopped and opened her eyes to see Stephanie yanking her own jeans and panties down and stepping out of them. She stepped out of her own clothes and knelt in front of her friend.
Stephanie was as trim as she had stated earlier. A narrow ‘V’ of short pubic hair was visible above her sex as she stood, legs slightly parted, showing her labia as the cleft disappeared between her shapely legs.
Like her friend had done, Denise reached out and touched her pubic hair, marvelling at the softness compared to men’s pubes.
“This is a lot softer than I expected. Nice.” she said, taking the opportunity to glance up at Stephanie and see how she was reacting. She was looking down at Denise, a quizzical look on her face as Denise went back to stroking her.
It was apparent that Stephanie wasn’t as sensitive there as she was and Denise wasn’t sure whether to leave it at that — a sort of, “she’s seen mine and I’ve seen hers” kind of thing, or whether to take it a stage further.
Curiosity got the better of her and she started to trace her finger nail along the outer lips and down the inner thigh and judging by the way she wobbled, that had a pretty marked effect. So she did it again and was repaid by Stephanie’s lips parting and glistening in the half light.
Denise let her fingers slide slowly and gently in between the lips and Stephanie’s legs started to go. She was forced to hold herself up by resting her hands on Denise’s shoulders and as soon as that happened, Denise started to take it further.
“No, not here, not now.” said Stephanie, trying hard to back away, but finding it difficult with Denise doing such a fine job of teasing her most sensitive parts.
She backed away and Denise looked up at her.
“Is something wrong?” she asked.
“I’ve never done this before.” she said. “I’m not sure.”
“That’s alright. Neither have I.”
“No, but you’ve been with a girl before, haven’t you?”
“I know what you mean Stephanie. I understand and no I haven’t been with a girl like this. I’ve only had sex with one girl and that was pretty uninspiring. I was too afraid to make suggestions and she wasn’t really interested. Needless to say we didn’t last long. In retrospect, perhaps that was what made me think there was something wrong with me.”
“What do you mean, uninspiring?”
“Well, it was all pretty standard stuff — Missionary position I think they call it — with the lights off. I don’t think I ever saw her naked. I never ‘touched’ her and it was all one sided. I jiggled it about for a bit, finished and rolled off. She never asked for anything and I didn’t ask if there was anything I could do for her. I just thought oh well, that was that.”
“I see.”
Stephanie slipped out and into the bathroom and Denise put her panties and jeans back on and sat down on the small two-seater sofa in front of the TV.
She was very subdued by the time Stephanie came back into the room. She had only put her panties back on and curled up on the sofa beside Denise.
They watched some pappy rubbish on the box for a while before retiring to bed. Denise had basically written off anything further happening and was understandably shattered from the travel, the drink earlier and was only too pleased to get some sleep.
Stephanie had some issues to resolve. She wasn’t naturally attracted to girls. Sure she’d fantasised about them on occasion and felt sorry for Denise, who had evidently led a very sheltered life, with little sexual interaction, but she found it hard to reconcile the idea of actually having sex with another girl.
In bed with the lights off and just the soft orange glow of the street lamps filtering through the curtains, they chatted for a while, both of them skirting around anything that could possibly be construed as anything sexual and also, leaving out anything that could be connected to the trouble they had just run away from. In the end, Denise turned one way, Stephanie the other and you could have driven a bus through the space between them.
The next morning however, the two girls were pretty much wrapped around each other, snuggled together in the middle of the bed.
Just as the morning before, Denise woke first and didn’t move a muscle for fear of disturbing Stephanie, or for that matter, losing the closeness they were now sharing.
It was like seeing girls walking down the street, happy to link arms or hold hands without even thinking necessarily about jumping into bed; it’s just that women share a different kind of closeness to men.
With men, it’s all roister-doister and clapping your ‘chum’ on the back, whereas women don’t do that, well not all of them anyway. They can be close without thinking about getting into one another’s panties, although it would be a challenge for a man to think that way.
Just as it was for Denise.
She just lay there listening again to the regular and soft rhythm of Stephanie’s breathing and thinking about what was going to happen in the days ahead. Thankfully, today was a Sunday and there’s precious little one can do on a Sunday, save relax. In this particular instance, relaxing was difficult, knowing what was potentially lying in wait for both of them.
Some time later, Stephanie stirred into life.
“Hi.” she said sleepily.
“Hi.” replied Denise. “How are you?”
“I’m not so keen on getting up that’s for sure.”
“Well don’t then.”
“Nice thought.” said Stephanie, staying exactly where she was, nestled in amongst Denise’s soft body.
Neither said anything, but Stephanie was thinking. She wasn’t into women, leastways not in that sense and yet here she was comfortably cuddled up to someone she knew wanted her and for some reason, wasn’t prepared to push it. She must have the patience of Job.
