It's often said that childhood memories are the clearest and sharpest we ever experience. This was certainly true in my case; my earliest recollections are a rich tapestry of image and emotion. In many respects, they laid the foundation for the person I would eventually become.

One memory in particular seems to have shaped my entire destiny.

It goes back a very long way, almost to the beginning. I doubt I was even five years old; all I can recall was a bright, golden summer, when each day followed the last in a never-ending limbo. A minute could last an hour, an hour could last a day, and a day frequently lasted forever. Time was a sweet, quiet afternoon drifting off into eternity.

Then something happened.

Something completely unexpected.

It started off with a mounting sense of excitement. We were going out for the evening, a trip downtown for dinner and a movie. The house bustled with activity as clothes were changed, shoes were shined and windows bolted down for the night. Decked out in our Sunday fineries, we piled into the car in a chattering mass of knees and elbows, a subtle mist of hair spray and aftershave tracking our every move. The dashboard glowed a soft, comforting yellow as we backed down the drive way, whooping and laughing and poking. Doors were locked, gears were shifted and the road swept by in a blur of street lamps.

This was a first time for me, a moment of surprise and revelation. I suppose I must've known all about restaurants and cinemas before that point, but they were things that belonged to the daytime world. Now everything had changed – the sudden flood of strobing neon practically overloaded my nervous system. Music blared from every corner, spectral colours flickered across the sidewalk. This was a fantasy land beyond anything I'd previously imagined.

Dinner flashed past with a rush of menus, waiters and neatly folded serviettes. There was no time for desert: the show started at eight and the box office was sure to be crowded if we arrived late. A small queue was just starting to form as Dad secured our tickets. Jostling our way through the lobby, we followed a uniformed usher into a darkened gallery, taking our seats just in time for the Coming Attractions.

This was one of the biggest events of my life up to that stage. We weren't just seeing a movie, we were seeing a scary movie – the kind I wasn't even allowed to watch at home. I also had some idea what it was about – my sisters had been talking all about it on the ride into town. It was set in The Olden Days, when men wore top hats and ladies wore long, bell-like dresses. There were no werewolves, vampires or demons, but there was a mad scientist who drank a potion and turned into a monster (or something). Like most kids, I loved a good fright every now and then, especially since spook-flicks were strictly off limits for me. This was shaping up to be the best night of my life.

Truth be told, it was … but not for reasons I was thinking.

The movie was far better than I'd expected. Dr Jekyll transformed into a suitably monstrous Hyde, ruthlessly terrorizing the gas-lit streets of London. Women shrieked in terror as the hideous creature descended on them; stalwart Bobbies plunged through the fog in swift pursuit. Torch-wielding mobs raged through dank urban catacombs, blood spattered across back-alley walls in a crimson shower. Needless to say, there was plenty of lurking and skulking about in cobweb-strewn passageways.

However, the best was yet to come.

Thirty minutes in, Detective Abberdine of Scotland Yard was chasing Mr. Hyde through the Whitechapel labyrinth. After several hair-raising encounters (and equally riveting escapes), the trail eventually led to a Soho den of iniquity known as The Judas Pit. Accompanied by his intrepid band of constables, Abberdine burst into the raucous music hall...

And here is where my story truly begins.

This was my very first introduction to The Cancan.

Up on the screen were eight beautiful young women, dancing with their skirts over their waists. Twirling swiftly before the camera, they whipped their petticoats from left to right, openly displaying their underwear to the audience. Black suspender stockings enhanced their slender, tapering legs, lending a sharp contrast to their glaringly white crinolines.

Shrieking with delight, the girls cantered before the footlights, turning cartwheels and handsprings to reveal their lavishly frilled panties. At one point, they spun round, flipping their dresses up at the back. Plump, round bottoms were presented to a roaring crowd, jiggling back and forth in time to the music.

I was utterly entranced by this spectacle. I sat staring up in open-mouthed astonishment. My heart raced like a trip hammer, a wave of liquid heat swept through my veins. I was literally on the edge of my seat, fingernails digging into the faux-leather arm rests. This was - without exception - the most thrilling second of my brief existence...and it altered my perceptions forever.

The image was permanently imprinted on my consciousness, preserved in deepening layers of awe. I went home that night with a thousand questions ringing through my head: who were those girls, what was the dance called? Why were they doing it, why would they flash their knickers to a room full of drunken, cheering strangers? Did they actually enjoy it? They certainly seemed to, no denying that.

We got home around ten PM, almost two hours past my regular bedtime. I should have been dead on my feet, but my mind was filled with visions of swirling petticoats. Climbing into my short cotton PJs, I replayed the scene over and over: the music, the dancing, the beautiful, smiling chorus girls. And the underwear, of course. Mostly the underwear. The panties.

They'd been deliberately showing off their panties. It was no accident, no momentary hint of satin, like when a girl goes ice-skating or country dancing. They'd been holding up their dresses on purpose, so that everyone could see their undies. On purpose. The implications left me speechless.

I fell in love with the cancan that night. It was the beginning of an affair which would span decades.

---

"A cold thrill seemed to run the length of Casey's spine as he surveyed the garish spray of satin petticoats. In a few minutes, he'd be zipped up into this - this party dress – and sent out on stage to make a public spectacle of himself. It wasn't fair! Why was she doing this to him? Hovering at the brink of hysteria, Casey looked up at his teacher, his eyes huge and moist and imploring: "Miss Deane, I can't do it, I just CAN'T!! I - I'm a BOY, not a girl!!!'"

Clocking in at just over 19,000 words, this special collected edition features classic tales of pretty young men sampling the delights of women's lingerie. Written in the racy, fast-paced style of the classic pulp era, Lace and Garters! is a must-read for devotees of TG literature.

---

Being chosen for a pivotal role is an honor in any production, even one so humble as Chamberlain Academy's school concert. I should have felt flattered; should, in fact, have felt ecstatic. Oddly enough, the only thing I felt was confusion. Confusion bordering on anxiety. And that was the strangest part, at least at first.

I've been treading the floorboards since my sixth birthday. I've appeared in children's pantomimes, dance recitals, and mannequin parades without number. Stage fright never entered into the equation, I was a decorated veteran of the stage. No, something else was fueling my apprehension. They'd given me no choice in the matter. I'd been conscripted, press-ganged into service. And where was the honor in that?

I reasoned initially that Ms Ramsey had chosen me for my background in dance and movement, which theoretically gave me an advantage over all the other boys in the dance club. But the end of the day, it was only a slight advantage. And that's why her choice seemed so baffling. There were at least three other boys who could have taken the part. Syd Chambers had studied classical ballet. Scott Bowers was the district ballroom champion, and Johnny Slash had won medals at the state finals. All three were eminently suited for the role.

Of course, Ms Ramsey wouldn't have chosen any of them; in point of fact, they'd never even been in the running. At the end of the day, they just didn't look right. It had to be me, because nobody else could possibly fulfill the requirements. The reason should have been obvious, blatantly obvious in fact, but I didn't care to admit it to myself at the time. Couldn't admit it to myself, might be more accurate. As it was, I was utterly mortified when I heard I'd be playing a girl's part in the school production.

They were presenting an Olde Tyme Music Hall at the end of August, a musical extravaganza which seemed to incorporate half the school. The show featured a Moulin Rouge number harkening back to the nightclubs and cabarets of nineteenth century Paris, slated to be the highlight of the production. Chamberlain Academy was renowned for its theater department, and no expense had been spared in terms of costume, lighting and set design. Ms Ramsey had promised the local press a riveting performance of spectacular proportions, and nothing would prevent her from keeping her word. Only problem was: Chamberlain Academy was an all-boy's school.

And I was the only one capable of dancing the French Cancan.

"The cancan? Ms Ramsey…I'm a boy."

I felt my cheeks tingling with embarrassment. My voice quavered with dismay; she couldn't be serious, couldn't expect him to humiliate myself in front of the entire school. My head spun with a feverish blend of shame and excitement. I knew Ms Ramsey extremely well, she'd been teaching me since the fourth grade. She would force me to go through with this, overriding my protests without a second thought. I could be certain of that much at least.

"Really? I hadn't noticed," she replied, smiling to herself, "all the same, I'm afraid there's really no alternative."

I was standing by her desk in the staffroom, patiently attempting to negotiate a role of lesser importance, one which didn't involve wearing a dress and about ten pounds of petticoats. Ms Ramsey was sitting in her computer chair, absently drinking a coffee. Nestles' cafe au lait; all of France in a cup.

"Anyway," she continued offhand, "I've already spoken to your Mother, and she's given her OK. Seemed rather pleased by the idea, as a matter of fact."

Yes, I could well imagine my Momma laughing down the phone at that one. She'd always had a rather sadistic sense of humor where her son was concerned. Worse still, she and Ms R were as thick as thieves, having worked together on half a dozen local productions. I decided to press on despite the hopelessness of the situation. There was too much at stake to give in without a fight.

"I can't do it, Mrs Ramsey. It's a girl's dance. Everyone will laugh at me."

"No, I doubt that very much," she answered, calmly sipping from her Starbucks mug, "Mikki, it may have escaped your attention, but half the cast will be dolled up as women. Most of your friends are in the chorus, they'll all be wearing dresses in the Moulin Rouge sketch."

"This is different," I replied, knowing that I'd be doing the cancan en solo. The rest of the guys would just be standing in the background, playing bar maids and waiters. It wasn't as if they had to raise their skirts and show off their underwear to like half the town. We weren't discussing the Macarena here. This was the cancan, one of the most celebrated (and notorious) routines of the modern era. It would require weeks of training and rehearsal to master; weeks at the very least. Visions of frilly white panties and long black stockings filled my head.

"I guess you're right," Ms Ramsey agreed reasonably enough, "the cancan's a tricky and rather complex number. That's why I chose you. We need the best, and you're the one, Mikki. You should feel honored."

Honored, I thought ruefully. This was going to ruin my life. I could already hear the jeers and catcalls that would follow me for the rest of the year. There were names for boys who like to dress up in women's undies. The laughter would never stop, even if I was doing it under protest.

"Can't you bring in one of the girls from Saint Brigit's?" I asked, casting haplessly about for a loophole, an escape route from this nightmare. This was my proverbial last-ditch gambit. Saint Brigit's College was the Catholic girls' school down the road, they often collaborated with Chamberlain Academy on the annual drama festivals.

"Can't spare any," Ms R explained conversationally, "we need them all for the grand finale right after your solo. Sorry, but it seems like you're out of luck, Mikki. Good thing you have a fantastic pair of legs."

I felt a soft, crimson flush invading my features. Was she deliberately taunting me, taking pleasure in my evident discomfort? Adults could be incredibly cruel sometimes, especially when they had enough power to pull rank. She must have known how embarrassed I felt, must have known that this would make me the laughing stock of the entire school. I was already halfway there, thanks to my Mother's insistence that I study dance and movement. Flashing my panties in the cancan would only make things worse. A hundred times worse, a thousand times.

"Mrs Ramsey…I can't do this. I'm not a girl."

I glanced around the staff room, hearing muted chuckles from the other teachers. They were all enjoying this, enjoyed seeing me robbed of my fragile adolescent dignity, reduced to a pleading infant. And why not? I was a child after all, my feelings didn't matter in the least. I shifted listlessly from foot to foot, almost dancing with frustration. Ms Ramsey regarded my performance with considerable amusement.

"Well, it's good to see you're getting your practice in early," she remarked, setting the mug down on her desk, "though I think we'll have to work on your pat en l'air. Rehearsals begin tomorrow at three thirty, Mikki. See you then."

I opened my mouth to make one final decisive complaint, but paused mid-sentence as she hit me with a massive dose of Teacher's Eye. I dropped my gaze immediately, wilting like a frozen rose. The decision had been made and nothing would alter the verdict. At barely sixteen years of age, I had no defense against The Eye, and Ms R was a world-class exponent. It was over, I was beaten.

Same as always.

I turned towards the staff-room door, feeling used, manipulated, confused. It was so blatantly unjust – she was an adult, a teacher, someone who was supposed to inspire faith and trust. Now she was going to force me into a skirt, subject me to the scorn and derision of the whole community. Face downcast to the floor, I headed for the hallway, dragging my steps on the scuffed and faded floor tiles.

"Oh – Mikki?" Ms R called brightly, just as I reached the open doorway. I looked back over my shoulder, eyebrows raised in expectation, hoping against all logic that she'd changed her mind, that it was a joke, some astronomically improbable misunderstanding. That she'd let me off and spare me the humiliation of a lifetime.

Given the circumstances, I should have known better.

"Don't forget to wear your prettiest panties," she said, eyes sparkling with hidden mischief. And that was all it took. The entire room erupted in mirth, teachers rocked back in their chairs, cackling like a bunch of old maids over some ribald joke.

Their laughter followed me all the way down the corridor.

---

You know, I remember when the cancan was considered very sexy. Petticoats were just going out of fashion when I was growing up, and practically every girl I knew wore fluffy little petti-sets back in those days. Needless to say, we all loved revealing our petticoats on the flimsiest pretexts - mainly because we knew how cute we looked. Fortunately, the opportunities came thick and fast in our part of the empire: my folks were "Lindy" fanatics from way back, and encouraged me to join in the festivities. As a matter of fact, I became the star attraction.

It was the practically the same thing every night - come 6.30 pm, they'd put Benny Goodman on the record player and I'd twirl around the living room with my skirts flying almost straight out from my waist. Mom and Dad always praised my antics, apparently it reminded them of when they were courting during the war. Given the circumstances, my eventual segue into the cancan was inevitable.

Here's how it happened:

One day, I was turning cartwheels in the backyard for my friends, raising a storm of catcalls every time my skirt flipped upside-down. Mom came to the back door to see what the racket was, and laughed out loud as she saw me wheeling across the lawn. Contrary to popular belief, this was normal behavior for girls back then, and Mom jokingly asked if we were practicing the cancan. I relied with an indignant "No!" but of course everyone was giggling at sight of my white cotton knickers.

I think I was about seven or eight at that time. I knew what the cancan was from movies and TV; like most girls my age, I thought it was the cheekiest dance imaginable, because it involved showing off your undies in public. Mom's teasing comment set some wheels turning in my mind, and a few days later I asked her if I could lean how to dance the cancan.

Mom wasn't really an expert, but she had a good idea of the basic steps and gave me some mock lessons in the living room. It wasn't much different from what we did in gym class at school (cartwheels, handstands etc), I just needed to throw in a few high kicks here and there. Mom even put the "Cancan Polka" song on the radiogram so I could sing along while I practiced.

Mom mentioned it to my Dad a few nights later, and naturally, they both agreed it was time for a Command Performance. At first I played coy, but after a little coaxing, I let Mom take me upstairs to change into my Official Costume (which consisted of an ordinary red sundress, a three-tiered petticoat, and a pair of black mary-janes). Once I was ready, we went back to the living room, where Mom put Offenbach on the player (the "real" cancan from Orpheus in the Underworld this time). I was already grinnign with anticipation - I'd known this moment would be inevitable, and had been looking forward to it all day long.

Anyway, as soon as the music started, I launched into my routine, dazzling my parents with lots of panty-flashing kicks, spins and handstands. The best part was at the end, where I bent over and flipped my petticoats up at the back, shaking my bottom from side to side. Mom and Dad both applauded this "Royal Flash," demanding an encore on the spot (which I graciously obliged, following a full minute of bald-faced ego stroking).

It was the first of many such spectacles: sometimes at Christmas, I was called upon to entertain friends and relatives with my scandalous routine, sometimes winning a standing ovation for my efforts. On one occasion, I even talked my girlie cousins into joining in - but as I often say - that's a tale for another day.

---

Casey Rodgers waited back stage at the Civic Center, his tummy fluttering with excitement. It was shownight for his dancing school, and everyone was rushing about frantically preparing for their numbers. Very soon, he'd be out on stage dancing before a large audience, the culmination of months of exhausting rehearsals. The long period of training had left him as tense as a tightly strung bow.

The murmuring crowds he'd seen out in the theatre had added considerably to his last minute butterflies. The place was utterly packed with people - parents and kids, teachers and students, old folk from Chamberlain Retirement Village. Hundreds of interested parties, all turned out in their Sunday fineries to cheer and whistle and hoot as the latest generation of Fred Astaires wove through their steps.

All those faces, all those eyes, turned up towards the stage!

Casey took a deep breath, forcing himself to calm down. He really had nothing to worry about. He and his troupe were doing a Broadway style tap-dog number; complicated and tricky at times, but none too difficult after so many hours of repetition. It was pretty silly, really. He knew he'd perform the drill without a hitch, he'd done it at least a thousand times before. But then, he always felt this way on shownight.

Turning away from the curtains, he walked back towards the dressing rooms. Backstage was currently in a state of siege; girls running everywhere in tutus and leotards, boys decked out in vests and tails climbing the wings. A gabble of mothers trailed close behind, fussing and scolding, calling for order above the din.

Well, at least I've got half an hour to practice, Casey thought, glancing around in the general chaos, if I can just find a spare corner with enough space to tap a shoe. He considered going outside and using the loading bay, but decided against it. Didn't want miss his curtain call; he'd never hear the end of it. He pushed his way over towards the stairs leading to the changing areas. Everyone seemed to be down here, the dressing rooms were probably empty.

"Casey. CASEY!!"

"Huh?" Casey whirled towards the voice.

It was Ms Deane, his ballet teacher.

Evelyn Deane was a long, streamlined woman in her mid-thirties, willow-slim and lean hipped. Her eyes were always hard and serious, no matter what mood she was in. The woman was wading through a cloud of Lilliputian Kylies, her classical features marked with impatience. Casey wandered over to meet her halfway.

"There you are," she said, looking him over with a familiar knitting of the eyebrows, "I've been searching for you everywhere." Casey's heart sank roughly six fathoms; he was in trouble. No idea what the problem was, but he knew that tone: honey laced with razor blades.

"I was just looking for a place to -" he stammered in a high, uncertain voice. Ms Deane cut him off with a dismissive wave of her hand.

"You'll have to get changed again. You're on in ten minutes," she said, gesturing for him to follow her up the stairs. He hurried along behind, not quite certain what his teacher had meant. As far as Casey knew, he was already in costume: black top, black jeans, and size five work boots. What was going on here?

"I thought I was on in half an hour, Ms Deane," the boy protested fretfully, "I'm in the Tap-dog number."

"Not any more. Toby Macklin will be taking your place."

"What?"

"You're out of the Tap-dogs, Casey."

"Why?" Casey exclaimed, still not understanding. He'd spent what seemed like six years perfecting his routine, and now Ms Deane was tearing it out from under his feet.

"Look, we don't have a lot of time, Casey," Ms Deane explained, shooing him up the stairs, "Janey North just twisted her ankle and we need someone to replace her. You'll be taking her place."

"What?"

"You're taking Janey's place".

"Janey North? But she's in -"

Suddenly, Casey understood. Everything. He gaped up at his teacher, his face a mask of disbelief. Janey North was one of the girls in the Montmartre number, the one everybody had been talking about for the last three months. Casey's eyes widened in dawning horror.

"But she's doing the can-can, Ms Deane!" Casey wailed, "I can't do that! I'm - you - you'll have to get some one else!!"

---

Having read thus far, you're doubtlessly aware that my sister and I were incorrigible knicker-flashers, making it more or less inevitable that we'd get 'round to dancing the cancan at some point. We'd both studied gymnastics since early childhood and used to impress our friends with various tricks we learnt down at the youth center - handstands, back flips, step-overs ect - anything that would "accidentally" display our undies in the playground. Given the circumstances, it was only a matter of time before we discovered the acrobatic joys of La Chahut.

If I remember correctly, we first started playing "Moulin Rouge" when I was about nine years old. It was a long weekend, our parents were out for the day and Lydia and I were watching TV from the living room floor. The cartoons were mostly finished for the day, the only thing worth watching was Rising Stars, a singularly lackluster talent quest where kids of no fixed ability competed for prizes nobody actually wanted. Our concentration normally wandered during the mid-morning dead zone, but on this occasion, there was something that definitely caught our interest.

One of the acts was a troupe of four girls dressed in bright red chorus outfits, complete with full circle petticoats and frilly white panties. Lydia and I watched in wide-eyed fascination as they whirled through their routine, which was mainly pirouettes and high kicks (although they finished the number by revealing their panty-bottoms to the camera).

Both of us were utterly intrigued by what we'd just seem. For my part, I'd always thought that only grown-up women danced the cancan. Neither of us had ever really imagined that girls our age might dance it too; certainly not until they were old enough to wear lipstick and make-up. Yet, here was the living proof, broadcast over the airwaves in glorious monochrome. And if they could dance the cancan on national television...

Lydia and I exchanged the briefest of looks, communicating on silent wavelengths beyond the reach of modern science. The thought of showing off my underwear in public was kind of exciting - almost intoxicating - and I could tell she was thinking precisely the same thing.

After the program finished, we got up and walked out to the rumpus room, guided by some innate telepathy shared by close siblings. Not a word had been exchanged beforehand, but we'd already decided what we were going to do. There was a full-length cheval mirror leaning against the back wall, a cast-off antique handed down to us by some nameless great-aunt. We pulled it out to a more central position and immediately started playing house in front of it, giving each other the occasional side-long glance to confirm we were still on the same page.

We went through our usual catalog of domestic role-plays, warming up for the main event. We were both pretty eager to start the morning's panty-flashing festivities, but we had to observe the mandatory protocols. Seven interminable rounds of hide-n-seek later, Lydia eventually decided it was time to get the show on the road.

About time, I thought, feeling my temperature rise by slow degrees. We'd had the house to ourselves all morning, but our folks could arrive home at any minute. If we were going through with this, we had to do it now. As in right now, this instant!

Taking our customary positions at either side of the rumpus room, we raised our arms and spun two cartwheels in front of the mirror. This was the unspoken signal I'd been waiting for, the moment the performance would finally begin. My pulse was already ticking in the side of in my throat. With our gymnastic background, we'd be much better than the girls on TV; we were far more agile and limber.

We warmed up for around five minutes, spurring each other on to greater feats of acrobatic prowess, whipping across the floor in a swirl of hands, knees and forearms. Our feet seemed to brush the ceiling as we plummeted through our opening set. At one point I saw Lydia bounce off the sofa in a graceful mid-air spiral, executing an effortless double somersault. I followed with a triple handspring across the room, finishing up with a back-step dismount...

And then we were ready.

The only trouble was, we weren't exactly dressed for it. Lydia was wearing jeans, I was wearing shorts, and we weren't "officially" dancing the cancan yet. We needed an excuse to ease into the new role (because, believe it or not, that's exactly how young girls think). I looked over at my sister, knowing she'd take the lead in this instance. As always, Lydia had the perfect solution and - as always - she never failed to deliver.

"I can't stretch in these jeans," Lydia said with an exasperated gesture, "they're too tight to do cartwheels in."

"Same with my shorts," I replied in the same dismissive tones.

Lydia shrugged her shoulders and started fumbling with her belt, undoing the top button of her Levis.

"We'll just have to take them off," she remarked in a tone of utter resignation, as if we had no other choice.

Once she'd peeled down her jeans and stepped lightly out of them, I removed my black cotton culottes, dropping them onto the sofa without a backward glance. I felt an unusual flutter in my tummy as I straightened up, unconsciously tugging down on my t-shirt. While the hem reached to about six inches above the knee, I imagined it only barely covered the trim of my underpants.

Lydia stood watching me from the left side of the mirror, a slim, leggy girl in an over-sized tunic and long white knee-socks. After a few seconds hesitation, she gathered up the right side of her shift, exposing her bare thigh almost up to the hip. Eyebrows raised with an unspoken question, she glanced in my direction, then tilted her face towards the cheval. Are you ready? No words were necessary; I simply nodded my answer and the performance began.

Flipping our "skirts" clear up to our throats, we launched into an impromptu routine, cart-wheeling across the floor in front of the mirror. Crossing over from right to left, we adjusted our speed to allow our hemlines to fall away, revealing our tummies, thighs and panties at precisely the same moment. I was wearing a pair of white cotton knickers that came all the way up to the belly-button; Lydia, being a few years older, wore shiny nylon full briefs – glossy red with lacy inserts on the sides.

Next, we experimented with various dance steps – high kicks, flip-flops and hand-springs, trying to recall the cancan in exact detail from the numerous movies and TV shows we'd seen over the years. At one point, Lydia bent over backwards and kicked her legs into the air one at a time (she was always more supple than me) resulting in her t-shirt creeping all the way down to her bra.

I followed this up with a point-perfect handstand, parting my legs in a classic aerial split. My light yellow tunic turned completely inside out, hanging tenuously from my shoulders and exposing my whole body from neck to toe. I could feel the cool afternoon air on my bare torso, raising a buzz of goose flesh along my tummy.

Precisely at that moment, I realized the windows to the rumpus room were wide open, and giggled with pink-faced embarrassment. I dropped down back onto my feet, smoothing out my clothing and wondering how much the neighbors had seen. Lydia asked what was wrong, and after I explained, we decided to preserve our dignity as best we could. Calling an end to the afternoon's activities, we drew the curtains and climbed back into our clothes, trying not to snicker at how silly we felt. If any of the local boys had seen us, we'd never live it down!

Needless to say, fear of exposure didn't deter us very long. The temptation to flash our panties to the world was irresistible. The very next morning after breakfast, we headed straight down to the rumpus room to continue practicing our faux-cancan. Jeans were shucked, hemlines were raised and pristine white knickers went on open exhibition.

Our rehearsal began with the curtains closed, but after a while, Lydia found an excuse to throw them open, claiming that the room was getting too hot. Nothing could have been further from the truth, of course: summer had long since departed and autumn conditions had kept the house cool for weeks.

I raised no objections – despite my earlier misgivings, the idea of being caught doing the cancan made my pulse race with excitement. I was certain Lydia that felt the same way; if anybody happened to walk past our window and see our underpants, we'd just have to deal with it.

After we'd worked out a satisfactory dance number, we took a short break to discuss our progress, determining that tunics and t-shirts just weren't right for the cancan. Still flaunting our undies, we ran up to our rooms and started rummaging around our closets for more suitable attire.

As it happened, Lydia had a nice, long full-circle skirt with broad lace trimmings, almost exactly what she was looking for. I had a high-waisted party dress with puffy sleeves and "Spanish" ruffles around the hem. It wasn't as long as Lydia's skirt, but I knew it would be perfect for twirling about the room!

Once we'd finished assembling our costumes, we swept back downstairs to compare outfits. It turned out we'd also been more selective in our choice of underwear. The subject was virtually unavoidable; the first thing I asked Lydia was what color panties she had on. Naturally enough, she was more than willing to oblige.

