Daddy's Girl
by Katherine Day
By Katherine Anne Day
(Copyright 2009)
Editorial Assistance by Julie.
“You’re sitting just like a girl,” his mother said.
The voice was harsh and accusing, jarring Lawrence out of his concentration on the book he was reading.
“Ah . . .oh . . . mom, I’m sorry,” he replied, quickly uncurling his legs which had been tucked daintily under his body. He now sat more erect, both of his feet squarely on the floor; yet, he felt he still might have looked a bit girlish.
His mother had been warning him regularly about his posture and mannerisms, letting him know that his father had been adamant that Lawrence should be acting more a 13-year-old boy. “Quit prancing about like a girl,” his father scolded him several nights before, having caught Lawrence cavorting about like a ballerina as he listened to music from “Swan Lake.”
“Oh Larry,” his mother argued. “The boy loves good music and likes to act it out. Let him alone.”
“Christ, he should be out playing ball, or hanging out with the guys. He’s our only son, and he’s acting like a girl.”
In recent months, the argument over Lawrence’s behavior became a nightly litany, usually occurring after his father had returned home from the Fly Inn, a neighborhood tavern that catered to airline employees. His father was an airline mechanic, and a successful one, having been made a lead mechanic in his crew, a position of great responsibility in that he had to sign off on the fitness of a plane to fly. The family lived a few blocks from the city’s airport. Lawrence Collins, Sr., displayed an Irish joviality that made him popular with his co-workers and the patrons at the Fly Inn. At home, however, his father turned dour, forever sarcastic and critical of both Lawrence Jr. and his mother.
Due to Larry Collins’ popularity with his co-workers, he had been elected president of his local Mechanics Union the previous year, a job with a workload that forced him to quit stopping at the Fly Inn after work. The job of president took on a 24/7 character at the Collins residence, with Larry Sr. usually working in his home office to make phone calls and work on the computer late into the evening. The family could hear him yelling over the phone to some callers. The union was in tense negotiations with the airlines, and it was obvious the bargaining would be difficult.
As a result, his outrage at Lawrence not being more boyish was reduced. He occasionally would express concern about the boy, and Lawrence often sensed his father looked upon him with great disgust. Lawrence was thankful, however, that his father no longer went into drunken assaults on his girlish behavior.
In truth, Lawrence Sr. had been a doting, loving father early in his son’s life, eagerly changing diapers and assisting his wife, Dorothy, in the caring for their young son; the attention the two parents gave to young Lawrence became particularly attentive after Dorothy suffered a miscarriage when Lawrence was a year old, an event that ended the couple’s hopes for future children.
As the boy reached ten, it was apparent he was different from most boys in the neighborhood. He cared not for the rough-housing of the boys, their pushing and shoving. He stayed far away from the pickup baseball games and football skirmishes that occurred on a pair of adjacent vacant lots on his street.
“Why don’t you go out a play with the boys?” his mother used to chide him until he came home one day bloodied and in tears.
“The ball hit me in the face, mommy,” he explained through his sniffles. “Billy threw it hard at me, and I couldn’t catch it. He threw it too hard.”
“Oh my poor baby,” his mother said, wiping his face.
“And Billy said he didn’t throw it too hard. He said I should go play with the girls. And they all laughed at me, mommy.”
His mother knew better than to tell his father about the incident; his father had tried in vain to teach Lawrence how to throw and catch a baseball, finally giving it up as a bad job.
During those years in late elementary school as Lawrence Jr. showed signs of being inept at sports and apparently disliking anything that other boys did. His father began spending nights at the Fly Inn, and for several years, until his election to the union position, he returned home to heap verbal abuse on his wife and only son. His father, however, never struck either of them, and Lawrence never recalled being spanked by his father.
Lawrence drew closer to his mother, helping her with housework, including doing much of the cooking, a chore his mother abhorred, but Lawrence seemed to pickup kitchen skills easily and enthusiastically. He found happiness in hurrying home after school, putting on one of his mother’s frilly aprons and working in the kitchen. His light brown hair was fine in texture and typically was let to grow down to his neckline, before being cut. His need to flick the hair from his eyes added to his feminine mannerisms.
“Why don’t you put this scarf on?” his mother asked one afternoon, handing him a particularly colorful silk wrap. “It’ll keep your hair back while you finish decorating those tarts.”
That afternoon, because Lawrence was busy baking tarts and decorating them, his mother had him wear a pink frilly smock. His slender smooth arms protruded from the smock and he had felt especially girlish that day. He had put on his favorite CD of “Swan Lake” and was occasionally dancing between his chores.
His mother smiled as she watched her son, always so happy and joyous when he was in the kitchen. She loved Lawrence, and especially so when he was happy. She was pleased her husband was not home, and Lawrence would have to change into more masculine attire before he did arrive.
She tied the scarf peasant fashion about his head, kissing the boy lightly on his lips when she finished.
“There you are my gypsy,” she said.
She led him to the bedroom and posed him before a mirror, smiling as she did so.
“Mommy, you made me like a girl,” Lawrence said.
“So I did, my sweet little gypsy lass,” she said.
“But mommy, I’m a boy.”
“I know, honey, but don’t you like how you’re dressed?”
Lawrence caught himself smiling into the mirror, following it with a quick pirouette, and then protesting again. “But I’m a boy.”
“And so pretty,” his mother said. “You mad at mommy for dressing you like this?”
He hesitated. “No, mommy, I love you. I’d like to be dressed like this all the time, but I’m a boy.”
“I know, Lawrence, dear, but maybe we can have some fun, just you and I. OK?”
The boy looked at his mother, a little fear tempered his enthusiasm, as he was not sure what kind of “fun” his mother had in mind.
“OK, mommy,” he said.
“Tell you what, Lawrence. You finish decorating those tarts, and then come back into the bedroom, and we’ll see what we can do.”
“What do you wanna do mommy?”
“How’d you like to be mommy and daughter for an hour or so?”
“You mean me be your daughter?”
“Yes, honey. Would you like that?”
“Oh yes, mommy, but won’t it be wrong? I’m a boy.”
“I don’t think so, if it makes you happy, dear.”
“It does, mommy. It does,” the boy said gleefully, kissing his mother and then running back to the kitchen to finish the tarts. He was fashioning little yellow daisies on the frosting of each tart, and he used an exaggerated girly motion as he did each one. As he did so, he began humming in a voice that was light and wispy and in a boy soprano register. Even though he was approaching 13 years old, his voice still hadn’t changed and he was one of the few boys of his age still singing soprano in the choir; it caused him some embarrassment and Miss Schoenweiss, the music teacher, diplomatically placed him next to the alto section and other boys.
“Now let’s take off all our clothes, dear,” his mother said as he returned to her bedroom.
“All?”
“Yes, I’ll leave, and you can put on these,” she said, holding out a pair of cotton panties, white with pictures of little girls skipping among flowers. She had removed them from a package of new panties, labeled: “Little Diane -- Panties for Girls.”
“These, mommy,” he said, holding them.
“Yes, dear, I bought them just for you.”
“The whole packet?”
“Yes, I hope you like them. Now let me know when you’ve changed.”
*****
His mother left the room, and Lawrence changed, finally standing naked, except for his new panties. He stood before the mirror again, hugging himself, seeing a narrow-shouldered white-skinned body, his arms slim and without muscle tone. He noticed his hairless chest formed a slight indention between two tiny breasts formed by soft mounds of flesh.
“A girl!” he said, prompting excitement to form, and he pressed his thighs together to bury his tiny penis, which had grown hard.
“Are you ready?” his mother asked, breaking his spell.
She entered carrying what appeared to be several skirts and blouses. “These are mine, darling, but I think they’ll fit you. We’re about the same size.”
It was true; Lawrence had grown to within an inch of his mother’s modest height; she had remained a tiny wisp of a woman with slender trim legs, a cute butt and smallish breasts. Lawrence tried on several skirts, before settling on a floral print layered skirt, white, with teal blue, yellow and some pink. His mother had to tuck it in about the waist, but otherwise it fit well, falling to about his knees.
She also broke open a new package containing a training bra, in a design matching his panties.
“Mommy, you planned this for me, didn’t you?”
“Yes, darling, I did. I have seen how much you enjoy doing the things other girls do, and you looked so happy, so I thought I’d see if you’d like it.”
“Oh mommy, how did you know?”
“A mother should know her child, and I could see what a sweet daughter you have been recently.”
He blushed, raising his finger to his lips in a coy motion.
“Besides, cutie, I know you’ve been into my stuff. You never fold them back properly.”
“Mommy, I’m sorry.”
“That’s OK my pet.”
They finished up the outfit with a purple peasant blouse with light pink piping. His mother produced a pair of flats, the kind the girls in school wore, and his put them on, marveling at how lovely his legs were.
“Now let’s do something with your hair,” his mother said.
“Oh mommy,” he said, brushing his hand across the front of his head. “How about bangs, like this?”
“And then straight hair, with a hair band over the top,” his mother suggested.
“Yes, mommy,” he said growing so excited.
His mother beckoned him to join her on the vanity stool, before the makeup mirror. She lightly tinted the area beneath his eyes, and darkened slightly his brows. She padded some powder on his face.
“See how it’s done honey?”
“I know mommy, I’ve watched you,” he said.
She then put lipstick on his lips, a light, almost natural tone. “Young girls don’t wear garish makeup, dear,” she told him.
He rubbed his lips together, as he’d seen him mother do hundreds of time.
“We’re mommy and daughter,” he said finally.
“Yes, my sweet,” his mother said, holding him tightly.
“We’re pretty,” he said.
And they were. Lawrence’s soft facial features and full lips were markedly feminine, and his mother, Lawrence knew, had always been a pretty women, slender and with a lovely milk-white complexion and light brown hair. Her features, too, were delicate. Mother and son also shared sparkling blue eyes, ever alert and cheerful in appearance. There was a softness that seemed to permeate both.
“What name shall we call you?” his mother asked.
“I need a girl’s name, mommy, since I’m a girl.”
“Laura?” his mother offered.
He scowled.
“Lolly?” she offered again.
“How about Heather?” he asked.
“Mmmmmm. You look like a Heather, I think.”
“Let me be Heather, mommy. OK?”
“OK, but this can only be between us, dear. In an hour, you’ll have to change back, and remember, don’t let your father know.”
“But mommy, I’m so pretty. Too bad daddy wouldn’t like Heather.”
*****
It had been a year since Lawrence had been dressed the first time by his mother. His father’s growing vocal concern about the boy’s lack of manliness forced them to limit their mother-daughter times to about once a month.
“Can I be Heather today?” Lawrence’s pestered constantly, only to have his mother warn that their father might learn of the charade and become even more upset.
“Just think if your father ever found out about Heather,” she reminded him. She tried to get him to act more boyishly, and even though the boy tried, he would easily slip into girlish mannerisms.
*****
It was two o’clock on a lovely summer afternoon and Lawrence was curled upon the sofa, having been deeply engrossed in “Pride and Prejudice” since mid-morning.
“Are you reading that book again, Lawrence?”
“Yes, mom. I like it.”
“Are you crying Lawrence?” she asked, seeing his reddened eyes.
“No, mom, my eyes are tired,” he lied.
“Don’t lie to me, Lawrence. You must be at the part where Elizabeth’s lovers leave the family.”
“I guess,” he nodded.
His mother moved to the couch, sitting next to him, and putting an arm around him, drawing him tightly to her. She kissed him gently on the forehead, running her hands through his long light brown hair. As a small child he had been blonde, and if his hair wasn’t trimmed, he often was mistaken for a little girl.
Lawrence let himself be drawn to her, welcoming her embraces and the familiar and faintly lilac scent from the soap she favored. He loved it when his mother hugged him, even though he knew he was getting too old for these long periods of affection between mother and son. In her arms, he felt safe from the demands of the outer world where he would have to fulfill his role as a boy and male in a hard world.
“Is this the third time you’ve read this book, darling?” his mother asked.
He nodded truly feeling embarrassed to have been caught reading this book for a third time. It was truly his favorite among all of his books, and he knew it was usually thought to be a girl’s book.
As if she knew what he was thinking, his mother spoke quickly to comfort him: “That’s OK my darling,” she said, still lightly running her fingers through his hair. “There’s nothing wrong with a boy having sweet thoughts and reading good books.”
“Mommy,” he said tentatively. His voice was soft, still high-pitched, as his voice still hadn’t changed; he spoke shyly, as if not sure of what he was about to say.
“I feel like Mary,” he said, admitting to his mother how much he identified with the girls in the book.
“You like Mary?” his mother asked, confused by the boy’s quiet comment.
“No, mommy,” he said, reverting a more childish version of addressing her. “Mommy, I feel I am Mary. You know, the shy daughter. The one who reads books?”
He blushed now at the admission, wishing he could take the words back, knowing that his mother would be mad, with him admitting how much he felt like a girl. She was constantly defending Lawrence against his father’s accusations that the boy was a “sissy,” a “coward,” a “wuss” and “wimp.” He wondered, too, if imagining himself as Mary was merely comparing his own personality as a boy who shied from playing with other boys and seemed to retire into the solitude of books and writing and often times quiet reflections.
His mother, however, merely hugged him a bit tighter, kissing his forehead again, as if protecting him from the cruel world.
“Mommy loves you darling,” she said.
His mother was quiet for a few moments and Lawrence retreated even more deeply into the warm comfort of his mother’s embraces.
Finally she said: “Oh but Mary’s not very pretty,” referring to the fact that the middle daughter was the most plain of the five Bennett girls in the book. “I think you’re more like Lydia.”
“The youngest girl mommy?”
“Yes, she’s so cute and pretty, just like you my precious.”
“Oh mommy, you’re teasing me now.” He laughed, happy to see that she seemed to taking his comments as a joke.
“Maybe, Lawrence, but if you want to be one of the daughters, why not pick out one of the pretty ones?”
“Mommy, I don’t want to be one of the girls. I just said I kinda like Mary, ‘cause she’s like me, I guess.”
“I thought you wanted to be Heather,” his mother said, jokingly referring to the few times she had helped Lawrence dress as a teen girl whom they named “Heather.”
“I do, mommy. I am Heather, but I’m kinda like Mary, too.”
“Ok, little girl, but enough of this,” his mother said. “I need to get ready for work, and I need you to help me fix some supper for your father.”
*****
When Lawrence turned 12, Dorothy Collins resumed the waitressing career she interrupted when Lawrence was born. She returned to the German restaurant she had worked at when she met Larry Sr.
“The tips are great, Larry,” she told her husband when he objected.
“We don’t need the money and you should remain home.”
“Larry, you know we need a new car and new furniture, and Lawrence will need help going to college.”
In the end, her husband relented, agreeing the extra money would be helpful. He did give her a warning: “No fooling around with those salesmen!”
