Stephanie’s Deal by Jennifer Brock Steven peeked at his Christmas presents, so his family decided that his punishment should be to live as a girl until he had to go back to school. Stephanie has a date in four days, but before that she’s going to spend a day with her mom, try to stop a fight, and enjoy some retail therapy.

Episode 6

Thursday morning Stephanie woke up and liked that for the first time since becoming a girl there was no specific schedule for the day; no one would be telling her what to do or when to do it. She got out of bed, checked her hair in the mirror, and put on her robe and slippers.

Finding herself in a silly mood, she struck up a conversation with her new doll to help make up her mind. “So, Hannah, what should I do first — take a bath, or get some breakfast? If I take a bath first, then I’d have to get dressed, and I’m not sure what I’m going to do today, so maybe breakfast is the way to go. But then again, maybe they’ve got something planned for me after all. Good idea, I’ll go see if I’m supposed to be doing anything specific. Thanks, Hannah.”

She scampered off, giggling and bouncing, to see where everyone was. It turned out that her father had gone in to the office and her older sister Michelle was gone to catch up with friends she hadn’t seen since going away to college. Her mother was home, though. Stephanie found her in the kitchen. She was frowning over the newspaper and enjoying a cup of coffee. Stephanie asked if there was anything planned for her to be doing that day, and Mom said she hadn’t thought about it.

Stephanie helped herself to a bowl of cereal and over breakfast asked her mother if there was anything she could do to help her out around the house, since she hadn’t come up with any plans of her own for the day. Mom thought about it and decided that she could use Stephanie’s help with the laundry.

It was only when she took her bath that Stephanie realized that she hadn’t been thinking like Steven all morning, and it worried him. This girl stuff was becoming much too easy. At least it was more than half over.

She wasn’t sure what she’d need to wear to do housework. Mom’s advice was to find something casual and comfortable. Michelle usually wore sweats to do housework, but Stephanie’s wardrobe was all skirts and dresses, so she didn’t have anything that low-key. She settled on a pink top that was almost a t-shirt but had lace around the collar, a red pleated skirt, and knee socks.

Laundry was quite a chore. First, she had to empty each of the hampers from everyone’s room into a laundry basket and carry it down to the laundry room to make a big pile of dirty clothes. Then the big pile had to be sorted by color, and the delicates from the three females in the house had to be separated out. Then when the clothes came out of the washer, they needed to be sorted again based on how they’d get dried. Some things went in the dryer on hot, some went in on cool, and some things didn’t go in the dryer at all and needed to be laid out on a rack in the laundry room. When they came out of the dryer, some things got hung up right away and the rest got folded, but they all got sorted by who they belonged to. And finally, everything got delivered back to the right rooms.

While they were putting Stephanie’s clothes away, she asked her mother something that she’d been wondering about. “There’s so much in here. Why do I have more clothes that I’d need for my week and a half?”

“I wasn’t sure everything would fit, so I got you some things in different sizes. Also, I wanted you to have a real girl’s experience at putting an outfit together. If you only had exactly eleven ensembles, it wouldn’t be accurate. Actual girls sometimes go through several outfits in a day, so I wanted you to have that option as well. Plus you have to remember that I was very mad at you that day I first went shopping, so I wanted to overwhelm you with the girliest assortment ever.”

“What’s going to happen to all my girl clothes after I go back to being a boy?”

Her mother sighed. “Well, I’d been planning on keeping just a few things and hanging them in my closet in case you ever did something insanely stupid again, and donating the rest to charity. We could have used the tax deduction. But then you went and volunteered to be in your cousin’s wedding, so we’ll have to keep a good chunk of your wardrobe. We can’t have you showing up at your dance class in the same outfit all the time. So we’ll just have to find a way to squeeze both your Steven clothes and your Stephanie clothes into your dresser and closet.”

“That dance class thing is real?”

“Grace called while you were out yesterday. They want to wedding party to join them on the dance floor at the reception, and that means making sure everyone can dance. So her mother is paying for all of you to learn ballroom dancing. They want the video to be perfect. Since you’re her little brother’s dance partner, it would be tough to convince her mother to let you skip the class.”

“I don’t just have to take a class, but I also have to dance with a boy? Yuck!” Stephanie grimaced.

