by The Rev. Anam Chara
© 2010-2013 by the Rev. Anam Chara+
To See Through a Glass Darkly
by Anam Chara
Chapter 1
*****************************
Next I needed my daily shower. At first the bathroom looked more pink-and-white than its usual white-and-pink. Mom must have changed the air freshener. It smelled especially nice today. I stripped off my pajamas, got in the shower, and closed the door. As the water began to flow and I lathered up, I started to feel more tingly than usual. For just a moment, I thought that I had no body hair, not that I have very much anyway, but I appeared clean-shaven and smooth until I finished rinsing and grabbed a towel. My sparsely grown chest hair, such that I had, was still there.
For a moment I had thought that I heard my girlfriend Tina’s voice on the other side of the shower door. Why would she be here this early? Sliding it open just enough to peek outside, I saw my sister Sonia instead. She’s a junior, a year older and an inch taller than I am, with full waist-length blond hair and crystal blue-gray eyes. Her high cheeckbones give her a very Russian look.
“Are you finished, Li’l Brother?” Sonia asked me.
“Yes, Sis,” I answered. “But for a moment there you were sounding like Tina.”
“Ooh!” I could hear the smile in my sister’s voice. “Sounds like you’ve really got it bad for her!”
I felt myself blushing.
“Sasha, I’m happy you’ve found someone. Tina’s so very sweet and you two make such a cute couple! I’m proud of my Li’l Brother. You are so discerning about women.”
“Discerning?” That’s how she describes me dating Tina?
“I mean you chose a good one!”
I felt myself blushing again.
Now my sister sees me as a real person, or at least she has since Tina and I began dating. She introduced us, after all, and has been so very supportive of our relationship. But somehow, I seem to miss the constant fighting that Sonia and I used do with each other. It was a lot of fun, really.
Back in my bedroom, I opened the closet door and did a brief double take, thinking that I had seen a couple of my sister’s dresses and a few pairs of high-heeled shoes. Yet at second glance, there were none. I took a clean red polo shirt from the closet and a pair of blue jeans to get dressed. For a moment I sat on the edge of the bed and pulled on my socks and shoes. There was a full-length mirror on the back of the closet door, and as I went to shut it, I could have sworn that I saw a brunette dressed in a red polo shirt and denim miniskirt looking back at me. But it was just myself.
*****************************
Sonia and I met downstairs for breakfast. Mom had prepared for me my favorite, simple breakfast of wheat bulgur and fruit, buttered whole wheat toast, skim milk, pink grapefruit juice, and tea. We would sweeten our tea in the traditional Russian way, with jam or fruit preserves instead of sugar or honey. As I was reaching for the strawberry jam, I noticed that my fingernails were somewhat long and well-trimmed, oval, clear and shiny with white tips, like my sister’s. Then I blinked again to see my normal, jaggedly trimmed nails.
“Sonia, is there a name for that style you just had your nails done in?” I inquired of my sister.
“It’s a French manicure,” she answered.
“Remember, we both got matching French manicures, too,” Tina said to me.
I turned my head to see that Tina was not there.
For certain, I’d been hallucinating since I had awakened that morning. I felt a cold sweat break out on my forehead.
“Sasha, you look flushed this morning,” my mother observed. “Did you not sleep well?”
“He’s too sweet on Tina to get any sleep, Mom,” Sonia gently teased, smiling. “Bet he spent the whole night thinking about her!” She giggled.
“Sonia, now don’t tease your brother!” Mom cautioned her.
“Sorry, Mom,” she replied, “but I only meant to say that Sasha’s new girlfriend is a winner. He’s learned from you and me what makes for an ideal woman!”
Mom’s mouth dropped open and her eyes widened in disbelief at Sonia’s remark. So I figured that my rejoinder would have received the desired maternal sanction.
“Sis,” I said, “you certainly display an ideal ego!”
I had really miscalculated there.
“Son, do you mean that your sister and I do not model womanhood well?”
“No,” I rejoined. “I just meant that Sonia excels in loading her rhetoric for maximum effect, as she just did! But yes, I can’t help but seek a girlfriend with charm to match yours and wit to meet my sister’s.”
“Nice save, Li’l Bro!” Sonia conceded, sipping her tea.
“Agreed!” Mom seconded her, smiling.
“Maybe Sasha should spend a few days as a girl to see how much he’s learned from us? I know that I’ve got a dress or two that he’d look cute in!”
“Why? Did you already put them in my closet?” I asked quite curiously. I had wondered if my sister could see my hallucinations, too? This was disturbing.
“Sasha, you dress up beautifully as a girl!” Tina said to me suddenly.
I looked around for my girlfriend. She still was not there.
“Sasha!” Mom cried. “You’re shaking!”
I placed my hands flat on the table. For just a second, I thought that I saw a bracelet on my right wrist and a small watch on my left as well as rings on my left hand. Looking again, I had my big sports watch on my left wrist. No rings. No bracelet.
“The bathroom smelled especially nice today. Did you change the air freshener?” I said, trying to change the subject.
“No, son,” she answered. “It’s the same scent as yesterday.”
“Maybe he’s smelling Tina in his dreams?” Sonia retorted, giggling.
“Sonia! I told you to quit teasing him!” Mom yelled at my sister, before giggling herself.
Silently I ate my breakfast. Tasting my food and feeling its texture was helping me somewhat to get my mind off these sudden, repeated hallucinations.
We heard a knock on the door and Mom went to answer it. “Sasha, it’s for you!” she called out to me.
As I got up from the breakfast table, Mom escorted Tina into the kitchen to offer her some tea. She was wearing the same red style of polo shirt as I with a denim miniskirt, hose, and a pair of smart black pumps with three-inch heels, ankle-straps and bows, much like the girl I thought I had seen in my mirror. Her raven black hair was up in an elegant French braid. She also had a new French manicure like my sister’s. We gently embraced and exchanged quick, affectionate kisses.
“I didn’t expect to see you quite yet,” I said, looking into her warm, brown eyes. For a moment I felt like myself again and forgot my morning of mirages. “But I’m glad you’re here now.”
“I thought that we could all wait for the bus together,” Tina explained.
“That works for me,” I answered.
“It will be fun for us all, I would think,” Sonia added.
Mom brought a glass of hot tea over as I sat Tina down at the table next to my sister, who explained how the Russian custom was to pour boiling water and tea leaves right into the glass and to sweeten it with fruit jam.
My girlfriend was enjoying the newly learned custom as I worried over what had been happening in my head. Those were indeed hallucinations that I had heard. Tina had only just arrived. It could not have been her at the breakfast table earlier, or in the bathroom while I was in the shower.
Am I losing my mind?
*****************************
Sonia, Tina, and I waited together for the schoolbus. A cool, springtime chill penetrated the air, refreshed with the ozone generated by lightning from the passing storm. There were several puddles of rain in the streets and along the sidewalks. When I saw Tina shiver, I took off my windbreaker and put it over her shoulders. Sonia giggled as I did it. My sister put on her own sweater and also giggled.
“What now?” I asked.
“Oh, nothing!” my sister answered. Both girls giggled at me.
A slight wind blew. I crossed my arms and flexed them, feeling my armhairs stand on end. Tina pulled my windbreaker around herself more tightly. Sonia buttoned her sweater up and once again, they broke into giggles.
“What is it?” I implored.
They just giggled more.
The bus pulled up next to the stop and they boarded. They took seats near the middle, Sonia in a left aisle seat, myself across from her in a right aisle seat, and Tina to my right in the window seat. She reached across me with her left hand taking my left hand to hold it in my lap.
We sat like that while Sonia struck up a conversation with Debbie, her red-haired friend sitting to her left in that window seat. I reached my right arm around Tina and she snuggled in closer to me. Then I closed my eyes.
Opening my eyes I glanced down at our left hands. She and I both wore on our fourth fingers matching wedding bands and engagement rings. Then I noticed that I was wearing a denim miniskirt, hose, and black pumps with two-inch heels, much like Tina’s, as if she and I were trying to wear matching clothes. Again, I broke out in a cold sweat. Then shaking, I glanced down again to see my normal jeans and sneakers.
Tina spoke up. “Are you feeling okay, Sasha?” she asked me. “You could be getting the flu with the way you look.”
“Not sure. I’ve been getting the chills all morning,” I said.
She reached into her tote bag and pulled out a pink sweater and put it around my shoulders. Across the aisle Debbie and my sister giggled. Tina still wore my windbreaker. She smiled at me and squeezed my hand.
“I hope it’s not the pills you’ve been taking for me,” she said.
Pills? I haven’t been taking any pills. Not that I know of. Did she ask me to take something? Is she into drugs?
“You’re so brave to be growing them for me,” Tina said, softly placing her right hand across my chest. “And I like the way you’re learning to match me when you dress up. That’s so sweet.”
Growing what? Today is getting stranger and stranger. I felt some itching and soreness across my chest.
“What do you mean, Tina?” I asked for confirmation.
“Well, we wore the same red top and your jeans match my skirt. It’s cute that we’re dressed like a couple.”
The schoolbus stopped for a policeman directing traffic, since the traffic signals were out. Tina pointed out to me two trucks and quite a few workmen who seemed to be in the process of repairing some damage at a power station from the thunderstorm of the night before. Otherwise, the scenery as viewed from the windows of our schoolbus appeared much the same as always.
Because of the problems with traffic signals, our bus pulled in to the parking lot at school almost ten minutes late. We disembarked as hurriedly as possible to get to our homerooms. The principal had announced that our bus would be delayed by a power outage so that we would not be counted tardy.
“Tina, I think my wallet is in my windbreaker. Would you trade it back for your sweater?” I asked.
“Thanks for letting me wear it,” she smiled back at me as we exchanged items.
“You too,” I answered.
Then Sonia’s friend Debbie spoke up. “You look cute in pink, Sasha. You should try borrowing Tina’s clothes more often.”
The girls all giggled again and I was reminded of my morning mental state.
“Tina, I think I’m going to the school nurse instead of my first period class. I’m not feeling too well at all. My guess is she’ll send me home.”
Sonia spoke up. “So you’re really sick! Should I call Mom?”
“Not until I see the nurse. I don’t really know what’s happening to me. I—I think I’m losing my mind.”
“What?” Tina asked.
“I’ve been seeing things and hearing things all morning. And I’ve been frightened by it all. I gotta see the nurse.”
“I’ll tell Mis’ess Brunswick that you’re at the School Nurse’s Office,” my sister assured me, referring to homeroom.
The bell rang and we went our ways, they to their homerooms, myself to see the school nurse.
© 2010-2013 by Anam Chara
To See Through a Glass Darkly
by Anam Chara
Chapter 2
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Russian language notes
«Господи помилуй!» [GAWS-puh-dʸee PAW-mʸee-looy], Lord have mercy!
*****************************
“Yes, I am. Who is it?”
“Alexander Ivanovitch Petroff,” I answered with my full name.
“Oh, Sasha! What brings you in today? It’s usually Sonia here.” Nurse Banner was wearing scrubs with matching white tunic and white pants. She had her rich dark-blond hair tied up in a ponytail by a cute white bow. Almost every guy in the school would fake an illness or injure himself to get sent to her office. That’s Miss Banner, by the way.
“Can we talk? I’m really worried. I’ve had this problem all morning and it’s weird.”
“All right. Let me get the door first.” Nurse Banner pulled the door close and motioned that I should get up on the examining table. As I sat up, I suddenly saw the miniskirt again and tried to crossed my knees but my jeans were still there.
Nurse Banner put a clean sleeve on an oral digital thermometer and stuck it under my tongue. Then she grabbed the cuff of a sphygmomanometer, wrapped it around my upper left arm, and put a stethoscope in her ears, almost in a single motion. She began pumping the rubber bulb while listening for whatever nurses do to take blood pressure. As the cuff tightened around my arm I had another fleeting glimpse of that French manicure on my left hand. I looked for the wedding rings that I had seen earlier, but they weren’t there.
She shook her head and sighed. “Honey, your systolic is through the roof! And your diastolic is elevated, too. You’re white as a sheet and you look like you haven’t slept in two days!”
Well, do the numbers! How high is it?
The digital thermometer beeped and she took it from my mouth to read the display.
Betcha she won’t tell me my actual temperature either.
“At least you don’t have a fever. Your temp’s normal enough. But no fifteen or sixteen year-old boy should have blood pressure like yours. Exactly what condition made you feel like coming in?”
“Ever since I woke up, I’ve been seeing and hearing things that aren’t there. I think I’m losing my mind. I’m scared.”
“Have you been taking any drugs? Smoking pot? Be honest with me, now,” she cautioned.
“No! None! Never!”
“Now, Sasha?”
“No! I’ve never taken any illegal drug or anything my doctor didn’t tell me to!” I snapped back at her. “I know that that would destroy my mind. I’m here now ’cause I’m worried about it already not working right.”
“Then you’re saying that you were hallucinating?”
“Yes.”
“You mentioned both seeing and hearing. You had both of those?”
“Uh-huh.”
“How ’bout taste, smell? Either of those?”
“I thought my Mom had changed air fresheners in the bathroom. She said it was the same as yesterday.”
“Hmm? You might have just misidentified that? Anything else? How about touch or feeling?”
“When I was waking up it felt like, well—”
“Yes?”
“It felt like Tina was in bed with me. But she wasn’t. I was afraid to even think that.”
“Tina’s your girlfriend?”
“Yes, we just started dating two weeks ago.”
“Since the wedding?”
“What wedding?”
“Have other hallucinations involved Tina?”
“Yeah. When I was in the shower I though I heard her voice, but it was my sister’s. But at breakfast I heard her say things to me.”
“Like what?”
“That we got matching French manicures together and—and—”
“And what?”
“That I dressed up beautifully as a girl.” I felt myself blushing again.
“Why? Do you crossdress?”
Now what? These are way too embarassing to tell her about. I shouldn’t have come here. And what did she mean by “since the wedding”?
“No. But in several of the hallucinations I saw myself wearing clothes like Tina’s. Matching skirts, heels, wedding rings—”
“Wedding rings?”
Wait a minute! Didn’t she already mention a wedding?
“Yes. We were both wearing matching wedding bands and engagement rings. We were holding hands. And for just a moment I would see myself dressed like her in a mirror. And these visions only lasted a second or two.”
“Have you ever dressed up like a girl, even as a prank or for Halloween?”
“No.”
“Have you ever wished to crossdress or thought about it?”
“Not really.”
“What do you mean by ‘not really’?”
“Sometimes on T-V or in a movie there’s a character in drag. Usually a comedy. Seeing that I’ve wondered, why would a guy do it?”
“Have you ever worn any item of girls’ or women’s clothing?”
“No. Well, not until we were on the school bus this morning. Tina put her pink sweater over my shoulders because she was wearing my windbreaker. But that was after I started seeing things.”
“Did you have any hallucinations that did not involve her or you dressing up like her?”
“The very first one was when I looked at the alarm clock. The display was lit with green L-E-D’s, but they’re red ones. They went back to red the next time I looked. And after my shower, I thought I saw a couple of Sonia’s dresses and a few pairs of her shoes in my closet, but they weren’t really there.”
“Has your sister ever teased you by or threatened you with crossdressing?”
“Sometimes. She even did it at breakfast today while I was having the hallucinations.”
Is Sonia getting ready to pull a fast one on me? So that’s why she’s not picking fights with me. She’s setting me up! Is Tina in on it? It would explain why they were giggling at me all morning.
And I thought that Tina really liked me. Or maybe she does and Sonia’s setting her up, too. But they were both giggling at me.
Suddenly I was in tears.
Nurse Banner was busy taking notes of what I was telling her, but immediately noticed the waterworks starting up.
“Sasha, was there anything pleasant about any of the hallucinations?”
I felt exhausted, emotionally and mentally drained. I looked up at the clock in the office. It was only nine o’clock. What could have been pleasant in all this? I can’t trust my own mind today. Did any part of this give me a warm feeling at all?
“On the bus, I heard Tina say that I was brave to be growing something for her as she held me. But I have no idea what she meant. And then she said that I was so sweet to dress up like her. At the time it seemed nice when she said those things. But now I’m not so sure.”
“Has Tina ever asked you to crossdress for her or wear something of hers other than her sweater this morning?”
“No.” I thought I had already answered that.
“Would you?”
“Would I what?”
“Wear her clothes or dress up like a girl if she asked you?”
“No.”
“You wore her sweater today.”
Touché! Nurse Banner scores. I should have seen that one coming. I’m not in top form today. No way I can hold my own in this match. I can’t even call a time-out!
“It was cold and I put my windbreaker on her. She was trying to reciprocate an act of kindness. If I had refused her, it would have been an insult. I couldn’t—I wouldn’t do that!”
Nurse Banner didn’t respond immediately. So I just sat there thinking how pretty she looked in her white dress, white hose, matching shoes, and nurse’s cap. I’m being cross-examined about crossdressing and I’ve got the hots for the examiner!
I placed my hand on my right knee and felt nylon hose. Feeling for my skirt I found my jeans again. Back to reality now—I think.
“Sasha, I’m assuming that what you’re telling me is as accurate as you can describe it. So I’m going to send you home for today and refer you to the school psychologist for further evaluation.”
“Should I go now, Nurse Banner?”
“Well first, how are you lovebirds fixed for contraception since the wedding?”
“Huh?”
“Are you and Tina doing it yet?”
“What? We’ve only been dating two weeks. We still blush making eye contact!”
“I’ve known girls to lock and load for motherhood faster than that!”
Did Nurse Banner really say that?
“One more thing, Sasha. Would you ask your mom for her pieroshki recipe? I love those when she brings them to bake sales.”
I can’t believe she asked me that. After what she just put me through, she has the chutzpah to ask for Mom’s secret recipe?
“I’ll see what I can do, but she doesn’t give that out to just anyone.”
Nurse Banner signed a slip of pink paper on a pad, tore it off and gave it to me. “Take this to the Main Office, Sasha. They’ll verify it and send you home. You must not come back to school until a qualified health care provider certifies that your presence does not put other students at significant medical risk.”
So, I left the school nurse’s office and started up the stairs to the Main Office. When I stepped onto the floor, my heels felt thrust up at an angle transferring the weight to the ball of my foot and I noticed a distinctive cadence of sound as the point of each heel hit the tile.
Looking down, I was wearing the red polo shirt, the denim miniskirt, hose, a pair of simple black pumps. Mentally I counted... eight, nine, ten... fourteen, fifteen... I took my next step and the rubber heel of my sneaker squeaked on the floor. I had maintained a hallucination for a count of fifteen. Can I do that? Should I do that?
*****************************
Entering the Main Office I was met by the grim stare of old Ms. Muldoon, the school secretary.
“You should be in class, Alexander Petroff!” she barked at me.
“I just consulted Nurse Banner and she’s ordered me home.” That was the correct way to phrase it. Ms. Muldoon was an authoritarian, so saying that the school nurse had ordered me home closed the matter. Any other way to present the issue would result in Ms. Muldoon keeping the matter open for an endless probe before the unwary student could leave. She’d been known to collect documents to verify a medical order up to four hours.
I removed the blue form that Nurse Banner had signed from a pocket of my windbreaker. I placed it down firmly on the main counter before Ms. Muldoon. Emphasizing it with my right index finger, I said, “There it is, signed by Nurse Banner. I understand that now, it needs only the principal’s countersignature. Would you present this to Doctor Martin, please?”
Again, it was necessary to speak the correct formula exactly. Ms. Muldoon was thus left with no basis to challenge my order. I was worried that I had a pink form in my pocket instead. The pink form is valid for girl students only. We boys have blue medical forms. I must have hallucinated the pink when Nurse Banner gave it to me.
Ms. Muldoon returned a moment later with the countersigned form.
“There, Alexander Petroff! I suppose you’re happy!”
“Why, of course, Mis’ Muldoon! And I thank you!” I said, prolonging eye contact just long enough that she had to avert her eyes. I had won. I took the pink form back as I quickly withdrew my French manicured nails from view.
“Please, Mister Petroff, could you fill out this Out-of-School Assignments form? Your teachers would be much obliged.” Ms. Muldoon politely presented me a white form.
“Certainly,” I answered and began listing my classes and teachers on the paper, the pen held by my unadorned fingers. A few other students were smiling while others were whispering to each other. I had learned to win these brief exchanges with Ms. Muldoon consistently. The strategy wasn’t at all difficult. But not even Dr. Martin could face her down. Once, he had even asked me how I did it.
“Thank you, Ms. Muldoon. I’ll be going now.” I glanced at my left hand, confirming the absence of any wedding rings.
“Would you like me to call a taxi for you, Mister Petroff?” she asked.
“I’d be much obliged, Ma’am, if you would.”
My sister’s friend Debbie was in the office. She nearly gasped as Ms. Muldoon dialed the number for me.
“How do you do that, Sasha?” Debbie whispered into my left ear.
I grinned at her. “Another time and place, Deb. Another time and place.”
“By the way, I like your new ear-studs,” she said smiling.
“Oh, thanks!” I replied. My hand went up to my earlobe. Nothing.
*****************************
When the taxi pulled up to our house, I gave the driver the transit voucher from the School Board and went right in.
“Mom, I’m back!”
“Why so soon?” she asked me coming out of the kitchen.
“I am not well. You asked me this morning why I didn’t look so good. I’ve been seeing and hearing things all morning—things not there!”
«Господи помилуй!» Mom cried out, making the sign of the cross.
“I went to the school nurse. She referred me to the school psychologist and said I should come home.”
“What things did you see and hear? Were they bad things?”
“Not bad things. But I’m scared because they weren’t there. I saw myself wearing a skirt and shoes like Tina’s and my nails were done like hers and Sonia’s. And then Tina and I were wearing matching wedding rings. And I heard her say to me at breakfast that I dressed up very pretty as a girl, but that was before she came in.”
“Oh, my little Sasha,” my Mom hugged me, “you are so smitten with Tina! You’re much in love my son!”
“Mama, I’m very tired. I should go back to bed.”
*****************************
I went to my room and pulled off my shoes, jeans, and shirt and dressed again in a clean set of pajamas.
Sitting on the edge of my bed, I began thinking about the questions that Nurse Banner had asked me. Were my sister and her friends trying to humiliate me by putting me into their clothes? Was Tina in on it? I thought she liked me, but could she be playing me for a fool?
Then as I was curious, I opened my closet door and composed myself for whatever I might see. Nothing appeared to be in my closet that shouldn’t be there—no dresses, no skirts or frilly blouses, and no high-heeled shoes.
Relieved, I shut the closet door again and sighed deeply. Maybe now, I could lie down and avoid any further hallucinations by sleeping through them. Normally, this is how I would feel in the evening after a long, busy day. After reclining, I was asleep.
© 2010-2013 by Anam Chara
To See Through a Glass Darkly
by Anam Chara
Chapter 3
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Russian language notes
Мой Саша [moy SAH-shuh], My Sasha
*****************************
“H’llo,” I groggily greeted the caller.
“That you, Sasha?” It was Tina.
“Uh-huh.” I answered, not fully awake.
“Did the nurse send you home?”
“Uh-huh. ’M in bed now.”
“Oh, you poor thing!” Tina consoled me. “I’ll come right over to see you after school’s out.”
“’Tw’d be nice.” I felt my eyelids getting heavier…
“Thank you for letting me wear your windbreaker this morning,” she said. “That was so thoughtful of you.”
“Y’r’elcome, Babe,” I mumbled, trying to stay awake.
“And thanks, too, for wearing my pink sweater. Most boys wouldn’t have been willing to do that. That was so sweet!”
“Y’r s’eeter ’an me, Teenie,” I answered her, not yet yielding to sleep.
“You sound like you can barely stay awake.”
“Yeah.”
“I’d better go now. You get some rest now, Sasha. I’ll see you after school.
“Af’ school…”
“Bye-bye!”
I was out fast.
*****************************
Mom’s knocking on the door awakened me, but there was also the aroma of her borshch, my favorite soup, and her famous mushroom- and potato-filled pieroshkis.
“So is мой Саша hungry now?” she asked, bringing a tray of food into the bedroom. Mom did not get to dote on me very often, so I would indulge her and operate in little boy mode for a while. Anyway, I had already worn a girl’s sweater today, and compared to that, Mom’s doting did not seem quite so embarassing. Besides, her borshch and pieroshkis are more than adequate compensation for any loss of pride.
“Thanks, Mama!” I said as she brought in my late lunch.
“Nurse Banner asked me to bring her your secret recipe for pieroshkis after she saw me this morning.” I told Mom. “Do you think that you could give it to her?”
“Son, you know that’s a long-held family secret. I don’t think it fair to give her our recipe.”
“I know. But she asked and I told her that I would see about it. I did and you declined. I have done what I promised. You simply exercised your right to refuse. So all is as it should be.”
“Oh, my Sasha!” my mother smiled, “so young and already so wise!”
I liked that. She was boosting both her own self-esteem and mine at the same time. The way today had gone so far, I decided that I liked her doting on me in this circumstance. Besides, I thought that she must enjoy it even more than I do.
“Thanks for bringing me lunch.”
“Did you want to drink coffee, tea or something else?”
“A cola would be good for now, Mama.”
“Then I’ll get you one,” she said and quickly turned to go downstairs.
As I picked up my soup spoon, I saw again the French manicure on my fingernails and closed my eyes. When I opened them again, my hands were normal once more. So I started immediately with the borshch. Since savoring my food had helped take my mind off the hallucinations at breakfast, maybe it would do the same now.
“Here it is, Sasha!” Mom announced as she brought me a can of cola and a glass of ice. She popped the tab on the can and poured the beverage slowly, allowing its head of foam to fizzle away, the tiny droplets floating up to my face, tickling my nose. Quickly I attempted to stifle my own laughter, but I was unsuccessful, and a giggle emerged.
“Sasha!” Mom cried, staring wide-eyed at me. “You giggled just like Sonia! I can’t remember you giggling before now.”
I looked at my fingers. No white tips, anyway.
“I laugh all the time, Mom,” I replied, trying to deflect here obvious point.
“I do not mean laughing. I mean giggling as a girl does. You sound the same as your sister.”
For a moment I wished that my father were home. But Papa was in New Orleans on a work project.
“Is it because I’m always with women and girls? I’m always with you, Sonia, Tina, and their friends. Most of my teachers are women. Since Tom and Bill moved away I haven’t spent much time around other boys.”
Tom had lived next door to us and we had been best friends since we were toddlers, until the metallurgical plant closed a year ago and his father, an engineer like my Papa, took a transfer to Pittsburgh. Bill’s dad worked at the same plant but was laid off. He had to move to Idaho for a new job. Guys like Tom and Bill can’t simply be replaced. It takes years to grow friendships like those. We keep in touch by email, but it’s still not the same.
“Well, you and Tina are a nice couple,” Mom reminded me. “She will make you a good wife someday. And you will be a kind and loving husband to her.”
Truth be told, that was what I’d like to happen for Tina and me. But we were really too young. For this to work out, we’d need to stay together as boyfriend and girlfriend for a few years. I really didn’t think that either she or myself had that much patience.
“After college I would hope,” I conceded to Mom.
“She’s a very good friend to your sister. That’s also very important, for your mate to get along well with your family.”
“Well, Sonia did introduce us. So I guess that I appreciate my sister now more than I used to. She could hardly have given me a better gift.” I wanted to stay as agreeable with Mom as I could right then. And honestly I did feel that way about Sonia. We got along nicely now, but sometimes her teasing and practical jokes were still over the top. Nonetheless, Sonia’s introducing me to Tina had made up for many bad feelings over the years. In one evening, Sonia did more to move me into manhood than all the baseball, soccer, and ice hockey games that I’d ever played in. I simply wanted to think as well of my sister as possible.
I recalled my thoughts while talking with Nurse Banner earlier. I felt guilty to have believed that Sonia would set me up for humiliation and even worse that Tina would be a participant. However, it would be consistent with my sister’s past behavior, although such practical jokes are just not Tina’s style.
“I really like Tina, Mom,” I said. “But I’m afraid of something hurting our relationship.”
“Oh? And what would that be?”
The French manicure appeared again on my fingernails.
“I’m afraid that Sonia’s teasing and jokes might go too far with me and Tina. Like this morning at breakfast—do you think Sonia meant it when she said she had a dress or two that would look good on me?”
“Would you be so ashamed if you did wear your sister’s dress. Sonia and Tina wear dresses. So do I. Are dresses so bad to wear?” Mom smiled at me. “You share many of Sonia’s features. Maybe you will look very pretty as a girl?”
The French manicure had vanished again.
“I never meant to say it was bad. But I’m a boy and we’re not supposed to wear dresses. In my hallucinations I’m dressed like Tina. That scares me.”
Mom waited a moment before speaking again.
“Your sister teases you because she loves you. She does it to show her affection. Teasing can only work because she knows and understands you so intimately.”
“But what if she gets Tina teasing me, too?”
“That will mean that you and Tina are meant for each other. The only woman who can ever know a man more intimately than his mother or his sister is his wife. A girl can only tease you like your sister if she loves you as much.”
That was not how I’d ever looked at teasing. Was Mom saying that I wanted Tina to start teasing me? This dating business sounded crazier than I thought.
“I’m still scared at these hallucinations I have of dressing like Tina. It doesn’t make sense to me.”
“I don’t know why you hallucinate about wearing her clothes, except to say that you very much want to be with her. Maybe you should talk to her about it.”
*****************************
Loud knocking on the door startled me awake.
“Sasha, can we come in?” Sis asked. “Or are you being naughty?”
Three girls broke into giggling. Sis was always here and Tina had promised to come. Anytime Sis and Tina were together, the next girl to join them was Debbie.
“Come in,” I announced. “All three of you.”
The door opened and there they stood, carrying an assortment of notebooks and textbooks for me.
“Here’s your homework for a week!” Tina announced. “It should keep you busy when I’m not here!”
Sis and Debbie broke into additional giggles. Absolutely, I had to be blushing at this point. My face should be as red as Mom’s borshch now.
“Deb,” my sister spoke up, “do you have a shade of blush that would look pretty on his cheeks?”
“None that would be any brighter than his own,” Debbie answered Sis, giggling. “But I have some darker shades of lipstick that would match his color nicely.”
All of the girls giggled again.
“Leave the books on the desk,” I told them. “And I don’t need any lipstick. If you’re thinking of some weird joke to play on me, please be so kind to wait until I’m back to normal.”
“That would take forever!” my sister whined. Tina and Debbie giggled at her remark.
Tina turned to Sis and Debbie. “Would you guys leave us alone for a few minutes?”
“Will you take pictures or should we?” Debbie snickered.
“Guys!” Tina sang out in a frustrated tone.
“All right we’re going,” my sister said as she closed the door behind her and Debbie.
A moment later, Tina sat down on the edge of the bed.
“What was in your hallucinations, Sasha?” she asked.
“First, you have to promise not to laugh at me. It may sound funny or silly to you, but to me it’s very confusing and most disturbing.”
“You have my promise. I won’t laugh, even if it’s funny,” she said.
After Tina promised not to laugh, I felt safer disclosing my hallucinations to her.
“My hallucinations are about you and me,” I began, “about us, but in a strange way. I see myself dressed like you, wearing matching clothes.”
“We were wearing matching clothes this morning,” Tina recalled. “We wore the same style and color top and your blue jeans matched my skirt.”
“But there’s more than that. I see myself wearing the red shirt, a denim miniskirt, hose, and high heels almost like yours. They don’t have the bows. And I have a French manicure like yours.”
“That is strange,” Tina answered. “What else?”
“On the bus this morning, when you put your pink sweater around my shoulders and took my hand, we wore matching wedding and engagement rings.”
Tina just stared and covered her mouth with her hand.
“Yeah. It scares me too. The wedding rings were the scariest of all the hallucinations. And they were for our marriage. Somehow I knew that. We had both matching wedding bands and engagement rings. But they weren’t his-and-hers; they were both a ladies’ style. And I have a feeling that somehow my dressing like you is also connected with our marriage.”
“That’s really weird, Sasha,” Tina said in a subdued and concerned voice.
“I know, but there’s more,” I continued. “This morning at breakfast, I heard you say that I looked pretty when I dressed up like a girl, but that was before you arrived and had tea with us. Do you think that, by the way?”
“I don’t know,” she asnswered. “Sonia tells me that she’s always been curious how you’d look as a girl. She thinks you’d be as pretty as she is. I only wonder when she talks about it. But given your size and build, legs and hands, your face, lips, eyes, and hair—Yes! I think you could do it!”
“She frequently teases me about it.”
“I know. She hopes against all odds that someday you may take her up on it. She was just a little jealous, when I got you to wear my pink sweater today,” Tina grinned softly at me.
“I’m always afraid that Sis may try to set a joke up to leave me in drag somewhere and totally embarass me.”
“I shouldn’t tell you this, perhaps,” Tina began, “but she has thought up some creative strategies for just that. But I can’t imagine her actually doing it because she’s afraid of really humiliating you. She wants to see you happily dressed up as a girl and enjoying it with her, like you were sisters.”
What Tina had just told me was a huge relief in one way, but even more disturbing in another. Maybe I’m not the only one in my family with a screw loose?
“Thanks for telling me, Tina,” I said. “It’s a relief to know that this was not some practical joke Sis set me up for. And I was afraid she might try enlist you in it, too.”
“Not to worry!” Tina assured me. “I’m not very good at playing jokes on anyone. Your sister is so much more creative at it than anyone else I know.”
“While it’s nice to know that Sonia isn’t setting me up for another joke, that was my only other explanation for what’s happening to me. That means I’m really hallucinating. Mom says it’s because I really got it bad for you.”
Smiling and blushing, Tina fell forward on the bed to embrace me. Suddenly we were in a deep, passionate kiss.
“Sounds like you’re close to losing it when I’m not with you!” she teased, smiling. “And you even want to wear my clothes next to you when I’m not here! That’s so sweet, you naughty boy!”
That was at least somewhat true, that I hallucinated about her when she was absent. But I was hallucinating also about her when she’s right here in front of me or sitting next to me on the bus. And in the hallucinations, I wore clothes like hers, but I didn’t know if they were hers.
“Nurse Banner says I gotta see the school psychologist next. She’ll hafta come and talk here, ’cause I can’t go back to school until someone in the system agrees it’s safe for me to return.”
“That sucks!” Tina remarked.
“Yeah, it does!”
I noticed the French manicure on my nails again.
“See it?” I showed Tina my hand.
“Of course. We had them done together,” she said.
“So it doesn’t bother you, then?” I asked.
“What doesn’t bother me?”
“The French—never mind!” I said, noting the white tips had disappeared again. “My manicure had reappeared and you very briefly acknowledged it,” I explained.
“But I didn’t!” Tina objected to me.
“In the hallucination you did.”
“You mean you just had another one, right here, right now?”
“Yeah!”
“That’s so freaky!” she exclaimed, wide-eyed.
“You’re not kidding!” I put it to her, “How d’ya think I feel about it?”
“I’m so sorry, my dear Sasha!” Tina pouted, putting her arm around me. “My poor Baby, is there anything I can do for you?”
“Just be with me and hold me,” I told her. At least this was for real.
*****************************
Sonia, Tina, and Debbie spent the remaining afternoon studying, then stopped to eat. I stayed in my room to sleep and thus avoid any more hallucinations. Or at least I could dismiss them merely as dreams. But I, too, was called down to eat. Mom served more of her borshch and pieroshkis for supper and then we went to a nearby ice cream shop for dessert. Tina and I went with Mom, while Sonia rode with Debbie.
I simply put on the clothes that I had worn in the morning, but I saw and felt my blue jeans and sneakers alternate with a miniskirt, hose, and pumps. Tina sat next to me and didn’t let go of my hand during the ride. Nor would I let go of hers.
We all ordered our favorite ice cream desserts. Tina and I shared a sundae with chocolate fudge and brownies between us. I sat as close to her as the molded plastic seats would allow. Then she hooked her ankle around mine and while we sat like that, the hallucinations seemed to stop.
After we had finished our ice cream, Tina and I started enjoying each other again until we were afraid Mom was going to separate us. Tina and I said our goodbyes for the evening and she rode home with Debbie. Sis and I would go home with Mom.
As Sonia and I got in the car, I turned to her. “Sis, thanks for introducing me to Tina. You’re a great sister. I love you.” I kissed her cheek.
She turned to me, tears welled-up in her eyes. “I love you, too, Li’l Brother. And Tina’s my friend. I’m so happy this is working out for the both of you. I just have such a good feeling about the two of you together.”
“That’s reassuring, Sis,” I confessed worriedly. “because I have a feeling, that in the next few days, whatever’s causing these hallucinations is going to push me where I don’t want to go. Please remind Tina and Mom of what you just said. And remind me whenever I seem the most desperate.”
“Sasha, what’s wrong?” Sonia asked.
“I don’t really know, Sis. I don’t really know.”
© 2010-2013 by Anam Chara
To See Through a Glass Darkly
by Anam Chara
Chapter 4
*****************************
Russian language notes
«Да, мой Саша!» [Dah, moy SAH-shuh], “Yes, my Sasha!”
*****************************
“G’morning, honey,” the familiar voice greeted me from behind. Her hand rubbed my tummy through the top of my sleepwear, a set of a very light blue satin with white lace trim. It has a loose-fitting top with thin straps over the shoulders and shorts with slit sides at the bottom of the legs. I think that once Sonia had told me that this kind of top was a camisole and the shorts were tap pants. But it all felt very nice, especially while Tina was rubbing my tummy through it.
“Good morning, Tina,” I answered and rolled over to see her. She was wearing the same style of sleepwear as I was, but pink instead of blue.
“Did you sleep well, my husband?” she asked, her warm, brown eyes focused intently on mine.
Husband? We just began dating two weeks ago, but she’s here in my bed and I recognize this as my room, in the house where I live with Sis, Mom, and Dad, when he can be here. Also, she and I are wearing the same style of lingerie. Women’s lingerie.
I looked over at the alarm clock again. The LEDs in the display were green.
“I’m not so sure,” I answered truthfully. My anxiety, though, might be more from what I’d seen since waking up than while dreaming.
This morning looked like all of yesterday’s hallucinations, except my perceptions weren’t shifting. After some five minutes I still saw a clock display of the wrong color, and a Tina who thinks she’s married to me, and, like her, I had a French manicure.
She pulled me closer to herself and I felt the warmth of her body and her soft, delicate skin. My own skin felt almost as soft as I became aware that my arms and legs were hairless and smooth. Tina’s feminine scent began to arouse me as I felt my manhood stirring in my satin shorts. We locked our lips together and I tasted the flavor of her raspberry lip gloss. She usually wears strawberry, so it must have been a special occasion. In any case, I was enjoying this kiss, as was she.
Since our lingerie was of the same design, it was likely that Tina knew I would be wearing it and perhaps even selected it.
“So, Tina,” I asked, “how do I look in my nightie?”
“Like I said before,” she answered, “you’re just way too cute to be a boy! You should really get used to dressing like a girl. You’re so pretty it should be a crime for you not to. That’s why me and Sonia wanted you to try it so much.”
Now, I did not remember her saying anything like that before. But there I was in a nightie and a French manicure just like hers, that I’d been seeing in my hallucinations. If these were hallucinations?
Maybe the suspicion that I entertained yesterday was closer to the truth than I thought. Maybe Sonia was trying to play an elaborate joke on me. Then it’s possible for Tina to be involved in it, too, especially since we woke up today wearing matching nighties. Did my sister want to humiliate me so badly? She had teased me about it many times, so I didn’t think that I could ever dismiss it as something that she might do. Yet Tina said that she doesn’t believe Sis would ever try to humiliate me.
But Tina calling me “husband”? Neither she nor I would be so impulsive as to get married still in our teens after dating only two weeks. Yet, all this seemed—it felt—too real to be mere hallucinations.
“Sasha, are you alright? You look distant right now,” Tina said to me, her face bearing a look of concern.
“All of this,” I answered her, “well, it seems—like a dream!”
“Yes, love!” Tina says, “It’s my dream and you made it real for me!” She pulls me closer and kisses me again.
What’s in that raspberry lip gloss of hers, anyway?
*****************************
After showering, I returned to my bedroom to dress. Sitting at the edge of my bed, I pulled on my underwear and went to my sock drawer. But as I bent myself into position to put a sock on my right foot, I noticed the sheen of clear nail polish on my toenails, which had been quite expertly trimmed. Then, I was startled to see that I held a rolled up pair of white pantyhose in my hands. Immediately I recoiled in fear, stood up, and dropped the pantyhose. Looking down at the floor were my simple white athletic socks, the same style that I always wear with sneakers, almost every day.
I picked up my socks from the floor and looked again for signs of a pedicure, which now were nowhere to be seen. Sitting once again on the edge of my bed, I closed my eyes and pulled on my socks before I could once more be frightened by them. So, how easy might it be to dress completely with my eyes closed, not looking until done?
Aaron Copland’s «Danza de Jalisco» rang out once again from my cell phone.
“Good morning, Sasha!” Tina’s voice came from the other end. “How’s my boyfriend today?”
“Good morning, Tina!” I continued facetiously, “I’m losing my mind! How are you?”
“I’m fine, you drama queen! But I’d be even better if I could join you and Sonia for breakfast,” she answered. “Is that okay with your Mom?”
Drama queen?
At the top of the staircase I yelled downstairs, “Mom, Tina wants to come for breakfast! Is that okay with you?”
«Да, мой Саша!» Mom yelled back.
“Sure, Tina. She says you can come. Besides, I’m anxious to see you again. Seems that I dreamed, or maybe hallucinated again, that we woke up together.”
“Really?”
“Yeah!”
“By the way,” she began, “even though you can’t come to school, don’t forget today is Spring Spirit Day. Dress appropriately.”
“Speaking of dress, do you ever wear raspberry lipgloss?” I asked her.
“I’m wearing it now,” she answered. “How did you know?”
“S’pose I told you ’twas in my morning hallucination?”
“Weird! You’ll have to tell me over breakfast. I’ll see you in a few minutes. G’bye!” she said and hung up the call.
I dressed quickly in a pair of red denim jeans and a black tee-shirt, then put on my sneakers. Red jeans are not so easy to find, but we could buy them at the school bookstore where they stock them in our school colors.
Then I noticed the blue form from school on my desk. It reminded me that I cannot return to school just yet. A qualified health-care provider would need to sign off on it before I could return to school. Besides, I didn’t care to revisit Nurse Banner without my Mom’s recipe for pieroshkis.The books and assignments were stacked up on my desk, so I could work on those until Ms. Tollefson, the school psychologist, came to see me. No reason to fall behind in my classes if I didn’t have to.