Lifting her skirt in the mirror, Lydia revealed a pair of black satin knickers, shimmering full briefs with a garish red trim around the legs. My eyes practically bulged out of their sockets when I saw them, I didn't know she owned anything so undeniably cheeky. Apparently, they'd been a birthday present from one of our older cousins, but she'd never had a reason to wear them until now. You can probably imagine how jealous I was at that moment - Lydia got all the best stuff!

Reading my expression with a well-practiced eye, she asked if I was wearing anything special. I responded by stepping forward with my right foot and raising my dress to my chin. As a general rule, I only wore plain white cottontails, but I also had a set of incredibly girlie underthings hidden at the back of my closet. Like my sister, I didn't get much chance to wear them out, but today seemed the perfect opportunity.

I'd chosen a pair of pastel pink sissy-pants with delicate lace frills all over the sides and bottom. A dainty floral pattern decorated the front, barely visible against the sheer, rosy fabric. They were, without question, the cheekiest little panties I had in my entire wardrobe.

Gazing at my reflection in the mirror, my head spun at the thought of showing them off: quite suddenly, I was secretly hoping that somebody - anybody - might be looking in through the window right now. These knickers were just too darned pretty to cover up.

Lydia sidled up next to me, still holding her skirt high over her waist. In spite of my overwhelming embarrassment, I still couldn't help grinning with secret mischief. I was looking forward to this – and it seemed a pity there would be no-one else to witness our performance.

Posing together in the cheval, Lydia asked me if I was ready to begin. Raising my dress as far as it would go, I nodded my assent, and we started into our routine.

"You ready?" she asked, nodding in my general direction.
"Yeah," I replied, carefully shifting my center of balance.
"OK. On the count of three. One -"
"Two-"
"THREE!"

And suddenly, directly behind us – the sound of a photograph being taken.

---

Misha Waverley adjusted his beret as he made his way along Lyndhurst Road. It was late October and the wind carried a chill promise of snow. The breeze was particularly brisk down here in the middle of town, where the office blocks cast their long morning shadows. Misha glanced at his watch; his appointment was for half-ten, which left him five minutes to find the place he was looking for. He hastened his pace a little, his tangled blond hair whisking out in the Autumn mistral.

He saw the sign as he crossed the intersection at Mansfield Avenue: a large orange marquee reading LACE & GARTERS in brilliant mauve letters. Setting off from the sidewalk, he scanned both sides of the crossing, anxiety stamped on his features. If anyone from school saw him sneaking into a dancewear store he'd spend the rest of his life eating lunch with the geek brigade.

Maybe worse.

Having ascertained that the street wasn't crawling with informants from the nerd squad, Misha strolled across the intersection and made his way to the store's front entrance. It was essential to look calm, relaxed - the least sign of guilt would expose him in a second. It had taken all of his courage to come this far, and even now he wondered if he'd have the nerve to go through with his plan.

He paused outside the shopfront's display window, struggling to control his galloping heartbeat. The window bore a fifties-style illustration of a young woman twirling in a ballroom dress, skirts flying up around her waist. The logo read: LACE & GARTERS!! SPECIALISTS IN COUNTRY, LINE AND BALLROOM DANCEWEAR. Beneath that, in smaller lettering; Custom fittings available on request.

Gazing in through the plate glass, Misha made out rack upon rack of glittering costumes; gowns, leggings, tutus, leotards - and petticoats. Hundreds of them by the look of things. The sight did little to sooth his racing pulse, although it did steel his resolve somewhat. Here he was, wavering on the footpath while the object of his desire was virtually within arm's reach. All he had to do was open the door and step inside.

A small silver bell rang over Misha's head as he walked into the store. He hesitated two paces in, staring around in awed silence. A gust of warm air caressed his face with insubstantial fingers; he felt as if he'd slipped into some glittering fantasyland. The store was literally dripping with satin; dresses and skirts hung in rows stretching off to infinity. Sequins sparkled like tiny clustered diamonds, black velvet rippled in luxuriant folds everywhere he looked. His face was literally glowing with child-like wonder.

"May I help you?"

Misha glanced around with a start. For a moment he couldn't locate the owner of the voice; then he saw a tallish woman looking over a rack of body stockings. She had dark blue eyes and curly brown hair tied back in a short ponytail. Misha estimated her age to be maybe forty. She stood regarding him with a sharp, business-like expression.

"Oh, hi ..." the boy replied, a little hesitantly, "I'm Michelle Waverley, I called you last Wednesday. I have an appointment at ten-thirty."

He cast a nervous eye around the shop, noticing for the first time there were close to a dozen customers wandering between the rows. Most of them were female, and all of them seemed to be looking at him. An identical pair of Mariah Careys were standing in the hosiery section, diligently comparing stockings whilst casting him suspicious glances. Misha tried to ignore them, focusing on what the tall woman was saying.

"Appointment?" she repeated, stepping out from behind the clothes rack. She was wearing black slacks and a loose yellow t-shirt. Her name tag read HI, I'M JUDY. A tape measure hung carelessly about her neck. She folded her arms neatly over her ample breasts, her face engraved with skepticism (or so he imagined).

"Yes - an appointment," Misha answered uncomfortably, "for a costume fitting."

The woman's features visibly softened.

"Oh - right," she said brightly, "you're the girl who called a few days ago. You're in a musical ... Calamity Jane or something?"

Misha began to relax.

"Yes, that's right. I'm in the chorus."

That was his story, his rationale for visiting a costumier specializing in girls' dance wear. He had grappled with the problem for weeks, ever since his latest transvestic obsession had emerged. Obsession being the operative word in this case; an inexplicable desire to own a ballroom crinoline had seized him over a month ago. Irresistible as well as inexplicable, to be precise. It had tortured his evenings, invading his dreams and robbing him of sleep for nights on end until a solution had finally occurred to him. It seemed to make perfect sense at the time, and appeared to be working now.

"In the chorus?" Judy asked, "well, let's see what we can do for you." Indicating the direction with a wave of her hand, she led him through an aisle of spandex tights, then called out to the back of the show room: "Donna! That girl's here, the one from Chamberlain Musical Society. The one we talked about."

"Who?!" A peppery, somewhat crusty voice, tinged with mild annoyance.

"The one who's playing the dance hall girl. She's come in for a fitting."

"Oh, right."

Misha followed quietly, almost squirming with embarrassment. The one who's playing the dance hall girl. She'd virtually shouted it at the top of her lungs. Everyone in the store was staring at him now, he could feel their eyes drilling into his shoulder-blades. He kept his face to the floor, hoping to conceal the rosy flush invading his cheeks.

Still, he really had no reason to hide his face in shame. His charade was going according to plan. No one in the store suspected he was actually male.

At thirteen, Misha Waverley had the face and figure of an adolescent girl, his natural beauty enhanced by a cascade of thick golden hair. As a child, he'd wondered if he'd somehow been born in the wrong body, sometimes believing that there was a pretty young girl locked deep inside him. In recent weeks, this female persona seemed to have taken on a life of her own, almost compelling him to undertake this risky little enterprise.

Amazingly enough, the masquerade was working fine, despite his earlier misgivings. All he'd needed was a dab of make-up and a pair of low-hipped jeans.

"Over here," Judy said, taking him through to a traditional oaken counter at the back of the show room. A thin, bird-like woman sat behind the cash register, her face marked with the lines of perpetual irritation. She was reading a Silhouette romance, and like Judy, she carried a measuring tape around her neck.

All similarity ended there, however. Her tag read MRS D. ADDLER. No customer-friendly "Hi, I'm Donna" for this blue-rinse matriarch: call me Missus, or get the hell out of my shop. She looked up as Misha approached the counter, scrutinizing him through a pair of expensive, gold-rimmed glasses.

"So, you're playing a saloon girl, then?" she asked rather sourly, adopting the tone of a woman who expected the worse of everyone she met.

"Yes, Ma'am," Misha replied automatically. His parents had always taught him to respect his elders, regardless of how they approached him ('courtesy costs you nothing', was one of his mother's favorite sayings, although he frequently doubted the veracity of this particular quotation). Mrs D. Addler shot her partner a sidelong glance, eyebrows raised.

"You hear that? 'Yes, Ma'am'. Pretty and polite. I'm impressed."

"Sign of good breeding," Judy remarked airily.

"Yes, I'm sure," Donna replied, narrowing her eyes to a razor-edged squint. Leaning over the counter-top, she studied the boy’s slim waist; his small, pouty mouth; his innocent, doll-like features. Misha shifted nervously beneath that protracted, unblinking gaze. What was she staring at? Had she penetrated his disguise? He fought down a tide of rising panic, knowing that a clear head was essential to maintaining his cover.

"How old are you?" the older woman finally asked.

"Thirteen, ma'am."

"A little young to be dressed like that, aren't you?" she demanded testily.

Misha almost fainted with relief. The old biddy was referring to his choice of clothing: a skimpy purple tank top that barely reached past his ribs; a pair of faded blue Levis with the top button undone and the zipper split open to reveal his lacy pink underpants. His pert young belly-button was clearly visible, poking out above the denim rim of his jeans.

"Oh, this is just the Brittany Spears look," Misha explained in his high sing-song voice, striking an unconscious pose. "Everybody's dressing like this." Even the boys, he added silently. Mrs D. Addler remained singularly unimpressed by this disclosure.

"Yeah? Well, any daughter of mine went out dressed like that wouldn't sit down for a week." End of conversation. Pushing her glasses back up her nose, Mrs A went back to her Silhouette, dismissing Misha from her thoughts. He bit his lip, wondering if he'd made the mistake of a lifetime, coming down here dressed as a girl.

"Don't mind her," Judy said, placing a light hand on Misha's shoulder, "she's just angry because somebody dropped a house on her sister. Come on, let's get you started. I think we've got what you're looking for over here. We supplied costumes for the Chamberlain Arts Festival, did I tell you that? Anyway, there was a wild west routine in that one: Okalahoma, if I remember correctly ...."

She ushered him away from the counter, prattling on like a country housewife deprived of company. Misha remembered to breath again, realizing that neither of these women were questioning his motives. They'd swallowed his story, accepted him as a girl. His secret was safe. All the same, his complexion continued to darken. At the end of the day, he was still a teenaged boy, no matter how feminine he may have looked. He was taking an enormous chance. If anyone here discovered he wasn't actually female, he'd be -

".... with your underwear."

(ohuh?)

Judy's words sliced through Misha's reveries like a pizza knife through mozzarella. What did she just say? Something about taking off his jeans and t-shirt? No, that couldn't have been right. He'd only come in to have his measurements taken, he didn't need to undress for that. Granted, he wanted to buy some of those petticoats he'd seen through the window, but he didn't need to -

Misha suddenly noticed where his guide was leading him.

(wha -?)

A prickling of goose-flesh thrilled down Misha's naked arms as they approached the accessories display. His warm pink blush suddenly flared a torrid crimson; a tremor ran through his thighs. Excitement filled his tummy like some hot, sweet liqueur. All thought of being discovered was driven instantly from his mind. He had something else to fixate on now, something which froze the breath in his lungs.

She was taking him to the Lingerie Stand.

---

"You ready yet?"

Danny Redcliff looked over towards the doorway, vaguely annoyed at the intrusion. At barely ten years old, he'd recently grown to resent his sister's constant policing of his behavior. Worse still, she had absolutely no respect for his privacy, particularly when he was getting dressed. He'd complained to his mother about it just last week, but she'd dismissed his protests with a laugh: Rosa had seen him naked since the day he was born, what was the big deal? Wasn't like he had anything to hide.

"You ready yet?" she repeated.

"No, I'm not," Danny replied with a touch of petulance, and turned back to the mirror. At least she hadn't caught him completely naked this time. He stood in the middle of the bedroom in his sheer white panties, meticulously stroking the twists out of his long, blonde hair. A pastel yellow sundress had been laid over the end of his bed, along with a pair of frilly white ankle socks. The clock on the dresser read 8.10.

Rosa stepped into the room, a tall, loping teenager with a denim jacket and the take-no-prisoners attitude peculiar to her generation.

"Yeah, well, Mom said to get a move on," she informed him, "now hand over the brush and let me do that."

"Hey!" Danny protested as Rose took the brush from his hands. A moment later, she was herding him towards the bed, applying a good-natured slap to his bottom for good measure. Danny gave a yelp of surprise; it didn't really hurt, but he absolutely hated it when she treated him like an infant. She was always barging into his room and acting like she owned the place. Sisters were like that: thought they owned the whole damned world (which wasn't that far from the truth, he would later discover).

"OK, hold still," she instructed. Seating herself on the bed, she made him stand between her denim knees, facing the mirror so she could finish untangling his hair. Danny settled into position without a struggle. Rosie was almost supernaturally powerful for a girl her age; he'd learned a long time ago that resistance was useless. That didn't stop him from voicing his objections, however.

"Why can't Mommy do my hair?" he moped disconsolately, "it hurts when you do it." He winced as the brush encountered a particularly obstinate twist.

"She's busy dishing up breakfast," Rosa replied, readjusting her grip on the brush, "told me to come upstairs and make sure you weren't late for school again."

"I wasn't late last time. I was getting ready."

"You were late because you wanted to try on every dress in the closet," she countered without missing a beat, "that's why I laid your clothes out while you were in the shower."

"Well, don't want to wear that old thing," he complained, looking down at the short yellow dress, "I want to wear the one with the strawberries on the front."

"You wore that yesterday," Rosa reminded him, breathing in his sweet, subtle child-scent. His hair smelt of baby shampoo and freshly sliced apples.

"I don't care. It's my favorite and I want it."

Rosa chose to ignore him. He didn't really want to wear the strawberry-frock, he was simply testing the limits, the way he did most mornings. Mom said his contrary moods were perfectly natural for a child his age, so they had to be patient with him – firm, but patient all the same. Rosa thought she understood what she meant. Boys were as fragile as pink carnations, everyone knew that.

Anyway, she quite enjoyed these forced grooming sessions.

Placing a hand on his smooth waist, she ran her fingertips along the trim of his panties, grazing his belly button in the process. Her touch was gentle, gliding over his pale skin with a silken whisper. Danny shifted slightly in her arms, though he didn't pull away from her feather-light caress. His complexion darkened as a warm flush spread through his tummy. Part of it was simple modesty: he'd become increasingly self-conscious about his body over the past few months (another reason why he resented her constant invasions of his personal zones).

But there was also a touch of anticipation in his shallow breathing and cantering heartbeat. Gooseflesh hummed across his shoulders as she stroked his tresses. Being stripped to his panties added to this sense of unwilling pleasure. Rosa was a girl, she had no right to see him undressed, and yet his head was spinning with excitement. That was part of the paradox: part of you loved being helpless and secretly hoped it would never stop.

"Okay," Rosa said, laying the brush aside and tying his hair back in two long ponytails. She turned the boy around and looked him up and down, flicking an errant curl out of his face. Danny had always been unusually pretty with his clipped button nose and tiny, sensuous mouth. His frost-blue eyes were large and solemn, the kind of eyes that could melt a woman's heart with a single glance.

"You ready to climb into that dress now?" she asked, knowing he'd probably refuse just out of principle.

"No," he replied, "I want to wear the pink one."

"Well, you can't," Rosa told him, picking up the sunfrock, "it's in the wash. Everything's in the wash; this is the only thing you've got left."

"Don't want to," he answered sulkily, "I don't like it." He looked down at his feet, refusing to meet her gaze.

"Why not?" she coaxed.

"It's too short. Looks like a baby-dress"

"You are a baby."

"No I'm not" Danny pouted, "I'm ten"

"You're nine. Anyway, it's either this, or walk to school in your underwear."

Danny's expression flickered in momentarily surprise.

"What?" he said after a brief pause.

"Mom said if you don't wear the dress, you have to go to school in your socks and panties." Rosa explained offhand, although no such conversation had actually taken place. She regarded Danny with a quizzical expression, amused by his obvious discomfort. His cheeks had flushed the color of a ripe summer tomato as he considered her words. He studied his sister's face, trying to determine whether she was serious or not. Reading his expression with practiced ease, Rosa raised one eyebrow enquiringly.

"Well, what's it going to be?" she asked, concealing her amusement, "time's a'wasting, kiddo."

Danny glanced at the frock in his sister's hands, deciding that she had to be joking. Turning up at school in his underwear would be embarrassing beyond words. His Mommy would never make him go through with it (although he didn't find the thought entirely unpleasant, for some reason). No, this was just another ploy to get him into the sunfrock, he was certain of it. Rosa was always teasing him like this, especially since he started The Change. Well, he wasn't about to give in so easily. He was going to wear his strawberry dress come what may, even if it was in the laundry hamper.

"Okay," he answered with an indifferent shrug of the shoulders, "I'll go to school in my undies." He turned around and stepped toward the hallway, turning his fanny in tight little circles. Rosa watched him indulgently; despite his sometimes exasperating nature, he really was the sweetest little thing on the face of the planet. Smiling to herself in wry, adolescent amusement, she put the dress aside on the bed.

"Danny?" she called, keeping her voice carefully neutral. He looked back over his shoulder at her.

"You planning to go barefoot?" she asked, holding up his frilly cotton socks.

"No," he replied, and started back to the bed. Wild roses stood out on his cheeks, Rosa saw with considerable satisfaction. He was practically fainting with anxiety; she could see that at a glance. Well, serves him right for being so contrary. Hiding a grin, she picked him up beneath the arms and lifted him up on the bed. Leaning back on his palms, he placed his bare feet on Rosa's lap. She drew the socks carefully over his toes, eyes wandering over his sleek, creamy thighs. His legs were slender, supple and rather shapely for a child of eight. She finished adjusting his socks and patted him softly on the knee.

"Don't you think you ought to change out of those?" she said, indicating Danny's plain nylon underpants. Danny looked down at himself in genuine surprise.

"Why?"

"You'll want to wear something prettier than these," she said, tugging at the waistband, "they're going to be on show all day. A lot of people are going to be seeing your panties, Danita, so you've got to wear your prettiest underwear for them."

Danny's eyes widened as he processed the image.

His heart started galloping like a runaway race horse. Suddenly, he wasn't quite so sure this was one of Rosa's tricks. What if she was telling the truth? More than half the kids in his school were male. The fact that he had actually been a boy only twelve months ago made little difference. Danny began to regret his impulsive decision. Why had he ever argued with her, especially over something so pointless? For a second, he was tempted to simply capitulate; concede defeat and slip into his short yellow dress.

"You said all my clothes are in the wash," he said doubtfully.

"Not your undies," Rosa replied conversationally, "Mum always makes sure we have a fresh supply." Danny bit his lip in frustration; he wasn't dealing with a rank amateur. He looked over at his dressing table, knowing she was right: there would be a neatly folded pile of vests and pants in the top drawer: folded, stacked and doubtlessly sorted by color. She'd checkmated him again.

"Well ..." he started doubtfully, still wavering with indecision. Sensing his hesitation, Rosa seized the opportunity to settle the matter for him.

"C'mon" she said, reaching out and taking him by the hand, "let's go and find you something pretty to wear to school today." Rising to easily her feet, she helped Danny off the bed and led him over to the dresser. He followed along with his pulse leaping into overdrive. How could this be happening to him? He couldn't back out now, she mightn't even let him change his mind at this stage. What was he going to do? In a few minutes, he'd be walking down to the bus stop in nothing but his panties, curly blond hair streaming down to his waist. This was literally a boy's worse nightmare. He racked his brain for an escape route, some plausible excuse which would allow him to retain some vestige of dignity.

Nothing much came to mind.

Rosa halted before the dresser and pulled open the top drawer. As expected, it was practically bursting with freshly-washed lingerie; pants and vests and crop-tops and all manner of dainty underthings. Releasing Danny's hand, Rosa began to finger through the drawer, painstakingly checking though the various articles. She supposed she was being a little mean, teasing him so mercilessly, but she honestly couldn't help herself. He was so innocent, so vulnerable, so deliciously naive. And anyway, he deserved it; acting like a prima donna when he was supposed to be getting dressed.

"Okay," she announced, "these look nice."

She held up a pair of flimsy satin panties; sheer full briefs with a delicate white trim. They were a soft pink color and decorated with a faint floral pattern on the front and bottom. Danny felt his temperature rise: they were so thin he could see daylight shining through them. Moist, liquid heat swept through his tummy – Rosa was going to make him put them on, force him to wear them in to school. By the end of the day, every girl in his class would know exactly what he usually wore under his dress. Danny looked up at his sister, speechless with embarrassment.

Rosa returned his gaze with a benign, knowing smile. He was blushing from crown to heel, blushing to the very roots of his hair. She knew precisely what he was thinking, she could almost see the panic cascading through his nervous system. They'd reached the moment of truth, the point of no return.

"All right then," she said without further ado, "let's get you into
these."

---

---

Danny opened his eyes with a start.

It was early morning, just after dawn. The room seemed strange and indistinct in the dim, grey light. He glanced around hesitantly, trying to orient himself in the darkness. He felt a little dazed. He'd never been an early riser, and his nights had been rather restless lately. Strange dreams: sometimes baffling, often bizarre. Not quite nightmares. He'd been having them for months now. He pushed back the covers and sat up in bed, placing his feet on the floor. His throat was dry; always was after a night on the town. He needed a drink or he'd never get back to sleep. There was as bottle of soda in the fridge, tall and sweet and ice cold. He usually kept a few bottles in the icebox for precisely this purpose. Hardly a man's drink, he supposed, but as his late father had been fond of saying, Danny was hardly a man.

Yeah, right.

Gotta hand it to the old man, he always had a kind word for his gilded offspring, particularly when things weren't going so well. Like the time Dad had given him the choice between getting a job or Getting the Hell Out of My House. Yep, that was Pa all over. Kind, understanding, and patient to a fault.

Well, no sense brooding over the cruelties of the past; Dad had bought the farm more than four years ago, leaving Danny a small mountain of debts and a closet full of Hawaiian beach shirts. Life went on, world without end, glory hallelujah. Couldn't lie around in bed all day, no matter how appealing the prospect seemed. Danny stood up, stretched, stepped towards the bedroom door -

and stopped.

Something was wrong.

This wasn't his room. There was a rug on the floor, something thick and warm and fuzzy. A pelt of some kind, maybe a sheep skin. He could feel it beneath his feet. It shouldn't be there, he didn't own anything like that. His apartment had polished wooden floorboards, this place had both carpeting and rugs. He'd felt it as he'd slid out of bed. Why hadn't he noticed it then? He stared around in astonishment. Everything was wrong. The walls, the furniture, the drapes framing the windows - none of it looked familiar. He didn't have a dressing table, he had a computer desk. And that chair - it was the wrong shape completely; and should have been over by the bookshelf. Except he didn't have a bookshelf, not any more. He had a pot plant, sitting on a large, blocky chest of drawers.

Even the door was in the wrong location. He'd been walking towards a built-in wardrobe. He turned and looked back at the bed. It was a single, not a double. A single with plump, lacy pillows and a European quilt-cover. His head began to spun in utter confusion. This wasn't his room. He'd never seen it before. What was going on?

Where was he?

"Where-" he began, then paused in mid-sentence, raising a hand to his mouth. His eyes widened with shock. The tone, the pitch, the resonance: all of it was alien, exotic, as unfamiliar as the room itself. It was impossible, it was crazy, but -

(that's not my voice)

it wasn't his voice. It was high and sweet, like the ringing of a crystal champagne glass. Breathless and rather child-like. It was ...

(no)

Danny's heart seemed to halt momentarily. He bit his lip very hard, trying to control the panic he felt rising from the pit of his belly. This couldn't be happening. The dreams, the weird, haunting visions he'd had every night for the past three month - it simply wasn't possible. This was twilight-zone material, the stuff of nightmares and Stephen King novels. Such things didn't happen. Couldn't happen.

(i'm still dreaming)

Yes, that was it. He was still dreaming.

Except he wasn't. He knew that somehow. He was awake, completely awake, the fog had lifted from his mind - and he was standing in an strange bedroom, speaking with a voice that wasn't his. This was no dream. He put a hand to his temple and drew his fingers slowly down the side of his face. His cheek was smooth. Sleek and curved and as soft as the palm of a child.

"No," Danny gasped under his breath.

What had happened last night? What had he done, where had he gone after The Blue Rose had closed and he'd stumbled alone through the black, deserted streets of the Westside? He couldn't recall the exact details, his mind had been blurred with a mixture of Johnny Walker and cold winter night-air. He sifted through the fragments of memory, trying to make sense of the irrational. Something had happened, long after midnight. He'd found a shop in a back alley. A shop with an odd name. A shop that sold -

"Wishes," Danny said in his high, sweet, breathless voice.

His mind was suddenly very clear. Memory came flooding back in irresistible waves. The bar, the drinks, the woman in the shop that sold wishes. It was true; all of it. She'd had long black hair, reaching down past her waist, eyes like midnight diamonds, and a smile that could melt ice. They'd talked for a long time, it seemed like hours, and finally come to some kind of agreement.

But what did he wish for?

(no no no no!!)

Danny cast frantically about the room, searching for a lamp, a lighter, a box of matches; anything that would illuminate his face and body. He needed to see himself, see what had taken place while he'd been asleep. His voice had been altered, and it felt as if his features had changed too, although he wouldn't be certain of that until he'd actually seen them. Dear God, this couldn't be happening. What had he brought on himself?

(what did i wish for?)

There was a lamp on the bedside table, a cheap art-deco reproduction glittering with silver and carnival glass. Sells for about ten dollars in K-Mart. A few feet from that was a mirror. The kind with hinges in the middle; what do you call it - a cheval mirror? Yes that was it. He'd seen one last night, there'd been one in the Gypsy's shop, it could have been the same one. The Gypsy had shown it to him. He'd looked into its silvery depths and seen ...

(- dream sweet dreams of me -)

He leaned over and switched on the lamp, blinking against the dazzling light. It seemed much brighter than it should have been. Narrowing his eyes, he looked down at his hands, turning the palms up and splaying the fingers. He shook his head in disbelief. They were small. Pale and delicate; smooth as a porcelain vase. They weren't his hands. They were the hands of some fragile, alabaster doll.

Danny turned slowly towards the mirror. His heart was literally pounding against his chest now. His body felt different, the weights and balances seemed completely off center. He wanted to run his hands over his body, discover the extent of the transformation, but he didn't dare. What would he find? What would be missing? Despite his mounting dread, he found himself drawn irresistibly to the mirror. Something had happened to him last night, some metamorphosis that defied all logic. He'd made a bargain with a woman who sold wishes. What had he surrendered as the price of a dream? What had he paid for? He had to see, had to know. He had no other choice.

