I haven't written many solos but just lately I have finished a couple of stories that were just too complete to be serialised.

…..and the swirl of the plaid.

I have heard people say that you should try everything once. I have often thought that this could be a little crazy. Say, you tried skydiving and got it wrong, there is no second time. Or, maybe, you take up scuba diving and forgot to head for the surface. Whammo! No chance to go around again.

What they really should say was ‘First learn to do it properly before you try it once. And always try to have a buddy beside you.’ I, at least, had a buddy beside me for most of the things I had tried in my mad younger years but, when he went away, I stopped trying things out as I grew to protect myself a little more carefully.

Let me backtrack for a moment. I am Martin Murphy and my buddy is James Fitzwilliam. We were both ‘Army Brats’ as our fathers were both working from the same barracks in Penicuik, near Edinburgh. My father had joined at Aldershot Garrison; he had been moved to Scotland when he was transferred to the Royal Regiment of Scotland, to be based in the Glencorse Barracks. As he was now in the admin, rather than being operational, we were considered static and my parents had bought a house in Bilston, not far away and I was a ‘last gasp’ baby.

I met James at the Loanhead Primary School and we stayed friends through our High School days until he followed his father and joined up. I wasn’t likely to follow my father into the army as I did not reach the minimum height requirements. For James and me it was a case of us sharing our first experiences; tree climbing, skinny dipping, apple scrumping and all the usual things that boys get up to.

In our primary days, though, we did one thing that is not the usual sort of thing that a couple of red-blooded boys are noted for. We both have older sisters by a year or more. They went to a different school, the Paradykes Primary. One day we borrowed our sisters’ old, smaller, school uniforms and attended their school for a full day, chatting with other girls telling them that we were new in town. We didn’t get caught out until we got home and both our mothers had got home early from a shopping trip. We were both grounded for a week but I, for one, thought it was a lot of fun. I learned later that it had been a turning point for James.

I loved living in Scotland and took to one of the local cultures, the world of the marching band. Here, it invariably consisted of pipes and drums. I our High School days, we both joined the Bilston band, James as a piper and me as a drummer. Being small, I ended up with a small Basler drum, a bit like a snare drum that was a main-stay of all marching bands. I did try out on the pipes but everyone thought I would scare the kiddies as I looked as if I was being attacked by a giant tartan spider.

I carried on playing the drum after James joined up. I didn’t expect to see him back in town now he was an operational trooper but some years later I ran into him at a pub in Edinburgh. He was not the person I knew as he had been rotated through various European war zones, mainly in the Balkans, and had been returned home with P.T.S.D. He was, by now, fully gay and was sitting with his partner, Julian, when we met. I was happy to see him and we chatted and renewed our friendship. His partner was happier when he realised that I had not followed the same path so was not a rival. James was again playing the pipes as he was a reservist and had been taken on by the Lowland Band, an offshoot of the Regiment.

I had gone into IT after school and was doing quite well as a freelance programmer and a go-to person when things got out of hand. As such, I did a lot of work from home when I wasn’t deep in the computers of large corporations. I had been out with a few girls but they mostly were also of the shorter stature as normal girls did not appreciate their boyfriend only coming up to their boobs. I thought it was an advantage but it did not seem right to them.

After that chance encounter we kept in touch and met up about once a month in a pub or, during the day, a café in Edinburgh. It was good to go over some of the things that we had done, and survived, but he would never talk about his time as a trooper. He, and his partner, attended my sisters’ wedding and he told me that he would get me to go to his sisters’ wedding, when she found a bloke to marry. It appeared that she was having far too much fun to settle down. Things, for her, came to a head one night a year or so later when she had far too much fun and found herself pregnant.

What’s the problem with that? I hear you say. Well, the problem was that the father, a certain Jimmy Ross, was from a very strict and very traditional family. It was a case of ‘you do the crime, you do the time’ and the sentence for being wayward with your Willy was life! His father was a career soldier, an officer of high rank and a stickler for following the rules. The marriage was to be held on lands connected to the clan and it would be a full ceremonial one. James, as a piper, was destined to be integral to the events of the day.