Regardless of what she thought she wanted, it was nice being close to Denise. She was warm and soft and Stephanie could almost feel the love coming from her. That gentle stroking of the hair without the expectations of sex or seemingly any reciprocation. She just seemed happy to be there and that was nice.
Stephanie moved and looked at Denise whose eyes were closed, but she snapped them open when Stephanie’s movement caught a nipple.
“Yeesh!” cried Denise, almost sitting bolt upright. “I wasn’t expecting that.”
“What?” asked Stephanie.
“You caught one of my nips when you turned. I’m sorry. I nearly entered a low orbit there.”
“Which one?”
“The left one.”
Stephanie gently kissed the offended nipple and once again Denise’s eyes closed and she started to purr like a contented kitten.
“Is that better?”
“Almost. I think you might need to kiss it one more time, just so that it knows you weren’t being malicious.” Stephanie grinned and again very gently kissed the nipple, which was now twice the size that it had been.
“Now?”
“Now the other one’s feeling left out. I think you might want to kiss that one better too.”
Stephanie kissed that one too, but with a mischievous glint in her eye, added a gentle bite to the kiss.
“Ye GODS!” exclaimed Denise who tried to sit up, but Stephanie just stayed where she was and pushed her back down, taking the whole of her right nipple into her mouth and sucked, not kissed this time; this was a fully fledged suck.
Denise’s breath left her chest like a hurricane and instead of having to be pushed back into a horizontal position, slumped back whether she wanted to or not. Meanwhile, Stephanie was busy alternating between nipples and all that Denise could do was lay back and think of England — well all the nice things that were coursing through her nerve endings anyway.
Some time later, Stephanie stopped, Denise off to the mixer in a world of her own.
“Jesus girl.” she gasped. “For someone who doesn’t like the idea of lesbianism, you certainly know how to light the fuse.”
“I don’t like the idea. I just can’t think of you as a lesbian. I mean it’s not really your fault that you’re a girl is it. Three days ago, you stood up to pee and if Thursday hadn’t happened, we’d probably never have met. Well we have met and I like you. In fact, it goes a bit further than that and I thought that was what people did when they feel like that about one another.”
“Well, I don’t think I could have looked at it that way, but it gets my vote and as for you my girl, I don’t think I’m going to be able to let you out of my sight.”
“Goody!” said Stephanie and went back to her new found fascination with Denise’s boobs.
As it happens, Denise had to call a halt there. There’s such a thing as over stimulation and coupled with a severe desire to relieve herself she had to get up.
Memories of the day before rushed into her head.
“Er, before I go, where are you going to be when I get back?”
“I’m not going anywhere.” she said and quick as a flash, Denise bolted for the bathroom trying to be out again before Stephanie had time to change her mind.
Denise walked back towards the door of the bathroom and could hear a murmur coming from the other room.
Was she playing with herself? Was that what she could hear?
No. It was much more measured than that.
Denise put her ear against the door and listened closely.
Those damned mobile phones. Denis had never needed one. There was no-one for him to phone. That didn’t mean that no-one else had one though.
She was talking to someone and didn’t sound as though she was enjoying it. The main thing Denise kept hearing was “no”. She didn’t know what that meant — other than the obvious, but in the context she was hearing it from Stephanie, there was little to go on.
She waited until Stephanie had stopped talking and the murmur was replaced by a different sound, much less measured and much more worrying. She opened the door and stepped quietly into the room.
Stephanie was still on the bed, her clutch bag before her and a small silver mobile was on the bed before her. She looked up at Denise, her tear-stained face evidence of the phone-call.
“What’s going on?”
“That was Paul.”
“What was?” asked Denise, trying not to let on that she’d been eaves-dropping.
“On the phone. He’s pretty mad.”
“Barking.” said Denise.
“No, he’s after both of us. He wants you because you know what’s going on and he wants me because I didn’t do what I was supposed to.”
“So why did you phone then?”
“Denise. Please, you don’t understand.”
“Oh, I think I understand plenty.” said Denise, her face hardening. As much as she loved this girl, there was no way she was going to stand for being taken for a fool, especially if that meant putting herself in danger.
“It’s not what you think.” said Stephanie, the tears running down her face in torrents. Denise could see that she was scared out of her wits. There was something else entangled in this web of confusion; something that Denise needed to get to the bottom of.
“Go on. I’m listening.”
Stephanie wiped her eyes and sniffed a couple of times. Denise wanted to go and put her arms round her, hold her close and tell her everything was going to be alright, but she knew she had to get all of this out of Stephanie before she could go any closer. The way things were going, there was every possibility that it might not happen at all.
“I told you that my brother was into drugs, but our parents didn’t know that. He was selling them; selling them for Paul and his cronies. I know Paul’s the front man, but the money comes from somewhere else. I don’t know where.” Denise passed the distraught girl a tissue.