I’m disturbed most by the persistence and stability of my waking hallucination today. It held for a few minutes, and the longer it held, the more real it felt. Although it was a hallucination, I felt Tina caress me and rub my tummy. The satin was soft and smooth on my skin. I had observed the detail in the lace trim and the stitching on the bows of our lingerie as well as the grain of the wood on my dresser. I never thought to look for a pedicure, but I noticed a glossy, sheen of clear nail polish on my toenails. There was no mistaking the timbre of Tina’s voice, the pitch contour of every vowel and diphthong, and her distinctly softened sibilants. I could smell her perfume lingering from yesterday and catch the scent of her womanhood matching her warmth. And I was surprised by the tart taste of her lipgloss. Yes, it all seemed too real.
But there was even more happening, than just the basic senses seeming so real. I could feel—no—I knew that there’s a reality to this in my own mind. It seemed that Tina and I pick our lingerie together and that my crossdressing and our dressing like each other is a very special affair within our marriage. Somehow I did this willingly and happily with her.
Yet as real as all this seemed, it couldn’t be real. It was a hallucination, my very considerable imagination on overdrive and running rampant. Hoping that Sis had somehow outdone herself as a prankster and joker, that she’s somehow creating a series of illusions to fool me into fulfilling her fantasy of me crossdressing, it was now clear that this was a trick of my own thoughts, not sleight-of-hand but frame-of-mind. Moreover, from what Mom and Tina told me yesterday, Sonia’s fantasy is something that she wants me to enjoy with her.
Since the hallucination this morning both persisted longer and seemed more real, I’m worried that they will get more stable, lasting longer and becoming more powerful, until I’m drawn into them and lose any connection with the real world. If it continues, I will likely lose my mind.
When my hallucination of Tina appeared this morning, it seduced me. I thought that it was my real Tina, even though it could not be her. I was only sixteen, but I could still distinguish reality from imagination, couldn't I? This was crazy.
The school psychologist will have to believe me if I’m to get help for this. But the consensus of opinion at school was that she had more loose screws than a hardware store. So, I was less than confident about meeting with her. Maybe I should just find help on my own. How good could a school shrink be with hallucinations, anyway? She was there mostly to give psychometric tests and guess who had some hyperactivity or attention deficit disorder. It wouldn't be fun.
I felt two arms reach over my shoulders and cross over my chest. I felt Tina’s touch again. Glancing down, I noticed my alternative attire for the day. Instead of the black tee-shirt was a black silk turtleneck and the jeans were replaced by a pleated red denim miniskirt. Today my pantyhose were white and I wore a pair of black maryjanes. Tina wore a white silk turtleneck, a pleated black miniskirt, and red hose with her black maryjanes, so that we were dressed in complementary styles.
Tina and I embraced one another and kissed.
“Honey,” she said, “sit down and let me do your makeup today. With Ms. Tollefson coming over you want a very subtle look for her. After all, you don’t want to scare the school psychologist.”
I giggled. Not laughed, but giggled like a girl. Like Tina and Sis and Mom giggle. And I felt really good doing it.
“When she sees me dressed like this she’ll run from the house screaming,” I said.
“Why? Quite a few guys do it with their wives or girlfriends nowadays,” Tina tried to reassure me.
Quite a few? I’m the only guy that I know who apparently borrows his wife’s (?) clothing with her active encouragement.
Tina proceeded to apply the various kinds of cosmetics to my face, but very lightly, explaining as she went. Apparently I hadn’t been crossdressing very long and Tina instilled the feelings of confidence that a good teacher gives. She’s not just doing my makeup, but teaching me how to do it for myself.
She handed me the brush for the eyeliner. “Remember the theme today is subtlety,” she reminded me. “Let’s see how well you do it yourself.”
I brushed a few strokes lightly over one eye with the eyeliner and stopped, glancing to make eye contact with her.
“That’s it. Now the other eye,” she said, prompting me. I brushed a few more strokes and Tina smiled.
“Sasha, my love,” she said, “you keep getting better and better at this. I know that adapting to this lifestyle is not easy, but I’m very proud of you—proud that you’d do it for me and proud that you’re doing it so well.”
“Well, I do have a good teacher,” I remarked to her, smiling.
Tina blushed, then continued the lesson.
“Hmm? The best hairstyle for you today is prob’ly a simple ponytail,” she said drawing my hair up between a thumb and index finger. Opening a drawer in her vanity she took out two hair ribbons, a white and a red, and two pink scrunchies.
“Remember, a girl wears her ponytail higher than a boy, almost at the very crown. Boys with long hair usually tie it off at or below the ears.”
I brushed out my hair, found the right spot on my crown and gathered my hair in between my thumb and forefinger as I had seen Tina do, then slid the scrunchie from my wrist to my hair. Tina then tied the white ribbon into a perfect bow between my scalp and the scrunchie, the entire operation needing maybe less time to do than to describe.
“Honey,” she asked, “would you do the same for me?” She passed me the red ribbon.
“Why, of course!” I answered, accepting the ribbon from her. She quickly brushed out her hair slid her scrunchie onto it and I tied it off as she had sone with mine. She then removed her scrunchie and I did likewise.
We both smiled in the mirror and briefly kissed. Then, a shiver ran through me as it dawned on me that indeed, I liked how I look. Suddenly, dressing up like a girl seemed normal to me. Maybe I wasn’t born to it, but it somehow felt right. I had acquired new skills and was creating a new persona whom others like and who I enjoy being.
“Something’s missing,” I said, opening the lid of the jewelry box on the vanity.
Tina smiled at me. “You have learned well, my love,” she said. “You’re prompting me now.”
We both selected cross pendants today. Mine was a Russian cross in sterling silver; Tina’s, a golden crucifix. We also chose watches and bracelets in matching metallic tones. Giggling, we helped each other fasten our jewelry. Then, neither Tina nor I could believe what I said next. “Where can we go when you’re back from school this afternoon. We’re both too cute to waste all this effort on staying home.”
She stared at me wide-eyed, her mouth agape.
“Anywhere you want to go, honey,” she answered in disbelief. “Anywhere you want.”
“After I talk to Mis’ Tollefson I figure that I’ll be ready to get outta here really bad. Besides, I do look like a girl, don’t I?”
“Just remember to flash those wedding rings when the boys try to pick you up, Hubby!” Tina warned me.
“And don’t you forget to do the same, Wifey!” I retorted and then quickly planted a kiss on her lips.
“You ready for breakfast yet, Li’l Bro?” Sonia asked, peeking through my door.
I looked down at my—jeans. The hallucination was gone, but instead of feeling relief, I felt—wistful.
As I got to the bottom of the stairs, the doorbell rang. I answered the door to see Tina wearing the white silk turtleneck, the pleated black denim miniskirt, the red pantyhose, and the black maryjanes. Also, she wore the gold crucifix with a matching ladies watch and bracelet. Just like in my hallucination. Her one incongruous item of apparel was a red baseball cap with black and white trim. Her hair was in a ponytail hanging out the back, secured by a red bow.
“Good morning, Sasha!” she greeted me. “I got you this for Spring Spirit Day. I see you’re dressed for it.”
From her totebag Tina took a white baseball cap with red and black trim to present to me.
“Oh! Take this, too!” Tina remembered. “You might try this to gather your hair and thread it through the back of the cap,” removing a pink scrunchie from her wrist to give me. “You can tie it off with this,” she continued handing me a white hair ribbon.
I blushed.
“Thank you, Tina. Maybe I should wear the hat when the school shrink visits?” I joked with her.
“I was hoping you might wear the hair ribbon when she talks to you,” Tina said, giggling. The giggle was echoed by my sister behind me.
“Sis! Give it a break!” I yelled. But their giggles escalated to full-blown laughter.
“Come in, Tina,” Sonia invited her into the house. “Breakfast is ready. You can sit next to Sasha.”
“Please!” I said to my girlfriend. “I want you there if I hallucinate again. Or even if I don’t.”
In the kitchen, everyone was quickly seated, even Mom, since Sis had helped prepare breakfast with her. As she sat down, I noted Tina’s red cap. The red and white baseball caps matching our pantyhose and hair ribbons from the hallucination were altogether too weird. If Tina had just brought hair ribbons, that would have been easier. But with the baseball caps, it seemed that reality itself was beginning to tease me. Like I needed another source of teasing!
When we sat down at table, for just a moment, I thought that I saw Tina wearing just the red ribbon in her hair, but at second glance, she was still wearing her basebal cap. Meanwhile I placed mine at the side of the table.
“Sonia, this is yours!” Tina presented Sis a black baseball cap with red and white trim and a matching black hair ribbon.
“Thanks, Tina!” She smiled and quickly put her hair up in a scrunchie and Tina tied off Sonia’s ponytail with the black ribbon.
“Sasha!” Tina pouted. “You’re not wearing yours?”
“A gentleman doesn’t wear his hat at table. That would be bad manners,” I reminded her.
Sonia giggled. “Would it be proper for a boy to wear a baseball cap at table if dressed like a girl?”
“Sis! Can’t you sing another tune?” I objected.
“Yes, Sonia,” Mom added. “Don’t tease your brother when he’s showing good manners! It’s rare enough among youth today. You should encourage him!”
Tina also rallied to my cause. “So few boys know how to be nice to a girl nowadays,” she explained. “I feel privileged to have Sasha for my boyfriend. If manners dictate he should wait to wear his new hat, then I’ll be content to wait.” She smiled at me.
Mom had taught us good manners from as young as I can remember. She had always presented manners as a game, one that I had learned to enjoy playing.
We continued our small talk and sillier topics as breakfast progressed. Tina appeared to have enjoyed learning the Russian custom of sweetening her tea with jam.
“So, when does Mis’ Tollefson come today?” Tina inquired, referring to the school psychologist.
“Some time after lunch,” I replied. “Of course, since I’m not allowed to go back to school yet, she must come here and because I’m absent for a medical issue, I mostly have to stay home. Like, I can’t go to the mall, the arcade, or even the library to study during school hours.
“I doubt it will be boring when Mis’ Tollefson shows up, though,” I said and the girls giggled at the remark. Our school psychologist had won herself the reputation for being weirder than anyone else on the staff or faculty.
“Sasha, did you have any new hallucinations this morning?” Mom asked.
“Yes, but it seemed more pleasant than scary,” I said glancing obliquely and grinning at Tina. She giggled again.
“What?” Sonia demanded to know, puzzled.
Then I made an involuntary mistake that Sis would never let me forget. Like a girl, I giggled.
“Sasha, you giggled!” Sonia beamed. “And that’s distinctly how girls giggle.”
“He did it yesterday, too,” Mom felt compelled to report.
“Oh, really?” Sis asked, looking at Mom then Tina. “Are you sure there’s not just a little bit of girl inside you?” she teased.
I knew where this line of discussion was leading and, especially today, I did not want to go there.
“Give it a rest, Sis! After yesterday and so far this morning, it’s just not funny anymore,” I objected quite truthfully.
Maybe these hallucinations were somehow trying to suggest that I should—or would—fulfill Sonia’s fantasy? But then why is Tina in them and not Sis? Tina’s talk indicated that this was somehow very important to my sister, as weird as it seemed.
Still, I was uncomfortable with the idea. I was small enough a boy that my masculinity felt threatened. That’s why I went out for baseball, soccer, and especially ice hockey. At soccer I would get quite a few yellow cards, so my teammates thought I was tough even though small. In truth, I got so many yellow cards, but not red, because I was clumsy, tending to get in an opponent’s way, colliding with and tripping them up unintentionally. However, it made my friends and teammates think me more rugged, so I went with it. When playing ice hockey, I accumulated some serious time in the penalty box for much the same reason—or so everyone thought.
Nonetheless, I couldn’t understand why Sonia wanted to dress me up like a girl. And she had wanted this a long time, years in fact, since we were little. It made no sense to me whatever.
We finished breakfast and I went outside with Tina and Sis to wait on the schoolbus. Tina then produced a hairbrush from her totebag and brushed my hair into a ponytail (boy’s style) and secured it by a pink scrunchie from her wrist.
“You have the white hair ribbon?” Tina asked.
“Y’know, I’d rather not wear it,” I confessed to Tina.
“I know. But then I could just leave the pink scrunchie in your hair,” she said.
I gave her the white ribbon and Tina tied my hair off with it. She then helped me thread my ponytail through the back of my baseball cap. Sis giggled as she clapped her hands together and then high-fived my girlfriend.
“You guys planned this, didn’t you?” I asked.
Sis and Tina giggled again, beaming their most innocently mischievous smiles at me.
“I might have known!” I complained.
Tina embraced me to kiss, but it quickly became more of a challenge than usual since the bills of our baseball caps were in the way. She giggled and I chuckled as we had to adjust our angles of approach. But we found the right position and went for the long kiss.
“Guys! Get a room!” my sister teased.
We broke off our kiss more because we needed a breath than to acknowledge Sonia’s remark. (Sis had demonstrated some serious liplock to onlookers more than a few times!) We were still feeling giddy and continued giggling and laughing. Then to her surprise and delight, Tina and I both kissed Sis on opposite cheeks simutaneously.
“Sis, I do need to talk to you after school today,” I told her.
“What about, Li’l Bro?” she probed.
“I won’t know exactly until I’ve talked with the school shrink,” I told her, “but I’m wondering if our interactions had have anything to do with my hallucinations.”
“You mean my teasing, don’t you?” Sonia said, subdued and looking down sadly.
“Maybe,” I replied honestly, “but like I said, I can’t know for sure until I talk with Mis’ Tollefson. So don’t blame yourself. This isn’t about fault or blame. It’s about why this is all so weird. Most of it seems to be in my own head.”
“I still would feel better if you weren’t going through it,” she said.
“Of course you would,” I consoled her. “You’re my sister and you care for my well-being. That’s why you set me up with Tina, right?”
Sis smiled at me with tears in her eyes. I kissed her on the cheek and with Tina, we all hugged together as the schoolbus pulled up. I helped Sis onto the bus and kissed Tina as she boarded. As the bus pulled away, I went back into the house to wait for the school psychologist.
© 2010-2013 by Anam Chara
To See Through a Glass Darkly
by Anam Chara
Chapter 5
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Russian language notes
Мой Саша [Moy SAH-shuh], My Sasha
«Да, моя Мама!» [Dah, mah-YAH MAH-muh], “Yes, my Mommy!”
*****************************
As I’d found learning languages to be quite easy for me, the French lesson was simple enough to get through. History was even less challenging given the way it was taught. All that was necessary was simply reading the assigned text. No written assignment was required for the course this week.
Sitting at the desk, I chanced to notice my reflection in the mirror of my closet door. I saw myself as a girl again.
I looked down to see the black silk turtleneck, the red denim miniskirt, smooth white pantyhose on my legs, and the pair of cute maryjanes with the strap over the instep. I reached up and felt the ribbon in my hair holding up my ponytail at the crown. Another look in the mirror confirmed how nicely Tina had tied the bow. The carefully applied makeup blended subtly into the image. It seemed barely there.
Wow!
The girl in the mirror looked very pretty. Now I knew why both Tina and Sis wanted me to dress up. I really did look nice as a girl. I still felt embarassed, but I was also feeling good.
Sonia was a beauty queen and it only made sense that we would share genes. Then I remembered Mom’s words:
“You share many of Sonia’s features. Maybe you will look very pretty as girl.”
For now, though, I was dressed more in Tina’s style. She also wants me to look as beautiful as she does.
Then I saw something on the desk I hadn’t noticed before. It looked like a wedding photograph. In it I recognized Sonia and Debbie as bridesmaids, and Tom and Bill as groomsmen. Certainly I would have picked Tom as my best man and both he and Bill would’ve flown back for my wedding. But instead of a bridegroom, there were two brides in beautiful white wedding gowns. Tina was one and the other was—myself! Was this a digitally altered photograph? Somehow, I was thinking that it was not.
So then, I was a bride in a wedding? In front of other people? In a dress? With my best friends there?
This was a bit much for me and I started to feel a little dizzy and light-headed.
For the first time I inspected my fingernails quite closely. The French manicure is so elegant and suddenly, I knew it must have been my idea. I never liked red nail polish on anyone—it’s too garish for my taste. Tina and Sonia both wear various shades of red. Did they go with the white French manicure just to match the white dresses, or was it a concession to my own taste and style?
I had helped plan the wedding, too? Did I want to do this? In front of everyone?
Now I was more than just a little dizzy and light headed. In fact, I was beginning to feel—.
*****************************
I awoke startled to see Mom and Ms. Tollefson kneeling over me. Then I glanced down at myself to see a black tee-shirt and no wedding rings or manicures. Relieved, I took a deep breath and exhaled.
“That’s right, Sasha,” Ms. Tollefson said quietly. “Relax. You’re alright, now.”
“Would you like some tea, мой Саша?” Mom asked me.
«Да, моя Мама!» I answered.
“Mis’ Tollefson, would you like tea, also—Russian style?” Mom asked the psychologist.
“Yes, I would, thank you.”
Mom and Ms. Tollefson helped me to my feet. Slowly. I must have fainted to escape the hallucination. Mom lead me downstairs by the hand, the school psychologist behind me, since I was still somewhat dizzy. We went into the kitchen, where I noticed a briefcase on the table.
Mom turned to the samovar and ran hot water into two glasses of tea leaves. She then set our glasses of tea and spoons on the table and place the covered dish of strawberry jam between us. Then taking her own glass of tea, she left Ms. Tollefson and me alone in the kitchen. Sitting down at table, I spooned some jam into my tea. The psychologist, observing me, did the same.
“The Russian tradition is to sweeten tea with jam or fruit preserves. We also serve it with the whole leaves in the glass. Tina just learned this yesterday morning.”
“So, Sasha, how are you and Tina? I hear you’ve been dating?” Ms. Tollefson asked.
“Yes. She and my sister Sonia are best friends. Sis set us up for our first date.”
“When was that?”
“Only two weeks ago.”
“Did you like Sonia getting involved in your personal life that way?”
“Yeah. It was the nicest thing she’s ever done for me,” I replied then sipped my tea.
Ms. Tollefson had these penetrating, crystal blue eyes. The kind that could see right into me. Taking a sip of her own tea, she looked right at me. “Nurse Banner copied me her notes from your meeting with her yesterday morning. I’m very concerned about what’s happening to you. There’s something very wrong, I think it’s safe to say, but I can’t begin to guess what. Hallucinations are usually a symptom of schizophrenia or some similar disorder, but there’s usually more than just that. And from what I can tell, you’ve had the full range of sensory hallucinations: visual, auditory, tactile, gustatory, and olfactory. You’ve had all those?”
“Yeah. And all at once, too.”
“How real do they seem to you?”
Nervously, I adjusted the hem of my miniskirt and crossed my ankles. As I did, I noticed how nice the texture of nylons rubbing across my legs felt.
“As real as we are here. But I know that they can’t be for real. That’s why I went in to see Nurse Banner yesterday morning,” I replied, feeling the texture of my red denim jeans.
“Well, at least your reality-testing sounds intact, Sasha,” she remarked.
“Huh?” I wondered aloud.
“Reality-testing is how you recognize what is and isn’t real. In this case you know when you’re hallucinating because what you see and hear doesn’t make sense to you. The content of what you perceive is so far from what you’d expect, you question if your perception is true.”
“I guess that’s why the content of my hallucinations bothers me so much?” I queried. “Things shouldn’t be happening the way I’m seeing them?”
I glanced down at my French manicure. Again.
“Correct. And it justifiably upsets you when you see it,” she offered as a conclusion, sipping some tea again. The psychologist continued, “Now, I’d like you to tell me about the content of your hallucinations.”
I hated this.
Maybe I could start with something more innocuous than my fully envisioned episodes of Crossdressing at DeGrassi Senior High.
“It began when I woke up yesterday. The L-E-D’s in my digital clock’s display were green. Normally they’re red.”
“Have you ever been told you might have a color vision deficiency?”
“No, but wouldn’t that affect my perception of other colors as well? Only the L-E-D’s changed color. And the bathroom. Our bathroom is pink things on a white background. But yesterday it looked more like white things on a pink background.”
“You reported to Nurse Banner that you saw yourself crossdressed in these hallucinations?” Ms. Tollefson asked.
I blushed.
“I’ll take that as a yes,” she noted, flexing a very slight grin at me.
“You could say it’s a persistent theme,” I admitted.
“Sasha, you wouldn’t be the first boy who imagined himself wearing girls’ clothing,” Ms. Tollefson tried to assure me with a smile.
I looked at my shoes. Maryjanes. Why was this happening to me?
“But I don’t even want to imagine it. I’ve always been small for a boy and I get pushed around for it. I’m supposed to grow into manhood but I’ve always been afraid that I’ll never measure up,” I confessed to her.
“I have noticed in your records that you’ve gone out for soccer, hockey, and baseball. And you’ve had quite a reputation for being a real scrapper at hockey and soccer,” Ms. Tollefson remarked, having opened her briefcase for some documents.
“The truth is that in soccer, I’m a clutz. I cause other players to trip and collide all the time. But I like it when I’m yellow-carded because it makes me look bad-assed! It’s good for my image off the field.”
“Is it the same way in hockey?” she followed up.
“Oh no! In hockey, I really do get mad. We all do and tempers flare sometimes. Even though I spend some time in the penalty box, you should see how much more I do get away with on the ice. Nothing’s for show there. For me, baseball and soccer are just games. But ice hockey is serious business.”
Ms. Tollefson raised an eyebrow. “I see! So you have established your claim to manhood in the hockey rink?”
“You’d better believe it!” I declared smugly to her. “Papa and I bonded on the ice. He was a very good hockey player before he came to America.”
“What does he do now?” Ms. Tollefson asked.
“He’s an engineer. After Christmas he went to New Orleans to work. He got a six-month project there. But he did get to come home for Holy Week and Easter, though.”
“So he’s not residing here right now?”
“No. He’s had to travel for work since the metallurgical plant closed. We really miss him. I wish he could have seen me play hockey this year. But he makes so much more money because he’s willing to work in different places.”
Ms. Tollefson continued to take notes on her pad, now and then pausing to look at a document in her briefcase.
“There’s another theme in your hallucinations that concerns me greatly,” she continued.
You’d’ve thought that the crossdressing were weird enough as a theme. Apparently, she needed more.
“And what’s that?” I asked, not certain where she might be going with this.
“You mentioned to Nurse Banner that you and Tina were apparently married in your hallucinations.”
“Yeah. She would call me her ‘husband’ and we wore matching wedding rings. In one today, I saw a picture of our wedding. We were both wearing wedding dresses in it.”
Looking at my left hand, there were neither wedding rings nor white tipped fingernails.
“The crossdressing theme again?” Ms. Tollefson probed further.
“It seems to be connected with our marriage. It must be supposed to bring us closer, somehow,” I speculated.
“But you’ve only been dating two weeks. Isn’t that early even to be thinking about marriage?” she asked rhetorically.
“That’s why I knew it was a hallucination. We couldn’t’ve been married yet. But in the hallucinations we seem to have married two weeks ago instead of beginning to date then.”
“Sasha, you’re talking about your hallucinations almost like they’re a different history,” Ms. Tollefson observed.
“I didn’t think about them that way. Besides, they don’t seem like a different past, but another present. My clothes when I’m crossdressed in the hallucinations seem to be related to what I’m actually wearing.”
“What do you mean?” she pressed further.
“Well, if I’m wearing a black tee-shirt, the hallucination has a black turtleneck. Denim jeans appear as a denim skirt. Things like that.”
“That’s interesting,” she noted. “So your hallucinations distort rather than contravene reality.”
“What?”
“The content of your hallucinations is not impossible. It’s only different from what you know. You could crossdress, but you don’t. You could be married to Tina, but you aren’t. Your clock could have green L-E-D’s, but it has red. Think about it. Is anything you’ve hallucinated actually impossible? Or is it just not likely?”
Nothing that I had seen in these visions was impossible. It was only confusing, disturbing, or embarassing.
“They’re just unlikely. But someone would prob’ly object to them before they could happen. Like, I’m sure Tina and I are too young to get married. Even if we wanted to, I think we’d still plan it after graduation. My parents would object for sure. Hers would, too.”
“So then, who’d object to you crossdressing?”
“I would!”
“Anyone else?”
“My Papa, certainly.”
“Just your father, then?”
“Almost everyone else I know. Tom and Bill, although they’ve moved away. My coaches and teammates would give me no end of grief. And Mis’ Muldoon would find it in violation of some kind of policy and require me to fill out an endless stack of forms. And whatever classmates weren’t avoiding me would be looking to beat me up!”
“How would your Mom, sister, and Tina feel about it?”
She just had to go there.
“Mom thinks I’d look pretty, Sis constantly teases me and schemes to get me into her clothes, and yesterday Tina had me wearing her pink cardigan and today,” I said, reaching back and pulling it from my hair, “this white hair ribbon.”
“Oh!” Ms. Tollefson exclaimed, cupping her hands over her mouth to muffle a sustained, whining laugh-tone and to conceal a naughty grin.
“It’s not funny!” I objected.
“I’m sorry. It was so unexpected,” she apologized. “So, how does your sister tease you?”
“She’s always remarking about how I’d look in a dress or skirt she has or something like that. Tina talked to me and said that Sonia has this fantasy of dressing me up.”
“She wouldn’t be the first girl to dress up her little brother. I did mine when we were kids. He looked so cute!”
I sensed a screw loosening just then.
“So how did he like it?” I probed.
“Not too well, but he had to do it for a school assignment,” she answered. “It was that or flunk.”
“That’s not fair!” I responded.
“Our mother agreed,” Ms. Tollefson continued. “But he did ask me, though, to make him look as much like a girl as possible. He thought it would be worse to look like a boy wearing a dress.”
Somehow that was a logical, even if a perverse, conclusion. They had attempted to minimize any embarassment ensuing her brother’s experience.
“Sasha, I have a test I’d like to give you,” she said, getting some documents from her briefcase. “This won’t take too long and it might help me understand where you’re coming from. It’s called the ‘Bem Sex Role Inventory,’ or the ‘B-S-R-I.’ It’s an attempt to measure your response to traditional masculine and feminine values.”
Somehow, I knew another screw had just loosened.
*****************************
On this BSRI test I was required to rank if a word or phrase given described me on a scale of one (if never) to seven (if always). There were sixty words or phrases and it took me longer than it was supposed to. This was because I was worried about wrong answers.
There weren’t supposed to be wrong answers on these tests. But for me there were, because the test, if I understood Ms. Tollefson correctly, was going to tell if I were more comfortable with masculine or feminine thinking. But that’s not such an easy thing to tell from the words or phrases I had to mark. For example, the terms conceited, dominant, and soft-spoken all appear, but how can you know which is masculine or feminine? I know both males and females who are all of those and others who are none of them.
It took Ms. Tollefson only a few minutes to score my test and announce the results.
“Sasha, your score on the M-scale is six-point-one and on the F-scale it’s six-point-four, which classifies you as Androgynous.”
“Well, I don’t wanna be androgynous,” I proclaimed. “I’m a boy and I wanna stay one.”
“That’s not quite what the test means,” Ms. Tollefson tried to allay my fears. “It means that you would be good at both traditional masculine and feminine roles.”
“You gave the score on my M-scale as six-point-one and on the F-scale as six-point-four. Am I right in guessing the M-scale is for ’masculine’ and the F for ’feminine’?”
“That’s correct,” she answered.
“Then I scored higher on the feminine than on the masculine scale,” I observed, very anxiously. “That’s not something I needed to hear today.”
“It’s alright, Sasha,” she said, still trying to reassure me. “Maybe we could just say for you, that androgynous means your masculine and feminine traits show a healthy balance. You’re neither macho nor sissy. You would find both equally distasteful. Am I right?”
In truth, that did sound like me. Machismo required doing some unbelievably stupid things just to show that you were—well—macho! Of course, I didn’t care to dress up like my sister, either.
“Yes. You nailed that one,” I conceded.
“And the point-three difference,” she said, smiling and stretching the white hair ribbon between thumb and index finger of each hand, “is why Tina got you to wear this!”
Ms. Tollefson began giggling like a schoolgirl. Even the school psychologist was teasing me.
Yet another screw had loosened.
*****************************
Before Ms. Tollefson left, she decided to refer me to a psychiatrist for further evaluation and diagnosis. She said something about gender identity disorder not usually being associated with hallucinations. Then she said that I may also be referred to a neurologist to look for a possible brain injury.
After the school psychologist had left, Mom and I sat down at the kitchen table with fresh tea.
“Mom, I don’t really have much confidence in her,” I said. “Everyone at school thinks she’s flaky. Now, I have to agree. She even teased me about my hair ribbon. Imagine that! The school psychologist was teasing me!”
I sweetened my tea with some strawberry jam and sipped it.
“Yes. That is strange for woman with her responsibility. What you think that she really mean by it?”
“I don’t have a clue, Mom.” I sipped some more tea.
“I think you worry about Sonia’s teasing too much,” she said to me.
“Tina mentioned yesterday that Sis told her that she’s had a fantasy of dressing me up for a long time.”
“Yes. She speaks to me of it sometimes.”
“But what surprised me is what Tina said was Sonia’s reason.”
“Oh?”
“She said that Sis didn’t want to embarass me, but that she wanted me to enjoy it with her. Tina said she had never actually tried because she was afraid to risk humiliating me.”
“Son, that is true,” Mom affirmed. “But there may be more to it than she even knows, herself.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“I tell you this. She enjoys dressing up in beautiful dresses and elegant gowns. Sonia enjoys being girl. To your sister, that is most magnificent state of being possible. But there is one tradition of being girl that she has not done and, as things are, she cannot do. But you may help her come close to it.”
“What would that be?” I tried to probe more deeply.
“I may already tell you too much, Sasha,” Mom said. “Any more should come not from me, but from Sonia. You are my son and I am very proud of you. You are highly intelligent, uncommonly wise, and more sensitive than most other boys. So, use your heart and mind to figure it out.”
With that, Mom smiled and left me alone in the kitchen.
© 2010-2013, 2018 by Anam Chara
To See Through a Glass Darkly
by Anam Chara
Chapter 6
*****************************
Working at my desk, I had completed my writing assignment for English. Briefly, I looked over the assigned problems in Algebra and Chemistry. Those weren’t difficult for me—I could do them in my sleep—or maybe even during a hallucination?
So next, I should think about Sis. Tina had revealed to me that Sonia’s fantasy was indeed to dress me up like a girl. However, she did not want this to embarass me but for me to enjoy it somehow? Her thinking so, I simply could not understand. How could she imagine that I would ever enjoy crossdressing? Even if I did so that only she could see me, I’d still be embarassed. If anyone else were there to see me do it, I’d be humiliated.
Yes, I’d need to have a serious talk with Sis. But I must be careful because this fantasy was apparently very important to her. Yet, I couldn’t yield to her on it. But if Tina were right, at least Sis appreciated my discomfort with her fantasy.
Looking at the time, it was nearly three o’clock, so Sis would be home soon. But it was a green three o’clock. I looked down, sure enough, at my skirt. Looking in the mirror, I could see that my hair needed some work. So I went to the vanity to brush it out carefully. Then, I asked myself, how would Tina do it?
Soon, I had brushed my hair out, and next, I found the pink scrunchie on the vanity and put it around my wrist. Gathering my hair between thumb and forefinger, I pulled the scrunchie over my hand to my hair. Now, all that remained was to tie the white ribbon between my scalp and the scrunchie.
I smiled at my reflection in the mirror. I had fixed my own hair myself. Then I felt a shudder as I understood that I looked like a girl and a very convincing one at that. I had been dressing like this for Tina, but still, I was only in another hallucination.
Then I noticed another detail in my reflection. Raising my hands to my chest, I cupped a small pair of breasts. A brassière contained them under my top. The fabric felt soft and smooth. Touching my shoulders I felt its straps under the turtleneck.
In the context of these hallucinations, I had begun crossdressing somehow, and Tina had encouraged me. Yet more than that, I had begun to enjoy wearing clothes like hers. And it felt good to look so feminine. This just wasn’t like me!
Maybe these hallucinations were trying to tell me something? I didn’t really know what they were. Maybe I needed to study something about them? Certainly this was more than I wanted to think about right now.
I wished just then that Papa were here. I could maybe call him, but then what would I say? Ought I tell my father that I was afraid of losing my mind? Certainly not! His work was too important to all of us, and if he were too worried about me, he couldn’t think well. Or he might come home immediately and I’d rather not risk that. It could make even more problems for all of us.
There was only one person with whom I could talk now, even if I felt uncomfortable to talk with her about this subject.
*****************************
“Mom,” I said entering the kitchen. “I need to talk with you.”
“Of course, мой Саша!” she said. “Would you like tea, then?”
«Да, моя Мама!» I answered, grateful that she had offered me the calming beverage. “That would be very nice!”
Mom smiled as she put tea in two glasses for us and filled them from the samovar. Sonia and I had grown up with tea instead of coffee. Mom brought the steaming glasses over to the table as I sat down, then so did she.
“So, мой Саша,” she began, “what bothers you?”
Nervously I glanced at my slightly dirty and irregular, short, normal fingernails.
“While doing my homework,” I began, “I had another hallucination and discovered something about it that upset me.” I felt a slight tremor in my lips as I spoke.
“You were upset more by something in the vision than by having the vision?” Mom asked to clarify. “I wish to understand correctly.”
“No,” I answered. “That’s not exactly what I meant. I’m not quite sure how to say it. Maybe—I guess what upset me was not even what was in it, but how I felt about it.”
“Your feelings about it surprised you?” she asked.
This time I glanced at my white-tipped nails and played with my wedding rings. Then I seemed to relax somewhat.
“Yes, that’s what upset me,” I replied, spooning some strawberry jam into my glass of tea. “I saw myself dressed like Tina, again. But I had removed the ribbon she gave me while talking to Ms. Tollefson. So I brushed out my hair, fixed my ponytail, and tied the ribbon like she did this morning, since I still want it in my hair when she returns after school. At first, I felt good because I was able to do it just like she did. But then suddenly I felt comfortable dressed as a pretty girl. First, I liked it, then I felt scared because I liked it.”
“Is that why you have tied the white ribbon at the top of your hair?”
My hand went right up to the top of my head. I had tied off my ponytail in the classic girls’ style high behind the crown. I blushed as I quickly pulled it loose. I dropped the ribbon on the table and took a sip of tea.
“Son, you are shaking!” Mom remarked. “You’re splashing your tea everywhere.”
Immediately I set my glass of tea back down. And I felt tears streaming down my cheeks. I took a paper towel to wipe up the spilled tea.
“Мой Саша!“ Mom began to console me. “Yes, I think that I understand. Do you remember our talk after Ms. Tollefson left?”
My nails were simple and unmanicured again.
“You mean about Tina?” I asked Mom to be certain.
“Yes,” she answered. “What might you do about Sonia’s teasing? Your visions are teaching you how to resolve it. Have courage in yourself and trust your sister to appreciate your doing it.”
I felt my whole person shaking at Mom’s advice. What she was hinting I should do scared me. But she is my Mom, the same one who stood by me when I went out for soccer and ice hockey and encouraged me to keep playing when I thought of quitting those teams. She has been at every home game that I played and even away games when possible. She would even smile at me when I would be sent to the penalty box for “asserting my presence on the ice.” (That was Mom’s phrase.)
The shaking subsided as I remembered that Mom had never given me wrong advice. Still, I was uneasy about it.
*****************************
Sitting alone at the kitchen table, I continued to mull over what to do. Then, Sis came into the kitchen and went to the samovar for some hot water and made herself some tea.
“Please, Sis, come and join me,” I invited her. “Do you remember this morning when I said I wanted to talk to you?”
Sis sat down next to me at table.
“Yes,” she replied, her voice subdued. “So what’s up? Am I responsible for causing your hallucinations by teasing you?”
“Honestly, I don’t know,” I confessed, hoping that it might reassure her. “But I do need to find out why you always tease me about wearing dresses.”
Sonia looked away, as if to avoid eye contact.
I tugged down on the hem of my skirt. Oh, if Sonia only knew what I wore in my mind right now! Still, I wasn’t quite sure where I wanted to take this conversation. Then, I recalled what Mom had said to me earlier in the day and the truth fell into place.
“Yesterday,” I continued, “Tina told me about something you told her, and today, Mom confirmed it. More than that, Mom told me to figure out your motive for teasing me about dressing up. And I think now that I understand. You’ve always wished that someday you might have a younger sister, haven’t you?”
Sonia bowed her head for a moment and quietly sipped some tea. She was uncomfortable.
“Yes, I have. But don’t take it the wrong way. I’m glad to have you as a brother. I really do love you, Sasha.”
“I know that and now I think understand how deeply you really mean it. And after you set me up with Tina, I’ve been looking for a special way to reciprocate that affection with you.”
Then I began thinking about what to say next and the tremors started again. Then the French manicure returned to my hands and I calmed down. I crossed my ankles and relaxed feeling nylon brushing against my skin.
“Sonia, yesterday at breakfast you teased me that you have a dress or two I would look cute in.” I couldn’t believe I was saying this, yet I continued, “I would like you to place those dresses in my closet while I consider becoming your little sister for a while.”
Sis stared at me wide-eyed for a moment, her mouth open for a moment until it formed into a smile and she squealed with delight.
“Shut up!” she beamed. “For real?”
As I sighed, I noticed carefully the dimples in the corners of her smile. They looked like mine. Mom would tease both of us about them.
“I’m really scared and I’m nervous about doing it, but now I understand that you don’t want to embarass me by doing this. I know that you want me to enjoy it with you.”
No manicure. Red denim jeans instead of skirt and pantyhose.
“Yes, Li’l Bro!” Sis said, taking my hands in hers. “I love being a girl and I’ve always wanted to share that with you somehow. If you’re willing to trust me, we can have a lot of fun doing it.”
Tears began streaming down her face. She leaned over in her chair and hugged me, kissing me on the cheek.
“Sis, I trust you. I’d always feared humiliation when you teased me about it. But I love you and know you love me and wouldn’t do that.”
“Oh, of course not, Sasha!” Sis affirmed, smiling and crying at once. “Being a girl, living feminine is so wonderful! It’s really the most beautiful experience I could ever share with you. Dressing up is just one part of it, too.
“Tina and I have noticed how you are more sensitive than other boys and we think you’d enjoy having girlfriends—not just a girlfriend like Tina to be dating, but a circle of girls to talk with, to go shopping with, and all that. And we want to include you as our girlfriend, too. We’d love you to be a part-time girl!
“I know how lonely you’ve been since Tom and Bill moved away—especially Tom. The two of you had been together almost since the two of you could walk and talk. You’ve not had any friends so close since they left. But we girls like to grow as many new friendships as we can. You really need to get ‘girled-up’ for a while.
“Oh, Li’l Bro!” Sis suddenly gasped. “I hope I’m not overwhelming you with all this.”
“Just let me try to get used to the idea first. This is very important to you, so I need to become happy about what you want to share. I don’t want to disappoint you later by backing out before you’ve had a chance to enjoy it.”
*****************************
Mom entered the kitchen.
“Sonia,” she announced. “We have company arriving. Would you get the door?”
“Mom, guess what?” my sister said, as if ignoring Mom’s request. “Sasha—.”
“I heard,” Mom assured her. “Sasha is willing to be your sister as well as your brother.”
Sonia went to answer the door while Mom came and put a comforting hand on my shoulder.
“Son,” she said, “I have even more pride in you, now. Today, you show love, wisdom, and courage in a most unusual way, perhaps more so than you can yet understand.”
“Mom,” I replied, “I learned from my visions that I can overcome my fear of looking foolish by embracing it. My sister will become my mentor for girlhood, won’t she? This is what you meant. She never had a sister to teach before.”
“You are correct again,” Mom confirmed. “You learn well from your visions. And from your mother, too.”
At that moment we heard the squeals of combined joy and disbelief emanate from the next room. Sis, Tina, and Deb were all there and my sister obviously had shared her news of my intention to indulge her fantasy. She and both of her friends filed into the kitchen to deliver hugs and kisses to me. Tina waited until Sis and Deb kissed me on both cheeks at once, and then Tina pressed her lips to mine for an especially passionate kiss.
“Sasha,” Tina began, “I’m looking forward to this as much as Sonia. You are going to become one charming and beautiful girl. We’ll all have a hand in it, and when we’re done, the only boyish thought that you will ever want to have is desiring me!”
That was apparently what had happened to me in the hallucinations. I had accepted “girlhood,” except that Tina and I were married. Now, was I about to allow my life to follow what I’d seen in my hallucinations of today and yesterday? Only three days ago, none of this yet existed. Why now?
“Please, ladies!” I pled with them. “Slow down so I can get used to the idea. I’m still anxious about doing it. Just make sure you do a really good job, because I don’t want to look like a boy in a dress.”
“Li’l Brother,” Sis began, “trust me; trust us! We have all noticed your features and have ideas for you, starting with a full makeover. But when to start, we’ll leave up to you.”
“How long do you want me to do this?” I inquired next.
“As long as you’re alright with it,” she answered. “It will take some time. It would be the most fun for you if you experience a range of things but not all at once. We don’t want you to be overwhelmed.”
So this would extend beyond a single day or a night-on-the-town. Then a time frame became immediately obvious to me.
“Since tomorrow is Friday and I can’t return to school until someone signs my readmission form, let’s think about tomorrow, the weekend, and maybe Monday.”
I sat back for a moment and relaxed a little, while the girls all sat themselves down around the kitchen table, Sis to my left, Tina to the right, and their friend Deb across from me. Mom came in next to make us tea, but Sonia gave up her seat to Mom and went to the samovar to make the tea. She began spooning tea leaves into the glasses.
“Mom,” my sister said, “I know you’ve been making tea all day. It’s my turn now. Take a break and let me host this little celebration.”
Glancing at my hands, the manicure was not there. It hadn’t been visible for a while.
“Let’s get going then!” Sis announced as she filled the glasses from the samovar. “Getting Sasha dolled-up will take some effort, but I think that we can work together on this. Deb, you’re a genius with hair. Can you give him a nice style, work with him, maybe teach him how to do his own?”
The redhead across the table from me giggled.
“I think so,” Deb answered, looking directly at me, “if he will trust me.”
Deb’s flaming auburn hair was always beautifully styled and now was no exception. I knew that she often helped Sis and Tina with theirs.
“Did you do the style you’re wearing now?” I asked.
“Of course I did,” Deb affirmed to me.
“Then absolutely, I’ll trust you,” I promised her.