Dorothy remembered how attracted he had been to her when they first met as waited on his table. And, she knew she still looked particularly fetching in the waitress outfit, its full flowing peasant skirt, square shaped low-cut bodice and puffed sleeves. In her late 30s now, Dorothy still retained the youthful freshness that seemed to tantalize persons she met.
She left for work at 5 p.m., just about the time Larry Sr. was due home. It was agreed that she would prepare a supper for him and that Lawrence would serve it. She had hoped that with father and son forced to spend time together that Larry Sr. might grow closer to his son.
For a while, an uneasy relationship developed, with father attempting to interest his son in a baseball game, or maybe a trip to the golf driving range and to the game shop. Lawrence, grateful for his father’s attention, tried hard to enjoy those times, but his lack of physical coordination and general weakness betrayed his ineptness and brought out his father’s impatience.
“Just keep your eye on the ball, Lawrence,” his father would repeat over and over as the boy whiffed or dribbled the golf ball off the tee.
The straw that broke the camel’s back came one beautiful June night when a golfer at the next tee spot suggested: “Sir, those clubs look a little heavy for him. Maybe he should try women’s clubs for now.”
It was an innocent suggestion made to be helpful, since many boys when they first begin to golf often hit better with women’s clubs that are shorter and lighter and easier to swing. Larry Sr. took the suggestion angrily, and still feeling the effects of his after-work beers, said in a loud voice: “Mind your own business. He’ll hit like a boy if it kills me.”
“Sorry sir,” the man and tall middle-aged golfer who had been belting the ball out over 250 yards. “Just trying to be helpful. That’s how I taught my son, and now he beats me.”
“Well, I’ll teach him my way,” his father shot back.
“Ok, ok, have it your way, sorry.”
“You better be sorry, calling my son a girl,” his father’s anger now rose as his face reddened.
Lawrence was stunned by the exchange, and started to say, “Dad, he might be right. These clubs are a bit . . .”
“Shut up, Lawrence. I‘ll handle this.”
His father walked over to the man, fists clenched.
“Daddy, please,” Lawrence begged his father, tears beginning to roll down his face.
The incident ended with the golf pro intervening; he knew Larry Sr. and liked him, and he was able to calm him down.
“Let’s go Lawrence,” his father said, grabbing his son’s slender wrist and leading them off the golf tee and heading for the car.
His father said nothing on the way home, retiring to his den to watch television, leaving Lawrence to his own. Larry Sr. never mentioned the incident again, but their father-son expeditions ceased, with the nightly routine finding Larry Sr. in his den watching television or doing his union work while his son cleaned up the kitchen, before retreating to his room. He began finding joy in this period, often humming to himself as he washed the dishes and wondering what it would be like to be a housewife.
To help his mother, Lawrence took on more and more responsibility in preparing supper, setting the table and doing the dishes.
His father showed little gratitude for Lawrence’s efforts, offering grunts of thanks and soon calling him “Laura” in mocking the boy’s chores which he considered “women’s work.”
Dorothy saw this happening but the money at the restaurant was good; she was a popular waitress and easily gained advances from men of all ages; as a skilled waitress, she was skilled in fending them off diplomatically. In truth, though, she enjoyed the attention and the knowledge that she still was a lovely woman. She had felt Larry Sr. had not been particularly attentive in the last few years and she welcomed a chance to be out of the house and avoiding Larry Sr.’s post-tavern grumpiness.
*****
In his room at night, Lawrence found himself dreaming constantly about being “Heather,” growing excited at the prospect that he could become a pretty cheerleader. Reality, however, dashed those dreams, first because he admitted that he could never be as strong and athletic as the girl cheerleaders were, and secondly, because, well, “I’m a boy.”
The summer promised to be a long and boring one for Lawrence; too young to get a job and without any real friends, the days would be long and uneventful. The boy, however, was not prone to sleeping late or to laziness; he had a restless streak, and he soon busied himself by doing the household chores, including the laundry, dusting, vacuuming and window washing.
One day in June, his mother rewarded Lawrence for all his household work by letting him dress as “Heather” for a while. He put on his mother’s old denim mini skirt and a sleeveless tee shirt. Dorothy also found a pair of pink tennis shoes in the back of her closet for him to wear and tied his hair into two short pigtails with light yellow ribbons. She even let him wear a pair of lace panties and a matching bra, stuffed with socks.
“My, aren’t you the pretty one?” his mother told him the first time he was dressed in that outfit.
Lawrence walked about, exaggerating the swing of his hips and giggling.
“I’m not letting you out in that,” she said, also with a laugh. “You’ll have every boy in town at your heels.”
A glance in the mirror told him she was right. He had the smooth, slender legs of a fashion model, tiny ankles, gently giving way to slightly curvy calves, pretty knees and a hint of soft thigh.
These were happy moments for Dorothy and Lawrence, then known briefly as Heather. But Dorothy knew she better not encourage a trip into femininity for her son; he was too vulnerable and there’d be hell to pay from Larry Sr. Besides, she knew that life for an effeminate boy or one who was interested as living as a woman would be difficult. Lawrence, she knew, was a bright student and had lots of promise, and she worried his feminine tendencies might stifle his very real potential.
One night, Larry Sr. took notice of how neat the house had become, and praised his wife for the “sparkling way” she kept house; when Dorothy was poised to say that Lawrence was responsible, the boy shot his mother a glance, warning her not to let on that the boy had been doing the housework. Such knowledge would have pushed his father into a tirade about Lawrence doing “girl’s work.” (To be continued)
Lawrence Jr. dreams about being one of the Bennett girls in “Pride and Prejudice” and soon learns that he can indeed be a pretty girl. He shares in the giggling friendships of a group of girls, but his father’s disgust at his girly ways deepens.
Stacy Kwiatkowski, the kids all called her “Stacy Kay,” was a tall, blonde girl prone to chunkiness, and she had become Lawrence’s closet friend through middle school. She had a broad nose and plain, almost peasant-looking face, but she had a winning smile that made her one of the more popular girls.
Lawrence and she actually were the same height, he being small for his age, and she likely outweighed and probably could have out-wrestled him should they ever try.
This close friendship between a shy, retiring boy and a gregarious, popular girl seemed out-of-place, but it came about naturally in the two young people’s mutual interest in reading. And, strangely, it was an argument over “Pride and Prejudice” that cemented their relationship.
“I think all women should be like Elizabeth,” Stacy said one day in 7th grade English class. “Women need to be in charge, like Elizabeth was.”
The teacher had asked students to say what was their favorite book and why. It was a heady assignment for the young teacher, since she was gambling on the hope that some of the children in her class actually had read a book.
There was silence at first until Stacy spoke up, stating the “Pride and Prejudice” was her favorite book because it showed that women should speak out. Lawrence eagerly agreed “Pride and Prejudice” was his favorite, too, an announcement that brought an astonished: “That’s a girl’s book,” from Hugh Mistele.
The teacher was quick to the rescue, saying boys or girls could read “Pride and Prejudice” and that it was good reading. She, however, didn’t let the issue rest there, asking Lawrence why he thought it was his favorite book.
The question puzzled him at first, and he merely said: “I dunno. I just like reading about the family.”
He realized he answered in a soft, tentative voice, and in a high register.
“They’re all girls, Lawrence,” teased Hugh.
“I know,” he said, a bit more forceful this time. “What’s wrong with that? I like Mary the best.”
His words came out quickly without thinking, and he could hear the class giggling now, mocking his interest in “Pride and Prejudice.” There were murmurs and he suspected he heard the words “fag” and “sissy” and “girl” being muttered in glee.
The teacher, finally realizing what was going on, quickly turned to another student to ask about his favorite book, and he said “Star Trek,” which also brought guffaws since it wasn’t a book at all.
Stacy lived a few blocks from Lawrence and the two rode the same school bus, but Lawrence had paid little attention to the popular girl. She was always giggling with girl friends or flirting with boys, and Lawrence who got on the bus first was content to sit in a rear seat by a window, trying to attract as little attention as possible. Lawrence realized his precise mannerisms and neat outfits had pegged him as a sissy and sought to remain in the background as much as possible. As far as he knew, Stacy never even knew he existed.
Yet, the embarrassing episode in English class brought them together, with Stacy joining him on his seat on the school bus home that day.
“That’s cool you like ‘Pride and Prejudice,’ Lawrence,” she said, sitting next him, her fleshy body red from running for the bus.
“Really?” he said, scrunching his body toward the window to give her more seating room.
“Yes, silly,” she said, still breathing heavily.
He was sitting erect, his feet placed flatly on the floor and his book-bag in his lap, with his hands folded primly on top. His long hair was flowing with the wind from the open window as the bus started up. He realized that at a glance he must look like many of the teen girls on the bus. The boys, he noticed, were all slouched in their seats, angry or bored looks on their faces, many with plugs in their ears, listening on iPods or MP3s.
He remembered his mother’s warnings about appearing too girlish, but he was so penned into his seat it would be difficult for him to change. Usually, no one sat next to him on the bus, since he was often one of the first on the bus, choosing an aisle seat near the back. He had no close friends, and no companion to talk with, until Stacy joined him that day.
Lawrence felt dwarfed by the large girl next to him; he could see that beneath her fleshiness there was a strong body, making him feel weak and inconsequential.
“Miss Hilgersdorf suggested we form a book club at school,” she began.
“Oh?”
“And, Lawrence, you know, she’ll be our adviser and there might be some extra credit,” Stacy continued, now regaining her breath.
“I like to read,” he said tentatively.
“That’s obvious, and so do I. Do you wanna join us?”
“That’d be OK, I guess, but when do you meet, ‘cause I gotta get home and make supper for my dad.”
“Make supper for your dad?” she asked, surprised.
He reddened, realizing he told this girl something he didn’t have to tell. Now, she must really think I’m weird, he thought.
“Well . . . ah . . . yes. Mom leaves for work about the time he gets home and he wants a hot meal.”
“That’s being a good son,” she said. “But we only meet on Tuesdays for an hour after school, and my mom picks me up, and she could take you home.”
“OK, I guess, I’ll ask my mom.”
“Awesome,” she said, genuinely pleased with Lawrence’s apparent response to joining the club.
“I read a lot,” he volunteered. “What books you plan on reading?”
“Oh I don’t know, but Mariah wants us to start with the Traveling Pants books,” she said.
“Oh, they’re OK, I guess.”
“Maybe we’ll choose something else, since the Traveling Pants books are for girls, and if you join us, maybe we should get something else.”
“No, Stacy, that’s fine. I’ve read a couple already.”
“Really, that’s awesome.”
Lawrence smiled. He couldn’t believe what he was hearing. Stacy, a girl who was the most popular girl in school, was finding him “awesome.” He knew he was not a typically strong, muscular boy, which he thought most girls wanted.
“You’ll be the only boy, among five or six girls. I hope that’s OK.”
“Awesome,” he said, with an impish smile crossing his face.
Stacy may have thought that Lawrence was reacting as a hormonally charged teen boy, but in reality Lawrence was looking forward to the prospect of being accepted into the club with all girls, and, he hoped, eventually to be considered one of them.
The book club never really did develop; except for Stacy, Lawrence and one other girl, most of the girls failed to do much reading. Yet, in trying to get the club started, Lawrence and Stacy became tight friends.
In the 20-minute school bus ride, they began sharing more than their reading interests, telling much about their family life, and finding a bond in that they were often left alone. Stacy’s mother, an Air Force pilot, was stationed for three years, at the Air National Guard base located at the same major airport when Lawrence Sr. worked. She was divorced and Stacy was an only child, living exclusively with her mother. Like Lawrence, she prepared most of the meals in the house and kept it clean, since her mother’s schedule had become so demanding. Her mother was commanding officer of the unit.
“We’re both like housemaids,” Stacy said one day, immediately regretting the words in that they might embarrass Lawrence.
“Yes, we are,” he agreed. “I feel like a maid often.”
“I thought you’d be mad, me calling you a housemaid.”
“Not really, we do important work, Stacy. How else would your mom and my dad eat?”
*****
The summer between their 7th and 8th grades, Lawrence and Stacy saw each other almost every day, usually riding their bikes together toward the Lake Parkway, which had an adjacent bike path following the shore of Lake Michigan. Lawrence had taken to tying his long hair into a ponytail for the rides, and on warm days he wore shorts and a sleeveless tee shirt.
“Two guys are following us,” Stacy said on a warm, June morning. A light breeze off the lake cooled the bikers.
“Oh yeah. They look old, like in high school.”
“I know, and they maybe think I’m in high school,” she said, making silent reference to her own height and huskiness.
“Do you think they think I’m a girl, too?” he asked.
“I think so,” she said laughing.
They were biking leisurely, so they could talk, and it was apparent the two boys were catching up.
“Mom’s always after me to act more boyish, and maybe I should cut my hair, too.”
“You’re cute, Lawrence. I like you as you are.”
He smiled.
“Except I’m jealous,” she teased. “You’re so much prettier.”
He faked like he was going to punch her, but then laughed instead.
“Let’s speed up, we can lose those guys,” Stacy said, quickly picking up the pace.
Soon the two were speeding down the bike path, leaving the puzzled boys in their wake. They heard a yell: “Hey girls, we just wanted to talk.”
Hearing that got Lawrence and Stacy to begin giggling, but the two, both accomplished bikers, easily outpaced the boys, finding a secluded spot where they stopped, dropping their bikes and bursting into uncontrollable giggling.
“Hey girl,” Stacy teased Lawrence. “They were hot after you.”
“No they liked you,” he responded.
The two continued to giggle, soon got to rolling on the ground together, wrestling playfully and tickling each other. Lawrence knew he was no physical match for Stacy, and he rolled into the fetus position while she poked at him, calling him “girl.” He loved it, and kept his voice in its high giggle.
They finally ran out of breath and the two sat up on the grass in the tree lined clearing, and Lawrence found himself flicking his hair in a feminine manner as he looked at Stacy.
“I must disgust you,” he said.
“No way. You don’t,” the girl said, mystified by the comment.
“I’m not much of a boy, am I?”
“I don’t know what that means, Lawrence. You’re my friend, my best friend. I don’t care what you are.”
Lawrence didn’t respond. He was sitting with his legs folded under himself, looking down at the grass.
“Look, Lawrence. I consider you a friend. We can talk about anything. We’re not boy and girl friends. We’re friends.”
“I think you’re my best friend, too,” he said. “I never before had a friend I could be with and enjoy.”
“Besides, maybe I’m not much of a girl,” Stacy said. “I’m so fat and big.”
“You’re not fat, Stacy. You’re a very nice looking girl. Look at all the friends you have.”
“That’s because I always want to put on a ‘happy face,’ even when I wanna cry. I’m not at all petite and pretty.”
“And I go hide, because I can’t be as much a boy as my dad wants. And I don’t like being called a ‘sissy’ and those things.”
“You’re so smart, Lawrence,” Stacy said. “You’ll go far.”
“You too, Stacy.”