Danny looked.

"Dear God," he whispered, feeling the strength drain out of his legs. The room began to lurch as the truth struck him with paralyzing force. A gentle, mellow heat spread through his torso by perceptible degrees. The moment spiraled out to eternity as his knees gave way.

There was a woman staring out of the mirror.

She lay on the bed drifting between the tides of consciousness, staring listlessly around the room. Her pulse was a dull throb in her ears. The seconds tapped away as she tried to understand what she'd seen. An illusion, some trick of shadow and light? An hallucination? Maybe she was mad. There was no other explanation. Last night she'd been someone else. A man. She'd gone out drinking at the Blue Rose, lost her way home, found her way into an antique shop on the west side of Chamberlain. Then she'd gone crazy.

Yes, that was it: she was insane.

And a woman.

(i'm a woman)

Some minutes later, she found the courage to risk another glance. The room had gradually brightened as the sun began to rise. She sat up and ran her hands through her long, thick hair. Sumptuous blond locks flowed through her fingers. Last night it had been short, brown and rather greasy. What else had changed? The mirror had revealed only a glimpse before she'd collapsed over the bed.

She got up and walked hesitantly over to the cheval. Bending in closer, she studied her face in detail. There'd been no mistake. She was female.

A woman. No. Not a woman. A girl. A teenager, no more than sixteen years old. A young sixteen, not a mature one. Her eyes were huge and innocent; the eyes of a child who still kept a Barbie under her bed. She was surprisingly pretty. Her small, serious mouth was offset by full, sensuous lips. They were folded into a permanent crimson pout, the kind that had grown men weeping with desire.

She was wearing a frilly, pink baby-doll; a sheer, translucent nightie which barely reached down to her waist. A pair of nylon panties were clearly visible below her belly button; shiny full briefs with floral insets and lacy trimmings. She felt suddenly embarrassed, like a little girl who discovers that her party dress is way too short. She fought an impulse to pull down the hemline and hide herself from the world.

It was a rather odd thought given the circumstances. Her world had gone haywire in the space of a few hours, she'd lost her body, her world, her life. So what if her underwear was on display? She had far more important things to consider for the time being.

Still, the image in the mirror was utterly captivating. Danny found he couldn't look away, even for an instant. Her figure was petite but curvaceous; her legs lean and tapering. She could have been a ballerina or a gymnast, maybe even a catwalk model. Her breasts seemed firm and supple, from what she could see of them. The nightie was extremely low cut, revealing a breathtaking amount of cleavage.

(i'm beautiful)

Danny looked away, her cheeks flaring with shame. What had she been thinking?! She wasn't a woman, this wasn't her body. She ... HE was a MAN for Christ's sake, not some mincing sissy-boy playing dress-up in his sister's bedroom. No man wants to be beautiful. A man should be strong, powerful, respected; but never beautiful. Yet here she was, posing before the mirror in her lacy, pink lingerie, admiring her figure like a giggling prom queen.

She was trembling. A rash of cold gooseflesh buzzed across her naked shoulders. She had never felt so alone, so isolated in her life. The full horror of her situation came crashing down like the sword of Damocles. She was a sixteen year-old girl with no past, no family, and not a cent to her name. She owned nothing but the clothes she was wearing (a short, pink babydoll and a pair of lace panties; what more could a girl need?). Danny Milner had been a worthless, pointless excuse for a man, but at least he'd managed to survive after a fashion. Now, she had nothing: no friends, no money, no life.

(what am i going to do?)

She sat down on the bed, hiding her face in her hands like a child afraid of the dark. The room seemed to lurch and bend in undulating grey waves, like a set in some incomprehensible German expressionist film. Stars flickered momentarily across her vision as she wavered on the verge of consciousness. It wasn't the alcohol, she had no trace of a hangover. Not even the slightest hint. Why should she? She hadn't been drinking last night. Danny had.

Danny Milner, undiscovered artist, part-time alcoholic and full-time social outcast. Danny Milner, who couldn't hold a job (or a girlfriend) more than two weeks at a stretch. Danny Milner, who made up for his innumerable shortcomings by touring the dives of the Westside. Danny Milner, that pathetic, self-pitying waste of a human being, who'd drunk himself into oblivion and left then her, half-naked and penniless, in the body of a sixteen year-old girl.

What am I going to do?

She looked hesitantly around the room once more, hoping to make sense of this nightmare. Where was she? How had she gotten here? Where was her money, her clothing, her former life? There was absolutely no sign of Danny Milner to be seen anywhere; no jeans dropped carelessly to the floor, no shirt slung over the back of the chair, no cheap vinyl wallet lying empty on the writing desk. Elvis has left the building folks. Permanently.

What am I going to do? she asked herself for the third time, her eyes stinging with approaching tears. She covered her face again, her long golden hair spilling down either side of her shoulders. She wept, quietly as a child weeps, her body shivering with cold and fear. The room was silent, apart from the lonely sobbing of a frightened teenaged girl.

What am I going to do?

The answer would be a long time coming.

---

A light April breeze was gusting up the driveway as I helped my mother load her bags into her '57 Chevrolet. Mom had been a Chevy girl since her sophomore years, back when Elvis was still young and the Beatles were playing artschool socials in Liverpool. She'd aged well through the intervening decades, looking no more than thirty due to her fine bone structure and trim, svelte figure. People often told me I got my looks from her, right down to the opal-green eyes and platinum blonde hair.

"You sure you'll be OK here all alone?" Mom asked as I passed a well-packed hamper through to the back seat, "I'll be gone for more than a week this time." Always the skeptic in matters of the heart, she was fretting that I'd be the victim of a home invasion or something while she was off spending Easter at Aunt Lizzie's.

"I'll be fine," I replied for the umpteenth time, straightening my spine with a series of audible clicks. That hamper had been heavier than I'd expected.

"Stop fussing, Mom, I'm not a baby any more."

"You're my baby," she replied, brushing my hand with a feather-light touch, "and this'll be longest we've been apart, since ... well, I just don't like leaving you here by yourself. Sure you won't come out to Lakecrest with me? Elsie's looking forwards to seeing you again."

This last statement chilled the marrow in my bones. Mom's Aunt Lizzie was the stuff of nightmares; a woman whose merest glance could reduce grown men to quivering orthodontists. Then there was my cousin Elsie, a socially challenged cyber-geek with coke-bottle glasses and an eating disorder. Dinner with Dr Hannibal Lecter was preferable to a week with Mad Lizzie Newton and her nerdlinger daughter. Besides, I had other plans for the vacation.

"Sorry, Mom - I've got that history report due after the break," I answered, trying to hide my impatience, "Connie Radcliffe's coming over on Thursday to exchange notes, and I can't let her down, can I?"

"No, I guess you can't," Mom agreed thoughtfully, "in the meantime, Connie Radcliffe will be spending Easter with her own family; hunting eggs, eating home cooked meals ..."

"Jeez, Mom, I'm not going to starve," I interrupted, almost writhing with exasperation, "you left me enough of those frozen dinners to last six months. I'm eighteen years old, I won't burn down the kitchen. I know how to look after myself."

"Yes, I know," she said, stroking my cheek warmly enough to make me shrink with guilt, "I just can't help worrying. Eighteen isn't as old as you think it is, sweetheart. I'd never forgive myself if something went wrong while I was away ..."

"Nothing's going to go happen, Mom," I almost stammered, looking down at my feet. Like most teenagers, I felt totally mortified by maternal displays of affection. "I've got Aunt Lizzie's phone number inside. I promise I'll call you every night to let you know I'm OK."

"That won't be necessary, darling. I trust you." She gave me a tired, happy look and leaned forward to kiss me on the forehead. Her hair tickled my face. She had a clean, tender smell about her, a mixture of carnations and lipstick and Pond's hand lotion. A young woman-scent, despite her age. I fought down an overwhelming sense of embarrassment.

"All right," she said, running her fingers through my hair, "take care of yourself. I'll phone you up on Good Friday to see how you're doing." She turned away, opened the door and pulled out her keys. "No parties, no loud music and don't stay up too late."

"Yes, Mom," I replied automatically. She needn't have worried, I'd given up sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll for lent. Like I said, I had other plans for the long weekend. I stood back as she turned the key in the ignition, gunning the Chevy's engine the way she always did before a long trip.

"Have a good time with Connie," she called over the eight-cylinder roar, then fixed me with a mock-stern look: "but not too good."

I nodded enthusiastically, trying to look as innocent as possible - which, in fact, I was. Connie Radcliffe wasn't coming over to exchange notes (or anything else). The whole story - history assignment and all - was a lie, a red herring to legitimize my absence from the Manson Family Reunion out at Lakecrest.

"Bye-Bye, honey." Mom blew me a kiss while she backed the Chevrolet down the driveway, dual exhausts humming in deep resonance. I followed her down to the street, keeping clear of the car's wide turning circle. I lifted my right hand in farewell, doing my best to look mature and trustworthy.

"Bye, Mom. Say 'hi' to Elsie for me."

"Will do." She swung away from the curb, gripping the wheel with both hands, and thundered off in hail of gravelstones and exhaust fumes. Top down, hair flying in the April slipstream, she looked maybe half her age, a precocious young cheerleader on her way to the Big Game. I stood in the street waving goodbye until the Chevy vanished over the crown of Summerhill Road ...

And literally bolted up to the house.

I was almost fainting with excitement by the time I reached the front door. It had been months since I'd had the place to myself, and I was trembling with expectation as I considered the day ahead of me. Locking the door with a swift, loud clack, I scampered through the living room, kicking off my sneakers without a second thought. I was free, alone to do whatever I pleased over the next four days.

Loosening my t-shirt at the waist, I hurried past the staircase, dodging though to the main hallway. My pulse slammed into overdrive as I imagined all those delicious satin treasures closeted away in the Back Room. The walls seemed to flash by in a strobing montage of frames, prints, and fashion illustrations.

The Back Room was a spacious, two-level extension with picture windows, spotlights and high ceilings. It was festooned with potplants, drawing tables, dressing torsos and sewing machines. Mom used it as both a design studio and a reception area when she was meeting with clients. It was a feminine, creative place, rich with her aromatic presence: scented bath oils; long departed roses; a touch of Chanel. I loved this room almost as much as I loved her.

The back wall was lined with mirrors. They dominated the studio from corner to corner, but were little more than a facade for the long, walk-in closet which housed my mother's private collection. Very few people even knew it was there, mainly because it contained the pieces she never intended to sell.

Mom's design sense leaned towards the strange and the fantastique. She often drew her inspiration from the excesses of fashion history - La Belle Epoch, French Rococo; anything with a Parisian flavour. Needless to say, it had been an absolute wonderland during my early childhood, seeding my dreams and igniting my most volatile desires. In the course of years, the Back Room had become my stage, the theater on which I enacted my most secret fantasies.

Did Mom suspect? Possibly; there was very little she didn't know about me.

Halting by the wall of mirrors, I scrutinized my reflection critically, putting a slim hand to the back of my neck. Removing a sequined elastic binder, I allowed my thick, blond hair to cascade past my shoulders. The image in the mirror immediately began to alter. With my hair sweeping down in a shimmering arabesque, I looked small and fragile; a pretty teenaged girl in oversized blue denim.

A shiver swirled through my tummy like a dash of ice water. Quivering with delight, I threw off my t-shirt and jeans, tossing aside the meaningless vestments of my male identity. Turning back to the mirrors, I adjusted my hair to cover my slim shoulders, almost dizzy with anticipation. I felt short of breath, my thighs started to shake with high-wire tension. I was impatient to finish the change, eager to climb into my costume and begin the afternoon's performance. Stepping closer to the mirrordoor, I studied my face and figure for imperfections. There were very few, even at this range.

I was rather fortunate in this respect. Possessing a sexually ambiguous appearance, I could easily pass for female. I had the androgynous lines and huge, liquid eyes of the Waif. My Mother once remarked - in all seriousness - that I could have modeled girls' fashions on any local catwalk.

I padded over to the closet, reveling in my bare thighs, my smooth, ivory skin. It was so wonderful, so liberating, to shed my male identity. Nearly three months had passed since I'd emerged from my gendered prison; twelve agonizing weeks locked in a boy's rancid body, counting off the empty, interminable days. Well, all that was finished now...

---

"The girl looking back at me was utterly breathtaking.

Her long, shapely legs bent slightly inward at the knees, their supple length exaggerated by the tense black suspenders. The red lace trimming the garter belt was garishly bright, as were the frills on her flimsy little panties. And strangely, in the dim lamplight of the Alcove, she seemed to have large, ripening breasts filling out the low-cut bra she wore. It was an illusion of course, a trick of the light and a feverish imagination. I was looking at a pretty teenaged girl in her underwear. One with my face and form..."

In this classic piece from the Cynosure collection, a beautiful young tranzie discovers a secret doorway to another world - but it doesn't lead to Narnia! Finding herself on the wrong side of the mirror, Bianca Woodrow discovers that the brightest of dreams can give way to the darkest of nightmares - one in which she might be trapped until the end of her days...

---

It was Saturday morning in the second week of spring, and nine year-old Kim Taylor was practically busting to get out of the house.

Leaning out of the window of his upstairs bedroom, Kim gazed across the lawns and fences of Heartsfield. The air still carried a hint of winter; he could taste it on the back of his tongue as he breathed. A deep, clear sky framed the distant mountains, lazy white clouds drifted sedately across the horizon. Too nice a morning to spend in front of the TV, no matter what was on. The day beckoned him with all the promises of childhood - some of which he was still too young to understand.

He'd promised to meet Janet and Suzie at the playground around half-twelve, which was why he'd grabbed lunch early today. His Mom was really big on the three squares thing and she wouldn't let him out the door without a bite or two. Well, she couldn't complain he wasn't getting his daily ration; he'd downed three BLTs and a glass of Quik only half an hour before. He'd also cleaned up his room, just in case she tried to hold him on a technicality. Mothers were like that, they almost never played fair.

Closing the window, Kim walked over to the dresser, keeping one eye to the clock. It was quarter of twelve; still plenty of time to get down to Memorial Park if he left in the next ten minutes or so. He passed a brush over his hair and tucked his t-shirt into his jeans, making sure to tighten the belt a notch. Unlike most boys his age, Kim was small and delicately built; it was difficult to find clothes that fit him. Even with his hair cropped to the nape of his neck, strangers regularly mistook him for a young girl (a situation causing him considerable embarrassment until quite recently).

Grooming rituals completed, he stepped into his runners (thick, pumpy Docs, roughly three sizes too big) and made for the door. All he had to do now was sneak past the Guardian of the Living Room and he'd be home free. Unfortunately, this final obstacle was also the most difficult to avoid, as his Mom had eyes like a proverbial hawk. Worse still, he knew she was getting curious about how he was spending his afternoons, which meant she would probably go fishing for answers.

And that might pose a few problems.

Kim trotted down the staircase, wondering how he was going to handle this. He wasn't old enough to deceive her (the woman was a human polygraph), but he obviously couldn't tell her everything - not even the parts she'd be capable of believing. Trouble was, she wouldn't let him leave until she'd satisfied her interest. Well, some of it, at least. Maybe that was his solution; throw her a couple of tidbits. Not too much; just enough to keep her guessing.

His mother was stretched out on the sofa, languidly reading one of her Anne Rice novels. This was a familiar scene: Lynne Taylor was a binge reader with a preference for the supernatural. The Vampire Chronicles was her all-time favourite, she must have read it at least sixteen times, as if searching for passages she hadn't noticed before. Kim honestly had no idea what the attraction was. Once you read a book you already knew how it ended. There was no point in reading it again from what he could see.

Kim approached the foot of the lounge with all the caution of a mouse approaching a sleeping lioness.

"Can I go out now, Mom?" he asked, trying hard not to shuffle his feet.

"Cleaned up your room?" Lynne asked without looking up.

"Yeah," Kim replied with an absent-minded nod.

"OK, then," Lynne said indifferently, "where are you going?"

"Down to the Park," the boy answered, "I'm meeting J and S at the swings."

Lynne glanced up, eyebrows arched with uncharacteristic surprise.

"J and S?"

"Janet and Susie."

"And who might they be?"

"Some girls in my class," Kim told her conversationally, "we catch the bus to school together. They live out in Chamberlain Heights."

"Oh, Chamberlain Heights," Lynne smiled, putting on her best la-de-da accent, "moving up in the world, are we?" Kim was aware that she was trying to reel him in with a touch of humour, but he didn't understand what she meant. He shrugged, not really sure how to reply.

"Yeah, I guess so."

Lynne stared at him a few seconds longer, studying his expression, his posture, the lowering of his gaze. He was holding something back, obviously, although he looked more uncomfortable than secretive. Well, whatever it was, it couldn't have been anything too serious. He was nine years old, how serious could it be? Probably just embarrassed about having a little girlfriend or something. Well, whatever it was, she could afford to be patient. She'd find out everything eventually. She always did.

"All right then," Lynne nodded, turning back to her book, "have a nice day with your friends." Casually turning a dog-eared page between her fingertips, she signaled that audience was finished.

Kim said goodbye and exited the room, hoping to avoid further questioning. He made it as far as the hallway before she issued the usual reminders, almost as an afterthought: "Dinner's at five. And be careful crossing the road."

"Yes, Mom," he called back, and let himself out through the front door. A fine day greeted him with a freshening breeze. He was glad to be out in the fresh air, away from his mother's interrogations. He could see that she'd been surprised he was meeting a couple of girls at the playground, and would have given her eye-teeth to know what was going on. And that would have been a little difficult to explain, particularly since J & S weren't really his friends.

They were Kitty's friends.

Kim ambled along the sidewalk swinging his arms, watching dragonflies zither across the nature strip. Memorial Park was five blocks up the Drive, about fifteen minutes walk from his place. Except he wasn't heading for Memorial Park, not exactly. He was heading for the playground, just as he'd told his mother, but it had a different name over there. A lot of things had different names over there, come to think of it.

Over there.

That was his name for Kitty's world. That land of wonders he'd discovered almost a year ago, when he'd learnt that dreams weren't always dreams. It was a place of infinite possibilities, where fantasies came true and there was no need to keep secrets from anyone, least of all his mother.

Over There.

Crossing the road at Lethbridge Canal, Kim turned left into Memorial Drive. The Drive was the main street of Heartsfield, running the length of the town and dividing it neatly in two. Hopscotch grids decorated its sidewalks with meticulous regularity, shaded by the leaves of a thousand maples. Kim knew every crossing, curb and corner of the Drive, because he'd lived here all his life.

Heartsfield was your archetypal picket-fence township, a picture-postcard village nestled around the foothills of the Chamberlain Ranges. It was pretty much the same in Kitty's world as it was in his; chalk-white footpaths and tree-lined avenues. You could almost smell the cinnamon pie cooling on every second window sill. His Mom adored the place, said it had a Norman Rockwell feel to it. Kim didn't know who Norman Rockwell was, but the sentiment was clear enough.

Kitty's town was virtually identical, only it was called Hartsvale on her side. Kim supposed the similarity wasn't purely coincidental; everything in Hartsvale was like a reflection of Heartsfield. He'd seen something similar on Star Trek, one time - that episode where Worf found himself falling through a bunch of quantum realities (whatever they were) and everyone seemed to have a double. Which was how things were in Kitty's world. It was like everybody he knew had a twin, someone who looked and acted the same as their counterpart.

Kitty Tyler was his twin, in a way.

Yes, she was a girl, and she wore dresses and ribbons and everything, but she was his twin nonetheless. He'd realized that the very first time he'd "stepped over" to the other side, nearly a year before. It didn't matter that she wore panties and skipped rope and slept with a cuddly panda in her arms every night. They were so similar, so alike in every other respect. The cast of their features, set of their gaze, the very colour of their thoughts. Yes, Kitty Tyler was his twin in every sense of the word.

His twin, and much more besides.

---

Three dark fantasies told from a transgendered perspective. Contents include:

The Shop at the End of the Road: a teenaged boy strikes a Faustian bargain with an ageless woman, incurring a debt that can never be repaid...

Stepping Over: a subtle rift in time and space allows nine-year old Kim Taylor a glimpse into a life he might have led...

Tell Me True: a mysterious door leads to a world of secret, feminine delights for one lonely, neglected little boy...

Originally published on BCTS, this supernatural trilogy has been revised and formatted for instant download. Clocking in at just under 20,000 words, Tales of Light and Darkness has been released into the public domain by the authors.

---

KC was five when his family moved into the house on Carrington Drive. He was very big on secret agents and hidden passages at the time, and was thoroughly intrigued when he discovered a door which went nowhere. This was utterly outside of his experiences with doors up to that time: a door, by its very nature, had to lead somewhere. You walked through one to get from outside to inside, a doorway took you out of one room and into another. You knocked on one to get it open, flicked the latch to let people in. Most of their handles were too high for KC to reach, but this one had its knob set down low, just the right height, as if it had been built for KC and KC alone.

He came across it on the afternoon they shifted in. KC had been helping his Mom and Dad carry stuff into the kitchen (well, they'd been doing most of the actual carrying, KC had been more sort of supervising and making helpful remarks, like "Why are there mushrooms growing in that cupboard?") when he noticed there was another room at the back of the kitchen, some hitherto unobserved space that KC just had to inspect.

He wandered through the canyons of boxes springing up on the lino, and made his way into the back room, pausing in the middle to stare around. He couldn't remember ever having been in a room this big before. The ceiling seemed about three miles high. The floor was a vast expense roughly the size of a playground. How were they ever going to fill it up? There weren't enough cardboard boxes in the world to do that.

Then he noticed the door.

It was tall, taller even than KC's Dad (who was the tallest man in the world, KC was sure), but it still looked rather tiny sitting there in the middle of that huge blank wall. It was thick and heavy, like the door at the front of the house. It must have been a very important door, as it was made of dark, oily wood. KC was utterly delighted with this find; his new home had all sorts of surprises. Hundreds of rooms to explore, as well as cupboards and fireplaces and wardrobes and all sorts of little nooks and crannies a boy could squeeze into when he wanted to hide from his older brother.

Maybe this place just went on and on! Wouldn't that be just so cool!! His old home had been nothing like this. KC had climbed over every inch of the house back at Ashville, and there had been absolutely nothing exciting about it (at least, not lately). Even Mom's wardrobe had finally lost its fascination, and that, at one time, had been the scariest thing in existence (KC's brother had assured him that at least twenty ghosts lived in Mom's creepy old wardrobe. He then proceeded to lock KC in that dark, confined hole for nearly thirty minutes until Mom and Dad came home and heard him screaming hard enough to split a lung).

KC walked over and studied the door with the sort of expertise normally reserved for a professional. Not only was the knob set at a perfect height, it was even the right size for his little fist. It gleamed in the lusty haze of the early afternoon, and KC decided it must be made of gold. The thought suddenly occurred to him that it might be locked. It had a big, black keyhole (odd for an inside door) just beneath the knob. What if it was locked, and they'd lost the key?

KC felt a jagged stab of panic. There had to be at least a zillion rooms hidden behind that door just begging KC to go exploring, and no one had a key to open it with! It was locked forever!! He'd never get to see what was on the other side now. He'd grow old and die without ever getting to set foot past the mystery doorway. No, that couldn't be right, this was his door, he'd discovered it before anyone else in the universe. KC gripped the knob and turned with all his might.

The door opened, swinging outwards with no resistance whatsoever. KC almost collapsed with disappointment. The door didn't go anywhere.

2.

The door opened onto a brick wall, brown and dull and streamered with cobwebs. It must have been the most boring wall on the face of the planet. KC called out to his father in dismay.

Dad sauntered out of the kitchen, house-dust peppering his balding head. He had grime on his thick, blunt fingers and a screwdriver in his shirt pocket. Graham, KC's older brother, swaggered along behind, sneering in abject contempt at the sound of KC's voice.

"What's up, Doc?" Dad asked, grinning from one side of his face to the other. His smile was usually enough to warm KC's little heart, but he wasn't going to be cheered up so easily. This must have been the biggest let-down he'd ever known. Worse than that, he knew he was going to have to live with it, somehow.

KC pointed at the doorway.

"Dad - this door. It doesn't go anywhere.'"

Graham curled his upper lip, staring down at the younger boy.

"So what?" he demanded, eyes flaming like lanterns fueled by hate. So fucking WHAT??! Graham had just turned fourteen and considered himself to be some kind of adolescent deity. He wore a black leather jacket and tight blue levis, which was evidently what all the gods were into that year. Dad ignored his divine offspring and inspected the door to nowhere.

"Some of these old places are funny like that, KC," Dad said, rattling the knob experimentally, "bordered up fireplaces, bricked-in windows, that sort of thing. You know."

KC nodded to affirm he knew precisely what his father was talking about, although in actual fact, he hadn't the proverbial faintest. Several seconds later, he decided that betraying his ignorance was preferable to sending the next six years wondering.

"Why doesn't it go anywhere?" he asked. Graham shook his head in snide, knowing arrogance: Only a fucking IDIOT wouldn't know that.

"Probably did once," Dad explained, waving the door back and forth, as if this would confirm his theory, "might have been another room out there at some point - a laundry, preservatives room, something or other. Maybe an extra bedroom. Who knows?" He looked down at KC and smiled.

"What happened to it?" the boy asked.
"Torn down, I guess. This place is pretty old, Kase."
"How old?"
"How old do you reckon?"
"About a thousand years!"

Dad laughed, ruffling his son's hair, and made his way back in to the kitchen, chuckling to himself. Graham glared down at KC for two seconds, then strutted out of the room, a fourteen year-old hustler with a Marlon Brando jacket and the coolest moves in the space-time continuum. KC stared after them, then looked back in at the doorway. Hardly enough room for a mouse to fit in between the door and the brickwork. He closed it quietly, and went off to supervise the installation of the sofa in the living room.

3.

Despite his disappointment, the Door to Nowhere continued to snare KC's attention. Once the excitement of The Big Move had died down, he spent most of his mornings playing out in the back room, eyes constantly circling around to the door and its shiny gold knob. It was a mystery. Sure, Dad had explained it all to him; old houses were built strange. But that hadn't really explained anything. The door didn't lead anywhere now, but it had led somewhere at some time.

And not to some boring old place like a laundry.

His Mom had been reading him a book back in Ashville called The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. It was a story about some little kids who go through a creaky old wardrobe and find a whole new world called Narnia. It was always snowing in Narnia ("always winter but never Christmas") and there were all sorts of magical animals and fairy-story people: lions and tigers and giants and witches and goblins and a whole mess of other things with names KC could never remember. He just bet the door had led to some secret place like Narnia once.