This led to a couple of problems for him. The first was that his partner was not welcome and the second was that his part in the ceremony needed him to be joined by a drummer. I understood that he would be piping the bride down the aisle and also leading the ‘happy’ couple back out into the world. For the sake of his family the drummer should be seen as his partner on the day and must be female, a problem for him as he didn’t know of any female drummers who would be prepared to go with him on a weekend in the highlands.

The Ross family could trace its roots back to Wester Ross, way north of Inverness, and was linked to the Mackenzie clan. The wedding was planned to take place in the ballroom of the Dundonnell House, which had once been owned by a Mackenzie forebear. I listened to him talking about it with half an ear but sat up when he said “Martin, I have come up with a plan that would solve both of my problems and also get you there at the wedding. Would you come along and play the drum for me? I can get you a complete set of womens Lowland Band uniform and, with your size and some extra help with your looks and hair; you could fill the shoes perfectly.”

Of course, I had a good laugh but he then said he would pay for my time away and give me a cash payment afterwards if we pulled it off. I tried to steer him away from the idea but, the more he talked, the more I could see that I could get a weekend away, add another new experience to my list, and make a little money. I finally said “OK, you’re on, but I will need to spend some of your money being made to look the part.” He readily agreed, gave me some cash and I went off to see my sister to tell her what was planned. She thought it was a great joke and promised to help me get into character.

She came home with me and, as I still lived in the family home after our parents had gone into care, she went up to the attic and threw down three suitcases that she told me contained her old clothes that had never been tossed out. She said that there should be almost everything there to give me a make-over as she had, when younger, been a bit flat chested and needed some ‘little helpers’.

I questioned her reasoning as I was only going to dress in the uniform to play the drum and she gave me a right dressing down. “Martin” she said “if you swagger up the aisle in a womans’ uniform you are sure to give yourself away. Also; what if someone in the wedding party sees you outside the church while you are in your normal clothes, it would be a disgrace for James and his family and a stigma his sister would have to live with for the rest of her life. I will not allow Colleen to have that on her shoulders, she will have enough trouble with that Jimmy, a no-hoper who does not really love her.”

She then informed me that the only way I could get away with it is if I left the house, looking, sounding and feeling like a woman and stayed in character until I returned to the house. Only that way would be good enough and she was going to do her best to make it so. I resigned myself to her perfect logic and she proceeded to measure me up and then go through the cases to find all the items that would fit me. Luckily, I was still around the same height that she was as a teen and twenty-something girl so there looked like there would be a good selection.

The wedding was two weeks away but she decided that I needed to start now so that I had the acting down pat when the date came around. I was, at the time, working on some coding for a customer from home so would be able to stay out of sight. She got me to totally undress and she rubbed me all over with some foul smelling goo, telling me to stand still for a while as it worked. Then I was into the shower and when I dried myself, I was almost hairless. She had some of her old panties so got me to put a pair on and the feeling that I got from sliding them up my hairless legs was amazing.

She then went over my body, plucking out any loose hair that had resisted the chemicals. I was then introduced to the wonders of wearing a bra with forms in the cups, something that had not been a part of the school uniform so many years before. “I will go to the shops and get you a couple of other things” she said “but this will have to do for now. Try this dress on.” The dress was a simple shift that I just needed to put on over my head and, lo and behold, when I looked in the mirror I saw a very ugly looking person with a girls’ body.

She said that this would do for the moment but that she would be back in the morning to finish the job. In the meantime I was to wear the dress all of the rest of the day and to put it on tomorrow, along with the underwear. She found, in one of the cases, a bunch of her old nighties and put three out for me to wear at night so that I continued absorbing the aura of femdom, even as I slept. Before she left I gave her the money that James had given me, as well as a little extra, and asked her to get me in some supplies for the next few days as I was going nowhere! She told me that I was to shower well in the morning and handed me some shampoo and conditioner that my mother had left behind, telling me to use both, twice. I was also told to shave closely before and after the shower every day. She also gave me a jar of night cream that I was instructed to use every night, without fail.