“Sasha,” Sis continued, “since we have similar facial features and complection, it would prob’ly be best for me to work with you on cosmetics and understanding your own color. Tina, take charge of wardrobe for him. Show him how to dress and how to shop. For now, you can use any of my clothes, shoes and accessories that fit him.”
“I look forward to it,” Tina answered. “It will be fun for sure.”
“There’s another issue we need to cover,” Sonia said. “Mom, we need a coach to encourage Sasha. All this is new to him—very new. He will need some words of support when he’s too anxious or when what we do gets too difficult. You’ve already helped this way. But we all may need such support now and then, not just Sasha.”
“You know that I will always help you, any of you as I can,” Mom said. “And Sonia, your brother is doing this for you. So never fail to show him that you appreciate it.”
“The most difficult job here, though, belongs to Sasha,” Sis began to conclude. “He will try to learn in a few days what we’ve been doing daily since we were born. Li’l Bro, you are so sweet and brave agreeing to do this for me.”
“So, Sasha,” Tina asked me quietly. “Why did you finally agree to give in to your sister’s wish now?”
“When you told me she wants me to enjoy it because she does, you helped me understand she wants to share this with me like a sister. Mom confirmed this today. Sonia’s always wanted a little sister and I’ve promised to try to be that for her. And in my hallucinations, I felt good dressing like you. So I think it will be okay.”
“You were dressing like me in your hallucinations?” Tina asked, surprised. “What were you wearing?”
“Turtlenecks and skirts like yours, but with colors reversed. Maybe like twins would. Pantyhose and shoes like yours, too,” I recounted. “We woke together wearing the same style of lingerie, yours in pink and mine in blue.”
She kissed me quickly on the cheek and grinned.
“Sonia,” my girlfriend addressed my sister, “I think he should start tonight. Did you have a plan for that?”
“Well, to be honest, I never thought he’d go along with it,” Sis answered, “so I don’t have too many details in mind. You have any ideas?”
“Let’s give him something for bed tonight,” Tina suggested. “Do you have any available lingerie he could wear?”
“I might,” Sonia answered. “I have a new set of a satin camisole and tap pants. Powder blue, I think, with white lace trim.”
A light blue camisole with lace trim is what I had worn when waking up with Tina in that morning’s hallucination. This was beginning to feel too spooky, now.
*****************************
Nervously I sat at Sonia’s vanity while she studied my face. For the first time ever, I was dressed entirely in women’s clothing. But it was alright, since I was alone with Sis and Mom was already asleep.
Sis had been trying to figure out which cosmetics would look best for me, while I tried to calm down after the small trauma that I had suffered by using a depilatory for the first time. That stuff was very irritating. Sis had applied a nice, soothing lotion to me afterwards, but the memory of that irritation still lingers.
After my evening shower, I had dressed in a never worn set of matching powder blue camisole and tap pants with, of course, white lace trim. This was indeed what I had worn in my hallucination. Tina had also remarked that she had the same style at home in pink. I had never worn satin next to my skin before and it felt very nice. That had to be why lingerie was a major industry.
“This lingerie feels great, Sis!” I remarked.
“Think you can get used to it?” she inquired of me.
Blushing, I could feel my manhood stirring. So, I crossed my legs and tied my belt tighter.
Sonia and Tina giggled... Tina? I thought she was wearing her pink lingerie, but she was gone...
Sis had given me a short, white, belted dressing gown to wear over the lingerie. She called it a kimono, although I had always thought that were a Japanese garment. The fabric seemed similar to satin. Maybe it were. This was all new to me.
“That’s why lingerie is made from satin and similar fabrics, Sasha,” she explained. “Satin has a very sensual feel to it. Even the slippers have satin insoles.”
She had also given me a pair of what she called maribou slippers with three-inch heels and big balls of fuzz over the toes. I was supposed to wear these to get used to walking in heels. Balance was an issue only briefly for me. (That was an added bonus from my skating at ice hockey.) But walking in them with a correct, feminine gait would take more work.
“They feel nice, too,” I commented, “except they might be just a little small.”
“I should call Deb then,” Sis answered. “She wears a half size larger than mine. Hers might be a better fit for you, especially in pumps. The right fit is very important for wearing heels. I’m surprised you handle those as well as you do. You haven’t been practicing secretly have you?”
“Not at all,” I replied. “But remember that I spend a lot of time on ice skates. I’ve got good balance on my feet.”
“Hmm? I never thought of that,” she confessed. “And I bet that’s why you have such nice legs, too. We have to get you into some sheer nylons. I know you’ll turn heads with those!”
At that moment I understood that my sister was looking for me to do more than just to pass as a girl. She turned heads wherever she went and wanted me to do the same. All that time I had worried about her stranding me as a boy in a dress somewhere, I had been clueless.
“You really think that you can make me into a pretty girl, Sis?” I pressed her, both hoping for and afraid of an affirmative answer.
“Since we share the same genes, let’s wear the same jeans!” she answered.
“Good one, Sis!” I commended her.
“Thanks, Li’l Bro,” she acknowledged, pleased by the compliment.
Beauty was a serious business for Sonia. She, too, was taking a risk. At first, I had thought the risks were all mine. But she seemed to have much at stake in my dressing up. It was some kind of a test for her and her friends. She had organized us and given everyone a specific assignment. It was like doing a group project at school.
“Tomorrow evening, Tina and Deb are going to sleep over so we can do you up properly for the weekend,” Sonia told me. “Marcia and Jacqui might come, too. I’ve invited them, but maybe I didn’t give them enough notice.”
“Exactly, who else is going to know about this ‘challenge’ that I’m rising to?” I asked my sister.
I trusted Sis, Tina, and Deb. I knew them and they had specific roles in the production of this little makeover. Why bring in anyone else unless she has a specific skill to contribute?
“Hmm?” Sis mused. “Should we ‘pinkie swear’ everyone to secrecy?”
Pinkie swear? Was that a girls’ variation on the blood oath?
“That might reduce some fears,” I replied.
“Li’l Bro,” she addressed me, switching topics, “that was the right call on the facial hair. Your skin tones and complection are enough like mine that we can use less foundation than otherwise.”
Fortunately, I hadn’t really grown too much facial hair to speak of. It would still need a little more growth to qualify as “peach fuzz” without insulting the peach. Sis wasn’t immediately sure whether I should shave it first or if she could simply cover it up with a heavier foundation. We agreed that I had better options if I could wear less foundation, so I shaved what facial hair I had.
“When I invited Marcia and Jacqui over,” Sis switched back to my earlier question, “I didn’t mention that dolling up my Li’l Brother would be the evening’s entertainment.”
“With you doing my makeup, Deb, my hair, and Tina, my clothes, what else is there for Marcia and Jacqui to do?” I queried.
“They’ll be your coaches in speech and movement,” Tina informed me.
“Walk like a girl? Talk like a girl?” I followed up.
“You got it!” Sis affirmed for me.
If Sis were anything, she was thorough. As I sat there watching her study my face, I glanced at the array of brushes and other implements in the various trays, nooks, and niches on her vanity. Since Papa always talked about using the right tool for the right job, I suddenly understood that this “girl” thing took more smarts than I had ever thought about.
Sis next turned her attention to various small bottles of nail polish. Of all the things that girls wear, I had always thought nail polish the strangest, the most absurd. To me it had never made sense why girls wear it. Maybe now I would find out.
“So then, are you going to color my fingernails?”
“Of course,” Tina responded. “And toenails, too.” You get the full work-up.”
Looking at my hands, I could see the French manicure again.
“Then please do mine like yours,” I requested. “It looks nice and I think I might feel more comfortable with it than other styles.”
Honestly, though, if I had to dress like a girl, I thought Tina would like it if we matched our styles. Also, I felt safer taking a few cues from my hallucinations. At least they were familiar to me.
“It’s reassuring that you’re already learning style,” said Sis, smiling back at me. “Yes, I think you can have a French manicure. I can do that for you the first time, but it is a more difficult style to do yourself.”
“I can help him and see that we all have matching manicures,” Tina assured us both. But how? She was no longer even here!
Just as suddenly, Tina was gone and my nails were plain again. Then I shuddered.
“Well, this whole affair is a challenge for me anyway,” I asserted. “I guess that’ll be just another one.”
“That’s my Li’l Bro!” Sonia smiled with pride. “But while you’re doing this, would it be okay for me to call you ‘Li’l Sister’?”
“I guess so,” I agreed. “You’ve always wanted to call someone that and it’s why I’m doing this, after all.”
She hugged me and kissed me on the cheek again. I had a feeling that I would bond with Sis in the next few days as I never had before.
And that would be fine.
© 2010-2013, 2018 by Anam Chara
To See Through a Glass Darkly
by the Rev. Anam Chara
Chapter 7
Sasha dreams instead of hallucinating.
Sonia escorted me from her room to mine. And to my surprise, Mom was waiting on us there.
“Mom,” I began, “Sonia said you were already asleep.”
“No, not asleep–just in a dream!” Mom replied bearing a very motherly smile. “I just want to tuck my new daughter in. You can see that I have changed your bedclothes.”
A pretty pink, quilted satin comforter was in place of my accustomed blue, coarse one. The corner had been turned down, hotel style, with soft pink, satin sheets peeking out.
This was unexpected. I’d been thinking mostly in terms of how girls dress. Did they also sleep differently? So, tonight I would find out. Maybe this would be my first behavioral challenge?
“We want to get you started in style, Sasha,” Sonia told me. “We don’t always get satin sheets, but the occasion calls for them. You will have pleasant dreams tonight.”
“Just so long as I can quit hallucinating,” I replied. “It’s getting hard to tell what is or isn’t real for me. The problem now is if I can tell a real dream from one that’s hallucinated?”
“Мой Саша!” Mom pleaded, “don’t trouble yourself so much. You really do need satin tonight!”
“Thanks, Mom, Sis!” I said. “I am tired. It’s been a long and strange day. Maybe I can simply sleep tonight. No strange visions or anything.”
Getting into bed I noticed the feel of satin all around me, the lingerie as well as the sheets. My Mom and sister both kissed me on the cheeks and I bid them both “Good night!” The satin felt cool and luxurious. I could get very used to this, it felt so–so…
*******************************
There was a chill in the autumn air as I stood along the sideline of the soccer field. Sonia, Deb, Marcia, Jacqui, Tina and myself were all wearing our school’s red, white, and black cheerleading uniforms. I felt happy wearing mine. Then Tom and Bill called to me from the field.
“Sasha, we need you at midfield,” Tom yelled.
Then Bill shouted the same words, “Sasha, we need you at midfield.”
Then, one-by-one, my teammates all repeated the words, “Sasha, we need you at midfield.”
“Sasha, I need you at midfield,” said Coach.
“Sasha, they need you at midfield,” said the referee, offering me a yellow card in his right hand, a red card in his left, as if to ask my preference. I pointed to the yellow one, for some reason that I didn't know.
“Tina, I have to go,”I said to my girlfriend, planting a kiss on her lips. “I’m needed at midfield.”
“But we need you too,” Sonia reminded me, “to do our pyramid.”
“I will come back for that,” I promised my sister.
I asked the referee, Can I stay in my cheerleading uniform?
Again, the referee offered me a yellow card in his right hand and a red card in his left. This time I pointed to the red one.
“The colors are the same. Everyone has seen you and already knows who you are,” he said. “You’re also too cute not to play as a girl.”
So, I began playing the game. My strategy seemed to be mostly distracting the other team with my uniform until I saw all of my teammates wearing the same colors of sweaters and skirts as myself. Yes, somehow my teammates were all wearing skirts instead of shorts.
Now Sonia was beckoning me to return to the squad from our sideline. It was time to build the pyramid. But I had to play on. The ball came to me so I kicked it over to Bill and started for our sideline. I was almost off the field when the play came my way again. An opponent kicked it out-of-bounds. So I took the ball for the throw-in and tossed it toward Tom.
Quickly I ran to my squad and positioned myself standing between Deb and Sonia. Tina and Marcia stood on my shoulders and Jacqui, the smallest of us stood on theirs briefly before somersaulting down.
I started back toward the field, but the referee held his hand up to signal me to wait. And Dad was now the referee.
“Son, are you midfielder? Are you cheerleader?” he asked me.
Then my coach came over. He asked me, “Are you a wave? Are you a particle?”
*******************************
I awoke in a cold sweat. Wave or particle? What was that all about?
The clock displayed, in green LEDs: “2:48.” I turned over to see Tina’s angelic face sleeping. Is she for real? I thought to myself. Then she was gone. If we were married, then I would see her sleeping like that every night. I cried. This was crazy. I was really in love with Tina.
*******************************
In the mirror Sonia was braiding my hair and wrapping the braids around the crown of my head, interweaving them with a wreath of flowers. She and I were wearing similar clothing, traditional maidens’ peasant costumes. We both had white blouses with embroidered trim and beautiful laced bodices and colorful patterned skirts with embroidered aprons. I wore a pair of nice soft leather flat shoes laced across the insteps and up around my ankles and lower legs.
Then I knew she was preparing me for my wedding.
“Art thou anxious?” I heard her ask in my mind.
“I hope so,”I sent my thought to her. “If I be not anxious, then it be not true. Thou art Woman. Understandest thou not?”
“Thou Brother,” she spake in my mind, “within us differeth each the Feeling. Thou feelest so because thou art Man, yet thou hast chosen the Woman’s Life. Christina loveth thee and accepteth thee, both the Man and the Woman. Alone can she marry thee. Thou acceptest her Love both as Woman and Man. Thou alone canst marry her. The One’s Dream awakeneth in the Other’s, thine and hers. Understandest thou not?”
“I, thy Sister, understand, yet I, thy Brother, understand not!” I thought, “How cometh that to be, my Sister?”
“The Woman within thee hath been belittled as ignorant. Thus belittled, she hath sought to learn and hath increased in Wisdom. But the Man within thee hath been too proud in his own Knowledge and ignored such as not he knew. Thus he hath yet such to learn.”
“Sayest thou that as Woman I be wiser than myself as Man?”
“Aye, my Brother! I say it,” she affirmed, “for ’tis true. Therefore camest thou unto me for to teach thee the Way of a Woman. Thou knewest in thy heart that thou must seek a Woman’s Wisdom, even unto becoming Woman thyself. When thou did so, broughtest thou Joy and Delight to Christina thy Betrothá¨d, to thy Mother, and to me thy Sister. And thy Father knew also that thou this Wisdom might seek for such had he in his Youth even sought.
“We pray that when thou hast wed, thou shalt seek to continue in the Life of the Village as Woman.”
“So would I,” the thought formed in my mind. “As Woman am I content. Christina is also content when I be as Woman.”
“Thou choosest the better Way, my Sister,” I read Sonia’s thought. “Happy am I for so that thou would stay. But know this: I love thee nonetheless in Breeches and Jerkin as in Skirt and Bodice. Thou art both Brother and Sister to me. So the One be always welcome and yet the Other be always missed.
“For he hath been brave and strong and she hath been cheerful and tender. Though but one be near to my Hearth, they both also be dear to my Heart!”
*******************************
Again I awoke. Sliding out from between the sheets, I sat up on the edge of the bed. The display proclaimed “3:39” in bright red digits. Turning on a low light and getting out of bed I thrust my feet into the high-heeled maribou slippers and delicately stepped over to the closet and opened the door.
The face that looked back at me from the mirror was indeed a girl’s. Sonia had done my hair in two braids and tied them off to the sides with blue hair ribbons. I smiled at myself. Then I started to blush. Turning my head slightly, I bowed my head just a little, and batted my eyes as coyly as I could. For some strange reason, I wished just then that I had freckles.
In my closet I noticed that there were now a couple dresses hanging there and a couple sets of skirts and blouses. I noticed a pair of simple black pumps with three-inch heels and a pair of ballet flats with bows on top of their toes. Then I thought back to the look on her face when I asked Sis to put them in my closet. I started to cry again. Then I suddenly knew. I wanted this. I had always wanted this. Sis knew it yet I had always been too afraid to admit it to her. But mostly, I had been too afraid to admit it to myself.
Slipping off the fuzzy slippers and turning off the light, I lied back down in bed. I began to cry yet again, over all the missed opportunities to dress up that I could have shared with Sis. She had always wanted a little sister so badly and I could have exchanged my desire with hers at any time. Was being a boy so important to me that I had broken my sister’s heart all these years?
I cried myself back to sleep.
*******************************
Tom, Bill and I were in the locker room. They had been in there a while longer and already had their pads on, pulling the long wool stockings up their legs and attaching them to the leather garters hanging down from their belts. The sweaters went on next, followed by the short trousers.
I fumbled the combination lock and had to try again. When my locker was finally open, I reached behind my waist to untie the bow at the back of my dress. Then I asked for Tom’s assistance to help unzip it in the back, which he willingly obliged. Quickly I removed my dress and slip, kicked off my pumps, then peeled off my pantyhose. Next I took my cheerleading uniform out of the locker along with a sports bra, a pair of sheer nude tights, and white figure skates.
“Hey, Sasha!” Tom addressed me. “You’ve turned out to be one hot babe for a guy!”
“Yeah!” Bill continued. “If we didn’t know you were a guy we’d wanna date you!”
“Well thanks, guys!” I replied. “I think?”
“If he can’t find anyone else for a prom date,” Bill teased his friends, “Tom might wanna date you anyway.”
“Sorry, guys,” I retorted, “but Tina’s got dibbs!”
“Aww!” Tom pouted. “And I was so looking forward to it.”
He slapped my butt sharply through my panties as he walked past me.
“Ow! Tom?” I yelled. “Y’know, I’m wearing these for female bonding, not male!”
“Pfff!” Bill expelled a sudden bilabial fricative. “I swear, Sasha, you’ve been more the man since your sister began dressing you up than you ever were before. Yeah, you can priss-about in your heels, but you can swagger in ’em, too!”
“Either of you two have the balls to do this?” I asked them, rhetorically. “I think not!”
“We know,” Bill snickered. “If you had thought, you’d’ve never done it!”
At once, both Tom and I threw dirty towels at him. I sat down on a bench.
“You’re just upset,” Tom rose to my defense, “because he’s a cuter girl than Shelley was when you dated her.”
That was a surprise. To any of us Shelley had been the prettiest, the most desirable girl in school. Before Tina and I got together, I would have done almost anything to get a date with Shelley. Among us, Bill had the bragging rights. For anyone to think me cuter than she was high praise indeed.
I had changed my regular panties for the tights and had pulled the red panty of my uniform over them. Next I blushed just a little as I took off my brassiere and put on my sports bra. Then I pulled my white turtleneck on over it and zipped the collar up in the back. The main uniform of matching black shell and skirt with red and white trim went on over the turtleneck and panty. The uniform would be completed with white figure skates, trimmed with red, white, and black pom-poms.
I went back to my locker and propped the door all the way open to view the full-length mirror. Next I brushed out my hair, gathered it up in a ponytail, and secured it with a white scrunchie. Now I sat down on another bench in front of the locker and put on knee and elbow pads. I put on fresh lipstick and lipgloss, then a little rouge on my cheeks.
I looked so cute!
Tom and Bill both wolf-whistled at me and I felt a lovely little tingle go through me. I so enjoyed being me! I was ready to step out on the ice. So, I got my helmet, gloves, and hockey stick from my locker and started out to the rink.
As we stepped onto the ice, Tom grinned at me.
“Now, show some spirit out there, Sasha,” he said. “We don’t want you to drag this game along.”
I grimaced back at Tom and gently elbowed him in the arm as he chuckled at me.
I skated over to the bench where the cheerleaders were sitting. All the girls hugged me and Tina’s lips met mine for a brief moment of liplock. Then they all gave me the high-five as I skated out on the ice.
Tom was a center ice for the face-off and I was on right wing, Bill on left. Tom won the face-off and I took a short pass from him and skated quickly past the opposing forward and into the attacking zone, then passed the puck across to Bill, who dumped it around the boards behind goal. I was there quick and Tom took the passout from me between the face-off circles. He passed left to Bill around the opposing defenseman who inadvertently was screening his own goalie. Bill’s wrist shot found the upper right corner of the net. The red light went on and a cheer went up from the crowd. The game clock shone only “18:54 Period 1” and we were up one-nil.
Skating back to position for the next face-off, the blade of a stick slapped my butt. Whirling around I pushed the offending player, the defenseman who had screened his own goalkeeper, away at his left shoulder. He swung back at me with his left hand and I dropped my stick and hit him with a simple one-two punch before we separated. The whistle blew and we both got called.
Glancing over at my team bench, I saw Mom, sitting behind the glass, off to the side. She smiled and applauded, giving me an approving thumbs-up sign.
The referee announced the penalties, “Visitor, right defenseman, minor for slashing and minor for roughing, four minutes total. Home, right forward, double minor for roughing, four minutes total.”
Then I saw that the referee was Dad.
“Son, are you cheerleader? Are you forward?” he asked.
“What Papa?” I queried.
“Visitor has added two minutes penalty for indecision,” Dad announced to the penalty timekeeper. “Six minutes total.”
The other cheerleaders came out and hugged and kissed me and they all got into their positions to cheer on the ice while I took my seat in the penalty box. They turned to direct their cheer to me:
“Have you chosen particle or wave?
You know ya only get to see one or the other!
Will you choose your legs or your face to shave?
Now tell us who you wanna be: Sister or Brother?”
What? I thought as I awoke in a cold sweat.
*******************************
The alarm began beeping, but it seemed too loud and too soon. I glanced over at the red LEDs glowing a rather premature “5:00” at me. Wait! That was two hours early.
“Good morning, Li’l Sister!” I heard Sonia’s altogether too cheerful voice. “Rise and shine!”
“Sis,” I growled at her, “my wake-up time is seven o’clock. It’s only five.”
“Your my Li’l Sis, now! We girls need to get up early to freshen up for the day, pick out our clothes, do our hair, and apply our makeup. We’ll be lucky to make it to school on time as it is.”
“You forgot, Sis. I can’t go today. I still have that medical deferment that keeps me home.”
“Oh, that’s right!” Sonia apologized. “Sorry I forgot. But if I’m gonna help you this morning, it must be now.”
Sis had a point that I had to concede. I agreed to her game and these were her ground rules.
© 2010-2013 by the Rev. Anam Chara+
To See Through a Glass Darkly
Chapter 8
Sasha dresses for his first day as a girl as he begins bonding sister-to-sister with Sonia and girl-to-girl with their friends.
"So, Sasha," asked Sonia, "why are your eyes so very red this morning? If I didn't know better, I'd say you've been crying."
"Good call, Sis," I conceded looking at my face in the bathroom mirror. I woke up twice this morning from some disturbing dreams. And I cried myself back to sleep. Both times."
"Well, a nice shower should help. And while you're in there, you'll need to learn about hair regimens. You start with a shampoo, next you need a rinse, then you apply the conditioner at the end," Sis advised, giving me three matching bottles labeled "Shampoo," "Creme Rinse," and "Conditioner for Normal Hair," apparently all bearing the same logo. "When Deb styles your hair, she may give you different ones that are more suitable for your specific hair type. Your hair is darker than mine, but yours seems to have similar body and texture. So my hair products are reasonable to start with."
"I've only used shampoo," I remarked. "All this other stuff is new to me."
"Being a girl is not for the stupid!" Sis bragged, "most boys couldn't keep track of it all. Doing all this will make you smarter."
Like I weren't smart enough yet? I already had "straight A's" in all my classes, so far.
"Sis," I asked from behind the shower door, "what's this funny looking sponge for?"
"That's a loofa," she answered. "It exfoliates your skin."
"What's exfoliate mean?" I queried her.
"It strips off the top layer of cells from your skin. They're mostly dead skin cells. That makes room for the next layer to mature."
"I never knew that."
"Boys never do," Sonia asserted. "That's one of the reasons guys have coarse skin."
"But aren't guys supposed to have coarse skin?" I asked. "I thought it was one of the so-call 'secondary sex traits' for men."
"Hmm?" Sonia answered. "I'm not certain about that. Maybe I should check that out. But remember that we want you to be as feminine as possible. In your own words you want to look like a girl and not like a boy in a dress."
"How do I use this shampoo?" I asked her.
"Instructions are on the bottle. But use the shampoo first, the rinse next, and then the conditioner."
I opened the shampoo. It smelled flowery, I thought, like honeysuckle, although I wasn't sure. So, I began to shampoo my long and thick hair. Then I found myself wondering why I had hair past my shoulders. Had I grown it such long hair somehow thinking that I wanted to be like Sonia?
Why did the instructions on shampoo always say to repeat? I never understood that. Was it a ploy just to sell more shampoo? And was I supposed to use the rinse after each shampooing or just after the second one?
"Sis, are you there," I called out to her.
"She's not here, Sasha," I heard Tina's voice. "I am. You need something?"
"Do I use the rinse after shampooing both times or just after the second time?"
"I only shampoo once," my girlfriend-- no, she's now my wife again-- responded. "The 'repeat' is just there as a ruse to sell more. But I do lather and massage my hair longer."
So, I was convinced I should go for the "Creme Rinse" next, but as I glanced down, I noticed two small breasts jutting from my chest. I ran my hands along them and was hit by a very strong but pleasant sensation. The nipples appeared suddenly to tense up. These were not glued on. These were real.
"Tina," I called out, "could I have a towel?"
"She hasn't come yet," Sonia answered, "but here's one for you."
My chest was flat and normal.
Sis folded a big white towel over the top of the shower door. I wrapped around my waist and opened the door.
"Sasha! No!" Sonia screamed. "We can't have you going about bare-breasted! Wrap the towel under your arms. Quick!"
Immediately I did what she said and then I let the other towel fall from my waist. This felt weird.
"Now we also have to teach you to wrap your hair as well," she continued. "Look in the mirror and watch how I do this. It's simple, really."
She wrapped the towel around my head in a style resembling a turban with a flap over the top and down the back. She did it quickly, too.
"Li'l Sis, did you get that?" she asked.
"Not quite. You did it too fast," I complained. "One more time, but a little slower?"
So she unwrapped the head towel and showed me very carefully the way to fold and wrap it.
"Ready to try it?" Sis asked me. I took the towel and proceed to fold and wrap it as she had demonstrated.
"Not too bad for your first try," she conceded. "But next time it needs to be just a little more secure, so it doesn't unwrap too soon."
She unwrapped it again and this time demonstrated a slightly subtle difference in what I had done and how she wrapped. She made the difference in fold and motion clear. Then she offered it to me again.
Once again I wrapped the towel around my head and Sis smiled.
"That's it, Sasha! Just like it should be," she confirmed. "You're becoming a girl, one skill at a time."
"Exactly how many skills will that be?" I probed.
"Don't know yet," she confessed. "I'm still learning new ones."
*******************************
Sonia led me back to my room, where she had laid out a set of girl's underthings for me including matching brassiere and panties, a slip, and a pair of pantyhose.
"Start with the bra and panties, then get into the pantyhose," Sis told me. "You might need help getting into those."
"I was hoping you'd have stockings and a garter belt for me," I confessed to her.
"Stockings and garters are more complicated. But if you're really interested, we can try that another time. I like mine. They're really feminine."
"Well, Sis," I began, "this may come as a surprise, but I already know how to use a garter belt and stockings."
Sonia looked at me wide-eyed. I just loved that look when she did.
"You've been wearing mine when I'm not home?" Sis accused.
"No. I have my own," I bragged mischievously.
"You've been buying lingerie?" she interrogated me.
"No. Not at all," I teased.
"Mom or Tina or someone else gave it to you?" she speculated.
"Not exactly," I said, withholding what she sought.
"Then what exactly?" Sonia demanded, obviously losing patience.
"Sis, haven't you ever wondered what's worn under an ice hockey uniform?" I prompted her.
"You wear a garter belt?" she asked, puzzled.
"Of course," I disclosed to my sister. "What did you think held up our long woolen stockings?"
"I didn't know that," she admitted.
"Most girls wouldn't," I said.
Sis smiled and kissed me on the cheek. Maybe the idea of rugged guys in garter belts appealed to her. Should I tell her that our garter belts for ice hockey were made from heavy elastic and velcro, not satin and lace?
"Get into your bra and panties, then I'll show you how to handle the pantyhose."
After taking the towel off my head and shaking out my hair, I put on the undergarments. Getting the brassiere on was a bit difficult. I should ask Sis how to do it. And the panties felt tight, but very soft and smooth. Overall, getting into these was difficult, but worth the reward once done.
Then I looked at myself in the mirror. This was getting interesting. Sis was right; I can appear as a credible girl, a young woman, with a little work. It helped that we had a similar facial structure. Genetics had been kind to me and nothing less than generous to her. If a boy ever wanted to look like a girl, he could find no better role model than Sonia.
"I'm ready for you now, Sis," I called to her. She came in and showed me how to ball up the pantyhose and work it up my legs.
"By the way," she said, "although most girls wear their panties under their pantyhose, it's not unheard of to wear panties over pantyhose instead. You can try it whatever way suits you."
"Any special reason for that?" I inquired.
"These things are passed down mother to daughter," she said, "or older to younger sister. Maybe they're just different traditions. Or maybe some girls just prefer the feel of nylon next to their skin. I don't really know."
"So what's next?" I asked Sonia.
My sister took a pair of foam pads from a large pocket of her dressing gown.
"You're wearing a training bra. There's a pocket in each cup to insert one of these pads. There are two reasons for this... one, you need to get used to the feeling of having breasts; two, you need something there for your dresses and blouses to look right. As you get used to them, we can get you larger inserts."
"Two or three times in my hallucinations, I've had my own breasts," I confided to her. "I could touch and feel them. It really scared me."
"Breasts are nothing to be afraid of," she advised me, inserting one of the pads in my bra. "They're a simple part of who we are. The saddest part of being a boy, in my opinion, is that you don't grow breasts and get to wear bras. That's like magic to me."
"But I've heard of women and girls complaining about their bras all the time," I objected.
"That's true enough if a bra is the wrong size, a poor design, or not adjusted properly," she replied, inserting the other pad. "But if it's the right fit, there's hardly anything that's more pleasant to wear. The main problem us girls have is that our sizes keep changing as our breasts grow, so we're constantly needing to adjust and replace our bras."
"I never thought about that," I acknowledged. "But it certainly explains some things I've seen and heard."
"Sasha, I'm so proud of you for agreeing to this," Sis lauded me. "I know you had so many misgivings about dressing up for me. But I hope it will even make you a better man. You can be a better boyfriend and husband some day. Maybe you'll be able to see just a little more through a woman's eyes."
"Well, I would imagine that there's more to being a woman than just dressing up."
"Absolutely, my Li'l Bro!" she affirmed. "But even if you don't do any more than you already have, you've gone further yet than most men would ever dare.
"Still, I want you to experience more than looking like a girl. I'd like you to feel what it's like to be among girls and have a 'girls night out' and hear what we really think of guys and what our hopes and fears are like. I want to take you shopping with me as my little sister and try on a variety of dresses that make you look cute, hot, or silly."
"You want me to be an ambassador between men and women?" I asked, paraphrasing her description.
"You might put it that way," she said, a little more relaxed.
Sis told me to raise my arms up and put the slip on me, working it over my head and on down. She tugged on it here and there and I found myself instinctively moving my hands up and down the fabric, smoothing out any wrinkled lines. Sonia smiled at seeing this.
"You do that like you've always known how, Sasha," she observed approvingly. "Maybe I have been raising a little sister all along?"
"No," I said. "Smoothing it just seemed like the logical next step. And the fabric feels so nice that I just can't help but run my hands over it. No great mystery, really."
Sis now picked up a hairbrush and made a few strokes through my hair and gathered it up in ponytail to be secured by a white scrunchie from her wrist.
"Well, take a look in your closet mirror now," Sis instructed. "And we're not even close to finished yet."
After a double take I just stared at my isomeric image for a moment. Wow! I thought to myself and sat down on the edge of my bed. The only clue that I had that I was a boy was my own physiological response to the image in the mirror.
"Sonia," I began, "I'm so sorry. I had no idea. You saw me like this a long time ago, yes?"
"Yes, Li'l Bro," she assured me, "and more. So much of the true beauty in the world is hidden that I feel responsible to make latent beauty real. For this one, I had to get Li'l Bro to let Li'l Sis out to play. But I never thought you'd do it voluntarily. I always thought that I'd have to trick you or even force you into doing it. But being feminine is sacred to me. To coerce you to be a girl would have destroyed the joy in it for me as well as for you."
"I wish that I had given in to you earlier. You wanted me to enjoy it with you. Well, for what it's worth, I think I would have. But I was too scared."
"Still, Sasha, you're brave," my sister tried to assure me. "Courage is not the absence of fear; courage is being afraid, but doing it anyway."
"But we lost all that time that we might have dressed together, played together, worked together," I lamented to Sis. "I regret that lost time."
"Hey, Li'l Sis!" she stopped me. "We're not all grown-up yet! Besides, don't be such a drama queen! And do you remember what Mom tell us? 'It's never too late to do the right thing,' she's always saying."
Drama queen? Not again! That was twice in two days.
"What's next, Sis?" I queried.
"I don't have enough time this morning to go through everything you need to learn about make up. So, let's get you into your dress for the first time," she decided. "Then I can just do some touch-up work on your face."
"Don't worry," Tina said. "I can help you out with your make-up after school."
I scanned the room quickly but didn't see Tina. I looked at my left hand. No rings.
Sonia stepped back to the closet and took out a navy blue dress with white trim in nautical style. The design looked as if it had been taken from a sailor's uniform. I thought back and could remember Sis wearing it once or twice.
"I really liked this dress," she told me, "but my boobs grew too big and too fast for it, so I only got to wear it a few times. Let's see how it looks on you."
Sonia held the dress for me to step into and then zipped up the back and secured it by a fastener at the top.
"You may not be able to get this off without help," she said. "Not everyone handles back-zipping dresses easily. If I'm not here, Mom will help you out of it."
"Well, I'm not looking to take it off too soon," I assured her. "I promised you that I'd do this at least today through Monday, and I'll keep that promise, no matter how anxious or scared I might feel."
Somehow after all this, I felt a little less anxious, as if the butterflies had ceased to flutter in my tummy.
"And we'll have fun pretending to be Lesbians," Tina remarked, giggling.
What?
I looked for Tina but could not see her.
The butterflies in my tummy began fluttering again.
Sis redirected my attention towards the mirror as she adjusted my dress. As I watched the image in the mirror, the butterflies began to calm down.
"Li'l Bro," Sonia said studying me, "you make a very attractive Li'l Sis. By the time we're done, there's no way your appearance could give you away. Behavior, deportment, language; those are another issue. But you'll have a chance to work on those, too."
There was no mistaking that the image in the mirror was all-girl, looking fully feminine, and one hundred percent female. Sis was right. Looks would not give me away. I would only be given away by my speech or actions. Sis had done what she promised. I don't look like a boy in drag, but a real young woman.
The butterflies had given way to a gentle tingle and a very light feeling of-- giddiness? I didn't recognize this new feeling. I had never experience it before. But I knew that I liked it and wanted to keep it.
"Wow!" I exclaimed. "Thanks, Sis! I just can't believe it! You really know what you're doing."
"Thank you, Li'l Bro," she said, hugging me, "for giving me the chance... Now we have to decide on your hair for today."
"Why not braids like you did yesterday evening?" I asked. "They looked so cute. Do you think braids would work with this dress?"
"I don't see why not," my sister giggled, "if you don't mind drawing attention to yourself."
"I'll prob'ly have to stay home all day," I reminded her. "So I may as well go for maximum effect."
She indicated that I should sit in my chair with my back to her, facing the mirror. Sitting on the edge of my bed, she began to braid my hair in two tails.
She smiled again. "I wonder if my maryjanes would fit you? Your style today seems to be going for sweet and cute."
Sonia did my braids fairly quickly, securing them with white ribbons tied in bows. I couldn't help blushing and batting my eyes. I thought I was supposed to.
"Gee, Sasha!" she grinned at me, "You're playing this to the hilt. You're certainly keeping your promise to me."
"It's easier," I replied, "and less embarassing to go all the way with it."
There were a couple pairs of women's shoes in my closet now, a pair of ballet flats and a pair of pumps with three-inch heels. Sis brought the pumps over and had me step into them.
"Ouch!" I said. "These feel a bit too tight, Sis. They seem to pinch my toes really bad."
"That's often the case with pumps, especially with higher heels. Let's try the flats."
We changed my shoes. They didn't pinch like the pumps did but still were a little tight.
"That's better, Sis," I conceded, "but I think my foot is just a bit larger than yours."
"I think you're right, Sasha," she confirmed. "Not to worry, though. I called Deb and asked her to bring a few of hers and her sister's shoes over. We should find something that fits for you. If you want, you can wear the slippers down to breakfast until she gets here. Now I want you to come to my room for just a moment."
So Sis led me into her room and indicated that I should sit at her vanity. She pulled her extra stool over and sat next to me. She very lightly worked a bit of eye makeup on me and some lipstick showes me how to blot away the excess. Then she showed me how to apply the lipgloss.
"This has a strawberry flavor to it," I noted, "It can taste it Tina and I kiss."
"Now you can taste it anytime," Sonia giggled.
"But you'll still like it best when you taste it on me!" Tina said, sitting on my sister's bed, behind her. She was wearing a beautiful green dress, trimmed in gold, and gold strappy shoes with four-inch heels. "And you look so cute in pigtails, Hubby!"
I grinned back to her as I noticed my wedding rings and French manicure. Tina blew me a kiss and I must have blushed, because I noticed Sis do a double take when she tried to match some rouge color to me face.
"Maybe you don't need any rouge today?" Sonia remarked.
Tina had vanished again.
"Sasha, I need to get ready myself, now," she said, I'm going to start with my makeup today. I'd just like you to watch all the steps I go through, which items I use, and what order they're done in. You'll need to develop a similar procedure of your own."
The next twenty minutes or more confirmed for me that so-called "girl power" is a very complex set of skills. I knew that from this day onward, I'd never again be able to think of pretty girls ipso facto as silly or stupid. The large, sloping tray of colors on my sister's vanity began to remind me of the control console of spacecraft in a science fiction movie. I wondered if it were as hard to navigate?
"Now, Li'l Sis," she said, "because you are now my Li'l Sis, we may sometimes need to help each other dress. That means we will often see each other in our underthings and even nude sometimes. But sisters can do that and behave themselves, as I'm certain you will. And the same goes for me."
Suddenly, I felt dizzy and a little light-headed as she said that.
*******************************
We met downstairs for breakfast and my Mom just beamed when she saw me
"ÐœÐ¾Ñ Ð¡Ð°ÑˆÐ°!" Mom cried, emphasizing slightly the feminine form of the possessive adjective. I had not realized how subtle the expression could be in Russian.
The name "Sasha" is the usual nickname in Russian for "Alexander." In other words, it's mostly a Russian boy's name. Occasionally, it might be used as a girl's name in Russian, but it's not common. But in English, Sasha is usually a girl's name. So, my name was in a way almost unisex.
In Russian, adjectives must match the gender of their nouns. When Mom said to me, "Мой Саша!" [pron. moy SAH-shuh], that was "My dear little Alexander!" But when she said, "ÐœÐ¾Ñ Ð¡Ð°ÑˆÐ°!" [pron. mah-YAH SAH-shuh], that was "My dear little Alexandra!" That's just a small change of vowel in Russian. But it changed my whole sense of self as soon as Mom said it.
"You look just adorable!" Mom smiled at me. She pulled me to her for a powerful hug. "I have a new daughter!"
Ow! I should have seen that coming. And it hurt! After all, I did understand Mom-logic well enough and it was the logical consequent. The rules of affectionate expression required that she pinch my cheeks. Which she did. Hard!
I never thought pinching cheeks were a Russian custom. It always seemed more an Italian prerogative to me. Maybe my Mom learned it from Tina's mother? Did I mention that Tina's family was Italian?
After pinching my cheeks, Mom delivered the obligatory kiss to my forehead.
"Sasha, you're every bit as cute as Sonia! That girl is so gifted in understanding faces. She's made you into a princess!"
I thought back to the history of the last Russian princess named Alexandra. Her fate was not so enviable. Fortunately, this is America and the year is well past 1918.
"I'm glad to do this with her," I said, "I feel better about it than I thought I would."
"I told you it would not be so bad," Mom reminded me.
"That you did," I acknowledged. "But there's more to this than dressing up for Sonia, isn't there."
"Да, Ð¼Ð¾Ñ Ð¡Ð°ÑˆÐ°!" she replied [pron. DAH mah-YAH SAH-shuh, trans. Yes, my Sasha!]. "And after Sonia and your friends have gone to school, I will explain most of it to you. The rest must wait for your Papa to return."
I thought for a moment. Did Papa know what was going on? Did he know about the hallucinations? Did he know that I had agreed to dress up in Sonia's clothes over the weekend? Would he think me less manly? How much did he know? I was afraid to find out.
Just then, the doorbell rang.
"Sasha, answer the door!" Mom told me. "Let's see how you look to your friends."
While Mom continued to prepare breakfast, I went into the sitting room. The moment of truth? Everything comes down to this, opening the door...
"Sasha? Is that you?" Tina gasped aloud, nearly breathless.
"Omigosh!" Deb squealed. "Izzat you? Oh, wow!"
"Yeah, it's me," I answered them somewhat sheepishly.
"You look great, Sasha!" Tina declared. "Absolutely adorable!"
"You're so cute!" was Deb's verdict. "We never expected you to look this good."
"The majority of girls in the school aren't as pretty as you are right now!" Tina assured me. "Sonia really knew how to fix you up. You absolutely must stay like this for a while!
Tina, wearing the same gold-trimmed green dress and gold strappy heels I had envisioned, hugged me closer for a strong, passionate kiss. I could get used to this!
"Sasha," Deb addressed me, "your sister asked me to bring over some of my shoes 'cause hers are a little small for you."
I sat on the sofa while Deb knelt, dumping a few pairs from a large tote bag onto the floor. I slid off my sister's ballet pumps, as Deb placed a similar pair of shoes next to my feet. Sliding my feet into them, they felt nice but a little eerie through the nylons.
"Stand up and walk in them some," she said. "Do they feel okay?"
"They fit fine," I said. "Perfect, I think."
"Try the black pumps with the ankle straps next," Tina suggested. Those should go nicely with that dress."
I stepped into the pumps and Deb fastened the straps around my ankles. These fit quite well. More important, They didn't pinch. I stood up and walked around some. Still, they didn't pinch.
"Tina, whaddya think?" I asked.
"They look great with that dress," she said. "How do they feel?"
"They fit fine," I answered. "Standing at this angle all day might start to feel weird, but they seem comfortable now."
Deb expressed her own concern. "How's your balance on those three-inch heels, though?"