The days drifted by, growing shorter and colder as the year turned to Autumn. Rising early in the mornings, KC could never resist the temptation to get up and peek behind the Door to Nowhere. Of course, there was never anything back there except the brown brick wall. But sometimes, he was absolutely certain there was something else in there, and KC was just about busting to know what it was.

---

There was a shop on the outskirts of town, one of those magical little places that seemed to sell nothing but half-remembered dreams and broken promises. It sat at the end of a long forgotten cul-de-sac, nestled amongst the elms and maples, idling away its days in a seemingly eternal springtime. Its only customers were small children, fallen teenagers and forlorn lovers, all seeking answers to unspoken questions.

The answers were supplied by a dark-eyed woman who sat behind an ancient cedarwood counter. She greeted her clientele with an indulgent smile, her lips curving in a startling, gloss red crescent, a gilt-edged deck of tarot cards splayed beneath her lacquered fingertips. As young and ageless as a waxworks gypsy, she watched in tacit amusement while her visitors foraged through the racks and shelves at the back of the store. Few could explain precisely what they sought, but each knew the moment they found it, squirreled away amongst the books and bells and Halloween masks.

Sometimes they might search for days, drawn inexorably back to the shop with its country-fair collection of everyday marvels. Opera glasses and china dolls; pocket watches and baseball cards; black satin gloves and the sweet, mocking lies of a beautiful woman. It was a museum of the strange, the exotic and the wonderful, housing a thousand scattered fragments of a thousand scattered lives. Trade was never brisk, but no one who entered the premises ever left empty handed. The Shop at the End of the Road sold everything. The cost was naturally excessive, but then again, happiness never comes cheap.

Happiness comes at a price very few could afford – and which none could ever resist.

Robin Lindale walked in the deep green shade by the side of the road, thirteen years of late September sunshine in the body of a child not quite his age. He strode the verdant lanes with a light, easy step, meeting the world with a gaze that could calm an angry sea. Fair and slight and willow thin, he possessed a naive beauty that drew the eye of everyone who saw him. Many would turn to remark on his lush, Autumn features, thinking him a girl hiding beneath a boy's careless denims. Their unsuspecting whispers often brushed the truth, although no one would have guessed what lay concealed below Robin's alabaster countenance.

He was on his way to The Shop at the End of the Road, treading a path he'd followed since early childhood. A life-long devotee of the arcane and the inexplicable, Robbie had become the Shop's sole regular customer. Its dark, aromatic interior had held him entranced from the moment he'd stepped through its leadlight doorway half a decade before. His once-intermittent journeys were now a regular pilgrimage, a ritual he observed with an almost Catholic devotion. Like most children his age, Robbie was a creature of custom and ceremony. The Shop was a great unspoken mystery in a grey pedestrian world, and his life would have been incomplete without this weekly dedication.

He approached the store through a grove of pines clustered around the front entrance. In previous centuries, the Shop had been a small parish church with bluestone walls and mahogany floorboards. Stained-glass windows lent it a surreal quality much in keeping with the owner's Gothic personality. Robbie had always found this melancholy atmosphere vaguely menacing, like the moaning of the wind through a moonlit graveyard. He trotted up the front steps, inhaling an intoxicating mixture of Indian Rose and pine resin.

He paused just inside the threshold, adjusting his vision to the perpetual night inside. Dim, looming shapes gradually resolved themselves into art deco lampshades and glass-topped display cabinets. Nothing looked familiar; the merchandise altered from day to day like the colors of an April sunset. Robin stood silhouetted in the wide Victorian doorframe, savoring the fresh aura of mystery.

Then: a distant, nocturnal voice, drifting through the darkness:

"Hello Robbie."

The woman behind the counter waited in a pool of indigo shadows, silently reading the inscrutable cards with her long, spiderling fingers. She didn't need to look up to know who had entered her store. She divined the future the way the blind read brail, and was rarely – if ever – caught off guard. Long accustomed to her enigmatic presence, Robin approached her with the careless trust of a five year-old.

"Hi Felicity," he replied, using the name she'd told him to use, which wasn't her name at all. He halted before the counter, glancing absently down at the Tarot cards. Her finger hovered over The Queen, an image which held a special significance for the boy. It always turned face up whenever he entered the store.

"Earlier than usual," Felicity commented indifferently.

"Yeah, I thought I'd drop in before the place got too crowded," Robbie replied ingenuously, unaware that such a comment could easily be misconstrued as the grossest sarcasm. Felicity dealt another card, whicker-flicking it into place with a dark, effortless grace.

"Seven of Cups," she remarked, unsurprised. Mystic numbers and the search for meaning.

"Cool," Robin nodded as if he understood the first thing about the Tarot, then looked towards the back of the shop. Like everyone who came here, Robbie was searching for something – though he wasn't sure how to describe what it was at this point. It was kind of silly, kind of embarrassing, now that he stopped to think about it. Maybe if he just went out back and had a look round ...

"Felicity, would it be OK if I –" he began, inclining his head towards the old Lady Chapel. A crumbling, circular alcove packed with skirts, trinkets and hat-boxes, it was sure to house the object of his desires.

"Of course," the woman agreed in a subtle, knowing tone Robbie was too young to recognize. He was thirteen, and a boy; guile was an artform beyond his understanding. He sauntered into the rear of the store, past a framed poster advertising a French magician named Robert-Houdin (Suspension Chloroform, the legend read). He felt confident that he'd locate his prize out in the Lady Chapel or some other part of The Shop. That was the true enchantment of Felicity's place; nothing was ever out of reach if you sought hard enough...

---

One of the oddest things about change is that you rarely see it coming.

It sort of sidles up to you all silent and unannounced, like the rising of the sun or the turning of the seasons. For me, it happened on a bright, cool morning at the beginning of summer; not long after my ninth birthday. Must've been around the same time my Dad went off to Chicago with his girlfriend. Mom and I never saw that one coming either. Looking back, I suppose I shouldn't have been so surprised at what went down over the next few months; a lot of weird stuff was going on that year.

I was sitting on the front steps of our Fairmont home, listening to the radio and absently playing with a Whipper-Snapper. A Whipper-Snapper is one of those toys that fall in and out of fashion; a small blue ping-pong racket with a black rubber ball attached to it. They have about a dozen different names; Hip-Zipper or Bee-Bopper or something equally inane, but you know what I mean. You probably had one yourself when you were a kid.

It would have been about ten in the morning when the Tracker Brothers moving van pulled up in front of the house next door. I watched their arrival with considerable interest; the Old Stewart Place had been vacant for about two years and had half a dozen realty signs decorating the front yard. My mother secretly hoped it never sold, because you could never tell what kind of neighbors you were going to get. Guess we were about to find out.

Anyway, a couple of fat, sweaty guys got out of the truck (the Tracker Bothers presumably) and started unloading furniture onto the front lawn, grunting and wheezing with exertion. Leaving the radio on the veranda, I stood up and walked over to the edge of the yard. Even at my age, I knew you could tell a lot about people from their possessions. There was a fence dividing our properties, a low, red-brick wall maybe a foot high. I stood to one side, casually zocking the Whipper-Snapper up and down. If the Trackers noticed my presence, they didn't give any indication.

Surveying the chaos, I figured that the new neighbors had at least one kid; most probably a girl by the looks of things. Most boys would have been disappointed to see all the dolls and pandas and bunny-ruggles, but I was the only kid living up on Fairmont Heights at the time. Most of my friends lived out in Greendale, way over on the other side of town. Any change would have been an improvement as far as I was concerned. Glancing back towards my house, I sat down on the fence, settling in for the morning. Mom wouldn't like me annoying the removalists, so I decided to keep a low profile.

The neighbors themselves appeared five minutes later, rolling up the driveway in a late model ford (a Thunderbird, if I remember correctly). The doors cracked open and two people got out: a tall, dark haired woman and a little blond girl I judged to be about the same age as me. I was too far away to get a close look, although I thought the mother was probably quite good-looking. As for the daughter, she scooted into the house carrying an armload of stuffed animals faster than it takes to read this sentence. The woman walked over to talk to the moving-guys, both of whom were struggling with an antique European chaise-long, the sort you see in old Frankenstein movies. A lot of her furniture was like that; all vintage lamps and statuettes and vases from mysterious lands. I later found out that that was her job; she used to be an agent for some auction house in upstate New York.

The morning proceeded for about an hour until the Trackers took a coffee break (the older sibling kept a thermos in the van), by which time most of the furniture had been relocated inside. The lawn was still littered with tea-chests and hampers, but most of the work had been done. The little girl had spent most of her time darting in and out of the house collecting toys, books and assorted knick-knacks; now she was ready to explore her immediate surroundings. Or more precisely, she was ready to investigate me.

Gingerly mounting the brick fence, she held her arms out for balance and started walking along the top, pretending she hadn't noticed me. I did much the same thing, hammering idly away at my paddle-ball until she was about ten feet away. We both looked up at the same instant, cued by that obscure sense of timing all children seem to possess. She paused for a moment, then tight-roped forward a few more steps.

"Hi. I'm Chrissie," she informed me, cutting through all the social protocols without a backward glance.

"Hi, I'm Billy. You're new here." I'd been on an unending quest to state the obvious for some years now.

"Yeah," she confirmed offhand," we just moved in this morning."

"Where you from?"

"Longridge Bay."

"Where's that?"

She shrugged her answer; very few nine year-olds can point out their hometown on a map. That was no big deal, though; I sometimes had trouble finding my way home from school, so she was probably doing better than me.

"You live there?" she asked, pointing to our modest little colonial bluestone.

"Yeah," I nodded, "I live here with my Mom."

"I live with my Mom too," she commented, still working on her balance (although the fence was only a foot off the ground), "but not my Dad. He went away a long time ago."

"Where to?" I inquired, surprised that we were both single-parent kids.

"I don't know. Canada, I think."

"Mine's in Chicago." We spoke with the innocent curiosity of very young children, communicating more with looks and glances than anything else. I think that's where it all began, in those quiet moments between each sentence. We talked and we listened, and somehow, in the brief pauses punctuating our words, our lives had become inextricably linked. Of course, neither of us could have realized that at the time. At the end of the day, we were just two kids chattering away in the warm June sunshine.

About the only thing I really noticed was how pretty Chrissie was; much prettier than any of the girls I knew from school. She had the delicate bone structure and milky complexion of a new born infant. I think her most captivating feature was her eyes. They were a pale shade of violet I'd never seen before; violet ringed with turquoise, if you can believe that. Whenever they caught the sun, they seemed to glitter with some strange purple light, though that was probably my imagination.

"Do you have any brothers or sisters?" she asked, pirouetting around on her right foot. Her little pink sun-frock ballooned out around her thighs as she turned.

"No, I don't," I answered, thinking she probably studied ballet or something. She reminded me of a music-box dancer.

"Me neither," she said, patting her skirt down, then added: "my Daddy left when I was really little."

I thought of mentioning that my father only ran off two months before, but decided I didn't want to talk about it. Instead, I returned my attention to the paddle-ball, whocking it towards the grass in short, elastic loops.

"What's that?" Chrissie demanded, spinning anti-clockwise this time.

"It's a Whipper-Snapper. I got it for my birthday." I gave the ball an extra hard zock, stretching the string out to around three feet. Chrissie's eyes widened as if she'd never seen one before. The ball streaked out half a dozen times before I dropped the pace back to more normal parameters.

"Can I have a try?" Chrissie asked.

"Yeah, sure," I shrugged. Chrissie jumped off the wall and her dress ballooned up again, this time around her waist. I stood up and handed her the paddle, talking her through the intricacies of holding the grip. Chrissie nodded along for a few seconds, then started zocking away like a world class champion. My eyes widened in vague astonishment: it had taken me nearly two months to perfect my technique, practicing every day since my father flew the coop.

"You've done this before?" I gawked in near-disbelief.

"No, this is my first time," she corrected, literally beaming with pleasure. She turned her shimmering, purple eyes in my direction, and somehow, I knew she was telling me the truth.

In the weeks that followed, I would discover that Chrissie was something of a prodigy. She could pick up new skills in the blink of an eye and usually without any practice whatsoever. Mastering the paddle-ball in a matter of seconds was probably the least of her abilities, though it sure impressed the hell out of me. At times, I found it downright spooky, but on that lazy summer morning at the beginning of June, it was the proverbial mystery of the ages. I never had the opportunity to ask her about it, however. Just at that second, Chrissie's mother appeared on the front veranda and called out to her.

Both of us turned towards the voice, Chrissie a fraction of a second earlier than me (and without losing her rhythm for so much as a second). The woman standing at the top of the steps was tall and willow-thin with jet black hair slicing down the left side of her face. She was wearing a plain blue house dress that somehow rippled against her figure like liquid silk. She looked to be in her late twenties, though at that distance I couldn't be sure.

"That your Mom?" I asked, squinting for focus.

"Yeah," Chrissie confirmed, taking me by the hand and tugging me towards the house, "come over and say hi." We set off across the lawn, dodging between miscellaneous crates and packing cartons. I was suddenly a little shy of meeting her, knowing she was probably incredibly busy with everything. If I'd been a few years older, I would have made some excuse and come back in a day or two, but I was still too young for such complex social rituals. Needless to say, I had nothing to worry about. Chrissie dragged me to the foot of the steps, and her mother came down to meet us.

And my eyes widened for the second time that day.

Chrissie's mom was the most beautiful woman I'd ever seen in my life. There's simply no other way to describe her. It wasn't conventional beauty, like you see in fashion magazines or TV shows. No, it was much more subtle than that, sort of like the tones of a Renaissance painting or the scales of a classical aria. I stared at her with a child's unaffected wonder, and she rewarded me with a smile that could have shamed the sun.

"Who's this?" she asked, touching my face with her luminous gaze. I felt my heart stall in mid-beat.

"Momma, this is Billy," Chrissie said, indicating me with a sweep of her hand, "he's my new friend".

"Well, pleased to meet you, Billy. My name's Evelyn Reinhart. My friends call me Eve."

"Hi, Mrs. Reinhart," I managed after an incredibly long pause, "I'm Billy Campbell. I live next door." More of my unending crusade to pinpoint the obvious. It never occurred to me to call Eve by her first name (even if it had, I knew my mother would never stand for it). The social niceties being concluded, Chrissie grabbed my hand and pulled me a few steps closer.

"Mom, can Billy help us move our stuff inside?" she asked, fidgeting with excitement. Eva regarded her daughter with a just a hint of amusement.

"Certainly," she nodded indulgently, "if he wants too, that is."

"You wanna?" Chrissie chimed.

"Sure," I agreed without paying that much attention to the question. I was peering up at Eva in a daze, taking in the perfect contours of her face, the thick, black curtain of her hair. There was no denying the facial resemblance; mother and daughter shared the same perfect features, right down to the clipped button nose and the dimples on either side of the mouth. The same haunting, violet eyes too.

"Come on, then!" Chrissie exclaimed, yanking me up the steps and breaking the spell. "I'll show you where my my room is!"

We spent the remainder of the morning scampering around the house and yard without actually doing anything (the Trackers did most of the heavy lifting, cursing like marines because everything seemed to weigh a thousand pounds). We were too excited be of any use. Exploring the Old Stewart Place was like discovering some exotic, fairy-tale world. Every doorway led to a dozen more; there had to be at least a hundred rooms under its gabled roof. Or so it seems when you're nine years old.

The removalists finished about one in the afternoon. Eve paid them both an extra twenty for their services, then set about putting the kitchen in order. Chrissie and I stood on the front lawn, watching the Tracker's van rumbling off down the road and wondering what to do next. We couldn't play inside; the house was a chaotic sprawl of unopened boxes, even Chrissie's attic bedroom.

"You wanna play hide and seek out back?" she suggested, kneeding her skirt between her fingers like a four year old, almost dancing with anticipation. I have to admit I was sorely tempted. Like any boy of my generation, I would have stayed out playing until the sun went down or the world came to an end, whichever came first. Trouble was, I knew I had to get going. My mother had been kinda moody since Dad left, and I wasn't sure how she'd react to me spending so much time with a couple of total strangers, even if they were our new neighbors.

"No, I better go home now", I explained, hoping I wouldn't hurt her feelings, "my Mom'll be calling me inside for lunch soon".

"OK", she said, hardly disappointed at all, "you want to play again tomorrow?"

"Well, sure. There's a playground over on Wentworth Drive, I'll take you there if you want."

"Good! That'll be fun," she answered, hitting me with that 250 volt smile she'd inherited from her mother. For a split second, I saw a ghost of the woman she'd eventually become, and my heart did another somersault. Then it was gone and she was just Little Chrissie Reinhart, the girl next door.

"All right then. I'll see you tomorrow morning." I raised a hand to signal goodbye and started walking towards the brick fence, smiling at the thought of taking Chrissie to the park tomorrow. We'd had such a wonderful day together, I was honestly looking forward to seeing her again.

I'd gotten less than ten steps before she called out to me.

"Billy?"

"Yeah?"

"Want me to get your Whipper-Snapper?"

I paused, looking back over my shoulder at her. We'd left it upstairs in her bedroom when we came down to wave goodbye to the Trackers.

"It's yours," I said after a micro-second's consideration.

"Really?" Chrissie asked, her expression almost comically surprised.

"Yeah. It's yours. Keep it." Hell, why not? It was a lame excuse for a birthday present in the first place - even if it was the last thing my Dad ever gave me. Chrissie, on the other hand, was utterly delighted. She ran over in a haze of flying skirts, pigtails whipping about in the slipstream. I braced for impact, thinking she was going to kiss me.

"Thanks, Billy," she trilled, hugging herself in undisguised pleasure, "you're really nice." That flickering purple light was back in her eyes again.

"You're welcome," I smiled, more than a trifle embarrassed by her boundless enthusiasm. Part of me was hoping she really would kiss me - although I would have blushed the color of a ripe strawberry if she had.

"See you tomorrow then?" she demanded, still hugging herself around the middle.

"You bet". Nothing short of a mass extinction would have kept me away.

We said goodbye once more and I stepped over to my side of the fence, glancing back over my shoulder as I walked up to our front door. Chrissie was spinning across the lawn like a pink tornado, hands lifted to the skies. I halted on the porch to watch the show, half-expecting her to lift off the ground and go soaring off over the trees. It was impossible not to like her, she was sweet and funny and…well, magical in ways that I couldn't define.

Giggling at the top of her lungs, she trailed out of her spin and fell over on her back in a flail of knees and elbows. She lay there staring up at the sky, panting for breath and happy as a cloud; I stood watching her for a few more seconds, feeling a warm glow spreading though my midsection. I had no idea what I'd set in motion that day, no idea what was approaching or how my life was about to change...but none of that counted at the time. All I knew was that I'd made a new friend.

And in the end, that's all that ever matters.

---

Tessa Greenhart unbuttoned her cotton blouse, her face flushed with excitement. The dressing room was literally bustling with movement. Neon-lipped models stepped gracefully through clouds of make-up and perfume, assistants rushed costumes from rack to shoulder, while the floor manager waded through the chaos barking orders like a drill-sergeant. Tessa smiled to herself, breathing in the rich scent of Red Door and adrenaline.

Narrowly avoiding a gaggle of dressmakers making for the door, Tessa walked across the room blouse in hand, looking around for the clothing rack. The rest of the cast had already been zipped into their outfits - mainly miniskirts, camisoles and designer jeans - ready for the first take. Filming was about to begin; she had to get into costume as well; although this would involve dressing down rather than dressing up.

They were making a television commercial for Carmine Nights Lipstick, a relatively upmarket cosmetic with a racy girlfest image. CNL had pulled out all the stops with this advertisement, aiming at a young professional female demographic. Glancing through the doorway, Tessa could see the technical crew running last minute checks over the video equipment. The set was a fluorescent retro-seventies mock-up, soft edges and liquid day-glow colors contrived to suggest a large group house in the burbs. Seemingly imbued with a life of its own, it buzzed with a glaring neon radiance.

She hung the blouse over a nearby chair, almost delirious with anticipation. Very soon, she'd be called out to present herself to the camera in her underwear; a girl of barely eighteen with flowing platinum blond hair and liquid blue eyes so deep you could drown in them. Undoing her tiny black mini, she slid the skirt over her slender, tanned thighs, then let it drop to the floor, forming a lycra pool at her feet.

Her high-cut lace panties were so sheer that they seemed to have been airbrushed onto her body; the tender hues of her flawless, ivory flesh were plainly visible through the gossamer fabric. She suppressed an urge to place a hand over her cleavage. This was her first time before the camera, the dressing room was full of strangers, and she felt agonizingly self-conscious.

Still, she had no reason to complain. A new life was opening for her. She was going to be a model. Maybe not a star like Elle or Claudia or Naomi (let's face it; CNL was hardly the Pret a Porter), but the thought of being on TV was thrilling nonetheless.

Besides, even if she never froze the traffic at Times Square, she would live out a fantasy she'd had since she'd been a little girl. She was utterly breathless, thinking on it now. Small local advertising companies notwithstanding, the commercial would be broadcast via ECN; the EastCoast Communications Network.

The thought was intoxicating.

When she stepped in front of the video cameras, she'd be parading her lingerie throughout the entire north eastern region. Which meant that literally millions of people were going to see her in absolutely nothing but her bra and panties.

Striding through the human tide in her flimsy pink undies, Tessa glanced in the mirror, checking her Alpine blond hair and adjusting an errant lock spiraling over her left cheek. She nodded, smiling faintly to herself: the illusion was perfect.

So perfect, in fact, that it had never been an illusion.

How long had she been a girl?
All her life.
How long had she lived as a girl?
Ten years; since her eighth birthday, in fact.

She'd always had a rather feminine appearance, a softness and a fluid grace which simply couldn't be hidden or disguised, regardless of what society or genetics had to say on the matter.

Of course, image was nothing, as the soda commercials had told an entire generation of teenagers back in the nineties. Image alone hadn't made her a woman, nor had the unexpected reshaping of her anatomy close on a decade ago. In the final analysis, such factors were largely irrelevant.

Tessa Greenhart had entered the world biologically male, an insignificant Y-chromosome carelessly tacked onto the end of her DNA, but events since that moment had confirmed that biology did not equal destiny; at least not for her. Tessa's body had been a template, a blank page on which sex and gender could be written. The essential truth had been inscribed on her flesh in chemical signifiers...

albeit a priori):

The script played on the universal belief that pretty young girls inevitably fall out of their clothes as soon as they're left alone together. Tessa had loved the idea as soon as her agent had described it to her: five beautiful girls sharing a house in the suburbs, preparing for an evening out on the town. Running from shower to bedroom, borrowing hairdryers and stockings, swapping dresses hand to hand and making up in the mirror; the myriad little things women do before the Big Night Out.

Towards the end, the girls are shown in their bedrooms, glossing their lips with with Carmine Nights, while the stereo blares out the GirlPower jingle written especially for the advert. It was the only mention of the product; the rest of the commercial was made up of pretty girls decked out in stilettos and lycra slip-dresses as they hurried about brushing their hair and ransacking each others wardrobes.

Tessa had been snared instantly: the treatment was fun, the soundtrack boppy. It was exactly the kind of shoot she'd wanted to do since she started modeling and (best of all) the script required that she appear in her bra and pants. This had been the major drawcard, as far as Tessa had been concerned. She had to run through the house flaunting her knickers while the gyro-cam followed her from the bathroom to the stairway, and thence to her bedroom, where she'd be shown doing girly-things: blow drying her hair, dancing in the mirror and making up her lovely face - exactly what she did at home when she was planning a long evening's nightclubbing.

It was completely gratuitous, of course: there was absolutely no reason why she had to film the advertisement in her bare essentials; it was a lipstick commercial, not a lingerie parade. She could just as easily be shown glazing her lips fully clothed. Not every woman makes up in her underwear, regardless of what the majority of men would like to believe. But the undisguised sauciness of the idea appealed to Tessa. It was as if the part had been written just for her.

---

---

Something odd is happening in the picket-fence township of Ridgewick. Situated on the banks of the Courtland River, this midlands paradise is a place of mystery and wonder, a storybook haven where nothing is ever quite what it seems. Home to the highest population of transsexual children in the world, Ridgewick is a place where gender is malleable and indeterminate. In the span of a few brief years, tall strapping youths have morphed into blushing young virgins, middle-aged bachelors into stunning, blonde brides, and war-weary veterans into green eyed viragoes.

The locals say there's something strange in the water, something which can rewrite DNA, alter chromosomes and even turn back the clock...but nobody's completely sure what it is.

Hi everyone, Tracy here again :)

Following on from this blog-post, Maryanne Peters and I have started work on a collaborative novella under the working title of The Ridgewick Phenomenon. The main story-line involves a genetic mutation spreading through a rural community, causing biological males to gradually morph into anatomical females over a period of years.

A prologue to the novella may be read here. If you find the concept interesting, feel free to post ideas and feedback below. Alternately, if you wish to discuss the project in private, you may contact me via the site's messaging system. All contributions are most welcome, along with drafts, outlines and complete chapters.

Over to you. Looking forward reading your responses :)

"No, Daddy, please no! Not another a spanking!!"

Rob Jackson was sick of Vanessa's backtalk. All he wanted was a little respect and consideration, a place to relax at the end of a day's honest labor. Instead, he'd received nothing but snide remarks, passive misconduct and blatant contempt. Worse still, the girl had outright refused to perform her allotted chores, despite repeated warnings.

Well, Rob had finally reached the end of his rope. 'Nessa's behavior would have tested the patience of a saint, and they were way past the point of no return. It was time for some affirmative action, so to speak. If reasoned discourse wasn't having the desired effect, there was always the alternative, wasn't there?

Let's see if a good, long spanking over his knee wouldn't adjust her little attitude problem.

'Nessa had known she was in serious trouble the moment he'd called her to the living room. Looming over her like a granite sculpture, he'd laid down the law in no uncertain terms, eyes narrowed with parental wrath. His tone had left little doubt as to the outcome of this particular lecture: while half-expecting the inevitable conclusion, she'd been hoping he wouldn't go quite that far. There were very few things she feared as much as a trip over her Step-Father's knee.

"No, Daddy, pease don't, I'm really sorry," 'Nessa wailed in open fear, "I'll be really good from now on, I promise!" Rob ignored her pleas with a kind of slow-burning disdain, inclining his head towards the staircase.

"Up to your room right now," he replied in a gravel voice, "I'll be along in a few minutes; you know what to do."

"Daddy, pleeease –"

"NOW!!"

