DANNY Chapter 36 by Roberta J. Cabot This is a story about Daniel, a guy with a unique talent and an even more unique problem: A great singing voice and the looks of his gorgeous sister. And how he and his family deal with his having breasts. And how he ends up as the female lead singer for a high-school cover band as well as a radio DJ. Janet, the former bandleader of Danny's rock band was apparently the one who sabotaged the concert, but it's unclear why. She seems to be in the middle of some psychotic breakdown. As for Danny and the band, they successfully recovered from Janet's sabotage attempt, and they, plus their Glee Club "do wop" backup singers, retired to their dressing rooms to prepare for their next set. Never a dull moment with Batch Fourteen, and Dan & his gang.

 
Chapter Thirty-Six:  Pinch-Hitter

***** (Fallon) *****

As we entered our dressing room, I was shocked to see Danny already in it. But then I remembered. It was actually Danielle wearing a duplicate red dress to Danny's, with her wearing the same hair style as Danny's, with the hair-extending half-wig, shoes, accessories, scarves at her wrists, and, well, everything. I guess I can't be blamed for my confusion at seeing two of Danny - this was all still new to me, after all.

I grinned at the two mirror images. "This is cool," I said.

I gathered from Danny that the blah-blahs happening on stage was partially to give us an excuse to go to the dressing rooms where we could do the substitution.

Danielle grinned at me. Actually, she looked rather nervous.

"Don't worry, Danielle," I said. "You'll do great."

"I don't know if I can remember all the lyrics, though."

"Danielle!" all of us reacted violently.

Danielle giggled. "Kidding! Kidding!"

Danny frowned at her. "That was mean, sis."

She hugged Danny. "I know. But I couldn't resist." She turned to the rest of us. "Okay girls - we have less than ten minutes. Do what you have to do - bathroom break, fix your makeup, whatever. Come on! Chop chop!"

June and Betsy went to the en suite bathroom while I sat down in front of one of the makeup mirrors to touch up my face. I was one of the lucky few who seemed to not need to go to the bathroom that often. I picked up the bottle of water on my table and took a swig.

"How 'bout you, Danny," I asked.

"I'll go later," she said. "I need to change out of my outfit. Danielle? Can you help me?"

Danielle nodded and brought Danny behind a changing curtain with some clothes in her arms. I didn't have the heart to tell them, however, that I could still see them from one of the makeup mirrors - its angle was such that I could completely see Danny as they took off her dress. And I had to stop my urge to whistle.

Everyone knew that I was into girls, but no one had anything to worry about from me. I've always resented that people thought of us that way. I mean, do people immediately assume guys are always out to attack women? But that was how it was. I've learned not to mind such things. But, to be fair, these people haven't shown any of that. They're some of the few kids that treated me like a regular person - how can I betray that? But… looking at Danny undressed, with only a thong and high heels between me and her, she was definitely a temptation. But, wait - wasn't she really a boy? But she has boobies! Sexy boobies, too… and… she looks too good to be a guy!

Was someone playing me for a fool?

But then she turned in profile, and I saw… a big bulge in her thong. It clearly wasn't a girl's thong, otherwise, Danny would have… spilled out of her underwear. That bulge! But she has boobies, too!

I stood up and walked rapidly to them. I grabbed the changing curtain and pushed it aside.

"Hey!" Danielle said. "What…"

Danny went, "eep!" and covered herself the best she could with her hands.

"What gives, Danny?" I demanded. "You told me it was all just a costume.That you were actually a guy!"

"Well, I am! Now, will you let me get dressed in peace?"

"But… but…" I gestured to her boobs in confusion.

"And what about my breasts!" She put her fists on her waist. It reminded me of Wonder Woman striking a pose. That is, if she was a redhead, was naked and had boobies larger than Gal Gadot's, and with scarves trailing from her wrists instead of metal vambraces.

I shook my head and went back on topic. "How can you have boobs!" I exclaimed.

And, with that, Betsy and June burst out laughing. I didn't even notice that they came back in.

Danny and her sister couldn't stop themselves and started giggling, too. I guess Danny saw my expression, so she took pity on me.

She went to me and pulled me into a hug. "Don't worry, Red," she said into my ear. "I'll explain everything. But later, okay? I promise. We just don't have time right now."

I couldn't help but hug her tight, and that's when she belatedly noticed that she was undressed. I didn't mind, though.

"Ummm… I think I better finish dressing now… What do you think?"

I giggled and let go. I did give her a little kiss on the cheek, though, before allowing her to go behind the changing screen again. Though sorely tempted, I tried not to take a peek at Danny getting dressed anymore.

