I looked at myself again in the mirror and frowned. I may only have been 12, but I knew what I liked and I did not like this...

That Poofy Dress

by

Susan Brown

I looked at myself again in the mirror and frowned. I may only have been 12, but I knew what I liked and I did not like this.

I was wearing a well below the knee length dress, peach coloured for god’s sake! It was all poofed up with lace and satin bits all over. Matching peach ankle socks and what our American friends call Mary Jane’s on my feet completed the effect of a giddy little girl, more Shirley Temple than Shirley Temple ever was.

Then my hair, oh Lord, what had they done with my hair? Admittedly long, but those things that the hair dresser did for me should be against the law.

‘Are you ready Lesley?’

I looked like a boy in a poofy dress, I knew I did.

‘Fancy drawing attention to myself like this.’ I thought, ‘Just because my mum said that I had to wear it.’

It was an all girl’s, pretty dress type party, but I had to go because my twin Jessica, who was loved by everyone but me insisted that I go dressed like...like...this. A pity that she wasn’t into Goth; black clothes would have suited my mood. At 12 she should have been well out of this type of rubbish, but no, her friends and her thought that it would be a giggle to dress like this for the party.

‘Call it a theme party,’ she said with a giggle–she was heavy giggler, I wondered if you could get a pill for that. What was wrong with jeans and a t-shirt?

‘Lesley, come along.’

‘Coming,’ I shouted down, still very reluctant to show myself.

‘Mummy, Lesley won’t come down.’

‘I know Jessica darling I will go up in a minute.’

I knew that tone and the oily way that Jessica wrapped mum around her little finger made me want to heave.

For goodness sake, I had been strapped down and forcibly had that heavy makeup put on me. Child cruelty, that’s what I call it. If dad was still around, he wouldn’t have allowed it.

‘Lesley, if you don’t come down this minute, I will come up there...’

‘Go on Mummy, go up and...and...’

‘All right,’ I shouted, ‘I’m coming,’

After one last shuddering look at myself, I left my room and went downstairs. At the bottom were mum and the hated sister, a smirk all over her face and wearing a dress even poofier than mine, in yellow for god’s sake. It gave me a headache to look at it, where were my cool sun glasses...

Why did she always get her way? Why couldn’t I just be me? Why oh why was I wearing this flaming poofy dress?

Maybe I could call child protection help line. This has got to be the worst...

‘Oh Lesley, you look very pretty; what do you think Jessica?’

‘My dress is nicer.’

‘Yes dear but what about Lesley’s?’

‘Okay, ‘spose.’

Jesicca was now in a skulk. She does that a lot. Maybe I looked nicer in my dress than she did in hers and she was jealous?

I giggled at that. Hell that sounded a very girl giggle from me. Had to watch that; I have an image to keep up. I hoped to goodness that none of my friends saw me like this. Luckily, Jessica’s friends had nothing to do with mine, so I might, just might get away with this.

‘Let’s go you pretty, pretty girls.’

‘Mum, do not call me that,’ I said with clenched teeth.

‘Sorry Lesley. Look you are doing this for you sister, remember that.’

‘So she came top of the class again and she was promised a party but A, why do I have to go, B, why do I have to dress like...like...this and 3, what will my friends say if I get seen out in public wearing this goody two shoes reject dress that went out of fashion when you were a girl?’

‘Now you look very pretty and I love the pink lipstick it matches your gorgeous nails. Go with the flow, have fun. You only have to do this once and I did say that you could have that new iPad if you just did this little thing.’

Jessica smirked again. She already had a new iPad. She had it for being top of the class. In my opinion brains aren’t everything. I have personality, she has An Attitude.

‘Oh good, there’s the taxi, come on let’s go!

Mum went out with Jessica squealing after her. I wished she didn’t squeal like that.

I hate my sister.

I ran out of the house and was in the taxi almost as it stopped. I wanted to make sure that no one saw me like this. I was certain that my face would be red with blushing, but then it would be anyway with the amount of blusher mum put on my cheeks. Life was just one long series of nightmares and this nightmare I would relive time and time again.

The dress got caught up in the doorway of the taxi, did I say it was a poofy dress? It had three petticoats for god’s sake! I sat down, carefully, trying not to get poked in the eye by wayward ribbon–life really sucked sometimes. Eventually the other two piled in and then we had to mess about so that our dresses didn’t get entangled and creased like the one that Diana wore at that wedding.

As I sat in the taxi, hiding my face as much as possible–you never know who could see you–and looking forward to when it was all over and I could get back to normal,I would never again allow myself to be bribed and bullied like this. I would stand on my own two feet and be strong!

On the way back from the party, I was in a state of almost complete exhaustion. My mind tried to black out the party, but it was difficult. All Jessica’s friends said how pretty I was and what a lovely dress I had on and my hair was so nice and who did your makeup?

The food was OK but it was a pity I wasn’t old enough to drink spirits. I could have done with some fortifying. Jessica, strangely enough, was quite nice to me at the party and tried to make me part of it. I would have to think about that. Was she a female Jekyll and Hyde? We had been reading it in English class and it was well cool the way someone could change like that. We hadn’t finished the book yet, but I bet you a mouse to a PlayStation, that it will all end in tears.

Mum and Jessica were doing that ‘wasn’t it wonderful’ and other gushy type talk on the way back. I was above all that and I sort of zoned out when they started discussing in detail, the dresses that everyone wore. I just wanted to get home and changed and out of this poofery. I just ached to get back to normal.

We arrived home and I was out of the taxi almost as soon as it stopped. I had grabbed the front door key from mum and despite calls of ‘walk, don’t run,’ I was in the house and up the stairs, trying not to trip on the hem of that damned dress before the other two were through the front door.

I went into my bedroom, took the dress and other stuff off leaving it all strewn across the floor, the dress was so poofy, it almost stood up on its own!

Then I grabbed my dressing gown, went and had a shower, washing the makeup off by scrubbing my face with my flannel. I washed the curls out of my hair and then soon I felt normal again and I finally started to breathe more easily. After drying my hair with the hair dyer and combing it through, I got dressed, shuddered at the sight of that dress once again, wondered if it would burn easily and then went downstairs, sighing that the torment was over and at least I would get an iPad out of the whole horrid experience.

I walked into the lounge and there was mum and Jessica, still dressed for the party, looking at photo’s on Jessica’s iPad. They hadn’t wasted any time downloading them from mum’s phone and I would bet a memory stick to an iPhone that the whole lot would be on Facebook, before the night was out.

Mum looked up and frowned.

‘You changed then?’

‘Yes,’

‘You looked nicer in that dress.’

‘No I didn’t, I looked silly.’

Jessica was too wrapped up in the photo’s to take any notice of me and I could hear ‘ooh’s’, ‘aah’s’ and the occasional giggle as she looked at her iPad.

‘Well I think you looked lovely and at least I have some nice pics of you.’

‘What’s wrong with the way I look now?’

I looked down at my pink t-shirt, jeans skirt, and white trainers with pink laces. This was the real me. I may be a trans-girl, but I know what I like.

‘I still think you looked lovely in your dress,’

‘Oh mum, it was so...so...so...poofy!