Vanessa scrambled up the stairs in tears, having failed to overturn her sentence. There would be no clemency, no lenience, no last second pardon. She was going to be spanked like an errant child. It wasn't fair, it wasn't right, and there was absolutely nothing she could do about it.

Stepping through the open doorway, Vanessa glanced around her bedroom in rising panic. She had to get ready, prepare for her swiftly-approaching punishment. The first order of business was to drag the heavy, post-and-rail chair to the middle of her bedroom. It had to be placed facing the bay windows, from where her spanking would be visible to half the neighborhood.

Having hauled The Chair to its appointed position, Vanessa moved onto her next task. It was time to disrobe, shed her jeans and t-shirt in preparation for her punishment. By the time her step-daddy arrived, she had to be waiting submissively in her socks and underwear. This was an integral part of her ritual humiliation: even though she was now eighteen, Rob still bared her bottom whenever he gave her a spanking.

Whimpering under her breath, 'Nessa scampered around the room, setting the furniture in order and climbing frantically out of her clothes. Her head spun in near-hysteria, her tummy swarmed with butterflies. Time was running out, and her Daddy was probably already on his way up. She cast a frightened look about her room, making sure that everything was in its place. He'd be here any minute, and she couldn't afford to be so much as two seconds late. Unfortunately, the clock seemed be running slow today.

'Nessa's heart practically leapt into her throat as she heard her Father's footsteps ascending the stairs.

Rob entered the room a few moments later, his jaw set in lines of grim determination. Vanessa immediately renewed her appeals for leniency, suggesting numerous alternatives to traditional punishment – grounding, extra chores, loss of privileges, even corner-time. Needless to say, it was all for naught; Robert Jackson was not a man to be trifled with. Judgment had already been pronounced, justice would be served without delay.

Scowling, Rob seated himself in the chair and ordered her to finish her preparations. At the same time he started to roll up his shirt sleeve, right forearm rippling with thick, corded tendons. At the sight of these manly exertions, 'Nessa's self-control faltered completely, as she knew precisely what came next.

"Please, Daddy, nooo," she implored, nonetheless following his curt instructions to the letter. The moment had arrived, it was time to bare her bottom. Weeping in utter misery, she begged him to let her keep her underwear on, to spank her over her panties.

"Please don't make me take them down, ohhhh, nooo, please, please, Daddy!!" Her desperate appeals were met only with Rob's bald-faced threat to make it much worse if she didn't get those panties down right now!

Voicing a tiny sob, Vanessa faced away from him, taking hold of the elastic waistband of her low-cut cotton underpants. Tugging them slowly down in back, her lush, ripe bottom-cheeks came gradually into view. She was trying to get away with a partial baring, lowering her pants just a few inches in the back. Needless to say, Rob had already stood for more than enough. Face darkening with anger, he told her to GET - THOSE - PANTS - DOWN!

Groaning in abject humiliation, 'Nessa peeled the sheer cotton fabric down to her knees, slowly revealing her sleek, naked bottomtops. She wept in undisguised shame, tears glistening on her cheeks like liquid diamonds. She hated being treated like a little girl; it was degrading beyond all description –

Especially since she'd been born a boy.

"All right, that's IT, young man!!"

Marion Hoskins was at the end of her tether. She'd had the worst day in recorded history and the last thing she needed was another screaming match with her son. The boy had been testing the limits for over a month now, and she'd finally decided it was time for some direct action. All she wanted was a little old-fashioned respect, after all. Recognition for the long days she put in at work; for her senior status within the household. Sixty hours a week in the office from hell and all she could look forward to was a mouthful of Jessie's sneering contempt. Well, all that was about to change. At the end of the day, she deserved better than this. She was the one who brought home the bacon, for Chrissake!

"Get up to your room this instant," Marion growled, scowling down at the boy from withering, arctic heights, "You have ten minutes to get ready!"

Jessie's eye widened with dawning horror. Ten minutes' head start could only mean one thing.

"No Momma, no, please!" Jess cried, knowing what she had in store for him, "anything but a SPANKING!!"

His posturing, adolescent pride evaporated immediately; Jess had good reason to fear his mother's anger. Instigating that argument on the way home had been a tactical error. He knew from painful experience that she wouldn't tolerate any of his snide backtalk. If only he'd managed to keep his mouth shut. There were certain boundaries that should never be crossed. The consequences were too dire to contemplate.

Unfortunately, the time for negotiations had long passed. Marion had already made her decision; nothing would alter her verdict. And that was one thing Jess could count on.

"Get up to your room NOW!!" she snapped, leaning in close to the boy and pointing towards the staircase. A single vertical line appeared on her forehead, directly between her eyebrows. Jessie's heart sank; he recognized that particular signal. His mother wasn't simply angry - she was downright furious. A chill of suspense played his spine like a xylophone. Whimpering in protest, he turned and fled for the staircase, his long, blonde ponytail flaring out in his wake.

Marion watched him hit the stairs at a full run. A tall, handsomely constructed woman in her early thirties, she stood with one hand on her hip, forcing her pulse to drop back to its normal pace. Jess was long overdue for discipline, but she wanted to be completely calm when she entered his bedroom. The task ahead would require her full concentration, and she intended to savor every squirming, twitching moment to its fullest extent.

Where was that brush? The one with the teak wood finish, as smooth and dark as a baby grand. She usually kept it on the mantle piece over the fireplace, where it would always be within easy reach. Marion normally applied her open hand to Jessie's naughty bottom, but today, she felt the circumstances required a little something extra. A grim smile touched her full, red lips.

I'm going to enjoy this, Marion thought, walking through to the dining room.

It was time for a dose of Old Faithful.

Jess bolted up the stairs in tears, his expensive Nike sneakers pounding the steps two at a time. He was literally overwhelmed with shame and fright; it had been more than four months since his last spanking, and he knew this would be far worse than a couple of glancing smacks on the tail. His Mother was mad this time, REALLY mad. He should never have started that stupid argument on the way home.

She's going to SPANK me!! Jess thought frantically, wiping the moisture from his cheeks. He sprinted along the upstairs passage way and headed for his bedroom door. He couldn't afford to drag his heels. He had to prepare for his punishment. If he wasn't finished by the time she arrived, things would probably go a lot worse for him.

At thirteen years of age, there were very few things Jess hated more than a spanking. He would gladly have eaten spinach every night for a month if he could avoid going over his Mother's knee. Of course, no such options were available on this occasion. Nothing could temper her judgment once she'd made up her mind. Hot tears filled his eyes once more. He could already feel her wide, scarlet handprint burning into his naked buttocks.

Running through the doorway, Jess paused a few feet from his bed and stood looking around the room, his face a mask of trepidation. How much was it going to hurt this time? Was she going to use the brush, that hard, black heirloom she kept on the mantelpiece over the fire? He'd only felt its touch a handful of times, but he dreaded it more than any other weapon in his mother's arsenal. The last time she'd applied it to his tender young bottie-cheeks, he'd had to eat standing up for nearly three days.

Sobbing in misery, Jess went over to his study desk and started dragging the old, straight-backed chair into the middle of the floor. He'd come to think of it as THE SPANKING CHAIR, the site of a thousand bare-bottomed torments. It was a constant reminder of his juvenile status within the family hierarchy, the fact that Marion was his mother and he would always be subject to her authority.

Shifting the chair to its venerated position, Jess went over to his built-in closet. He hesitated before the folding door, his belly tensing up in apprehension. Now came the part he loathed the most; the thing he despised more than any other part of this ritual of disgrace.

It was time to get changed.

Stealing a glance at the clock (he estimated he had less than six minutes to go), Jess began to undress, pulling off his t-shirt and unbuckling the belt of his jeans. He bit his lower lip, whimpering in consternation. Why did he have to do this? It seemed so unfair, so terribly unjust. Even a child should be allowed some measure of dignity, no matter what he'd done to incur the maternal wrath.

Tossing his jeans and underpants into the laundry hamper, Jess reached back to remove the band from his ponytail. And at that moment, Jessie Hoskins no longer looked like a thirteen year-old boy. He didn't look like any kind of boy for that matter. With his long, curvaceous limbs and his slightly protruding belly, he seemed small, dainty ... vulnerable.

Sniffling like a child lost in the rain, he folded the closet doors back into themselves and surveyed the interior. His soft, child-like features melted with dismay. He'd known what was awaiting him, but a vast wave of despair overpowered him nonetheless.

The closet was full of dresses.

And there it was: the ultimate humiliation. Marion always insisted he dress up as a little girl whenever a spanking was on the agenda. She had instituted this rule not long after his fifth birthday, and had enforced it ever since, brushing aside his protests with barely a second thought. It was the most degrading thing he could imagine, a betrayal of his budding, teenaged masculinity: being forced to slip into a pair of girl's panties and a sun-frock prior to having his bottom tanned...

---

I've had a life-long fear of injections since I was a child; I used to cry and cry whenever I was due to get one. I particularly dreaded getting needles in the bottom, because it was so painful and embarrassing. The worst part was that back in elementary school, we had to get shots at least twice a year, and we were always vaccinated in the bottom.

That was one of the main drawbacks to being a tranzie. Our hormonal systems were considered so bizarre that we required constant medical supervision throughout grade school. The majority of us were perfectly healthy in most respects, but medical researchers were still trying to identify the process by which biological males could spontaneously transform into anatomical females. Subsequently, we were poked and prodded and studied like guinea pigs in a research facility (and treated with considerably less respect, in my humble opinion).

Then there was the batspit crazy urban myth that TISM was somehow infectious. That bald-faced pack of lies had started in Ridgewick back in the late nineties, coinciding with a well-known "moral panic" of the period. Parents were up in arms all over the Courtland Valley, believing that a 'gender plague' was poised to decimate the male population, spreading through classrooms and playgrounds like the common cold. There was literally no evidence that TISM was contagious – the condition is genetic, caused by chemical pollutants in the local environment – but when did the truth ever get in the way of a good conspiracy theory?

The rumor was highly publicized in the press, and our local school board over-reacted, ruling that every tranzie in the district had to undergo two medical inspections per year, complete with inoculations and booster shots. None of us really understood what it was all about, but we all thought it was terribly unfair that the other children didn't have to have them too.

I was about eight the first time we were herded into the clinic for the "new program." Most of us were already crying when the nurse told us to strip down to our panties and line up for our preliminary examination. We even had to take off our socks and singlets, because the doctor would be inspecting every part of our bodies. Needless to say, the physical was horrendously invasive, but it was little more than a warm up for the main event.

After the Doctor had finished examining us, we were ushered in groups of three towards the vaccination room, where two nurses were waiting with loaded hypodermics. Standing outside, you could hear the three girls ahead of you wailing in pain as the needles were slipped into their plump, round bottoms. Long before we reached the door, all of us were sobbing tears of fright, knowing our turn was soon approaching. I was crying just as hard, realizing precisely how much it was going to hurt.

Some of us told the nurse we'd already had our shots, but she said that our parents hadn't provided the required paperwork. If the school didn't have the correct documentation, we had to take them all over again (a lot of us were injected by mistake every year, following the official policy mandated by the Ministry of Education at that time).

I practically fainted on the spot when the nurse called us in for our booster jabs. All three of us entered the room weeping in shame, crying all the louder when we saw the long, gleaming needles lined up on the medical tray. As we each had to receive three injections, they wanted to get it over with as quickly as possible. The senior nurse made us turn around facing the examination table, then ordered us to take our panties down to our knees.

One of my friends immediately begged to take hers in the arm, but the nurse simply shook her head in firm reply: "No, it has to be in the bottom." Obviously, the subject was not open for negotiation; being children, we had no say in the matter. We were instructed bend over the examination table with our bare bottoms raised for our shots.

Whimpering in utter humiliation, we lowered our panties down our legs, revealing our plump young bottom-cheeks to the staff. I burst into fresh tears as I assumed the position, thrusting my naked bottom out for the first shot. I can still feel the goose bumps flaring over my arms and neck and tummy. Cool air whispered around my inner thighs, triggering uncontrolled tremors through the entire length of my body. Hearing the senior nurse step towards me, I closed my eyes in childish terror.

Nooooooooooooo-

A second later, the needle plunged into my left cheek, just above the curve of the buttock. Screaming in agony, I clenched both sides at once, squirming my hips forward against the table. The needle seemed impossibly long and sharp, piercing white-hot inches into the smooth, tender flesh.

"Hold still," the nurse said, picking the next syringe, "this won't take long." Her voice was vaguely sympathetic, doing very little to reassure me. I instinctively knew the next shot would hurt twice as bad.

"Just relax your bottom," she said, then sank a wide-bore hypodermic into the other cheek. A huge bolt of pain exploded across my right buttock, streaking halfway down my leg in the process. I shrieked again, much louder than before, tears dripping from my chin in a continuous stream.

"All right, last one," the nurse remarked, raising the third needle, "this'll only hurt a minute."

A final intramuscular jab, far worse than the last, penetrating deep into the soft flesh. Jostling my bottom back and forth, I dug my nails into the table cover, yowling at the top of my lungs.

AAAAAOOOOOOOOWWWWW!!!

It must have been a large syringe, because the nurse took an incredibly long time to depress the plunger. When she finally withdrew the needle, my bottom was throbbing in blue fire agony.

"There… that wasn't so bad, was it?" she asked while I adjust my panties back into place. Sniffling in childish misery, I nodded my agreement without further comment. At that point I would have said anything to escape that medical torture chamber. My two friends were also wiping their eyes, faces lowered in girlish shame while the junior nurse raised their undies.

"Good, then. You can go put your clothes back on, now — just go out through that door, and you can pick up a lollipop from the tray on your way back to class."

We left through the back exit while the next three were waved in, tear-streaked and trembling with anxiety. The lollipops did very little to salve our wounded bottoms. In some cases, the bruises lasted for days; I had to sleep on my belly for over a week.

An intolerably hot Thursday night:

Victoria Street teemed with nightwalkers. Liquid fire pulsed above the sidewalks, washing the streetlife with stammering flares of color. It was late January, and the Fringe Festival was less than a week away. Macquarie Junction was being innudated beneath the annual torrent of interstate visitors and overseas tourists, the local population had fractured and diversified over the last month. The Festival's primary themes were ostensibly multicultural; lately it had assumed a multisexual character. Transgression had begun to spill beyond the Junction's redlight borders, celebrating otherness in every conceivable form. The city had become an electronic saturnalia sweltering in the Great Summer Heat.

Yana Milovic crested a wave of stone wash denim and rode out the King Street rapids. She was making for the shrieking neon heart of the Westside, eyes picking out shifting gaps in the crowd ahead. A window opened between a throng of Kylies and she glided through the rift like a ghost. A complementary set of hermaphrodites squabbled their way past the San Francisco; they looked like a pair of department store mannequins decked out in red vinyl and bubblepack. One of them paused and smiled as Yana glanced curiously in their direction.

Yana had been squatting in the Junction for close on eighteen months now. She recalled the previous summer's cultural eruptions; the endless parades of pierced flesh and jellied hair, the legions of social mutations clustered outside the clubs and cafes. The Westside was awash with drugs and trick, hustlers were dropping Rage and pissing silver. Trade around Federation Gardens would probably quadruple over the Festival. The johns would pay for just about anything this time of year. Yana could jack the price up higher than her lycra stretchskirt, and by the end of the month, she'll have made enough to get them a real place. They could lease one of those big old houses in Crossways or maybe Dawson. Quiet little avenues, colonial verandahs, polite eldster neighbors, none too pricey.

Angie had explained the whole plan to her last night. Angie seemed to know these sorts of things, she was smart that way. Plenty of streetcred when it mattered. She'd never walked the Wall (and therefore never had to dodge the pimps), but she always brought home the big-trick ideas. Squatting in the Meat Packers had been one, hustling the Gardens had been another.

The other girls didn't trust Angie, said she was too straight and easy with the Mouth. Yana saw it sometimes, but her loyalty never really wavered. She'd never have thought of milking the Festival last year, she hadn't known Angie at the time. She hadn't even had a squat back then, she'd been sleeping in the public convenience over by Museum subway.

She dodged a gaggle of Jackets with orange hair and paused by the intersection of Victoria and Wales. Jackets were pretty harmless, in this part of the Westside they were nearly as common as Goths, and neither seemed interested in breeding outside their respective species. Further along she'd need a little vigilance (one of Angie's words - she tossed things like that in everyday speech), up around Royal and Crown, where the neon really started to shriek. That part of the Westside was crawling with Heads; Heads and Ivans. Heads went in slash-packs, Ivans were sole predators, the sort who enjoyed hurting women. Fortunately, both groups generally confined themselves to homophobic bug-hunts during the Festival.

There was a plethora of sleazoid pimps cruising the Junction who'd just love to add Yana to their youth-club hareems. This was a possibility which sent Angie and the others psychotic periodically. The Westside fed on women; hustlers, sugarflesh and streetrick seemed to be the main diet. Sometimes they went down at sunset and simply never came up. Homeless and underaged vanished into the Zone with almost supernatural regularity.

They'd already lost Jacinta.

That had been just three months ago, and she hadn't even been hustling at the time. Took the sub out to Albert Square to score some Haze from Frankie the Shit and managed to forget the way back. No big deal at first; Jacinta was a runaway (they all were), you had to expect sudden disappearances from a midnight runner, even one who'd found a decent squat. But then the rumors started round the circuit. Streetword had it that she'd been 'conscripted' into juvenile service by the Radcliff Brothers, a pair of sugarpimps who specialized in renting jailbait to middle aged Rotarians. Evidently, Frankie handed her over to the Radcliffs in exchange for an armful of Fireskate. She'd been fifteen, same age as Yana herself.

The lights greened and Yana whipped forward, wedging her way between a pair of KenDolls. She'd nearly made farside when she slammed into a tall Goth wearing a weathered black leather overcoat. He glanced down and stepped lightly past, avoiding contact as if she were a child (which she was, although she would have gargled Draino before admitting it), then vanished into the streetide without comment. She often wondered how Goths could afford to hang so much leather from their lupine bodies. She'd never met one who actually did anything.

Yeah, Angie had fears for Yana's safety (not enough to accompany her down to the Gardens or try to figure out a less hazardous way of feeding the kitty, but she was concerned nonetheless), but someone had to bring the trickmoney home if they ever wanted to quit the squats. You walk the Wall, you take the risks. Still, Yana wasn't exactly streetgreen, she had enough Eye to scan a flesh merchant longrange. They usually talked fluent pimpspeak and drove long penile chromes with personalized number plates. They weren't always stereotypes of course, sometimes they morphed out into Flannels or Suits, but after a while you learned to read Face. Angie said Face was a language unto itself, but it was nothing like Mouth. Mouth was almost always a lie, especially when it came attached to a john. Face was more like some book written in cypher. It seemed completely incoherent at first, but once you mastered the code, you could read Face in just about any language.

Selena down at the Wall once told her much the same thing. What a john says isn't worth a pinch of shit at the best of times, it's what you see in the face that matters. That was Selena's great axiom of life, and she didn't just apply it to hustling. It was good to know a bit of Face in any relationship; men always tried to hide behind words and clothes, no matter what the scenario was. The suit may say Armani, but the face will read Asshole in huge, lurid, billboard lettering.

Intuition had saved Selina's life years ago, when she'd been selling it up in the Zone. The johns who approached her there were always bulging with concealed anger. Ivans were her most regular clientele; she had to read pretty deep to see it. Some hid their fury so well that she never saw it until they had the knife at her throat. Up 'til then, they seemed to be nothing more than short balding losers looking for a bit of hump. That's what made them so dangerous. Serial killers could pass for used car salesmen or garage mechanics, sometimes with even greater success than tranzies passed as women.

"You see a lot of both working the Westside," Selina had once told her, lips curving in vague irony.

Yana negotiated a gleaming maze of Kawasakis parked outside the Bluestone Tavern, where a group of Leatherdykes were milling about with their cans of UDL, tooling around and accosting the passing streetlife. Desperados from the Sunshine State according to the license plates, they burst into a ragged symphony of shrilling catcalls as Yana slivered by, giving her the kind of sexlip more often heard around construction sites. Yana grinned and exaggerated her heelwork momentarily, something she'd never have done a year ago.

She'd bummed around with a few lesbians since coming to the Junction, mainly runaways like herself. They'd all been Sigourney Weaver wannabees, shaving their heads and butching up like Ripley from that third Alien movie. The final result, in most cases, was almost farcically androgynous. The majority had looked about as butch as Kate Moss during her waif period.

Yana had tested the water with one of them last June, partly out of curiosity, mainly out a desire to survive the most savage part of Deep Winter. It had been her first time with a female. Her name had been Tish, a grungy little girl with a sexually ambiguous body and a diminutive porcelain face. She had a delicate silver ring looped through her right nipple, a sight Yana never ceased to find wincingly unpleasant. She always felt an impulse to cover her own breasts whenever she saw it.

She crossed Royal Parade and entered the Red Zone, her eyes clicking into high surveillance. This was where the problems would start. Heads were swarming in the cloying heat, their faces long and canine and festering with mindless rage. Of course, they were easy to pick. The Badge presented the main problem, particularly during the Festival. Badge was far more difficult to pick than Head. Police of the plainclothes variety were about as ubiquitous as ratz in a subtube. The Westside was virtually drowning in Suits, and you could never be sure which one was working undercover. You could never fool a Badge. Selina said they practically wrote the book on reading Face, they could spot a runaway with their eyes closed.

Badge had a nose for sugarflesh, sniffing them out like white pointers and hauling them off the street to the proverbial Fate Worse Than. Strip searches and cavity probes weren't exactly legal where child prostitutes were concerned, even under the Special Powers Act, but you heard a lot of horror stories walking the Wall late at night. From what Selina told her, the Badge had a long history of protecting paedophiles and sugarpimps, and it hadn't ended with the Inquiries of the late-nineties. Hidden video evidence had landed a few scapegoats in the pen, but the trials had mostly been media spectacle. Child sexual abuse had been the tabloid fashion at the time. Public hysteria had been satisfied, but the underlying carcinoma had barely been grazed.

Badge still wore the meanest rep in the force, particularly the undercovs. Many of the older hard-asses were still on the take, and teenaged girls came at a premium. Jacinta had almost certainly fallen foul of the Vice Squad. Probably caught her up by Albert Square and sold her off to the Radcliffs for a percentage of the trade. There was no shortage of paying customers, even a pizza-faced slag like Frankie the Shit could afford an hour of quicktime every now and then. Of course, that particular debate had become academic long ago. Jacinta hadn't surfaced since her disappearance, and no one was really certain what had happened to her.

Yana quickened her pace, holding her gaze dead forward, and body-surfed her way along the sidewalk. Federation Gardens was still fifteen minutes distance. The monorail didn't go that far. The subway went close, but the walk from Coronation Station to the Fed was even worse than the last half-kay of Victoria Street. The Zone offered an illusion of safety if nothing else. There were lights and crowds and the possibility of assistance should something go wrong. Coronation Drive offered the possibility of a violent, sudden and agonizing death. Non-natal caesarians, apparently. Heads out there would slice you open for the six dollars you had in your shoulder bag.

Of course, Yana was lucky to have a shoulderbag, let alone six dollars to carry 'round in it. Most homeless owned the clothes they wore and rarely had more than the price of a MacDonald's cheeseburger on their person from day to day. Well, she was squatting now, and life had improved marginally since she quit the midnight run.

Yeah, she was still living on the jagged edge, and she was still punching tickets on the Westside express, but at least she had some place to come home to, even if Meat Packers was nothing more than a dilapidated old theatre out by the School of Art.

Nine weeks ago, she'd been an urban nomad, dodging Badge and turning tricks in the alley behind the Royal Hotel for five dollars a shot. Angie had changed all that; Angie looked out for her. That was what the other girls seemed to forget: Angie looked out for them. Sure, she could be cold and arrogant and had a tongue you could gut a fish with, but she'd turned things around for all of them. No one squatting at the Meat Packers went hungry, none of them had to face the midnight run or fear the rent collectors who worked the shelter circuit. There were a few things Meat Packers couldn't provide; hot water or new clothes or dope, but Angie said they could worry about luxuries once they'd pooled enough cash for a lease. Besides, there were a few perks to be found in the Zone; gifts, trades, favors between hustlers. The Wall was a network of streetlife contacts, and Yana was still finding her place.

She'd only been trading along the Wall for a few weeks, but Yana knew many of the regulars from her Albert Square days. A lot of runaways and sugarflesh used to hang out at the Square, bumming loose change and trade from the locals. Like Yana, they'd seen the economic potential for bleeding the incoming Festival crowd and decided to cruise the Fed. Angie sometimes referred to them as sugarclones because they all looked alike, even the boys. A few could have passed for Yana's older sisters. People had often mistaken she and Jacinta for twins, although the similarities were as superficial as skin color and hairstyle.

The Madges were less familiar, and Yana tended to avoid their company. The majority were meaner than catshit and roughly as territorial as a riverful of saltwater crocodiles. Several of them regarded her with the sneering contempt that can only be felt by aging whores or johns of any vintage. They found her youth and appearance (to say nothing of her pimpless status) irritating beyond all tolerance; Yana always copped a few rounds of slagmouth whenever she turned up in her brief lycra dress and stockings that stayed up by themselves. Only one of them had ever treated her with any respect, and Yana had known her almost as long as she'd been in the Junction.

"Hey!"

Selina raised an ivory palm in greeting. Standing beneath an equine relief, she was a delicate alabaster figurine clothed in lurid indigo shadows. Katie smiled and waved back. She liked Selina. Selina with her surgically reconstructed figure and her technologically perfect features; Selina with her fifty year old mind nestled within a hormonally enhanced adolescent body.

"Hey!" Yana replied and walked over, reaching into her shoulderbag for her heels, "How's trade?" The obligatory question.

"Brisk. Snoid came by looking for you earlier on."

"Oh, God," Yana relied, crimping her face in disgust, "what did he want?"

"Same as always," Selina answered. Snoid was perhaps the most loathsome creature in the entire Westside, lower on the evolutionary scale than even Frankie the Shit. Yana slipped off her flats and stepped into the heels, magically lengthening her thighs by about six centimeters.

"So why's he always asking for me?"

"You're about the only one who'll put up with him." Which was true. Not even the Madges wanted to touch him. Granted, all johns had nauseating habits, it was programmed into their genes, but most of the girls would have preferred to go swimming in a pool full of cold mucus than spend five minutes in vitro with the Snoid.

Yana straightened up, dropping her flats into the shoulder bag abyss, dismissing Snoid and his revolting fantasies.

