“Is there an animal you think is particularly like you?”

She turned to grin at me. “I believe it,” she said.

Part 1 - Melrose

Chapter 6 - Tight

I already knew that Marjorie could lie with a straight face but when she said that the corset wouldn’t hurt, she told a big fib.

She and Deirdre fitted it around me. It had scoops at the top that fit under my bra. The bra I was wearing, I mean. It closed in the front with something I learned was called a busk, and it laced up in the back where I couldn’t see or reach easily while wearing the damned thing.

Deirdre pulled it snug and that wasn’t so bad. Then Marjorie worked the laces tighter, eventually yanking on them like she was starting a motorboat engine. Something about the design kept the laces from slipping out whenever they were tightened.

I gasped.

“Can you breathe?” asked Marjorie. But she stopped pulling and measured my waist. “Twenty-five and three-quarter. That’s…that’s really good.”

“It’s cutting me in two,” I whined.

“It is not. You’re fighting it. You can’t take such deep breaths. Try to breathe shallow, but not too fast, you’ll get dizzy. Stand up straight, put your shoulders back.”

I just glared at her. “I’m gonna tell Mom that you’re being mean to me.”

She laughed. “Okay, okay. I think it’s tight enough. Let’s see how a size four fits.” She tied off the laces behind me and tucked them in.

I didn’t have the breath to resist so they tried several dresses on me, finally settling on a size four made of some black stretch material with short poofy sleeves and lime green accents. They picked it because it covered the bra straps, shoulders and back, and it fit like another skin, but showed what they thought was adequate cleavage.

I stared at myself in the mirror. I looked hot. Marjorie saw me looking and made that sound Arno had made in his throat. “Rrawwrghr.”

“I’m your little brother,” I reminded her.

She laughed. “Try the shoes on,” she passed them to me and they fit, the 7Bs. The short heel was enough to make me feel taller, which I kind of liked.

She had me practice walking around the store, also standing and sitting in the corset, dress and heels. Only the corset really made this difficult. It not only kept me from breathing deep, I couldn’t bend or twist at the waist like I was used to. The shoes I had no trouble with and caused me to start wondering if I could get some elevator shoes for when I went back to being myself.

I hadn’t really wanted to leave the dressing room. Somebody might see me. The short sleeves left my arms bare and the scoop neckline showed my fake cleavage, something I wasn’t really happy about. And the dress ended six inches above my knees, an incentive to keep my legs together and be careful how I moved, stood or sat.

When some other customers came in, I hurried to the back with Marjorie following me.

“You’re doing okay—better than okay, really,” she said. She had followed me with a bottle of perfume or cologne or something she wanted to try on me. “Why did you dash off suddenly?”

I peered out from behind a rack of faux bomber jackets. “Someone came in. They might see me.” I glared at her. “And keep that stuff away from me,” meaning the bottle in her hand.

She laughed. “Lots of people will see you at the party.”

“What party? There’s not really a party with a prize, you made that up.”

“I made that party up, but trust me, we’ll find a real party somewhere.” And she sprayed me with the stinkum. It was sweet and smelled like flowers.

“Agh!” I commented.

Marjorie laughed and dimpled. She had very forgivable dimples.

“How long do I have to wear this? To win the money?” I gestured at everything. “And did you have to squirt me with that stuff?”

“Just till midnight. And yes, smelling good is part of the package of being beautiful, Cinderella.”

“Ha,” I said, as if that was funny.

“But you don’t have to win it, I’m just going to give it to you.”

“I’m not sure it’s worth it. And I never did agree….”

“I tell you what,” Marjorie interrupted. “I’ll sweeten the pot. You can keep all the clothes and stuff I’m buying for you. And this bottle of perfume, too.”

I just glared at her and she laughed.

“Come here, come over here. You need some jewelry.” She’d taken her own bracelet back and I wasn’t wearing any bling at all. Not that I wanted to.

Whoever had been in the store had left so I went over to where Marjorie was looking at jewelry. Le Trend had one big rack that was all various animals as pins, necklaces, charms, even earrings. “Do you have an animal totem?” she asked.

“Huh?” I was staring at my reflection again, this time in the mirrors near the display.

“Is there an animal you think is particularly like you?”

I blinked. What an odd question. If you were a tree, what kind of tree would you be? “An animal? Uh—a chipmunk?” I actually had a genuine connection to a completely different animal, but I didn’t want to bring that up for reasons.