I did wear the dress and finally got used to it wrapping around my legs. As I worked I slowly got used to sweeping it as I sat down because, if I didn’t, I ended up with creases in my thighs from the folds. That night I undressed and put on the first nightie, sleeping quite well but waking up with a monstrous woody that needed to be seen to before I could pee. When I did pee I needed to sit so that I could target the pan properly. I showered and used the hair products as ordered and my hair felt smoother and finer than it usually did. When my sister arrived she had some bags of shopping, some going into the larder for my next few days. Some was destined for me, though, and the things that did surprise me were four sets of matching bra and pant sets from a lingerie store. She told me that one of the secrets to feeling like a proper woman is to be wearing sexy underwear and knowing that you have it on when no-one else can see it.

She had also bought some more up to date and mature outer wear for me as ‘you don’t want to look like a teenager’. When I went and changed I understood the reasoning, I felt very naughty in the black, lacy bra and panties and even more so when she handed me a garter belt and stockings, showing me the correct way to put them on. With a new skirt and top I still looked like an ugly person in a skirt but didn’t feel like it. “Wear these for the rest of the day” she said ‘and tomorrow I will be back with a friend of mine from the salon to make you less ugly. We may even be able to make you passable. Now, practise your girl voice whenever you can; I want to hear it tomorrow.”

That day I wore the clothes and found that they became more comfortable the longer I persisted. Every time I read something I would try to speak like a girl, getting so good that I answered the phone using it. Luckily it was someone from British Telecom telling me that my internet connection was causing ructions across Europe and they needed to log on to fix it. I argued with them and they hung up after telling me I was a bitch. That at least, was one-nil to the female me, who I was starting to refer to as Martha.

The next day I used the hair products again and my hair, which I wore fashionably long, now sat on my shoulders and looked really good, if a bit straggly. I tried one of the other sets of underwear and outer wear that day and felt that I was getting the hang of this girl thing. My inflated opinion of my success was brought down to earth when my sister arrived with her friend and I was subjected to severe torture as my eyebrows were plucked into a more ‘pleasing’ shape and I was introduced to the wonders of make-up. It took some firm instruction but, by the time they left, I had a female hair style and had learned to apply a simple make-up that would do for the task at hand. Of course, with the putting on, I also had to learn about the taking off. I now also sported polished nails.

She had also brought some new shoes for me that I needed to walk around in. It took the next two days before I felt safe in them but persistence paid off and, by the weekend, I was moving well, if a little differently to my normal shamble. The higher heels forced me to be more precise with my gait and I found it easier when I developed a bit of a wiggle. The real pain for me was that I now needed to wash everything I had been wearing; no more undies for a week these days.

On Saturday morning my sister came early and helped me to dress in a fully co-ordinated way and she had brought around a bottle of her old perfume, which she sprayed in all the appropriate places. She also had a new set of things for me to learn, a couple of necklaces, bangles, rings and ear rings – clip on, of course. Today James was going to bring me the drummer uniform and, when he rang the bell I opened the door. He said “Hi, is your brother in?” and I said “No, will I do?” Just then my sister hooted in the lounge and he looked at me more closely. “Martin, is that you?” he gasped. I answered “You can call me Martha for the moment, come on in and let me try on that uniform.”