“Sweetheart, the whole reason why they needed you was to have a partner for her brother. I thought you realized what that meant. You’ll have plenty of time to get used to dancing with him enough so you won’t make that face at the wedding. Definitely not your best look.”

“Plenty of time? How long is this class, anyway?”

“It’s every other Wednesday night starting next week. They’ll come pick you up at 7:00, so you’ll have to be all prettied up by then. The course runs for ten sessions.”

“Ten sessions every other week? So for twenty weeks I’m going to be dancing with a boy? Oh, crud.”

“It’s not so bad. You might even like it. Your father rarely takes me dancing anymore, but when we do go out it’s a lot of fun.”

“If I have to be able to be a girl for twenty weeks, what are we going to do about my hair? And fingernails? And my earrings — if I take them out to be a boy again, will the holes close up, or can I put earrings back in when I want to be a girl?”

“Calm down. It’s not happening yet for a while. You’re still a girl full-time for another five days, so we have plenty of time to come up with a solution for those issues before they become urgent. The goal of your punishment was not to publicly humiliate you, so we’ll find a way to keep your double identity a secret. I promise.”

Stephanie wasn’t quite mollified, but all that laundry really wore her out, and took most of the morning. She just had to trust that her Mom would work it all out in the end. She got to do the vacuuming next, which was loud and annoying, but it gave a real sense of accomplishment to see the marks left by the machine on the clean carpet.

Her mother had lunch ready for her when she was done with all the carpets. They had chicken salad sandwiches and creamy broccoli soup. Stephanie exclaimed about how tiring it was doing housework, and Mom joked that she’d better marry a liberated guy who’ll chip in to do his share. That led to talking about the date Stephanie had made to go over to a boy’s house for New Year’s Eve. Stephanie was very worried that Brian would try to kiss her, and her mother told her that no boy could make her do something she didn’t want to do; if Brian tried to put a move on her she should tell him no in no uncertain terms and then she could call her and she’d come get her, no matter what time it was.

That seemed to cheer her up, so her mother tried to change the subject a little. She asked her how she liked going shopping for dresses with her sister the day before, and Stephanie said it had been fun. Mom then pointed out that she probably would need a new dress to wear to the party. The one she’d worn to the tea party was a little too fancy, and none of her others were quite fancy enough. They decided to make a day of it on Friday, and go out to find her something nice. Maybe Michelle would want to tag along for a real Girls’ Day Out.

After lunch, Stephanie was put to work dusting the living room and dining room, where a million little knickknacks were on display and all needed cleaning. Stephanie didn’t like dusting, and couldn’t understand what the whole point was; they were just going to get covered in dust again. Dusting was tough work, and it even made her sneeze a couple of times. But she got all the little ceramic children cleaned.

Just when she was ready to relax after all her chores, Mom told her there was one more job, and it was the worst; the bathrooms had to be scrubbed clean. It was gross and disgusting, and really made her appreciate all the stinky, messy jobs that her mother did around the house all the time. The couple of little chores Steven normally did to help out at home really weren’t much at all. Maybe when Steven came back, he’d try to do a little more.

Stephanie felt really grubby when she was done, and needed to change her clothes, even her underwear. Mom promised that the housework was done, so her new outfit was a light green blouse and a dark gray skirt over white ribbed tights, with a white button-up sweater to top it all off. Because she wanted to look nice, she used the glittery lip gloss and brown mascara that she’d gotten for Christmas, and put a drop of her cologne behind each ear. She even experimented with putting her new barrettes in her hair.

She wasn’t sure of her new look, and asked Mom for an opinion. She said Stephanie looked lovely. Stephanie asked if there was anything she could do to help out with dinner. Mom was pleased to see her newfound interest in cooking, and put her in an apron and told her to wash her hands. Dinner was this really complicated roast that got rolled up and tied with a string, and Stephanie got to help out at every step along the way, chopping vegetables, measuring herbs, and even got to put a finger on the knot when her mother tied up the meat.

When Michelle and Dad got home, they both commented on the delicious smells coming from the kitchen, and Mom told them how helpful Stephanie had been. Dad joked that some day she’d make some lucky guy an excellent wife, but Michelle told him he was being sexist and you didn’t have to have a vagina to do housework. Mom stepped in and told her not to talk vulgar at dinner time, and Michelle said that there was nothing vulgar about a perfectly natural body part, and then everyone was mad at everyone, and dinner was ruined. It still tasted very good, but everyone ate in silence.