The two may have not understood it at the time, but their friendship was based on a solid foundation: their shared intelligence and an understanding empathy for other persons. Such a foundation would make it possible for these two very outwardly different teens to share in each other’s joys and fears, triumphs and failures, opportunities and challenges.
*****
The two became inseparable that summer, with Stacy biking over to Lawrence’s house nearly every afternoon, after she completed her own household chores.
Lawrence’s mother welcomed the teen girl’s visits, since Stacy encouraged Lawrence in getting outside and in getting more exercise. Since Stacy was participating in a summer softball league, she needed practice, and the two often would find an empty ball diamond and play catch.
She taught him how to throw a baseball with more authority, something his father had never been able to do.
“Good, Lawrence, you no longer throw like a girl,” she teased after several days of instruction.
He learned, too, how to hit a baseball, though with his weak arms, he rarely hit it hard.
Stacy continued to be superior at the physical aspects of the sport, but she made no attempt to embarrass him. With his hair still flowing long, the pair often were taken to be girls, an observation they rarely sought to change.
“Can we play with you girls?” said a voice from among a group of young teens, two of them girls and three boys, who approached them as they practiced hitting grounders to each other one day on a ball diamond.
Stacy looked at Lawrence, wondering whether he’d like that. He nodded tentatively.
“It’ll just be for fun,” said one of the boys, a blonde, crew cut slender boy said.
“Yeah,” suggested a dark-skinned boy. “How about girls against boys? One of you two girls looks really good.”
It was obvious the group had watched the two playing, and had been impressed with Stacy’s natural athletic talents. They obviously had no clue that Lawrence was a boy, and it was a logical conclusion given his slender, un-muscular frame and his flowing hair. He was wearing short shorts and a tee-shirt.
“I guess it’s OK.” Lawrence said, his voice soft and tentative.
As the teens gathered their teams together, Lawrence identified himself as “Heather,” an identification that was accepted without question. In the game that followed, the girls played the boys closely, but losing in the last inning when Lawrence, playing in the outfield dropped a fly ball, and then threw the ball poorly back to the infield. He played so badly, that he easily was the poorest player on the girls’ team.
The boys leaped for joy at the victory and ran across the field to hug the girls; one boy, who called himself Bobby, made a point of comforting Lawrence, saying, “I thought you played pretty good for a girl.”
Lawrence merely hung his head, saying nothing.
“Anybody could have dropped that fly ball,” he said, a statement that Lawrence knew was not true. Any kid his age should have made the play easily, he thought.
“Oh, I guess,” he responded.
“She doesn’t play ball often,” Stacy said, entering the conversation.
“She did pretty good,” the boy, Bobby, said.
“Would you two girls wanna come with us to the custard stand?” one of the other boys asked.
“Oh I don’t think so,” Stacy said.
“Come on, Heather,” Bobby pleaded.
“I don’t think so,” Lawrence reacted.
“Will you be here again?” he asked.
“I think so,” Stacy replied, as she and Lawrence headed off for their bikes.
*****
‘Whew,” Lawrence said, as they mounted their bikes and headed for Lawrence’s home. “I’m glad that’s over. I’m so bad at baseball.”
“You were OK,” Stacy said.
“Yeah, for a girl.” The two giggled.
They headed slowly out of the park, riding side-by-side, talking easily.
“I know, I am so sorry I dropped the ball, Stacy,” he said. “I was hoping they’d never figure out I was a boy.”
Stacy laughed. “There was little chance of it, Heather. You won the eye of Bobby. I think he wants to be your boy friend.”
“I guess he does,” Lawrence said. “That’s kind of scary.”
The pair headed onto a residential street, continuing for several blocks without speaking both a bit winded from their exertion.
“You really do make a pretty girl, Heather,” Stacy said finally as they parked their bikes at Lawrence’s house.
Dorothy Collins greeted the two youngsters eagerly, offering them lunch. Soon, the two were giggling at the kitchen table, snickering over the fact that Lawrence had fooled three other teens that he was a girl.
“What’s so funny?” his mother asked.
“Nothing.”
“Oh come on, you two aren’t giggling over nothing.
“It’s a secret, mom,” Lawrence said, growing red in the face.
“Yes, Mrs. Collins, but it’s not anything bad,” Stacy added.
They giggled a bit more, and Stacy whispered in Lawrence’s ear when his mother left the room: “You could fool any of the boys, they’re so horny.”
“I know,” he whispered back, realizing the prospect of being a girl both excited him and scared him.
“It’d be neat to flirt with him, Heather,” Stacy said again, using his adopted girl’s name.
“I guess, but what would he do when he finds out? Probably beat the crap out of me.”
“I’ll be there to protect you, girl.”
“We better forget it,” he said finally.
“Mom is planning all sorts of neat stuff, and you we can all swim at the pool in our apartment complex,” she said.
“You mean an overnight sleeping PJ party?” he asked, puzzled.
“Yes, silly, that’s what PJ parties are. Sleepovers. Haven’t you ever been to one? No, of course, not, you’re a boy.” There was a hint of a giggle in her voice.
“Who’ll be there?”
“Just a bunch of girls. You know ‘em all, Heather.”
“What’s going on?” he asked suspicious now, hearing his girl’s name.
“Come on. It’ll be cool. You can come as Heather, and just be among us girls.”
Lawrence hesitated. Was he being made the butt of a joke? Were the girls going to tease him?
“Please, Lawrence, it’ll be fun. The girls all like you and I know you’ll have fun, really.”
Stacy promised the party was just to have fun. She said she knew Lawrence would enjoy it, since the girls she was inviting were either on her softball team or were serious students and were not girls who would make fun of him or tell other kids. He enjoyed all six of the girls, and often joined them in schoolyard chatter or at the lunch table, usually as the only boy. None of the group could be considered as “slutty,” since they were all 12 or 13 years old, were considered bookish and nerdy and still showed some basic naiveté.
In the end, he agreed, telling his mom he was sleeping over at Stacy’s house, a fact confirmed by Stacy’s mother, who told Dorothy Collins that there would be seven girls and Lawrence at the party. Stacy’s mother had suspected Lawrence’s feminine nature was deep-seated and saw how much he enjoyed doing feminine things and being with her daughter.
“Isn’t that a bit strange,” his mother questioned. “A boy among seven girls at a PJ party?”
“Yes, Dorothy, I’d say so, but in Lawrence’s case, it seems he’ll fit right in, if you don’t mind me saying.”
“I guess you’re right, but I need to talk to you first,” his mother said.
*****
Dorothy Collins and Mary Kwiatkowski met the next day for a mid-afternoon coffee at a local family restaurant, a time that seemed to fit both women’s work schedules.
“Thank you for coming, Mary,” Dorothy said, after the two were settled in a booth with their coffees. Dorothy had ordered an apple pie, the restaurant’s specialty, but the other woman had deferred.
“Just looking at that pie adds three pounds to me,” Mary said. “How do you stay so slender, Dorothy?”
“Just lucky genes, I guess,” she said with a warm laugh.
“A bit like your son, I can see. Both so slender.”
“Tell me what you think of Lawrence and his friendship with your daughter,” Dorothy began with a direct question. Her voice was suddenly firm, almost hard.
Mary settled back on her seat, not answering immediately. Dorothy looked into the other woman’s eyes.
“Well, Dorothy, I think the two kids enjoy each other,” she started.
“That’s obvious.”
“And, Dorothy, I don’t think they’re doing anything wrong. They’re just good friends.”
“Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think they are either,” Dorothy answered with a slight laugh. “For one thing, Lawrence is so shy I don’t think he’d try anything and if he did, I’m sure your Stacy could handle him. Physically, that is. She is so much stronger.”
Mary laughed. “I think both of our children are a bit behind the curve when it comes to boy-girl things. Although you can never tell for sure. They are at a critical age.”
“Yes, I know, but my concern isn’t that.”
“What is it Dorothy?”
“Let’s be frank, Mary. This pajama party thing has just brought the matter to a head in my mind. Why would a 13-year-old boy want to be in a sleep-over with seven girls?”
“You’re right, it is a bit strange, but then your Lawrence is a very special boy, Dorothy.”
Dorothy Collins looked at the other woman across the table, wondering how much she should tell her. It was the first time the two had met, other than running into each other once at a parents-teachers evening at the school in the previous year. Can I trust someone I hardly know, she wondered.
Dorothy felt dwarfed in the presence of this tall woman with her study body and military bearing; she felt, too, to be inadequate in the presence of such a majestic woman, comparing her own slender body, pale complexion and wispy hair to Mary Kwiatkowski. Too, she knew the woman’s superior education added to Dorothy’s hesitancy in talking about her family and what she considered its own secrets.
Yet, she saw in the sparkling blue eyes, the round face and snub nose of Mary Kwiatkowski warmth and kindness that Dorothy found reassuring.
After a moment of silence, Dorothy began, “Yes he is a special boy, as you say, and a very good boy, too, but he just always wants to be doing girl things. It’s just not natural, and my husband, Lawrence, Sr., is just livid about it. He even sits like a girl, it seems, and loves reading girl books. Would you believe he’s reading ‘Pride and Prejudice’ for the third time?”
“He’s a boy with different tastes, Dorothy. Nothing wrong with that.”
“Oh, I know that, but it seems he wants to be a girl. He even told me he dreams of being Mary, one of the sisters in the book. The shy, bookish one.”
“I noticed he seems to act like just one of Stacy’s girl friends when they’re together, but I know she’s taught him to throw a baseball better and they go on long bike rides. Your son is healthy, Dorothy, and smart and very polite. You should be proud of him.”
“I know, but Larry . . . my husband . . . is just tormenting the boy now; he and I argue constantly, telling him Lawrence will never be an athlete and to let him find his own way.”
Mary leaned forward, extending a hand across the table, putting it on Dorothy’s arm. The fingers of her hand, large and beefy, nearly encircled the smaller woman’s slender arm, holding it gently, but firmly.
“I may have caused it, Mary. I let him dress in my things sometimes, because he wants to. I should have stopped it. If Larry ever finds out I did that, he’ll be impossible to live with, always ragging on me and Lawrence.”
“Does your husband beat you?”
“Oh no, Dorothy answered quickly. “Never touches me that way. It’s just how he gets. Looks at me and Lawrence with scorn, like he hates us, like we’re both failures or something. I know I’m not a college girl, like you. Only been a waitress, but I love my son, and I love Larry. He’s really a good man, except for this.”
The two were quiet for a moment, and then Dorothy continued her lament:
“It just seems I let Lawrence act so much like a girl. I let him wear some of my things. You know we’re about the same size. And I shouldn’t have done that. Oh, what have I done, Mary? I made him into a girl, but he seems so happy as Heather.”
“Dorothy, you did no such thing,” Mary said firmly. “That child was headed into life wishing he was a girl, regardless what you did.”
“You think so?”
“I’m not really sure, Dorothy, but from what I have seen your son may be transgendered,” Mary said. “Do you know what that means?”
“Just that it’s when a boy wants to wear girl clothes and act girly.”
“It’s far more than that,” Mary said. “A transgendered child is one who feels he or she was born in the body of the wrong gender. Like Lawrence, who may indeed wish he was born a girl, but ended up with male parts.”
“It’s more than crossdressing or being a drag queen?”
“Yes, honey, it’s a real feeling. The child can’t help it.”
“So Lawrence wanting to be Heather is a real feeling? Not just play-acting?”
“Maybe so, we can’t tell ourselves, Dorothy. He’ll have to be getting some professional help to determine that.”
Dorothy sat stunned; she realized many boys liked dressing as girls but wasn’t sure they actually were girls inside, within their inner being.
Mary also mentioned a former first sergeant who served with her in one of her tours of duty in Iraq.
“Outwardly, Mark was all male,” she said. “He was my lead mechanic, and he was a good one, just like your husband is, I would guess. All the guys respected him, and he got a medal for bravery by going under sniper fire to save a corporal who had been wounded on the remote air base where they worked.”
“Oh, was he transgendered?”
“I guess he was, Dorothy,” she said, pausing, with a heaviness coming into her voice.
“What’s wrong, Mary?”
Her blue eyes suddenly moistened and Mary seemed about to break into tears.
“Two months later after receiving the medal, Mark shot himself. He was alone in the barracks and when he found him he was in lingerie and was wearing lipstick.”
“Oh my?”
“And he left a note saying he could no longer bear living a lie that he was a man. ‘I am a woman,’ he wrote. He expressed shame and asked forgiveness of his family and the other men in the group. And he signed it ‘Maryanne.’”
Mary explained that as his commanding officer she had to gather up his effects and send a note to his parents, living in a small town in Minnesota. His father was a retired Army colonel. She said she found printed email messages buried in his barracks locker to a friend in Chicago who seemed to be urging him to “come out.”
“But he said his family would be shamed, even though he had wanted to be girl as long as he could remember.”
“Oh so sad,” Dorothy said, and the two women held hands across the table, both with tears in their eyes.
The two sat there silently for a moment, Dorothy thinking about her son, and remembering the joy she saw in his face whenever he was dressed or acting like a girl. Could he indeed be transgendered? She’d have to look into that possibility. But, what would her husband do about that?
“Do you think I should let Lawrence go to the PJ party, Mary?” Dorothy asked. “Maybe I should say ‘no’ so as not to encourage him in this.”
“No Dorothy, let him come, and let him be with the girls,” Mary replied. “I got an idea that might help both you and him get a better idea about just how much of a girl he thinks he is.”
“Yes, what’s that?”
“Here’s what I got in mind,” Mary said. After she outlined her ideas, the two agreed upon a plan for Lawrence and the pajama party.
*****
Lawrence was the hit of the PJ party, once they got over the idea that there was a boy in their midst.
“He’s no boy,” Stacy said teasingly. “Tonight, he’ll be Heather, and just one of the girls.”
“Heather!” the girls squealed in delight.
“You really want to be Heather?” asked Wendy, a dark-complexioned girl, taller than Lawrence. She had a serious demeanor to her question, as if she couldn’t believe the idea.
“Hmmmmmm, I guess,” he said. “If I wanna stay for the party, I guess I better be Heather for the night.”
The girls fussed over him, all seemingly bent on making him more and more a girl. Stacy produced an entire outfit for him, panties, bras, a camisole, short skirt, scooped-neck blouse and sandals.
“I think these will fit you, Heather,” she said.
“These are new,” Lawrence said, his mind questioning where this was going.
“Yes, just for you Heather,” Stacy said. “My mom said if you were to stay over, you’d have to be a girl like all of us.”
She explained her mother made an educated guess at sizes having gone just that afternoon to Penney’s to purchase the clothes.
“Your mother did this? She wants me to look like a girl?”
“Yes she did, and she’d like you to go to her room now, and she’ll help you dress.”
Mrs. Kwiatkowski carried herself erectly, befitting her military status. As Lawrence entered the room, she displayed broad smile, her blue eyes bright and cheerful.