"Fallon, you flirt," June grinned as she sat down to do some touch-ups on her face.

I shrugged. "I was just…"

She made patting-down gestures. "I know, I know," she said, "but let's get through tonight first, and we can talk about it after."

I nodded.

"'Kay," Danny said, "I'm all ready."

We turned and looked at her.

And, looking at her now - it was enough to make me go hetero. Or at least bi.

She wasn't wearing anything really fancy. She had on a form-fitting, short-sleeved, off-the-shoulder, sleek bodysuit in white or maybe more cream or ivory given it had a kind of subtle tone to it. It had a knitted-in, sheer-opaque effect on the shoulders and fancy edging at the neck. And given her generous, C-size boobies and super-sexy bod, I couldn't stop myself and wolf-whistled.

She also wore a pair of shiny, belted black-leather leggings (a big silver buckle on the belt) that disappeared into black, knee-high, thin calfskin riding boots. Although real riding boots didn't have stiletto heels, as far as I knew.

All-in-all, her entire ensemble was super-form-fitting, super-sleek, and super-super sexy. I didn't notice I was slack-jawed until June humorously pushed my jaw up to close my mouth. Everyone laughed and I blushed.

Somehow, though, the outfit's color was a little off given Danny's bright red hair. But they seemed to have that covered - Danielle took off Danny's half-wig that she wore to make her hair longer than normal, and give it more body. She then braided and then piled Danny's hair on top of her head then retrieved a long shiny black wig from a form on one of the makeup tables. Danny put on a net, put the wig over it, put in some hairpins and started combing and smoothing her new raven hair down. To do so, she had turned profile to me, and I sighed, admiring her beauty. And though she was actually a boy (which I didn't completely believe yet), I still kept calling her a "her." Wishful thinking, perhaps.

That thought did remind me of her gender, so I took a quick peek at her package while she was in profile, and I saw the barest of bulges. I knew some girls who had more prominent pubic mounds than Danny's bulge atm, so I don't think Danny would be found out. And at least she didn't have a camel toe - something most girls had problems with when wearing shiny tights or leggings that fit like a second skin, like Danny's leggings did. Anyway, Danny knew how to "dress" down there.

"Pssst!" June whispered to me. "What are you doing, Fallon?"

My eyes snapped up, embarrassed to realize I was staring. I blushed and shrugged at June. "Sorry," I said.

I was relieved that the twins didn't notice - they were busy fitting Danny's wig on, and in moments, Danny brought her head up and, like magic, she was suddenly a perfect brunette!

Danielle started working on Danny's makeup, wiping off what she had and darkening her brows and lashes to match the wig as well as renewing her face with a different palette. While she was doing that, Danny replaced her dangly earrings with big, gold wire hoop earrings. The hoops stuck out through her brunette hair, giving her a touch of an eighties slut vibe, and it pumped up the sexiness of her look. Not that she looked slutty, but the retro touch was edgy enough that it enhanced her dark hair and looks.

The next thing Danny did was to dip her fingers into a little bowl filled with a milky-colored solution, and the false nails she was wearing just peeled away.

"Danielle?" she said while she rinsed and dried her hands. "Do I put on nail polish?"

Danielle shook her head. "No time, Danny. That's a problem, though - without any polish, your hands are not gonna look nice."

"Can I make a suggestion?" I called out.

"Yeah, Fallon?"

"Just wipe her nails with a bit of baby oil or petroleum jelly or something to get them shiny. I got some here." I held up a bottle of mineral oil I found on my table as well as a little container full of cotton balls.

Danielle went over, gave me a big kiss on the top of my head (I'm sure she did that so that she wouldn't mess up our makeup) and grabbed the stuff from me. I had to smile.

Someone knocked on our door.

"Two minutes, ladies," one of the stage hands called through our door. "Two minutes on stage!"

All of us wrapped up what we were doing and started for the stage, but with Danielle instead of Danny with us.

"Guys!" Danny called and we looked back at her. She had put on a punk-rock style vintage slim-cut, fitted leather biker jacket over her white bodysuit top and she looked even sexier. Instead of bulking her up as jackets tended to do, the slim cut of the motorcycle jacket actually emphasized her figure.

"Good luck out there," she said.

We smiled, waved back and walked out of the dressing room.

It was a real shame she wasn't a real girl, I thought.

***** (Danny) *****

I watched them all file out but, despite my smile, I was worried. Not for the band but for Danielle.

We drilled and practiced a lot, and I think Danielle was as prepared as she could be. We even picked the best songs we could that fit Danielle's range. The thing was, though, I've heard her sing at home before, and she was no singer. Hopefully, our song selections will help.

