The Weekly Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 3387 by Angharad Copyright© 2023 Angharad

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This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
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On the following Monday, Siän Informed me that we were going out for a meal with her parents on the Saturday evening and she required me to come to her place to try on a few dresses that evening, so I could borrow one. I couldn't argue because customers were in and out of the shop, so all I could say was, "We'll see." I knew I was labouring in vain because she always won the argument.

I got through the day but really all I wanted to do was sleep, however, I had had the summons from my supposed girlfriend to attend and we spent a good hour trying on different dresses before she announced that was the one. I looked at it in the mirror, a long one on the inside of her mirror and had to admit it looked lovely. Her mother popped in as I was doing so with some tea and biscuits for us and admired it.

"Are your parents going to come with us on Saturday?" she asked although I thought she knew my situation.

"I haven't asked them, Mrs Griffiths," I replied.

"Oh, I think you should," she said as a parting shot and I sat on the bed and drank my tea. I felt like crying, all the fun of selecting a dress had faded at the thought of my dad coming out for a meal with me as Charlotte. I made a hurried excuse to leave and virtually ran home to avoid my father who was due at any time.

"You're later today," exclaimed my mother as I ran up to shower.

"I'll tell you in a minute, "I shouted as I ran up the stairs. I now had to think of something to tell her. I mulled it over as the shampoo and body wash eased my woes for a moment. I decided that instead of making up a story, I tell her the truth.

With this in mind I quickly dried and dressed myself after a bit of body lotion and combing my hair and dressed simply in jeans and polo shirt over which I wore a sweatshirt to hide my budding booblets. I did consider a bra but that may have been detected by my dad.

"So why were you late? More cash and carry problems?"

"Uh, no," I blushed and told her about the coming dinner appointment.

"You know that your dad is away all weekend on a course?" she informed me, so I could come."

Blushing ever redder I told her, "But they want me to go as a girl."

"So, I think I can pretend for one night that you are, after all, they were very helpful when you had to wear the girl's uniform while you were doing the play."

"You don't mind?"

"I can put up with it for one night but never mention it to your father." I hugged her and almost burst into tears instead she offered to plait my hair to make it look less girly to my dad.

The rest of the week passed ever so slowly as I dreamt of my coming meal with a sense of happiness and also one of impending doom. Whenever I tried to do anything like this, it always backfired on me, usually with cartloads of manure and I got covered in it. However, as Saturday approached it seemed that the man upstairs must have been on holiday because everything seemed to be going smoothly. Of course, I was at the shop serving customers as I seemed to be every day but it enabled me to save a few quid and I was hoping to buy a few things to take to university with me, or buy them there. Brighton wasn't as big as Bristol but no one knew me there, so it may be better to wait.

I finished work and went home not quite sure if today would be a good thing or not and I nearly suggested to Mrs Griffiths that they went without me, but Siân handed me the dress to borrow and kissed me before throwing me out as she wanted to get ready. We were still three hours from the time we would meet at the restaurant so I wondered if I had time to sleep for an hour first. I went home carrying the dress in a garment bag and my mother told me to go and shower.

"I was hoping for a quick nap first," I told her.

"No, you need to get ready, we'll only just make it as it is," was her reply and I almost felt like calling it off despite my excitement of going dressed a girl, I was just so tired. I trudged upstairs and she'd already laid out my lingerie for the evening, a bra and panties and tights along with a pair of shoes I'd never seen before. I went into shower and she told me to bath and shave my legs, there was a razor there. Too tired to argue I did as I was told then after bathing I rubbed body lotion into my hairless legs and into my largely hairless body, remember puberty had passed me by.

I gently towelled my hair and wrapped it in a hand towel before I emerged from the bath. "You smell better," observed my mother and told me to get my undies on and she'd brush my hair. I complied feeling slightly more upbeat as I did so. She dried and brushed my hair as I sat in bra and pants as she did so, then to my surprise she put my hair into an updo. threading it through some sort of doughnut thing. When she had finished I was astounded, stood up hugged her, and kissed her cheek. She promised to show me how to do it myself when she had time. She never did but Stella did some years later.