Lawrence walked in carrying the clothes daintily over his arm so as not to muss them.
“Here’s my darling girl,” Stacy’s mother said.
Lawrence nodded, his face growing flush. He was confused and worried, convinced he should run out of the house and head home.
“Sit down Lawrence,” she said, beckoning him to a rocker covered with dainty pink pillows.
He did so, sitting with his knees together, pushed to one side, in a most feminine manner. He brushed his hair from his face, and placed his hands on his lap.
“Lawrence, the girls would like you to be dressed as a girl tonight, and I wonder if that’s OK with you,” she said.
“I don’t know,” he said, hesitantly. “My mother would be mad if she found out.”
“Oh she knows, and it’s OK with her, if it’s OK with you.”
Mrs. Kwiatkowski explained that Stacy had told her how much Lawrence had seemed to like girl stuff, and that he did most of the housework at home. She said his mother had told her he seemed to think of himself as a girl.
“Now, if you don’t want to do this, Lawrence, that’s OK,” Mrs. Kwiatkowski continued. “You can just stay for the movie and the hotdogs and stuff and I’ll call your mom to pick you up.”
“You mean I don’t have to dress up as a girl?”
“No honey, you don’t. It’s up to you.”
Her smile was soft and warm, and Lawrence now understood why her daughter was so well-liked and so friendly to everyone.
“You know, I kinda like all Stacy’s friends,” he said, slowly.
“They’re nice and they won’t tease you honey,” she said. “But if you don’t like it, you can go home anytime.”
Lawrence sat before this woman; she smiled and looked at him with warmth. He wondered what would happen if one of the girls told some friends; how much more teasing and bullying would he get? And, what would happen if his father found out?
Yet, the prospect of spending an evening with these girls, as a girl, giggling, and fixing each other’s hair and painting nails, maybe even talking about boys, was a lovely thought.
“I’d like to stay, ma’am,” he said simply.
*****
“We need to paint his nails,” Wendy said.
“Oh yes,” chimed in another girl. “He’s got pretty feet.
“And such lovely hands, too.”
After Stacy’s mother completed dressing Lawrence, he returned to find the girls all gathering in Stacy’s bedroom, which was large and surprisingly feminine in decoration, given Stacy’s activities as an athlete.
They sat Lawrence on the vanity stool in Stacy’s bedroom, and Wendy took his feet in both her hands, admiring them, noticing his slim ankles and barely noticeable curves to the calves of his legs.
“Mom’s a cosmetician,” Wendy said. “She’d love to make you pretty, Heather.”
“She’s already pretty,” said Althea, a tall dark-skinned African-American girl.
“Well, then, prettier,” Wendy said with a laugh.
Soon, the girls tired of making Heather out of Lawrence, and turned to giggling over the school yearbook that had just come out, looking at the pictures and picking out who they thought were the cutest boys. Soon teasing developed over Wendy’s swooning over Jason Templeton, a blonde boy with bangs and a mischievous smile.
“Wendy’s picked the cutest boy in class,” Stacy said.
The girls agreed.
“Doesn’t Heather need a boy friend?” Althea asked.
Lawrence blushed and turned away.
“How about Paul?” volunteered Sheila, a rather chunky girl, with round face and already developing breasts that strained the cloth of her purple tank top.
“Yes, Heather,” teased Wendy. “How about Paul? He’s nice.”
Stacy intervened. “No, Paul’s not good enough for Heather. Why not Jason Templeton for Heather?”
“You mean my Jason?” Wendy asked. “No way. He’s mine.”
“But doesn’t the prettiest girl deserve the cutest boy?” Stacy said, giggling.
“Yes, Wendy, we all know Heather’s the prettiest one here,” Althea said.
All the girls nodded their heads in agreement.
Lawrence felt elation, realizing that while the title of “prettiest girl” may have been made as a bit of fun, it may indeed have been true. Looking around the bedroom, Lawrence thought in all honesty he was very pretty, and probably prettier than any of the girls. Yet, he felt shame, that he was a boy who was so feminine and un-masculine that he could easily become a pretty girl.
Lawrence finally spoke up in his sweet voice, girly voice, “Wendy I won’t steal Jason, besides mommy says I’m too young for boys.”
The girls all giggled, and Wendy hugged Lawrence in gratitude.
*****
“OK, girls, it’s time for the pool,” Mrs. Kwiatkowski said, entering the room, as they continued to argue over various boys in the class.
Stacy and her mother lived in a condominium project that was favored by Air Force personnel at the base; it had a number of amenities, including workout rooms, a small gymnasium and a large swimming pool that was always well attended.
“Did all you bring your suits?” she asked.
They all nodded, except Lawrence, who stood somewhat puzzled.
“Come with me, honey,” Stacy’s mother said, grabbing him by the arm. “We’ll fix you up.”
She led Lawrence to her room and gave him two tiny pieces of clothing, a pink top with ruffles and a matching bottom. She also gave him a jock strap, suggesting he wear it under the bottom to tuck in his penis.
“These aren’t bikinis,” she explained, “Since we need to cover your male part, you’ll wear a fuller bottom than most of the girls, who like the bikinis. And you don’t need filler for this top, since girls your age usually don’t have much up there anyway. And I see you have a hint of breasts as it is.”
“I’m scared, ma’am,” he said, taking the clothes from her. “Maybe I shouldn’t go to the pool. What if somebody finds out I’m a boy?”
“I understand,” she said. “And you don’t have to go there. But you’ll just be taken as one of the girls out there.”
“You think so?”
“Yes, Heather, you really do have a lovely body and you look very sweet. Now go get dressed, and go have fun.”
*****
The pool was just beginning to full up on this early Friday evening, but the girls were able to find several lounges and a table and chairs where they could put their towels and sandals. All of them wore bikinis, except for Lawrence and Melanie, who was chubby and whose ballooning tummy would have looked out of place.
The rule, however, was that girls and boys with long hair, had to wear swim caps, and Lawrence wore a purple one, tucking his pigtailed hair up into the cap. He found he was enjoying this, acting totally like the girls he was with, giggling at times and prancing about as they approached the water.
“Oh darn, here comes Jonathan and his bunch,” Stacy complained.
“Who?” said Wendy.
“He’ll try to flirt with us, but he’s in high school and must be 16 by now,” Stacy said. “He’s boring.”
The boy named Jonathan was tall, slender, with long dark hair; he had the body of swimmer, sinewy and smooth. He wore a bikini bottom, exposing his muscular thighs and tiny waist and he walked with swagger.
“Him?” Wendy asked nodding toward the boy. “He’s cute.”
He was joined by three other boys, also in bikinis and showing off their tanned muscular bodies. Lawrence looked at the foursome, wondering how boys got such strong, manly bodies when his was so feminine and weak.
“Stacy,” Jonathan said. “Who are all your friends?”
“You don’t wanna know?” she answered back tartly.
“Stacy, you’re such a snob, why don’t you introduce us? I think they wanna know us.”
“Go away, Jonathan, you know we’re all too young for you and we’re having a PJ party. Just for girls.”
Wendy piped up. “Oh Stacy, why not introduce us?”
Stacy relented, introducing each girl, and, of course, stating that Lawrence was Heather. Jonathan’s friends were all freshmen and sophomores at the high school, and they were introduced as Marcus, Jackson and Will.
The boy named Will was particularly muscular, his shoulders broad but he was not muscle-bound, just with long arms and legs with sculpted sinews. He was standing closest to Lawrence.
“So you’re Heather,” the boy said. “I’m Will. Do you go to Roosevelt too?”
Lawrence nodded, keeping his eyes looking down.
“You’re a shy girl, Heather,” the boy said.
Lawrence looked up, into the boy’s eyes. The boy looked back, and the two looked at each other for a moment, not saying anything. Lawrence was puzzled; how does a girl act when a handsome boy approaches her, he wondered?
“I like to read a lot, do you?” Lawrence finally said, realizing how stupid the statement must have sounded.
“You do? I do too,” the boy said, obviously pleased to find a topic about which the two could talk.
Soon the two were discussing in some detail about the books they liked. It seemed Will liked sci-fi books, but he admitted to reading “Pride and Prejudice,” realizing it was a “chick” book. They giggled when Lawrence said he wanted to be Mary, the bookish girl.
“You can’t be Mary,” the boy said. “You’re too pretty.”
The other girls soon were teasing and flirting with the boys, as Will and Lawrence (as Heather) moved off to one side and continued their conversation.
“Let’s go swimming,” Will said after a few minutes.
“I’m not a good swimmer,” Lawrence said. It was a fact; he was a terrible swimmer, hardly having only recently progressed past the dog-paddle stage.
“Then I’ll teach you,” he said, smiling and grabbing Lawrence’s slender hand and leading him to the pool.
With his strong arms, he lifted Lawrence, holding his narrow waist by both hands and walked him into the water.
Will was a gentle strong boy, and he guided Lawrence into a swimming mode, holding him up with both hands and showing him how to best kick his legs. Lawrence grew excited by the feel of the boy’s hands on his tummy, his penis growing hard. Lawrence hoped the jock strap would contain his penis, and not pop out and spoil everything.
The boy grabbed Lawrence’s weak upper arms, showing him how to best do the crawl stroke, and when Lawrence began to lose his breath, Will turned Lawrence over so that he was facing the older boy. Lawrence was alarmed: he saw the boy’s eyes brighten and strange smile come on his face. Was the boy going to kiss him? Lawrence was shocked at the prospect, but mercifully nothing happened.
The girls left the pool after an hour, all of them gushing about Heather’s “love affair” with Will.
“I told you that you were the prettiest and you got the hunkiest guy,” Wendy said.
“Is he going to ask you out, Heather?” Althea asked.
“I’m too young to date,” Lawrence blushed, hoping that explanation would halt the talk. In his mind he realized that if this what happens when you’re a girl, how marvelous. He also found great comfort in being treated as a girl; it seemed so natural to him.
A strange thing happened after they got back to Stacy’s condo. They were all giggling, and prancing about that the girls began getting out of their wet bathing suits with Lawrence in the room. Althea, as a matter of fact, was having trouble untying her top, and asked Lawrence to assist her in removing it.
“Let me help you, Heather,” the girl said after Lawrence untied the strap to her top.
“Oh, I better leave you girls,” Lawrence said, realizing he had never before seen a girl without clothes on.
“No, you won’t,” Althea said, holding onto his skinny, soft upper arm. “You’re one of us now, girl.”
“Yes you are Heather,” Wendy echoed.
Lawrence realized he couldn’t have broken out of Althea’s tight hold even if he wanted to. She was far stronger that he was. Besides, he knew his puny body looked exactly like most of the others in the room: that of a still developing “tween” girl.
The girls took turns drying their hair; most stood around in panties, no longer wearing tops. Only Stacy and Melanie, the chubby girl, had developed breasts of any size. Lawrence, in spite of the fact that the girls seemed to pay him no mind, felt self-conscious, folding his arms across his chest, not realizing that in doing so he had pushed the tiny mounds of soft flesh that featured his breasts into a hint of a cleavage.
It was Wendy who first said noticed, and she was never one to hold back speaking out her thoughts. “Oh Heather, you have cute breasts, too.”
“She does,” commented one of the others, as Lawrence tried vainly to cover them up with his folded arms, an act that even increased the illusion of a cleavage and feminine breasts.
“Let us see, Heather.” Althea added.
The tall girl easily pried Lawrence’s arms down from his chest, leaving him standing there exposed, the nipples on his breasts now hard and dark brown with surrounding pink areolas.
“Oooh,” said Wendy, lightly pinching his left nipple, and action that made his penis grow erect.
Lawrence knew his penis was small, and unlikely to burst out of the jock strap Stacy’s mother had him wear, but he was uneasy with the prospect. The girls, however, soon turned their attentions to each other, pinching each other’s nipples in a giddy scene; they all pleaded with Melanie to take off her swimsuit top and expose her more matronly breasts, but the girl refused.
The scene eventually gained some order, as the hair drying was completed; the girls fixed each other’s hair for the night, brushing first, then tying some into ponytails or pigtails, leaving others to band their free-flowing hair across the top.
There was a seeming uniformity to the nighties the girls wore; they were pink or light blue in a gauzy cloth, mid thigh length with peasant bodices and straps across the shoulders. Mrs. Kwiatkowski produced a similar one for Lawrence, except that it seemed to be covered with more lace than the others.
“You look so dainty in that, Heather,” Stacy’s mother said, after he put it on.
He realized, as he looked in the mirror, that he did indeed look like a girl of about 10 years old. Althea had tied his hair in pigtails, making the illusion that much more convincing. Lawrence didn’t say anything.
“Don’t you like the nightie?” she asked.
“I do, ma’am,” he stuttered. “It’s just that . . . ah . . . I look so . . . ah . . . like a little . . . ah . . .”
“Girl,” Mrs. Kwiatkowski supplied the answer.
He nodded in the affirmative, realizing the ridiculousness of the situation. Here he was a boy anatomically, enjoying a PJ party with seven girls, and he found himself enjoying himself being “one of the girls,” and, more importantly, being accepted by the girls as one of them. The feeling of belonging to a group of other kids was so satisfying; never before had a group of boys accepted him, instead belittling him for being a sissy, having a voice “like a girl,” crying too easily and being so terribly weak and inept at sports.
*****
Later the group gathered in the living room to watch a Hannah Montana movie; pizza was delivered, along with lemonade and some fruit. The girls gathered on the couch, on the floor and in both of the easy chairs in the room. Lawrence found himself next to Wendy, both propping themselves against the couch, between the legs of the girls sitting on the couch.
At one point, Lawrence, feeling his leg going to sleep, moved to adjust his position. “Here lean against me,” suggested Wendy, whispering into his ear. She moved tightly against Lawrence, their bare arms touching.
Soon, Lawrence felt the girl put an arm around his shoulder, and draw him more tightly against her. Wendy’s hand began massaging his upper arm.
“I envy you, Heather,” Wendy said softly, under the sound of the movie. “Such pretty arms and shoulders.”
“Oh,” was all he could mutter.
“I’m built like construction worker,” she explained.
Lawrence nodded, feeling the firm, muscular arms of the girl around his shoulders; he had noticed earlier the sinews of the young girl, marveling at her strength. Stacy told him Wendy placed first base on the softball team and was the best hitter. “She’s a tough player,” Stacy said.
At one point, Lawrence dosed off, awaking during a loud scene in the movie, to find himself totally in the embrace of Wendy, who was holding him so closely that their faces were nearly touching. He felt totally at ease and in full comfort.
The boy mused: this was strange. Here he was in the arms of a pretty young girl, and even though he had begun to get hard at times, he did not desire her as he felt a boy should. He had heard other boys talking about “getting pussy,” “planking a girl,” or “getting their cherry,” but such talk had always discomfited him as crude. He still wasn’t quite sure what “getting their cherry” truly meant, but he had an idea.