Well, we're committed. Can't back out now. Time for me to make my way to the "secret room."

The "secret room" wasn't any kind of fancy thing - just an unused storage room in the basement level of the Arclight.

I knocked on the locked door.

"That's not the secret knock!" Tracey said.

"I forgot the secret knock!" I replied. "Lemme in, Tracey! Before someone sees me!"

Tracey opened the door and I slipped in.

"Wow!" Tracey said. "Danielle was right! Less IS more! You look incredible, Danny. Ahem, I mean Robin." She giggled.

I waved her down. "Chill, girl," I said. "Is the set ready?"

"See for yourself," she said and waved to the setup inside the room.

To say I was gobsmacked was an understatement.

Inside was a duplicate of our broadcast booth, complete with control board and the shelf of stuff and equipment on the faux back wall. True, the equipment on the shelves weren't powered up, and the control board was mostly made of painted balsa wood, posterboard and fake lights and switches, but, looking through the viewfinder of the camera Tracey had set up, it looked authentic. The one false note was the chair - the chair was a regular office swivel chair instead of our booths' chairs.

No one was in the room, of course - it was just Tracey and I. I asked her about details. "You made all of this?" I asked.

"Yep," she said. "Took me almost a week. The magic of duct tape, posterboard and spray paint. Nothing works on that board, of course," Tracey said. "And don't put any weight on it. Don't touch it, even. Coz it's liable to collapse. As for the shelf behind you, that's all real - the shelf itself is actually the shelf from your booth, as well as all the tapes and cartridges and equipment, arranged in the same way as in the booth.

"So what I'll have you do is to have you standing in front of the shelf instead of sitting by the board. That way, no one will have too much of a chance to notice the fakeness of my fake board. Whereas the stuff on the shelves are one hundred percent genuine.

"No one is here to help me with the camera, of course, so the camera will have to be static. That means you have to stay there and not move too much so you can stay in the shot. I also got the streaming black box set up. I can split-screen you with a video from my computer for callers that go Skype or Google instead of by phone or cellphone."

She gestured to her tripod-mounted camera. "That's my Sony MILC. It's connected to my Apple Mac, which, in turn, is connected to the video feed to the production booth. The audio feed from the wireless mic also goes into the Mac. I guess we're all set, technically speaking. And with my headset, your headset, my relay telephone switch and a T1 Internet connection, I guess there's nothing to do anymore but to do it, as my mom would say."

"Gotcha. But, Trace, I think it's important to have me seen at the board. Y'know - so people will believe that I'm in the booth."

She thought it over. "I think you're right. So. How about this: I'll get an initial shot with you from the side, sitting in front of the board, and you can fake fiddling with some of the fake controls. Then you can stand up and walk to the shelf, and I'll track you with the camera. And then you stay there until we're done."

"But why should I stand up and walk to the shelf?"

"Ummm… How about because you're gonna look at your clipboard, which is on the shelf." Tracey picked up a clipboard with the station logo, clipped some papers onto it, and put it on the shelf. She made room for the clipboard by taking down some of the cartridges.

"That's pretty smart, Trace. Okay, sounds good." I looked and noted that the papers were actually programming notes that I could refer to. Cool.

So, while Danielle and the band started getting ready to climb up the stage, Tracey and I started doing some blocking. Tracey put a wireless microphone on a mic stand in front of my chair, the stand's height adjusted so it was at just the right height for me while sitting down.

She handed me a pair of wireless headphones, and we did a couple of tests of me facing the camera, unclipping he mic, standing, walking to the front of the shelf, picking up the clipboard and then standing there, all the while Tracey practiced tracking me with the camera. After I had the clipboard and the mic in-hand, Tracey would lock the tripod down.

I noticed that only the half of the fake board that was facing the camera was complete. The part that couldn't be seen was missing or incomplete, which was probably part of why Tracey couldn't be too fancy with the camera angles.

She sighed.

"What's wrong Trace?"

"Well…" Tracey began. "I know we had to minimize the number of folks who knew about the substitution and the fake booth, but it would have been nice to have some other people to help. Even just one extra person."

"I know Trace, but it'll just be for a short time. We can manage."

"You're right, I guess. So, listen, I'm gonna try and squeeze in ten callers later, but let's have a minimum of five - two or three after each commercial break."

"All right. So, we're set?"

"Yep - we're set."

"'Kay. While we wait, how about we watch what's happening on stage?"

Tracey nodded. She got a small monitor, put it on top of a little card table beyond the range of the camera, switched it on and tuned it to KRPX. And we got to see a little of Danielle singing with the band, after all.

to be continued...

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