We put some foam pads in my bra and the dress fit more properly, the shoes, which fit me comfortably she explained were on offer in M&S so she thought they would. They had a two-inch heel and I had to potter about the house before I felt safe in them but they made the dress look better. She helped me with my makeup and then helped me into my dress. I felt so good and I had never looked better. She smiled ruefully at me and then went to dress herself while I went off to make a pot of tea. In my world, everything runs around a cuppa.

She gave me a squirt of smellies and loaned me a jacket to keep the evening chill away but I was so high with pure joy, I wasn't really aware of the temperature. We drove in her old Fiesta to the restaurant and a few moments later Siân and her parents arrived. Mum knew the Griffiths as Siân and I used to play dollies and tea parties when we were younger and we enjoyed ourselves with all sorts of memories about Siân and my girlhoods even though they were well aware I wasn't a biological one, they ignored that and came up with stories about events I could hardly remember which indicated to Mr Griffiths that I was more girl than boy and that they'd never had any problem with me going up to Siân's bedroom even now.

My mother blushed a little at times, I'm sure she thought I was gay or asexual and until I met Simon I really wasn't sure myself. All I knew was that girls didn't turn me on, I just envied their bodies and clothing and their ability to give birth. Siân told me that I looked so nice in her dress that I should keep it, sadly, it and the shoes were dumped by my father while I was away at uni, my mother said nothing about his intrusive behaviour and subsequent vandalism.

I had had a wonderful evening as my mother's daughter and felt almost blissful about it at the same time knowing that my father would be apoplectic about it if he learned our secret. When we got home, Mum told me she had enjoyed herself too but that she would never mention it to Dad and if I had any sense, neither should I. We effectively had to pretend it had never happened, and the next day I was back down the paper shop yawning and serving early customers. Siân called in about midday and handed me some photos she had taken with her phone, Galbraith saw us discussing them and said if he had known I was out last night he'd have given me a later start this morning. Now he tells me after I've been here for five hours.

I took them home and discretely showed them to Mum who thought they were very nice and I should save them to look back on but somewhere my father wouldn't find them. I shoved them inside a folder on biology which he never examined but he found my dress and shoes and destroyed them. We argued like mad about it and he actually hit me. I was so surprised that I did nothing about it. He got physical several times in the ensuing years including the last one where he did me real damage and I tried to end it all.

But that was a long time ago and both my parents were deceased even though I could remember Mum quite enjoying the dinner we had. It was the only time that she treated me as a girl off her own bat. When I had to wear the school uniform while I did the Scottish play, she was able to pretend that she had nothing to do with the decision as that had been between Murray and my dad. Perhaps if she hadn't died we might have been reconciled and I remember that evening now and I still have the photos somewhere of her and I together at the table smiling. It was one of my fondest memories of her and it showed me how much my dad had controlled her.

It's all water under the bridge now but when I went home that night I sought out the old photos and put the one of me and Mum in a small frame and put it on my desk. Livvie spotted it and correctly identified a younger me in it and she asked who the older lady was. I told her my mother.

"But you said your mum was anti-trans, so how come she's smiling sitting next to you as a girl."

"I shall never know but I think she was much less worried about it than my Dad and only toed the party line while he was about, he was away that weekend and we went out to dinner with Siân and her parents before we both went off to uni. Then we lost contact with each other for several years, found our true selves, and met up some years later as older and wiser women."

"Well, I think you're quite wise but you are much older," Livvy threw at me.

"Hey, not that much older, I'm only forty this year."

"Yeah, like I said, much older. Never mind, Mummy, just think it won't be too long before you get your pension." She ran off before I could reply I was so gobsmacked, the way things were going, I'd get a state pension about 80 thankfully, I don't need to rely on it and I have several pensions that Simon arranged, so I should be quite comfortable provided nothing adverse befalls me. But that is all in the future and now I just sat with a cuppa enjoying my memories of that night with Mum, it was magical.