“Come on, girls,” announced Mrs. Kwiatkowski, when the movie ended. “Let’s figure out where we’ll all sleep.”
All of the girls and Lawrence brought sleeping bags, adding to the prospect that there’d be no shenanigans going on between these 12 and 13 year old girls. Lawrence chose a spot in the living room, and as he was laying his bag out, he noticed Wendy putting hers down next to his.
“We can talk now,” Wendy said, as she opened her sleeping bag roll.
“Yes,” Lawrence agreed, though he wondered if that was all Wendy wanted. He liked the attention she was giving him, but he was a bit wary as to where it was heading, and whether he could handle it.
It was well past midnight when the talking and giggling ended among the girls, who were spread out in the living room and a dining area. There were snippets of low-level talking going on between several pairs of girls; Wendy and Lawrence were busily engaged in talk, too.
“I wanted to bring my bunny, but I thought I’d get teased,” Wendy said, in an almost whisper.
“Your bunny?” Lawrence questioned.
“I never go to sleep without my bunny,” the girl added. “He’s a brown bunny, but so cute. I call him ‘Bouncy.’”
“You should have. I see Melanie has hers, and so does Misty,” Lawrence said.
“I know. Do you have a bunny, Heather?”
Lawrence hesitated, and then said: “Yes. I call her Daisy. She’s like a poodle dog.”
“Do you sleep with her at night?”
“Every night, except now.”
“Oh that’s so cute,” she said. “I miss Bouncy so much.”
“And I miss Daisy.”
There was silence for a while; finally Wendy said, “Tonight, you can be Bouncy, and I’ll be your Daisy.”
Somehow, their sleeping bags had come closer together, and soon they were both lying on their stomachs, faces close together, facing each other, whispering. As such, they were doing no different than the others.
“I’ve never had a sister, or even a real girl friend,” Wendy said.
Earlier, she explained her mother had died when she was ten, leaving her to be raised, along with her seven-year-old brother by her father and his live-in girl friend. Her father was an executive with one of the airlines serving the city, and traveled most of the time. His girl friend, a flight attendant was often gone, and the two kids were often cared for by their grandmother, who had emphysema and had trouble walking. Consequently, Wendy found herself in charge of the household, assuring her brother got up for school and was washed and fed; she also was ordered to keep the house clean.
“We had to do everything, Jack and I,” she said referring to her little brother. “We miss mommy so much.”
In the darkness, Lawrence sensed that Wendy was sobbing lightly. He reached over and put a hand to her shoulder.
She grabbed it in her firm, calloused hands, and drew it to her mouth, where she gently kissed it, and then held it firm in her grasp, as if afraid to let go.
“Would you be my girl friend?” Wendy finally whispered.
Lawrence could sense the pleading in the girl’s voice, could feel her sadness and emptiness; yet, he was still a boy. How could he agree to be her “girl friend?” But she was so insistent.
“Yes, Wendy. Let’s be girl friends,” he said.
“Heather and Wendy. It sounds so cool.”
She kissed his fingers one-by-one, still holding his hand tightly.
“You have the prettiest hands, Heather,” she said quietly. “”Every part of you is so pretty.”
Lawrence felt total contentment, finding sweetness in the growing love between two 13-year-old girls.
*****
In the morning, Lawrence returned to his boy clothes, although he did continue to wear a pair of cotton panties with pink and yellow flowers printed upon them. They were dainty, just the type a girl of 8 or 9 might like. The girls had undone the pigtails and brushed his hair vigorously so that it flowed loosely about his head. He wore the nighties until just a few minutes before his mother was due to arrive to pick him up.
As the girls lounged about, reluctant to rise from their sleeping bags after their short night of sleep, Lawrence realized they had accepted him as just another girl. After their initial amazement, they had treated him as Heather. He smiled at that realization.
Wendy continued to attach herself to Lawrence’s side, whispering questions about when Lawrence would appear again as Heather, wondering if they could be together again soon.
“My dad wouldn’t want me to have a boy sleep over,” she said. “But you could come as Heather.”
As she said this, her fingers wound around his spender wrists and one finger began caressing the underside of his forearm, feeling its smooth and soft flesh.
“Okay, Heather,” Mrs. Kwiatkowski said, still using his girl’s name. “I see you’re mom’s here.”
“Thank you,” he said, gathering up his bag, and beginning to leave the house.
“Oh, you didn’t get all your makeup off, Heather,” Stacy’s mother said. “Here’s let’s clean off that eye shadow and lipstick.”
“Oh, that’s OK, mommy can see my like this,” and Lawrence pranced out the door to greet his mother. He ran gleefully to the car, waving back at the girls who watched him in wonder: how could a boy be so pretty?
He opened the door, sitting down as a girl would, placing his bottom on the seat and then bringing his feet in, placing them squarely on the floor, his hands folded in his lap after he fastened the seat belt.
“How did it go, Lawrence?” she asked as they begin driving home.
“Oh mommy,” he said, using a term he hadn’t used in years; usually it was “mom.” “It was fun, mommy. We girls had a ball.”
“We girls?”
“Yes, mommy, I was Heather all the time, and they all liked me as Heather. I was a girl, just like them. Isn’t that just so … ah … so nice.”
“I guess.”
“And they all said I was the prettiest, mommy. Do you think they’re right about that?”
She snuck a glance at him as she drove.
“Well, with that makeup still on, honey, you do look quite pretty.”
“You know, mommy, I could have brought Daisy,” he said. “Some of the other girls brought their bunnies and stuff.”
He grew silent; finally his mother said: “What is, dear?”
“Mommy, I’m not a girl.” His eyes began to fill with tears. “Why is it, mommy, that I’m happy when I’m a girl, playing with the girls?
They were silent as his mother entered the driveway, and Lawrence began crying. His one night as a girl was over, and he felt so bad. What was to happen now?
As she stopped the car, she took his hands in hers, and held them for a minute. She looked at her son, smiled, removed one hand and brushed a few strands of light brown hair from his face.
“I know, honey, I know,” she said, finally, and he knew she understood. He forced a smile and the two left the car and entered the house. He was, for that moment, his mother’s daughter.
*****
By the time his father got home that night, Lawrence, with his mother’s help, removed any sign of Heather. He had taken a long shower, washed his hair and removed the nail polish from his toes and fingers. He put on a tee shirt with a Green Bay Packer logo and a pair of shorts, plus his running shoes.
“I don’t know what we’ll do with your hair, honey,” his mother said. “You really should get it cut, if you’re going to continue to keep your father happy.”
“I know, mom,” he said, lightly running his fingers through his hair. He admitted to himself, as he looked in the mirror, that with his long, flowing hair, his fairly high cheekbones and full lips that he looked very much like a girl.
“You like how that looks, right, Lawrence?” his mother asked, knowing full well the answer.
“Pretty,” he said, giving out with a tiny giggle.
“Oh you’re a tease, Lawrence,” she said. “Now, let’s tie that hair in a ponytail, since lots of boys wear their hair that way.”
He agreed, and when they finished, his mother said, “I don’t know. You still look so girly.”
“I guess.”
“I just noticed, Lawrence, you had your eyebrows trimmed last night, didn’t you?”
He nodded. “Don’t you like it?”
“God, I hope you father doesn’t notice.”
*****
Fortunately for Lawrence, his father was working many overtime hours that summer, the travel season having gone into full swing. Also his union work was becoming more intense, as the negotiations with the airlines struggled along. He returned many nights after eight, and was content to have Lawrence prepare his supper, swig a few beers, watch some baseball on television and fall asleep.
Strangely, he said nothing about Lawrence doing “girl’s work,” and seemed appreciative to the boy’s attention and efforts at making supper.
“This is terrific, honey,” his father said one night, using the term “honey” for Lawrence.
The boy nodded, wondering how his father came to call him “honey.” Perhaps, it just slipped out of his mouth without thinking. His father didn’t say it sarcastically as his did in the past, but just in a matter-of-fact way.
“Did your mom make it?”
“No, daddy,” he said, using the “daddy” for the first time in years to address his father. “I did. It’s a Creole recipe I found, and I added a few things. You really like it? I was so afraid you wouldn’t.”
“Lawrence, I do. It’s marvelous.”
His father smiled at him.
“Thank you daddy,” he said, again blushing as he realized his used a term of endearment usually reserved for young children or girls.
“Well, son, your father’s got to make some calls for the union,” he said, getting up from the table. “Your father appreciates all you are doing to fix his supper and all. I’m sure you’re not having much fun. I’ll be in my office.”
His father retreated to his basement office, which he set up after he was elected President of his local union. Along with the overtime hours, his father spent many hours in his office, making phone calls. It seems there was a strike possible, and his father was busy calling members and other officers developing strategies and winning support for the union’s cause.
As his father left, Lawrence was tempted to say: “Daddy I’m having the best time, fixing your supper and cleaning up and pretending I’m a housewife.”
Instead he was smiled, put on a frilly apron, brushed his hair and tended to the dishes, singing softly in a high, sweet voice. He knew the house would be spic-and-span by the time his mother returned from her summer school evening teaching duties.
*****
Most afternoons that summer, Lawrence biked over to Stacy’s house, where the two merely hung out in her room, or took side bike trips. It was also time when Lawrence was able to dress as Heather since Mrs. Kwiatkowski — apparently with the agreement of Lawrence’s mother — had set aside girl’s clothes for the boy to wear.
During those few hours, he was Heather. Sometimes, Wendy joined them as well. On several occasions, Mrs. Kwiatkowski took the three of them to the mall, where Lawrence skipped and pranced along as Heather, usually wearing shorts and a tank top, with hair flowing freely. They giggled, flirted with the boys and ogled fashions on display.
“Hey, Heather, hi,” a voice sounded urgently as the three were shopping one Saturday in mid-July. They were on the second level of the Brookside Mall, having just left the food court.
At first Lawrence ignored the call, but Stacy poked him, saying: “Heather, that’s you he’s yelling at.”
Lawrence turned to see Will, the boy he’d met at the pool a few weeks earlier. He was approaching with his friend, Jonathan, who had also hailed Stacy.
The five teenagers stood around awkwardly for a minute, before Stacy broke the silence, pointing to Wendy to ask: “Did you boys know Wendy?”
They nodded in the girl’s direction, and Wendy responded with a scowl, moving closer to Lawrence, as if to block Will’s pending move to Lawrence’s side.
“Hi Will,” Lawrence responded shyly, permitting Wendy to come between the two of them.
“I was hoping to see you again, Heather,” the boy said, trying to maneuver so he could speak more directly to Lawrence. Wendy moved each time to block the attempt.
The threesome soon engaged in small talk, while Stacy and Jonathan began a more earnest conversation, moving to a vacant bench in the passageway.
Abruptly, Wendy said in a firm tone. “Come on, we gotta go.”
Her insistence finally paid off, and the girls left the two boys standing rather sadly in the mall’s hallway, with Will pleading: “Heather, can I call you?”
Lawrence waved back, an excited girlish wave, as if to show his (Heather’s) continued interest in the boy. Finally, he blew a kiss in the boy’s direction, as Wendy angrily grabbed his arm.
It was not the first time Wendy got testy with Lawrence. It happened when he flirted with some boys, or when some boy seemed to take extra interest in Heather.
“Nice girls don’t do that, Heather,” she said, still holding his upper arm hard.
“Ouch, you’re hurting me,” he said.
“You shouldn’t flirt like that,” she said. “You’re supposed to be a nice girl.”
Lawrence was puzzled by the girl’s reactions. All three of them had been flirting, and he couldn’t figure out why she was questioning him about it. He noticed that she also was staying close to him in the mall, often touching him, even holding his hands. He liked the feeling he had to admit.
Later, after Wendy was gone, Stacy asked: “What’s this with you and Wendy?”
“What’s what?”
“It’s like she’s your girl friend,” Stacy said, her face a bit red.
“I don’t know. We’re just friends,” he said. “I don’t know why she got so mad at me earlier.”
“She’s probably jealous,” Stacy finally said. “You were getting all the looks from boys.”
“I guess.”
Lawrence thought back to the pajama party, and the close attention Wendy paid to him that night, the urging that the two become “girl friends.” It dawned on him, that Wendy was seriously in love with him, or rather in love with Heather. Was it possible that Wendy was lesbian? He had recently learned about girls being lesbian, and Wendy’s insistence that she liked him “as a girl” might be explained by her sexual orientation.
*****
With his father’s time after supper being spent mainly on his union work, Lawrence found the after-supper time to be bleak. A few times, he did bike over to Stacy’s, particularly in June and early July when the sun didn’t set until well after 9 p.m. He had to get home before dark, according to his father’s stern warning; many nights, however, Stacy was not home, usually playing softball somewhere.
Lawrence had yet to find another boy with whom to chum around with; he hated going to the playground, knowing full well he’d be asked to do some “boy” stuff, like play ball or shoot baskets, both of which he performed dismally, and usually to the taunts of “pussy boy,” “faggot” or even “girl.”
Instead, he often found a book and curled up on the backyard outdoor lounge (the family had a modest barbecue area marked out with two chairs and a lounge). He currently was reading another “Traveling Pants” series book, following the adventures of the girls intensively. Often, his mind would wander, and he’d be dreaming he was one of the girls, reliving their fictional lives. He was glad his mother was not home yet from her waitressing job since he knew she’d yell at him for sitting “like a girl.” He had yet to tell her that when he sat like that, he was most comfortable, and it felt most natural.
Also, he noticed that when he fancied himself as a girl, with his thighs tucked under him, his penis grew hard. He wondered as he read romantic parts of books what it would feel like to be hugged and kissed by a boy; that was when his penis grew even harder.
It wasn’t much of a penis, as he knew from his awful experiences in locker rooms for gym class. Other boys not only had muscular bodies, but they had huge (in his mind) male parts, totally unlike his own. Lawrence felt he was the most pathetic example of boyhood in the school, although if he’d taken time to look around a bit more, he’d find there were others very much like him.
“Why do I have to be a boy?” he wondered so often to himself. “I’m no good as a boy.”
So he dreamed of being a girl. Maybe a girl, like Mary in Pride and Prejudice.
*****
“Lawrence, there’s a girl on the phone for you,” his father yelled from the house.
Lawrence looked up from his reading, a bit shocked, and he noticed a smile on his father’s face, realizing that his father may be feeling “there’s hope for the boy yet,” since he was getting a call from a girl.
“Hi Heather,” said the voice. It was Wendy.
“Hi, Wendy.”
“I was wondering. My dad is taking me on a camping trip for a few days, along with his girl friend.”
“Yes?”
“He said I could bring another girl along.”
“Oh?”
“And . . . ah . . . I wonder if you’d come as Heather? Would you? It’d be fun.”
Wendy gushed out the last few words, obviously somewhat embarrassed to inviting him as a girl.
“I don’t know, Wendy. They’ll find out.”