"My balance is good," I bragged. "Remember, I'm a hockey player and spend a lot of time on ice skates."
Sonia entered the living room just then.
"Li'l Sis and I have already had this conversation," she said. "She says it's also where she get's her legs. Show 'em off, Sasha!"
The high-heeled shoes readily emphasized the curves of my muscular legs. Sonia signaledfor me to walk a couple steps and turn around.
"Oh my!" Tina said. "You see that, Deb?"
"Yes I do!" Deb responded. "Can we let him go to school like that?"
"I'd be afraid for him," Tina worried.
"What's wrong?" I asked them.
"Li'l Sis, your legs are gorgeous. Almost every girl in school will wish she had legs like yours. I mean, you're going to come up against jealousy like you never knew could even exist!"
"What do I do, then?" I queried.
"Offer simple, honest advice on how you got them," Tina suggested.
"Well," I began. "It's mostly from playing ice hockey. Skating really makes me work all those muscles."
"Then ice skating is your first beauty tip when asked," Deb summarized form me.
My first day as a girl and I was already being briefed to give beauty advice? This had now gone from absurdly silly to positively surreal.
Sonia spoke up again, "Your next tips are the depilatory and the lotion you used for soothing you legs."
"And your pantyhose," said Tina, "are the perfect touch for your legs. You need to know the brand name, style, and weight of your hose. Be able to tell that to anyone who asks."
"The more graciously that you can offer those as your 'beauty tips,' the less jealous the other girls will be," Deb advised.
"Sasha," Sonia began, "the only reason I'm not jealous of your legs is that I'm already a little taller and that takes adds some desirability since I don't have your muscular devopment."
"And I'm not jealous of Sasha's legs," Tina revealed, giggling, "because he-- or she-- likes to oggle mine!"
Deb and Sis squealed at Tina's disclosure while I could merely blush.
"Good morning, everyone!" Mom announced, "Breakfast is ready."
*******************************
We all adjourned to the kitchen and sat down at table for breakfast, taking up our usual seats, Tina at my right, Sonia to my left, Mom and Deb across from me. Only my mother was not wearing a dress, but pants.
"Here we are on Friday morning," Mom announced, "and for the first time, Sasha is here as my daughter."
Everyone began sweetening their tea with strawberry jam. I did so and buttered my whole wheat toast.
"Thanks for bringing those shoes over, Deb," I said appreciatively. "They seem to be my size and quite comfortable."
"You're welcome, Sasha," she replied. "Keep them as long as you need them. My sister and I have lot of shoes. The styles I brought are so basic that we had more than pair of those. But it's surprising that you take to heels so easily."
"Belive me," I said, "it's the ice hockey. And it's given me more than just me pretty legs. It helps balance, too."
"Maybe we should have a girls' hockey team next season?" Deb suggested.
"They could be hot on and off the ice!" I hoped aloud, smiling.
"And you could be our first cheerleader," Sis suggested.
"Too bad, girls," I said, seeking to cushion the blow, "but I'll be playing. Can't be a cheerleader for you!"
"Aw!" Tina groaned. "You'd be so cute in a cheerleading uniform!"
I remembered the dreams that I had overnight. As much fun as the invitation for cheerleading might be, I really need to be on the field and on the ice. I'm a doer and a participant; I just can't watch from the sidelines.
"Sorry, girls!" I apologized. "But duty calls! I'm midfielder at soccer and right forward at ice hockey. If I don't play, I'd let my teams down. That wouldn't be right, would it?"
"That's okay!" Deb relented. "We don't want those legs of yours to lose their nice tone!"
"Careful, Deb!" Sis cautioned our friend. "We don't want it going to his-- her head!"
They all giggled.
"By the way," I began, "baseball season starts soon. I usually play at second base or shortstop."
"Ooh! I kinda like that! Tina remarked. "The shortstop wears Prada!"
This time, even I giggled. Like everyone else there.
"Don't you ladies have a softball team at school?" I asked. "Like, sports aren't just for boys, ya know?"
"I'd be willing to go out for some sport," offered Sis, "if Sasha would go out for cheerleading."
"Not fair, Sis!" I objected. "You know that would conflict with the soccer and hockey seasons. And we don't even know if the cheerleading squad would allow me to join. You ought to go out for something anyway. Look at the advantage you'd get from firming up your legs and tush!"
More giggling from around the table.
"Like, I think Sasha's right," Tina conceded. "Maybe we could all go out for a sport together?"
"That might be fun," Deb acknowledged, "but not all of us would necessarily do well in the same sport."
"Deb's right on that score," I affirmed. "You need to find which sports are right for each of you."
"Well, Li'l Sis," asked Sonia, "what should I play?"
"Sis, with your height, your build, and your energy," I enumerated, "you're perfect for volleyball as a team sport. And I've seen you play tennis. Why haven't you gone out for the school team yet? In fact, you and Tina would make a competitive doubles team. Again, I've seen you both play."
"Sonia," Tina addressed my sister, "tryouts for tennis are next week. Want to?"
"Why not?" Sis answered. "If my Li'l Bro can try out for Li'l Sis and make it, anything's possible."
I broke out into giggles again.
"How about me?" Deb wondered.
Deb already played girls' varsity basketball. She knew she was good, too.
"You already know what you're good at. I don't need to give you sports advice, Deb," I said. "But if you all want to go out for a sport together, as Tina suggests, then consider going out for the girls' softball team. I think every one of you has a reasonable shot at making it."
By that time we had all finished breakfast and it was time to see everyone off to school. As scared as I had been to dress up at first, now I was disappointed that I had to stay home instead of going to school as a girl.
We all went outside to the schoolbus stop and engaged in a big group hug and exchange of kisses. I could get used to this, too. Mom was there, too, participating in the send-offs.
"I love you, Sasha," Tina reminded me. "You know I can't wait to get home to my husband."
I noticed her wedding rings and mine as we broke out of our hugs and a moment later the rings and my French manicure vanished. Then I helped Tina to board the schoolbus. Yes, I might dress and look like a girl, but my mother still raised a gentleman. Which is maybe why she and I got a couple stares as I helped her onto the bus. Mom and I then waved the bus off.
"ÐœÐ¾Ñ Ð¡Ð°ÑˆÐ°!" Mom addressed me. "Let's clean up the kitchen from breakfast. After that, I want to tell you about your Papa and me and why we are married."
To See Through a Glass Darkly
Chapter 9
Sasha learns why Mama married Papa & that when a medical appointment comes open, ready or not, you take it.
*******************************
Working together, Mama and I needed but a moment to clear breakfast from the kitchen table. I rinsed the dishes and put them inside the dishwasher. Mama then made fresh tea for us.
"ÐœÐ¾Ñ Ð¡Ð°ÑˆÐ°," she began, "now I'm going to tell you some history of your father and myself. I want you to understand that much of what you experience now is like what your Papa did as a boy and even as a young man when we were first married. You need not fear it as this is in truth normal for you. The only difference is that you must find your own path to understanding how to work with your feelings. And I believe that you have already begun that."
"So, what did Papa do?" I wondered. "Did Aunt Svetlana dress him up as girl?"
"Not quite," Mama said, "I dont think so, anyway. That was not his path. But your father has a very strong woman within him. He did learn, much as you are beginning to do now, to honor and to express the feminine aspect of who he is. Just as you have been, he was fearful when he began, but as the woman inside him grew, she became a source of strength for him and for me. That is why I agreed to marry him."
"You say that he didn't dress up but that he still has a woman in him. How can that be?"
"I will use the word that Ms. Tollefson used yesterday," Mama said. "Your Papa is androgynous as she says. He is comfortable and competent in a woman's ways, even enjoying them. Yet he is no less a man for such. He appreciates the problems of both men and women and the advantages that each show to find their solutions. Your Papa's confidence in life is so great because he is adept at both men's and women's ways. He can easily call upon whichever way is best when he must act."
"What kind of women's things has Papa done, then?"
"After you and Sonia each were born, often I could find work when your Papa could not. So he would do all the work at home as if your mother. He fed you, changed your diapers, and bathed you. When you cried, he held you and when you stopped he put you to bed. He cleaned our home, laundered our clothes, and cooked our meals. He even learned to sew for me. Did you know that he even made dresses and skirts for me? The girls with whom I worked could not believe that my own husband could make more beautiful dresses than they could buy in the shops."
"Papa really did all that?" I asked, nearly in disbelief that my father's creativity was so great.
"Yes, he did. All of it!" Mama affirmed. "After we would put you and Sonia to bed, your Papa and I often sat long into the evenings, sewing clothes while talking about anything and everything. And we both had sewn many of your and Sonia's clothes while you were little children. Those were such special times for us. Your Papa is every woman's dream: strong, rugged, and manly when he must be, but also passionate, kind, and gentle when such is needed. Not only is he my husband, but also he can even be my girlfriend when I need one. Only a very special man can be both."
That was much to think about. To imagine that my strong, rugged father, knocking his opponents to the ice with a good check, also sitting with Mama to sew dresses and baby clothes, simply blew my mind. That was another side to my father, one that I could not recall seeing. Was I maybe too young a child then to have any memories?
I looked but saw neither manicure nor wedding rings on my fingers.
"Mama, does Papa know about me dressing up?"
"Of course," she confirmed. "I told him yesterday after you agreed to it."
"What did he think about it?"
"Your Papa was somewhat surprised and very amused that you agreed to dress like your sister. He was most concerned, though, that you only do it willingly. He would be very upset if he thought you might be forced."
"No, Mama," I assured her. "Sonia teased, pestered, and harassed me; begged, pleaded with, and made me feel guilty over it; and she even planned and schemed ways to fool or force me into it. But she didn't do so because she enjoys being the girl she is and wants to share that with me. So I accepted it as her gift. She never smiled at me like that before, not that I could recall. As scared as I was, and still am, I knew that I did the right thing by Sis. So here sits your son, wearing his sister's dress, underthings, and pantyhose, and her girlfriend's shoes."
"Please, do not feel any shame for how you are now dressed," Mama advised me, "because my son is showing that he is willing to face his fears to become that special young man that he is meant to be."
There's an essay due in my English class. Maybe a good theme would be "The Meaning of Irony"? I blushed.
"And what did you find that your sister could not do unless you help her? Mama continued. "I told you yesterday that you were sensitive and wise enough to know."
"Sonia wanted to teach a younger sister the joys of growing up as a girl, but since she had no younger sister, she has offered it to me," I confirmed to Mama. "And I felt selfish because I had resisted until now."
Mama smiled at me and repeated one of her favorite maxims, "Sasha, it is never too late to do what is right, good, and joyful for others."
"Mama," I continued, "there's another, an additional reason that I should tell you about."
"And that would be, Ð¼Ð¾Ñ Ð¡Ð°ÑˆÐ°?" she probed.
"In the strange hallucinations," I recounted, "Tina and I married only two weeks ago. In our wedding pictures we were both wearing white wedding dresses. And I get the feeling that somehow, my dressing as a woman is part of our marriage. We often wear matching or similar clothing. And I was feeling progressively more at ease crossdressed in my hallucinations. That supported me in my decision to do it for Sonia."
Mama closed her eyes and took another sip of her tea.
"ÐœÐ¾Ñ Ð¡Ð°ÑˆÐ°," she began, "from now on, I will only address you in the feminine when you dress as a girl. Now, know this, my daughter. I do not believe that you are "hallucinating." That word implies that what you see must be false, untrue, not real. But I believe that what you see visions, what the Irish call the "second sight." Thus, you see the true sight of what must be somehow real."
That sounded just a little too spooky to me.
"Mama, I've never heard talk about anything that way before," I told her quite worried. There were still no wedding rings or manicure on my hands.
"Until now I never needed to," Mama disclosed. "But others in your Papa's family and in mine have also seen visions, or so stories are told. These stories were told in ancient Russia, ancient even before the time of writing."
Suddenly sonorities from Igor Stravinsky's Le Sacre du Printemps filled my mind. We had played a suite from it in the All-Metropolitan Youth Orchestra almost a year ago. Had I mentioned that I play violin, oboe and English horn? Stravinsky's ballet suite was heavy stuff to be going through a teen-ager's mind while having a heart-to-heart talk with Mama.
"So what are you saying, Mama?"
"There are seers in your Papa's line and mine," she paraphrased. "I think that you may be a seer, also."
Suddenly, to be a boy wearing his sister's dress seemed uninteresting, if not quite normal, compared to what Mama had just told me. I was just glad not to have heard any of this before talking with Ms. Tollefson yesterday.
Just then the telephone rang and Mama answered.
"Hello, Petroff's residence... Yes, he is here how."
With her finger, Mama beckoned me to the phone.
"Hello, this is Sasha..."
"Sasha, this is Ms. Tollefson. I just had a call from Dr. Torricelli's office. He's the psychiatrist I referred you to. If you could be ready now, he has an opening and can see you right away. He had a sudden cancellation. I could drive by now and get you, if that's okay?"
That was just great! There I was, wearing my sister's clothes and the school psychologist wanted to take me to see a shrink.
I lowered the handset.
"Mama, Ms. Tollefson said that an appointment just came open with her psychiatrist and she wants to bring me with her. Should I go?"
I liked making it sound as if the appointment were for Ms. Tollefson.
"Sasha, always accept an unexpected opening. Medical appointments are often hard to get."
"Okay, Ms. Tollefson, I'll take it..."
"Good I'm only five minutes from you...," she said. "Bring the blue form from Nurse Banner, too..."
"I'll be ready, then," I confirmed. "Thanks!"
"I'll be there in five. Goodbye!" Ms. Tollefson said and ended the call.
Quickly I went upstairs to retrieve the blue medical form from my desk, but it was now pink. Glancing at the clock, it displayed green digits. On my hands, a French manicure and wedding rings.
"Sasha!" Mama yelled up the stairs. "Bring your wallet and cellphone!"
I hadn't even though of my wallet since the previous day. It would still be in the pocket of my windbreaker. Got it! The cellphone was still in its cradle on my desk recharging. Had it too!
Downstairs Mama was waiting for me with a small black clutch bag. "My daughter," she said, "a lady going out anywhere always carries a purse with her. Sonia prepared this for you yesterday."
Mama gave me the bag which I opened. Inside were a silver Russian cross with a matching chain and a ladies watch with a silver band. Also, it contained a compact with mirror, a few small tubes of cosmetics and some hand lotion, a small package of tissue paper and two scrunchies. There was just room left for my wallet inside. Outside were pockets for a calculator, which Sonia had thoughtfully included, and my cellphone. There was also a long strap with brass fobs that was attached by rings at the ends of the bag.
Mama helped me fasten the chain for the cross and the watch. Tina's so thoughtful. She gets a big hug and kiss from me when she gets home.
"Take this," my mother said, offering me a twenty-dollar bill. "You might need it."
Never one to refuse money, I accepted the Federal Reserve Note from her.
"Thanks, Mama! I'll try not to use it."
"It's for a cab or bus fare to get home and, if needed, lunch."
A car-horn honked an obnoxious four-note sequence from outside.
"Oh, Mama! I'm really scared now. Do I have to go out there as a girl?"
Smiling and hugging me, my mother reassured me,"Yes, you do, Sasha. My new daughter must make her entrance into the outside world. And you will do fine!"
Hugging her back, I said, "I love you, Mama!"
"And I love you, Sasha!"
I slowly walked to the front door.
"Sasha, would you turn around just a moment?"
¡Flash!
A metallic after-image lingered a moment in my field of vision. I hate camera flashes. Then the obnoxious four-note sequence repeated.
"Mama?!" I whined.
"Sorry!" she apologized, giggling. "But I promised your Papa!"
I opened the front door to take my first steps into the world as a girl.
*******************************
From the landing outside the door, I took the two steps down to the sidewalk and then tried to walk along the path. In confusion and fear, instead of feeling my own sense of balance, I strode a step or two and felt as silly as I must have looked. So I stopped, closed my eyes and stood there a moment. When I opened my eyes I looked at my French manicure. But this time I saw it because I needed to see it. Hallucinating, I could feel the right way to walk.
Now I strode confidently toward Ms. Tollefson's car, placing one foot deliberately in front of the other, swinging my arms. I smiled hearing the click-clack of the heels on the pavement. Only a few seconds later, I was at the curb and opened the car door.
"Sasha?" Ms. Tollefson asked. "Is that really you?"
"Yeah!" I snickered. "Whaddya think?"
Smiling, I spun around once for her to see my dress.
"You are so cute!" she said. "But I think it's the braids that drive the look home for you."
I stepped into the car with my left foot.
"No, Sasha!" Ms. Tollefson stopped me. "Girls don't get into a car that way! Put your rear into the seat first, then keeping your legs together, swing them in."
It definitely felt awkward getting in as she described it.
"Doing it will take some practice." Ms. Tollefson lectured. "To get out, you simply reverse the procedure: keeping your legs together, swing them out, plant your feet on the ground, and stand up."
More easily said than done I thought to myself. These girls' activities were appearing harder than they looked. No wonder Sis enjoys being a girl so much. Mastering the various tasks in a girl's life has to engender a daily sense of achievement.
Ms. Tollefson turned the car toward the medical district.
"So, Sasha," she began, "why are you cross-dressed today?"
"Honestly?" I asked her to clarify.
"Always be honest with your psychologist or other therapist," she reminded me. "Otherwise, they can't help you.
"Well, Sis has teased and pestered me for years to let her dress me up. I'm so upset over the hallucinations that I needed some kind of distraction. But remarkably in my hallucination, I felt comfortable when I was cross-dressed, like I was supposed to. So I concluded that it might not be too bad after all. She's very happy now that I've agreed to it and I feel better because she does. It made her day. I was also surprised how important my doing this is to her. She says that she enjoys being a girl and that she wants to share it with me. And I think I can feel myself enjoying it at least a little that way."
"That's very interesting. I'm pleased that this is your own choice with Sonia," Ms. Tollefson said. "What do your parents think about it?"
"They're supportive. My parents are all right with it because I agreed on my own to do it. My Papa was only concerned that I not be forced. My Mama thinks it would be a good experience for me to try out that androgyny thing you told me about yesterday. She said that Papa is also very androgynous and I think they were expecting me to do something like this. Of course, just before I came out, Mama snapped my photo to send Papa."
"Yesterday you told me that your father would object to you cross-dressing," Ms. Tollefson recalled, "but he did not apparently do so. And your mother told you that your father is also androgynous. How did he express his androgyny?"
"Huh?"
"I mean, what androgynous things did he do? she clarified. "Did he dress up like a girl? Have mostly girls for friends? Play with dolls?
"When Mama and Papa came here to America, he had trouble finding work in his profession for a while. So he stayed home doing housework and taking care of Sonia and me. He even learned to sew and make clothers for us. He kept doing it until he found work as an engineer."
"Then you mean he did the housework while your mother was employed outside the home?" she asked, again seeking to clarify."
"Yeah. But when I was two years old he found a good job at the plant here and earned much more money than Mama could, so she stayed home with us until I was old enough to go to school."
"How did your father feel about doing the housework?"
"I don't really know, since I haven't talked about it with Papa directly. But Mama talked as though he merely accepted it as necessary and went about his way getting it done. Also, she said that he could be like her girlfriend whenever she needed one. That did surprise me, but Mama talked like it was one of his most remarkable traits."
"Does he seem like a manly enough role model to you?" Ms. Tollefson probed further. I wasn't sure I liked the implication of the question.
"Have you ever seen my Papa play ice hockey? I replied. "I've seen him knock opponents to their butts with some good, solid checks. And he's taught me to do the same. What we take, we give, too! "Mama calls it 'asserting our presence on the ice' when we do it."
"Then your father sounds like a good example of an androgynous man," the psychologist concluded. "He can raise babies and sew clothing, then haul and kick ass in a hockey game. He's rugged but soft, as gentle as he is strong. And I can see you being much like that, too. No wonder Tina likes you so much! Most young ladies would consider you a good catch."
Even wearing this?
"Tina's the only one who interests me!"
"She is such a nice girl. You ought to hold on to her."
"I intend to," I assured her. "She's my sister's best friend as well as my girlfriend. Breaking up would be too awkward, even if we wanted to."
I had never thought about that before. It was probably a good thing that Tina and I were completely in love with each other. Glancing again at my hands, no rings or manicure. My medical form for school was now again blue.
"We're almost there," Ms. Tollefson reminded me. "He's in the Medical Arts Professional Building.
"I've never been to a psychiatrist before," I said. "What's it like?"
"Remember that first of all, a psychiatrist is a medical doctor. He's had all the training that any other physician has. But he's chosen to specialize in how the mind works and especially how it works with the body. Many times when something is wrong with the mind, it's because something else is wrong with the body that needs fixing. You need to know why you're hallucinating. For example, maybe you had a brain injury playing ice hockey? Or did you ever get beaned playing baseball?"
"I never got a bean pitch, but I have been knocked to the ice a few times," I conceded. "Like, wouldn't I know, though, if I had like a concussion?"
"It's very possible," Ms. Tollefson told me, "to have a concussion missed in an initial diagnosis. It happens all the time."
"You mean I could have had a brain injury playing a sport and not know it?"
"Yes. It's common in football and ice hockey," she said. "And if he thinks it might have happened, Dr. Torricelli would prob'ly send you to a neurologist to check your brain more carefully."
I began to wonder if I could have a concussion. I had taken a few checks on the ice that were just as hard as I had given. And I had also been involved in a couple of hard collisions at soccer. Yellow cards on both plays. But I had never been beaned at the plate. Not yet, anyway.
"But what Dr. Torricelli is most likely to do, is to try to get you talking about what's really on your mind."
Then it happened. I suddenly had fit of giggles. I don't mean full-blown laughter, chuckling, or snickering, but cute, darling, mischievously girlish giggling. I could not do this at will, but it was spontaneous and involuntary. And I couldn't stop.
"What is it?" Ms. Tollefson tried to elicit an explanation from me.
Still I could not stop giggling. I put my hands over my mouth briefly in a vain attempt to stifle the giggles. Instead, the giggling merged into a squeal which caused Ms. Tollefson to join in the giggling. At that point, I had tears flowing down my cheeks. Now I began to really laugh and hug myself. I had to try pulling my knees up into my tummy to keep from hurting. Not easy to do strapped in seatbelt and shoulderbelt!
Ms. Tollefson guiding the car into a parking berth, smiling and shaking her head all the way.
I unfastened the latch holding the safety belts and let myself curl up into a ball of warm, happy feeling. All the worry and anxiety that I had endured for the past few days seemed suddenly to dissolve into calmness.
"What brought that on?" Ms. Tollefson asked me. "You suddenly were entirely silly. None of the morose character that I saw yesterday. And you were giggling and laughing completely like a girl. Like there were no boy in there at all!"
"Ms. Tollefson," I answered. "What's really on my mind? It's so absurd! We're talking about how I may get a serious brain injury playing sports or could already have one. But what am I really scared of? I'm scared of wearing this dress. I'm afraid that now someone might recognize me appearing as a girl. But do you know what I'm most afraid of?"
"No,"she answered, "how could I know, unless you tell me?"
"Now, I'm most afraid that I might like dressing up and being a girl," I confessed. "I'm afraid that it will be fun and that I will enjoy it as much as Sonia hopes I will. Yet I don't understand how. But after I giggled, screamed and laughed like that, like I've heard girls do, I felt calm and very happy. Is this how a girl always feels?"
"Always? No," she answered me, "but I think you just experienced a high point of being a girl."
"But how could a boy feel it?" I inquired. "Does dressing up change someone that much?"
"Sasha, that's a very good question," she acknowledged. "In your case it helped. If you remember the results of your BSRI from yesterday, you scored in the higher range on both the M- and F-scales. That means you're androgynous. Wearing a dress gives you the permission, even a requirement, to show off your feminine side. As high as your score on the F-scale was, I'm not surprised that you were afraid of liking this experiment with being a girl?"
"But how could I already know how to giggle and laugh like a girl," I objected. "Sonia's friends haven't even started coaching me for it yet?"
"You've been watching your mother and sister and their girlfriends since you were born as well as all the other women you've encountered in daily life. You've observed them all and, believe it or not, you've learned much about how women and girls behave. Like, when you stepped out of the house and onto the sidewalk, you were unstable because you were trying to walk as a boy in those heels. Then it looked like you stopped, thought about it, then you strode down the path like a runway model. You already had the knowledge in you. You only needed to find and use it."
"Believe it or not," it was my turn to say, "I called up a memory from a hallucination when I could already walk in heels."
"And that's why we're here," Ms. Tollefson reminded me. "We need to do something about your hallucinating."
To See Through a Glass Darkly
Chapter 10
Sasha sees Dr. Torricelli about the hallucinations, but it's hard for anyone to ignore the boy presenting en femme.
Ms. Tollefson and I got out of the car. It took me but a single attempt to get the move down of keeping my legs together, swinging them out, and standing up, and that was it. Then Ms. Tollefson and I strutted across the parking lot to the Medical Arts Professional Building. For some strange reason, I felt more in control of my life than ever before, all while going to a psychiatrist.
That essay on "The Meaning of Irony" was sounding better all the time.
As we approached the building, a man who was on his way out smiled and held the door open for us.
I smiled back at him, batting my eyes, and said, "Thank you, sir!"
"Not at all, miss!" he replied, smiling.
Ms. Tollefson grinned and nodded her approval of my simple interaction.
"Sasha, you do realize that he saw you only as a girl, don't you?"
I had some difficulty believing that I had passed so easily as a girl in my first test with a stranger.
"I guess so, but it didn't seem real," I told Ms. Tollefson.
"It was very much real, Sasha," she replied. "There was no reason for him to suspect that you were anything but the teenage girl you appear to be. Get used to it."
Inside the building lobby, we went to a security desk to announce our arrival. Ms. Tollefson had made the appointment for me, so she went to take care of it.
"Hello, sir!" she addressed the guard. "Astrid Tollefson and Sasha Petroff to see Doctor Torricelli."
The guard, a young man in his early twenties, checked information on a desktop computer.
"Yes. I see your names here," he confirmed. "Still, I need to check with Doctor Torricelli's receptionist and then issue you temporary badges for your visit."
He picked up a telephone and pushed some buttons.
"Marjorie, this is Sam… Astrid Tollefson and Sasha Petroff are here for you. May I send them up?…"
"…That's fine, thank you," Sam the guard said, then ended the call. "Yes, ladies. You can go on up in just a moment."
He printed our names and other information on two small white cards and asked us to sign our names to a list in a logbook. He the put each badge into a clear vinyl holder with a green lanyard, emblazoned with the words "Medical Arts Professional Building Client" repeated around its length and gave them to us.
That's a nice ring set," he said. "Are you a newlywed?"
"Yes," I heard myself say, "only two weeks. My wife asked me to vow m'habiller en femme at our wedding and I'm still getting used to it."
"Wow! That's not easy to do, Sam conceded. "My fiancée asked me to do it, but I think she was just kidding. I'd look too ugly. Anyway, you're a much better man than I to do it!"
"Not at all, Sam," I assured him. "Let each one live as each one may!"
"Thanks for that. Please wear these at all times in the building, ladies," he said. "Doctor Torricelli's suite is on the third floor. It's at the far end of the corridor to the right of the main elevator. The Ladies' room is to your left, just before the suite. Have a pleasant visit."
"Why, thank you, Sam!" I offered him my gratitude.
Ms. Tollefson said simply, "Thank you."
"Did you hear that, Ms. Tollefson?" I inquired as a reality check.
"Hear what?" she asked me.
"Sam asking if I were a newlywed?"
"He said no such thing!" Ms. Tollefson insisted.
Hallucination over.
We went to the elevator and immediately it opened for us, so we rode it directly to the third floor. We turned right to go to the end of the hallway where we could see the name Antonio G. Torricelli, MD, Psychiatrist stenciled on a translucent glass door.
I was about to open the door to the psychiatrist's suite when Ms. Tollefson grabbed me by the arm and pulled me to the left and back a couple of steps.
"We need to freshen up first," she decreed. "Come with me."
She dragged me where I'd never gone before: into the Ladies' room.
"Ms. Tollefson, I can't be in here!" I objected.
"You can and you will!" she replied. "If you're going to dress like that, you gotta come in here. Stop and think for a moment: what would happen if you went to the Men's room?"
Dressed as I was, that would be absurd.
"Your point is taken," I conceded to her. "But you might have just said so instead of dragging me in here."
I looked around and noticed differences between men's and women's restrooms. Of course, I would not have expected to see urinals in here, but what did surprise me was that there was a sofa against a wall. There were also dispensers for sanitary napkins and tampons. Most notably, everything in here was really clean. And it smelled of perfume. It was cleaner than I had seen in a men's room before but that might also have been the building management's policy. Were all women's restrooms like this or were there more deluxe features in this building?
Ms. Tollefson was looking at her image in the mirror, touching up her cosmetics. I didn't know how to "freshen up" anything, though. I simply smiled at my reflection and was once again amazed how thoroughly cute and feminine I looked. Sis really had done a great job.
"Remember, Ms. Tollefson," I said. "I'm new at all this."
We stood at the door of Dr. Torricelli's suite.
"Ready, Sasha?" Ms. Tollefson asked.
"No more or less than for anything else today," I replied as non-commitally as possible.
"Here we go!" she announced as she opened the door and strode in.
I followed her in, feeling more butterflies in what might be best described as a performance of sychronized fluttering.
As we approached the reception desk, a young woman smiled at us. A cherrywood nameplate on the desk bore the name Marjorie Stedham engraved on it.
"Good morning, ladies! I'm Marjorie," she greeted us. "How can I help you?"
"This is Sasha Petroff," Ms. Tollefson said. "I'm Astrid Tollefson, his school psychologist. He has an appointment with Doctor Torricelli."
Suddenly those butterflies had formed into a chorus line and were kicking away like the Rockettes in a grand finale. She had called me "he." Ms. Tollefson had given me away immediately. My face was turning beet red. Then unexpectedly, Marjorie came to the rescue.
"You're a boy?" the receptionist was glowing wide-eyed, as if star-struck. "Wow! That's so cool! You look perfectly like a girl. I'd have never known if she didn't mention it. You're so cute. And how did you get such nice legs?"
This was seeming surreal, but I did feel somewhat relieved. Remembering what Sis and her friends had told me, I decided to go with it.
"I play ice hockey. The skating helps shape my legs up quite nicely. And it helps me balance in these heels, too. When my sister dressed me up this morning, she and all her friends were just a little jealous."
"I am too," Marjorie confessed. "You look great!"
"Well, you're nice to look at, too!" I affirmed, returning her compliment.
Marjorie coyly batted her eyes. I felt myself blushing yet again.
"Why, thank you! We'll have to talk before you go, today," she promised. "When a boy can pull off your look, I can learn something from you!"
"Thanks, but this was my sister's doing," I cautioned her, "and really, I'm clueless about what she did."
"Still, let's talk," insisted Marjorie." Now, here are some forms for you to fill out. When you're done, then you'll meet Doctor Magnusson who does our intake counseling.
The forms were standard forms for contact information, medical history, privacy protection, and informed consent. There was also a form for parental consent that I'd need to give Mom. There were also forms for Ms. Tollefson of some kind. When we finished filling the forms out, she had something to tell me.
"Sasha, I'm going to have to go back to the school," Ms. Tollefson informed me. "I have to meet with Doctor Martin right after lunch."
"You mean you're leaving me here alone?" I objected. "That's not fair!"
"These are nice, friendly professionals here," she replied. "I can't imagine them giving you any grief."
"That's not what I mean and you know it!" I offered my verbal riposte.
"Sasha, now that you're dressed up like a pretty young lady," Ms. Tollefson said, "let it work for you."
"How do I do that?" I asked her.
"Bat your eyes and blush a lot," she suggestively teased me. "And don't forget to smile, too!" With that she stepped out of Doctor Torricelli's suite.
So, why does the school psychologist like to tease me? I could feel yet another screw loosen.
I took my set of forms to Marjorie and asked about the parental consent form.
"Is one parent enough or do I need both?" I asked her.
"You can ask Doctor Magnusson about that," she replied. "I'll call him now. I still can't get over how nice and feminine you look."
Marjorie picked up the inter-office telephone and pressed a button. "Doctor Magnusson," she began. "Our new patient is ready for intake. Should I bring him in now?… Thank you… We'll be right there…"
"Sasha, Doctor Magnusson said for you to come right in," she said getting up from the reception desk. "Come with me, please."
As she stood up, I noticed her knee-length navy skirt with very narrow pleats. Her shoes were each made of a white canvas vamp attached to a sole built up into a high wedge-shaped heel from what looked like a woven material, with ribbons wrapped around and tied above her ankles. She wore a navy waist-length jacket and a ruffled white blouse. I felt somewhat strange. Marjorie was beautiful, but I wasn't certain if I were in fact attracted to her, or merely interested in her clothes. But I knew that I wanted shoes like hers.
She led me to another office in the suite where stood a thin, tall man with blond hair and a well-trimmed reddish blond beard waiting. He smiled and held out his hand to greet me.
"Sasha, this is Doctor Robert Magnusson," she introduced him to me. "Doctor Magnusson, Sasha Petroff. Astrid Tollefson brought him in this morning after another appointment cancelled."
"Welcome, Sasha!" he greeted me. "Nice to meet you."
"Uh... uh... good morning, Doctor," I stumbled over my words. "I'm pleased to m-meet you."
"Doctor Magnusson will do your intake interview, first," Marjorie reminded me, "then he'll confer briefly with Doctor Torricelli before you see him."
"Thanks, Marjorie," I said. "You've made me feel more at ease here today."
"That's my job, Sasha. Thanks!" she said smiling as she closed the door behind us.
Dr. Magnusson motioned for me to sit in an armchair or on a couch. I chose the easy chair, then sat down smoothing my dress underneath me and crossed my knees. I noticed that his cherrywood nameplate was engraved "Robert D. Magnusson, Psy. D."
"All right, since Marjorie referred to you as he," Dr. Magnusson began, "I should conclude that despite your appearance, you're in fact a boy?"
"Yeah," I answered him. "I suppose you'd like an explanation?"
"Well, it did cross my mind, yes. But I think that you would like to offer one, anyway. And for what it's worth, I wouldn't have guessed that you're a boy if Marjorie hadn't called you 'he.' I hate to say this, but right now, you're prettier than my daughter, who's almost your age, and she's not at all a bad-looking girl, herself. So why are you dressed en femme for your visit today?"
En femme? I had heard that phrase in my hallucination with Sam and had not only known but even used the phrase. Would it be French for "in woman"? No, maybe, it's "as woman"? I'd need to look it up to be sure.
"My sister, Sonia, had wanted to dress me up like a girl for a long time. She teased and pestered me about it until yesterday when I gave in to her. She's been on cloud nine ever since. Since I'm not allowed to return to school until I get this medical form signed, I promised her that I'd stay dressed as a girl through Monday. It's been less than an hour ago that Ms. Tollefson called me and said that I could get an appointment here today. I didn't even have time to change. But even if I did, I promised Sonia I'd stay dressed up for her and I dont't want to break that promise. I even slept in a nightie for her."
"So, then you don't feel like a girl trapped in a boy's body?" the psychologist asked me.
"Gosh no!" I answered. "I'm a boy trapped in a girl's dress. But I was just starting to have some fun when Ms. Tollefson left me here alone. I might look prettier than your daughter, but I still mostly think and act like a boy."
"I can understand your dilemma," he said to reassure me. "You really would prefer to look like a girl instead of a boy in a dress?"
Yes, this is not the first time that I was hearing that phrase recently.
"That's a good way to put it," I responded.
"Have you ever wanted to dress up like a girl on your own?" asked Dr. Magnusson.
He would ask me that, wouldn't he? Of course, he would; that was his job. I was about to deny it, but then I thought back to what I had thought while I was awake between dreams and to what Ms. Tollefson had told me about being honest with therapists.
"Yes," I replied. "Whenever Sonia would mention it, I wondered what it might be like to wear pretty dresses and things like she did. It goes back to when we were little kids. I can't even remember when the first time was. After a while, I might imagine it myself sometimes, but mostly I would just push it out of my mind. Since I was about twelve years old, though, I might think about a girl I saw wearing something nice and wonder how it might look on me and what it would feel like to wear it myself."
"How did you feel about that?" he probed.
"Embarrassed and ashamed," I admitted, "but still very curious about it."
"Did you ever cross-dress before now?"
"No, but sometimes I wanted to."
"So, why didn't you?"
"Well, I was too afraid of being caught for one. It would have been too embarrassing for me. But there was also Sonia's teasing. If I had dressed up, even in secret, it would have been like giving up and I would lose the game with her."
"That's an interesting way to look at it, for sure," he said, scribbling on his notepad.
"Then why did you give in to her yesterday? What changed?" inquired Dr. Magnusson.
"Two things," I began. "First, I had started having these hallucinations where I was dressing up like my girlfriend, Tina. As the hallucinations continued, I started to feel comfortable seeing myself dressed up like her. In my hallucinated world, Tina and I were already married and I seemed to express my affection by dressing up like her."
"So, then there's a continuity to these hallucinations that you've been having?"
"Yeah. It's almost like I'm in a different place when I have them."
"That's very interesting," he commented, jotting down something in his notes. "What else changed, so that you agreed to dress up for your sister?"
"I learned what my sister really wanted for me."
"Oh?" Dr. Magnusson asked as his eyebrow went up.
"Sonia is very beautiful. She likes to model in fashion shows and compete in beauty pageants. She had always wanted a younger sister to teach sisterly things to, but that never happened. So she needed me to play that role for her. And she confessed that she loves being a girl and that she had always wanted to share the joy of being a girl with me. When I looked at it that way, I felt a little guilty that I had been so resistant to her. When I offered to let her dress me up over the weekend she smiled like I had never seen her before and then she started crying. So here I am, as you see me."
"And how do you feel about it, dressed as you are now?"
"All mixed up!" I answered, knowing he'd want more explanation. "I feel silly and happy, embarrassed, afraid, confident, trapped in women's clothing but more in control of my life than I've ever been. As scared as I am like this, it also seems to be fun!"
"You enjoy the risk of it?"
"Maybe. But I'm not sure if that's what I feel the best about. I don't really know."
"Would you do it again?"
"I promised Sis that I'd let her dress me up through Monday. So I have to do it until then."
"What do your parents think about it?"
"They're okay with it. Mom confirmed what Tina told me about why Sonia wanted it and also suggested that it might not be so bad. She called me her 'new daughter' at breakfast."
"And your father?"
"I was sure he'd object, but when Mom called him, Dad was only concerned that I was doing it willingly and hadn't been forced. She took a photo of me to email him before I left."
"Are your parents still together?"
"Yes, they're still married. Dad's an engineer, though,and since the metallurgy plant closed, he's worked all over the country as a consultant. Right now he's working on a project in New Orleans, but Dad always tries to come home to be with us for the holidays and special days."
"How does Tina feel about you dressing up?"
"She seemed totally giddy when she saw me dressed like a girl this morning," I related to Dr. Magnusson. "And she said that she wants us to pretend we're lesbians."
"So you vowed to stay dressed en femme for your marriage?
"Yes," I answered. "Tina asked me to."
I glanced down at my hands and contemplated my wedding rings for a moment.
"Well, that's not too unusual when younger men of your age get married nowadays. And as nice as you look, it's not such a surprise that your wife wants you to stay dressed like you are." But now, Sasha," continued Dr. Magnusson, "I'd like you to describe your hallucinations to me in as much detail as you can remember."
"I'm having one right now," I told him. "I can see my—"
The rings were gone again.
"Well, I was having another one," I insisted. "But it now seems to be over. This is typical. Most last for only a few moments."
"What did you see?"
"My wedding rings and French manicure," I responded. "That's how I usually know when I'm hallucinating. I can see the rings and manicure that I don't really have. Also, you asked me if I had vowed to remain dressed en femme after we married."
"But I did not," Dr. Magnusson objected.
"No," I agreed, "but the hallucinated you did."
"Have you seen other persons in your hallucinations?"
"Yeah," I affirmed. "I've seen Mom and Sis, Tina, their friend Deb and many of my classmates and the school staff in them. I've seen people from this building, too."
"Hmm?" he seemed to ponder his next question. "Have you hallucinated about anyone whom you don't know?
This was not a question that I expected. So, I paused and thought about it for a moment. It seemed that everyone I had seen were people that I knew, whom I would normally encounter every day.
"No," I replied. "They're all my family or friends or other people that I normally would see."
"That's very interesting," said Dr. Magnusson. "Could you describe your other hallucinations to me? And please try to remember as much detail as you can."
So I began to detail my hallucinatory experiences for him. This continued for almost forty-five minutes as I did my best to recall everything that I saw, heard, and felt while he stopped to verify every detail and nuance that I reported. He seemed to be the most interested in the extended hallucination that I had of Tina applying makeup to my face and fixing my hair.
Then I related my earlier encounter with Sam the guard downstairs. Dr. Magnusson's face turned white at my recollection of it. He just scribbled more on his notepad.
"So, Sam discussed your dressing up with you as if it were a custom that he knew?"
"Yeah. He told me his fiancée had asked him to vow dressing up as well, but he thought he'd be too ugly."
"There's no doubt about it," chuckled Dr. Magnusson. "If he showed up in drag at the security desk, I'd turn and run!"
I giggled like a girl at that, myself. And Dr. Magnusson wrote something else on his notepad. He must have noted be giggling like a girl.
"When I told Ms. Tollefson that he asked me if I were a newlywed, she said he didn't."
"And she was standing right next to you?"
"Through the whole conversation."
"Remarkable!" he observed. "How did you feel when she said that?"
"Relieved," I replied, "because I knew the hallucination was over."
"So, Sasha, looks like you've got quite an interesting case here," concluded Dr. Magnusson. "I'll confer with Dr. Torricelli then you'll meet with him. While we do, the nurse will give you a simple check-up and take your blood."
"Why?" I asked.
"Remember that a psychiatrist is also a physician. Since Dr. Torricelli may need to prescribe you medication, we need to give you a basic health check. Many psychiatric symptoms can be caused by physical illnesses. We want to see if you might have one of those. And we need to start with the same things that any physician would," so the psychologist explained to me. "I should also ask if you have any other questions?"
"Since Dad is not going to be in town for a while, is it enough for just Mom to sign the parental consent forms?"
"That should be okay. But please ask your mother to give a telephone number for him, in case we would need to reach him. Anything else?"
"Am I going crazy?"
Dr. Magnusson frowned a little, leaned back in his chair, touched the fingertips of his two hands together, and then he sat up and smiled.