Stephanie was glad that the argument wasn’t her fault, but it was still really uncomfortable. She cleared the table and tried to cheer her mother up but it wasn’t working. She went up to talk to her sister to try to fix things from the other side. She told Michelle that Mom had been looking forward to trying to have a Girls’ Day Out on Friday with just the three of them together, but with two of them fighting that probably wasn’t going to happen.

She asked if Michelle would apologize to Mom for her dinner conversation, and she said that there was nothing wrong with any of the words that she used, so she had nothing to apologize for. Stephanie told her, “You knew that Mom wouldn’t have wanted to hear that word, but you used it anyway.”

Michelle played innocent “What word?”

“You know the one. When you were talking about girl parts.”

“Which girl parts were we talking about? Could you remind me what word I used?”

Stephanie was blushing, and whispered the word softly. Michelle claimed not to have heard her, and made her repeat it louder. Stephanie still wasn’t loud enough. The third time, Michelle seemed satisfied, but gave Stephanie a lecture anyway about how the proper words for body parts were nothing to be ashamed of. Stephanie said that maybe they weren’t, but it still wasn’t the right time to bring the subject up. Michelle would only let the subject drop if Stephanie promised that she’d still help with the housework even when she grew back her penis.

Michelle agreed to say something to Mom. Stephanie went with her as a show of support. She said that she thought the plan for the three of them to do some female bonding was a good idea, and since she was only going to have a little sister for a few more days, she’d apologize for Stephanie’s sake.

Mom was more perceptive than Steven had ever noticed. Instead of staying mad at Michelle, she said that it wasn’t like her to pick a fight and asked her what was really bothering her. Michelle just collapsed in her mother’s arms and started crying tears of frustration. She hadn’t seen her boyfriend Kurt since she’d left college. She tried to call him on Christmas but it went straight to voicemail, and so had every call she’d tried since. He still hadn’t called her back.

Mom just held her for a while. Then she set in trying to solve the problem. She asked if the number Michelle was trying was a cell phone or a real phone, and after a little bit of discussion over what made one phone more real than another, she admitted that it was a cell. Mom suggested that maybe he’d just forgotten his phone or battery charger at school. Being away from his phone might not be as devastating for a guy as for a girl.

Michelle was brightening a little, but she wanted to know why he didn’t just call her from a land line. Mom thought that maybe he didn’t know her number; if he always called her from his phone he’d never need to actually dial the number. Michelle said that she knew for a fact that she was number one on his speed dial, so that could be true.

Mom told her she could call information and get the phone number for his parents’ house. Michelle pouted and wanted to know why he couldn’t have done the same to get their number, but Mom reminded her that they were unlisted. Dad had gotten harassing calls from a disgruntled client once. Michelle looked through her things for the paper with Kurt’s parents’ address on it, and then called 411 from the phone in the family room.

It was hard to follow only half the conversation, but it didn’t sound like she was talking to her boyfriend. Stephanie asked her mother how she knew that there was something bothering Michelle. Mom said that she’d always had a way of easily reading her emotional state, an ability she’d never been able to master with her son (or her other daughter for that matter). Stephanie was always very emotionally guarded.

After Michelle got off the line, she was all smiles and hugged her little sister and her mother and even tracked down her father and said she was sorry for using words he didn’t want to hear. Mom and Stephanie calmed her down enough to find out what happened.

Kurt wasn’t home, but she’d talked to his father. When she gave her name, he knew who she was. Kurt had even showed his Dad her picture! He told her his son was an idiot and forgot his phone at school, only realizing it when he wanted to call her on Christmas Eve. Apparently, he’d been moping around ever since, when finally they made his brother take him out to watch a hockey game. Michelle had given him both the house phone number and her cell, and he promised to tell his moronic son to call her when he got in.

She danced around the living room for a while, and was even in a good enough mood that she accepted when Mom suggested the family gather around the table for a game of cards. They played gin and Stephanie almost won, but Dad pulled ahead on the last hand. The second game got called short when Michelle’s cute little ringtone went off.