“When I said I got made responsible for what Andrew — my brother — owed, what I didn’t say was that they said if I defaulted, mum and dad were going to get it. I didn’t know what he meant by that and after he told me to silence you, I got the picture — in Technicolor!”
She blew her nose and Denise sat on the bed beside her.
“I knew what would happen, but it took a while to sink in. When he phoned, he told me he was watching my mum and dad at their Sunday Bowls games at the local green. He described what they were wearing and that if I didn’t do something quickly, they wouldn’t be playing anymore.
“Now I don’t know what to do. I was doing what I was doing for love, but it was the love of my mum and dad, not for you. I know that’s harsh, but it’s the truth. The way that Madam what’s her face reacted just made that part of my story easy to cover up, easy to keep out of the frame and I have to say, I thought we might even get through this, but now I don’t know and I’m scared Denise, scared out of my mind.”
The tears started again, her face a river of tear-drops. Denise caught her in her arms and pulled her tight. If this was another fabrication, Stephanie was doing a really good job and somehow, it didn’t feel as though she was lying or even exaggerating the truth. For the first time, she thought that Stephanie was telling it as it was.
Denise was disappointed to say the least. She thought that Stephanie was one of the “don’t know” brigade. One of those who didn’t know whether they were one thing or the other; the “take it slow and we’ll see” type, but it seemed that Stephanie was well aware of not being even slightly bi-curious, despite the closeness they shared in bed, the curiosity she saw in Stephanie when she was touching the smooth skin above her sex, the nipple thing just minutes ago. It was all what it was on the face of it, nothing more — truly WYSIWYG.
Stephanie continued to sob as she was held and Denise wondered what was best.
She didn’t want to die; well that went without saying, but now they were in a situation where if she just buggered off and didn’t tell Stephanie, Stephanie’s parents would likely as not wind up in a suspicious car wreck and God alone knew what would happen to Stephanie.
Meanwhile, they were no closer to finding out what was behind all of this. Had it just been a robbery, the likelihood of them being pursued to this degree would be minimal. On the other hand, the police had released information to the general public, that they had prevented an arson attack, so that made things a little more complex.
Still, the likelihood of being chased down like animals was not that high, but there was something that Stephanie had said that struck a chord.
Drugs.
Maybe, the money was coming from someone in Smart’s employ, even his family. If that was the case, what happened would have been something else entirely. The arson may well have been a way to raise capital to fund something drug oriented.
In that case, the value of the shop would at a conservative estimate have been worth millions in stock and the building itself, not to mention revenue. Put that towards a deal and the way that works, that investment could have been increased tenfold.
That would certainly be worth chasing someone down for.
It was a chilling thought.
It may also have been pure speculation, but what if Stephanie’s brother had tried to get out of the drugs game? What if he wanted to clean up his act, but Paul and his henchmen had given him no option and his death was as a result of him trying to get the hell out of there?
This was getting scarier by the second and Denise’s one act of ‘heroism’ as Stephanie had put it, had landed her in a real hornets nest of lies, deceit and worse.
Denise shuddered as she thought of the chances of them getting out of this alive. Worse still, she considered the darker possibilities of Paul and his men putting them to work as drug dependent ‘crack’ whores. Their lives would be worse than dying and whose fault would it have been?
If they didn’t at least try to get through this, then they might just as well hold their arms out for Paul and his gang to push the needles in.
Denise was cold at the thought of what was ahead and it angered her that these people can live and breathe and continue so far outside the law that it made them almost untouchable. She even started to feel an element of sorrow for the poor lads who had been hired to burn Fellows down. They probably wouldn’t last inside. Prison was not going to be a friendly place to any of them.
Stephanie had cried herself to sleep and Denise laid her down, pulling the bedding up to her neck. Kissing her softly on the forehead, she calmly got up and started to formulate a plan.
Part VI
The Plan
Denise dressed and quickly scribbled a note for Stephanie who was gently snoring away, tucked soundly in bed. She grabbed her jacket and slipped out of the room, leaving a “Do not disturb” sign on the door.
Downstairs at the front desk, the Jimmy Somerville look-alike had been replaced by someone else far less surly.
“Is there an internet café nearby?” she asked.
“It’s not really near, but there’s one in Sydney Street. Do you know where that is?”
“I think so. Is it just down from the station?”
“That’s the kiddie. If not, I’m sure I can think of something else.” he said, giving her a wink.
Denise thanked him and left taking St. James’ Street, across the Old Steine to North Street. Sydney Street was at the end of one of the roads on the right.
It took about half an hour, but she made it and was surprised that even on a Sunday morning, there was still a lot of life in the town. She had visited it quite regularly as a child and whilst so much had changed, there was still so much that hadn’t. Certainly, she remembered it well enough to find her way around.