"You got what I need?"
"Yeah. Right here."
"How much?"
"Twenty." This was cheap, a favor, a big one, but it was still more than Yana had on her.
"Hold it for me?"
Selina shook her head.
"No. Take it now, babe. You can pay me back in an hour. Night's getting old."
"Thanks."

This was a supreme act of trust, rarely witnessed this side of the Wall. Selina produced two small containers, shifting her body to mask the transaction from any covert gaze. She moved with a casual, fluid confidence, the expertise of decades, seeming to touch Yana's elbow, directing her towards the promenade. Selina was a world-class coolhand, she'd spent most of her life under some form of surveillance. The Westside was full of eyes, but Selina knew how to throw up a blind spot. Not even the Badge would have seen anything more unusual than a pair of hustlers parading the Wall, their faces lowered in furtive sugartalk.

Traffic droned incessantly along Memorial Drive, streams of chrome and halogen radiance. Yana put a hand to her mouth as if yawning. The night wound on, intolerably hot.

The night Cathy Hargraves grabbed her kid sister and climbed out the bathroom window of the Stonehaven Children's Home, she imagined that her life would unfold something like this:

First, she and Ellen would run away to Macquarie Junction, where they'd take refuge with the Salvation Army or one of the welfare shelters in the Westside. Cathy would take work as a waitress or kitchen hand or whatever and start putting away money for more permanent lodgings, then, after a few months, she'd meet this big, hunky guy with a drop-dead smile and a red porsche (the guys in Cathy's fantasies always drove red porsches). He'd take her out and spend a lot of money on her, then ask her to shack up with him. They'd move into his big house overlooking the Harbor, Ellen would go to primary school, and Cathy would spend the rest of her life buying clothes, smoking dope, and having spine-clenching sex with her beefcake swain.

Ten months later, her life had turned out something like this:

She and Ellen were living on the midnight run. The Salvos were overflowing with homeless, and the people over at the Junction City Mission had tried to hand them over to the Badge. They were constantly sick and dirty, ate maybe three times a week, and both had been reduced to scrounging out of garbage cans on numerous occasions. Their hairlines were caked with crumbling reefs of dandruff, their clothes reeked like used sanitary pads. Even the stuff they lifted from the Brotherhood Shop began to crawl with microlife after a few days in the Westside heat.

Worse still, Cathy had discovered that the big hunky guys who drove red porsches had absolutely no interest in filthy slagheap runaways such as herself. The Jackets and Straights who frequented places like The Tech or Links in the Westside already had girlfriends, long-legged Kylies in tightblacks and slettoes. The only guys that Cathy seemed capable of attracting were skags, sleezoids and wannabe sugarpimps. Beefcake was on short supply in Cathy's bankrupt demographic, which seemed to consist exclusively of losers, cuntswabs, and the hideously ugly.

No, about the closest she'd come to her red-porsche hunk had been the three months she'd spent with Riko Laguna.

Riko had been a petty thief and persistent dole-fraud; a tall, skinny, weasel-faced tosser with slickback hair and a Latino accent. Said he came from South America, told endless stories about Rio de Janiro; childhood struggles with poverty, gangs, and the law. Claimed that the Westside was a church picnic after the streets of Rio. It had been a long haul spanning two continents and a black market career of international proportions, but Riko had the vision and the drive.

It was all bullshite, pure and unadulterated bullshite, as her old man used to say.

His name wasn't Riko; he sure as hell wasn't Latin. Couldn't even speak Spanish. Looked about as convincing as one of those Saturday night flamencos that hit the Matador every weekend. Took tanning pills and blackrinsed his hair to look Hispanic. Said it made him irresistible to women. This was another example of Riko's amazing capacity for self-delusion.

He had offered them lodgings in his gangrenous little bedsit at the beginning of the previous year's winter. Cathy had only agreed because she'd caught that Malaysian flu which had been decimating the suburbs at the time. Nearly as bad as the thing in that Stephen King movie. Another three days on the street and she'd have been catfood. No choice really. Move in with Riko the chinless wonder or feed the roaches. It wasn't the first time she'd been reduced to abject desperation since leaving Stonehaven. At one point she'd been willing to drop her pants for half a pack of Marlboros. Sharing a hole with Riko Laguna couldn't be any worse than that, nothing could have been worse than that.

She'd been wrong, of course.

Like most of the skags Cathy met on the street, Riko was a walking bag of fecal matter. You could almost see the sleeze dripping from his face like huge gobbets of liquid shit. He contaminated everything he touched. The touching wasn't all that bad in itself, she'd learned to blank out unwanted groping as far back as Stonehaven. Unfortunately, whitenoising simply didn't work where Riko was concerned.

Being horribly unattractive to women, he was obsessed with the humiliation and victimization of his desired objects. Cathy became the surrogate for all the Kylies he'd never had, the ones who'd turned him down, pissed him off, made him feel short and weak and ugly. The ones who had treated him with the utter contempt he deserved. He'd stored up decades of hate and anger and self-loathing, for which Cathy's body became the vessel.

However, his revenge hadn't happened all at once. Riko may not have looked too bright, but he was about as cunning as a shitpoke full of sewer rats. Cunning enough to move slowly, gradually poisoning her already depleted reservoir of self-esteem and building up to a crescendo of perversion. Looking back, Cathy wondered how she hadn't seen it coming. She'd been on the midnight long enough to recognize the signs. Standard pimptrick, right down to the promises and the addictive substances.

That year's poverty special had been Rage, a comparatively inexpensive synthetic which replicated the effects of XTC without the lethal side effects, at least according to the publicity. Riko got her started almost as soon as she'd moved in. Didn't even wait for her fever to subside; said it would 'speed up' her recovery. Kill the virus, lower her temperature. No, don't worry, sweetchunks: Rage is non-addictive. Pure as rainwater, sweeter than crystal springs.

Lying prick.

She'd been hooked by her third rock, and Riko moved in like the failed barracuda he was. Left nothing undefiled. Made her do things that she never would have done, even back in her starvation days. The sort of things that only a man could imagine doing to a fifteen year-old girl. Made her feel like offal. Like shit from the body of some diseased animal. Two months in sexual purgatory, the starring attraction of a freakshow's wetdream. Cathy still had nightmares about it, particularly when she'd gone straight too long.

Well, that was history, or at least Riko was.

Dumb fuck had pushed his luck too far one night down at the Matador. Picked a fight with some wimpy little geek from the western suburbs. Started with some stupid argument and a lot of macho posturing. Streetword said Riko went in playing Rambo. Thought he'd kick the geek's runty asshole and get a medal for doing it. Ended up pleading on his knees with tears running down his scrawny face. Turned out the wimp had a switch blade and a truckload of meanstreet friends. That was Riko, no argument. He'd been pretty handy with his fists where she and Ellen were concerned, but no real balls when it looked like he might get hurt.

Cathy had tried to keep the bedsit after Riko's heroic demise, convinced that she could claim squatter's rights. That was one of the great urban myths of the midnight run: if you found a decent hole and managed to hold onto it for more than a week, you got to stay there. No one could throw you out. Not even the legitimate owners. You had squatter's rights, which under Cathy's definition amounted to the right to do anything you pleased. Didn't matter that you weren't paying rent, didn't matter that you were only fifteen years old and had once traded sexual favors for the price of a couple of Big Macs. Didn't even matter if the Suit came 'round waving his papers and threatening to call the Badge. You had squatters rights, which meant you could stand at the door, stick your bird in his face and tell him to go lick your ring.

Didn't last too long, of course.

Badge did come by one morning, and she didn't ask them to lick anything. Barely managed to shove Ellen out the back window while the Boys kicked down the door and shouted for them to stop. Even closer than that day at the City Mission. They'd been riding the Westside express ever since, with Cathy punching tickets for whatever the johns were willing to pay. Which wasn't much at the best of times. Sometimes they didn't pay jackshit, just fetched her a backhand upside the face if she gave them Mouth.

Rent collectors posed similar difficulties.

Collectors were homeless Skags; basket cases for the most part, but occasionally you ran into the odd psychotron who went about extorting money from streetkids and anyone too small to fight back. Common practice in homeless circles, as common as sexual abuse and blagging. Three of them had forced her out of an empty hole she and Ellen had been sharing with a boy named Kerryn. Just turned up one night and gave them a choice between paying rent or getting out. One of them slapped Kerryn around when he tried to do that hunter-gatherer thing teenage boys do whenever someone threatens their turf. Not being stupid, Cathy took Ellen and got out before the collectors decided they wanted more than a bit of loose change.

She never saw Kerryn again. Bit of a pity; he was the only decent guy she'd met since Stonehaven.

Winter might have passed, but the streets were just as vicious. They'd been sleeping in doorways and lifeline bins for weeks now. Squatting was no longer an option since the Festival came to town. Space was shrinking, no room anywhere, even out by the industrial section. Festival was a lightning conductor for homeless. They seemed to be drifting in from all over the City, probably attracted by the drugs and trade. Meanstreet kids from places like Ashtown or 'Drute, armed with pigsticks and slazors. Pre-generation Heads, conurban bacteria multiplying in the arcades and back alleys and commission districts. Gott Allmächtige would've had trouble finding a squat during Festival.

Then there was the excess baggage to consider. Being homeless in the Westside was asspain enough, but having to constantly look out for a whining ten year-old girl was a full-scale Rectinol. Ellen was a constant burden, slowing her down, clinging like a pre-pubescent octopus, simping and crying whenever she got frightened or tired. Jesus, the little shit hardly ever spoke at all, except to complain that she was hungry or thirsty or too hot or too cold or whatever else was bothering her. Sometimes Cathy felt like grabbing her by the back of the head and slamming her dumb face into the nearest wall until she shut the fuck up.

Of course, Ellen wasn't really the problem, was she?

Fact was, the only legacy of her season at Casa Riko was a Rage habit that registered eight on the Richter scale. Streetprice had been jacking up over the last month, and Cathy couldn't turn the trick fast enough to raise what the street doctors were asking nowdays. Festival prices. Hustlers down by the Wall were making the big cash, but they were professionals, all of them, even the sugarflesh. Got around in stretchskirts and heels and torsos. Cathy would have been lucky to own a clean pair of underpants.

Not that underwear figured high on her list of priorities at the moment. She'd been straight for three days now, and she was shaking worse than that Tokyo 'quake a few years back. She'd managed to score a little Haze from Frankie the Shit last time she saw him, but Haze was to Rage what jacking off was to sex. No comparison, no satisfaction, no real edge. If she didn't get a few rocks pretty soon, she'd go premenstrual with a bullet.

Still, there was the alternative Frankie had hinted at the day she'd wheedled the Haze out of him. Told her he knew a way she could earn herself an even tenner and enough Rage to last out the next month. Pretty extreme, but so was her habit...

---

---

Jess Taylor ambled swiftly up the driveway, fishing his keys out of his pocket as he approached the front door. He was a boy on a tight schedule; his Mother would arrive home at five, dinner would be on the table no later than six. That left him less than three hours of free play; three hours of simple, childish joy in the late September sunshine, three hours on the swings and slides and monkey-bars down at O'Connell Park.

Heart pounding with excitement, Jess let himself into the house, dropping his backpack in the hallway. His Mother would probably give him grief over that later, but he was in too much of a hurry to consider the consequences. Heading towards the staircase, he unzipped his jacket and bolted up the steps two at a time. It was 3.15 in the afternoon; the day wasn't getting any longer.

Leaving his jacket hanging over the banister, he scrambled into his bedroom, hurriedly pulling his t-shirt over his head. Six hours a day in the school from hell, surrounded by creeps, cretins and bullies. He couldn't wait to get changed, kick off his school clothes and slip into something more comfortable - so to speak.

Pausing in the middle of the room, Jess climbed out of his jeans and walked over to the closet, a petite, twelve-year old boy with long blond hair and pale blue eyes. His soft, effeminate features lent him a lush, girlish appearance, the illusion further enhanced by his rounded, curvaceous shape. Exceedingly pretty, he was often mistaken for a girl at first glance. Strange to say, this was something Jess didn't mind at all.

Jess, you see, was a very special boy.

He opened the closet door and started sorting through the racks and hangers. One side of the space was full of boy's clothing - pants, shirts, gym socks, boxer shorts and runners. Jess didn't spare it a second glance. Boy's stuff; ugly, scruffy things, he'd never had much use for them. He certainly never wore them once he got home from school. The moment he stepped in through the front door, Jess was free to shed his male identity as a snake sloughs its skin. He could be his real self.

Jessica.

The right side of the closet was lined with cutesy little girl's things: skirts, vests, tank tops; printed floral blouses with puffy sleeves, drop-waisted sunfrocks with outrageously frilled hemlines. They were all gifts from his Momma; stock-taking specials from her downtown kidswear store. Strangely enough, she'd always been surprisingly tolerant of his feminine preferences, even going out of her way to encourage his cross-gendered behavior. Jessie suspected it had something to do with her not liking men.

Jessie reached into the closet and removed a pastel pink sun-dress, a delicate cotton wisp decorated with tiny rosebuds around the neck line. Sheer, loose and almost unbearably cute, it was one of his all-time favorites. Momma had helped him pick it out for his last birthday. It had been one size too big at the time, but he'd grown into it over the past nine months.

Laying the frock out on his bed, Jess walked over to his chest of drawers and took out a pair of pristine white panties - flimsy cotton briefs with a dainty trim encircling the legs and waistline. Jessie's pulse began to race as he stepped carefully into the underpants and drew them slowly up his thighs. Easing the pants into position with a loud, elastic snap, he went back to the bed and pulled the sundress over his head.

And, in the blink of an eye, a boy became a girl.

Smoothing the cool fabric against her tummy, Jessie turned to look in the mirror, smiling at what she saw. The boy she been a few minutes before had disappeared without a trace. Jess Taylor had vanished the instant she'd kicked off the jeans. No - that was wrong. Jess Taylor had never really existed in the first place. He was just a mask she wore during school hours. A mask, a name, and nothing more (quoth the raven ...).

Giggling a child's innocent laughter, Jessica spun around several times to make the skirt twirl. The dress flared up in a pink arabesque, then floated lightly back into place. The hem barely reached down past the tops of her thighs; the cotton was so thin that her underpants were clearly visible through the gauzy fabric. She posed in the mirror, admiring the line of the frock, the shape of her long, tapering legs. Moistening her lips in anticipation, she whirled around once more, allowing the dress to sail up past her belly button this time.

Having completed the dress-twirling ritual, she retrieved a pair of socks from the drawer and sat down on the bed to pull them on, one tiny foot at a time. They were the kind with a lacy white frill decorating the band. He'd picked them up during a recent shopping expedition to Ridgewick Mall. Jessie had fallen in love with them at first glance, putting them on right there in the Stocking Shop, attracting more than a little attention in the process.

Jess stood up, glancing at the clock. It was 3.25; time to go. Her friends would be wondering where she was. Stepping into her pink Barbie runners, she grabbed a black hair-band on her way out and tapped off down the hall. She descended the stairs at a gallop, binding her hair back in a long, golden ponytail. Not a second to lose now, she'd have to sprint all the way to the park.

---

Angie stepped into the changing booth, laying her purchase over the chair. Cheeks flushed with girlish pleasure, she shut out the busy hum of the showroom, reaching back to unzip her bright red sun-frock. A trim young girl with wavy blond hair trailing down past her shoulders, she smiled with the vaguely guilty expression of a child caught with her hand in the candy jar.

Dropping the dress down to her tiny waist, she began to shimmy it over the curve of her hips. A faint crescent touched her lips; the Fever had been raging through her system for more than three weeks now. It was like one of those tunes that spiraled endlessly around at the front of your mind, despite your firmest efforts to push it away. Well, the fire would be quenched today, her yearnings finally satisfied. She looked back into the mirror, admiring the lithe flow of her petite figure.

Like most girls her age, Angie loved wearing pretty underthings beneath her day clothes - it was a delicious secret she could hide from the rest of the world. Her brassiere was a pastel-pink wonderbra, thrusting her full, pert breasts up to form a deeply divided cleavage. One of the straps looped off her left shoulder; it was covered with a delicate white trim. Her flesh was as smooth as alabaster, having only the barest touch of a suntan.

Long hair hanging over her face in blond arabesques, she wriggled her bottom out of the dress's slim waistline, gradually exposing her scanty, high-cut briefs. They were a pair of pink satin bikini panties, decorated with tiny bows and white lace fringes. Gleaming like molten silver against her creamy skin, they looked as if they'd been airbrushed onto her body.

She stepped gingerly out of the dress, careful not to catch her stilettos on the red fabric. She'd ruined one too many expensive outfits with a careless turn of the heel. Hanging the frock over the door hook, she swept her hair back from her face, feeling a warm, moist blush rising through her tummy. Angie had good reason to feel excited. She'd found what she'd been looking for.

Finally.

Stepping across the booth in her undies and high heels, she leaned forward to inspect her purchase. She'd spent close on a month browsing her way through Chamberlain's Westside, visiting every boutique and lingerie store in the Fashion Quarter, cruising her way around the plazas and the malls. Searching for just three shreds of intimate fantasy, remnants of a forgotten decadence.

Grinning a radiant smile, Angie picked up the dainty lace garter belt, marveling at its fragile and complicated beauty. A magical wisp of lace, lycra and shimmering liquid satin, it was as complex and as insubstantial as a dream. The suspenders trailed in long, ornate streamers of floral elastic. Stretching the straps between her lacquered fingertips, Angie felt a thrill of pure feminine allure strafe through her entire body.

She laid the garter belt back on the chair, imagining how it would look clipped around her waist, then picked up one of the stockings, smoothing it out with her left hand. The jet black denier whispered enticingly between her fingers. Sheer and gauzy and almost completely transparent, it was a genuine silk stocking, the kind with a reinforced toe and a seam down the back.

Angie squandered a few moments admiring its gossamer perfection. The barest touch raised gooseflesh along her arms and shoulders. It felt unspeakably feminine, a thing of dreams and unspoken desires. A long, delicious shiver raced the down length of her spine; the very thought of drawing that nebulous material along her thighs made her ache with anticipation.

Kicking off her high heels, Angie bent down to slide the stocking over her right foot. The naughty-little girl smile stole across her features again.

Garter belts and suspender stockings were rather difficult to come by these days. You could still find exotic, sensual underwear around the "bohemian" districts and recycling centers, but the larger retailing chains seemed to stock only the most utilitarian garments. Pedestrian, plain, unimaginative. Some women referred to them as "Passion Killers", recalling the silk-ration shortages of the war years. Dull, colorless and boring.

Life had been depressingly monotone since the Conservatives returned to power.

The latest Swing to the Right had unleashed a torrent of traditional values, surpassing even the excesses of the Churchill years. Bigotry had sprouted across the country like a furious, virulent weed; these were dangerous times for those who wavered at the edge of "acceptability." Campaigns had been launched, witch-hunts mounted against the "pink stain". Diversity was being driven underground.

Naturally, there had been a backlash from liberals and civil liberty activists, but the movement had been swiftly and ruthlessly undermined. Protestors vanished into the shadows literally overnight, many had gone into hiding. Invisibility was the safest option: fear, isolation and loneliness was preferable to ridicule, harassment and burning crosses.

Fortunately, Angie had very little to worry about. She was already invisible. No one would have guessed, even for a second, that she had not been born female.

"Are you okay in there?"

Angie glanced around with a gasp, a vague blush touching her porcelain features. The door to her cubicle had been flung open, allowing the world outside a generous view of the booth's lavender interior. A tall, thirty-ish sales woman stood by the doorway, smiling in at her. Virtually paralyzed with surprise, Angie looked self-consciously into the showroom, frozen in the act of slipping her long, tapering leg into a silk stocking.

Embarrassment blossomed in the warm depths of her belly. Angie was young and strikingly beautiful; a willowy adolescent on the edge of maturity. Her eyes were twin pools of late November sky; huge and innocent and glowing with child-like wonder.

She crossed her hands modestly over her cleavage, stepping back from the open doorway.

"Oh, I'm sorry," the sales assistant apologized, brow furrowed in genuine concern, "did I startle you?" She was a tall, elegant woman with beaming, elfin face. Her ID tag read JEAN, the sort of name that sounded inexplicably appropriate when attached to women of her generation.

"No, no - not at all," Angie replied, her face reddening to the tone of a maraschino cherry, "just a little jumpy, I guess. I'm... I've been looking for..." her sentence trailed off into the endless limbo of the unfinished statement. It was ridiculous - ludicrous really - she still grew as coy as a ten year-old whenever she went shopping for underwear.

Jean stepped into the cubicle, absently forgetting to close the door behind her. Angie opened her mouth to say something, but couldn't quite get it out.

"Do you need a hand with that?" Jean asked, indicating the garter belt.
Angie blinked several times, almost flustered beyond words.

"Well, I... yes, I suppose so. I mean..."

The assistant nodded, her smile almost comically sympathetic: it's okay; I know exactly how you feel.

"They can be a little difficult, especially if this is your first time trying one on," Jean told her, picking up a handful of lace corsetry and stepping into the narrow confines of the changing space. Taking Angie gently by the shoulders, she turned the blushing young girl towards the mirror. She stood in her bra, panties and stockings, flushed to the tips of her eyebrows.

Jean passed the garter belt around Angie's waist and hooked it into place, her fingers moving with the expertise of long practice. Excitement poured over Angie's body like some thick warm fluid, her breathing quickened to swift, shallow spurts.

"It's sort of like putting on a bra, except lower down," the older woman was saying, "the tricky part is attaching the stockings".

Angie could only nod her assent, feeling the belt constricting her waistline by at least three inches. The satin was stretched taunt against her rosy flesh; the garters dangled against her bare thighs.

Out in the salesroom, heads were craning about on flexible stalks. It was Saturday morning, and this was the only store this side of the city to stock European underwear. Evidently half the population of Chamberlain was in the showroom at the moment, and every single one of them wanted a better look. Well, at least the saleswoman's presence was blocking their view for the most part.

Thank heavens for small mercies, Angie thought to herself, a tiny giggle rising to her lips. Taking a deep, calming breath, she pushed the laughter back into her belly, shifting her center of balance to her left hip. Her eyes literally danced with feminine mischief. Her heart was pounding in her throat, she felt almost delirious with exhilaration.

"There, that's done," Jean said, turning the girl around by the elbows so they were standing virtually face-to-face, "now, let's get those garters hooked up. Could you step forward on your right leg for a moment?"

Angie thrust her knee slightly forward in the classic pose while Jean began adjusting the suspenders. She fumbled with the clasp for a few seconds, fussing over the garter-strap and drawing the stocking up a few inches. Translucent denier stretched against Angie's lean, white haunch.

Jean clucked under her breath, hitching up the stocking-top with some difficulty in the claustrophobic space of the changing booth. She released the clasp after a brief struggle, then straightened up with an oddly skeptical look on her face.

"Here; come out into the showroom", Jean said, taking Angie lightly by the wrist, "there's not enough space in here for the two of us."

A two second pause. Then:

"Pardon?"

Angie's cheeks flared like a pair of wild strawberries.

"Come on out", Jean repeated, smiling placidly, "it's a little too cramped in here. There's plenty of space in the showroom."

"The showroom?!" Angie gasped in surprise, "but...but I'm not... I'm not wearing anything." Her tummy swarmed with hummingbirds, a wave of panic surged through her entire nervous system. She felt herself stepping into her stilettos, her mind suddenly slipping into autopilot. Her lips parted in shock, eyes bulging from their sockets.

What was she doing?!

"Oh, don't worry about that," Jean replied amiably, leading her forward by the right hand, "we have pretty young girls like you in here all the time. It is a lingerie shop, after all." They were at the very threshold now: in a few seconds, Angela would be exhibiting her lingerie before the entire store.

But there are MEN out there, Angie tried to say, though the words never actually left her mouth. The store was literally crammed with ubiquitous males (or so she thought); husbands and fathers, silvermaned patriarchs in dark smoking jackets, little boys in baseball caps clinging to their mother's skirts. Angie strutted forward on her impossibly high heels, her head spinning with a mixture of shock, embarrassment and pure, breathless delight.

"...anyway, you need to see yourself in the three-way to get the full effect," Jean was prattling on, oblivious to the girl's crimson-faced reluctance, "those change-room mirrors just can't give you the distance you need for a full-length view."

I must be dreaming, she thought wildly as they stepped through the doorway into the brightly lit salesroom. Time seemed to pause as she was led towards the central display, weaving a trail through a small forest of gaping mouths and goggling eyes. The store was absolutely bristling with customers, and most of the clientele seemed to be of the masculine persuasion.

Angie simply couldn't believe this was happening to her. Although she'd harbored fantasies of this kind for years, she'd never - NEVER in her wildest dreams - imagined she'd find herself parading her gleaming satin underpants before a roomful of startled (and somewhat admiring) onlookers. Her luscious, teenaged body was bursting with the ripening fruit of dawning sexuality. A rare, fine color was stealing up her torso, tinting her red from chin to belly button.

This can't be happening, Angie thought once more as the crowd parted before her.

---

As mentioned elsewhere in my writings, my parents originally came from Eastern Europe (former Soviet Union) and considered child nudity completely normal, especially in warm whether. My sisters and I grew up roaming round the house in our undies and playing under the sprinklers during summer. I guess this was nothing unusual back in the day; it was an age of innocence when there were very few prohibitions against juvenile dishabille.

There were also certain benefits to be reaped from disregarding social conventions. In my case, I learned early on that a half-naked girl gets far more attention than a clothed one, and found every possible "excuse" to shed my clothing whenever we had guests or relatives over.

This exhibitionistic streak became a slight problem after a few years, as my folks had trouble keeping my clothes on inside the house. I was always walking into the living room in my panties, hoping to surprise our visitors. My parents never freaked out over this; they knew I was just a little girl trying to get a reaction. I was usually ushered back upstairs with a light smack on the bottom, much to everyone's amusement.

On the other hand, my Mom soon noticed that while I thought nothing of walking around the household in my bare knickers, I absolutely hated being undressed in public. Being one of the most wily women in human history, she often used my sense of modesty to her best advantage.

For example, if I were taking too long to get dressed in the morning, she'd threaten to send me to school in nothing but my scanties. This was usually enough to galvanize me into action, and I'd always be ready within two minutes flat (I thought about calling her bluff on several occasions, but the nerve failed me each time).

By the time I reached adolescence, Mom and Dad were employing public humiliation as a form of "behavior modification" – especially when we were camping around Lake Ridgewick. My folks were old-school hiking enthusiasts, and used to take us camping at least three times a year. We all looked forward to these periodic vacations, but being something of a tomboy, I tended to run wild as soon as we arrived. This was a matter concern for Mom and Dad: between scaling outcrops and stirring up hornets' nests, I was constantly getting into mischief. By the end of the second day, my folks were normally at their wits' end trying to curb my "enthusiasm."

