The Girl He Would Not Be
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

When you grow up with somebody you never really think about what they look like, until one day you just turn around and you see something you have never seen before.

Looking back, I can remember my mother talking to my father about Bruce, and saying: “Not just a good looking boy, but a pretty boy.”

I remember thinking that the word “pretty” can only apply to girls, and Bruce was a boy like me. It seemed as if we had known one another forever. We met in elementary school and went right through high school together. We played sport together, went hiking in the woods and swimming in the creek, and sitting around gaming together side by side or over the web at our own consoles.

Like I say, you don’t see anybody except the person inside when you are that close.

We were both into girls, but the girls attracted to Bruce were different from the girls attracted to me. I remember one of them saying to me: “I could never be attracted to Bruce – he just doesn’t seem manly enough to me. Not like you, Travis. You’re more masculine.”

It didn’t seem to me to make any sense. He was just the same as me – a normal guy. That was what I thought.

We were around at his house, playing some shoot-em-up game on his console and I just looked across at him and I saw it. He could be a girl. They had been right all along. Bruce looked pretty. As the light of the screen danced across his face I started to imagine him with long hair and with red lips.

You cannot unthink things like this. Once this idea is in your head it is going to stay there. It meant not only could I never look at my best friend the same way, but it meant that I was crazy about seeing him dressed as a girl, in a dress with a wig on his head and makeup on his face.

It became an obsession, I guess.

My biggest fear was that he would see that I had changed – he would detect that I was now looking at him in a very different way. I almost felt as if I was turning gay. But it was not that I was sexually attracted to my buddy – I just felt that if he was a girl I would be. Is that so weird?

Maybe what was weird was my attempts to see him dress as a girl. I suggested that maybe for Halloween we should both dress up as women. I knew that I would look terrible as one, but I just wanted to see how pretty he could really be.

“Come on Travis, we would look stupid as chicks,” Bruce said. How could I argue – in my case at least?

They were organizing a dance at school and were asking for themes. I put in an anonymous suggestion for a vice-versa theme – you know – girls go as guys and guys go as girls.

When it was raised in discussions Bruce said: “Well I won’t be going to that dance, that is for sure!”

What was I supposed to say? “Me neither!” I said. “No regular guy wants to dress as a woman.”

So when the opportunity for a bet came up I said it back to him like this: “No guy wants to dress as a woman, so if you are so sure of yourself put it on the line – if you lose you have to dress as a girl and spend an hour at the mall dressed like that.”

He didn’t take the bet. It was so frustrating. And I felt that if I kept pushing it, he would think that I was some kind of faggot.

The next trick I tried was when we went out hiking and I suggested that we go for a swim.

“I don’t have any trunks, and I see you do,” said Bruce.

“Actually, my girlfriend left her bathing suit in my bag,” I said, rummaging around for it and pulling it out. Actually, I had bought it and in a size that would have been perfect for Bruce. It was a one piece suit with a floral pattern in bold colors.

“No fucking way,” said Bruce.

“Well, I am going in, so you can watch me get wet,” I called out as I plunged in.

“I rather jump in naked,” he called back.

“Go on then!” I called out from the water.

“Promise that you won’t laugh at me,” said Bruce. He looked serious and a little upset.

“It’s the bathing suit or the birthday suit,” I called back, floating on my back and kicking up a splash.

And then I saw Bruce standing on the rock that I had dived off. He had taken off his clothes and was standing there, with his hands cupping his groin. His chest looked puffy, as if he had two little girl’s tits on his chest. When he pulled his hands away to cover those I could see that his penis seemed to have retreated into the small amount of pubic hair – it pointed forward rather than down.

I could see how embarrassed he was. I had seen him before, at least naked from the waist up and he had not looked like this. There was something going on with his body. He looked distressed, and I was his best friend.

“Put the costume on Bruce,” I said. “It is just the two of us here.”

He walked back to where it lay. He picked it up as if it were poisonous, but he slowly put it on. It was a perfect fit. It cupped his chest and seemed to obliterate any lump in his crotch. Somehow the bright colors seemed to make his eyes greener and his lips redder. As if it needed to be repeated, the only word that could describe my friend Bruce was “pretty”. He was very pretty.

He walked beside the diving rock into the water. I was just transfixed.

“Thank you for not laughing,” he said. “The doctor said that my body is going through a confused puberty, whatever that means.”

“Buddy, you look fine to me,” I told him. “Just fine.” I should have just stopped there. Even the extra two words were too much. “And that costume looks good.”

He placed his hands on those little tits of his and smiled. I think that was when I knew that I was in love. All that was needed was for him to reveal the woman he truly was, and I was hers. It is that simple.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2021