Sydney Street was much quieter than the area around North Street and she scanned the row of shops, most of which were shut, for somewhere that looked like it would fit the bill.
Needless to say, it was as it just had to be, at the other end.
It took a couple of hours to find what she was looking for and cost a small fortune to print it (that’s a small fortune in real terms, not comparing it to the small fortune she spent on clothes. That was a bigger small fortune).
It felt to Stephanie that Denise had been gone for hours and as soon as she heard the door open, she had flung herself at Denise and was sobbing tears of joy, hugging her tight enough to stop blood flow.
“You had me so worried.” she said. “I know you left the note, but I had no idea where you’d gone or what you were going to do. Where were you anyway?”
“I went to find some things out.” she simply replied.
“What things?”
“Look, shove that in your gob and shut up a minute.” she said, throwing a chocolate bar to her.
“Ooh, chocolate.” said Stephanie and ripped the wrapper off.
Humming a catchy refrain, Denise laid out the printed pages and showed them to Stephanie.
“See?” she said proudly.
“No. What am I looking at?”
“Old Man Smart. That’s him there.” she said, poking the page with her finger. “He’s the one running Fellows while his dad’s at his holiday home in Barbados.”
“What does that prove? It doesn’t tell us what’s going on, does it?”
“Look closely. I had to blow that image up a bit, but I’m sure that’s someone we both know.”
“Fuck! That’s Paul.”
“That’s right.”
“So what does that prove?”
“It proves that they know one another. It doesn’t prove anything about the drugs or the killings, but it does prove that they are not strangers.”
“Drugs? Killings?” said Stephanie amazed.
Denise filled Stephanie in on her idea.
“It all made sense when you said what you said about your brother. You said he was on the mend didn’t you?”
“He was. He was doing really well and then he died.”
“Why?”
“The police said it was an overdose.”
“It probably was, but do you think he would have gone to that much trouble trying to clean his act up and get himself together just to blow it with one more fix?”
“No.”
“Neither did I.” she said smiling. “Then I thought about how they were going about keeping you in check. The threat to your parents and that clinched it.”
“I don’t follow.”
“Suppose your brother wanted out.” she said slowly. “And then suppose that he was more than just a user and a petty thief, at least as far as Paul and his business was concerned. With all that Andrew knew, do you think they just have let him walk away from all that? I mean, he would have known about Paul, about Smart and that would have been another of Paul’s loose ends wouldn’t it?”
“It makes sense.” said Stephanie looking just a trifle wan and pale.
“I know. It frightened the life out of me too.”
She sketched out the rest of the idea and the more she said it, the more she got the feeling that she was on the right track.
“I couldn’t fathom why I was so important to them after I was witness to a bungled attempt at a robbery. I wasn’t really even a witness. I saw men in balaclavas, so I don’t even know who they were. I only heard the bit about Smart. That was all.
“So I factored in the arson attempt as well and still I couldn’t see that in a business as big as Smart’s, it was worth chasing us all over the place. That’s where your brother came in. I kind of put him into the picture too and he didn’t fit unless there was something to do with drugs that linked all three of them together.
“I knew it linked your brother to Paul, but I couldn’t work out whether Paul was just hired help with business of his own on the side, you know, brought in to do specific jobs and the like; the nasty bits, or whether he was part of an established team. When I saw this press release, I realised that I was probably closer to the truth than I imagined.”
“And you put that together from a few snippets of information?” asked Stephanie.
“Well that and an overactive imagination, yes.”
“I have to say, that’s quite impressive.”
“Thank you.”
“I suspect that this was just what Paul was afraid of.”
“The native Americans say that you can’t bury something forever, as given time it will always rise to the surface to be found. Someone would have got to it in the end anyway.”
“Do you think we’ll be able to convince the police of this?”
“I sincerely hope so. I don’t fancy ending my life just yet or winding up as a crack whore.”
“Crack whore?” asked Stephanie, somewhat startled.
“More of that imagination.” said Denise with aplomb.
Denise and Stephanie went to the station and the two of them boarded a train to go home.
“Don’t you think it’s a bit early to go home?” asked Stephanie.
“I have a hunch this will be all over soon. I think it’s time to take what we know back to the police and let them deal with it.”
“But Madam what’s her face said not to trust the police.”
“No, she said they were useless, but we can’t deal with this on our own. They have the manpower to sort this out and make it right all ways round.”
“I don’t know. Perhaps we should stay a couple more days and wait until it all blows over.”
“Look Steph. I can understand why you’re nervous about going back, but we’ll have to do it sooner or later. At least this way we have half a chance of getting away with our lives intact. I would imagine your parents might feel much the same way.”