"In truth, I can't tell you, now. But in clinical psychology, we talk about something called 'insight.' That means the patient knows that something is wrong and understands that he or she must be careful in judgement and actions. Sasha, you're a bright young man, or young woman if you prefer, who has remarkable insight into what's happening. You knew something was wrong, so you immediately sought help. Also, you've developed an appropriate method of reality-testing that works in your circumstances. Your awareness, intelligence, and insight are protecting you right now. That's the best thing that you've got going for you, and it can go a long way to help you. I trust you to take care of your own sanity and you should, too."
"Will dressing like this affect my sanity?" I asked, more in fear than curiosity.
Dr. Magnusson simply smiled.
"This might surprise you, but my instincts tell me right now, that it might be the healthiest thing you could do."
Dr. Magnusson picked up his telephone and called for Marjorie to come and escort me again. She led me away from his office and into an examination room.
"Nurse van de Meer will be here in just a moment to take your vitals and draw blood for some basic medical tests," Marjorie began, "So I should ask you to undress, but just down to your undies. If you need it, you can wear this gown."
She placed a paper gown on the padded examining table. Already I would need to take off my dress in front of a stranger. And the day would become weirder yet.
"Okay," I acknowledged, "but I might need your help with my zipper, though."
"Sure, Sasha!" she answered smiling. "It's easy enough."
She unlatched the fastener at the back of the collar and zipped my dress open.
"Thanks!" I said. "I'm so grateful for that."
I let the dress fall down my body and stepped out of it. This felt really weird. There I was, a teenage boy of sixteen, wearing bra, panties, pantyhose, and high-heels, standing in front of a young woman I'd only met an hour ago. I could see myself blush again in a full-length mirror mounted on a wall. For the first time, I noticed that there was some padding in the panties as well as the bra. My sister must have wanted me to have some curves.
I sat down in a chair and began to unbuckle the ankle straps of my shoes.
"Will you need any more help?" asked Marjorie.
I stepped out of my shoes onto the floor. The cold tile felt a little strange through the feet of my pantyhose, yet I liked it.
"Only to zip my dress up again before I leave," I told her.
"Okay," she said. "I'll come back when it looks like you're ready."
We heard a knock on the door and a voice asking, "May I come in?"
Marjorie opened the door and a nurse wearing a white dress, tights, shoes and a cap entered. This was really unusual since nurses mostly wear scrubs these days. Then I remembered to glance at my hands. White tips and wedding rings. I wanted to put on the paper gown, but now it was not on the examining table.
Marjorie smiled back at me and closed the door.
"Good morning, young lady," the nurse greeted me. "I'm Nurse van de Meer, but please call me Becky."
"My name is Sasha," I responded. Good morning, Becky."
She opened a file folder. And looked in it for a moment.
"Oh! I'm sorry!" Becky exclaimed. "I thought you were a young woman!"
"That's okay!" I said. "I'm relieved that you did. Today I'm supposed to look like a girl."
"Are you coming in for gender identity counseling?" she asked me.
"Oh no!" I replied. "I'm just dressing up a few days for my sister."
"For you sister?" the nurse probed. "Would you step up on the scales, please?"
"Yeah. She always wanted to dress me up. She teased me about it since we were little. Yesterday I decided that I'd do it for her. I feel nervous about it, but I think I can have some fun doing it, too."
"You're at fifty-six-point-seven kilograms, Sasha," the nurse informed me. She lowered a small metal arm down to the top of my head. "And a hundred sixty-five-point-one centimeters."
She took me by the elbow and helped me step down from the scales. I noticed her cap had been replaced by a white hairband and now she was wearing white scrubs.
"Well, Sasha," she addressed me, "You're so sweet to do it for your sister. You make a very convincing young lady and an especially cute one at that. You certainly fooled me!"
"Thank you, Becky" I said. "I was afraid that I might look like a boy wearing a dress."
"Little chance of that," the nurse reassured me, "unless you move or talk like a boy. By the way, that's 'Becca' and not 'Becky,' please!"
"Oh! I'm sorry, Nurse Becca," I apologized to her. But I was sure that she'd given her name as "Becky." Once again my manicure was no longer visible.
"We do see boys here with gender identity issues who are still learning to present as girls," explained the nurse. "They might dress nicely, but then they don't walk right or talk right or they have other failures in proper feminine behavior. There's so much more to being a woman than just pretty clothes."
"My sister's friends will be teaching me those things after school today," I said. "Or at least they plan to start. My girlfriend's involved, too."
"So it sounds like she might want to have fun with you dressing up, too."
"I've been having hallucinations where we're married and I dress up like her."
"That's unusual," the nurse said.
"It's why my school psychologist brought me here," I admitted.
"Is that Astrid Tollefson?" Becca asked me. "I thought that I saw her earlier today."
"Yeah," I confirmed. "I came with her this morning."
"Sit down now," she instructed. "I need to get your temperature and blood pressure next."
Becca put a fresh sleeve on a digital thermometer and thrust it under my tongue. Next she wrapped a cuff around my upper left arm and began to pump a rubber bulb, then listened to the inside of my elbow with my her stethoscope as she watched a sphygmomanometer.
"Hmm?" she wondered. "Seems a little high. Betcha it's 'cause you've never had anyone see you wearing girls' underthings before."
I blushed again. Becca grinned at me and squeezed my hand. She held my wrist and looked at her wristwatch.
"Your pulse is a little elevated, too," she said with a professional but sincere smile. "Relax, Sasha. You'll be fine."
Just then, I heard a loud beep and she extracted the digital thermometer from my mouth and wrote down the numbers in my chart.
"Astrid and I were roommates in college. We've had a lot of fun together. She can be so silly sometimes! Sit up on the examining table, if you would, please," she told me. She took a wooden tongue depressor out of a jar as I climbed up onto the padded surface of the examining table. The folded paper gown was there once again, right where Marjorie had left it.
"Say 'ah!'" she commanded.
"Ah!" I said as she thrust the oversized popsicle stick into my mouth.
Stepping on a pedal, a trashcan bearing the familiar Biohazard logo opened, and she tossed the once-used piece of wood into it.
"Do you know Ms. Tollefson's brother then?" I probed, curious about our school psychologist's backgeround.
"Dougie? He's a really charming guy," she said. "He's dating my little sister Lisa now."
Next she took a wand of some kind and put a plastic cone on the end of it.
"Turn your head left," she ordered, looking into my ear. "Now right." She opened the trashcan again and discarded the cone.
"Cross your knees," she said next, then struck just below my knee with a rubber hammer.
I felt a tingle as my leg kicked out. I giggled. Like a girl. Again. I still had trouble understanding how I could do that without any coaching.
"Cross them the other way, now." She tapped the other knee with the hammer and it kicked out like the first. I giggled yet again.
So, now I was really scared. I discovered that I like the way pantyhose feel on my legs. I really liked wearing them. That I liked how they feel embarrassed me.
"Sasha," she began, "your legs are so nice. I wish my legs were that shapely! However did you get legs like that?"
"Playing ice hockey," I told her. "Ice skating does wonders to shape up your leg muscles."
"Then I'll have to get out my ice skates next winter."
Was everyone going to ask me for beauty tips today?
Becca took a small flashlight and pointed to a corner of the room.
"Look over there, please," she said, shining the flashlight into one eye, then the other.
Next, she brought out a plastic T-shaped tubular device and put a plastic sleeve on one end it. The bottom of it was plugged into a desktop computer.
"This is a spirometer," explained the nurse. "It's used to measure both breathing rate and volume of breath. Put your lips around the sleeve and breath normally."
Nurse Becca wrote down numbers she read from the monitor and then typed some information into the computer.
"We're almost done here," said the nurse. "Now comes the part that's no fun. I need to draw your blood."
"This will hurt, I'm sure?" I asked her.
"Just a stinging sensation for a second or two," she confirmed.
She produced an empty syringe with a ring at the top of the plunger and a piece of rubber tubing.
"Which arm would you prefer for this?" asked the nurse, offering me a choice.
"Left," I said.
She tied the tubing around my upper arm and felt around the inside of my elbow and just below it. Then I suddenly felt the needle jabbed into my arm and looked away while it filled. Tough as I like to think I am, I'm still quite squeamish. Then I felt some pressure applied to my arm.
"Hold that," Becca told me and I compressed the gauze pad as she let go of it. Quickly she secured it with a strip of medical adhesive tape.
"You can get dressed, now, Sasha," she said, moving toward the door, "and I'll take this over to the lab."
"Could you send Marjorie in to help with my dress?" I asked her.
"Certainly!" Becca promised as she closed the door behind her.
I stepped into my navy dress, pulled it up, and thrust my arms through the sleeves. The door opened and Marjorie entered.
"Help!" I cried. "Please zip me up!"
"Of course, Sasha," she said as I felt her hands on my waist from behind. Her hands deftly found the zipper and she closed it up my back. Then she hooked the fastener at the top. I sat down to put my shoes on.
"Sasha, by the time you're done with Dr. Torricelli, it will be time for lunch. Why don't you join me? My treat. It'll be fun to talk with you."
I thought for a moment. I only had twenty dollars in my wallet, and I might need that to get home. Also, I'd be worried about what Tina might think. But Marjorie just seemed curious about me dressing up and maybe she wanted to trade fashion tips. And somehow, I needed to find out where she got her shoes.
"That would be nice. I want to ask you for some fashion tips. I am new at all this," I said, fastening my ankle straps with their tiny buckles. "I'd like to be able to talk about this with my sister, my girlfriend, and their friends without appearing completely uninformed."
"So, you have a girlfriend? Marjorie inquired. What does she think of you dressing as a girl?"
"I'm afraid that she may have way too much fun with it," I lamented. "Sis put her in charge of picking my clothes out for this. But this dress is one of my sister's. It was special to her and she wanted me to wear it for my first day as a girl."
"Do your sister's things fit you well?" she asked.
"Mostly, I would guess. She is a couple inches taller than me, but we seem to have about the same build. My feet seem to be a size larger, because I had to borrow my shoes from one of her bigger friends. Sonia's shoes were just too tight for me."
"Did you do your own face?"
It took me a second to understand that she meant my makeup.
"Oh no!" I answered. "Sis did that. She's really an expert with it. Our faces share the same features and she already knew what to do with it."
"And so elegantly, too, I see," commented Marjorie. "She gave you such a very light touch of it, yet your face has so inviting and sophisticated a look. It contrasts nicely with your pigtails."
"Believe it or not, the braids were my idea," I confessed. "Sonia had done them for me last night, so after she put me into this dress, I asked her to braid my hair again. My biggest fear is being recognized as a boy in a dress. I asked Sis to make me look as much like a girl as she could."
"Seriously, Sasha," she said, "there's nothing the least bit boyish-looking about you whatever. You need to appreciate that many, many girls out there would do anything to look as cute and as pretty as you do right now."
"Really?" I pressed her for reassurance.
"Well, you might need to touch up your lipstick and lipgloss just a little," she said. "There have been days when I didn't look nearly as nice as you do now. But please, never underestimate how— how right you look as a girl!"
She picked up the spirometer and took its sleeve off and gave it to me. There was a light ring of lipstick around it. My lipstick.
"Here's a souvenir for you, Sasha," said Marjorie. "Your first lipstick stain!"
"How many times have I seen women leave lipstick on cups and glasses?" I wondered aloud.
"Next time your girlfriend wears a light-colored blouse," Marjorie said to preface her suggestion, "you should kiss her and leave a lipstick stain on her collar."
I grinned and giggled at the thought.
"We'll go to Dr. Torricelli's office as soon as he signals me that he's ready to talk with you.
Marjorie had escorted me again, this time to the psychiatrist's office. This time, I decided to sit on one end of the couch. Weren't psychiatrists supposed to have couches for patients to lie down on? Marjorie closed the door behind me as I sat across from Dr. Torricelli.
"So, your name is Sasha and you're a young man and not a young woman?" Dr. Torricelli asked me.
"Yeah. I dressed up like this as a favor to my sister, Sonia," I told him. "Dr. Magnusson said that I look prettier than his daughter. What do you think?"
"You do look like a very pretty girl," he said, "although your mannerisms and speech need some work."
"Sis has a couple friends she's asking to coach me on those things."
"Your goal is to pass as a girl?"
"Well, I promised Sonia that I'd dress up for her, but I didn't want to look like a boy in a dress. I look a lot like her, but she said my speech and movement was much more likely to give me away than my looks."
"I'd say that she's probably right," he agreed. "So, how do you feel dressed like that?"
"Somewhat anxious and apprehensive, but I'm also trying to have fun with it. Sis says it's important to her for me to enjoy this. I don't want to disappoint her."
"Are you and your sister very close?"
"Yeah," I answered. And I'm beginning to believe that we're even closer than I thought. I think I started to feel that way recently. Sonia set me up with her best friend, Tina, and we really hit it off. She knew somehow that we belong together."
"D'you think you're in love with her?"
"We've both got it really bad!" I confessed. "We've just been dating two weeks but it already feels like we're getting serious."
Dr. Torricelli smiled at me.
"Now, have you ever felt that you are, or want to be, or should have been a girl?"
"Even though I might look like a girl," I answered, "I'm perfectly happy to be a guy. This is all just for fun!"
"Again, answer the question: have you ever felt that you wanted to be or should have been a girl?"
Now he was asking me about what I had wanted? And he wasn't going to let me deflect the question. I'd need to be careful. I took the opportunity to stretch out on the couch. The leather was cool and I liked the way it felt through my pantyhose along the length of my legs.
"I've imagined being a girl," I admitted. "Mostly curiosity, I think. I've wondered how it would feel to be a girl, but I wouldn't want to quit being a boy, either. And Sonia is so good at being a girl, sometimes I've been a little jealous of her. If I were to be a girl, I'd want to be one like she is."
"Sounds like she's a role model for you? he speculated.
"Maybe," I replied, "but I think she's the world's best sister."
"All right," Dr. Torricelli said, relenting from that topic. "What I really need to discuss with you is the series of 'hallucinations' that you've reported."
"That's why I'm here," I affirmed. "They've really been freaking me out. They seem, they feel so real— too real!"
"When did they start, Sasha?"
"Two days ago," I replied.
Dr. Torricelli looked at notes in a file folder, frowning. He then consulted a small spiral-bound volume on his desk.
"Sasha," he said, "there's much more here than meets the eye."
"No kidding, Doc!" I retorted.
"By the book, son," he continued, "most of the unusual perceptions that you described to Dr. Magnusson, may not be hallucinations, but illusions. It's not clear to me exactly which you've experienced. Maybe you've had some of both? I can't really tell from your descriptions alone."
"What's the difference?" I asked.
"Technically speaking, a hallucination occurs when your perception has no external stimulus," explained the psychiatrist, "but an illusion is only a distorted perception of an external stimulus."
"I'm not sure I understand the difference."
"Let's take your own descriptions as examples," he began. "You dress in a black tee-shirt and red denim jeans, but then you look at yourself wearing a black turtleneck with a red denim skirt. That sounds more like an illusion to me. But when you're alone in your bed and your girlfriend suddenly appears next to you, and then she's gone, that seems more like a hallucination.
"Okay, I think I get the difference there," I confirmed. "But how important is the difference?"
"Well, a hallucination usually occurs as a symptom of a psychotic disorder, while an illusion does not. In the case of a hallucination, you're seeing things that aren't there to begin with. That's usually more serious than an illusion. In an illusion you're misperceiving what is there. That's not quite so serious as the first case."
"So, you're saying a hallucination means a more serious illness?"
"In a word, yes," he confirmed. "But again, it's not clear which kind of perception we need to deal with just yet. So don't go jumping to any conclusions now. First of all, we need to do a few tests on you.
"What kind of tests?"
"Tests on your brain. I must refer you to a neurologist for those," the doctor informed me as he wrote on a small pad. "At the very least, you'll need an EEG and we'll take it from there."
Ms. Tollefson said that Dr. Torricelli would probably make such a referral.
"What's an EEG?"
"That's short for electroencephalogram, which is a chart of your brainwaves. If your brainwaves aren't normal, it might indicate a brain injury of some kind."
"Ms. Tollefson said that it's possible I could have concussion from playing soccer or ice hockey. Would that cause what's happening to me?"
"Certainly it could, although it would be somewhat unusual. But checking for it is simple enough and it's a good place to start looking. However, there are also many other things that it might be. Don't jump to any conclusions. But I should ask you have you had many collisions playing sports?"
"Oh yeah. Quite a few, especially at ice hockey."
"Have you hit your head in these? Hitting your head on the ice might result in a serious injury."
"I get knocked down a lot, but not on my head. Most often it's on my butt!"
"That makes a concussion unlikely," he assured me, "but it's still possible. You don't look to me too much like a hockey player, though."
Was he referring to my dress or my size?
"I had the most penalty minutes on the team this season. I may be short, but I'm tough in the rink! Mom says I 'assert my presence' on the ice."
"Yet you're okay sitting here dressed like your sister," chuckled Dr. Torricelli, "although you don't feel compelled to become a girl? Sasha, maybe you're just very androgynous?"
"That's what Ms. Tollefson said after she gave me that test yesterday."
"What test?"
"She said it was the Bem— BSRI?"
"The Bem Sex Role Inventory?"
"Yeah, that's it!"
"Did she tell you your score?"
"I think it was six-point-one on the em-scale and six-point-four on the eff-scale."
"Yes, that would mean that you're fairly androgynous according to the test."
"Is that a good thing?" I asked. "This morning Mom said that Dad is also very androgynous."
"Well, that depends entirely on what you do with it. You present well as a young woman. I expect that you are no less as a young man. From what you told Dr. Magnusson, you seem quite curious about exploring the feminine lifestyle. You may have some gender identity issues, but you don't seem to have any real gender dysphoria. For you, the time you spend dressed as a girl may be time well spent."
"You mean I should dress like this?"
"In your heart of hearts, I think you want to. You've been curious about it for a long time, if for no other reason, because your sister kept reminding you. And I also think that somehow she knew that you wanted to do it."
"I only promised her that I would until Monday."
"Yes, but I think that you will want to extend this little experiment a while longer. You had mentioned that you were beginning to have fun with it. Since you've already given yourself permission to do it, also give yourself the permission to enjoy it."
"Dr. Magnusson said it would be healthy."
"If you're doing it the right way and for the right reasons, and I think you are, then yes!"
"Can you sign this medical readmission form so I can go back to school next week?" I asked, presenting him the blue paper.
Dr. Torricelli took my form and said, "In my professional opinion you present no danger to yourself or others. Do you plan to dress like that for school on Monday?"
"I don't know. I didn't think that I would get my form signed before next week. But I did promise Sonia that I would dress up, thinking that I'd still be at home."
"There's an area here on your form to indicate any conditions or restrictions for you to return. I'm going to indicate that they should allow you to attend classes cross-dressed if you'd like to. I want you to have that as an option."
"Is that necessary?" I queried him.
"Necessary? Probably not," he remarked. "But if you should like to or need to show up at school en femme, noting it on this form, signed by your psychiatrist, would help you avoid possible administrative hassles. Remember, we do see boys your age with gender dysphoria here and I have had some experience with how school administrators can react."
Hmm? Should I let Sonia know about this? If I told her,then I knew I'd be wearing a dress to school Monday. But Dr. Torricelli was right. I was beginning to enjoy this enough that the possibility that I could go to class like this excited me. But it frightened me as well.
"Thanks, Doc!" I said, accepting the form back from him.
"Sasha, here's a referral to a neurologist for you," he said, handing me yet another paper. Paula Bennett is very, very good at what she does. Give this to Marjorie before you leave and she'll schedule an appointment with her for you."
"Does it matter when I see her?" I asked, taking the referral form as well.
"The sooner, the better," he said. "We need some test results before making a definite diagnosis. I'm not prescribing you any meds today because I'm not sure that your symptoms are really psychotic. Anti-psychotic drugs can have very nasty side-effects and I don't want you taking them unless and until it's absolutely necessary. If what you're having are not hallucinations, the meds might not even help. If you can't sleep, that's a different matter and I might offer you a sleep aid."
"What should I do until then?" I asked the doctor.
"Dr. Magnusson said he told you about insight. You seem to know what's real and what's not. You have found your own way of knowing what's not as it should be. I'd rather for now that you rely on your own insight as much as you can. Frankly you're handling this as well as anyone could. Are you having any trouble sleeping?"
"Not really," I answered. "Except for some really strange dreams."
"What kind of dreams?"
"I was dreaming that I was playing soccer and then ice hockey wearing a cheerleader's uniform. And someone would ask me if I was a particle or wave? That made no sense to me whatever."
"Have you taken high-school physics yet?" asked the doctor.
"No, that's scheduled for next year," I said.
"It's a reference to quantum physics," he told me. "It's possible to view subatomic phenomena as either a wave or a particle, but not both. As an observer, you can set up an experiment to look at whichever you want, but not both at the same time. It's your choice which one to study, but then you can't know anything about the other. When this was first discovered, it shook up the physics community around the world. It's something you can look up in the library, or ask a science teacher about it."
"Why would I be hearing it while dreaming?"
"I don't know," Dr. Torricelli admitted. "That's a very good question. Indeed, you've picked up some knowledge of it, even if you're not aware how, when or where."
"That's weird," I commented.
"Welcome to my world, Sasha!" he retorted, laughing.
Marjorie set her telephone handset down in its cradle. "I've arranged an appointment with Doctor Bennett for you next week. Her office will call to remind you the day before and tell you any special instructions you might need to follow."
"So is everything all set?" I asked her.
"Yes, it is," she said. "Let's go to lunch, now. I'm ready to eat something before I starve! You wanna try Aunt Ellie's Kitchen? It's just across the street. They have good soups, salads, and sandwiches there, and they make a really great deep-dish pizza. Many of us in the building eat there often. We use them for catering, too."
"It sounds fine to me," I answered.
Then let's go, Sasha," Marjorie ordered. With that, she stood up, slung her purse over her right shoulder, and we were out the door.
To See Through a Glass Darkly
Chapter 11
Marjorie takes Sasha to lunch and shows him who he is in a most unusual way.
Marjorie pressed the call button for the elevator and its door opened almost immediately. We entered and she pressed the button marked "Lobby."
"You'll need to return your visitor's badge to Sam before we go," she reminded me. "I noticed your address. You're at most only a few minutes from here. If you'd like, I could take you home right after lunch."
"I'd appreciate that greatly," I replied. "I'd rather not wait on the bus like this or have to call a taxi."
The elevator stopped and its door opened up to the lobby. Following the usual rules of ettiquette, I deferred to Marjorie and waited for her to step out first. But she also hesitated, waiting for me.
"Ladies first," I said.
"Look who's talking!" Marjorie answered back to me. "For the moment, we're both women and since I'm escorting you as our client, you go first."
"Mom raised a gentleman," I protested.
"Are you aware of the lady's side of protocol?" Marjorie asked me. "Now that you present as a young woman, you must react appropriately. It's not proper for you to defer according to gender so long as you're appearing as a girl. That's much more likely to give you away than anything in your dress."
Although I knew that I'd need to learn new behaviors, I hadn't thought about how quickly I might need to adjust or even unlearn old ones. Marjorie was right. If I behave as a gentleman while crossdressed someone would be likely to notice. So I had to change my protocol from gentleman to lady and rather quickly. That's what Sonia's friends Jacqui and Marcia would be helping me do.
The elevator door started closing again, but Marjorie held the "Open" button so I stepped out and she followed as I went toward the security desk. The lanyard and my visitor's badge came off and I returned them to Sam.
"Thank you, Miss Petroff," he acknowledged me. "I hope your visit went well."
"It was quite interesting, Sam," I replied. "Thank you for asking."
"I'm taking Sasha to lunch," she told Sam. "Then, I'm driving her home. D'you want anything from Aunt Ellie's today?"
"Thanks, but Lucie's bringing a picnic basket," the guard answered smiling. "Maybe next time."
"Okay," Marjorie conceded. "I'll see you again after lunch. And give my best to Lucie!"
"Will do!" Sam answered.
Marjorie gestured for me toward the door on the opposite side of the lobby from where I had entered with Ms. Tollefson earlier that morning. We walked out quickly. I was easily able to take the few steps down from the door to the plaza in Debbie's heels. It seemed much easier than when I tried the similar maneuver for leaving my house this morning, so I smiled to myself for having learned a new skill. We turned left to continue down the street.
"It's a beautiful day, Sasha!" Marjorie exclaimed.
"Yeah," I agreed. "It is."
At that moment a strong gust of wind picked up the hemline of my dress and I became suddenly aware of a tingling as the breeze penetrated my pantyhose and cooled me below my waist. Then I noticed that Marjorie was holding down her skirt, so I thought to do the same.
"This is one of the ongoing problems when wearing dresses or skirts," she said. "You never know when you're going to fight the wind to keep your hemline down."
"Oh, I don't know," I retorted. "It's not so bad. It seems like fun!"
"You would say that as a boy, wouldn't you?" she objected. "But still, it's not acceptable to let your dress fly up in the wind."
"I just like the way it feels," I explained. "And it gave me quite a rush!"
Marjorie giggled. "It must be a completely new experience for you," she surmised. "Some thrill, huh?"
"It was fun!" I protested. "Can I do it again?"
"If it does, be quicker to hold your dress down the next time," she said in her cautionary tone. "After all, you don't want anyone thinking you're too wild a girl!"
I hadn't thought about that before, but I had always thought that catching the breeze was why girls liked to wear dresses. So much to learn; so much more to unlearn!
We continued walking down the street to the corner and the red hand was glowing. Across the street was a quaint, friendly looking brownstone façade with the words Aunt Ellie's Kitchen arched across its large, plate glass window and, in somewhat smaller letters, Soups, Salads & Sandwiches stenciled below. Inside we could see quite a few patrons who had already gathered for lunch.
The crossing light now displayed a white icon depicting a pedestrian walking, so Marjorie and I crossed the street and continued to the main door of the restaurant.
We were greeted inside by a vivacious blonde and blue-eyed hostess dressed in an ensemble consisting of a short, white leather skirt and matching jacket decorated with rhinestones and fringed seams, styled in a western motif. Her blouse displayed a top-stitched yoke in similar style. The uniform was completed by a pair of white cowgirl boots with four-inch heels and a white Stetson hat. A brass nametag on the breast pocket of her jacket bore the name Heather.
"Welcome to Aunt Ellie's Kitchen!" Heather greeted us. "Two for lunch today, Marjorie? And who's your friend?"
"Yes, two for lunch, please, and this is Sasha," she introduced me to the hostess. "Sasha, this is Heather. She's the hostess for the daytime shift."
"Table or booth today?" the hostess inquired of Marjorie.
"Sasha, would you like a booth?" Marjorie asked me for my preference.
Glancing quickly around the dining room I noticed that the booths were somewhat more secluded.
"That would be fine," I answered. I figured that Marjorie had asked since she was sensitive to my dilemma, or maybe, she was simply more polite than I am.
Heather led us to a both and gave each of us a menu. "Can I get you beverages?" she asked.
"I'll have a cola, please," I answered her.
"A diet cola for me, Heather," Marjorie requested.
"Very well," the hostess acknowledged our preferences. "Katie will be your server today. I'll send her with your drinks." And with a wink and a smile, Heather returned to her station by the main door.
A moment later, a waitress came by our booth with two soft drinks on her tray. She was wearing a blue denim miniskirt and a red western blouse with a top-stitched yoke and a blue printed bandana for a scarf. She wore white low-heeled cowgirl boots and a white Stetson. Her brass nametag bore the name Katie.
"Hello, there!" Katie greeted us smiling. "I'm Katie and I'll be your waitress today. Now who had the diet cola?"
"I did," Marjorie answered. "Sasha had the regular cola."
The waitress gave us each our beverages. "Are you ready to order, now?" she asked.
"Not yet," Marjorie said. "Give us a couple minutes, please. My friend's never been here before."
"Of course, then," Katie said with a smile. "I'll be back in a few minutes."
"She's cute in that cowgirl get-up," I observed. "I could imagine you wearing it."
"I almost had a job working here," Marjorie told me. "The tips here are really good. It's because so many professionals eat lunch and dinner here. The only reason I didn't take the job was that Dr. Torricelli hired me first. Maybe you'd like to work here for the summer?"
"Do they hire guys as servers?" I inquired.
"Sort of...," she said, hedging somewhat.
"Sort of?" I asked, wanting clarification.
"Ellie has been really kind to a few of our clients who've had gender identity issues," Marjorie began to explain. "All the servers who work here, including the boys, wear the same waitress' uniform. It helps them get used to presenting as girls in public. There are even some guys who've worked here just for the fun of it— well, really because the tips are quite good."
"You mean I'd have to dress like a cowgirl to work here?"
"Yes, but I think you're cute enough to pull it off!"
"Sorry, Marjorie," I objected, "but blue jeans are as close to the western look as I care to get."
"Still, you might keep it in mind for the summer," she reiterated. "They're hiring for it now. And again, they pay better here than most other places you could try. So, whaddya want for lunch?"
"Ever since you mentioned it, I keep thinking about that deep-dish pizza. How'bout it?"
"I'm a vegetarian," Marjorie said. "Would a meatless pizza be okay with you?"
"Certainly," I conceded. "In fact, I follow such a diet while I'm in training. Also, I'm an Orthodox Christian and I often fast from meats for religious reasons. Besides, I think this Three Mushrooms Florentine Pizza looks good."
"That's perfect!" she exclaimed. "We'll get it, then. Would you like to share an appetizer, too? The black bean dip is wonderful!"
"Sounds good to me!" I answered.
Katie returned to our booth. "Ready to order, now?" the waitress asked us.
"Yes," Marjorie replied. "We'll have the Southwestern Chipotle-BlackBean Pá¢té with blue corn tortilla chips for an appetizer and the fourteen-inch Three Mushrooms Florentine DeepDish Pizza."
"An excellent choice," Katie confirmed. "I'll have them start that right way." With that, she left us and made her way to a server's station, where she entered our order into the restaurant's electronic system.
"So tell me, Sasha," Marjorie began, "why did you dress like a girl today?"
"To make a long story short," I replied, "my sister has been trying to get me to do it for years. She's teased and pestered and begged me until I gave in yesterday. I needed a diversion, a distraction from these illusions or hallucinations or visions or whatever. I'm really scared of them. I feel like I'm losing my mind. But in them, I'm wearing Tina's clothes. It didn't make sense to me because it seemed— it felt— real!— too real! In these visions, I not only saw the clothes, but I could feel the texture of the fabrics, smell fragrances, and even taste the raspberry lipgloss. I took a shower and noticed my skin was soft and my body hair gone. I even thought my breasts were growing.
"So, I decided that since this theme seemed to be playing out in my head, maybe I should just go with it. Since I would have to stay home from school anyway, now seemed like a logical time to indulge Sonia's long-time obsession with dressing me up. And I have to admit that I'd been curious about what it would be like myself for almost as long."
"When did it start?" Marjorie asked me.
"I don't really know," I said. "Sonia's wanted me to dress up like a girl ever since I can remember. I can't recall when the first time she asked me was. But I think it was before we were even in kindergarten. And I'm sure my curiosity about it had to begin not too long after she began teasing me."
"Then it sounds like this little problem has always been with you?" she assessed.
"That would be a fair conclusion," I conceded to her. "Or it always had been. It's resolved now. Perhaps it will be replaced by a new one, since Sonia can't tease me over not doing it anymore."
"How do you think Sonia feels about it, now?" Marjorie continued to probe.
"When I told her that I'd do it, she cried and hugged me and kissed me. And so did her girlfriends. I think that I began blushing just from all the attention; it was so overwhelming. And when she started to study my face for applying cosmetics, her expression was so intense. Her concentration was focused completely on what she was doing. It was like when I'm batting: I put everything out of my mind except the next pitch. While she studied my face, I was the only one who mattered to her."
"You'd never seen her like that before, had you?"
"No, I hadn't."
"You're bonding sister-to-sister," Marjorie affirmed. "Your doing this is very special for her, I think."
"It seemed almost like the most wonderful moment in her life," I remarked. "It was really weird, to be honest. Why would my dressing up mean so much to her? It doesn't make sense to me. I could have let her dress me up a long time ago and been done with it."
"Sasha, I don't think it's as easy as that— being done with it, I mean," she said, the register of her voice become slightly more somber. "You're not going to be done with it after today."
"Well, I promised Sonia I'd go along with it for the weekend."
"No— it's going to go longer than you— or she thinks!"
"What?" I asked Marjorie. "Why d'you say that?"
"Just that I think this weekend will completely change your relationship with your sister. She won't want you to stop dressing up, but neither will you. And unless I miss my guess completely, your girlfriend will ask you to continue, too."
"But I have to go back to school, soon," I protested. "How can I go to school like this?"
"Dr. Toricelli did give you medical permission," she reminded me. "You'll be taking advantage of it."
"I don't intend to," I said, denying her assertion.
"Not today, you don't," she conceded. "But you have an interesting weekend coming up. Nothing will ever be the same for you afterwards."
"That sounds ominous to me, somehow," I remarked.
"Not at all, Sasha!" Marjorie giggled to me. "You really don't understand, do you? The outcome will be happy for you and all those around you. You just won't believe it for a while."
I started to sip my cola but noticed a slice of lime on the edge of the glass. I didn't remember Katie bringing a lime with my drink. Marjorie's had a lemon. I glanced at my fingers again to see the French manicure. Looking around the restaurant, I noticed that the waitresses wore white knee-length boots with four-inch heels instead of the mid-length cowgirl boots.
Not again! I couldn't even have my lunch without these crazy hallucinations!
"Marjorie," I warned her, "it's happening again. There are citrus slices on our drinks and the waitresses' boots suddenly changed style in front of me."
"Citrus— What?" she asked.
The lemon and lime slices were suddenly gone, as usual in my hallucinations or whatever they were.
"I had another hallucination," I explained. "Some details in here changed. The waitresses were suddenly wearing different boots and there was a lime on my drink and a lemon on yours. But now they're gone. It's how my hallucinations usually are. I see details around me altered very briefly, then they revert to normal in a few moments. But sometimes the changes run longer."
"How do you know what's real or not?" she wondered.
"By noticing changes in specific details. The color of the diodes changed from red to green on my bedroom clock. And I have a French manicure and wear wedding rings in the hallucinations. If I glance down at my hands, then I can know immediately if I'm hallucinating or not. Tina and me are already married in my hallucinations. We have matching manicures and rings."
"That really is weird," Marjorie commented. "It sounds almost like it's another world."
"Yeah, it does seem that way, doesn't it?" I replied. "It's why I needed my sister's help. The images of seeing myself wearing skirts and maryjanes were beginning to really freak me out. I would be wearing blue jeans, look down at my legs and be wearing a denim skirt and pantyhose instead. Then I'd, like, blink and I was wearing jeans again, all in a matter of seconds."
"Wow! I'd've been freaked out, too."
"It gets even worse," I continued. "I woke up yesterday and Tina was in bed next to me. We were wearing the same kind of nighties, except hers was pink and mine blue. Then she vanished. It's like she and I were talking but she wasn't even there!"
"No wonder you needed to see Dr. Torricelli," she conceded. "Had you taken any drugs or anything?"
"Not at all," I assured her. "It's been at least a couple months since I've even had aspirin for anything."
"Then this is all happening inside your head? On its own?" Marjorie queried.
"Apparently so," I confirmed. "The strangest was an extended one where Tina was helping me apply makeup and fix my hair. It went for a few minutes, it seemed. And it was like she was really there. We wore complementary clothes. Like we were dressing as a couple and not individuals."
"That sounds so sweet!" she said to me, almost envious of the experience. "I like the idea of dressing a boyfriend up to match his girlfriend. It's cute!"
"But would he want to?" I put the question to her. "It seems that in my strange images the decision's already been made and I don't have anymore say in it. I'm just along for the ride. Tina and I seem in it either to have a matching or complementing wardrobe or even to share the same one."
"I don't know," Marjorie replied. "But it sounds like that might be an especially intimate way to share. So are your clothes always the same size as Tina's?"
"I'm not sure myself," I confessed, "but Tina's not quite as tall as me, so I'd imagine her skirts and dress would be a little short on me."
"You said the dress you're wearing now is your sister's?"
"Yeah," I confirmed, "and it fits fine, I think. Sonia's just an inch or so taller than me in her stocking feet. She's given me permission to wear her clothes, but she's also put Tina in charge of my wardrobe."
"So d'you have any women's clothing of your own?"
"No— nothing!" I said. "Remember that I just gave in to Sonia on this yesterday. This was her fantasy after all— not mine! But I'm sure that they'll wanna take me to the mall tomorrow. Besides, I can think of something I want."
"Oh? What'd that be?" Marjorie asked.
"I like your shoes," I admitted to her. "Where did you get them?"
"These?" she responded in surprise. "I think I got'em in that discount shoe store in the mall. They're actually quite easy to find."
"Is the style called anything specific?" I inquired. "What should I ask for?"
"These are espadrilles," she explained. "They're quite comfortable and come in many variations. I'd be surprised if Sonia and Tina didn't have a pair or two for summer, anyway."
"Are they for summer?" I wondered aloud.
"Not exclusively," she said, "but they're perfect to give a dressier look to sundresses, even shorts. They really are 'must-haves' for a lady's summer wardrobe."
"Exactly what's a sundress?" I asked Marjorie for an explanation.
"It's a lightweight dress, often of a fabric like cotton or linen," she began, "that leaves the neck, shoulders, and arms bare. It usually is supported by thin straps over the shoulders."
"Okay," I answered. "I know I've seen Sonia and Tina wearing them. Even Mom!"
"They help you stay cool in the summer," Marjorie added. "I think you'd look cute in one with a pair of espadrilles, a macramé handbag, sunglasses and a broad-brimmed hat."
Marjorie seemed already to be selecting a summer wardrobe for me. She might be another girl who likes dressing guys up.
"Please," I giggled, "don't you start choosing my wardrobe, too! Sonia already put Tina in charge of that. What if you and her don't agree?"
"I guess that'd be even more complicated," Marjorie said. "But as cute as you are, you should enter a beauty pageant. With a little coaching and the right clothes you could easily win!"
"No!" I told her, raising my voice slightly. "That's where I draw the line! My sister competes in those and I've seen what she goes through. I have enough going on in my life as it is. No way! No how!"
"But you're so—" she began.
"No!" I reiterated. "No! No! No!"
"I compete in beauty pageants, too," she continued, "and I've won a few. You've got the look!"
"Thank you," I responded, "but I don't have the interest. Besides, I've seen how Sonia stresses out over them. And competing in them is not exactly cheap!"
"It does get expensive," Marjorie conceded. "But most of them offer scholarships as prizes."
"I know," I affirmed. "But I can also earn scholarships for sports, music, and my academic performance, too. I don't need the added distraction of the local pageant circuit. Besides, that's my sister's thing and I wouldn't want to rain on her parade!"
"Sorry, Sasha," she apologized. "It was just a thought. But don't be surprised if Sonia or Tina suggest it, too. You're too pretty not to be asked!"
Would Sonia want me to enter a pageant? No, she couldn't. I certainly wouldn't want to compete against her. That's her chance to shine. I don't care how good I might look. Besides, I'd have more fun helping Sis with her own bid.
"Again, thanks," I said, "but I'm just not interested."
About then, Katie came by with our appetizer, the blackbean pá¢té and blue corn tortilla chips. It was really tasty. Both Marjorie and I attacked it eagerly.
We barely seemed to have time to finish the appetizer when Katie return with our pizza. She gave each of us a clean plate with a slice of the deep dish pizza on it. The savory aroma of the pizza was so very powerful. We began to enjoy it even before we put it in our mouths.
"Before you start on the pizza," Marjorie began, "girls take smaller bites and don't eat as much. When you're out as a girl, remember that. Since you're a guy, you still have a bigger appetite. So, save it and take it home for later. A lady should at least appear to be concerned about her figure."
"That's not something that I ever though about," I confessed, "but it does explain what I've seen when I'm out for dinner with girls. Sonia especially worries about it."
"Since she competes in pageants, she would," Marjorie concluded. "Try to watch your sister and imitate how she eats and behaves at dinner. And when you're dressed as a girl, it's always acceptable to express concern over your weight, unless someone else there is obviouly obese, in which case, you shouldn't mention it at all."
"Being a girl seems so complicated," I told Marjorie. "How do you keep track of all the rules?"
"The same way you guys do," she said. "We just grow up doing it. It's not strange or complex to us at all."
"Still, it's a marvel anyone can keep track of it all," I admitted. "I'll never call girls "dumb" again. It takes too many smarts to be a girl!"
Marjorie giggled at my remark. "I never thought I'd hear a guy say that!"
"There's so much a girl has to do to be— well— a girl!" I observed. "How do you find time to think of anything else?"
"We manage," Marjorie answered smiling at me. "But we mostly wake up earlier in the morning than our brothers do."
"Yeah," I said stuffing a bite of pizza in my mouth. "I found that out this morning. Honestly, that's the only thing today that I haven't liked. Well, that and getting a blood test. That's never fun!"
Katie our waitress came by again.
"Would you ladies like refills for your colas?" she asked.
"If you could, please!" I replied.
"Mine as well!" Marjorie added.
"Okay," Katie confirmed. "And did you save room for dessert? Our special is Aunt Ellie's Dutch Apple Pie á la Mode.
"Oh, I don't know," I objected quietly. "That may be too much for me!"
Marjorie flashed an almost imperceptibly approving grin my way. "I don't think that I can eat anything else, either," she said. "But I think that they'd appreciate it back at the office. So, could we get the whole pie to go? Packed with the ice cream? Do we get the special price on the takeout?"
"Of course!" Katie answered. "I'll just add it to your bill and you can pick it up on your way out."
"And could you pack the remaining pizza for us too?" Marjorie requested.
"Absolutely!" Katie promised. "I'll take care of that as well."
Marjorie had reached into her purse and pulled out her wallet, quickly producing a credit card. "Run this while we make a pitstop," she told Katie. "We'll pick up the dessert on our way out."
Marjorie's finger beckoned me to follow along as she started toward the Ladies' Room. For the second time today, I was being ushered into the inner sanctum of womanhood. And I was feeling nervous about it once again.
Fortunately, each stall in the Ladies' Room had a door to offer privacy for its user. So I took advantage of that for a couple minutes. I emerged from it noting in the large mirror that I needed to straighten my dress some.
"It's okay, Sasha," Marjorie addressed me. "Women go to the Ladies' Room together quite often. Boys don't do that. Fortunately, there's no one else in here. I need to let you know something." She was applying lipstick, carefully watching herself in the mirror.
"Oh?" I responded. "What might that be?" I noticed that some of my own lipstick had smudged off. I reached into my purse to extract a tube.