“No, Heather. They won’t. I told them all about you.”
“All?”
“No, not that you’re a boy. Just how cute your are and smart and all that.”
“I don’t know. I’ll have to ask my parents.”
“I know.”
The two continued talking for another 30 minutes; it was mainly small talk with a little bit of gossip added. Lawrence realized it was “girl talk,” and he found it so easy and natural. He found himself giggling, his voice growing more and more high-pitched, until his mother yelled: “Lawrence, who are you talking too? That’s gone on long enough.”
“Mom wants me to hang up, Wendy.”
“Oh,” she said, disappointed. “I love to talk to you . . . ah . . . Heather.”
Lawrence let out a quiet giggle, smothering it into the phone. He loved being called “Heather.”
“You’re like my best girl friend,” she said.
“I guess,” Lawrence said, half embarrassed by the statement, and half pleased.
He loved the idea of the camping trip, but it scared him. And, he realized, he was growing more and more wary of Wendy’s strong affection for him as a girl.
“Who were you talking to, honey?” his mother asked.
“Oh,” he said, faking a nonchalance that he didn’t feel. “That was Wendy, just a girl.”
“A girl, calling you?” his father asked.
“Yes, Larry,” his mother interjected. “What’s so strange?”
“Nothing, I guess,” his father said. “It’s nice he has friends.”
His father’s face reddened and Lawrence Jr. realized his father was feeling some pride in the fact that his son may have manly appeal that a girl might like. The boy was pleased his father enjoyed the idea, but he realized he was living on false pretenses. What would he do if he found out Lawrence was being invited to camping trip as a girl?
Lawrence's natural loveliness permits him to continue living a girl's life and he takes a chance to go with another girl's family on a camping trip as a 'girl friend;' Lawrence continues to worry about his father's reactions.
Chapter Five: The Camping Trip and Revelation
His mother looked in on him that night, as he was getting ready for bed, having donned his boy pajamas with the Green Bay Packer logo. He had spent some moments in the bathroom primping, playing with his hair and admiring how cute he looked. He wished he could have worn nighties as he did at Stacy’s, but knew his mother was trying to hide her husband from noticing his growing girliness.
The eyebrows, truly, were a giveaway; if his father cared to look at him closely, he would notice they had been trimmed away, leaving just thin strands of light hair. His cheekbones seemed to hold a high profile, adding to the feminine look, along with his rather full lips. His neck was thin, and with no noticeable Adam’s apple.
As he looked in the mirror, his shoulders thin and arms slender and smooth, he could see only a girl, not even an effeminate boy. Just a girl. Even in the boy’s pajamas, he could only see a girl. It was exciting. He remembered how he looked in the swim suit, and how much he was admired as if he was all girl.
He lay in bed that night, wondering if Wendy was right, that he could spend a weekend as Heather with her father and his girl friend and not be discovered. From what he saw in the mirror, he thought it could be done!
The next morning he told his mother about Wendy’s invitation; she balked at the idea, particularly when told that Wendy and he would likely share the small tent together while her father and his friend would be alone in the main tent.
“But, mom,” he protested. “Wendy doesn’t want me as a boy. I told you that.”
“Well, it’s strange all the same dear,” his mother said, her tone soft and gentle. “I just don’t like the idea of two 13 year olds sleeping together, even if the boy thinks he’s a girl. You still have your penis and I know you’ve begun to experience it.”
“Oh mom,” he said. “Not much.”
It was true. Lawrence had only recently begun to masturbate; it happened for the first time in bed one morning, when he awoke and begun to feel the softness of his upper left arm, using his right hand, imagining himself a girl. His penis grew hard between his thighs, and his mind moved into a fantasy that he was a pretty teen girl. All of a sudden, without warning, his thigh was wet with sticky white substance; it scared him at first until he realized that he was doing what he was told was “masturbating.” Fortunately he captured most of the moisture in his pajama bottoms.
His parents had permitted him to participate in a special class in school which included explicit sex education, helping young teens to understand their bodies.
Momentarily, this first experience puzzled him. Did it mean he was a boy after all? He hated the idea; girls, he had been told, had a different experience.
Lawrence had three more cases of masturbation since then; and, he realized, they all developed when he was picturing himself as a girl.
“Am I weird?” he asked himself. “I only do this when I think I’m a girl.”
In the end, his mother, after a call to Wendy’s father, agreed to the camping trip; she became convinced in her call that the father thought of her son only as “Heather, a girl friend of Wendy’s from school.” He assured his mother that Wendy, also an “A” student like Lawrence, was responsible and that his girl friend was also a responsible person; she’s a “flight attendant, Mrs. Collins, and very well-respected.”
“We’ll tell your dad that it’s a camping trip with several friends,” she said. “I hate to lie, but he’ll have a fit if he knows you’re going to be a girl for a weekend.”
*****
Lawrence had never been camping in his young life, and the prospect of sleeping on the ground — even though he was in a sleeping bag — seemed “yucky” to him. Would there be bugs on him? Maybe a mouse or squirrel nibbling on his ears?
His squeamish behavior would be normal for a 13-year-old girl, and Wendy found his girlish squeals to be “cute.”
“You’re such a girl,” she teased him the first night in the tent.
“But I think something’s biting me now on my leg,” Lawrence said, his voice in high register and whiny. He tweaked his right calf with the toes of his left foot, hoping to relieve the itch.
Wendy giggled, and Lawrence added: “It’s not funny. Maybe it’s a wasp.”
“Get out of your sleeping bag, girl,” Wendy demanded. “It’s stuffy in here, and we can sleep on top of my bag, and use yours for a cover if it gets cold later.”
He did as she commanded, and soon the two were lying on their tummies, looking at each other, almost touching. Wendy had examined his leg and using the flashlight found no evidence of a bug or a bite; she did use the opportunity to run her hands along the slender calf of his leg, an action that excited Lawrence, causing his penis to swell.
Both were wearing flannel pajamas, Wendy’s being light blue with floral designs and Lawrence in pink with bunnies running across the top. Wendy was hugging “Bouncy,” her favorite bunny and Lawrence with “Daisy,” the well-worn poodle doll.
Lawrence, now becoming “Heather” in all but physical reality, found comfort in being close to this strong young girl. He loved her sinewy arms and legs, so beautifully formed and proportioned, and soon found his hands caressing her bicep as the two lay together, talking softly into the night. He felt her hands later caressing his slender arms, his softness and weakness now making him feel so totally female.
After a while, Lawrence heard footsteps outside the tent, and a tentative voice ask: “You two girls doing OK?”
“Yes, Tricia,” Wendy responded to the voice of her father’s girl friend. “We’re just talking.”
“OK, girls. Your dad, Wendy, says you two should get your sleep,” Tricia added. “You know we got a canoeing trip tomorrow?”
“Yes, Tricia. We know.”
“And Heather, you doing OK?” Tricia’s voice continued. “I know this is your first time in the woods.”
Lawrence, who had been worried the woman would come in the tent and see the two of them so close together, merely said a tentative “Yes ma’am.”
“Good night, girls,” Tricia voice came, followed by her footsteps, crunching on the twigs and gravel that covered the forest floor.
“Do you like my dad’s girl friend?” Wendy asked, once they were sure Tricia had left.
“She seems cool,” he replied. “Don’t you like her?”
“Well she’s not my mom, but she’s OK. I miss my mom so much, Heather. But Trisha has been nice to me.”
Lawrence sensed in the darkness that his friend was beginning to tear up; soon he heard quiet sobs, and he reached over to her, drawing her tightly to his chest. Wendy sobbed into his chest, her tears wetting the front of his pajamas. Lawrence knew that Wendy still reflected to her mother and her death when she was seven. He felt so content at that moment, knowing that he could provide comfort to another person. He knew that sweet feeling came from the fact that he was being accepted as a girl, at least for this weekend. Earlier, his penis had grown hard, but as they lay together, it soon softened and he found sweetness in being together with another girl, as a girl. They talked no more, and soon were asleep in each other’s arms.
*****
For Lawrence, the canoe trip began as a disaster; he stumbled as he was pulling the canoe into the water, falling totally into the water and getting his shorts and top wet, losing his pink baseball cap in the process. As it floated down the west fork of the Chippewa River, he tried vainly to catch it, only to fall again.
The others laughed as he got himself up, the wet purple girl’s tee-shirt plastered to his skin, showing the tiny mounds of breasts and nipples in a damp outline.
“You’ll be ok, Heather,” yelled Tricia, as she came over to assist him out of the water. “It’s a warm day and you’ll dry off quickly.”
To make matters worse, his first time in a canoe was scary. “It’s so tippy,” he complained in his girlish voice to Wendy.
“That’s OK, Heather, I’ll keep it steady. Just step in.”
Finally Lawrence managed to get in the front of the canoe, and waited for Wendy to step into the back. The current of the river, still swollen from early June rains, made it difficult at times to steer, but soon Lawrence got the hang of it, realizing that Wendy at the rear was truly in command of the canoe and that he, being in the front, could do little harm.
The four were in two canoes, with Wendy’s father and girl friend leading the way in their canoe.
“What a fun day?” Lawrence exclaimed when they returned to the campsite. “Thank you Mr. Hoskins and Tricia, for letting me join you.”
“We’re glad you could come,” Tricia replied, announcing that it was Wendy and Heather’s turn to make lunch.
“I’m no good at it,” Wendy complained. “I’ll just poison you all.”
“Remember, Wendy, you said you’d share the chores on this trip,” her father said. “Now get to it.”
“But, daddy,” Wendy began to argue.
“Let’s do it, Wendy,” Lawrence interjected. “We’ll fix ‘em a good one.”
“That’s a good girl,” her father said. “Heather’s setting a good example for you, Wendy. It’s great you have such a nice girl friend, Wendy?”
Wendy gave a cold stare to Lawrence, no doubt for his playing the “good girl” before her father. Lawrence reddened not feeling at ease with the attention he was getting; so far, the charade that he was “Heather” was going well, but closer scrutiny may cause that to end.
“Oh, daddy, you know how much I help around the house,” Wendy said.
“I do, honey,” Wendy’s father replied. “And dad’s grateful to you. It’s just that I like Heather’s attitude, and she’s so sweet. When did you two become friends?”
“She’s been around, daddy, only we were never good friends until I spent time with her at Stacy’s PJ party.”
“Well Heather, we’re so happy you’re with us,” her father said as Heather and Wendy began to make lunch.
“I’ll get the fire started,” volunteered Tricia, as she went to the grill to fire up the wood.
The two were to fry potatoes and fish the group had caught, mainly small panfish, along with one nice walleyed pike. Wendy’s father had insisted that the two girls, who caught the fish, had to clean them too. “Those who catch them must clean them.”
Lawrence, as Heather, was timid in the chore, calling it “uckky.” He was sincerely revolted by seeing the fillets trimmed off the frame of the fish, some of them still twitching with blood spewing as they went under the assault of the fish knife.
“That’s awful, the poor fish,” Lawrence said, his tone one of shock.
“You’re such a girl,” Wendy said with a laugh as she tackled the project with zeal, showing Lawrence how to properly fillet a fish.
The U.S. Forest Service campsite was outfitted with a grill and picnic table; but otherwise there were no amenities. A public bathroom with cold water showers was available for use by all campers about 300 yards away. Lawrence and Wendy usually trekked to the women’s room when the need arose together; fortunately, the women’s room had individual stalls so that Lawrence could pee in private, but the room was always filled with other women and girls, many standing about in only panties and bras as they sometimes washed undies in the washroom sink, in spite of signs saying: “Please do not wash clothes here. Use Susie’s Laundromat on Highway 77 in town.”
Trish was a tallish, well-groomed woman in her late 30s, and in spite of the rough amenities of the campsite managed to look like she stepped out of an L. L. Bean catalog. She wore her medium length light brown hair in a bun while on the trip, and put on no makeup, yet you could see she was a beautiful woman. Her body, too, was a picture of health, toned and without any fat.
She wore Capri pants and a tee-shirt, saying “Central States Airlines: Unfair.” Lawrence saw the same tee-shirt on his own father, indicating that Trish, too, must be a union activist. He knew she was a flight attendant, and that, heaven forbid, she might even know his father.
“Heather Collins?” Trish began, as she stoked the wood, causing sparks to fly, “Are you any relation to Larry Collins.”
Lawrence who was cutting the potatoes at the time, said simply. “Yes, he’s my father.”
The minute the words left his mouth Lawrence wished he could have them back, swallowing them forever.
“Larry’s a great guy,” Trish continued. “He’s really been good for the unions at the Airlines.”
Lawrence nodded, and tried to concentrate on the chore of preparing the potatoes for the frypan.
Trish continued to talk about how she knew Larry Collins from the union coordinating group, which the various unions representing the Central States Airlines workers had formed. It turned out that Trish was the lead representative for the flight attendants and knew the senior Lawrence quite well from the union work.
“I didn’t know Larry had a daughter,” she said finally. “He’s only talked about his son.”
“Oh, I guess,” Lawrence said, speaking softly, tentatively, hoping the subject would go away.
“Well, he’s got a lovely young daughter, Trish,” Wendy’s father said simply.
It was apparent that Wendy’s father, Paul Hoskins, whose management job with the airlines, was both jealous of Trish’s warm talk about Lawrence’s father and her deep involvement in the unions.
“Let’s get that meal going, girls,” he said.
Mercifully, the topic of Lawrence’s father was ended, but he could see the puzzled look grow on Trish’s face.
*****
Later that afternoon, Wendy and her father left for a few minutes to get more firewood, leaving Lawrence alone at the campsite with Trish.
He was sitting on a picnic bench, his legs tucked under him in typical teen girl fashion, reading “Pride and Prejudice.” He wore denim shorts and a tank top, with his hair tied in pigtails. Trish, too, was reading, a popular best seller that was currently on the Oprah reading list, “The Story of Edgar Sawtelle,” a fascinating novel of a deaf 14-year-old boy who lives in the Wisconsin northwoods.
“You reading that for school?” Trish asked.
“No, I like the book,” he answered.
“Oh I did too, must have read it a half dozen times,” she volunteered.
“Me too,” he volunteered.
“Why do you like it, dear?”
“Oh, I guess I like reading about a family of all girls.”
“That is neat,” Trish agreed. “Would you like to have been a girl back then?”
“I don’t know, life was more difficult, I guess, but I think girls were so much more feminine then. I like that.”
“Don’t you believe girls or women are equal to men and can do the same jobs?”
“Oh yes, Miss Kendrick,” he replied using Trish’s last name. “I believe in women’s rights, but I just like women to still be kind of dainty and feminine.”
“You mean like you?”
Lawrence blushed, wondering where this was headed. He was worried and tried to turn his attention back to the book.
He saw Trish close her book, and reach across the table touching Lawrence’s arm, a gentle touch.
“Darling, you may call me Trish, by the way, and you know what I think?”