Neither of the girls were comfortable with going back into the lions den, whether it be sooner or later, but the train left the station and Denise felt that whatever the outcome, she wasn’t prepared to keep on running, always having to look over her shoulder. It didn’t seem right.
It was three hours later when they disembarked and both Stephanie and Denise were pleased that this would soon be all over.
“Good afternoon girls.” said Paul.
“I had a feeling this would happen.” said Denise.
“I had to. Don’t you understand? He has my parents.” said a once again tearful Stephanie.
Denise was grabbed roughly by both arms and pushed towards a waiting car. All the way, Stephanie was going on about her parents.
“Will you stop your bellyaching woman? You’re starting to piss me off.” grumbled Paul.
Stephanie sulked, but meanwhile, Denise sat quietly in the back between two goons, neither of whom she would like to have met in an alley in broad daylight, let alone a dark one.
Soon, the car pulled up outside a warehouse on the outskirts of town.
Denise was pushed in first, accompanied by the two goons. They were followed in by Paul and then there was a loud ‘clack’ as Paul switched on the power and several strip lights blinked into life.
The warehouse was huge and they made their way past stacked boxes, pallets of this and that and large machines to what looked like a small office at the rear.
“Mum, dad!” shouted Stephanie and ran to her parents, asking after them and telling them how she and Denise had been in Brighton.
“ENOUGH!” snarled Paul. “So!” he continued, turning to Denise. “You thought you could run did you?”
“It seemed preferable to being silenced.”
“I can see where you get that idea, but at the end of the day, you’re going to be silenced anyway. I don’t like loose ends.”
“Is that what you did with Steph’s brother Andrew?”
“You see, that’s where you all seem to think I’m just stupid and can’t see when people are trying to outsmart me. He tried. Look where it got him! A one way ticket to the grave.” he laughed a callous laugh while his cronies just stood silently, each holding one of Denise’s arms.
“So I guessed right then? This is all just for a drug deal is it.”
“Oh no. It wasn’t just a drug deal. It was going to be the biggest of the century. Of course you put paid to that one didn’t you?”
He walked across the floor and stood toe to toe with Denise.
“Have you any idea how much that cost us? HAVE YOU?”
“I presume it’s in seven figures, maybe eight.” she answered casually.
“Eleven — if you count those after the decimal point.” he said.
“I guess it’s all off now is it?”
“Oh no, you can’t stop us that easily. We’ve got another shipment coming in tonight. You see, that’s what happens when someone like me teams up with someone like Smart. He has the import licence and I have the acumen.”
“It’s not going to work, you know that don’t you?”
“Why? Who’s going to stop me?”
“I think the police may have something to do with it.”
“Hah! They couldn’t find their arses with a map.” he snorted.
“I wouldn’t be so sure.” she said.
“Why? What have you done?”
“Me? What can I do?”
“Smart and I have put too much into this to fail now. Neither you nor the idiot police are going to stop this. Tie them up with the others. Smart will want to deal with this personally.”
Paul and his men left them in the small office.
“What’s this all about?” asked Grace, Stephanie’s mother.
“Illegal drugs Mrs. Watkins. Smart has been importing it and Paul has been the distributor. Unfortunately I think Andrew may have got himself involved and was unable to get out in time.”
Grace started to cry and Mr. Watkins, who looked as white as a sheet could do nothing to console her.
“See? I told you we were wrong to come back.” sniffed Stephanie.
Denise said nothing. Her plan wasn’t quite going according to how she’d envisaged it. Then the lights went out and Stephanie wailed as the darkness engulfed them all.
They had no idea how long they’d been sitting tied together. All any of them could tell was that it felt like days, when they heard the large doors at the entrance being opened. Voices too far away to be heard distinctly came next and then the door to the office burst open. All four of them jumped and all of them let out a loud exclamation.
No-one could see who had come in as flashlights blinded them, but they were now surrounded.
There was a faint ‘clack’, the overhead lights started to blink on and the four of them could see that they were surrounded by armed police.
“Put those guns down and untie them.” said a man as he strode purposefully into the office. “Denise.” he said and she turned to face him.
“You took your time. I didn’t think you were going to come.”
“We needed to get them in the act of putting the merchandise onto British soil. Sorry about that. Still, all’s well that ends well eh?”
Denise was too happy that all of this had come to an end to be too upset with the policeman and before too long, they were led blinking out into the daylight, escorted by various paramedics and police officers.
“You knew!” said Stephanie. She looked shocked and very annoyed that her friend had let her believe that they were walking back into a trap.
“Of course I did. I couldn’t tell you because there was too much chance that you may have let the cat out of the bag.”
“When?”
“While I was out. I got the information from the internet and emailed it across to the police here. I just needed to know that there was help on its way. There was no way we would have been able to pull it off on our own and once I knew that your parents had been involved, well that just sealed it.”