My sister helped me change and I tried to memorise the correct order of dressing for later. When I presented myself to James in the lounge he was all smiles. He fussed a bit with the cap and sash but declared me fit for purpose. He went and got his pipes out of his car and I strapped on my drum. We practiced the two tunes we would be playing. The first, on entry, was to be a slow march but a joyful one and it was one I had played before so we were good with that almost straight away. The second was a triumphant tune that we would lead the happy couple into the garden for photos with. It was a fairly standard arrangement and it only took a couple of plays to nail it. My sister watched with a smile on her face as it had been quite a while since we had played together and a lot of water had flowed under the bridge since then. As the band uniform dated back to the Royal Scots days, it had the tartan of the Stewarts Hunting colours so I told the two of them they could now call me Martha Stewart.

That sorted I went back to my room to change as James had invited the two of us out for a meal in Edinburgh after he picked up Julian along the way. He did not expect me to come back down in a dress but I was determined to stay in character. My sister had raided her old things and was in a blouse and skirt that she looked really good in and which took some years off her. At the meal it looked like two couples eating out. James kept by my side and Julian attended to my sister. It was fun and when I finally got home I poured myself a glass of wine and shook my shoes off to sit on my sofa and contemplate the evening. Not once had someone screamed “There’s a bloke in a dress!” and I had stayed true to my Martha to the point that Julian was treating me like a woman as well. That is, he was civil but remote as he did not really like women. Another point for Martha!

I kept up my regime during the week and, by the time James came to pick me up Friday afternoon; I was acting the part of Martha as if I had been born to it. I had even gone out by myself and did some window shopping, being tempted by a lovely multi-coloured dress that I just had to buy. When I got home I hung it up and wondered why. I packed a bag with just my Martha things as we were going to drive up today, stay in the hotel tonight and Saturday night after the ceremony, then drive back on Sunday. It is close to two hundred miles and once you left the A9 at Inverness the roads got progressively more rural.

It was really weird as we travelled. At the odd stops we had I needed to use the ladies loos, something I never thought I would ever do. We stopped at Inverness for an early dinner in a little Chinese place and everyone treated me like a lady, the waiter pulling my chair out for me. When we arrived at Dundonnell Hotel we found a typical high country hotel, a little worse for wear and when James went to register he found that we had been given a double room. There were no other rooms available as the place was booked out with hikers and some other wedding guests. We left our instruments in the car but took our bags up to the room. It wasn’t bad, as hotel rooms go, the bed was a good size and we had a nice view out towards the Loch. James apologised but it wasn’t his fault as the room had been booked by the grooms’ family and they were not to know.

We decided that we would just have to make the most of it as it was only for a couple of nights. At least there was a small ensuite so we didn’t have to go traipsing through the corridors looking for a bathroom. We went for a walk along the waters’ edge before we turned in and I took his arm as the ground was a little uneven for my heels. He stayed for a drink in the bar while I went up and got ready for bed. When he came in I buried my head in the pillow until I felt him slide in beside me. We said goodnight and he turned out the light.

I woke with a start and when I looked at the bedside clock it read two thirty. James was trembling and jerking and muttering odd words like ‘all the blood’ and ‘bodies, bodies everywhere’. I couldn’t help myself as I leaned over and started saying quietly that it was all right. In the end I was holding him closely and whispering in his ear that everything was all right and he calmed down and just started crying quietly. I continued to hold him until he went off to sleep again and I then rolled over to my side again and wondered at just what things he had seen in the Balkans

In the morning I was awake early and showered and dressed in a skirt and top before he woke. When he did I told him that I was taking a little walk and that I would see him in the dining room for breakfast. He looked a bit lost but nodded as I left the room. I was sitting with my first cup of coffee when he came in and sat down. He was quiet while we ate and then said that we should take a short stroll before we came back to change into our uniforms. As we walked I again took his arm and he said “Martha, I seem to remember you comforting me during the night and it felt so good. Julian refuses to do anything when I have a nightmare and has started to sleep in the spare room because he cannot understand what I went through. Thank you for last night; it almost seemed that I had a wife looking after me.”