He shook his head in a negative motion.
“I think there’s a sweet boy hiding underneath Heather.”
Lawrence said nothing; he looked down at his book, as if to ignore the comment. He knew she figured it out: that he was Lawrence Collins, Jr., not Heather.
All he could do was cry. His body shook as he tried to hold back the sobs and tears, but it was to no avail; soon he realized the woman was next to him, holding him tightly in her arms, welcoming his sobbing face onto her shoulders as she patted his head gently. The two sat together, rocking gently as Lawrence cried and cried.
“Don’t tell dad,” Lawrence finally said, as the crying subsided.
“We need to talk some more about this,” she said.
“No, don’t tell him, he’ll kill me. And don’t tell Mr. Hoskins.”
“Oh my darling,” Trish said, drawing him closer, letting him sob again. “Tell me all about what you feel, my darling. We’ll figure out what to do and how to tell.”
Lawrence told how he so often felt he should have been born a girl, how much he enjoyed doing girl things and how he wanted to be a pretty girl. He told her how out of place he felt in the boys’ world, how inept he was at sports and how frightened he was of trying to live up to his father’s expectations that his only son would be a strong, masculine lad who would marry and eventually father children.
Before he finished talking, Wendy and her father returned from the lake.
“What’s going on here?” Paul Hoskins asked. He had obviously noticed that Trish was holding Lawrence in her arms and that “Heather” had been crying.
“Heather and I need to keep talking about something, Paul,” Trish replied.
“What? Is she sick?”
“No, Paul, it’s personal. Just let us walk to the beach, she and I. We’ll be back soon.”
Lawrence saw that Wendy looked perplexed, and he gave a tentative nod to her. He saw the girl nod back, followed by some terror in her eyes. Lawrence knew that Wendy suspected that Trish had learned their secret that Heather was really Lawrence Collins, Jr.
*****
“Honesty is always the best policy,” Trish said after she and Lawrence found a quiet spot on the fishing dock. Being mid-afternoon, and sunny, there were no persons fishing, knowing the unlikelihood of catching anything in the brightness of the day.
“I know, Trish, but I felt I had to lie, and I know I shouldn’t be here as Heather, lying to you and Wendy’s daddy.”
“Yes, it is a lie, isn’t it?”
He nodded.
“What do you think we should do?” Trish asked.
“I don’t know,” Lawrence replied, although he knew what the answer should be.
“You do know, Heather,” Trish said. “You know we need to do one thing first: tell Paul about this. He needs to know his daughter was sleeping with a boy.”
“Oh no, Trish. No. We didn’t do anything? Really we didn’t. Just hugged each other like we were girl friends and giggled.”
“I know that honey, but it still looks bad. I’ll make sure Paul understands your situation. He’s a good man, dear.”
“I know he is. He’s been so good to me and this has been the best weekend ever, until now.”
Lawrence leaned closer to Trish, who took his hand and held it. He felt so dainty and feminine sitting next to her.
“Then, I’m going to call your mother and tell her she should tell your father, and tell her I will help make sure that your father understands.”
“He’ll never understand,” Lawrence said. “He hates me for being a sissy.”
“No, he doesn’t hate you, dear. He’s told me how helpful you are around the house and how you do his meals. He loves you dear. Once he understands, he’ll love you more.”
Lawrence nodded, but wasn’t sure that Trish was correct about his father.
*****
After Paul Hoskin’s initial shock that “Heather” was really Lawrence Collins Jr., he settled down. He knew about transgendered children, he said, having seen a news report recently on such situations, and thus was not too surprised.
“But, what I hate is the deception, the dishonesty, and from my own daughter,” he railed at Wendy.
“It was my idea,” Lawrence said, trying to defend his friend.
“No daddy,” Wendy said. “I urged her to come as Heather. I like her; she’s my best girl friend, daddy.”
“But she’s not a girl!” he exclaimed.
“She should be,” Wendy replied.
“But she’s not. She’s a . . . or . . . he is a boy.”
They all agreed that for the second and last night of the trip, Lawrence would sleep with Wendy’s father and Trish and Wendy would share the small tent. Lawrence, of course, had no male clothes and he would remain dressed as Heather for the rest of the trip. Other than the sleeping arrangements, he was treated as Heather, a sensitive, dainty girl.
In the tent, as he tried to sleep that night, Lawrence stifled the temptation to cry; it was true: Mr. Hoskins had been kind to him since the revelation, stating only that he found it hard to understand, but he soon followed that with words of praise for the boy, ironically calling him “Heather,” several times. He praised the boy’s eagerness to work and cooperate; he noted that Wendy said that he was a top student, and then asked Lawrence: “Was she telling the truth about that?”
“Yes, Mr. Hoskins,” Lawrence replied.
He laughed, adding: “Well I must say you’re quite a girl. Now let’s get some sleep.”
Soon Lawrence heard his host’s steady breathing, indicating he was sound asleep; Lawrence laid on his side, massaging his soft body with his right hand, thinking alternately of the previous night with Wendy and then about how his father would react when the truth came out. Would he be as understanding as Mr. Hoskins?
As he pondered the thought, he wondered if he could somehow run away, plotting all sorts of schemes until sleep came.
Chapter Six: A Father’s Discovery
As president of Local 125 of the Airline Employees Union, Larry Collins had an office within the air terminal, where he spent 25% of his workday in time paid for by the union. There, he handled union problems from the job, conferred with stewards and members who may have grievances, discussed work place issues with his management counterparts and even handled various personal problems, such as a worker facing garnishments or alcoholism issues.
On the week before his son’s camping trip, Collins hosted his regular weekly stewards meeting, an hour-long session held to share problems and grievances. He hated these meetings, because too often they constituted ‘gripe sessions’; mercifully they were held during the last hour of the day shift as part of the labor contract with the airline. The stewards therefore kept the meetings brief hoping to end on time and head for home, the tavern or wherever.
“I got a delicate one, Larry,” commented Tracy Elton, who was the steward for the crews that cleaned and stocked the planes during lay-overs. Tracy stayed after the meeting ended, and Larry led the steward, a middle-aged, matronly woman, to his office.
“I got a member, one of the cleaners, who wants to come to work as a woman now,” Tracy began.
“Oh, and this member? He’s a guy?”
“Yes, Jimmy McCulloch. You know him? He’s the slender blonde guy with the long hair.”
Larry thought for a moment; there were 980 members in his local union, but he took pride in hoping to know all of them. His political future for re-election as president depended upon knowing his members.
“Oh, yes. I’ve worked with him. Our mechanics like him. He wants to be a woman? Here?”
“Yes, he came to me in tears yesterday,” she explained. “I had noticed he had been wearing some strange outfits to work, but didn’t say much. He’s young and you know how kids are today.”
“Yes,” Larry nodded. “But we wear uniforms here? Male and female not much different.”
“I know, but he still feels he should be able to adopt his female name, Jessica, wear the woman’s outfit and use women’s bathrooms.”
“God, is he some kind of faggot? With all the problems we got in negotiations, why do we have to deal with this?”
“Larry, don’t be too harsh on the guy . . . ah . . . girl. She explains she’s under treatment for being a transexual.”
The steward said the worker had explained to her that he had felt like a girl all of his life and that it had become painful to “pretend to be a boy or man.”
“It’s a real deal, Larry,” Tracy said. “These people can’t help themselves and many commit suicide over it.”
“I’ll check it out,” he said.
Larry Collins did check it out, even sharing the issue with his counterparts in the monthly joint bargaining council meetings where the leadership of the five unions representing workers at the Airlines met to share common causes and coordinate bargaining strategies. Trish Hendricks attended these meetings and reminded the group of the pilot whom she knew of in Iraq that committed suicide over a gender issue.
That night Larry had trouble sleeping, his mind turning over the coming concern of whether he would have to lead his union members to a strike or if he might find a way to avoid it while protecting their rights. There were no easy answers.
Then his mind turned to another problem, that of Jimmy McCulloch who wanted to become Jessica McCulloch. And that got him to wondering about his own son.
*****
“I knew we’d have to face this soon or later,” his mother said to Lawrence the afternoon after the camping trip. She found him in his room at his computer, wearing pink shorts and a lavender girl’s tee shirt with the words “Girls Rock” and looking very girlish. He was online, but only aimlessly looking at the screen, still worried about the incident during the camping trip.
“What, mom?” he asked turning his head and flicking hair out of his eyes.
“We’re going to have to tell your father.”
“About what?”
“You know damned well what,” his mother’s voice raised in anger, a rarity for her.
“I know I guess. Trish called you.”
“Yes, Miss Kendrick called me. She found you out, and she advises us to tell your dad about Heather.”
“I know, mom, and I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have gone camping.”
“And I have been wrong to let you go and to go as a girl. I’ve been so wrong to let you be Heather. I encouraged you. I am so wrong, otherwise you could have been a boy your dad would have been proud of.”
“Mommy, mommy, I can’t be a boy. Never. Never.”
He got out of his chair and ran to his mother, engulfing himself in her arms as she stood at the doorway. He laid his head upon her shoulders, his cries growing louder and louder.
His mother held him, and she began crying as well. Lawrence felt comfort in the arms of his mother. Never had he felt so weak and fragile as he did at this moment, his puny body shuddering in sobs in the arms of his mother.
“I can’t be a boy, mother,” he said through his sobs. “I just love being a girl; I feel so good as a girl.”
“Honey, we’ll have to tell your father, you know,” she said after his sobbing subsided.
Lawrence nodded, as if in unbelief. How could they tell he father?
“I know mommy, and he’ll try to make me into a boy, I know it. I can’t mommy. I can’t be a boy; I’ll hate myself.”
She held her son, soon finding him calming down.
“Your father’s an understanding man, dear, and he’s not stupid,” she said, but Lawrence could feel that his mother did not necessarily believe the words she was saying. He did remember that his father had been fun and kind to him until his girliness had become apparent in recent years.
“Now, your father will be home in a few minutes,” she said. “Go to your room, dress in something boyish, and take all the makeup and polish off. Just stay in your room until I come get you.”
“Ok, mother,” he said, noticing the tenseness in her manner.
“I’m going to have to tell your father everything now,” she said. “And, I don’t know how he’ll take it. It’s best you stay out of sight.”
“Oh mother, I’m so sorry I brought all this on. Why couldn’t I have been a real boy, just like dad wanted? I so disappointed him.”
He got up and kissed her lightly, and she held him tightly to her for a moment, speaking softly. “No honey, I’m sure you haven’t disappointed, and he’ll appreciate you, if not now, eventually. Really, my dear. He does love you.”
*****
Lawrence put on a pair of blue jeans, a light tan polo shirt and New Balance running shoes; all very boyish stuff. He went to his computer, trying to concentrate on a game; he had found Bridge online to be a particularly fascinating game, but his anxious feelings ruined his attempts at concentration, giving it up as a fruitless effort. So, he lay on his bed, wondering how his father was reacting, wondering what was in store for him.
His mind wandered, but always into dreams of being a girl. He turned over onto his side, his right hand landing upon his slender upper left arm, and he marveled at how thin and soft it was. So girlish. He imagined Heather in a prom gown, her shoulders exposed, so white and smooth, and walking alongside Will, who was wearing a huge smile, knowing he had snagged the prettiest girl in school for his prom date.
He had tucked his penis between his thighs; it had grown hard in his musings. Yet, he wished it were gone, replaced by the nice convex curves of a girl’s crotch. He imagined the lovely ‘y’ contours of smooth white flesh, covered with light blondish hair. His imaginings grew ever more intense as his pictured himself carrying a child into full pregnancy, his ballooning belly a picture of beauty. He remembers Sally Penders, the young woman who moved in across the street, and her pregnancy. He felt a strange envy as he watched her advance toward childbirth. What indeed is more enchanting than a fully pregnant woman, whose joy at giving life radiates from her smiles?
His reverie became tearful: never, never, would he be able to carry a child, to be a mother, to be a lovely woman great with child.
What cruel joke had been played? In all ways, he was female, a girl; except, of course, he had a penis and no vagina and no hopes of ever carrying a child. He could dress pretty and look like a girl, but never would he be a total woman.
His musings had taken him away from the fear that his father was to be furious over his feminine activities; yet, as his tears began to subside, he began to wonder what was happening as his mother revealed his secret to his father. Strangely, he heard no raised voices, no shouts and no one being beaten. Still that didn’t stifle the fear that his father would be furious, not only with himself but also with his mother.
He felt terribly concerned now that he had forced his mother into a position of defending him; he loved his mother so much and he hated what that she was forced into dealing with his gender difficulties.
*****
There was a knock at the door. Three light taps, followed by the words of his mother: “Heather, Heather, may I come in?”
“Heather?” His mother said again, and Lawrence was shocked to hear his mother use the female name, particularly since she had asked him to dress as a boy.
“Come in mother,” he said finally, sitting up on the bed, rubbing his eyes with a piece of tissue.
“Have you been crying, honey?” she said, moving to sit next to him.
He shook his head in the affirmative.
She put and arm around his narrow shoulders, drawing him tightly against her, and kissing his forehead, a few strands of hair caught on her lips.
“Nothing to cry about, Heather,” she said.
“Nothing? Dad must be furious, mommy.”
“He is somewhat, dear, but I think he understands.”
“He does? He must be upset with me?”
“No, dear. He loves you, and he’ll always love you. Your father is a good man, dear.”
“Oh mommy,” Lawrence didn’t know whether to cry or laugh.
“Now, dry your tears, and we need to pretty you up, Heather, for your father. He wants to see his daughter.”
“His daughter?” Lawrence asked, not believing his ears.
“Yes, his daughter, darling. He wants to meet Heather.”
“Oh mommy,” he said, throwing himself onto her body, the two ending in a deep hug.
Chapter Seven: Heather Emerges
“Come on honey, you need to decide now what to wear,” Dorothy Collins prodded her daughter.
Heather couldn’t decide what she should wear for her father; at first, she chose a black satin dress with thin shoulder straps, a plunging neckline and short skirt line. It was her favorite, and she knew it portrayed her lovely body to great advantage.
“But I look too slutty, mommy,” she said. “Daddy will be upset.”
“I tried to tell you that,” her mother said. “But you were determined.”
It had been nearly an hour since Dorothy Collins entered the girl’s room to say that Larry Collins Sr. was willing to meet “Heather,” his new daughter. Heather had showered, using a soft, sweet smelling soap, and readied herself for her “debut” as Heather. Her mother helped her brush her long brown hair, turning it into a bob at the back, and bending a hair across her forehead in a cute bang.
Just a few minutes before her father had rapped on the door, telling the two to “hurry up,” Heather decided upon wearing a full floral, pleated skirt that went to the knees, a crá¨me-colored layered blouse with a square bodice and puffed-up short sleeves. She wore coffee-colored thigh-high hose and a pair of black flats with a strap.
“Honey, you look just adorable,” her mother said.