“You could have told me.”
“No I couldn’t. I needed you to be as natural as possible so as not to attract any attention. They didn’t know me, but they knew you and I’m fairly certain that Paul would have known something was amiss.”
It could all so easily have just ended there.
The police had got the bad guys and made a very impressive drugs bust; the hostages were freed, the answer to what had happened to Stephanie’s brother was cleared up and the charges added to the growing list for Paul and Smart. What more could there be?
Well what about Denise?
…And Stephanie?
Did they get together?
It turns out that they didn’t, least not to begin with.
Fellows reopened the Saturday after the robbery and everyone was surprised that Denis wasn’t present. Cynthia was promoted temporarily to supervisor — something she wasn’t comfortable with and apart from the workload being higher, everything went as normal.
Denise phoned them on the Monday and explained that things had happened and that Denis wasn’t going to be able to make it.
“Is he sick?” they asked.
“No, he’s not sick, but he’s really not himself right now.”
The woman, a ‘jobsworth’, often found in HR positions, positions within the social security system or local government departments that require customer-facing skills such as hers, demanded that if Denis wasn’t ill, he should come in and explain his absence for the Saturday.
Denise dressed casually in her favourite jeans, t-shirt and blouson and went into the store. She knew exactly where to go and informed the woman that she was there to see Ms. Sharpe.
Denis had never liked Ms. Sharpe. Her over made-up face and thin, permanently pursed lips suggested that she enjoyed pissing people off for the hell of it and her frequent comments of “it’s more than my job’s worth…” just got Denis’s goat. Denise didn’t expect that that would change although he or rather she had.
“Come!” called the voice from behind the office door.
Denise entered shoulders back and ready for anything this harridan could throw at her and full in the knowledge that her job was probably not hers anymore.
“Yes?” she said curtly, not looking up from the piece of paper before her.
“You wanted to see me?” Denise said amiably.
“And you are?” she responded, still not looking up.
Now this was likely to be difficult since, try as she might, up until now she had not been able to say the name Denis. She gave it a go.
“Robson, Den-Den-Denise Robson.” she said and then thought “Oh fuck it! This is who I am lady, you deal with it.”
“Denise? I don’t know…” It was only the addition of an ‘E’ that changed Denis’s name from the masculine to the feminine after all and well, as much of a bitch as this woman was she wasn’t stupid, despite the writing on the toilet walls. “Shouldn’t that be…?” she looked up for the first time to see not Denis, but Denise.
“Who are you?”
“I’m Denise Robson.” said Denise. “I just said that.”
“You’re a…”
“Yes. I’m fully aware of what I am. I used to be the man you were expecting and I don’t expect you to believe a word, but I am now Denise. Now, about that absence. I told you on the phone that I wasn’t feeling myself and you chose not to believe me. Does this answer your questions?” she asked standing before the woman, holding her blouson open and showing off her respectably-proportioned breasts.
“I-I-I don’t know what to say.”
“I didn’t think you would. I didn’t either when I first discovered this, but like it or not, I’m now Denise. I’ve had a really shitty weekend and frankly I don’t give a poop about you or your jobsworth attitude, I need to take some time off.”
“I see.” said Ms. Sharpe, collecting herself, though still not sure what to make of the woman before her. “Will you be returning to work after your absence Denis, sorry Denise?” she asked, drawing ‘Denise’ out like a piece of bubblegum with a thin lipped ‘smile’.
“I don’t like your attitude, madam and unless you want a sexual harassment charge brought, I suggest you climb down off that pedestal you’ve mistakenly put yourself on and keep a civil tongue in your head.
“Well! I’ve never been so insulted.” she spluttered.
“And neither have I. You have no right to judge and you certainly have no right to treat me or anyone else that way. If you want insults, go read the writing in the toilets, there’s plenty there. In the meantime, I would be grateful if you would make the necessary changes to the paperwork with regards to my name and gender. If you need any further confirmation of that, I will see my doctor and get him to furnish you with the necessary documents.”
Denise, flushed with the outburst of anger, however well-controlled it may have been, left the office.
It didn’t take long for the case to go to trial and during the hearings there was little time for anything else. The relationship between Denise and Stephanie had changed and Denise wished it hadn’t.
Despite the fact that Steph was almost permanently distracted by what was happening in her life and gave Denise the impression that she wasn’t trustworthy, she felt that Steph’s intentions were honourable and as misguided as she may have been; her heart was in the right place. Denise didn’t stop loving her, even though the feelings weren’t reciprocated.
The police held both girls under protective custody, though they were kept separate and whilst one would have thought that it was an open and shut case, what with the baddies being caught red handed and all, Smart had some pretty clever and expensive lawyers working in his and Paul’s defence and there were fears that the witnesses would be compromised — hence the protective custody.