She turned to grin at me. “I believe it,” she said.

“I like chipmunks,” I tried to explain.

“Here,” she said, handing me a long golden chain necklace with a charm in the middle. A little golden chipmunk with green eyes and a hazelnut in its paws.

“Cute!” I exclaimed. Well, it was.

“Let me,” she said, putting the chain around my neck and adjusting it to where the chipmunk dangled just above my fake tits.

Deirdre got into the act and they decorated me like a Christmas tree, bangles and bracelets on my wrists, a necklace of odd-shaped beads in different colors. I even got some rings and clip-on earrings.

They took turns finger combing my hair this way and that but nothing made much difference. “You need a professional ‘do,” said Deirdre.

I rolled my eyes.

It was harder to recognize myself in mirrors now. The girl I saw looked like she might have been popular in school. She might have had friends that went places and did things that didn’t happen in a virtual world. I didn’t know her.

Someone else had come into the store again and I looked for a place to hide. I must have made a noise because Marjorie turned to see what I was doing and we bumped into each other as I practically ran back to the changing room.

She followed, calling out. “For Pete’s sake. Abby?”

I had pulled the curtain closed but she pushed on through it. “Are you crying?” she asked when she found me, sounding astonished.

“No,” I said. “You whacked me across the face with your hair when you turned around so sudden.” I could lie, too.

“Oh, sorry. C’mon, you can’t hide in here all day.” She tugged at my hand. “Let me pay the damages and next stop is the salon to get you a mani-pedi and a makeover.”

I shook my head. “I don’t want to do this anymore,” I said. “I didn’t want to in the first place. Where’s my clothes?” She pointed out a Le Trend shopping bag in the corner of the changing room. I snatched it. “Get out,” I said. “I’m changing back, I don’t want the money.”

“Kissy,” she began then changed it to her cover story. “I mean Abby…”

I cut her off. “I’m going back to being me, Davey. I mean David. Or Davey, who cares?” I glanced at the mirror. “I’m not that girl.”

“It scares you doesn’t it?” she said.

It was just the two of us in the changing room, Deirdre was out helping another customer and adding up the tags from the stuff Marjorie had bought.

I nodded, looking at the girl in the mirror who had one hand up to her face.

“Look at you standing there, knees together, butt stuck out, shoulders back, tits forward. I taught you how to do that only five minutes ago. And when you ran, you ran like a girl.”

“In heels and a tight skirt and wearing a damn corset? Of course I ran like a girl.” I wanted to be pissed about it but somehow I couldn’t manage.

“Don’t pout,” she accused. But then she grinned. “You even pout cute.”

“I can’t believe this is happening,” I said. It sounded like whining to me. “How did you talk me into this?” I gestured at what I was wearing.

“It wasn’t that hard,” she said. “Be honest, looking like you did, going to school must have been hell.”

“I—you—no….”

“You were teased and bullied, maybe not so much the last couple of years but middle school? Hell on the playground, right?”

I nodded, wincing. It had been pretty rough until I had hooked up with the other geeks and nerds in my junior year of high school. No one bothered us as long as we stuck together. They made comments—the rich, popular kids. But they left us alone and no one got beat up or thrown in a trash can anymore.

I looked at the girl in the mirror. She was one of the popular kids. Almost beautiful, and hot. I couldn’t believe how hot she looked in her tight dress. “Where were you when I was in the sixth grade?” I asked her.

“Getting my bachelors in marriage and family counseling,” Marjorie answered.

I looked at her, surprised.

“So they called you names—fag, queer, sissy, maybe even worse.” All teasing and kidding put aside, Marjorie was as serious I’d ever seen her. “They probably did physical things too. You never got raped, did you?”

“I—no!” Maybe I had got off lucky.

“During all of that, did you ever wonder what it would be like if you were the person they kept accusing you of being?” she asked. “You had to be really careful, you had to walk and talk as much like a boy as you could. Be invisible, not be the real you.” She gestured toward the mirror.

I stared at the girl there. “She’s not me,” I said.

Marjorie leaned toward me and kissed me right on the lips. She pointed at herself, “Kisser,” then she pointed at me, “Kissee.”

I started to cry again and she pulled my head to rest on her shoulder. “It’s okay, Kissy. You can be yourself now. You don’t have to pretend to be a boy.”