"Just that you're going to be dressing like a girl for a long time," she said. "You really need to get used to it. The journey in front of you will be difficult but very fulfilling for you. Your family and closest friends will be okay with you doing it, too."
"How can you possibly know that?"
"I'll tell you the truth about me that I've never told anyone else" she began her confession. "I can see and read auras. And yours is beautiful. You've built your own psyche, your personality, into a work of art, although you can't understand it yourself. What's so remarkable, though, is that the feminine and masculine colors of your aura are so perfectly matched as complements, interacting with each other in very spectacular patterns. But I can't do its beauty justice in words. I must show you!"
With that, Marjorie placed her index and neighboring fingers over my temples and her thumbs at the back of my head. Then I saw in the mirror bright beams, layers, and vortices in various hues, shades, and tints of light radiating from and swirling about me, illuminating the entire room. Also, I heard in my mind the sounds of lush harmonies, as if Philip Glass had composed a few variations on themes by Debussy and Ravel.
Marjorie let go of my mind and the light and sound show ceased. I was gasping for breath, but all of the anxiety was gone as I studied my face in the mirror. What she had shown me was overwhelming.
"Sasha," she continued, "everything that I've told you is there in what you just saw. I've been slowly learning how to read auras and you have the most beautiful one I've ever seen."
"I have to say that it's all too much," I admitted to her. "It was overwhelming."
"What I can tell you is that you must continue the path that you've begun to travel. I can't really explain it all to you now. Your ability to blend your masculine and feminine aspects will become your greatest strength. Your emotional depth and scope will match that of your intellect. Your most difficult challenge will be learning to trust those around you. And don't worry if you feel overwhelmed right now; you'll be up to understanding it as you need to. Oh, Sasha! Your journey will be so exciting! I envy Tina and Sonia getting to travel it with you."
Marjorie was telling me more than I could take in. At this point I was trembling too much to handle the brush for my mascara.
"Do I need to redo my mascara or anything else?" I asked her, turning my face from the mirror to her.
"Try some fresh lipgloss," she suggested. "Your look just screams for it!"
I checked my purse for lipgloss. Indeed, Sonia had thought of that, too. I spread a small dab of it on my lips as I watched myself in the mirror.
"That's excellent!" Marjorie observed. "Did Sonia show you how to put that on as well?"
"Yes," I answered. "But she only had time to show me the simplest techniques this morning."
"Then you've done it before, yourself?"
"No. Why?"
"You just applied it with a studied hand," Marjorie told me, "like you've always known how. That's sort of what your aura was showing me."
We left the Ladies' Room and went over to the cash register where the pie and ice cream were packed to go along with a box for the remaining pizza and large paper cups with lids and drinking straws in a cardboard carrying tray. A tall, somewhat stern-looking woman in her mid-thirties was there waiting for us.
"Good afternoon, ladies," she greeted us. "Did you enjoy your lunch?"
"Of course, we did," Marjorie answered. "Gloria, I'd like you to meet Sasha, my new friend." She turned to me. "Sasha, this is Gloria, an actual niece to Aunt Ellie. She's the manager of this restaurant since Aunt Ellie opened a new one. Rumor has it she's about to open a third."
"It's no longer a rumor, Marjorie," Gloria corrected her. "The paperwork has been signed and sealed. The third location of Aunt Ellie's Kitchen will be opening as summer begins. And it's nice to meet you Sasha. Are you still in high school?"
"Yes, Ma'am," I answered, blushing somewhat. "I'm a sophomore."
"Would you be looking for a summer job?" Gloria asked me. "We're hiring for summer now. Aunt Ellie wants to transfer some of our more experienced staff from both here and her other restaurant to the new one. So we need to replace them with new staff as well as add our usual extra staff for the tourist season."
"Honestly, Ma'am, I hadn't thought about it yet," I admitted to her. "I'm still focused on my classes until school's out."
"Could I interest you in submitting an application to us?" she asked me. "Anyone Marjorie brings us has done well here. I find that her judgement is impeccable. Just being in her company constitutes a reference here."
"I really can't stay longer today," I told her, trying to deflect the inquiry. "If I can take it with me and submit it later, then I could consider it."
Gloria presented me with an application which I carefully folded and placed in my purse. I would look at it later, but I did not much care for the idea of dressing as a cowgirl for the summer. I was looking forward to summer music camp anyway.
"Thank you, Ma'am," I said to the manager. "It feels nice to be asked to apply."
Marjorie spoke up again. "Sasha is one of my special friends," she told Gloria. "She would be an exceptional waitress for you."
She has slightly emphasized the intonation of the words special and exceptional. I felt just a little uncomfortable, as I could guess the meaning of the hidden message so conveyed.
"Your total is forty-two dollars and seventy-four cents on your firm's credit card," Gloria announced. "Sign here please."
I noticed Marjorie left a hefty eight-dollar tip for Katie. She was right when she said that tips were good; she was giving them! Of course, with that many highly paid medical professionals frequenting Aunt Ellie's Kitchen, it made sense. Could I get used to the cowgirl look? Hmm? Might it be fun and lucrative?
There I was, thinking of reasons to crossdress again. I'd only been dressed like this a few hours and already I was liking it too much. What had Sonia done to me? What had I done to me?
Marjorie gave me the pizza box and tray of drinks to carry while she would take the pie and ice cream.
"Sasha, we'll go to my car in the parking lot behind the Medical Arts building and I'll drive you home. You keep the remaining pizza for yourself. I'm hoping that driving you home and coming back will take enough time for the ice cream to soften up. It's frozen solid!"
A smiling Gloria held the door open for us to leave and waved to us on our way back across the street. We smiled back to her as Marjorie waved for the both of us.
"Sasha," Marjorie began, "you be certain to fill out that application for Aunt Ellie's and bring it back."
"Did you consider that I might have my own plans for the summer?" I objected. "I hadn't been looking for a summer job because I already had one promised to me. More than that, I spend a week or two at music camp every summer."
"Oh! I'm sorry," she replied. "I guess I thought that you might want to work there because of the money. They do pay better than any fast food place you might work at. What kind of job do you have lined up?"
"I've been asked to work as a junior teaching assistant with the Metropolitan Music Festival Workshops," I told her. "This summer will be the first time that I'm eligible to get paid for doing it. And I've been so looking forward to it. It's only minimum wage, but I get to attend all the master classes and take my private lessons for free. And that's worth a lot more to me."
"Do you play an instrument?" Marjorie asked me.
"Violin and oboe," I told her. "I'm best at violin, because I've been playing it since kindergarten. I started playing oboe and English horn for the band in middle school."
"Wow! You must have lots of talent!"
"I love music," I confessed. "It's something I really enjoy doing. Everyone at home plays something. Dad plays piano; Mom, viola; and Sonia, 'cello and flute. And my Aunt Svetlana is a violinist as well. We like to play chamber music at home. That's really fun for us."
"You come from a family of musical talent." Marjorie acknowledged.
"Yeah!" I affirmed. "It's just something that we all love to do. I've thought about becoming a professional violinist myself. Aunt Svetlana and my teacher both say that I have the talent and the technique if I want to commit to it. But also I enjoy math and science. I guess I'm too young to decide what I want to do yet."
"That explains some more of what I saw in your aura," she said. "That seems like it may be one of the much more difficult decisions that's still off in your future."
"Mrs. Wyatt, my high-school counsellor, says that trying to choose a career might be especially difficult for me because I'm very good at quite a few different things. Mom said that Dad might have been stressed out over whether to go into engineering, science, or music. But in the old Soviet Union, the decision was really made for him. He was kind of pushed into engineering because his scores were best in math and the applied sciences and, at the time, the state needed more engineers. But he's always liked working as an engineer. The only time he ever doubted it was when he was laid off from his job at the metallurgy plant here."
"You're very proud of your dad, aren't you?" Marjorie asked me. "He seems quite a role model."
"Oh yeah!" I answered. "You should see him play ice hockey. I learned so much about how to play from him. But Mom also told me that while he was looking for his first job in America, he did all the housework while she went to work. He sewed our clothes for me and Sonia when we were little. She said that Dad even made dresses for her."
"That's very interesting," Marjorie remarked. "Sounds like androgyny runs in your family."
"That's what Mom said, too."
"Does your dad know you're dressed like your sister today?" she followed up.
"He probably does now," I admitted. "Mom took a photo of me just before I left this morning. She called him yesterday and told him that I had agreed to do it for Sonia."
"What did he think about it?"
"He was okay with it so long as it was my choice and hadn't been forced."
"Your father seems a very interesting guy," Marjorie concluded. "Most men I know would totally freak out if their sons were dressing like girls."
"I thought he would, too," I said, "until Mom told me that he'd been the homemaker for us. But as an engineer, Dad's a very practical guy and when he learned at the time that Mom was able to get a better paying job, he apparently had no trouble with it. When he found a higher paying position, they switched roles again."
We arrived at Marjorie's car, a small compact, and she had already unlocked the doors by remote. She opened the passenger side door for me and I managed to sit down with the correct sit-and-pivot move even though encumbered with the pizza and beverages. Marjorie was duly impressed with the maneuver.
"Sasha, are you absolutely certain you're not really a girl after all? I was sure you'd never make it into the car with all that!"
"Well, it's not that difficult! Besides, Ms. Tollefson made sure I learned the move this morning. For that matter, why is everyone so eager for me to succeed as a girl? It's creepier than my hallucinations! I understand my sister having the fantasy, but altogether too many people seem to have a vested interest in my— trans-vesting!"
My ill-formed pun seemed to have triggered Marjorie's giggling reflex. Moreover, I was already girl enough that when she giggled, so did I. Self-restraint didn't seem to apply to giggling. A few days ago I couldn't giggle; I didn't know how. And I still didn't know how, but I had just begun to do it spontaneously.
I put our drinks in the recessed niches molded for that purpose and Marjorie held the pizza box while I fastened the seat-belt-and-shoulder-strap safety harness. Then I took the pizza and bag with the pie and ice cream as she buckled up started the car. We pulled out of the parking place and began driving toward the street.
Unlike most other girls that I rode with, Marjorie was not one to converse while driving. She remained clearly focused on the task at hand, and I just knew better than to interrupt her without a good reason, like to tell her where to turn. We quickly made it onto the highway and she continued westward, the general direction to my home.
"Take the next right-hand turnoff," I directed her. "Then drive to the second stoplight."
She followed my instructions calmly. "Then where to?" Marjorie requested as she continued.
"Turn left," I said. "Continue four blocks to the next traffic signal."
I noticed her grinning as she followed my instructions. And wondered why?
The traffic signal was red and she began to brake to a stop.
"What next?" she asked.
"Turn right, then go one block," I told her. "Now turn left and proceed to the traffic circle and follow the signs. It's counterclockwise. Mine's the first reddish-brown house on the right."
She quietly pulled up to my house and applied the parking brake.
"Are you driving yet? Marjorie asked.
"I have my license," I answered, "but I don't have much experience driving. Mom says that she'll let me drive more when I really need to."
"Well, you're excellent as a girl!" she said smiling with a hint of mischief gleaming in her eyes. "Only a boy who gives directions as well as you do, or a girl, is willing to stop and ask for directions."
I had to wonder if that were indeed true, or was she merely trying to encourage me further to accept an eerily impending girlhood?
"Thanks for the ride, Marjorie!" I announced gratefully. "I hope to see you again, soon!"
"Me too, Sasha!" She handed me the cola as I exited the car. "You, Tina, and Sonia should come shopping with me and some of my friends. We can take over a mall some Saturday! Interested?"
"I'll ask everyone," I promised as she began to pull away from the curb. "Bye-bye!"
Marjorie honked a goodbye as she waved to me.
As I walked up the path to our house, I understood that most of the misgivings that I had felt about this strange experiment were muted by the fact that I had made a new friend because I was wearing my sister's dress.
Pronouncing Russian phrases
Да [dah], yes
Ðет [nyet], no
Мой Саша [moy SAH-shuh], my Sasha (boy)
ÐœÐ¾Ñ Ð¡Ð°ÑˆÐ° [muh-YAH SAH-shuh], my Sasha (girl)
ÐœÐ¾Ñ ÐœÐ°Ð¼Ð° [muh YAH MAH-muh], my Mom
Mom had been watching and hearing all that had happened when Marjorie drove up to our house and let me out.
"Sasha, did you make a new friend?" Mom asked me as she opened the door.
"Yes. That was Marjorie, Dr. Torricelli's receptionist. She thought I was very cute dressed as a girl and offered to buy me lunch and then drive me home. Apparently, boys dressing as girls is not so unusual after all."
As Mom giggled at my remark, I stepped up into the house with the leftover pizza and cola.
"ÐœÐ¾Ñ Ð¡Ð°ÑˆÐ°, many boys could also be pretty girls if they try," she assured me. "More should be like you are now. You no longer fear the woman within yourself. Like your father, you have found your path to becoming a whole person."
Mom shut the door after I was inside.
"But Мама!," I said, "I am still afraid!"
"Perhaps you are," Mom conceded. "But of what? Do you still fear discovery or humiliation? Do you fear disappointing Sonia or Tina or even yourself? I think that you even feared that you might disappoint your father or me, but indeed, we approve of what you do now. But I do not believe that you fear the woman within you any longer."
I took the pizza and soft drink into the kitchen and left it in the refrigerator. This was much to think about and then I understood something that Mom had discussed with me earlier.
"Ðет, Ð¼Ð¾Ñ ÐœÐ°Ð¼Ð°," I said. "I have liked being a girl so far today. That's been a surprise to me. And I'm looking forward to dressing up over the weekend."
"As am I, Ð¼Ð¾Ñ Ð¡Ð°ÑˆÐ°," she acknowledged. "Would my new daughter like some tea?"
"Да, Мама, I would like some."
"We can sit in the salon while we enjoy our tea."
I sat down on the right end of the sofa to unfasten the straps of my shoes. Gently I kicked them off and sat drawing my legs up beside me, as I had seen Mom and Sis do so many times. I could feel the plush upholstery of the sofa through my pantyhose against my legs and feet. It felt quite different than the cool leather upholstery of the couch in Dr. Torricelli's office. Feeling the various textiles through my pantyhose was not only curious but also exhilarating and enjoyable. Again I felt the silky, satiny undergarments against my skin. Because my sister's wardrobe had always seemed so complicated, I had also assumed that it had to be uncomfortable. Maybe other garments were, but now I felt genuinely comfortable and relaxed in Sonia's nautical-style dress, undergarments, and pantyhose. The only thing that had been in the least uncomfortable were Debbie's stiletto pumps. Yet I think they helped me feel the most like a real girl.
Mom brought in the tea tray and set it down on the coffee table. (So why aren't there tea tables?) She had filled two glasses of hot tea and there were also two small plates with her own baked soft cookies. We each sweetened our tea with jam.
Sitting back in her favorite armchair, Mom appeared as relaxed as I felt.
"Marjorie was kind to offer me a ride home," I said. "She's very remarkable in her own right. She gave me some advice for dressing up."
"What makes her remarkable to you?" Mom asked.
"She's competed in beauty pageants like Sonia," I told her. "I should ask Sis if she knows her."
"Of course," Mom affirmed. "Perhaps she will be a friend to all you girls!"
Now did Mom need to say it quite that way? Yes. She wants me to consider myself a girl whenever I'm dressed as one. It does make sense, though. Sis wants me to enjoy girlhood; Mom wants me to take it very seriously. Can I do both without stressing out?
"She even suggested that we all should go shopping. Maybe her friends could meet with Sonia's, Tina's, and mine at the mall? Do you think that would work out?"
"You can always ask," Mom reminded me. "Girls like to bring girls together for any reason, like your sleepover tonight."
"That's right!" I recalled suddenly. "Мама, I've never been at a sleepover before. So, what happens at a sleepover, anyway?"
"It would be wrong for me to tell you. If I do, it would spoil it for both you and the other girls."
Other girls? Mom just won't let me forget it for a moment! I cuddled myself deeper into my corner of the sofa and sipped some tea.
"ÐœÐ¾Ñ Ð¡Ð°ÑˆÐ°," she addressed me, "you sit just like Sonia. Is her dress comfortable for you?"
"Да, Мама," I answered. "It's very comfortable. I was really surprised by that. I've enjoyed wearing it and I'll be happy to wear it all day long." I sipped more tea.
"So, you look forward to dress like your sister for all the weekend?"
"Да," I replied. "I promised Sonia that she may dress me all weekend and even Monday."
"ÐœÐ¾Ñ Ð¡Ð°ÑˆÐ°, that is not what I asked you. Do you look forward to it? Will you be happy to dress like your sister for the weekend?"
Why did Mom always have such a precise feel for language? Now I had to confess to her that I wanted indeed to dress like a girl and I knew that I was blushing because of it.
"Да, Мама. It's more than just a promise, now. I really want to do this for the weekend. Not just for Sonia and for Tina, but for myself. I feel nervous but still happy about it. I feel like it's something that I need to do— like it's something that I've always been supposed to do."
Maybe my conversation with Marjorie had affected me more than I thought. I could not escape the idea that somehow my destiny was to include dressing as a girl, and that I would need to get comfortable with it.
"You seem to understand that you ought not fear it anymore."
"But I still feel afraid."
"Да, but you also know that you need not fear it. Soon you will be able to dismiss your fear."
"Why do people fear, Мама?"
"Rational fear protects us from harm. That is a good, honest fear. God has made us to fear bad things so that we stay away from what could harm us. But when fear is irrational, then we mistakenly stay away from what cannot harm us. Indeed, then we might avoid what is good for us."
"Then, I should not be afraid of wearing a dress. It can't harm me."
"So you know that you can let go of that fear."
"I think so," I answered Mom, feeling better and calmer about it. "Besides it's just for the weekend."
"Did the doctor say that you can go back to school Monday?"
"Да, Мама. He signed my release to return to school. But since I promised Sonia to dress up for her, I must wait until Tuesday."
Mom grimaced and furrowed her brow just a moment.
"ÐœÐ¾Ñ Ð¡Ð°ÑˆÐ°, would you show me your medical form for school?"
"Certainly," I said, retrieving two documents from my purse. "And there's a parental consent form for you to sign that I must return to Dr. Torricelli." I walked the forms over to Mom. She studied the school's medical readmission form for a moment and handed it back to me.
"Did Dr. Torricelli say he needed anything else?"
"No, but Dr. Magnusson asked for Dad's telephone number in case there would be an emergency."
"Да, Ð¼Ð¾Ñ Ð¡Ð°ÑˆÐ°. That is wise." She took out her pen from the drawer of an end table and began writing on the psychiatrist's form. "And who is this person named Dr. Magnusson?"
"He is the intake counselor for Dr. Torricelli. He listens to the patients first to help Dr. Torricelli treat them."
"What did he tell you?"
"He said that I have remarkable insight into what's happening to me and he trusts me to take care of my own sanity and that I should trust myself as well."
"Did he say anything about how you were dressed?"
"He said I was prettier than his daughter and that it might be the healthiest thing I can do right now."
"I think he's right— both ways!" Mom said approvingly. "What did Dr. Torricelli say?
"He's not so sure that I'm hallucinating. He said some did sound like hallucinations but others did not."
"This is an honest man." Mom opined. "What did he think about you dressing as a girl?"
I blushed as I recalled what he did say to me. Just how much of it should I tell Mom? Maybe it's all right since it's just his opinion.
"He said that for me it would be time well spent. Also, he said that he believed I would continue doing it because I wanted to."
"He is wise as well as honest. I think that I may like this Dr. Torricelli," she concluded. "He will be good for you."
I knew that Mom would only say that because she already agrees with him. Somehow I felt that everyone was ganging up on me again. Because I agreed that I would dress up for Sonia, suddenly everyone seemed to have something at stake in my doing it. This was altogether too weird.
Mom got up and went to the kitchen. I relaxed and closed my eyes for a moment.
"Sasha, penny for your thoughts?" Tina asked me.
"I don't really know. Everyone wants me to be like a girl. And I do like how it feels when I am. But I'm losing the feeling that it's my choice. Does that make sense?"
"Sweetheart, it is your choice. You made it out of love for me and out of respect for what my gender represents to you— and to the world!" Tina reminded me. "I love your courage in dressing up with me, your willingness to be like us, to immerse yourself in who we are. I know it's a paradox, but the more you make yourself like a girl, the better a man you become. You have earned my respect, your sister's, your mother's, your father's, your teachers'. They all respect what you're achieving. You continue to earn that. Even most of the smarter and more popular boys at school think highly of what you're doing, even if they're too afraid to tell you."
"But how can you know that?" I asked her. "I can know what you and Sonia and my parents think, but I don't have anyway of knowing the others' attitudes."
"The other girls all talk to me and to each other. They all tell what their boyfriends think and how they feel about whatever's going on." Tina explained. "Do you know what they think about us? We're the trend-setters for serious relationships, since we've been married." Tina squeezed my hand and I relaxed. I noticed my wedding rings and French manicure again.
I liked what I heard Tina tell me, but she couldn't be my Tina, could she? Yet how could she be any other Tina? I had to be hallucinating again. But maybe, this isn't a hallucination, but an illusion? How would that be any different, though?
"It all feels like it's too much to me, though," I confessed to her. "I'm afraid of disappointing you, of letting you down…"
"I know, but don't worry about that," she said. "We're trendsetters. That also makes us trailblazers. We go into things knowing that not everything that we attempt will always work out, no matter how good we might be at doing it. That's a given! Don't think in terms of disappointing me or letting us down. The fun is more in trying new things whether we succeed at them or not."
Tina knew what to say so I'll feel better. I felt her hand rub my nylon-covered legs. Pantyhose felt so luxurious when used this way. The next thing I knew, we were engaged in some serious liplock! I sighed in pleasure and opening my eyes, I was sitting on the sofa, alone.
I leaned back and closed my eyes again.
To See Through a Glass Darkly
Chapter 13
Sasha dozes off to find himself dreaming dreams of what he's lost and what he's gaining.
The scoreboard indicated 3-3 at the top of the seventh inning. My buddy Tom would lead off at the plate and our friend Bill was on deck. I would bat third that inning.
"Ball one..."
"Ball two..."
"Strike one!..."
Tom hit a low line drive sharply down the third base line...
"Fair ball!"
Tom was on base with a single.
Bill, a left-hander, moved to the batter's box and I made my way to the on deck circle.
Tom and Bill had been practicing the hit-and-run and were getting good at it. So, I was not surprised when Jeff, the third base coach, signaled the hit-and-run. Against their right-handed pitcher, this had a reasonable chance of success.
"Strike one!..."
"Ball one..."
With the next wind-up, Tom sprinted down the baseline toward second and the shortstop moved to cover the bag. Bill whacked another low line drive that bounced once through the vacant position left by the shortstop. The centerfielder was to the ball as quickly as he could get there, but Tom and Bill were already safe.
I was up to bat next and took my position on the third-base side of the batter's box.
The first-base coach, Jim, signaled to both me and the third-base coach. Jeff signaled to Tom at second base. Jim needed something special. I was never a long-ball hitter, but I could be very quick. I signaled to Jim that I was ready to bunt. He agreed and passed signals over to Jeff and Bill. Jeff signaled Tom again. Jim signaled for me to take one strike.
"Ball one..."
"Ball two..."
"Strike one!..."
That was the green light. Tom and Bill were already running with the wind-up; the pitch was a low and outside fast ball that I bunted to the perfect infield spot for indecision: equidistant to home plate, first base, and the pitcher's mound. The catcher fielded the ball and looked at me on first, Bill on second, and Tom on third.
Bases loaded. No outs.
Next, our clean-up hitter, Gordie, was up. Batting left, he's a big guy and easily slams the long ball off right-handers. I glanced over at the Home team's bull-pen. They only had relief pitchers starting to warm up now? That was not very smart, not at at all!
"Ball one..."
"Ball two..."
"Ball three..."
"Strike one!..." on a fast ball, down the middle.
The next pitch was a poorly thrown curve ball. Gordie slammed it out of the park.
I awoke suddenly and felt myself relax. Gordie's grand slam, I guessed, had aroused me from my nap. Even though I hadn't turned my conscious thoughts to the baseball season yet, it would be starting up soon. So, here I am thinking about baseball while sitting on the sofa wearing my sister's dress. As pleasant as my sister's clothes felt, as much fun as I had wearing them that morning, I was still a boy. Not surprising that I had dreamed of baseball and what it would be like if Tom and Bill were still in town and on the team. I really missed my friends.
We had grown up together, the three of us. They were such great guys. We all played baseball, soccer, and ice hockey together as far back as we could remember. At baseball, I usually played at second base, Bill at short, and Tom at center field, where he would always be backing up one or the other of us on any defensive play. We invariably batted in sequence, usually Tom first, Bill next, then myself.
While we were still together, we presented a formidable line on the hockey rink, Bill at left wing, Tom at center, and myself on the right. We had made just about every kind of scoring play there was. Our coaches had always kept us together as a line. We always could anticipate one another and communicate very effectively with little more than glances. That was how hockey should be played!
After they left and our line was broken up, I became more of a utility player, substituting sometimes on right wing, sometimes as a right defenseman, but most especially an "enforcer." Bigger players often would try to take me out, but I had learned all sorts of tricks to knock them to the ice. Since I was smaller than most other aggressive players, these moves were almost like jiu-jitsu. Now I was noted for leaving the bigger players on their butts. Yet this behavior was all because I had so badly missed Tom and Bill.
I guessed that I still needed to work through my friends moving away. I wondered what they'd think if they saw me now? What would they think if they knew not only that I was wearing my sister's clothes, but also that I liked it.
What I really wanted to tell them was about the illusions or hallucinations or whatever. I wondered what they'd think of that? I could tell them about everything by email. That's how we'd all kept in touch, anyway. I hadn't even looked at my email today! I should be sure to do that.
I liked just sitting here on the sofa, sipping my tea. But it seemed strange. I'd seen Sis sitting at this corner of the sofa sipping her tea or coffee or cocoa many times. What did she think about when she did? Now I found myself in the same position. Was I now copying even how Sonia sits? Yet I felt calm and peaceful, as if it were an ideal posture to sit and relax. I had never felt quite so easy-going and settled. Taking another sip of my tea, I was fully aware of its taste and the strawberry jam sweetening it.
Then I knew.
I started to cry— and to smile!
Now I understood what Sonia, my sister, wanted me to experience— to know and to feel. She wanted me to learn a girl's perceptions. Sitting here, enjoying my tea, I let my mind rest. Beautiful. So simple.
I needed this.
That was so strange, but so certain, a fact.
Of course, I would anticipate Sis coming home so that I could hug and kiss and thank her for teasing me into this. But it wasn't any "can't-wait" anticipation— it was of the "can-wait" variety. That would be another happiness, different from what I was doing now and no less enjoyable. Yet meanwhile, the most pleasant activity that I could possibly do is just to sit on the sofa, nestling as a girl, sipping my tea.
The handbag that Sis had given me was on the end table next to the sofa, so I picked it up and opened it. The twenty dollar bill that Mama gave me earlier was still intact, so I took it out and put in on the end table. Because I had befriended Marjorie, I didn't need to spend it. She had both bought me lunch and driven me home. Usually Mama would just let me keep it, but I was always careful to offer it back to her.
Under the banknote was my pillbox. It was almost time for my afternoon dose.
Afternoon dose? Since when did I take an afternoon pill for anything? (Since when did I have a pillbox?) But somehow I knew it was mine. Then I noticed my French manicure again.
Again.
Wedding rings on my left hand, too.
Taking the pillbox from my handbag, I also put it on the end table beside my glass of tea.
"Honey, is it time for your pill?" Tina asked me.
"Uh-huh," I answered her. Somehow I did know that I had to take it now, but I could not recall how I knew. Nor did I know why I was taking it?
I extracted one pink pill from my pillbox, popped it in, and drank it down with my tea .
Then suddenly, I remembered Tina's strange remarks on the bus Wednesday morning: I hope it's not the pills you've been taking for me. … You're so brave to be growing them for me.
Now I understood why I was taking them.
I was growing breasts. Girl's breasts.
"I've been wondering if the pills might be causing your headaches," Tina worried aloud. "I know it's important for you— and for us— but I'm more concerned about your headaches. Women get migraines more than men do, so I'm still thinking yours might be caused by the hormones."
"We don't know that these are migraines, sweetheart," I reminded Tina. "They might just be from stress. Or maybe I need a new shoulder rest for my violin? Or even a concussion from one of those hits I took on the ice? We don't know. Besides, Nurse Banner scheduled me with Dr. Bennett for next week."
"Who's Dr. Bennett?" Tina asked me.
"Paula Bennett's a neurologist," I told her. "I heard that she's an internationally recognized expert at diagnosing neurological illnesses and injuries. She's also a personal friend of Nurse Banner. That's why she was willing to see me next week."
"That's nice of her," she said. "I hope she can help with it."
"Seriously, though," I said, trying to console Tina, and perhaps myself as well, "I don't think it's the pills. If it was, then the headaches should've begun when I first took the pills. These only began Wednesday morning when I woke up."
And now, somehow, I began to remember having the headaches.
"Why am I so sleepy, Tina? I haven't felt this tired since the hockey season was over."
"Maybe Sonia and me waking you up at five this morning?" she reminded me, giggling.
"Oh yeah, there was that. I think you two enjoy girling me up altogether too much!"
"Why shouldn't we?" Tina teased, throwing a small sofa pillow at me. "You're certainly enjoying it more than any boy should!"
She giggled again, so I picked up the pillow to throw it back at her. But she was not there.
I don't know how many times I dozed off that Friday afternoon. Every time I did, my nap involved me in some kind of a dream. This time, I was seated in a small chamber orchestra, two desks each of violas and cellos, and a single double bass. Kevin Hightower was playing oboe and I myself was on English horn. Dr. Malcolm Flynn was about to conduct.
He waved the upbeat with his baton and the violas first sounded their rapid legato figure in triple meter then quietly underneath, a slower, bouncing duple meter emanated from the deepest range of the cellos. The tempo was maybe andante or andantino. The triple and duple meter motives alternated over and under, almost as if in an antiphon. Then Kevin played a few long, clearly sustained tones on the oboe. I seemed to recall the music, but I wasn't sure. There was no part on my desk. Glancing over at Kevin's, he had none either. He was intently focused on an empty music stand. I noticed that the string players' desks were also empty. Dr. Flynn's desk had no score. Apparently he was conducting from memory. Everyone was performing from memory.
Then he cued me.
I'm not sure how I knew it, but I played along with Kevin and took up the triple rhythm on the English horn. I knew the music, but I couldn't quite recall the title or the composer. I couldn't recognize the form because we hadn't played far enough into it for any form to be recognizable. But somehow I knew this work, especially the fluid, over-and-under triple versus the bouncing duple meter motives.
Of course! The music was "Façades" from Glassworks by Philip Glass. I loved that work. This was the next-to-last movement, with its slowly mesmerizing, contrasting bass rhythms dancing a ghostly dance creeping up from their subterranean lair. Meanwhile its simple, haunting melody would float amidst the mysterious terpsichorean fantasy, now entwining within, then emerging from its eerie rhythmic motives.
Suddenly, Sonia was playing the melodic line on her flute at what had been Kevin's desk and I was playing along with her instead. And I was wearing a black dress, nude hose, and black high-heeled pumps. This was not how we'd rehearsed this— Kevin and myself. But he smiled at me, soaking a reed in the corner of his mouth, and gestured a mock salute. Whenever he did that he'd always be just amusing enough for me to lose my embouchure in the midst of playing. But somehow I resisted my newly girlish tendency to giggle just then and there.
Then I noticed Tom and Bill sitting in the front row of the audience. Bill was swaying to the beat of the music and Tom performed the same mock salute as did Kevin. Tina and Deb sat in the next row beside Mama and Papa. On the other side of my parents were Fr. Andrei and his wife from church. Why were they here?
Yet something more changed— I was now playing the melody on oboe instead of English horn. When did I change? I didn't remember rehearsing this switch. It seemed just to have happened. Sonia smiled at me as she let me take over the melody. And now Kevin was playing English horn instead. When did he rehearse it? I couldn't remember any of changing instruments in rehearsal. Did Dr. Flynn know?
This time I awoke in a cold sweat, shuddering as I did. There was something more to this dream than others that I'd had recently. Why this one, though? But there was also nothing there any weirder than what I was actually living right now.
Then I remembered something in the dream very much unexpected.
I had to see Fr. Andrei.
Links to recordings of "Façades" from Glassworks by Philip Glass:
To See Through a Glass Darkly
Chapter 14
Sasha visits Fr. Andrei, his priest, to discuss his feelings about the strange events in his life.
Pronouncing Russian words & phrases
Теперь мы видим как бы сквозь [тусклое] стекло, гадательно [tee-PyEHR' mwih vee-DEEM kahk bwih skvoss' tooss-KLO-yuh steek-LO guh-duh-TyEL'-nuh], We see through a glass darkly.
Чаткий [CHAT-kee], a rosary of knotted woolen yarn used when reciting the Jesus Prayer
“Mama, do you have the phone number for the church?” I asked. “Maybe I should talk to Father Andrei about all that’s happening to me.”
“Why do you think this?” she asked me. Her face was looking somewhat more concerned than a few minutes ago.
“Because I saw Father Andrei and his wife in my dream. Maybe he can help.”
“Perhaps, but now may not be the best time. And I don’t know that you would be wise to go dressed as you are now.”
“Yet, I feel that he may know something that I need to hear.”
“Perhaps. And I did not say that you ought not to see him, but that this may not be the right time.”
“Why? Is something wrong now?”
”The Church has not always accepted–not always understood–those who see visions.”
“Yet the Church is there for penitents and seekers.”
”So, about what do you need to be penitent?”
“Not trusting Sonia,” I admitted. “And to a lesser extent, not trusting you as well as I should have.”
“Well, so far as it concerns me, I forgive you.”
“Thanks, Mama,” I said, “That helps, but it’s Sonia who I've wronged the most about this.”
“I know. So perhaps confession would help after all,” his mother concluded. “So what do you wish to do, then.”
“If Father Andrei is in, I would like to go and talk to him.”
“I could drive you there, if you like?” Mama offered. “That would make certain you have enough time to talk to him. Is not too far for you to walk home afterwards.”
“That would be okay.”
“Get your purse and come then,” she told me.
The Byzantine dome of St. Basil's Church was not too far from our house and we were there in five minutes or so. There were a couple of trees in front of the church that I hadn't noticed before, but my wedding rings and French manicure clued me that the trees also might be no less illusory.
“ÐœÐ¾Ñ Ð¡Ð°ÑˆÐ°, you may call me if you wish after you talk with Father Andrei, or you may walk home.”
“It's not too far,” I said. “I’ll just walk.”
“If you wish, but you’re wearing heels today,” she reminded me.
That was not something that I'd ever thought about before. But I had gotten along wearing them well enough today. It shouldn't really be a problem.
“I’ll be okay,“ I assured her. “I think that I’m used to them now.”
“You are sure, Ð¼Ð¾Ñ Ð¡Ð°ÑˆÐ°?”
“Yes. I'll be fine,” I insisted. “I love you, Mama!”
“I love you, too, Ð¼Ð¾Ñ Ð¡Ð°ÑˆÐ°!”
As I got out of the car, I noticed that my wedding rings and my manicure had disappeared. So had two trees in front of St. Basil’s Church.
Sasha paused at Fr. Andrei’s door ajar before knocking and quickly rapped three times with his knuckles.
“You may enter, please!” Fr. Andrei invited him in.
With slight trepidation, carefully balanced in his high-heeled shoes, Sasha pushed the door further open and stepped into the priest’s study. Behind an old wooden desk sat a bearded clergyman wearing a black cassock. He chuckled as he addressed his teenaged parishioner.
“Come, Sasha. Do not be shy. I see that Sonia has prevailed in her effort to make you her sister.”
“You already knew? How?” I asked him. Had Sis already told Fr. Andrei about this? This was not a reaction that I had expected.
“Your sister told me of her wish long ago. Since she was small, Sonia hoped to share her girlhood with you.”
“Did everyone know about it but me?”
“No. She tried to tell you many times but you would not listen. Or you were not ready to hear it. Yet I see that you hear it now.”
I blushed yet again. By this time I was getting quite good at it. It was not a skill that I was trying to master, but I seemed to have been practicing it frequently now for a couple days.
“This and other problems are making things much too complicated now. I need to talk to you about them.”
"Come in, my son, and sit," the priest invited. "And no, I will not give you lecture on crossdressing as sin, since I do not believe that you do this as sin. But I will tease you because it fun."
“Then feel free to enjoy yourself, Father Andrei,” I said as I sat down in an armchair, smoothing my skirt, “at my expense!”
He chuckled again. “We must try and get sermon from your circumstance, yes?”
Yeah, he was going to enjoy this, but knowing Fr. Andrei, he would let me have some fun with it, too.
“In English or Russian?”
“Both maybe,” he answered non-commitally. “What be on your mind?”
“I think that I've been hurting my sister for years. I feel sick about it, too.”
“So this about you dressing like Sonia?”
"Yes. Maybe not dressing up like her was the sin?"
"Why you say so?"
"Because all this time, she just wanted to share what was important to her with me. And all the time I had refused," I told him. "I was embarassed and ashamed anytime she mentioned it. But to her it was a gift that she had for me. I had no idea that it was so important to her. Now I feel more humiliated that I didn't do it than that I finally did."
"You feel very bad that you did not accept her gift for so long?"
"Yeah," I confessed. "I didn't know she just wanted to share her girlhood with me, as you put it. I had always thought it was just another way for her to make fun of me. But she said she only wanted me to enjoy being a girl with with her. She has always wanted a sister to show how to be a girl. I didn't know any of this."
«Ð¢ÐµÐ¿ÐµÑ€ÑŒ мы видим как бы Ñквозь Ñтекло, гадательно », Father Andrei said in Russian.
"What?" I asked, hoping he'd translate his remark.
"Now we see through glass darkly," Father Andrei said. "Apostle Saint Paul wrote in First Letter to Corinthians. We cannot know everything. How could you know what your sister think? You boy, yes?"
"Yes, I'm a boy–despite my current appearance," I giggled.
Fr. Andrei smiled back at me. "Sonia did not expect you to know what she think. She hoped that you know but did not expect so. You boy. She knows that. You did not do wrong to your sister. You did not know. You could not know. How did you learn her wish? When?"
"I talked with Tina."
"Who Tina?"
"She's both my girlfriend and Sonia's best friend. She's come to church with us before."
"Girl has long dark hair? Always sits near Sonia and you?"
"Yes, that's her."
"Very pretty young woman. Since she Sonia's friend and your girlfriend, Tina said what Sonia wish to you?"
"Yes, she told me why Sonia wanted me to dress up for her. Mama had also said something to make me think about it. Then I knew that I owed it to Sonia after she set me up with Tina."
"Set you up?"
"I mean that she arranged for Tina and I to begin dating. Tina and Sis have been best friends for many years. So we've actually known each other for a long time, but we wouldn't be dating without Sis encouraging us."
"You very grateful to Sonia, of course. That was very important to you, yes?"
"Very much so," I affirmed. "It's one reason I decided to dress up for her. I wanted to thank Sonia for bringing Tina into my life.
"So then wearing girl's dress is sign for gratitude?"
"I guess you could call it that, yes!"
"No sin. Your sister feel good because she found you girlfriend and now you thank that she help you. This not sin but you good brother. You not understand before but now acknowledge gift of Sonia's girlhood. So also you accept now. You not know so you must forgive yourself."
"Do you mean that she will forgive me for refusing her all this time?"
"I mean that because you did not sin, it does not need to be forgiven. But if you need to ask than also I think that she will forgive you. Maybe she forgive you already, yes?"
"When I agreed to let her dress me up, she cried and then she hugged me more warmly than she ever had. I mean, she's my sister and we've always loved each other as brother and sister, but there's something special about this that I didn't know we could have before."
"Sasha, maybe now you feel special bond that sister have for sister?" Father Andrei suggested. "My wife tell me about this. She have both sister and brother but she say that love for sister very different than for brother."
"Maybe. I don't know," I conceded to Fr. Andrei. "But we are closer now than we have ever been. And I don't think that I have felt a need for my relationship with Sonia to be so strong. It feels strange, like that I really need to be her sister. I can't explain it. It's like–like–"
"Like it not all about you. Now you feel your sister's need," my priest concluded, finishing my sentence for me. "You have become girl because Sonia need sister now. I remember when your papa do like this for your mama."
"Mama told me about that yesterday," I mentioned. "Papa did all the homemaking while she worked for a few years. Then he found a good engineering job and they switched back their places again."
"Have you thought about why that Sonia need you to be sister now?"
Fr. Andrei's question was interesting. I had conceded to her when I learned that Sonia needed me to assume the role of a sister, but I hadn't really thought about why? My response to her wishes had surprised even me. Did I know if any other guys had done this or whether they would do it? As far as I knew, this might be an extraordinary way to help out my sister.
"No, not really. But once I knew that she needed me to do so, that she wanted to share it with me, that was enough for me to do it."
"Then you trust Sonia–I think word is implicitly–yes?" Fr. Andrei asked me. "You did not ask her to explain why?"
"The explanations came from Tina and Mama," I replied to him. "What they said confirmed that this was very special to her and that she even wanted me to enjoy it. I suddenly felt guilty to have resisted her wish for so long. I had been so selfish."
"I understand," Fr. Andrei consoled me. "But you have now atoned for any selfishness that you have shown her over this. You need most to forgive yourself. Now you and Sonia come to church Sunday so that I can give you both special blessing."
"I don't know if I can come to church Sunday because I promised Sonia that I would dress like her all weekend. She would be hurt if I don't keep my promise."
"So you keep promise when you come to church Sunday. I will be hurt if you not come. You promise to come to church Sunday?"
"But I can't come to church in my sister's clothes," I objected.
"You wear sister's clothes in church now," he reminded me, of course. "Why not Sunday?"
"Everyone will see me."
"You ashamed to dress like sister after what you have told me?"
"Well, no, but–"
"No but then! You come Sunday, dressed as sister," he concluded–and ordered. "Sonia and mother must come, too. Your papa still work in New Orleans?"
"Yes."
"You talk to him yet?"
"You must also talk to papa about wearing Sonia's clothes."
"Mama already talked to him about it. He said it's okay so long as I wasn't forced to do it."
"Not enough. You must also talk with him," Fr. Andrei insisted. "This not for him, but for you."
Admittedly, I did want to talk to Papa about what's been happening. Indeed, crossdressing was the least of my worries. The hallucinations or whatever were the more serious problem right now, what I had really come to discuss with Fr. Andrei.