Back in the room we both changed into our uniforms. James was a little slow in getting his jeans off and blushed when I was down to my lacy underwear. We put on the uniforms and checked each other for correctness and then took the car the short distance to the House. Of course, we were both in kilts and he looked very much the piper. It was to be a late morning wedding with a lunch to follow and we performed our part in the ceremony to perfection.

The father of the groom was very happy with the way it went and even gave me a kiss on the cheek at the lunch. There were a lot of photos taken with the two of us looking resplendent in our tartans alongside various members of the wedding party. The bride, Colleen, even told me she was happy that James had found himself a good woman at last. Finally, the ‘happy’ couple left for places afar, well, a hotel in Ullapool actually, and the guests all started to leave. We ended up in the lounge with the other military types having a drink and telling porkies.

Back in our hotel room James broke out in a big grin and hugged me, saying “You fooled them all, it was brilliant. You are brilliant, Martha Stewart.” He then kissed me and I was so carried away with the moment I kissed him back. He was sheepish as he broke away, saying that he was sorry for that as he had got a bit carried away. I told him that it just proved how good my playacting was and not to worry himself.

We had a dinner in the hotel dining room and a few drinks in the bar afterwards. When we went up to the room we undressed without embarrassment and I put on my nightie while he pulled on his pyjama pants. We did our ablutions and got into bed and he promised not to have a nightmare tonight as the pressure on him had passed with the wedding. I did wake up in the early hours again but this time I found him spooned into my back with his hand resting on my thigh. I moved and he rolled over again to his side of the bed and we both went off to sleep again.

Sunday morning, when I woke I found myself cuddled into him with him on his back snoring quietly. My left hand was resting on his hard cock and I stroked it slowly. I don’t know why but I pulled the sheets back so I could see it in the early morning light. I was fascinated and it called to me so I moved down the bed and kissed it, causing him to give a little cry in his sleep. There was a little drip forming on the end and I licked it to find out what it tasted like and then the desire overtook me and I took him into my mouth and rubbed the base of his shaft with my hand. It did not take him long to come into my mouth and I swallowed as fast as I could. When I turned to put my head back on the pillow his eyes were wide open and he pulled me to him and kissed me as he would a lover.

His hands were firm on my body and it was an experience I had never had before. Being touched and rubbed in places I didn’t know would cause sexual excitement was so new it was hard to take in. Another thing that was hard was him again. I didn’t resist as he turned me onto my side and spooned into my back, rubbing his cock against my waiting cherry. That morning I lost my virginity in a way that had never crossed my mind and we came together in more ways than one.

Afterwards we showered and I dressed in the sexiest outfit I had. We packed our bags and went down for breakfast. We were both all smiles but still wondering what we had begun, at least, I was as he had done that sort of thing many times before. Settling up we loaded the car and started our drive south. In Inverness we stopped for several hours, walking the town and seeing the sights, hand in hand or him with his arm over my shoulders. It was so good to feel protected and, maybe, a bit loved. It was him that suggested that we stayed in Inverness over-night and he asked that with such earnestness I couldn’t help but say yes.

That night he was gentle, loving and very virile. I was wrung out by the time we slept but was able to take another round first thing in the morning. That morning he said “I love you, Martha”. I told him that I thought I loved him as well and that I think I had for a very long time, even though I had not realised it before. Monday morning he took me home and we kissed before he left with the drummer uniform to take back to the headquarters.

I now was free to return to my former self but took extra care in putting my laundry through the washer and hanging my clothes in my wardrobe. There seemed to be almost as many dresses on the rack as my normal shirts. I showered, did my hair, and redressed in a fresh set of underwear and a skirt and top. Sitting at the window, looking out into the street and sipping a glass of wine, I thought about the weekend and realised that I had liked being loved. Martha did not go away that Monday, and, thankfully, nor did James after he had an argument with Julian. I think that it was more my comfort in his time of need than my willingness to take his seed that tipped the balance. We live in my house together now, as man and wife and, like the original Martha Stewart, I do the cooking.

Marianne G 2021