As the trial plodded slowly on, Denise’s feelings for Stephanie deepened — absence making the heart grow fonder and all that. She had a distinct feeling of loss at being separated from her friend after all they had been through and the refusal to allow contact between them hurt her deeply.
Nevertheless, the wheels of justice ground on inexorably and eventually the final outcome was reached.
Stephanie was exonerated for her part in passing on information since firstly, there were mitigating circumstances surrounding the safety of her parents and secondly, what she did ultimately led to the capture and successful prosecution of Edward John Smart, Paul Phillips and a number of lesser associates. She was however 'let go' by the force.
They were charged and sent down for amongst other things: Drug trafficking, importing Class ‘A’ substances with intent to distribute, murder, kidnapping, attempted murder, embezzlement and a list of other offences that would very nearly be the same length as this account. Needless to say, it’s unlikely that either Paul or Smart would see the light of day on the outside of a prison again.
Denise tried to keep herself to herself after the trial and Stephanie was not receptive to her calls, but being the prosecution’s star witness and what amounts to the linchpin in the case, for sometime after her life wasn’t really her own anyway.
Although pleased that it was all over, the knowledge that she had nothing to move on to coupled with the fact that Stephanie was no longer part of her life saddened Denise. She constantly wondered whether she would have been better off listening to that inner voice on that fateful Thursday evening and leaving things as they were; remaining the boring but ultimately safe Denis.
Denise was sitting in her kitchen in a melancholy mood. She felt more alone now than she had ever done and whilst she was more comfortable as she now was, it didn’t alter the fact that she still had no-one close.
She knew that relationships born out of stressful situations rarely lasted but she would have liked to have tried to cultivate at least a friendship between her and Stephanie and wasn’t entirely convinced that Steph, despite her protestations, wasn’t more into her in the first place. She felt that Steph’s preoccupation with the situation was what put their relationship on hold or rather prevented it from going anywhere.
She was startled back into life when the phone rang.
“Hello?”
“Is that Miss Robson? Denise Robson?”
“It is.”
“My name’s Fuller and I work for Mr. James Smart. He has asked me to arrange a meeting between you both this afternoon, if you’re available.”
Denise was flabbergasted. She’d just been instrumental in putting his son in prison probably for the rest of his natural life and he wanted a meeting?
Of course she agreed and went immediately into overdrive fussing (as she did nowadays) in the bath, out of the bath, before the mirror and generally for good measure.
She still hadn’t got used to the idea of makeup and decided against it which meant that she was ready long before a large black Mercedes arrived outside her front door right on time.
The driver got out and opened the rear door for her and she stepped in.
Inside sat an older man, not unlike a certain Mr. Heffner.
“I’m so pleased you could make it Miss Robson.” he said leaning forward and extending his hand. Denise took it and shook it warmly, but was still more than a little perturbed about what the meeting was in aid of.
“I suspect you’re a little confused as to why I would want to meet with you.” he stated urbanely. “I understand how you must feel, but let me put your mind at rest. That imbecile you helped to put behind bars may well have carried my name, but he was definitely no son of mine.”
“He wasn’t?”
“No. In fact I never wanted to have anything to do with him, but my second wife engineered it as part of the divorce settlement. I took him on and well, had it not been for your quick thinking, I doubt very much whether I would have a business left to run.”
“It wasn't all my doing.”
“No, but you did enough and just at the right time.”
They were driven to an upmarket restaurant on the outskirts of town and together had a wonderful meal before he dropped the bombshell.
“I’d like to you come and work for me.”
“But I already do.”
“You do? Where?”
“I was the manager of the men’s and ladies departments at your store in town. I just happened to be there when those thieves broke in and started unloading the electrical department into their truck. I phoned the police and the next thing I knew, I was mixed up in a whole hornets nest of cops and robbers.”
“My! You have been busy.”
“I know. Then once that was all over, I had to take some time off for the trial and I don’t know whether I’m going to get my job back.”
“I can tell you now that you’re not.”
“You mean I’m fired?”
“No. As I said before, I want you working for me. I’ll come straight to the point. I know who you are and what you have done and anyone who is prepared to put their life on the line for something deserves something in return. I want you to take over from my step-son.”
“Phew! That’s a big jump.”
“You can clearly think things through, you have an ability to function under pressure and I can’t think of a person who has been more loyal. What do you say?”
Denise was still buzzing long after she got home and was prone to fits of the giggles for no apparent reason for days after that. She was happy, but the hole that Stephanie filled was still causing her heart to ache.
It had been weeks since she had last spoken to Stephanie and she needed to know what had happened to her, why she refused to answer her calls and why they weren’t still friends. She felt that regardless of her orientation, there was still a friendship there and she would rather have a friend than a reluctant girlfriend.