"Then I will try to talk with him tonight when he calls Mama."
"Very well," the priest concluded, now seeming almost dismissive of my garb as an issue. "You have more to discuss than your clothing. What else do you need to talk about?"
"Father Andrei, I'm afraid of losing my mind," I admitted. "A couple days ago I began seeing hallucinations when I woke up. Or so I thought. I told the school nurse. She told the school psychologist, who sent me to see a psychiatrist. He said that they might not even be hallucinations but illusions or something else. Mama says that both her family and Papa's have seers who see visions. I don't know what to think. I'm afraid."
Fr. Andrei looked at me for a moment and leaned back in his chair.
"Have peace, my son!" he said calmly. "Tell me what you see in your visions."
So I began recounting for him what I had seen and experienced in my visions or whatever they were. I was especially careful to explain what I had heard and felt as well as what I saw. Also, I told him that Tina and I were already married in my visions and described the strange wedding photo and how I dressed like her as a sign of my commitment to our marriage.
"Interesting," he remarked. "This is what you tell psychiatrist?"
"Yes. I even had more visions while talking to the intake counselor there."
"You have one here now?"
"No. I don't think so," I said looking at my hands. No wedding rings or French manicure. "Nothing unusual has happened here while we've been talking."
"Oh, I not say that," Fr. Andrei chuckled. "You here in Sonia's dress. You tell me about vision that you and Tina married so you wear her clothes, and also that your clothes change back and forth while you wear them. Yes, your talking not usual."
"I mean I haven't had any hallucination since I came in to see you," I confirmed. At least not since getting out of the car. Of course by now I knew that could change at any time.
"So you have psychiatrist now?"
"Yes," I said. "I saw Dr. Torricelli this morning. He also referred me to a neurologist to do tests in case I have an injury. I might have had a concussion from playing ice hockey or soccer that was missed before."
"I know Dr. Torricelli. He is good psychiatrist. Also, he has helped others here in church before."
"My school psychologist made the appointment for me. I could not go back to school without medical approval."
"Do you have чаткий?" Fr. Andrei asked me.
"A what?"
"Чаткий–prayer rope or rosary for the Jesus Prayer," he explained. "Do you have one?"
"No, I don't," I answered. "Should I?"
"Of course!" he said, opening a drawer in his desk. "Every Orthodox Christian should have чаткий. I have one for you."
Fr. Andrei gave me a circular rope made of black woolen yarn with a hundred little knots spaced evenly around it. At the bottom was a cross of wool that looked to have also been tied of knots, ending in a tasssel. Four red wooden beads were spaced evenly around the circle of knots, one at the woolen cross.
"Hold in left hand. You should repeat Jesus Prayer on each knot, 'Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me'; also make sign of cross at each red bead," Fr. Andrei explained. "So each time around is one hundred prayers. Saint Paul tell us to 'pray without ceasing.' Jesus Prayer is how we do that. Keep чаткий with you and always pray. Pray on bus. Pray when you walk. Pray when you sit. Come again and I tell you more about Jesus Prayer."
"Sasha, my son," Fr. Andrei said standing up and stepping out from behind his desk, "I will pray for you now the Twenty-Eighth Psalm for the health of your mind.
Fr. Andrei began intoning a traditional chant for the prayer…
"Unto thee will I cry, O LORD my rock; be not silent to me…"
As I became caught up in the prayer, singing the tone of the chant in my mind as Fr. Andrei continued.
"…Blessed be the LORD, because he hath heard the voice of my supplications.
"The LORD is my strength and my shield; my heart trusted in him, and I am helped: therefore my heart greatly rejoiceth; and with my song will I praise him.
"The LORD is their strength, and he is the saving strength of his anointed.
"Save thy people, and bless thine inheritance: feed them also, and lift them up for ever."
Then I joined him audibly singing to close the prayer, "Amen."
I had not expected Fr. Andrei to hug me when he finished.
"You can go now. Read the Twenty-Eighth Psalm when you wake up in the morning and before you sleep at night. It will help you. If your visions are mental illness, then they will cease."
That was reassuring to me as I thanked Fr. Andrei and left his office.
It had seemed a nice day to walk home, but now I was wishing that I had let Mama come and drive me home. Walking home in these high heels was proving harder than I had believed when I told Mama that I'd be all right. The shoes began pinching my toes when I was about halfway home. And my back was also starting to feel some strain. I had heard that high heels often caused back strain for women. Maybe that was true. But maybe it was also just that I needed to get used to them.
Still the weather was nice, slightly warm but for an occasional breeze. So I continue to walk, listening to the cadence of my footsteps on the sidewalk. The sound was so different than when wearing my own shoes. It also sounded different on the concrete sidewalk than on the brick-paved street as I crossed to the block where our house was.
After I had crossed the street a sudden gust of wind caught and billowed the skirt of my dress. Without even thinking, I had bent at my knees and ankles as I had seen Marjorie do earlier, fighting to hold my dress down as the wind strengthened as if to peek underneath it.
And I felt myself blushing in the wind.
As if I were supposed to.
To See Through a Glass Darkly
Chapter 15
Sasha pauses for a very much needed musical interlude as family and friends gather around him.
Mom must have been watching for me because she opened the door as I came up the path to our house.
"ÐœÐ¾Ñ Ð¡Ð°ÑˆÐ°, you walked all the way home from the church?"
"Да, Мама," I answered her. "And I enjoyed it, too, except for these shoes."
"Not to worry. You will become accustomed to them soon."
So as not to disappoint Mom, I decided not to tell her that I really did not intend to wear them enough to get accustomed to high heels.
As a family of musicians, we had designated the largest room in our house as our "music room," or "conservatory." It had a small, two-manual tracker-action pipe organ with full pedalboard, a lovely baby grand piano, and plenty of space set up with illuminated music desks and chairs for our home ensembles to play there. The walls were shelved to hold our library of music books and scores. At the end of the room opposite the organ was our recording studio and sound system. Beautiful cabinets held libraries of recordings in both analogue and digital formats: vinyl LP's, tapes, CD's, etc., and various devices carefully built and maintained to play back their signals.
Our conservatory was a room in which we took great pride as a family, not only because we spent hours on end making music there, but also because we had all contributed to it as a family in creating and maintaining it, as well as using it. Mom and Dad together had designed and built the shelves. Dad had taught me much about electronics and acoustics as we designed and outfitted our studio and sound system. Mom and Sonia kept everything clean and all the instruments polished. Also, Sis had somehow become responsible for our music library, organizing all our books, scores, and recordings, and keeping them so. Mom and Sis had also re-upholstered most of the furniture, so that everything in the music room matched. Even Aunt Svetlana helped by getting us a great deal on the piano, which we bought from a nightclub where she had played at the time.
My best moment in adding to our conservatory came when I brokered the deal for the pipe organ that I had found. Dad had just been laid-off from the metallurgy plant, so bringing home the organ for him to restore helped keep his thoughts constructive and focused while he was looking for new work. Mom and Sonia worked together refinishing the bench and cabinet of the organ.
I became aware that I had not practiced my violin since Tuesday evening, before all the hallucinations began. I opened its case and took out the bow, applying rosin to it. Then I attached the shoulder rest, but discovered that I had to adjust it a little differently due to the training bra that I was wearing. After all, I had never played as a girl, before.
What to play, then, for my first solo as a girl? Being Russian, myself, it should be something by a Russian composer. I had been rehearsing Vocalise by Sergei Rachmaninoff. He had composed it as an aria for soprano, although it had become a standard work in the répétoire for solo violin. Then maybe the "Song of India" from Sadko, an opera by another Russian composer, Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov?
I spent a few minutes tuning my strings, then warming up with scales and arpeggios. Positioning my violin around the training bra was at first a challenge, but was starting to become an annoyance. I wondered, how did girls manage to play violin or viola at all?
After thirty minutes of practice I was reasonably satisfied with the Rachmaninoff and Rimsky-Korsakov works. So, I unbuckled the ankle straps of Deb's stiletto pumps and kicked them off, my tired and sore feet now cool and happily free of them. Yet, I was just a little sad not to be wearing them now.
Since we were getting close to that time of year, I decided on a different mood, a tune by Tin-Pan Alley composer Albert von Tilzer, Take Me Out to the Ball Game, with lyrics by Jack Norworth. I had found some interesting information about the song on the Internet. Most Americans only knew the lyrics to the chorus. They didn't even know that the song is about a girl telling her boyfriend where she wants to go on their date. All this reminded me that I needed to get myself psyched up for the high school baseball season.
At this time, I heard my sister and her friends coming in, so I decided to try another piece, La Fille aux cheveux de lin (or in English, Maid with the Flaxen Hair), by Claude Debussy. Sonia and Mom both liked this little opus, since they both had that kind of beautiful blond hair. I liked to play it just for them. Its score was marked con sordino, "with mute," calling for the softer sound made by a small wooden or rubber clamp affixed to the bridge of the instrument.
This one was beautiful, as I just let the music take over me while playing it. Then I suddenly became a little frightened as the beauty of it dawned on me. I had never played this piece so well before. And now I knew why…
This was a melody depicting glimpses of a girl, a beautiful girl, not flaunting her beauty, but simply enjoying it. She was at peace with herself and her own beauty, her own girlhood. I had never been able to feel the right way to play this before now. Why was I even thinking like this?
We had two sofas in the conservatory as well as a couple of armchairs. So I sat down on the left end of one, tucking my legs under me. Aunt Svetlana would be on my case so fast. And Dr. Otterbein, my violin teacher, would, too. "Violin ought always to be practiced standing," they both say. But today, I needed to sit this way, and to play while doing so.
I did not know how long I was there, curled up on that sofa, playing my violin. Nor did I notice Mom enter and take a seat in an armchair, sipping her tea. Nor was I aware just when I had noticed that Sis and Tina were also there, along with Deb, Marcia, and Jacqui.
When everyone had come in, I seemed to work on autopilot, functioning out of habit. Since I'm used to standing when playing in my lessons or as a soloist, I don't even remember getting up from the sofa. Tina had not seated herself on one of the sofas, nor in an armchair, but at the piano as my accompanist. My sister sat next to her, handling the scores as we played. All this transpired silently as I played alone, then Tina and I played together, and then everyone enjoyed listening to our music. (Okay! So, I gave in to both Aunt Svetlana and Dr. Otterbein by standing to play. You don't like it? You think I should be sitting for it? Well, then you take your violin lesson from either one of them seated! C'mon! I just dare you!)
This was the first time that Tina and I had ever made music together, just the two of us. Dad was usually my accompanist when I played at home. Since he'd been away working, I hadn't played with a pianist at home. I knew that Tina played. I'd even heard her playing here. But this was a new experience for me again, today: playing, making music, in harmony with the girl that I'm in love with. Indeed, this was an eventful day. How many things had I done today for the very first time? How many of those were altogether new?
We played a few pieces: Von Tilzer's and Norworth's baseball song (which everyone joined in singing), Tomaso Albinoni's Adagio in G Minor, and the works by Rachmaninoff, Rimsky-Korsakov, and Debussy discussed above.
While Sonia brought Tina the piano score for La Fille aux cheveux de lin, I could only think about my girlfriend. Debussy's little tone poem might have been about a blonde, but how I preferred the girl with raven locks seated at the piano! And after the way we had been making music that afternoon, the feeling that we belonged together, just wouldn't stop.
Debussy's favorite sonority must indeed have been the minor seventh chord. The opening melody traversed up and down a minor seventh chord by arpeggios, Ré… sá¬solmi… solsiré… sá¬solmi… solsisol… solmisol… famire…, just seeming to float in the air.
Everyone was relaxed, listening to us play, when suddenly, my fingertips couldn't quite feel the strings. My fingers began feeling clumsy, not moving quite as I wanted them as I heard the hard surface of my nails tapping against the ebony fingerboard of my violin. Then I felt a sharp pain stabbing through the tip of my left ring finger. I heard an ugly screech followed by the buzzing of a string.
"Ouch!" I yelled. "What the—?"
I looked at my left hand. The a-string had penetrated the corner of my ring-fingernail and split the pretty French manicure.
"Are you okay?" Tina asked, her and Sis springing up to see what were wrong. With the next blink, all the others else had huddled around me.
"I just broke a fingernail," I protested. "It can't be that bad, really. Can it?"
"It's your first one, though," Sis reminded me. But we were gonna give you a new manicure tonight, anyway. We could start now."
I looked at the broken nail again, but the French manicure was gone, as were my wedding rings. But my fingernail was split.
No question whatever about this one: this was not just an hallucination. The fingernail was still broken here in my reality, even if it looked different from what I had seen at first glance. And Tina, Sonia, and their girlfriends had all gathered around, holding my hand, fawning over my split nail, as if I had passed a rite of initiation into their own private sorority. Indeed, what I didn't know just then, was that I had.
Somehow, breaking my nail had confirmed me as a girl in their eyes. They all seemed to share a collective responsibility for me. That Sonia and Tina felt so did not surprise me. But Deb, Jacqui, and Marcia were just as much in the huddle surrounding me and their eyes all spoke with the same message: You're a girl now, one of us. We're all sisters, and we're here for you.
Then I understood that they'd gather around me in any time of need. Guys can and do likewise on occasion, although it's only in cases of extreme importance. But with girls, it's their herding instinct. I knew that if they're willing to huddle like this over anything so silly as a broken nail, then everyone of these girlfriends will be there for me in whatever situations I encounter.
My eyes began welling up with tears as this fundamental truth of sisterhood dawned upon me. It was very empowering. Now I knew that I was beginning to understand what was so important that Sonia had to share with me.
I should have tried this "girl thing" out a long time ago.
The other girls were all teary-eyed, too. Suddenly to be hugged by not only your girlfriend and your sister but also by their girlfriends all at once was overwhelming. All day, I had been dreading tonight's sleepover and its accompanying makeover, somehow worried that I would lose myself. But now, that dread had given way to an excitement and a soft eagerness. I was anticipating that makeover as much as any girl ever could.
I was as giddy as a teen-aged girl.
Then again, I was a teen-aged girl, so far as we were all concerned, at least for now.
However, breaking that nail also would admit me to a new fraternity as well. There just weren't any other members so immediately available to hold an initiation.
But they were around.
Vocalise, Op. 34, No. 14
Sergei Rachmaninoff
Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg, violin
Anne-Marie McDermott, piano
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A2kuI3YEnHI
La Fille aux cheveux de lin, Préludes I, No. 8
Claude Achille Debussy
Arnaud Sussman, violin
Michael Brown, piano
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jXw-MMn11is
by
Anam Chara
Chapter 16
Russian Language Notes
Водка [VOT-kuh], vodka, lit. little water.
Да [DAH], yes.
Мама [MAH-muh], dim. Mama, Mom, Mommy.
Моя Саша [mah-YAH SAH-shuh], fem. my Sasha. In Russian, Sasha is a nickname for both Alexander and Alexandra. Using the possessive adjective моя emphasizes that Sasha's mother is calling him by a girl's name.
Папа [PAH-puh], dim. Dad, Daddy, Papa, Pop, Pops.
Спасибо [spah-S'EE-buh], thank you, thanks.
Often, my first morning sensation would be an aroma from the kitchen. Today, though, a flowery fragrance that greeted me—perfume! It was the scent that Tina wears so often. I seemed to have a slight headache, some dizziness, and a light-headed feeling. My vision seemed a little blurry as I awoke. I was not in my usual bed but lying on the floor on a bedroll. When I sat up, the dizziness and light-headedness seemed to become worse, so I laid down again.
"Wake up, sleepyhead!" I recognized Tina's voice.
"He's always groggy like this on a Saturday," my sister's voice answered. "In fact, that may be all that remains of his boy-self now!"
"I'm not sleepy," I protested. "I'm dizzy and have a headache. What happened?"
I raised myself up again, this time on my right elbow and my eyes began to focus on Tina's smiling face and Sonia's mischievous grin. Looking around I recognized our conservatory.
So I had gone through with the sleepover. I glanced at myself and saw that I was wearing a long, royal blue, satin nightgown trimmed in white lace and ribbons, held up by narrow shoulder straps. It felt very nice to wear, actually. But then I noticed something else. My fingernails. A French manicure with white tips. Just like Tina's and Sonia's. Vaguely, I could barely remember telling them that I wanted mine to match theirs. But the tips were shorter on my left hand.
"I made sure that they wouldn't get in the way when you play," Sonia told me. "They might look a little funny that way, but I didn't want your manicure to get in the way of your music."
Touching them with my other hand, I realized that my left-hand fingernails weren't any longer than usual. How did they get the white tips on there at all? My right-hand nails were extended a little beyond my fingertips and shaped into a pleasing oval, just like my sister's and girlfriend's.
"We just thought it so sweet that you wanted your nails to match ours," Tina added to the discussion.
Red-headed Debbi was the next to speak. "And we can't wait to do your hair. I've never styled a boy's hair like I'll be doing yours today. I think you'll look perfectly like a girl when we're done."
Something suggested that these girls were having way too much fun with me.
Two other girls were there smiling at me as well. One looked Latin, the other Asian. Vaguely, I seemed to recall that the Latin-looking girl was Marcia, so that meant the Asian-looking one had to be Jacqui.
"G'morning girls," I addressed everyone. "Please, don't mind me, but I do have a headache today."
They all began giggling. That couldn't be a good sign.
Then Sonia held up a half-empty bottle of a clear liquid and it's label read:
No! Is this a hangover? My first hangover? Oh…!
"Моя Саша! I see you have hangover today," Mom said entering the music room. "I told you that to drink водка not wise."
"Couldn't you have stopped me?" I asked Mom.
"I try. You not listen," she answered. "But you say you are too afraid of girls. So you need—how you told me?—some liquid courage!"
Fuzzily, I recalled but fragments of conversations and actvities from the previous evening. It all had started when I caught and broke a fingernail on my a-string. My third finger. The ring finger. I looked at my left hand again. Someone did a good job repairing it. After that, the evening became pleasant enough, but I still couldn't remember exactly what had frightened me so badly that I needed "liquid courage" to make it through.
"I'm sorry, Мама," I apologized. "I hope I didn't do anything too stupid while I was—was—"
"The word you're looking for is drunk, Li'l Bro," Sonia teased me. "And of course you did stupid and embarassing things while you were. That was the whole point! But we love you for being so vulnerable with us."
"Yes," Tina added tenderly. "Whatever happens at a sleepover stays at the sleepover. That's private, among us who love you."
"Today, however," Jacqui spoke up, "you go public—really public! Because today we're all going—everyone together now—"
"Shopping!" they all sang out in chorus, triggering a new impulse of my morning's headache.
"Ow! That hurt," I whined, covering my ears with my hands. As I did, I could hear as well as feel the painful throbbing in my head.
"We're too many for the kitchen table, today. Everyone to the dining room!" Mom announced, for which I was grateful. Even from here, I could smell the coffee brewing. Likely she had brewed it for our guests this morning, since we preferred tea. Maybe I was one of the guests, too, because I most certainly didn't feel like myself today.
Sis and Tina pulled me to my feet and helped me into a dressing gown that seemed to match my nightgown. Then as they held me steady to step into the maribou slippers that Sis had let me wear, I noticed that my toenails glistened with a clear sheen. My expression must have been something of joy to the girls as they all giggled.
"We thought you needed a pedicure, too," Sis told me with a gleam in her eye. "But we didn't want to freak you out completely, so we just did your toenails in a clear luster. Next time, though, I think you should try a shade of pink."
Next time? What had I gotten myself into?
Since I was still unsteady in my sister's heeled slippers, she and Tina escorted me to the dining room and sat me down in my usual place. Marcia and Jacqui were already seated, Marcia taking coffee, and Jacqui, tea. But Mom did not ask me what I wanted. She placed a mug of hot, black coffee in front of me.
"Мама, I'd rather have tea," I complained.
"Coffee is better for headache," Mom decreed. "Today you drink coffee"
Everyone giggled but me.
"Sasha, you were so cute at the party," Jacqui said. "I should thank you."
"What?" I asked nervously looking over at Tina, but she began giggling even more. "What happened? Did I flirt with Jacqui?"
Tina smiled as her giggling escalated to an amused, squealing laughter, while she herself blushed.
"He doesn't remember what he did as her, does he?" Deb remarked wide-eyed to everyone. "The look on his face was just so precious!"
"Моя Саша! You really don't remember?" Mom said, smiling and tapping a small stack of pizza boxes on the counter, as if taking her cue to tease me. "I would think that you must remember!" She continued tapping the pizza boxes, but I could have sworn that she were playing tympani at a fortissimo.
"All right! What happened?" I fumed, sipping the hot and bitter, black coffee. "How badly did I embarass myself?"
"The pizza delivery boy made a pass at you!" Sonia told me. "He asked you for a date. You just stood there and stared at him!"
"I know the guy, Barry, and like him," recounted Jacqui. "So, when you didn't even answer him, I took your hand and led you away. Then he asked me out instead. So now we have a date later tonight. So I should thank you for—what? I know!—being scared at just the right moment! I had to rescue you and it worked out well for me, anyway."
"After he left, you went for the vodka!" Marcia added as everyone giggled. "You may not believe this, but you were hot, girl!"
I put my head down on the table. I felt sick. A boy made a pass at me? No wonder I went for Dad's liquor cabinet. I wanted some vodka in my coffee right then.
"Why did you have to tell me?" I lamented. "I didn't want to remember that. That's why I went for the vodka."
"Don't worry," Tina consoled me. "Every girl feels better after a session of retail therapy. You'll get to experience that today, too."
I sipped more coffee. Why did I ever agree to do this? Those hallucinations had seriously distorted my thinking.
"Retail therapy?" I asked.
"Shopping!" they all seemed to yell loudly at the same time.
"Ow!" I yelled back as the pulsing began in my ears again. "Not so loud!"
"If didn't know he had a hangover," Sonia observed, "I'd think Sasha was having her first period!"
Everyone giggled at that—except myself! I was too sick for their teasing even to upset me.
"Got any aspirin?" I asked Mom.
"I've got some Midol Teen® in my bag," Tina teased.
"Does it work for hangovers?" I wondered aloud.
Everyone was giggling or laughing at that as well.
"Моя Саша, Mom addressed me, "you simply need to drink your coffee, eat breakfast, and get moving. Today for you is very important."
"Will coffee and breakfast cure my headache?" I asked.
"No, but you need it anyway," Mom said. "Headache will go away when hangover finish. You still must eat." She opened the oven door and removed a baking sheet covered with pastries. Sis helped her place them on small plates and distribute them to us.
The pastries were hot and my headache lessened a little as I smelled their aroma. I raised my head from the table and looked at everyone.
"Thanks for including me in your sleepover," I offered them gratefully. "It was—a new experience."
"Did you have fun?" Tina asked me.
I looked down at my pastry. "I really can't remember," I apologized.
"Then you did!" Jacqui concluded as the others laughed.
"I still can't believe that the pizza guy—," I stopped, blushing. "He really made a pass at me?"
"Uh-huh!" Tina affirmed, smiling at me. "But you're already taken!"
I felt Tina's gentle kiss touch my cheek. When she did, I felt all my apprehension, misgivings, and fear about the previous night melt away despite my headache. I reached for her hand and she grasped it. Sonia took my other hand. Sitting up I could see that we all had joined hands and everyone was smiling at me. So infectious were their smiles that my own dimples were creasing. I breathed deeply and sighed in relaxation. My headache throbbed all the more, as if it were angered that I dare feel good defying its torture.
"Is your headache gone?" Jacqui asked me.
"No," I answered, "but I'm feeling better anyway!"
"I think Sasha understands," observed Marcia. "This is almost like a menses for him. He can feel the joy even through the pain."
"Girl, you're one of us now," declared Deb, making eye contact with me directly. "I think you're more girl on the inside than you know."
"You've always been," confirmed Sonia to me. "I've been after you to let your inner girl out to play since we were toddlers. At heart, you've always been my little sister!"
"Is that why I've looked up to you so much?" I asked Sis. "So often I've secretly wanted to be like you."
"Yes," she answered. "But it was never all that secret—not to me, anyway. That's why I wanted so much for you to dress up. You need it, really. You've needed it for a long time"
"But I'm a boy!" I protested. "And I'm only attracted to girls."
"Yes. And you're my boyfriend," Tina assured me. "But your also my girlfriend. You're a girlfriend to all of us, now, and we're all your girlfriends. More like sisters, really. Welcome to sisterhood, Sasha."
She kissed him on the cheek again, as everyone else in the room applauded briefly.
Everyone at the table was enjoying their coffee or tea and pastries along with a free-flowing conversation that mostly dazzled me, since I just didn't have my wits about me to keep up with it. So, I finished my coffee and pastry by small sips and slow nibbles. Very slowly, I felt my headache begin to clear…
Something felt—and smelled—very different in the shower. Sis had me supplied with body wash instead of soap. It had a very nice scent to it, like apricots, although it had a grainy feel to it. And my skin tingled just a little as I rubbed it all over myself. I think that I was enjoying myself maybe too much, since I heard Sonia ask, "Are you almost finished. We're all waiting, too!"
"I think so," I replied. "It's just that I can't believe how nice this body wash smells. But it seems a little grainy to me."
"That's the exfoliant in it," she explained. "Remember? We talked about it two nights ago. It strips away dead layers of skin cells."
"So that's how it feels?"
"Uh-huh," she confirmed. "I left a nice plush bathrobe out here for you."
"Oh! Do I need that hair remover again?" I asked. "Uh—depilatory as you called it?"
"I don't think so. Your legs still looked baby smooth to me."
"Thanks. I'll be right out, then."
Sonia had left the bathrobe on the hook next to the shower door. When I put it on, it was barely long enough to cover me. Also, the fragrance of the body wash lingered about me and I felt very relaxed by it. I could get used to it. There was no reason that I couldn't use it, even as a guy.
I wandered down the hallway to my bedroom to find Jacqui and Marcia standing guard outside my door, while Sis, Tina, and Deb awaited me within. Tina had already laid out a set of undergarments for me.
"Sasha, here we have for you a training bra with matching panties," began my girlfriend. "This is a camisole, often just called a 'cami.' And this is a half-slip, to be worn under your skirt. It's not always necessary, but sometimes it's still nice to have."
"This I know," I replied. "You forget that I grew up with a sister and that guys see a constant stream of girls wearing not much more than what's there. And Sis has been covertly training me for today since birth. Well, it's been mostly covert."
They paused a moment. Then Tina grinned at me. "Are you sure you know how to put it all on?"
"I think I can figure it out. I did wear Sonia's dress yesterday after all."
"Then put something on," ordered Sis.
"Uh… I don't wanna dress in front of everyone," I said, naked under the robe.
Everyone else giggled, but somehow, I just smiled at Tina and giggled back. Then I grabbed the panties and stepped into them, pulling them up underneath my robe. They felt smooth and cool, even silky.
A squeal went up with a bit of applause from everyone there.
"Thatta girl, Sasha!" approved Debbi, smiling as her eyes glanced about the room. "Certain others here, and they know who they are, do the same thing in the girls' locker room! You did that just like they do."
Suddenly everyone but Deb was blushing, including myself. Jacqui and Marcia had entered my bedroom, crowding it even more. So now six of us were in there and I was sitting somewhat awkwardly on the corner of my bed. This was too crowded for me to move around much.
"Girls, I don't have room enough to dress with all of you in here," I told them. "Tina's in charge of my wardrobe, so she stays to help."
"But I'm your sister," appealed Sonia.
"You did it yesterday, Sis. It's her turn," I said. Everyone else, but Sonia, giggled.
"Huh!" snorted my sister as she crossed her arms and strutted out of my room, her long ponytail swishing as she turned away from me. I heard her and her friends outside squeal in uncontrolled laughter after the door shut behind them.
"I love how she does that, Tina!"
"What? Storms out of the room?"
"No, not so much that. It's how her ponytail swishes when she turns around. It's so cool. I need to learn that."
Tina smiled at me again. "You're really into this! You really are trying to be girly, aren't you?"
"Sonia wants to share her girlhood with me. And that's more than just her wardrobe. She very clearly wants me to enjoy it. And I need to try getting into the role of a teenage girl and sister as best I can—like a method actor does."
"I hope that both of you appreciate just how lucky you are to have each other as brother and sister."
"Sonia really is a wonderful sister," I affirmed, "but she had me so freaked out with her teasing me over dressing up, until you talked to me about it Thursday afternoon."
"You really thought she was trying to embarrass you?"
"Yes and no."
"Oh?"
"I couldn't think of any other reason for a girl to dress her brother up."
"So you never thought that girlhood was something she might want to share with you?"
"Well until you brought it up, I had never even wondered if it was something that a girl could share with a boy."
"That makes sense enough to me," my girlfriend conceded. "But then what changed your mind?"
"First, when you described what Sonia wanted, I knew it was true. The idea of sharing her girlhood with me sounds so much like something she'd think up, it had to be the truth. And then, in my hallucinations, dressing up like a girl for you somehow seemed normal. I got curious enough to try it."
"That's honest enough for me. But we do need to finish getting you dressed, though."
"Pantyhose?"
"You want pantyhose?"
"Yeah. They felt nice yesterday," I confessed as I let the robe open and fall off my shoulders. I knew that I was blushing. "I—I really liked wearing them. Gosh! I'm so embarrassed!"
"That's all right, Sasha. I understand," Tina assured me as she picked up the training bra from my bed. "I love to wear them myself. And don't be too embarrassed because you like wearing them. You said that Sonia wants you to enjoy this. It sounds like you've already found something to get started with."
Tina held the straps of the bra up for me.
"I guess I do," I admitted, reaching through the bra-straps. "I'm just scared to be liking this so soon."
"But why? It's really who you are," she continued, gesturing for me to stand up and turn around.
"Really who I am?" I asked, holding my arms out as she hooked the bra from the back.
"Mm-hmm! You are so girly! Well, at least in the ways we hoped you were," Tina said to reassure me. "Everyone of us here have noticed this about you for a long time."
"Y'know, Ms. Tollefson gave me this test for androgyny. I scored high on both sides, masculine as well as feminine."
"Maybe that's why you're taking to all this so well?"
"Am I?"
"Yes, you are, Sasha. You're as pretty as a girl as you are handsome as a boy."
"That's what this androgyny thing's all about. I should be as competent at girls' things as I am at boys'."
"You seem to be doing that so far. And it's not just your looks, either. We all noticed that while you're dressed up, you act a lot like your sister. Especially you stand, walk, and gesture like Sonia."
"I wasn't aware of that, but it makes sense. Sis is the girl that I know best and knows me best. I'm not surprised that I'd copy her style. And we're both prob'ly gonna copy Mom, so that makes sense as well."
"Well, you do have much of your sister's style. Even as a boy you share quite a few things with her. I've noticed that you both like wearing the same colors and listen to the same music. You both like the same popular music as well as classical."
Tina continued helping me dress and I soon had everything on except shoes.
"I liked those black pumps with the ankle straps that I wore yesterday," I confessed. "By the way, I like it when you wear shoes like that."
"Well, they are a classic look," Tina informed me. "And I do like them. They go with just about anything you wanna wear. They're a wardrobe standard for any girl. But we do wanna get you into something else today, though."
"Oh? Whaddya have in mind?"
"Hmm? I had been thinking maybe a pair of strappy heels?" Tina mused, then grimaced. "Y'know what, though? I think the ankle-strap pumps do look better with that skirt and blouse. Since you like them, that's the call!"
These were the same shoes from yesterday, Deb's three-inch heels. I had managed to walk quite a lot wearing them without any real discomfort. My biggest problem is that my visual perspective was seriously altered suddenly being three inches taller.
I knelt down to put them on, but Tina stopped me and suggested that I sit a certain way to buckle the ankle straps.
"That's right, Sasha! Knees together and lean…"
The way she had me sit to fasten the straps made me feel, well, elegant. And to my chagrin, I actually liked sitting that way.
"You look so cute, hubby!" Tina squealed with a full smile. "Perfectly girlie!"
I noticed she and I were both wearing our wedding rings. The LEDs on the clock shone green again.
Next, Tina led me to the kitchen where Deb and the others had set up a makeshift hair salon. Apparently places to sit and a large sink were a sine qua non for this enterprise. She directed me to the chair and sat me at one end of the table so that the sink was right behind us.
"So Sasha, which of the hairstyles that we tried yesterday do you want to go with?" Deb asked as she covered my blouse with a huge plastic bib and fastened it behind me.
"We tried hairstyles?"
"Yes, we did. But I suppose that memory got dissolved in the vodka, too?"
"I guess it did."
Deb sighed rather loudly, then shouted, "Jacqui! Bring your laptop!"
A moment later, Jacqui padded into the kitchen with a laptop tucked under her left arm, sat down to my right, and flipped up the screen. "Whaddya want?" she asked.
"Show him the photos of his hair from the sleepover."
"Parallel views?"
"That'd be best. Show the three-quarter views first, next frontals, then profiles."
Jacqui quickly pulled up two photos side-by-side. At first, they looked like Sonia with darker hair, but then I realized that they were both pictures of me. I couldn't remember either of them.
"Well, Sasha, what'll it be?" Deb asked me.
"I don't know," I admitted cluelessly. I had no idea what to choose, nor even how to go about deciding on one. "What do you like? Or ask Tina or Sonia. I don't have any idea."
"You can't remember anything from yesterday?"
"Sorry, but I'm clueless. I don't know what's important in a hairstyle."
"What do you think, Jacqui?" Deb asked.
"I think he'll look cuter with the one on the right."
"I was thinking that, too," Deb concurred. "Quick! Go get the others!"
I don't think it took much more than a minute and Sonia, Tina, and Marcia were all there."
"The one on the right is best," opined my sister.
"Do the style on the right," instructed Marcia.
"The right is cuter," my girlfriend judged.
I guess that was a consensus. It would be the style on the right side of the screen. And it just screamed "girl!" But since I didn't want to be recognized or mistaken for a boy in a skirt and blouse, I simply chose to yield to their unanimous opinion.
"Then go for it," I told Deb. She smiled back at me and went to work on my hair. My sister and girlfriend hugged one another as they both emitted loud squeals of delight.
They were enjoying this entirely too much.
"This style is like a flipped semi-pageboy but much longer," Deb explained. "Although I've trimmed it a little, I only want to style your hair today, not cut it. If you really want me to cut it, then I can do that another time. Besides, you may not want to look too different when you go back to being a boy—if you go back to being a boy."
"What's a flipped semi-pageboy?" I asked.
Jacqui turned to me. "My hair's in a semi-pageboy," she said. "When it's flipped, the ends are curled to the outside instead of underneath like mine are."
"And what do you mean by if I go back to being a boy?"
"Well, after this weekend, I think you won't wanna go back!" Deb predicted.
"We hope to entice you to stay a girl," declared Sonia. "You're looking so good moving from Li'l Bro to Li'l Sis, that it'd be a shame to waste that."
Geeze! What had I gotten myself into? I had only promised to do this through Monday. I had to be back in school Tuesday and that would be the end of it. Or did they want to have me doing this as a hobby? It wouldn't be that bad, dressing up after school. Tina, Sonia, and I often studied together anyway, sometimes our house, sometimes Tina's. It's not like it would be in public, would it?
Then I listened to myself. This was getting out of control. And that was because somehow I had liked it. Maybe Ms. Tollefson was right. Maybe I was androgynous and needed some kind of feminine expression? But did I have to dress up like a girl for it? Maybe I should ask her a few questions about this? I didn't know. This whole thing was beginning to scare me.
"Can I have a mirror?" I asked. "I'd like to see what you're doing to me."
"Not yet," Deb answered. "Not until I'm done. Then you get to see the whole thing all at once. Seeing it halfway might scare you unnecessarily and we don't want that. Remember, you're gonna be seen with us all day, so I'm making you look as nice as I possibly can. We don't want this to be your first bad hair day as a girl, too."
"No, I guess not," I concurred with her.
"Li'l Sis, I wish you could remember more of the sleepover," remarked Sonia. "I've never seen or heard you have so much fun in your life. One thing's absolutely certain—you party like a girl!"
"At least you did until Barry made a pass at you," Jacqui reminded me. "Then you went for the booze."
And the lingering after-effects of it were still with me, although the intense, throbbing pain of earlier in the morning now had lessened to a merely constant, lower-grade headache. But what I really regretted that apparently I did enjoy myself but couldn't remember any of that. So, the alcohol had ruined the party for me, but not them. I was the only one who couldn't remember that I had a good time.
I looked down at my left hand to examine my manicure again (no wedding rings). The girls could have done them in any color, or made them really long, but they didn't. No, they did it to match Tina's and Sonia's because I had said that I liked theirs. And they did my nails short on my left hand so I could play my violin without any problems. I'd heared some awful tales of what girls did to the first one who dozed off at a sleepover. Then I remembered what the point of this exercise was. Sis wanted to share what was joyful with me. She'd kept the teasing to a minimum. She'd invited me into her circle of friends. They were still working to make me presentable as a girl. That would protect me from discovery. Indeed, they were all trying to make this fun for me. For the first time today, I flashed a brief smile in spite of my hangover.
"Sasha, you're taking to all this so much better than I hoped you would."
"I promised you that I'd try to enjoy myself while I did this. And except for this hangover, it's all been fun so far. Mom was right. This seems to be turning into a good experience."
Sis dropped down and kissed me on the cheek. "I'm happy you see it that way," whispered Sis in my ear. I could see her eyes moistening. I knew that girls cry when they're happy. Really happy. And my eyes were moistening now, too.
"Did I tell you that I went see Father Alexei yesterday after I got back from lunch?" I whispered to my sister.
"No," she answered also whispering.
"Well, he saw me and commented that you had gotten your wish."
"Omigosh! Was he—?" Sonia raised her voice.
"He was only concerned that he hadn't seen us much at church for a while," I said, my own voice still sotta voce. He made me promise to come Sunday and he wants you there, too. And I'm going dressed like a girl, so don't you dare not show up there with me. He wants to give us a blessing."
"Why would he wanna bless us? And you in drag?"
"Maybe because blessing is what priests do!" I smiled again.
"But I would've thought he'd be all judgmental about it and everything!"
"No, he wasn't at all," I said. "In fact, it seemed a little weird—almost like he was expecting me to show up wearing a dress someday."
"I kept telling him that I always wanted to dress you up like a girl."
"Yes, that seems to have been the case."
Now, Sonia blushed—deeply! Maybelline®, Cover Girl®, or Revlon® could use that color to inspire a whole new line of reds!
"It's okay, Sis," I assured her. "I really do understand now why you wanted this for me. And seeing how happy it makes you, I'm happy, too." She was crying now and so was I. Fortunately, neither of us had done our makeup yet.
When Deb had finished with my hair, about half an hour later, Jacqui set her laptop up with its camera for me to get a look at myself. I was frightened by my own appearance. I couldn't see the least bit of boy in my face. The hairstyle made me look really cute.
"Sasha, this is close to how you looked when Barry made that pass at you," Jacqui informed me. "Except for your deer-in-the-headlights stare!" She giggled.
"I can't say that I'm surprised," I conceded, examining myself carefully on the screen. "I would never have thought I could look anything like this."
"So, you like it, then?" Deb asked me.
"Yes. Yes, I do. It makes me look like a real girl. You did a great job with it. If you wanted to make me think about staying a girl, you couldn't have made a better argument!"
"Yeah, Deb," said Tina, flashing a wicked grin. "It's kinda hard to know whether to let him go back to being a boyfriend or just to keep him like this. There's cute, and then there's what I'm seeing right now!"
"Now, all we have to do is just get a little make up on you to complete the look," Sonia said to me. "Up to my room, Li'l Sis!"
Deb unfastened the plastic bib and let me go. My sister took me by the hand and led me out of the kitchen and up the stairs to her bedroom. She sat me down at her vanity and I got another look at myself in the mirror. Deb had really done such a nice job with my hair. In spite of my anxiety about it, this seemed to be working out.
"All right, Li'l Sis," Sonia addressed me. "Let's get started on your face. You'll be trying different clothes on, so I think we should keep to a lighter, natural look today."
"Whatever you think is best," I conceded to my sister. "You're the expert here." And she really had become expert with cosmetics, as much as any teenager could. So I had no doubt that she would complete my look as beautifully as possible.
"You're likely to try different colors while shopping, so we need your face looking as natural possible to get a fair idea of what will look right on you."
"That makes sense to me."
My sister worked her magic on my face with her collections of lotions, potions, and powders for nearly half an hour, explaining each step as she continued to work. She described to me the purpose of the various brushes and applicators, the contents of the jars and vials that she used, educating me about every choice she had made for my look.
"So whaddya think now, Sasha?" Sonia asked me. I studied myself in the mirror. There was no hint of a boy looking back at me. It was kind of eerie that I looked all girl. Fascinating, really. Just the intellectual puzzle how a boy could be made to look exactly like a girl occupied my mind for an extended moment.
"Wow!" I said, grinning at my sister. "This is amazing. I could never have imagined looking this good. How did you?"
"I've been planning this day for years," she reminded me flashing a wicked smile at me. "I've had a long time to figure out exactly how to make your face up."
That she had studied me for this purpose did sound a little creepy, yet I also knew that I could trust her judgment for the very same reason. I could not help but be pleased with the transformation that Sis, Tina, and their friends had given me. I had never looked so handsome as a boy as I was now pretty as a girl. I resolved that after this exercise was over, I would make every effort to groom myself as guy with an equivalent effort. I felt a sudden need to be worthy of Mom, Sonia, and Tina as a son, a brother, and a boyfriend.
"Well, Sis, I'm looking forward to going out now," I admitted. "I think today is going to be fun after all!"
My sister squealed and, kneeling on the floor, hugged me from behind. Somehow we managed to squeeze both our smiles into the oval mirror of her vanity.
"There's just one more thing we need to do, Li'l Sis."
"What's that?"
"Stand up!"
We both got up and she grabbed her atomizer off the vanity and pumped up a cloud of mist in the air and walked through it.
"You do the same," she said as she thrust the atomizer into my hands. So, I sprayed my own cloud of perfume and went right through it, too. Just as I did, the doorbell chimed the "Bells of Westminster."
"Oh, Geeze!" I exclaimed. "I wonder who that could be ?"
"Well, we're done here," declared Sis, taking me by the hand. "Let's go see."
Sis and I had hurried down the stairs to see who the new visitor was, but we stopped because there with Mom stood our Aunt Svetlana. And suddenly my heart sank and I began to feel embarrassed once again. Why did Mom have to tell her of all people about this?
Mom was busy introducing her sister-in-law to Marcia and Jacqui. She already knew Tina. Then, when Aunt Svetlana spied Sis and me, she ran right across the room to us.