Looking in the mirror, Heather was not impressed. She felt the outfit a bit dowdy and ordinary, but she realized it probably would be best to dress modestly in presenting herself for the first time before her father as Heather.
Her mother sensed Heather’s disappointment, and she reassured the girl that she looked sweet and lovely and, most importantly, totally feminine.
“Really, will daddy like me like this?” Heather asked, running her hand across her forehead in a motion to brush the bangs.
“Yes, dear. He’ll see you for the lovely girl you have always been.”
*****
Even so, Heather was not so sure her father would be pleased to see his onetime son now as a very feminine young lady. She followed her mother into the den, where her father was reading the Saturday morning paper and finishing his coffee.
Heather almost bolted as they approached the den, her stomach churning with anxious concern, but her mother whispered, “He’ll love you, dear.”
“Larry,” Dorothy Collins announced. “I want you to meet Heather, your daughter.”
Heather saw her father get up from the executive’s chair he had behind his desk, an inquisitive look on his face. The girl could see no anger, just puzzlement. Suddenly, standing there just inside the room, she felt exposed, almost naked before her father who had so much wanted a strong athletic boy for a son but now had a slender, almost fragile, girl as a daughter.
“Hi Daddy,” Heather said, tentatively, her voice soft.
Her father said nothing, and Heather reddened as she felt his eyes bore in upon her. She felt like fleeing the room, running away. Her father didn’t like her, she believed at the moment.
“Larry, say something to the girl,” Heather heard her mother plead.
Yet, her father said nothing, continuing to look at Heather, his face blank of expression and showing no sign of either disgust or joy.
“For God’s sake Larry, what do you think?” Dorothy pleaded again.
Standing still as a statue, Heather was at a loss of what to do, as her father examined her with his eyes; were they critical eyes? Or eyes of acceptance?
It seemed like hours, but it may actually have been less than a minute before Larry Collins spoke:
“Come here Heather, give your father a hug and a kiss.”
As he completed the sentence, his face broke into a broad smile.
“Oh daddy,” Heather said, running into his arms.
“I’m so proud of my pretty daughter,” he whispered into her ear after their brief kiss as he held her in his strong arms.
“Really daddy?” Heather asked, as the broke off the hug.
She joined her father on the couch in the den, her mother taking the side chair. Heather folded her legs to one side, her hands in her lap, looking prim and lady-like.
“Heather,” her mother began. “Your father and I agree on one thing and that is for you to be happy and to have a good future.”
“Yes, honey,” her father added. “Your mother tells me how happy you were when you were in your girl mode. And I could see how you struggled to be the boy I thought you should be.”
“Yes, daddy, I feel so much more natural as a girl. I really do. I don’t know why.”
“I know honey,” her father said.
Larry Collins then apologized for the cruelty he had shown to her when she was Lawrence, blaming himself for not recognizing what was so obvious.
“But, I am angry at both you and your mother for one thing,” Larry Collins said, his voice gaining an authoritative tone, which he could so easily develop.
“What Larry?”
“For lying to me all this time. Both of you.”
“We were afraid of how you’d react, Larry, and she was trying so hard to be the boy you had wanted her to be.”
“Yes, daddy, I didn’t want to disappoint you,” Heather said.
“Well, I wasn’t acting too nice during that time, was I?” her father said.
Heather and her mother let his comment pass, recalling how angry he would become in the days when he spent many hours at the Fly Inn, coming home full of beer and anger. In the last year or so, his union responsibilities had grown, as did the change in his personal habits; he rarely drank and was more even tempered.
Heather was puzzled now: what had prompted her father to accept her as his daughter so easily?
She didn’t get an answer to that question right away; instead, she was told she could continue to dress as Heather at home and in visits with her girl friends. Otherwise, she was to continue to be Lawrence Jr. outside the house.
“It’s not so easy for you to become Heather right away,” her mother explained.
“Yes, dear, we need to get you to a specialist to determine your situation, whether you truly are a girl in your mind and being,” her father said. “Then, if that is true, then we need to begin deciding how to make you into that girl physically.”
“I am a girl, daddy, I am. Nobody needs to examine me.”
“I’m afraid they do, because on your birth certificate, you’re Lawrence Jr., a boy, and that’s how you’ll return to school in the fall.”
“Oh daddy, I can’t go to school as a boy.”
“Well, that’s why we need to see a doctor,” her father said. “I’ve looked into this stuff before.”
“Oh?” Heather asked, looking puzzled. “You’ve looked into transgendered people?”
“Yes, dear,” her mother interjected. “Your father found out he has to defend a member of his union who is changing his gender from male to female.”
“And as union representative,” her father explained, “I had to defend his right to begin appearing at work as a woman.”
“Oh, did you like doing that?”
“Not at first,” her father admitted. “I thought he was just a fag and I was kind of disgusted by the whole event, but I had to represent him, or her.”
“Yes, Heather,” her mother added. “Then he talked with the woman, learned how difficult and cruel her life had been as a male. And, he studied up on transgendered stuff and realized it’s a real thing.”
“In fact,” Larry Collins Sr. added. “After handling that case, I began to look at you in a different way, and wondered whether you, my dear daughter, might indeed also be transgendered.”
“Oh daddy,” Heather said, leaning over to kiss him again. “You’re the bestest daddy in the world.”
*****
Heather’s birthday — she was turning 14 — came on the second Tuesday in August, the 10th, and her parents decided it was time for her to have a birthday party.
“It’ll be your first birthday as Heather, my dear,” her mother said. “And we’d like you to invite anybody you want.”
“I know mommy,” she said. The party was still 14 days away, and Heather had been living mainly as a girl for about a month. Her best girl friends, Stacy, Wendy and Althea, knew of the change, but no one else. Around the house now, Heather was always dressed and treated as girl, although sometimes her father slipped, calling her Lawrence, or using the pronoun “he.”
In most ventures out of the house, she still dressed as a boy, the exceptions being when she was going on visits or mall trips with her girl friends. No one, it had become obvious, would ever mistake Heather was anything but a girl, a feminine, dainty girl. And that’s how her friends accepted her.
Heather was completely overwhelmed by her father’s acceptance; in fact, he told her he wanted her to be wearing dresses, not slacks or shorts, when he arrived home for supper.
“I like seeing my pretty daughter,” he told her.
He hugged her every night when he got home, kissing her gently on her forehead, seeming to be proud of her femininity.
Heather loved these moments, and waited in anticipation for her father’s arrival every night, planning his suppers carefully and tastefully, always finding something different and unique. In her mind, Heather felt she was a young housewife, and her father was her husband, a newly married young man who adored her
Yet, her father’s time with her was short-lived each night; after the supper, he retreated to his den where she could hear him on the phone, often arguing but always showing patience with his callers. Some nights he left the house for a union meeting. His union work was becoming overwhelming, and he told Heather that the brief time her spent with her at supper was the best part of his day.
“Daddy,” she told him one night. “Maybe you can take me golfing sometime.”
“Oh darling, I’d like that,” he said. “And I won’t you expect to hit the ball hard, either.”
She giggled: “And I can use women’s clubs?”
“Yes, dear, and you can use the women’s tees, too.”
Heather smiled at that, as she put the chicken cacciatore on the table. Heather really did want to do things with her father now, even golf, where the experience before had been so horrid. As a girl now she was not expected to power hit the ball; she knew her father would be pleased to bring his lovely daughter out to the course, proud of her singular beauty which would be apparent in the cute golf outfit she’d wear.
“Oh daddy, that would be so much fun, and I promise I won’t slow you down,” she said.
“When this strike business is over, honey, I promise I’ll take you golfing, and I’ll be glad to have you hit like a girl.”
*****
“You must wear something special for the birthday party,” her mother said, on the weekend before the event.
Shopping at a popular girls clothing store which offered bargain prices that Saturday, they found a stretchy knit halter dress that featured a knot front with padded cups, empire waist and braided back detail. It would go to mid-thigh, and the deep V-neck exposed the sweet white flesh of Heather’s back and front.
Her mother frowned at first. “It shows so much skin, darling,” she said.
“It looks so cute on your daughter,” the sales clerk, a college-age girl, said. “That’s what all the girls are wearing these days, ma’am.”
“I know, but she’s only going to be 14 next week, and that’s so . . . ah . . . revealing. I don’t want any boys around so soon,” Dorothy Collins said.
“Mom!” Heather said, exasperated with her mother’s stated concerns.
“Oh ma’am, I understand your worries. But, your daughter has a lovely figure, and this dress looks so sweet on her,” the clerk continued. “This is a modest dress, compared to some.”
They finally chose the dress, though Dorothy Collins was still not convinced it was modest enough and that her pretty daughter was still naíve about the stuff of life and how her attractive body would lure boys and men.
*****
Except for her father, Heather’s 14th birthday party was an all-girl event. It was held at a popular restaurant, Chocolate Heaven, which was favored for its sweets and exotic sandwiches. It was a spot that mainly attracted women and girls.
The group included Stacy, Wendy and Althea, all in dresses with their hair fixed; along with Heather, the four were in stockings and heels.
“What pretty young ladies we have here,” said the hostess as she led the group of six to their reserved table near the rear of the restaurant.
Seeing four teenaged girls dressed so classy was a rarity in the current day, and they drew plenty of looks and comments as they wound their way behind the hostess. Heather never felt so self-assured as she did now, realizing that she was a pretty girl, and that she could walk proudly. It was such a change from the past when, as Lawrence, she would shuffle along, hoping no one would notice her.
To Heather’s great pleasure, she noticed how proudly her father led her, taking her hand in his as they followed the hostess. He presented Heather with the seat at the head of the table, pulling out the chair for his daughter, who daintily sat down, smoothing the dress as she sat.
“This lovely lady must be the birthday girl,” the waitress said, as she approached the table and introduced herself as Tiffany, “your server.”
“Yes, this is Heather,” her father said.
“And how old are you, miss?”
“Fourteen,” Heather said, her face reddening.
“Well, you’re a pretty young miss,” the waitress said.
As the birthday dinner progressed, it soon became a cascade of giggles, conspiratorial whispers between the girls and “oohs” and “aahs.” As the birthday cake was served, the restaurant staff gathered about the table to sing “Happy Birthday, Dear Heather,” joined in by many in the restaurant. When it was over, everyone applauded, and Heather sat pleased with the attention, and feeling a bit overwhelmed and not sure how to respond.
“Stand up, honey, and curtsey for the song,” her mother whispered.
Her father, sitting beside her, got up to pull the chair out, making it easier for her to stand, and she responded with a with a dainty curtsey to the restaurant patrons, receiving even more applause. Out of her eye, Heather noticed the smile on her father’s face. She hoped it was a smile that signified his pride in his new daughter. She had never felt her father could ever be proud of “him”, but now as his daughter, she had finally found acceptance, she hoped.
*****
“I love all the gifts I got,” Heather said, still excited after opening them.
“Thanks, Althea,” she said wrapping her thin arms about her sinewy friend. “How did you know I wanted a jewelry chest so badly? And so full of stones, too.”
“Oh Heather, all girls like such things,” Althea said.
Wendy gave her a scarf set, three satiny scarves that Heather could wrap about her neck, use as a shawl and head covering.
“The scarves are so girlish, Wendy,” Heather said, kissing her friend, who held her tightly for an embarrassing moment.
“Glad you like them, I felt they were so much like you,” Wendy replied, finally letting go.
“And, Stacy, this DVD of ‘Pride and Prejudice,’ I love it so. I’ve never seen this version.”
“It’s the first version, done in 1940 with Greer Garson as Elizabeth,” Stacy said. “I know you’ll love it.”
“Oh thank you, Stacy,” Heather said, hugging and kissing her, too. “I can’t wait to see it.”
“I think as you grow a bit older, Heather, you’ll look just like Greer Garson, so warm and friendly and feminine,” Stacy said.
“But who plays Mary?” Heather asked.
“Forget Mary,” Stacy said. “You’re so pretty, Heather, you should be either Jane or Elizabeth.”
Stacy pointed to the cover of the DVD, showing the actress in a bare-shouldered gown, her white skin exuding warmth and femininity.
“You’d look so sweet in a gown like that Heather, better than Althea, Stacy or me,” commented Wendy.
Heather blushed, knowing that Wendy spoke the truth; both Althea and Wendy had sinewy arms and shoulders of athletes, and Stacy’s upper body, though fleshy, showed strength. Heather realized how naturally feminine she was.
*****
To Heather, it was the most marvelous night in her young life. Her father hugged her as the party ended, and Heather’s heart leaped for joy: Larry Collins whispered in her ear: “I love you, daughter.”
Epilogue
For Heather, her life was only beginning. She indeed would begin attending high school as a girl, particularly after a psychiatrist added evidence to the fact that she was female with some male bodily issues that were to be handled through medication and some surgery, both gender-related and cosmetic.
Much more challenging in her teen years would be her relationships with her friends and classmates. Heather found Wendy’s clinging affection for her to be both exciting and wonderful, but also troubling. How would she handle Wendy’s advances?
She wished to maintain close to Stacy in hope that the two would be lifetime girl friends, ready to share each other’s joys and frustrations. Would that continue?
And Will? How would he feel once he learns that Heather, the girl he found so lovely, was really a boy when he held her in his arms in the swimming pool? Would he be angry?
And what about all the students in the big-city high school? How would they treat this girl who was, anatomically, still a boy?
Her father talked with her on the evening after her first visit with the psychiatrist when it became apparent that Heather’s best option in life was to transition to becoming a female.
“Honey,” her father said, “I checked with the school administration and they have a special high school now for kids like you.”
“I know, daddy,” Heather said. “It’s the Harvey Milk School of Excellence.”
“You can go there, dear. It might be easier for you.”
Heather thought for a moment. She had known about it, and even considered it briefly, knowing that there was a real possibility of being harassed and possibly hurt in an attack at her regular high school.
“Oh daddy, I’m just like all the other girls. Really I am. And I wanna be just an ordinary girl, with lots of girl friends and maybe even a boy friend.”
Heather blushed as she said “boy friend,” her mind going to a vision of Will.
“You’re sure about that?”
“Yes, daddy, I am. I’m just one of the girls daddy.”
Lawrence Collins Sr. smiled: “Oh Heather, my darling daughter. You’re really much more than ‘one of the girls.’ You’re my special daughter.”
“Oh daddy,” Heather said, moving to hug her father. “I love you so much.”
“And, I love you, Heather.”
They hugged each other for a moment; it was a sweet father-daughter hug.
When they broke, Lawrence Collins Sr. began to laugh.
“What’s so funny, daddy?”
Her father ended his laugh, and said:
“I was just thinking. I guess I don’t need the ‘senior’ at the end of my name any more.”
“Oh, daddy,” Heather said quickly. “Does that make you sad?”
“It does, a little bit, since I loved Lawrence Jr., but what father wouldn’t want such a lovely girl as a daughter.”