She tried the phone again, but there was no reply. She was upset that the only person she wanted to give her news to wasn’t there to take it and even if she had been, so much had happened that she wasn’t sure what kind of a reception she would get anyway.
She decided to go out and drown herself in shopping. She had new clothes to buy after all; her new job would entail having to go back to wearing suits and stuff. Mind you, perhaps this time, she could wear something that was a little more exciting than her previous ‘suits’ and you would be hard pressed to call them ‘exciting’ under any circumstances.
She was looking in the window of one shop, when in the reflection, she saw someone she was sure she knew.
“Steph?” she called. The woman turned round and looked at her. The hair was longer and didn’t look as vibrant as it had and the face seemed to have aged somewhat, but it was definitely her. Immediately the recognition set in, Denise’s stomach started to do somersaults and she knew that nothing she felt for Stephanie in the past had diminished.
“Denise?”
It was a subdued meeting. Like neither of them knew whether the other was pleased to see them or not, like they were scared of what they thought might happen.
“It’s really good to see you. I didn’t think I was going to see you again. How have you been keeping?” asked Denise.
“Okay I suppose. It’s been a bit difficult since the trial, mum and dad didn’t take the ordeal well.”
“I’m sorry to hear that.”
“How about you? You look as though you’re doing alright.”
“I suppose. It’s not the same though. I lost someone very dear to me after that debacle was all over and I regret very much not having made more of an effort.”
“Oh?”
“Yes. I thought she blamed me for not trusting her and getting her parents involved in some very nasty business and I don’t blame her for thinking that way. A lot happened and someone needed to take charge and I think that having done so, I may have ruined a really good friendship.”
They stood looking at one another for a few moments, before Denise could stand it no longer. She engulfed the rather startled-looking woman and hugged her tight.
“I’ve really missed you.” she whispered into her ear. “Please don’t tell me you don’t want to see me anymore.”
A single tear stood in the corners of Stephanie’s eyes when Denise let her go, hoping that her plea would not go unanswered,
“I couldn’t. I’ve had a hard time admitting it, but I’ve missed you too. I know things have moved on, you know, water under the bridge as they say, but no, I wouldn’t like it if I couldn’t see you again.”
“Would you like a coffee? I understand there’s a little Italian restaurant not far from here that does really good cappuccinos.”
“I think I’d like that.” said Stephanie and the two women walked off towards the eastern side of town. They had a lot to catch up on and the conversation had started almost immediately.
As they walked on leaving the shop behind them, Stephanie laughed and without stopping, she kissed Denise’s cheek, threading her arm though her friend’s, pulling the two of them closer together as they turned a corner and were gone.
Fin
Comments
Awesome Story Nick!!!
...Seems this contest is yanking great wonderful stories from all of our authors! Nick, you have done an outstanding job with this gem. Altruistic, very believable despite the strangefellows device (of course! :) hehe) and the action just flowed! Kept me moving right along, Not a boring spot anywhere!!!! Fun filled, action packed, and a romance of such that just felt right! *Many hugs* Thank you for this wonderful story that has made today a memorable one for having read it and has caused me to start exploring some feelings about myself and my ability in relating to others. It has made me think hard.
Love
Sephrena Lynn Miller
Thoroughly Enjoyable!
Best of luck in the contest, dear!
It must be me.... For the
It must be me.... For the life of me I couldn't find how or why Denis became Denise. Help?
I enjoyed the story but not knowing kept nagging at me.
it was Easy Suna!
.. the disembodied voice mentioned a few times was the demon that enabled the wish to occur and pervert it! Re-read it and see :)
Hugs
Sephrena Lynn Miller
Not that easy
I had to read it three times before catching on. It's a short sentence buried in the story, and isn't very obvious. Not bad, otherwise.
Karen J.
"A dress makes no sense unless it inspires men to want to take it off you."
Francoise Sagan
"Life is not measured by the breaths you take, but by the moments that take your breath away.”
George Carlin
Not that easy... now it should be.
My apologies for those who could not make the connection with the "change" and whilst I don't want to give too much away for those who haven't read the story yet, I do believe that it's now much more obvious.
I would have made the changes sooner, but after yesterdays fiasco, I wasn't able to. Now I have and I hope future readers won't have that problem...
Thanks
Nick B
Wonderful Story!
I loved the adventure, mystery, and romance in this tale. The characters felt very real. While not being perfect, they managed to rise above it all and do the right thing. Thank you for such a wonderful story. :)
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Heather Rose Brown
Author of Bobby's Rainy Day Adventure
Interesting story... I like
Interesting story... I like how Denise tricked Stephanie, to set up the gangsters. God... Stephanie should have know that giving in to blackmail will only encourage the blackmailer. Thanks to eros and his arrows or this might have ended as a tragedy.
Thank ou for writing,
Beyogi