"Sasha! Dat you?" my aunt almost screamed. "I cannot belieffe dat you so pretty!" She squealed and pulled me into one of her patent-pending hugs and did a little victory dance. "Wen your мама told me dat you do dis, I not know dat you do so well!"
"Спасибо, Auntie!" I said. "But it's all the work of Sonia and her friends. They want me to look as pretty as they are."
"Да. You go to mall wit dem. Dat is khwy I come, to drive big van," Aunt Svetlana explained. "And I tell you khow I dress your папа khwen khe was boy. Khe was also pretty girl. We khad much fun khwen children!"
"Dad dressed up like a girl?" I asked. So maybe that was why Mom called and asked her to come? Well that, and she drove a van.
"Да! Dat much fun for us bot!" affirmed my aunt. "We make big game of wkho most pretty girl! Your папа say khe more pretty girl dan me. And khe very pretty girl but not so pretty as I."
The doorbell rang again and Mom asked me to get the door. So I opened it and the person there was someone else whom I had not expected this morning.
"Marjorie?"
"Good morning, Sasha!" Marjorie greeted me. "How are you?"
Oh, this day was just getting better and better!
Continuandum…
©2011, 2017 by Anam Chara.
To See Through a Glass Darkly
by the Rev. Anam Chara✚
Chapter 17
Sasha and his entourage all go shopping together at the mall.
Russian Language Notes
ÐœÐ¾Ñ Ð¡Ð°ÑˆÐ° [mah-YAH SAH-shuh], my Sasha.
Ð¡Ð¾Ð½ÑŒÑ [SON’-yuh], Sonia.
Да [DAH], yes
“Marjorie Stedham?” I heard Sonia squeal from behind me. “Is that you?”
“Omigosh! Sonia Petroff?” Marjorie yelled back as they ran toward one another. “So Sasha’s your brother?”
I barely side-stepped their collision as they met and embraced right where I had been standing.
“Except that he’s my Li’l Sis today,” Sonia updated Marjorie, who was quite apparently a friend. But it made sense that they were, because they both competed on the local pageant circuit.
“Everybody,” my sister announced. “I’d like you to meet Marjorie Stedham, a friend of mine I know from several pageants. She’s won at least four crowns and was a runner-up more times than I can remember. You’ve met Mom before and apparently you already know Sasha. This is Papa’s sister, my Aunt Svetlana. These are all my girlfriends, Tina, Deb, Jacqui, and Marcia. And Tina and Sasha are also dating now.”
“Hi, everyone!” Marjorie smiled and waved to us all in the room. “Nice to meet you!”
I turned to Marjorie and my sister. “So what are you doing here, Marjorie?” I asked.
“I’m not sure if I should say anything about it, except just to you,” she answered. “Can we speak privately somewhere?”
“It’s okay,” I said, knowing that Marjorie had to protect my confidentiality. “Sis, Marjorie’s the receptionist for the psychiatrist that Doctor Tollefson took me to see yesterday morning.”
“Do you work there full-time?” Sonia asked her.
“Oh no! Just part-time, although I work the full day twice a week. I met your brother yesterday and took him to lunch. He looks so cute as a girl, I just had to talk to him! But since he’s your brother, it makes perfect sense now.”
“So then, why are you here now?” I asked again.
“Your mom called the office yesterday afternoon and we talked. She remembered meeting me at one of our pageants and asked me to come shopping with you today.”
“That’s great!” Sonia exclaimed. “You’re gonna get shopping advice from a four-time pageant winner today.”
“Who did your hair, Sasha?” Marjorie asked me.
“Sonia’s friend Deb.”
“Well, it looks great on you,” answered Marjorie. Hearing her name mentioned, Deb came over.
“You like it, then?” Deb asked her.
“Absolutely,” Marjorie replied. “I’ve seen professionals not do this as well as what you’ve done with his. You thinking of doing it as a career?”
“I might,” answered Deb. “But I really want to get a college degree, though. I’m not really sure what my options are yet.”
“Well, if you ever turn pro you can count on me as a client–certainly so long as you do work like that. It’s great!”
“Thanks, Marjorie.”
Mom came over just then. “Marjorie, thank you so much for coming. I’d like to offer you some coffee or tea and a pastry, if you’d like?”
“No thanks, Mis’ess Petroff,” she said. “I’ve already had my breakfast.”
“When Svetlana finish her coffee and Danish, then we go.”
“By the way, I just thought I’d mention it,” continued Marjorie, “but it looks like it might rain today.”
“Thanks for telling us,” said Mom. Then in a louder voice she announced, “Everybody have raincoat?”
“We have ours in my car,” said Deb. Jacqui and Marcia had come with her.
My sister went to the coat closet next to the front door.
“You wear my old raincoat, Ð¼Ð¾Ñ Ð¡Ð°ÑˆÐ°,” Mom told me. “You must not get pretty clothes wet. СоньÑ, you get coat for Ð¼Ð¾Ñ Ð¡Ð°ÑˆÐ°.”
“Now, should we all go in Svetlana’s van or maybe take another car?” Sis inquired of everyone generally. “The van can seat up to eight including the driver.”
“But how much stuff will we need to load for the return trip?” I asked.
“Sasha has a good point,” observed Sonia. “What do you think, Мама? Svetlana?”
“Seat in back of van folt down,” explained our aunt. “Useful to bring big instrument like bass or ’cello. And music stands, also. Much space for many shopping bags.”
“How many here have a car?” Mom asked.
Besides Aunt Svetlana’s van, my mother, Tina, Deb, and Marjorie all had cars there. Certainly, we could select an adequate convoy for a trip to the mall from the available vehicles. I was surprised though that we only took two.
Since Sonia and Marjorie hadn’t seen one another for a while, they rode with Mom in her car. Aunt Svetlana asked to drive Tina and me, but surprisingly Deb decided to ditch her own car for the trip, so that she, Jacqui, and Marcia all joined us in Auntie’s van.
Deb rode up front next to Aunt Svetlana while Jacqui and Marcia sat in the seat behind them. Tina and I held hands as we made out in the back seat.
“Mm!” Tina teased me. “I kinda like tasting my boyfriend’s strawberry lipgloss!”
“Well, I kinda like tasting yours, too,” I replied. “Raspberry, isn’t it?”
“Mm-hmm!”
We heard giggles from the the others in the van, including my aunt.
“Sasha, I think it wonderful dat Sonia get you dress up for her,” Auntie weighed in on the recent happenings. “I tink every boy need learn to dress like girl sometime. And you look very pretty girl. Your mama and papa bot proud of you to do dis. I proud, too.”
Being doted on by Auntie always made me blush, but Tina hugged me closer to herself and for the first time in my life, I think, I felt happy that Aunt Svetlana was teasing and doting on me.
Our two-vehicle caravan arrived at the mall, just as most of the retailers were opening for business Saturday morning. Aunt Svetlana found a row of empty parking spaces near the main entrance and pulled into one. Mom parked adjacent to her.
We all got out of the vehicles and assembled on the plaza in front of the mall.
“Khwere we go first?” Auntie asked.
“The first thing that Sasha needs are his–her own shoes,” observed Sonia. “I’d suggest Gentle Souls ®. We’ll do a lot of walking today and I want my new sister to feel as comfortable as possible. We can go on from there.”
So, my sister led us all to a shoe store of the same name not too far from the main entrance on the first floor of the mall. Apparently, the shoes from Gentle Souls ® were a standard for comfort. What caught my eye was a video on a big screen of two teams of women playing basketball in high-heeled pumps.
“Are they for real?” I wondered aloud, asking no one specific.
“Absolutely!” answered a petite sales clerk with waist-length blond hair. “I’ve sprinted for my bus wearing these more than a few times.”
“Didn’t it hurt?” I asked.
“Not at all,” the salesgirl continued. “I used to change into my sneakers whenever I got home until I began working here. Now I change my clothes but usually not my shoes. I’m Tiffany, by the way.”
“I’m Sasha and I’m on my first shopping trip today with my sister and her girlfriends and my girlfriend.”
For an awkward moment, I could feel everyone staring at me. A quick glance around the shop confirmed that the feeling was correct. Tiffany stared wide-eyed at me.
“You mean you’re a boy?” Tiffany asked for clarification, with a giggle.
“I didn’t say that right, did I?” I turned to ask Tina. She looked across the store to Mom, who shook her head.
“No, you said too much,” my girlfriend confirmed. “But it’s all in fun, so don’t worry about it.”
“He–she’s my little brother and promised me he’d dress like a girl this weekend,” explained Sonia. “I’ve been trying to get him to do it since like forever, and he’s doing it as a favor to me. We had no trouble lending him clothes to fit, but shoes are another matter.”
“She’s wearing a pair of my older sister’s,” Deb informed the sales clerk. “They’re close, but still not quite the right fit for him–her, I mean.”
“Well, you brought him to the right place,” Tiffany said, giggling with a smile. “I can’t think of anything better for a boy’s first pair of high heels!”
I knew my face had to be a deep crimson color by then. Yes, I would learn to think before I spoke after that.
Tina led me by the hand to a chair and sat me down. “Let’s get you shoes of your own, now.”
Tiffany brought over a Brannock ® device to measure my feet while Tina helped me take off the shoes that I was wearing. The young clerk carefully measured my feet–both of them–and then asked me about my own shoes.
“So Sasha, what size do you wear in men’s shoes?”
“Seven and a half.”
“Width?”
“Uh… I’m not sure.”
“Your feet are a bit wider than a girl’s would be, so I’m gonna let you try a wider shoe first, then a longer one if that doesn’t work,” explained Tiffany. “Usually, a guy needs to add two to his shoe size to get a woman’s shoe that fits.”
“You said ‘usually.’ Have you fit guys in women’s shoes before?”
“I have a few times. More than you might think, in fact!”
“It’s nice to know I’m not alone in this.”
Tiffany giggled again. “For whatever reason, we’re a favorite store for guys needing to wear women’s shoes. Your reasons are your own, but I gotta say you’re really sweet to do this for your sister.”
I blushed. Just then, another young woman, a little older than Tiffany entered.
“G’mornin’, Tiff!”
“Good morning, Carla! Would you take care of these other ladies while I get her shoes?”
“Sure,” answered the young woman. “Who’s next?”
“We all came in together just a few minutes ago,” my sister told Carla. “This is my little–uh–sister’s first time shopping at the mall here and I thought we’d come here first. She borrowed the ones she’s wearing now.”
“They’re my sister’s,” Deb added. “They almost fit Sasha, but not quite. Uh–she’ll need something easier to walk around the mall in.”
“Well, you won’t find more comfortable heels anywhere,” Carla declared. “So who else wants to try on a pair.”
“I do,” answered Jacqui. “I need a new pair of pumps to go with a new red dress to wear on my date with Barry.”
All of my family and sister’s girlfriends giggled at that as Jacqui looked obliquely at me. Again, I blushed as she had brought that up.
Soon after that, the store came alive with activity. Tiffany had me trying several pairs of shoes on, high-heels, flats, sneakers, and others. I found myself focused on selecting shoes and so was everyone else. We all were also trying on pair after pair in various styles and colors. And not long after that, another woman with the name ‘Jeri’ on her badge entered, presumably a manager for the shop. She looked surprised and happy to see what looked like a morning rush on her store.
“Hi there!” the woman greeted me as Tiffany continued to help me with an especially high pair of heels. “I’m Jeri, your store manager. Is everything satisfactory?”
“So far I’ve been overwhelmed by all the attention,” I admitted. “Tiffany’s doing everything she can to get me into my first pair of heels.”
“Well, that’s certainly a special occasion,” Jeri noted. “But why’ve you waited so long?”
My sister spoke up, “Sasha just wasn’t ready for heels until now.” Tina, Deb, Marcia, and Jacqui all giggled at the remark as Carla went back to fitting them for new shoes. Jeri began talking to Mom, Aunt Svetlana, and Marjorie, trying to make sales to them as well.
We were there for I didn’t know how long. Jeri announced a two-for-one sale and somehow I left the store with eight pairs of shoes. This began to bother me a little.
“Мама, why so many shoes?” I asked. “I only promised Sonia that I’d do this through Monday.”
“ÐœÐ¾Ñ Ð¡Ð°ÑˆÐ°, you worry too much!” Mom answered me. “And you not know yourself so well. You need them later.”
“I will?”
«Ð”а, Ð¼Ð¾Ñ Ð¡Ð°ÑˆÐ°! » she affirmed, which worried me. Firstly, she kept calling me Ð¼Ð¾Ñ Ð¡Ð°ÑˆÐ°, emphasizing the feminine adjective. She’d been using Ð¼Ð¾Ñ [mah-YAH] instead of мой [moy] with my name all morning. Next, eight pairs of shoes were entirely too many for just three days. So, this shopping trip was starting to give me some anxiety. How did she know that I might need all those shoes? Was she not telling me something?
I decided to wear a pair of low two-inch (5 cm) heeled navy blue pumps out of the store. They felt more comfortable than Deb’s sister’s shoes had. I could probably walk in the mall wearing these for a while.
“Deb, I guess I’m done with your sister’s shoes now,” I said, putting them on right away. “Please thank her for me, if you would.”
“Sure thing, Sasha,” she answered. “It was fun to provide your first pair of ladies shoes.”
Neither Carla nor Jeri had been in the store when I had betrayed my own privacy, but now Deb had let them know as well. And I know that my face must have turned beet-red again, but I was now giggling–no!–laughing along with everyone else–but Deb–at my own embarrassment. And I kind of liked the feeling.
Yes, I was embarrassed, but also I was having fun. I enjoyed a sense of belonging with everyone there. And for the first time, I understood–I felt as well as knew–the difference between embarrassment and humiliation.
“Okay, now!” I announced, smiling to Deb, who nearly cried in relief. “Does everyone here know that I’m a boy dressed like this?”
Deb took that as permission to join in with the fun and our collective mirth redoubled. For an extended moment, none of us could stop laughing. I had been mostly seated for the fittings, getting up to walk a few steps in each different pair of shoes. So I stood up, took my sister by the arm and kissed her cheek.
“You’re really okay with this, Sasha, aren’t you?” Sonia asked, pulling me into a hug.
“Yes, but I don’t know why,” I confessed. “What’s happening to me?”
“This is what I wanted to share with you–life as a girl,” my sister reminded me. “I hope you’re enjoying it.”
“I’d be lying if I said I weren’t. But I’m still scared even if I’m liking it.”
Just then I noticed Mom and Aunt Svetlana talking with Marjorie, who glanced obliquely at moment from the corner of her eye before she began moving toward me.
“Sasha, you’re really getting into the spirit of things, I see,” said Marjorie, noting the stack of shoeboxes next to me. “But you need to come with me if you still want a pair of espadrilles. Remember? From yesterday?”
“Yes, but I have more shoes than I can wear already.”
“No, a girl can never have too many shoes.”
“But I’m not a girl,” I reminded her. “And I only promised Sonia I’d dress up like this through Monday.”
“Come with me, Sasha,” commanded Marjorie, taking me by the hand. Then she turned to Mom, “Mis’ess Petroff, would you take care of his new shoes? I need to talk to him now.”
«Ð”а », answered Mom, smiling.
Suddenly, I was out the door with Marjorie and I was running along, working to keep up with her in my new pumps. She was taller than I and her greater height was mostly beautiful long legs, so my inexperience even in low heels made it difficult for me to match her stride.
“Marjorie, slow down before I trip over my own feet!” I winced. “I’m not used to shoes like these.”
“Get used to them, then! I wanna take you to another shoe store while your mom talks to everyone else,” said Marjorie. “We’ll get you a pair of espadrilles or two, but now it’s very important that I talk to you alone. Your mom will be explaining this to Sonia and Tina, maybe even their friends as well, since now they’re becoming your friends, too.”
“What are you talking about now?” I asked, more than just a little surprised. “You’re sounding weird.”
“Do you remember us talking after lunch yesterday? In the ladies’ room? When I showed you your aura?”
“What about it?”
“Well, today I’ve watched yours interacting, dancing with everyone else’s aura.”
“Is this for real?” I mused aloud. “I had trouble no small trouble believing what I saw.”
“It’s very much for real and I need to tell you what it all means.”
“Does it have anything to do with why suddenly I’m getting more than a weekend’s supply of new shoes?”
“Yes it does,” said Marjorie, holding both my hands and looking me square in the eye. “And it’s wilder than anything that you or I or anyone else has ever imagined.”
“You’re scaring me,” I told her. “I just wanted to dress up for a few days for Sis, so she and her friends could have some fun, and maybe me with them.”
“Please, don’t be afraid, Sasha. I’d been waiting for a while to meet you.”
“To meet me?” I asked for clarification. Had this girl been stalking me all along? “What’s going on here?”
“When I first met Sonia at a pageant, nearly three years ago, I saw in her aura that through her I would meet someone who’d be Twice Gifted. When I met you yesterday, I didn’t know that you were the one, but I did see that you’re becoming fully androgynous right away. When your mom called, then it seemed more likely that you were the one I saw in you sister’s aura. But when I saw her and your and Tina’s auras dancing together, I was certain.”
“Certain about…?”
“You being the Twice Gifted One,” clarified Marjorie. “I’m sure you’re the one I saw in Sonia’s aura.”
“The Twice Gifted One?” I queried.
“I don’t know all the details, but you have the soul of a true Androgyne.”
“An Androgyne?”
“It’s not so easy to explain,” said Marjorie. “I tried to tell you this yesterday, but I couldn’t find the words. The simplest way to describe it is that you’re both a boy and a girl. But since you’ve only been a boy until now, it’s time for you to live as a girl for a while.”
“It sounds crazy,” I dismissed what she’d just told me.
“How is it any crazier than what else is happening to you?”
I looked down at my hands and my diamond ring and wedding band were there again.
“My consciousness is still here with yours, Sasha,” she said in a voice that seemed to help calm me. “But yours has shifted, hasn’t it? I can tell because your aura’s changed its background color.”
“Please, stop! This is too much for me to understand. I can’t deal with it all.”
“I know,” she said, still making the effort to keep me calm. “It all seems to come at once, but it won’t. You’ll have time–time to learn what’s happening. This is all so exciting!”
“But it’s not happening to you! Besides, all this about auras and the Twice Gifted One and Androgynes isn’t what I signed on for,” I objected as my anxiety continued growing. “So, how do I get out of whatever it is?”
Then I heard behind me the steadily advancing gaits of high-heeled footsteps. Turning around I saw Sonia and Tina walking toward us. I noticed Tina wearing her wedding rings. She and Sis pulled me into an embrace that Marjorie joined as well.
“It’s okay, Hubby!” Tina whispered in my ear. “You can’t get out of it, but we’re in it together. You really need to learn to trust others.”
©2010-2013 by the Rev. Anam Chara✚
by
Anam Chara
What Marjorie has revealed to Sasha about who he may be proves very unsettling. They do more shopping as Sasha tries to adjust to what happens.
Sonia and Tina were sitting on either side of me while Marjorie knelt in front of me on the floor of Sheila’s Shoe World, tying the ribbons of a pair of espadrilles around my ankles. It felt strange that she would do this—strange because somehow I realized that I was looking up to her now, just as I looked up to my sister. Marjorie was becoming another mentor. Were all my role models to be female now?
“Try standing up now, Sasha,” suggested Marjorie.
I stood up in the espadrilles and took a few steps. I liked them. They were very comfortable. Yet finding that I liked wearing such distinctly feminine shoes also felt—naughty? Being a boy, I wasn’t supposed to dress as a girl, let alone to like it. Yet I did. Since Sonia wanted me to enjoy this, I had opened my mind to it and now was appreciating what she wished to share with me.
“These are nice,” I told my sister and friends. “I want this pair.”
“They have a two-for-one sale here today,” Sonia reminded me. “Get one more pair.”
“But why?” I demanded to know. “There’s no way I’m ever gonna wear all these.”
“Don’t worry,” Marjorie assured me. “You will have more opportunities than you think.”
I wasn’t exactly at ease with that. Even though I had volunteered to do this only for the weekend or so, I couldn’t ignore the feeling that already I had surrendered control of my life to my sister, my girlfriend, and a psychic beauty queen. But I also couldn’t ignore the feeling that, at least for now, that was the safest company that I could have.
Still, I had already purchased more shoes today than I had ever before owned at one time. And that was just the shoes. We hadn’t even shopped for anything else yet.
“Sasha, you need boots, too,” added Tina just then. I noticed that we weren’t wearing wedding rings, so I wasn’t in some kind of illusion. I had apparently had a conversation with Marjorie while hallucinating or in some kind of altered state. Tina called me hubby and we were both wearing wedding rings. Those are definitely signs that things are not what they seem in recent days.
“What?” I asked.
“Boots—for both weather and fashion,” Debbi clarified. I had been so caught up in my own little world that I had forgotten that Sonia’s and Tina’s other friends were also along for the ride. Marcia and Jacqui were eagerly comparing and modeling spring shoe styles at the far end of the middle aisle. But I hadn’t even noticed them coming in.
“I already have more shoes than I can wear,” I raised as protest, knowing full well that it would be dismissed.
“Sasha, a girl can never have too many shoes,” Marjorie reminded me.
“Yes, you told me that already,” I retorted, but deciding not to remind her that I’m a boy. That objection just wouldn’t carry much weight right now.
Debbi brought over two boxes of boots and kneeled next to me. She and Tina helped me take the espadrilles off and put on a pair of blue-gray boots of sueded leather with elegant cuffs folded around the top. Sonia signaled for me to stand. I stood, but teetered atop the heels. Tina and Debbi held me so that I wouldn’t fall or twist an ankle.
“Easy, girl!” Sonia warned me. “Let your heels settle and get a feel for how high you are.”
“These seem higher than anything else I’ve tried. Just how high are these, anyway?” I asked, but in complaint formed as a rhetorical question.
Debbi smiled at me. “These are four-inch heels,” she bragged about me. “And your legs look perfect in them.”
“Deb, I don’t think so,” I denied her claim. Four inches (10 cm)? I’d get dizzy wearing these. “Those shoes of your sister’s are the highest I was comfortable wearing. These are really too high for me.” Debbi had loaned me a pair of her sister’s three-inch (8 cm) pumps that had fit me quite well.
“Sasha has a point,” intervened my sister. “He’ll have to work his way up to higher heels. His legs will still turn heads enough as it is, though.”
My sister had referred to me in the masculine again. That worried me if anyone outside our group should overhear, but on the other hand, she hadn’t forgotten that I’m her brother. I glanced toward Sonia. “Sis, be careful with your grammar,” I whispered. “A pronoun can carry more meaning today than usual.”
Sonia raised a hand over her mouth as she giggled. “Sorry, Sasha!” she whispered back her apology. I guess I dropped my guard after what happened in Gentle Souls®.
Tina got us back on track. “Deb, do they have this in a lower heel?” my girlfriend inquired.
“I don’t know,” answered Debbi. “But this other pair has only a three-inch heel.” She opened the other box and withdrew a plain boot of simple black leather.
“Those look nice, too, Deb,” I assured her. “I like the simplicity.” And they were quite nice. Besides, I’d already turned down the other pair and didn’t wish to disappoint her again. I sat back down so Sonia and Tina could help me get the suede boots off.
Debbi and Tina helped me get the black boots on. I really liked how they felt going on. Standing up, I had little doubt. “Oh, I like these!” I announced. “If I have to get boots, this is the pair.”
“Those are a good choice, Li’l Sis,” confirmed Sonia. “That’s a classic look. Those boots will go with nearly anything else you’d wanna wear. But you should get the suede boots, too. You will be able to wear them later.”
“But that’s more money,” I objected.
“No, Sasha, it’s not,” Sis reminded me. “It’s two-for-one. Remember?”
“I thought that was just for the espadrilles,” I continued.
“Is for anything in store with same color tags or stickers,” explained Mom, just entering the store. “Is how they do two-for-one here.”
“You must learn khow to buy, моя Саша,” added Aunt Svetlana, trailing behind Mom. “We girls like shopping.”
“But not all at once!” I objected. “All this is too much for me today.”
Mom hugged me then. “Yes, I can see that is overwhelming for you,” she said. “Go out to a bench and sit awhile. We are shopping for us, too.” She kissed me on the cheek and scooted me toward the door of Sheila’s. I juggled my oversized shopping bags of shoes and boots, two from Gentle Souls®, one from Sheila’s, towards the bench outside, where I not so much set them down as dumped then and I more fell than sat down.
I must have been napping for a moment until I felt a hand on my shoulder gently rousing me. “Wake up, Sasha!” Sonia announced with a smile. “We’ve bought all our shoes for today. Time to continue.”
“Where do we go next?” I asked rather foolishly.
“Well when you get dressed,” my sister reminded me, “you, like, start naked and go from there.”
“So it’s lingerie and foundations next,” concluded Tina. “We gotta decide, like, what sizes and shapes you can wear. I mean you look okay in some of Sonia’s things, but you’re still, like, a little different, too. You need to learn your own sense of style.”
“Tina, this seems way more than I need,” I objected again. “After Monday, I’ll be through with all this.”
“No, Sasha, you won’t,” Marjorie spoke up. “I’ve tried to avoid telling you this because first, I don’t wanna frighten you, and also, I’m not sure how to interpret what I see.”
“Is this all about your reading auras again?” I asked her. “I really don’t buy it. I mean, that was a cool light and sound show you put on for me in the Ladies’ Room after lunch yesterday, but I just don’t go for all this psychic stuff.”
“Sasha, the young woman inside you has awakened, and she will emerge to play her role in your life and in the world,” preached Miss Stedham to me. “She will claim what’s due her. You have a choice to accept her and learn to integrate your masculine and feminine selves, or to resist her and suffer for it. You’ve wondered why Sonia wanted so much to share her girlhood with you? Well, it’s because it offers so much for you to enjoy.”
This all seemed too much for me. I felt like I wanted to turn and just run away somewhere, anywhere. But if I didn’t believe what Marjorie was telling me, why was I so upset about it? What she said was just superstitious, quite unscientific after all. But then how did she manage that light and sound show in the Ladies’ Room of Aunt Ellie’s Kitchen yesterday?
“But don’t I have any say in this?” I demanded. “Don’t I have the right to choose my own path in life?”
“Да, you certainly do, моя Саша,” answered Mom, suddenly entering the conversation. (She, my aunt, and Sonia’s other friends had just caught up with us from Sheila’s Shoe World.) “Or you did. I do not believe that you understand that you have chosen it already.”
“Actually, Mis’ess Petrovna, I believe he has one, maybe two more choices before his destiny along the Androgyne’s Path is confirmed,” advised Marjorie. “I see in his aura that those decisions may still be ahead of him. It’s difficult to read.”
“What decisions are they?” Mom asked her, anticipating my own question.
“I don’t know,” Marjorie conceded. “Nor can I say exactly when. I can only be certain that the first one will be very soon, even within a few more days.”
“How can I know what or when it will be?” I asked her, anxious to have some idea of how to direct my own future. “Can’t you give me some clue?”
Marjorie’s eyes began welling up in tears, and she answered with the high-pitched tension of regret in her voice, “I’m so sorry, Sasha, I just don’t know.” The tears began streaming down her face. “I’m too new at reading auras. The answers are there in your aura somewhere, but I just don’t know how to read it all yet.”
She was hurting because she was unable to console me more about my future. So I hugged her and, with a nod and a glance, urged Sonia and Tina to follow suit, and they did. “That’s alright,” I assured Marjorie. “I’m grateful for what you could tell me. You still gave me more than I knew.”
“I’ve had to learn how to read auras by myself, mostly from my own observations and intuition,” confessed Marjorie. “I’ve read what books on the subject by reputable authors that I could, but I really need to find a teacher to study with.”
“Like to find good music teacher,” Aunt Svetlana inserted herself into the conversation. “Often best to trust—khow you say?—word of mouth. I know someone wkho might khelp you.”
“You do?” Marjorie expressed surprised.
“I will ask friend wkhose mother is seer,” offered Svetlana. “Khwen student ready, den teacher appear.”
“Yet Marjorie must not tell Sasha any more about decisions,” warned the boy’s mother suddenly. “His own heart must decide each time without interference. Only thus he will know true destiny. And I believe that he will choose true.”
“But how can I do that without any direction?” I asked.
“Моя Саша, you not wit-out direction,” interjected Aunt Svetlana. “Your mama, your papa, your sister, and myself, next your teachers, your priest, and even your friends, we all khaff given you direction before. You forget your lessons so soon? Now iss time dat you tink on lessons already learned.”
I understood what Marjorie, Mom, and my Aunt Svetlana were telling me, but still I felt apprehensive about what I might be facing.
Sonia and Tina led me—dragged me was more like it—into another shop, Anne’s Intimate Apparel. To say the least, I was frightened entering this most sacred domain of the feminine. I think that I had this attitude because I had somehow learned that only naughty boys make any effort to view a girl’s undergarments, especially while she was wearing them. And somewhere I’d heard stories about how boys who’d been caught spying on girls in their lingerie might be punished by appearing publicly dressed as girls.
But I’m not being punished. After all, I volunteered to do this. Maybe I’m naughty not for wanting to see girls in their lingerie, but for wanting to see myself in it. Yes, Sonia did want to share girlhood with me, but I was also curious in my own right. Yet I could expect that by Monday, my curiosity would be satisfied. So I did not understand the need to buy myself a collection of matching sets of bras and panties any more than why I had purchased so many pairs of shoes.
Sonia grabbed my left arm to drag me toward a wall replete with racks of brassieres. She began to take a few from the racks and check labels for sizes. Then a tall blonde-haired lady sashayed over to us.
“Good morning, there! I’m Anne Wilson, the owner,” she greeted us. “Can I help you?”
“We hope so,” replied my sister. “Do you fit for bra sizes?”
“Yes, we do,” answered Ms. Wilson.
“That’s great!” Sonia continued. “Sasha here has never been properly fitted and just wears my outgrown bras.”
“Well! We can’t have that now, can we?” Ms. Wilson exclaimed. “Come with me to the fitting room.”
“Do I have to?” I objected.
“Of course you do!” Sonia decreed, taking my hand and beckoning Tina in our direction. My sister continued, “Getting fit for your first bra is an important rite of passage for a girl.”
“Maybe for me that should be a wrong of passage, instead?” I quipped.
“Now you’re just being silly!” Sonia shot back to me, rolling her eyes. “But I’m still hoping your jokes get better from all this.”
I suddenly raised a hand to cover my mouth as I broke into giggles. Then Sonia kissed my left cheek as Ms. Wilson led us behind a curtain into a hallway. To the immediate left was a louvered, bat-wing double door, that opened to the fitting room. Tina rejoined us and kissed me on my right cheek. They all escorted me inside.
“Someone please remind me again,” I pled. “Why am I doing this?”
“Because you love us,” replied Tina.
“And because we love you,” added Sonia. “Remember, my dream has always been to share girlhood with you and for you to enjoy it, too.”
For some reason, whenever my sister reminded me of that, I felt calm and content with what I was doing. Deep down, I knew that the reason for all this, even the years of her teasing, was exactly what she’d told me. Being a girl was very important to her. That she felt a need to share it was, for her, a consequence of love; to do so, an act of charity. At first, I thought this was all about dressing up, but quickly I’ve found out that it’s more than, soft lingerie, pretty dresses, and high-heeled shoes. Rather, she’s giving me a lesson in how girls think and feel and treat one another. What really surprised me was yesterday afternoon, when I broke my fingernail, Sonia, Tina, and their girlfriends all gathered around me with concern. If they’d do that over a broken fingernail, I’d have no doubt that they’d close ranks around me should I need them.
“That sounds interesting,” observed Ms. Wilson, as the double doors swung closed behind her. “I mean that she wants to share girlhood with you. I thought maybe you had to be a girl for a school play.”
“No, it’s not for a school play,” I admitted. “My sister had teased me about dressing me up like a girl ever since I could remember. But when I found out why, I felt guilty because I hadn’t. She just wants me to have a good time doing it.”
“Well, are you?”
“Honestly?” Nodding, I affirmed, “I think I am. My sister, my girlfriend, and their friends are doing all they can to make sure of it.”
Ms. Wilson smiled at me as she brought a measuring tape out. “Unbutton your blouse, please,” she politely commanded, so I complied, my fingers fumbling the buttons and my face blushing. “If it helps, girls often feel embarrassed, too, when they get fitted the first time. It marks such a big change in a girl’s life.”
“It’s an even bigger change for a boy’s,” I replied to her.
She giggled at my observation. “Yes, it is,” Ms. Wilson confirmed. “But you’re not the first boy I’ve fitted for a bra, and I doubt you’d be the last. Besides, the reason you’re doing this is not something I’ve heard before, but it’s really sweet. Would you take your blouse off, please?”
I removed my blouse as slowly as I dared. Then before I knew it, Ms. Wilson had already unhooked the back of the training bra that I had borrowed from my sister to wear. “You should slip it off now,” she continued. “Again, Sasha, many girls have reacted to getting fitted just as you have. They’ve learned to keep their breasts intimate and private, so they feel much as you seem to be right now. If you feel embarrassed revealing yours, that’s okay. It’s quite a natural response and very common. Now raise your arms, please.”
I complied and Anne Wilson deftly wrapped the measuring tape around my chest, just above the solar plexus. “Now, hands behind your head,” she continued. This time, she took the tape around right at the top of my underarms. “One more measurement,” announced Ms. Wilson. She wrapped the tape around me, right across the tips of my nipples.
Next, she draped her tape measure over a peg on the wall and then picked a clipboard and a pencil up. She wrote a few numbers and jotted other notes down as well.
“Hmm…?” Ms. Wilson pondered to herself. “I wonder if—I know! Sasha, wait here a moment.” She darted out of the room. Sonia and Tina stepped inside immediately after she had left. Instinctively, I held the blouse over my naked chest to cover myself. My sister and my girlfriend just stared wide-eyed at me and then to each other, open-mouthed, as if to gasp.
“What?” I asked, sensing that they were thinking a shared thought.
“Sasha, we’ve both seen you bare-chested before,” Tina reminded me.
“All the time,” added Sonia. “Even today.”
“So?” I challenged them.
“You covered right up when we came in,” remarked Tina. “Like, to be modest.”
“And you did so apparently without even thinking about it,” exposited my sister further. “You’ve never been bashful about your chest before. “So, we think you’re more a girl than you realize.”
I looked down at my sister’s soft, satin blouse that I was still holding across my chest. Suddenly, my cheeks felt warm: I was blushing again.
“That’s so sweet, Sasha!” Tina squealed, embracing me. Now I had felt her soft hands on my naked back before, but this time they felt as soft and smooth as the satin blouse which I continued to hold across my nipples. My girlfriend pressed her lips to mine and my body reminded me that, no matter how deeply I blushed, nor how many dresses, skirts, and satin blouses I wore, nor how sexy the lingerie I might wear under them, nor how high I teetered atop my shoes, in that one way that still mattered, I was still very much a boy. And I knew that I could be satisfied with that.
Just then, Ms. Wilson reappeared at the door, holding two or three bras. “Alright, young ladies, out!” she addressed Tina and Sonia. “It’s too crowded in here. Get out, now! Shoo!” She ushered them out of the fitting room. “Sasha, I’m going to try fitting you with this bra first. It’s called a push-up bra. If it fits you like I think it will…”
Ms. Wilson proceeded to fasten the tight push-up bra around my chest. She declared, “Yes! That’s perfect!” Then she turned me towards the full-length mirror to look at my own image. Then I glanced down at my chest. I couldn’t believe what I saw.
I had breasts.
“What—? How—?” I stammered, not even sure what question to ask. “Sonia! Tina! Come here!” I yelled, stunned, perplexed, and more than just a little frightened by my own reflection.
My girlfriend and sister rushed into the fitting room again. They just stared at me. “Omigosh!” Tina gasped. “You look like you have real breasts!”
“In a sense, they are his real breasts,” confirmed Ms. Wilson. “It is, in fact, his own real cleavage.”
“How did you do that?” Sonia asked her.
“When I measured his band-size, I noticed he had enough soft tissue in his chest,” answered Anne. “So, I used a push-up bra to exaggerate his cleavage.”
“So those aren’t padding or breast-forms?” Tina asked. “Just the push-up bra?”
“No, sweetheart!” I answered. “Such as these are, they’re all mine! But this brassiere is really tight.”
“That’s how it works,” explained Ms. Wilson. “It squeezes what you already have into the cups to create the illusion of larger breasts.”
“Well, at least it’s a consistent theme,” I remarked sotto voce in sarcasm.
“What’s that?” Ms. Wilson followed up.
“Illusion has been my theme for the week,” I said. “Things’ve seemed to me anything but real these past few days.”
“You look real enough to me,” Anne tried to encourage him.
“Thank you, but underneath all this, I’m still a boy,” I reminded her (and myself). “The girl before you is just an illusion created by a few others working together.”
“That’s not entirely true, Sasha,” my sister objected. “You do recall how you covered yourself up in here? You know? Only a few minutes ago? With the blouse?”
I wished that my sister were not so quick to remind me whenever I did something girly. It was getting hard enough to hold on to who I am. Yes, playing along with this was fun, but it was only for the weekend. I really thought that Sis and even Tina might have lost their perspective on that.
Once again, Ms. Wilson reached for her measuring tape. “Alright girls, you’ve had your peek,” she declared. “Out the door! It’s too crowded again. No, not you, Sasha! We have more to do.”
I began to leave because I thought that she had meant to include me as one of the girls. Or did she? She wrapped the measuring tape around me again, this time around the points where my newly pushed-up cleavage was at its maximum. “Sasha, you won’t need or want to wear the push-up bra all the time, but we want your inserts to look as natural as possible,” advised Ms. Wilson. “What your natural size appears to be with the push-up bra is about a B-cup, so I’ll give you the inserts to fill out your training bras to that size.”
Again, the collection of feminine items of lingerie to be purchased for me was mentioned in the plural. How much was there? Definitely, I couldn’t wear all this in just one weekend. And how much would all this cost, anyway? I knew one thing, though: I wasn’t paying for it from my allowance!
“Let me get this push-up off you,” Ms. Wilson said as she unhooked the bra’s fasteners behind me. “Next you can try the training bra with the inserts.” She left it for me to shed the brassiere while she continued other things.
She opened a drawer in a dresser against a side wall and took out a small carton, twice as long as wide but not very deep, bearing a picture of a demure teenaged girl wearing a brassiere. Then she brought out another box, cube-shaped, almost as wide as the longer one, bearing the same photograph of the pretty, smiling teen. Both boxes bore the label Becoming Woman® in an elegant, florid typeface. Only a moment was needed to understand the double entendre used for the product name. Then, reflecting a moment more, I caught yet a third meaning to flow from my own predicament. I was sure that the firm making and marketing these bras hadn’t counted on teenaged boys when forecasting sales, but I was also certain that they’d still appreciate the added business.
Ms. Wilson beckoned me over to the dresser, took the push-up bra from me, and laid it aside. Then she picked up the other bra from the box and one of the inserts. “I think this training bra is perfect for you,” she said. The clothier continued to explain while demonstrating, “The cup has an inner lining that forms a pocket for the insert. The inner linings are made of the same fabric as the cups, so you feel the bra, not the padding. That should feel much more pleasurable. You put the other one in.”
I did as instructed, noting how soft and smooth the fabric felt.
“That’s right!” Ms. Wilson approved. “Try it on now.”
I used the trick that Sonia had taught me, placing the cups in back, hooking the bra in front, spinning it around, and pulling the straps up over my arms. Ms. Wilson looked at me, shaking her head.
“What?” I queried.
“That’s not the right way to put a brassiere on,” she objected. “You’re cheating!”
“Cheating?”
“Yes, cheating!”
“So sue me!” I retorted indignantly. “I’ve only been wearing a bra for two days. “Besides, that’s how my sister showed me to put it on.”
“I know it’s not so easy at first, but the proper technique is to put your arms through the straps, pull the cups to your chest, and hook it behind you,” she explained. “It may take some practice, but it’s really simpler than what you just did. It’s just a matter of getting used to where the hooks are.”
What Ms. Wilson said made sense to me, although I’m not too concerned if I’ve put my brassiere on correctly. If I really had to worry about it fitting my breasts, maybe I’d think more about it, but as it was, it didn’t matter.
Or so I thought.
While I had been in the fitting room with Ms. Wilson, Sonia and Tina had been putting together a small, basic collection of lingerie for me to wear. Knowing the sizes to get, they had begun to gather matching bra and panty sets, camisoles, boy-shorts, slips, half-slips, and sleepwear. Of course, they had also been selecting more than a few such garments for themselves. After all, I had noted signs around the shop displaying a range of markdowns on a variety of items.
When Anne Wilson and I emerged from the fitting room, Sis and Tina met me with handheld shopping baskets laden with their choice of lingerie for me and themselves. Giggling, they presented me one basket, already filled with their recommendations.
“Again,” I observed, “these seem a lot more than I’m going to need.”
“A girl can never have too much lingerie,” remarked Ms. Wilson.
“That’s what everyone’s been telling me about shoes all morning,” I told her.
“Well, it’s true,” Sonia assured me. “For both lingerie and shoes.”
“I just can’t shake the feeling that I already have more girls’ clothing than I’ll ever need,” I complained.
“It’s not that much, Sasha,” replied Tina. “We ought to’ve bought you more before the wedding.”
I smiled at Tina and glanced down at my left hand. Please, not this again! There they were—my wedding rings. Tina and I both wore matching sets of a diamond engagement ring and interlocking wedding band. This set seemed normal, somehow, for a couple like her and myself, but only within my hallucination. Anyway, I was fairly certain that I had to be hallucinating again. Although my manicure was now the same inside and outside the hallucination, I noticed that something else was different. While I remembered wearing new two-inch (5 cm) heeled pumps out of Gentle Souls®, I now teetered atop four-inch (10 cm) heels, and my skirt was just as short as Tina’s and Sonia’s were. But strangely enough, I felt accustomed to what I was wearing.
“I hope we’re all ready for a break, now,” I whinged. “I need to eat something. And I think my chest is itchy from fitting all the bras.”
Tina intertwined her left hand fingers with my right. “Sasha, I don’t think fitting a brassiere is why you’re itching,” she said.
“Then what do you think it is?” I quizzed her.
“Exactly what it ought to be,” my girlfriend/wife answered, reaching into her purse and withdrawing a squeezable tube of some kind of medical cream. “I’d been expecting this any day,” said Tina, handing me the tube. Smiling, she whispered in my ear, “You’re growing a pair, now.”
©2013, 2017 by Anam Chara.