That was usually the point at which I was ordered out of my clothes.

I should mention straight up that this was the last resort when I was getting out of hand; the one sure way to keep me safely around the campsite. They knew I wouldn't stray too far if I were stripped to my undies, so after the usual warnings had been ignored, my Mom would call me over to the tent for the Dreaded Walk of Shame.

I'd start blushing as soon as I heard her tone, because I knew from prior experience precisely what to expect. There was a kind of ritual I had to follow: first, I was made to stand to attention by the tent while my parents gathered up all my belongings and locked them away in the car. Next, I was forced to take off almost every stitch of clothing – one piece at a time.

I usually began to plead around this stage, trying to broker deals and promising to be on my best behavior if she'd only let me keep my clothes on. Needless to say, it made no difference whatsoever: Mommy never listened to my protests; she'd given me fair warning and I was fully aware of the consequences. I had no one to blame but myself.

My head always started spinning as I pulled my t-shirt over my head. I frequently experienced a drifting, out-of-body sensation, as if I were watching myself from someone else's perspective. Goosebumps swept down my torso while Mommy slipped my shorts down, leaving me in nothing but my fresh cotton panties. I was then instructed to stand perfectly still with my hands laced on the back of my neck while Momma checked me over for nicks, scratches and poison ivy.

Around this point, people would suddenly appear out of nowhere, staring in curiosity as they passed along the main pathway. Lake Ridgewick was a popular tourist site and swimming hole; during the summer, there could be dozens of campers and day-trippers wandering about on at any given hour. Naturally, this made my forced striptease all the more embarrassing; there seemed to be hundreds of casual spectators walking past, casting inquisitive glances in my direction (inevitably, many of them were kids I knew from school).

After Mommy finished packing my remaining clothes away, she'd return to find me crying in child-like misery. The shame was utterly overwhelming – I was on open display to every stranger in the vicinity, reduced to a half-naked, weeping infant. Words cannot adequately describe the abject humiliation I experienced.

After reassuring me that this for my own good, Mommy would point out my boundaries and explain which areas were off limits. They wanted me to stay within visual range of the tent, I wasn't allowed to leave the camping grounds for any reason. No trail blazing, no rock-climbing, no exploring. I was allowed to go swimming in the nearby reservoir but only in the shallows. She would conclude by reminding me that going off alone was completely forbidden, and that breaking any of these rules would result in a willow-switch across the bottom.

"I'm sorry we have to do this," she would conclude, "but you've left us no other choice." She would then send me off to play with my sisters, both of whom were (of course) fully dressed. This seemed indescribably unjust to me, since they frequently went off by themselves, but I knew from long experience that the matter simply wasn't open to negotiation.

As a general rule, I wasn't even allowed to wear my sandals, unless we were traipsing through the woods with Mom and Dad. Even then, I was still required to stay slightly ahead of my parents without veering from the path. Daddy carried the switch in his right hand, ready to motivate my steps if I started falling behind. As I quickly discovered, there really was nothing like a hot, smarting bottom to put a spring back in my tread.

I suppose all of this must sound rather cruel and unusual, but looking back over the years, I know it wasn't as bad as it sounds. At the end of the day, my folks were trying to keep me safe, after I'd demonstrated I couldn't be trusted when left to my own devices. It only took me a couple of days to adjust to my "newd" circumstances, after which I settled into an otherwise normal routine with my family.

The only parts I truly regret were the daily collisions with children I knew from school. They always asked me why I wasn't wearing any clothes, and I had no alternative but to tell them the truth. Even now, two decades later, I can still hear their laughter echoing through the clear, green woods…

---

Standing in a pool of moody backstage lighting, Charise Granger drew her t-shirt slowly over her head, revealing a shining white satin bra, the kind with detachable straps and tiny lace trimmings around the cups. She paused a moment to shake out her strawberry blond hair and moisten her full, crimson lips, stealing a glance at the mirror. A tall, delicately built young woman with alabaster flesh and liquid blue eyes looked back.

Hanging her t-shirt over a nearby chair, Charise began to unbuckle the belt of her stone wash jeans, listening to the restless murmur of the Friday night crowd. The Palais Royale was perhaps the most popular adult venue in the Red Zone; the main bar would be swarming with nightlife by ten. In less than fifteen minutes, the lingerie parade would begin, and Charise would be sent out along the catwalk wearing little more than a whisper and a promise.

She was almost feverish with anticipation.

Charise had been working at the Palais for just over two months now, and still felt a little nervous before every show. Barely eighteen, she had little experience modeling outside a couple of down-home mannequin parades and amateur reviews (and certainly not in her bra and panties; such activities had been confined largely to her bedroom). By contrast, the Palais was a place of satin radiance and neon ecstasy. Stepping onstage in her impossibly tall stilettos, she felt a wonderful shiver of embarrassment fill her trim, firm tummy. She was young, she was beautiful, and the questionable nature of the 'entertainment' made her delirious with excitement.

There was, of course, another reason for her mounting anxiety.

Adjusting a wayward bra-strap, she began unbuttoning her jeans, progressively revealing the lacy tops of her high-cut white briefs. In a matter of minutes, every inch of those skin-tight lycra panties would be visible to every person in the bar. She could feel a subtle flush rising to her cheeks, tinting her flesh with a warm, carnation glow.

What am I doing here? she thought, working the levis slowly over her hips, enjoying the gently sinuous movement of denim down her thighs.

Peeling her jeans down to the floor, she stepped lightly out of them, brushing her hair back from her face. Her snowy white panties shimmered with a satiny radiance as she walked barefoot across to the clothing rack. Gleaming like quicksilver, they seemed to have been airbrushed onto her body, filming her hips like a second skin.

Her fingers played with the elegant French lace trim encircling the waistband; touching that sheer strip of floral gossamer made her ache with longing. She wanted to be out on stage as soon as possible, her long, slender legs absolutely bare, her lingerie on display to half the town.

What am I doing here? Charise asked herself again, running her hands down the length of her torso. How could she explain this sultry, breathless desire to place her underpants on full inspection for a room full of faceless strangers? She might have spent years wading through the mountain of literature devoted to her unique psychology (indeed, she'd started already), but her reasons were deceptively simple in the final analysis:

Parading her underthings made her feel beautiful.

Voguing across the catwalk in her scanties was an experience both thrilling and sensual; her state of dishabille always made her feel gloriously feminine. Having recently turned eighteen, she loved wearing pretty lingerie, and the opportunity to reveal her flimsies beyond her bedroom rarely presented itself under normal circumstances. The panty shows appealed to her sense of fun; like all teenaged girls, Charise enjoyed testing the limits.

Charise was young and pretty and she enjoyed parading around in her bra and panties. It was as simple as that. True, the money was good, but it wasn't her primary motivation for working at the Palais; Charise would have been perfectly willing to do it for free. She wasn't even particularly concerned about the style of lingerie she wore, just so long as it made her feel and leggy and lovely and unforgivably naughty.

In short, wearing lingerie made her feel like a girl.

She'd been amazingly lucky.

Few would have described it as luck, but it had been luck nonetheless, a type of luck relevant only to Charise herself, fortune of a magnitude that only she could truly appreciate. How many of her kind were born with a face which spanned the gulf between the male and the female so perfectly? A body so completely androgynous, poised at the very cusp of human gender, needing only the barest hormonal nudge towards the feminine?

Not many, she'd come to realize. Her transition had been crystal smooth, the drift of a feather through some flawlessly blue sky. She'd begun her metamorphosis shortly after her eighth birthday, back when She had been a He.

A boy.

A boy with tiny wrists and huge misty eyes and a voice like fine autumn rain. Missing his cue and entering the stage too late for puberty, he was constantly mistaken for a girl, a delicate, ivory tomboy attempting to hide her femininity behind short hair and Nike runners and those ungainly black duffle coats so popular a few years ago.

She'd known, even then. In a way, she'd always known; her earliest childhood memories involved aprons and lace and bright yellow ribbons; the innocent, dawning fantasies of a transgendered child. The knowledge had been abstract and hazy, like the blurring lens of a unfocused camera, but the understanding had been there all along. Over the years, it had grown into a certainty, a conviction profound enough to bring about the reconstruction her body, her identity and ultimately, her entire being. All set in motion the age of five...

When The Change had begun.

Backstage traffic was relatively heavy Friday nights; waiters, barhands and security staff passed through the changing area in an endless stream. Make up, dressing tables and clothing racks had been provided for the girls, but their employers saw no need for privacy. Girls who modeled their underpants for a living had no use for dressing rooms, as far as the management was concerned.

Charise glanced self-consciously around the changing area. Beautiful young girls were disrobing all around her, slipping out of blouses, stepping out of skirts and frocks. Not a single one over the age of nineteen, they walked about in their prettiest underwear carefully oblivious of the activity around them.

She often wondered about the other girls; did they feel that indescribable silken thrill that preceded clipping a suspender belt around a tiny waist? Did they enjoy the same moist, gasping fantasies she experienced whenever she slipped a wisp of black denier along her thigh? Charise believed there was nothing more sensual than stepping into a pair of Doir stockings, feeling the silk whisper along her cool, marble-smooth skin.

She hung her jeans over a hanger on the clothing rack, then wandered back to her table to check her costume (such as it was) for the evening. The show was about to begin; all around the changing area, the other girls were adding last minute touches to their make-up; fourteen achingly pretty young women stripped to their knickers, bending over their mirrors and displaying their lush, ripe bottoms to the world.

Charise joined them, pausing to step into her glistening black stilettos. Heels were absolutely essential to the job. No girl was permitted to set foot on stage without them. High heels gave her legs that sexy, tapering appearance the patrons admired so much. She turned her back to one of the full-length mirrors, appraising her curvaceous figure, eyes narrowed self-critically.

She stood with her hands on hips, looking back over her shoulder, shifting her weight from foot to foot. The stilettos were the only outerwear she would retain during the performance; ironic that they could add so much to her innate feminine sensuality.

The parade catered to a diverse range of tastes; in the first ten minutes of the performance, the audience would be treated to expensive Italian corsetry, high-class Victoria's Secrets, outrageously frilly petite culottes a la Francais; even good old-fashioned Playtex cross-your-hearts. And that was just the warm up.

Charise's personal favorite was the girl-next-door sequence of the program, with its adorable selection of full-briefs, control panties and plain, pretty lycra: the comfortable, sensible underthings that women wore in their everyday lives. She loved walking onstage flashing her underwires and cottontails; the very same undies she might have worn while shopping out at Chamberlain Plaza or buying a cheese burger at MacDonalds. She couldn't explain it; maybe she just felt more accessible striding the catwalk in her nylon hipsters.

Clicking back to her table, Charise gave her face a final check, tinting her cheeks with a soft carnation glow. She'd need a dab of powder before she stepped out into the spotlights. Just enough to take the edge off her breathless, rosy blush. Like most of the girls here, Charise favored the 'natural' look. Not that she needed too much sugar-frosting at the best of times; her complexion was as close to perfection as her unique biology could provide.

Charise just had finished her final preparations when the stage assistant bustled into the dressing alcove, calling for the girls' attention.

"All right ladies, time to go," he babbled in his thick Gaelic brogue, "everybody take your places please."

A burst of excited chatter followed this announcement as the girls deserted their dressing tables and flocked towards the Grande Stage. The atmosphere was tense with expectation. Tonight, they'd be doing things differently; tonight was going to be special.

The management had decided to spice up the festivities with a change to their normal routine. Each girl would enter the stage fully dressed and exit in nothing but her high-heels and stilettos. It would still be a lingerie parade, complete with a trip down the runway into the audience, but their skimpy little 'underwears' would come off over the course of the entire evening. It would be an extra treat for the audience, an unexpected thrill for the male contingent. Charise slipped quietly into the leggy throng, heart slamming into over-drive. Her body seemed to tingle with a kind of frigid heat, the way it always did before the show began.

Out in the auditorium, ambient noise gave way to rising cheers of the crowd. Glaring spotlights dazzled her eyes, and Charise had to bite her lip to reign in her excitement. In a matter of minutes, she would be standing on open display with only a flimsy pair of satin knickers to hide behind.

Contrary to popular belief, a classic Spectacle Érotique requires far more than walking around half-naked. There were certain protocols to follow, procedures to be observed. Fortunately, Charise had committed all of them to memory.

First, the girls would line up on the stage, resplendent in their svelt black minnies, sheer midnight stockings and six-inch stilettos. With their hair professionally styled, they'd be the very definition of elegance, as befitted the occasion.

Of course, looking beautiful was only half the job. The rest involved taking their clothes off, one piece at a time. And that was nowhere as easy as it first appeared.

At the beginning of the set, each of the girls had to walk down the catwalk, where they would shed all of their "inhibitions": first an earring, then a broach, then a deliciously long black glove. Next, they'd discarding their outer clothing, placing their tantalizing figures on public display. Only this time, they'd be taking it one step further: everything had to go: corsets, suspenders and bustiers would be cast aside with barely a second glance. By the end of the session, they'd be left standing in nothing but their high-cut lace panties.

In short, the whole affair was a thinly-veiled excuse to strip a group of pretty young girls down to their bare essentials. Once the bras came off and the breasts were bared, they would gather up their clothes and tip-toe backstage to prepare for the second set, where the entire process would begin all over again.

Standing backstage amongst her twittering co-workers, Charise felt her pulse quicken with a mixture of outrage and expectation. It was the most gratuitous exploitation she could imagine.

And she could hardly wait to get started.

---

CYNOSURE: SELECTED BRIEFS: this special illustrated edition features eight brief vignettes covering a wide range of transgendered themes. Written in the racy, fast-paced style of the classic pulp era, Cynosure Illustrated Fiction is an eclectic blend of whimsy, pathos, humor and fantasy. Highlights include:

Fallen Angel: for close on two years, 18 year-old Angel Harland has lived under the influence of his domineering aunt, subjected to an ordeal of shame, humiliation and cross-dressing. Finally reaching an age when he can decide his own destiny, Angel finds himself trapped in a web of psychological torment, from which escape may ultimately be impossible.

Tickled Pink: humiliation turns to ecstasy when a pretty young tranzie is tied down to a bed and tickled beyond human endurance. After the torment finally concludes, "Trina" realizes she will never be the same again.

The Playhouse: struggling to survive the lethal excesses of a post-apocalyptic world, young Verity Sherman has volunteered for "genetic reconfiguration" - a long and torturous medical procedure which effectively transforms biological males into fertile young women. If successful, Verity will be granted wealth, comfort and privilege beyond her wildest dreams - but only if she can survive the horrors of reconditioning.

Art and text released into the public domain. Feel Free to reuse as you see fit.

---

Hi all. I've just added another anthology to the public domain, you can read the collection here (PDF posted above) or over at Archive.org (see link below). Please feel free to alter, rewrite or expand the material any way you choose; author attribution is not required.

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A bolt of panic shot down my spine when I heard the key settling in the lock. My eyes flickered over towards the door: it had to be Aunt Cathy! What was she doing home so early? She'd headed off to her bridge club less than fifteen minutes ago; I wasn't expecting her back for several hours. My pulse leapt into overdrive as the key slid into place with an audible clack!

NOOOOOOOOO! I thought, feeling the colour rise in my cheeks. My lips parted in a silent gasp. My greatest fear was about to be realized; my deepest secret revealed. I stepped backwards in rising alarm, nearly tripping over the coffee table.

This couldn't be happening. Not here, not now. Not after I'd spent so many months hiding my true identity in the shadows. I glanced wildly about the room, mentally calculating the odds of making it across to the stairs unseen. Every nerve in my body started screaming with electric fire. Aunt Cathy was home, I could almost see her standing out on the landing, chatting way with her friends from the bridge club. Any second now, the door would open and they'd step inside, eyes widening at the spectacle of a teenaged girlie-boy dressed in frilly blue panties...

Turning away from the door, I caught sight of myself in the cheval mirror I'd set up near the sofa. It showed me as I truly am; a petite young woman with long blond hair and full, crimson lips. How could I explain this, account for my sudden metamorphosis? In all the months since I had come to live with her, Aunt Cathy had never seen me as my real self. She would never understand: very few people could, even in this day and age. I've never truly understood it myself.

The door swung open.

Aunt Cathy stepped across the threshold, adjusting her sunglasses and leading a flock of gabbling matrons into the living room. Frozen to the spot, I turned to face them, self-consciously covering my mouth with both hands.

A deafening silence fell upon the house as half a dozen babbling voices halted in mid-sentence. The moment seemed to spin out to eternity: how was I ever going to explain this?

An infinite span of time later, Aunt Cathy decided to break the insufferable tension with a single word.

"Chris?" she asked in a voice laced with honeyed arsenic. She stared me up and down with a long, measuring gaze, barely capable of hiding her amusement. I nodded, opening my mouth but unable to form a reply. What was she thinking? I could read nothing from her expression, apart from the faintest trace of mockery.

She knew! I realized in sudden, breathless clarity, she knew all along! Worse still, she'd set me up for this gratuitous humiliation.

I've never forgiven Aunt Cathy for what happened next. The house filled up with housewives and homemakers, spanning the Parlor from pillar to post. They milled about in conspiratorial groups, casting furtive glances at my thighs and panties.

I glanced towards the stairs, feeling two dozen pairs of eyes crawling all over my half-naked body. If the path hadn't been blocked, I would have bolted for my room and locked the door. Noting my obvious anxiety, Cathy suddenly called for attention.

"Ladies," she began, looking around at her friends, "you all know my nephew, Chrissy?" A murmur of assent rose from the crowd, which was now closing in around me in a loose semi-circle.

"Well, as I mentioned earlier, he's agreed to put on a show for us," Cathy continued in a bright, conversational voice, "as a matter of fact, he's been so eager he seems to have begun without us."

Some of the older women were laughing now: soft, placid chortles for the time being, which would soon give way to vicious, waspish cackling. The younger ones were smirking at one another, virtually incapable of keeping their faces straight. Aunt Cathy motioned them towards the armchairs and sofas, encouraging them to find a ringside seat.

"Chris has been working on this routine for months now," she explained merrily, "from what I can gather, he models his underwear every time I'm out of the house."

I groaned in utter despair. What did she mean, what was she going to make me do? Whatever she had in mind, it was certain to rob me of my last vestige of human dignity. I bit down hard on my lip, holding back the whimpers that threatened to escape my throat.

I knew most of these women by sight, having accompanied Aunt Cathy to several of her Bridge nights earlier in the year. One of them I placed as Adeline Rhodes, the president of the local P&T. The others I couldn't pin a name to, although I had the impression they'd all dropped by our house several times over the past six months.

Worse still, I was fairly sure they all had children, most of whom attended my school. Any hope of secrecy had flown out the window the moment these blue-rinse horrors walked in through the door. By this time tomorrow, the gossip would be all over town; everyone in Chamberlain would be discussing the color of my undies.

I stood to one side of the chattering group, trembling with barely suppressed panic. I wanted to run away, hide in my bedroom, but Cathy had no intention of letting me off that lightly. She'd spent weeks - possibly months - planning this moment, and nothing was going to rain on her parade.

Taking her place by the antiquated stereo system, she switched on the radio and tuned into the Melodies station. Low, sensuous "elevator" music drifted about the living room, setting the mood for the afternoon's festivities. Once the preparations were finished, Cathy addressed her audience, extending a hand in my direction.

"As I was telling you, Chrissy has ambitions of being a fashion model. This is probably why he's been stealing knickers off the neighbors' washing lines."

My jaw dropped in astonishment. That was an outright lie. I hadn't stolen anything; I'd saved up my allowance for months on end, buying all of my costumes via mail order. She must have known that; she seemed to know everything else I was doing. This was just an excuse, a flimsy pretext for the ordeal she was about to put me through.

"Noooo, Aunt Cathy, I didn't –"

"And, as he seems to have his sights set on lingerie modeling," Cathy went on, cutting me off in mid-sentence, "I thought we should give him a chance to perform before a live audience."

My eyes bulged from their sockets as I realized what my Aunt had been saving up as the Grand Finale. For one second the floor seemed to lurch beneath my feet. I shook my head in utter disbelief: this simply couldn't be happening. Even she wouldn't do this to me; wouldn't subject me to such total humiliation.

How wrong I was.

"OK, pay attention everybody," Cathy exclaimed, taking me by the wrist, "It's time our little model put on his show."

"Please Aunt Cathy, I don't want to do this," I whimpered hopelessly, trying not to stammer my words, "everyone will make fun of me." Cathy laughed her response.

"Oh, what are you so worried about? You make a beautiful little girl."

"But I don't want to look like a little girl, Aunt Cathy!!"

She leaned in close, lowering her voice and impaling me with a searing blue gaze.

"Well – I guess this is what you get for sneaking around behind my back, young man. You're going to model your pretty little panties in front of everybody, and that's the end of it!"

Faced with this intractable sentence, I immediately found myself begging, sobbing for clemency: No, please Aunt Cathy, don’t make me do this, I promise I’ll never do it again, please.

All to no avail. Cathy deflected my pleas with a careless wave of her hand, dismissing my fears as inconsequential. I pressed on regardless, appealing the verdict in growing desperation. Again, I should have known better. It was a doomed venture from the start.

"You're the one who wants to be a lingerie model," she said, effectively terminating any further discussion on the subject, "so here's your big chance."

"Noooooooo!" I wailed as she led me to the center of the floor. I stumbled along behind her, blushing all the way to my eyebrows. An urgent, feverish heat filled my tummy: this was really happening, she was going to make me dance in my underwear before a houseful of complete strangers.

I stared around the Parlour, heart thundering in my rib cage. The living room was a mass of babbling, wild-eyed housefraus. They were literally squealing with delight, eyes shining with feral pleasure. This was one show they weren't going to miss. I felt surrounded, trapped, hemmed in.

"No, no, please no!" I cried, heart pounding in my throat, "take me up to my room! I don't everyone to see!" A rash of laughter rippled through the audience. Some of them chortled over my childish modesty, others sighed with maternal pleasure. Someone patted me affectionately on the bottom: there there, sweetheart, no need to be shy.

"Don't be silly, Chrissy," Cathy replied gaily, "you're a girl, no one minds seeing your undies." She pushed me slightly ahead of her, then walked back to the stereo, leaving me alone in nothing but my bra, pants and stockings.

More laughter from the audience; high-pitched giggles of sheer derision. Several of the elder Moms clapped their hands in ribald encouragement. Overwhelmed with misery, I stepped away from them, only to discover my exit blocked by Mrs Rhodes and several grinning conspirators. The message was clear: I wasn't going anywhere.

Gasping with shame, I tried to to cover my flimsy little briefs with both hands. The action prompted a chorus of amusement from the audience: Isn't he just the sweetest little thing, look at him trying to hide his underpants, you'd never guess he was a boy, would you?

By this time, my face was blazing the color of a ripe tomato. Even now, years after the event, I can still recall the breathless, gasping shame of that moment, the leering, contemptuous cheers of my audience. That was how it seemed to me at the time; teenaged boys are terribly self-conscious about their bodies, particularly where strangers are concerned. Of course, none of that mattered to Aunt Cathy. She and her company were enjoying the spectacle far too much to consider my emotions.

"OK, let's get this show on the road," Mrs Rhodes said behind me, her high, warbling voice pregnant with excitement, "Cathy, ramp the music up a little".

I cast a final, imploring glance at my Aunt, but found no sympathy there. Her face was hard, stern, accusing. I knew that expression from painful experience. You're going to do this, it said, right here, right now, and without another word!

I choked back on my tears, knowing there was no room for debate, no room for negotiation. She'd reached her decision long ago, and nothing was going to alter her judgment. I would probably get a spanking later on anyway; the only question was whether it would take place in front of these screeching harpies or in the privacy of my room upstairs.

Cathy dialed up the music, then nodded her head in my direction, her eyes narrowed and threatening.

The moment had arrived. It was time to model my lingerie.

---

---

Anyone here remember their annual school physicals?

To this day, I still cringe at the memory for various reasons. Back in Ridgewick Elementary, we used to have at least one every year (two if you count the annual sports check up). Ours could be really embarrassing, because they were usually unannounced and we often had to take our medical in the same room as the boys.

It always started out the same way. First, we were ushered in two lines into the gymnasium, where the nurse divided us into two groups; 'girls' on the right side and boys on the left. This was where things started to get kind of weird. The boys only had to remove their shirts and singlets, but we had to strip all the way down to our panties.

I'm not exactly sure why this was, but I can hazard a guess based on the guidelines and protocols governing the treatment of transfeminine students. I think there must have been an unofficial policy to examine the tranzies more closely. And as we'd all been born male, the school board couldn't have us fraternizing with the 'real' girls.

There was no partition in the room at that time, so the boys got to see us undressing on the other side of the gym. After we'd taken everything off, we had to fold our clothes in neat piles and leave them on the wall-side bench. It's hard to describe how embarrassing it was, standing there in nothing but our undies, waiting for the doctor to call us into the clinic. All of my friends agreed it wasn't fair that the boys got to keep their most of their clothes on, while we had to mill about in our panty-knicks.

When the Doctor was ready to see us, the boys sat down on the left side while we were told to line up and wait their turn. The "clinic" was at the far end of the gymnasium; a brightly lit space with a table, some chairs and a set of scales. There was also a folding screen next to the doctor's chair, in case anyone needed a more "thorough" examination.

Like most of my friends, I was blushing to my hairline and trying to hide my underpants by crossing my hands in front. A couple of girls picked up their vests and tried to hold them around their waists, but the nurse told them to stop being silly, and made them wait with their undies on open display.

By now, you're probably wondering what kind of panties we were wearing. Back in those days, thongs and g-strings were banned by order of the school board, so most of us were wearing plain cotton full briefs. The majority wore pastel-colored knickers with elastic waistbands, while a few of the "cool" girls had floral prints with a little pink bow at the front. I was wearing white cotton pants, the kind that come all the way up to the belly button (yeah, if I'd known the medical was that day, I would've worn something different).

One of my friends – Helena – had on a pair of bright red nylon briefs that shimmered under the lights every time she moved. Naturally, she stood out amongst the crowd, and was the subject of schoolyard discussion for the next few days.