Stephanie was getting tired anyway; her day of housework had really worn her out. She put on her favorite flannel nightgown and brushed her hair, and on a whim brushed the hair of Hannah, her doll, too. Then she slipped in between her nice clean sheets to drift off to sleep, hoping she’d have sweet dreams instead of scary ones.

The next day, Stephanie’s mother dressed her in her white padded bra, panties, shiny tights, and slip, under a nice pink dress with a sash that tied in the back. She wore the jewelry her aunt Jeannie had made and her watch, and pulled her hair back with a pink plastic headband. She felt cute, and used her favorite strawberry lip gloss and a dab of perfume on her wrists and behind each ear.

Mom was a little more dressed up than usual, in a nice dress with blue flowers printed on it that she sometimes wore on Sundays, but with redder lipstick than she had in church. Michelle wore a short black skirt and a blue tank top under a pretty black jacket. The three Brooks ladies looking their finest piled into Mom’s car and went downtown to the mall.

Stephanie enjoyed walking through the stores knowing that she looked pretty and completely girlish. It was even fun going from store to store trying on dresses that her mother picked out, looking for the perfect one to wear to Brian Somers’ New Year’s Eve party.

They found it in the fifth store they tried. It was navy blue with white lace along the collar and the hem, and had what Mom called a “boat neck,” where it was wide at the top, almost all the way to her bra straps, but went straight across so it didn’t reveal anything. Michelle teased that Mom had picked it to so that Brian couldn’t try to look down her dress to peek at her boobs. Stephanie said that was a good thing, since she didn’t want him to be disappointed.

Mom insisted that she also needed new shoes to go with the dress, and took her to a few different shoe stores. She actually had Stephanie trying on grownup woman shoes, not girl shoes. They ended up getting a nice pair of navy blue pumps, with a heel that was almost two inches, but it was square instead of small and pointy like the shoes Michelle was trying on, since they were there. If she was going to have navy shoes, apparently she also needed a navy handbag, which meant going to another store. Shopping for an outfit as a girl was very complicated.

Michelle suggested that Stephanie should get some new jewelry, and Mom agreed. They picked out a pair of silver earrings that had sparkly chains dangling from rings hanging on hooks, and then found a necklace and bracelet in that same style of chain. Stephanie thought that she could have just worn the stuff she already had, but Mom said that her little girl would only get to have one first date, and she wanted it to be super-special.

It was kind of weird thinking about going on her first date ever, with a boy. Steven should have been screaming inside that he didn’t want to go out with another boy, but Stephanie was more nervous than anything else. She hoped Brian would think she looked nice.

They loaded all their purchases back into the car and then went to get some Chinese for lunch. The two sisters had to use the ladies’ room before eating, and it felt surprisingly natural. Stephanie worried that maybe this whole thing had gone a little too far when she realized that she hadn’t had a thought in days about the Nintendo Wii that would be the reward for all this.

After lunch, they thought about trying to catch a movie, but there wasn’t anything playing they could all agree on. So they went home and watched Mom’s favorite DVD, The Notebook. Michelle thought it was a cheesy movie, but she sat there sharing a big bowl of popcorn with her little sister and cried a little anyway. Stephanie thought it was a good movie, but she wasn’t sure why her mother liked to watch such a sad movie over and over again.

The girls let their mother have a break, and got dinner together by themselves. It was simple spaghetti and meatballs with garlic bread and a tossed salad, so they didn’t need any extra instruction. Mom peeked in on them having fun working together; it was hard to imagine that they used to get along so horridly.

Dad proclaimed the meatballs to be the best he ever had, and said that he was glad to see everyone smiling and laughing, instead of the tension of the day before. He asked the ladies how their day went, and they talked about all the shopping and female bonding they’d done. It even prompted Stephanie to give a little fashion show after dinner, to show off her new outfit. Dad said he wasn’t sure a pretty girl like her could be trusted around some boy, but she just blushed and giggled.

She did some drawing in Steven’s sketchbook before turning in, just to calm her head. The random scribbled doodle she thought she was making ended up having a lot more little pink heart shapes in it than she expected. She wondered if she really was expected to kiss Brian on New Year’s, and worried that she might not be good at it. Was it wrong to think about stuff like that?