Over the next fifteen minutes or so, the Doctor called us up to his table one by one. When my turn came, I walked up to the scales in my snowy white panties, feeling every eye in the room on me. My tummy was fluttering with butterflies, and for a while I felt like I was watching myself from a different perspective (this used to happen to me a lot when I was young). Stepping up onto the scales, I held my arms up in the air while the nurse weighed me then took my measurements. My heart was literally pounding against my chest, because my entire body seemed to be completely on view, as if I was stark naked. I wasn't really, of course, but that was how it felt.

After the nurse had finished with me, the Doctor asked me my name, then checked it off on his medical form. I instinctively went to cross my hands in front again, but he told me to hold them by my side while he checked my breathing (it's odd how a stethoscope always feels cold, no matter how many bodies it touches).

He asked me numerous questions during the examination, mainly about my family and general health, instructing me to turn round while he examined my spine. I practically fainted on the spot, knowing that I'd be facing my entire class at that second. It's strange: I suspected that worse was yet to come, but seeing everybody staring at me in my fresh white knickers was embarrassing beyond all description.

For some reason, my examination went on much longer than anyone else's. Completing the preliminary physical, the Doctor got me to perform some flexibility exercises. I must have been blushing from heel to crown by that time, knowing that my panties had been viewed from every possible angle. When he instructed me to spread my feet as wide as possible and place my palms flat on the floor, my pristine white bottom went on display to the whole wide world.

When he finally finished (after what felt like half a million years) the Doctor made another note in his report and sent me back to the girls' line. Walking across the room in my bare knickers, that strange, disembodied sensation swept over me again, twice as strong as before. My belly seemed to be melting with warm, liquid heat. It seemed so terribly unfair; none of my friends had spent so much time in their panties, parading about before half the grade.

I brushed shoulders with Helena at the half-way mark; it was her turn with the Doctor, and she looked even more reluctant than I'd been ten minutes before. Her bottom jostled along in tight little circles, highlighted by her glimmering scarlet panty-pants. I wondered how long she'd be under the stethoscope, breathing a sigh of relief that my ordeal was over.

Well, not exactly. For some inexplicable reason, we weren't allowed to get dressed again until the last girl had been examined. There were at seven more girls to go, meaning that the free show would continue for at least the next twenty minutes (if not more).

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Question: By definition, does a transgendered story absolutely require transgendered characters? Could it simply be a story in which the male reader adopts a female character's perspective; ie becomes the girl in the story?

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On a perfect spring morning at the very beginning of May, a boy named Dave Henson was sauntering down Lancaster Parade, a lanky red-haired lad trailing a bright red yo-yo from his right hand. School had been out for just over a week and the sidewalks were wavering with soft white heat. It was a wonderful time to be twelve years old with the entire summer spread out before you. Ridgewick was a sleepy little burg famed for its clement seasons, the kind of place you read about in Ray Bradbury stories. Lawn mowers droned in some remote distance, dragon flies whickered across moist, green lawns.

Crossing the intersection at Memorial Drive, Dave slung the yo-yo into a perfect overhand spin, letting it hover half an inch over the asphalt. The days were getting warmer; you could almost feel the afternoons leaning into summer. In a few weeks, the roads would be bubbling with hot black tar. He continued on towards Memorial Park, leading the yo-yo and keeping to the shade. A fresh spring mistral flickered down the avenue, rustling the overhanging branches.

"Hi Dave."

The voice came from somewhere overhead; high, clear and rather sweet. Dave glanced up and saw Janey Watson sitting on a low-hanging bough, feet swinging idly back and forth. Janey wasn't exactly a friend, but they were on pretty good terms. Dave was on pretty good terms with everybody. Janey lived up on The Crest, so they often crossed paths on the way home from school.

"Hey, Janey," Dave replied, snapping the yo-yo up to his palm, "whatcha doing up there?"

"Just climbing," Janey answered with a shrug, "you can see all the way to Chamberlain if you climb high enough."

"Yeah?" Dave asked, eyebrows raised in vague disbelief. Chamberlain was a collection of distant skyscrapers on the eastern horizon, regarded with semi-mythical awe by the local kids. Dave sincerely doubted you could see much of anything from Janey's vantage point, but he was tempted to climb up for a look, all the same. A glimpse of Chamberlain's gleaming towers would be tantamount to seeing God or something. Unfortunately, he'd grown a little wary of the whole Tarzan thing since he took that fall last year. He'd spent the whole summer in plaster up to his hips, and he didn't much care for a repeat performance.

Anyway, the view was pretty good from where he was standing. Janey's dress was breathtakingly short, barely reaching down to her thighs. Slim coltish legs descended towards the sidewalk, smooth and tanned and rather shapely for a kid of twelve. A light spring breeze was whispering through the leaves, lifting Janey's abbreviated hemline. Dave found himself craning his neck to see what lay beneath. Which was rather odd, considering that Janey wasn't really a girl.

Janey Watson was a tranzie.

There were a lot of tranzies around Ridgewick these days. Seemed like every second kid you met was one - although you probably wouldn't have known, not unless you'd lived here all your life as Dave had. Half the time, you hardly noticed they were even there. Dave knew most of the tranzies out at Ridgewick Elementary, he'd been through the system with them. There were eight in the sixth grade alone – something like ninety in the school, all up. A pretty sizable number, considering the school's population was barely four hundred.

Tranzies were transgendered children – kids who were neither male nor female. They were also known as transfems or T-girls, depending on which part of town you came from. They seemed to have a lot of different names, actually. Chamberlain Central News referred to them as "The Transsexual Generation" (the one that came after the Pepsi Generation, evidently). The Ridgewick Advertiser had labeled them "The Third Sex," while the North American Journal of Genetic Research described the phenomenon as Toxically Induced Sexual Morphosis; TISM for short.

On the other hand, some of the local epithets were dubious to say the least. Old man Nevin at the Beef 'n' Burger called them "fruits." Coach Phillips out at the high school dismissed them as "queer-boys" (and later claimed he was the victim of a "fag conspiracy" when he lost his job). Reverend Daniels from the League of Christian Decency denounced them as "an abomination in the eyes of God."

Of course, the kids around Dave's neighborhood – none of whom ate at the Beef 'n' Burger – had eventually settled for "tranzies," a child's diminutive which seemed less threatening and somehow more familiar. No one quite remembered who had coined the phrase, but it had passed into the vernacular back in the third grade, and was now the generally accepted term on the east side of town.

Dave had once asked his mother how a boy became a tranzie. Looking Back, David realized that his Mom had been expecting this particular question for quite some time, as she had a long and rather complicated answer prepared. Most parents discuss the birds and the bees with their children; in Ridgewick, they talk about something else entirely.

Apparently, it all had something to do with a chemical refinery over in Blaxland. The place used to make insecticides and defoliants (whatever that was), and there'd been this big chemical leakage about fifteen years ago, several years before Dave was born. The EPA had shut the refinery down, hoping to limit the damage to the surrounding environment, but by that time, the damage was already done. The seepage had reached the water table, and had been absorbed into the food chain.

A whole bunch of weird stuff started to happen over the next couple of years. Babies were born with webbed feet, some with mashed-up faces and crazy, twisted bodies. Others had gills and tails and the damp, moist skins of amphibians. It was like something out of The Twilight Zone. All of these died very young (which Mom thought was something of a blessing) and people hoped that was the end of it.

But then the first tranzies came along.

According to the medical journals, there were two distinct forms of Toxically Induced Sexual Morphism (Dave's mother had read a lot of articles on the topic for some reason). The first were "intersexuals" – anatomical hermaphrodites with a foot in both camps – although they more often passed as female. These were comparatively rare, despite being the first to appear after the Blaxland disaster.The second (and more common) form of TISM was known as transfemininity.

Transfems were biological transsexuals; young boys who morphed into little girls over a period of years. Exactly how this happened, no one was entirely sure, but Dave's mother had told him it was a little like going through puberty – except that you changed from one sex to another (this particular revelation had provided Dave with more than a few sleepless summer nights). Transfems tended to be frail and delicate from birth, with girlish features and slender proportions. Most began to 'turn' around the age of seven, taking at least three years to complete the process. From there, they continued through a more conventional puberty – though none were capable of menstruating or bearing children.

Janey Watson was a typical transfem.

He was, in fact, the quintessential transfem: small, petite, and indistinguishable from a real girl. It wasn't just his appearance, either: it was his behavior, his voice, his overall personality. He walked and talked and acted like a girl. Always had, even back in the first grade, when he wore Osh-Kosh overalls and Doc Martins For Boys. Dave himself wouldn't have known the difference, if they hadn't started out in the same class six years before. He found it easier to think of Janey Watson as a girl nowadays. Truth be told, he found it practically impossible to think of Janey Watson as anything else.

Especially since she'd begun wearing a training bra.

---

It was a perfect summer day, one of those endless, golden afternoons when the air was clear and still, with just the barest hint of a cool change in the early afternoon. The shadows beneath the trees were cool and green, the sky overhead a deep, faultless blue. The low droning of a million cicadas echoed from yard to yard.

Kellie Carlyle sped along the sidewalk, generating small tornados in her wake. Her face was flushed and her long brown hair whipped out in a streaming ponytail. Standing on the pedals, she hurtled down Ascot Street, dodging sprinklers and ducking branches. A slender girl in a bright yellow top and a short blue skirt, her eyes were dancing with innocent, child-like joy. School was out, the sun was hot, and the season was spread out before her like an endless white beach.

Easing down on the brakes, she turned left down Greenway and flew through a cold haze of garden spray. She screamed in pleasure as the water touched her skin: a million tiny rainbows shimmered into existence around her. Shaking the moisture out of her hair, she rode high on the saddle, her long legs pumping the stirrups at roughly the speed of light.

Crossing the road, Kellie took the short-cut through Greenway Park, where a bunch of high-school boys were horsing around with a football, trying to impress their girlfriends. Two of them yelled at her to get off the field, rushing at her with their bare chests glittering in the sunshine. Kellie lost them easily, gliding through the commotion with an insulting lack of haste. Baiting the big boys was a well-loved game, one she'd relished almost as far back as she could remember.

Emerging into Lincoln Avenue, she sailed along the bubbling asphalt, ringing her bell as she glided home. The Carlyle house was a highset centennial edifice, the kind of place featured in Better Homes and Gardens in the heritage section. Jess pulled up in front of the low brick fence, straddling her bike and glancing up at the attic window. No shadows, no movement, no motion. Yes: the place was empty, her folks wouldn't be home for hours.

Good!

Ditching the bike without a second thought, she glanced up and down the street to make sure the neighbors weren't watching (a habit she'd formed some years ago - always better to be safe than sorry), then literally dashed up the garden path, eager to get started.

Cheeks flushed with excitement, Kellie locked the front door behind her, sloughing off her backpack and scampering down the hall to the rumpus room. Her heart was racing and her colour was high. She'd been planning this Matinee for days on end, counting down the hours and minutes and seconds until the curtain rose on her Command Performance.

Bursting through the batwing doors, Kellie ran over to the old storage closet where she kept her costumes hidden. Her pulse was racing in her throat, her tummy was quivering with butterflies. It had been weeks since she'd last been left on her own, weeks since she's been able to shed her cumbersome male identity and stand revealed as her true self. Well, the doors were locked, the curtains were drawn and the stage was set. It was time to party!!

Pulling open the chest of drawers at the back of the closet, Kellie started sorting through her wardrobe. So many different characters, so many different identities. She had plenty of time, and literally dozens to choose from, but which one first? The Spoilt Girlfriend? The Sweet Young Thing? The Fashion Model? It didn't really matter, she had the whole afternoon before her. She stood up, making her decision, and peeled her Nike t-shirt over her head in a single fluid movement.

Burlesque!

Yes, she'd begin with a striptease; it had always been one of her favorites. She had at least a hundred different routines to choose from; Vegas showgirls from the Tropicana; Parisian danseuses from the Bal Tabarin, London starlets from The Windmill. Dozens of personas catalogued and stored away in the vault of memory.

Putting a slim hand to her ponytail, she removed a sequined elastic binder, allowing her tangled blond hair to cascade down past her shoulders. With her thick, curly tresses sweeping to her waist in a shimmering gold arabesque, she looked sweet and fragile; a pretty teenaged girl with crystal blue eyes and flawless, alabaster features. Kellie had been rather fortunate in this respect. She'd possessed a sexually ambiguous appearance since her early childhood, and the recent onset of puberty had little effect on her largely androgynous form.

Thowing off her jeans with a casual gesture, she slipped rapidly into her costume, starting with a pair of shimmering lace panties. Her entire nervous system flared with pleasure as each gossamer layer touched her flesh. Putting on her outfit was like assuming a new body. She always felt this way before the curtain rose on her Grand Performance: a swirling rush of backstage anxiety and moist, rippling expectation.

Glancing towards the nearby cheval, Kellie reached for her delicate red corset, its adjustable suspenders and hook-and-eye closure promising a perfect fit. The mere sight of it filled her with a mix of excitement and nervousness. Securing the basque around her waist, she carefully stepped into a pair of seamed midnight stockings, mindful not to tear the sheer fabric. Adjusting the garters to mid-thigh, she turned to face the mirror, savoring the sensation of the nylon against her skin. Her legs seemed lean and coltish, encased in their ebony sheaths.

Her stomach fluttered with anticipation as she gazed at the reflection before her. The girl in the mirror stood tall and slender, exuding a quiet elegance. Her lustrous blonde hair cascaded over her shoulders, framing her face and highlighting her large blue eyes. She appeared youthful, perhaps in her late teens, with an innocent, almost dream-like quality.

The ensemble was nearly complete, but the skin-tight black dress remained. Arching her back, Kellie drew the shimmering lycra hemline over her head, stretching the material almost as far as her knees. The dress was a masterpiece, adorned with crisp red stripes running down both sides. Exquisite lace traceries embellished the shoulder straps, infusing the outfit with a hint of allure. She complemented her regalia with long, crimson opera gloves and slipping into gleaming stiletto heels, their sharp points clicking softly against the floor.

Standing before the mirror, the transformation was striking. The dress clung to her form, accentuating her silhouette, while the accessories added a flair of sophistication. Her reflection exuded confidence and grace, embodying the essence of the character she was about to portray. With a final adjustment of her gloves and a deep breath, she was ready. The stage awaited, and it was time for the show to begin.

Closing her eyes, she began transforming the room around her, willing The Playhouse into existence. An auditorium began to materialize — a grand, cavernous space bathed in the warm glow of the main spotlight. The air was thick with the scent of aged velvet and polished wood, a symphony of sounds filled the space: the soft murmur of an eager crowd, the distant rustle of costumes backstage. The moment was at hand, the curtains poised to rise, and the magic of the performance awaited.

The weight of the evening settled upon her. The anticipation was palpable, the silence before the storm. The night was shattered by a staccato clash of drums; lights dimmed in preparation for the spectacle. The Theater leapt into sharp, technicolor resolution, its looming walls darkened by drifts of purple smoke. She could actually hear the quavering notes of the orchestra tuning up, the low, droning rumble of a moody audience —

And suddenly, Kellie Carlyle was on stage.

---

I suppose it must have come as something of a shock for The Boy Next Door. He and his family had moved in only a few weeks before, and when his mother sent him over to borrow a cup of sugar, the last thing he expected to see was a pair of firm, young bottom-cheeks staring him dead in the face.

You see, I was dancing the cancan.

Yeah, I know that sounds crazy, but I've always thought the cancan was an incredibly sexy dance. The idea of whirling across a stage with my skirt raised to my chin made my heart race every time it crossed my mind.

It had taken me a while to assemble the costume, starting with a garish satin dress I found at a Red Shield store out in Chamberlain. It looked practically brand-new when I took it down from the rack. The shop-lady told me it was an authentic chorus-girl outfit, a hand-me-down from one of the local dance schools. I managed to talk her down to ten dollars for the dress and a pair of black stiletto heels I'd seen in the window. Everything fit perfectly; I literally couldn't believe my luck.

The layered petticoats were a little more difficult to locate (not to mention expensive) but I eventually came across a dancewear supplier on the net specializing in music-hall accessories. I used my mother's credit card to buy them online and had them mailed to a post-box number at Chamberlain Mail Centre. I paid her back with interest, although I never told her what the transaction was for.

I picked up the lingerie at a Valentine's sale out of town, pooling my allowance for weeks in advance. The sales assistant wasn't sure whether I was a girl or a boy, but she was helpful enough once she saw the color of my money. So helpful, in fact, that I bought four of everything; bras, panties, bustiers and waist-cinchers. Variety being the spice of life, I settled for matching sets of white, pink, red and black.

As for the garter-belts and suspender stockings... well, that's a story in itself, which I'll get round to telling in due course.

The outfit looked absolutely fantastic once I added a cincher-belt and a pair of shoulder-length lycra gloves. I couldn't wait to try it out in the rumpus room (which my imagination transformed into a 19th century Soho music hall). Unfortunately, it had been weeks since I last found myself alone in the house. My bedroom was a little too small to dance in and I didn't want to run the risk of Mom walking in on my performance unannounced. Truth be told, we kept very few secrets from each other, but like any other kid my age, there were certain things I just preferred doing in private.

Anyhow, by the time summer rolled 'round and Momma went to spend the weekend at Grandma's place, I was almost climbing the walls. If you've survived puberty, you'll know how desperate the situation becomes when you're struggling in the grip of raging hormone levels.

Finally having the house to myself, I pulled the ensemble out of its hiding place in the wardrobe and carried it down to the rumpus room. It was large and well-lit, with plenty of space for twirling and kicking. There was a cheval mirror set up to one side of the television. Walking over to the sofa, I laid the garments out in careful order, preparing for the afternoon's festivities.

Peeling off my t-shirt, jeans and hipsters, I stood before the mirror, ready for my transformation. I paused a few moments, allowing the excitement to surge through my system like waves of moist heat. I'd been waiting months for this moment, feeling the exhilaration building up inside me like a slow-burning fever.

Shivering with anticipation, I reached for the lacy, black garter-belt.

It was the sort with adjustable suspenders and a hook-and-eye arrangement at the back. Just looking at the thing made me delirious with embarrassment. Clipping the flimsy piece of lingerie around my slim waist, I picked up a pair of seamed midnight stockings and stepped carefully into them, cautious not to tear the sheer fabric. Adjusting the suspenders to mid-thigh, I turned to pose in the mirror, enjoying the touch of nylon against my bare flesh. My legs looked long and tapering in their ebony sheaths.

Next, I pulled on a pair of pristine white panties, slipping them over the garters with a whisper of liquid satin. Delicate and nebulous, they shimmered like platinum in the lazy afternoon light. The garter-belt was plainly visible through the gossamer material. The hips were decorated with a delicious floral trim. I was blushing at the thought of exhibiting them to my imaginary audience.

I put on a matching white underwire brassiere, adjusting the shoulder straps with vaguely tremulous fingers. My tummy was fluttering with anticipation; the girl in the mirror was tall and slim and quite beautiful. Shining blond hair tied back in a long ponytail, she looked maybe fourteen years old; her large blue eyes and tiny mouth giving her an innocent, child-like appearance.

Turning around, I looked back over my shoulder, enjoying the curve of my figure; the lush, full shape of my bottom. The panties were a little high-cut at the back, exposing a generous amount of cheek on either side. I wriggled my fanny impishly, smiling back at myself. Raising one hand, I slapped myself, very hard, on the right buttock, leaving an angry red mark. My smile broadened in pleasure. I needed a good, hard spanking; I was an extremely naughty little girl, after all.

Returning to the business at hand, I pulled on the petticoats, their flouncing bulk accentuating the luscious swell of my hips. Two layers of alabaster frills, an absolute pre-requisite to dancing the cancan. Waved above the waistline, the crinolines formed a kind of backdrop for the underwear, a curtain raised to exhibit the panties and stockings.

However, the costume wasn't quite complete.

I drew the satin hemline over my head, allowing the dress to drop into place over the massed petticoats. It was beautifully designed, with a halter top and a full-circle skirt that swept down to just below the knee. The frock was ornate and rather gaudy, red and black stripes ran the length of the skirt. Lace traceries embellished the bustline. I finished my preparations by drawing on the long, crimson gloves and fastening the cincher around my waist. And then I was ready.

I posed in the mirror, stepping forward on one foot and lifting the petticoats to reveal a saucy black garter. My heart was racing in my chest, my eyes twinkled with mischief. Was this how it felt, waiting backstage while the band warmed up its horns and strings? I could almost hear the murmur of the crowd, the popping of corks and the clinking of glasses. In a very few moments, I'd have to run onto the stage with my panties on full display. My entire body was trembling with expectation. Gazing into the mirror, I saw a rich, pink glow suffusing my features.

Snatching up two handfuls of flocked white lace, I conjured up a packed Victorian nightclub on the south side of London. For one second, I could almost see the chandeliers flickering overhead, the coils of smoke rising to the rafters, the dim shape of the audience beyond the footlights. The band had started up with a clashing of drums: I was being summoned out before the crowd. It was time to reveal my gauzy white underwear to the world!

Grinning my most brilliant smile, I raced onto the stage in an avalanche of gossamer frills. I launched into my routine with a series of classic high-kicks, straining my garter-belt to the breaking point as my feet swept towards the ceiling. A vast star of joy seemed to explode in my belly. Heart pounding in ecstasy, I spun into a long, wheeling pirouette, skirts flying out in a perfect circle. I orbited around the room, exposing my panties all the way up to my belly button. Stockinged thighs flashed in the mirror as I swirled past, my hair flailing about my shoulders.

Every nerve in my body seemed to tingle with electric fire. Drawing a deep breath, I pitched forward into a cartwheel, scissoring my legs in mid-air to allow the crinolines to fall away. I paused at the height of my arc; suspended upside-down with my petticoats cascading over my head. Cool air whisked between my thighs as I went over, almost shrieking in rapture. It was wonderful, better than I'd ever imagined.

Landing gracefully on my feet, I whipped the dress back up to my throat and kicked my heels over my head, laughing like a child as I leapt from foot to foot. The audience roared its approval, their deafening shouts echoing about the ceiling. I rushed forward, waving my skirt as high as it could go. I felt sweet, feminine and unbelievably naughty. Tight black garters snapped against my haunches, virginal white panties glared in the mirror.

The performance lasted about ten minutes. Pulse thudding in my temples, I careened through a succession of kicks, handstands and flip-flops, taxing my gymnastic abilities to the limit. My stockings crept imperceptively down my thighs, exhibiting more bare flesh until the suspenders were as taut as violin strings. Wild exhilaration filled my veins; I spun ever faster, giggling and screaming as my petticoats rose and fell.

I finished up with by bending double and tossing my skirts over my back, baring my ripe, pantied bottom to the entire room. Breathless with excitement, I stood with my heels together and my dress hanging over my head. I clenched my bottom-cheeks impulsively, listening to the crowd cheering; thundering for more. I smiled to myself in pure, innocent delight, prepared to stand up and give them the encore they deserved.

Just at that second, someone cleared their throat behind me.

---

Verity Sherman walked down the central colonnade of the Facility, a pretty young woman in a pastel yellow sundress, her full lips pursed with trepidation. It was Monday morning; the Committee was meeting at ten thirty-five to discuss her latest progress report. Verity noted the time with an anxious turn of her wrist. Attendance was mandatory, she couldn't afford to be late by even a few seconds. She quickened her pace to match the pounding in her chest.

The colonnade was a vast expanse of iridescent columns sweeping off into an alabaster limbo. Opalescent pillars loomed on either side, their crystal surfaces glimmering in the muted light. Verity could hear her heels clicking along the vast corridor, remote echoes in the brooding, marble stillness. A fresh summer breeze seemed to flicker along the Italian floor tiles, raising the hem of her dress.

It was a trick, of course. Like everything else in the Facility, the breeze was an illusion, a simple mirage redolent with the scent of grape and honey-suckle. Deception was the only truth in this house of vacant fantasies. Everything here was either a lie, a dream or a nightmare - although the boundaries between the three were somewhat obscure, Verity had come to realize.

In the three months since she'd entered the Program, Verity had been exposed to indignities without number: probes and penetrations; medical procedures which invariably left her shaken and tearful. The invasions never seemed to end. They'd explored her most intimate recesses with a barrage of wicked-looking instruments, delving and touching and pricking and poking until she'd begged them to stop, wailing like a child as each new device was inserted.

Still, there was something worse than all the violations she'd suffered over the past ninety days.

There were the Interviews.

Reaching the end of the colonnade, Verity entered an equally extravagant hallway decorated with Baroque oils - Rembrandts, Van Dykes, Rubens and hundreds of others she'd never heard of. The walls were covered with thick indigo velvet, lending the hall the appearance of some lavish private gallery. Verity wasted no time examining the artwork; she could think about improving her cultural literacy if she survived her probation. As it was, she'd be lucky to make it through the next twenty-four hours with her sanity intact.

Verity wasn't alone in her never-ending pilgrimage through the Hall of Wonders. Like every other candidate in the Reorientation Program, she had a bodyguard assigned to accompany her whenever she moved about the Facility. A combination security guard, escort and prison warder, he rarely spoke, other than to inform her which door to enter or what direction to take.

Verity looked shyly up at the man striding beside her. He was a big, heavy-set veteran in a black business suit, aged perhaps in his mid-thirties. He walked with the precise, measured step of a military serviceman. His dark, impassive face was masked by a pair of reflector sunglasses, enhancing his hard, disciplined bearing. The tag on his lapel read TYLER, F. Verity had often wondered what the 'F' stood for, but had never summoned up the courage to ask. She was under strict instructions never to engage the bodyguards in private conversation.

They walked past a chain of sumptuous Rococo sculptures depicting the Rape of Persephone ('rape' being the operative word in this case), arriving before an enormous oaken door, half as tall as a Los Angeles apartment block. Verity's gaze wandered up to the coat of arms mounting the portal. Painstakingly embossed on the sepia woodgrain was a silver serpent coiled around a cross. The letters 'TVC' were inscribed in gold leaf directly below the shield. Verity had never understood the significance of the crucified snake, but she thought she knew what the initials stood for.

The bodyguard stepped in front of her, his large frame blocking her view of the logo. He must have been at least four feet across the shoulders. Touching a finger to the side of his sunglasses, Tyler F spoke quietly into his comset.

"Miss Sherman's here."

Endless grey silence for several seconds, followed by an equally ominous click: hidden locks turning in varnished oak panel. Verity's knees weakened as she contemplated the reception awaiting her on the other side of that monstrous door. She was dizzy, light headed; almost feverish with fear and expectation. It was a consistent paradox: despite her misgivings, Verity always felt a thrill of excitement as she prepared to face the Committee.

The door opened, evidently of its own volition.

"Go in," Tyler told her dispassionately.

Stealing a final, calming breath, Verity stepped across the threshold.

---