A Day at the Races
A Vignette
By Maryanne Peters

There was a bunch of us, and we all talked about entering the racecourse fashion contest at the Summer Carnival Horse Race. You might know the thing – there are prizes for the best dressed man and the best dressed woman. It was just that I was not going to spend the money on a new suit, let alone one that was mauve or mustard and I would wear only once. The guys talked about swapping suits which was OK for some, but I was too small.

“With that beautiful hair of yours you could swap outfits with one of us instead,” said one of the girls. I just laughed. It was a joke – right?

Rick said – “That’s a great idea. In these times they can’t disqualify a guy from competing with women if he wants to. You can wear one of last year’s outfits if you can get into it. You won’t even need a wig.”

My hair was fair too, but not like it is in the picture. That needed special shampoo and conditioner, and hairspray and lacquer after it had been styled. I told myself that it was a joke, which is why I am smiling. I skipped around in the dress and heels and played with the beads around my neck. I was trying to make light of it.

But the girls were not in the same mood. I remember being told – “This is a serious prize and we are all in to win it so we can share, so don’t embarrass us by telling everybody you are not really a girl. You had better get your walk and your talk right before we get to the racecourse. After that, it will be just like the horses on the track for us – it is all about winning.”

And the truth is that I started to realize that I had a chance. I mean I really did look good. My body shape was largely artificial thanks to corseting and padding, but my legs are long and my face and hair looked just about perfect. I put on my best show, and strutted myself in front of the adoring fans.

I won the prize and it was 20 hair and beauty treatments for a whole year. It was perfect for all the girls to share, but it would not have been right if I did not take my turn – perhaps a little more for having been the winner.

As it happens, I think being a pretty girl quite suits me. What do you think?

After my last free treatment next week Rick has offered to keep paying for them, subject to me being exclusively his. What do you think about that?!

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2023

A Different Life
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

Three Weeks After

Doctor Gillies steepled his fingers. It was not a gesture he did often – not anymore. He had done his stint in general surgery, but now that he had found his niche he understood that he needed to be more empathetic. He was, in the main. But now was the time for plain talking. This patient, Alex, needed to be told.

“Clearly you have been through a major trauma. Testicular cancer is serious and the loss of your testicles and the corpus cavernosa must be devastating, but what you are proposing to do from here is more than ill-advised, it is impossible.”

“Why”, Alex asked in apparent surprise.

“You concede that you are not transgendered. SRS is available only to transgendered people. I cannot be part of a treatment that is not appropriate. SRS regret is a real thing. People who are not transgender and even a few who are, regret what they have done. They decide that the wanted to father children, or have a penis to use in sex. We need to be very clear that only those people who are genuinely transgender get this kind of surgery.

“I understand that you are the best, Doc,” said Alex. “I will sign a release.”

“This is not just about liability. It is contrary to the Hippocratic oath. Heal and do no harm.”

“The harm has been done, Doc. I am no longer a man. I never will be. But the good news is that looking back on my life, I don’t want to be a man. I want another life. A different life.”

“Your oncologist will have explained to you the options for remedial surgery. We can do something to retore limited sexual function. We can certainly building you a penis to urinate with – something that will look very close to the real thing.”

“You are not listening, Dr. Gillies. That is not what I want. It is not just that I cannot be a father, and probably not much of a husband either, it is that I don’t want to be either of those. Not now. My life has taken a turn. I am not going backwards. I want to go forwards.”

“I am not sure what you expect of yourself. Do you think that you can just put on a dress and pretend to be what you are not? Some genuine transwomen find that difficult. Or perhaps you think that you can just walk around with a vagina in your pants – I can’t think why.”

“No. I want to leave my life as a man completely behind me?”

“I don’t understand why you would want to, but the point is that is not easy to adapt, as others have discovered.”

“You don’t understand because you are a man,” Alex said.

“So are you.” It was short and flat. It would hurt somebody who was truly transgendered. Dr. Gillies watched for a reaction, but none came.

“Not without intervention as I see it. You say that I should go this way, but I want to go the other way. This is not me being impetuous. I have given this a lot of thought.”

“Explain then. Because I will not be performing this surgery on you. Not with what I know about you.”

“As I said, I am at a crossroads. It has allowed me to look back at who I was, and what I have done. I find that there is little that I am proud of. I pursued my career with no thought for anybody else. I pushed people away who wanted to show me a better way. I competed with no regard for the losses of others. I was only interested in personal victories. And my relationships were the same. Just conquests, without the complications of relationships. So what does that sound like to you?”

“I assume that you are going to tell me.” It was more or less a sneer.

“It is called being a man,” said Alex. “Everything I did, I did because I am a man. How do I put things right?”

“People can change without changing their sex.”

“I have not taken the male hormones. I flushed them. I don’t want them. Without them, and without the balls that produced them before they were cut away, I have found peace.”

“You are free to live as a eunuch. This is no longer a binary world. Treat yourself as inter-sexed. You can be who you are without pretending to be a woman.”

“But I don’t want to be different. I want to live a normal life, not as some crusader for gender neutrality. I want to live as a woman. I want to wear women’s clothes and present myself as a woman. Because women do things the right way as far as I am concerned.”

“How so?” asked Doctor Gillies. “I am a man, as you have said. But I am not like the person you describe that you were.”

“I want to succeed in the right way. I want to work in a team as women do. I want to take pleasure in being attractive, and not just successful. I want relationships”.

“With women, I assume?”

“Why would that matter? Do you care what goes into the vaginas that you build?”

“No. I just care that those vaginas belong where I put them.”

“I see,” said Alex. “You seem to have made up your mind about me.”

“I am afraid that even if you came back to me next week with psychologists certificates that you were a legitimate transsexual I would probably not believe them. Such people have always had gender dysphoria. You concede that you had none before your recent surgery. You have put your position forcefully, but it has no merit. You will need to look elsewhere.”

Three Years After

The plane was filling up. The aisle seat next to Dr. Gillies was empty, and as people boarded he hoped it might stay that way. That is, until she stepped on. She was tall wearing a tailored suit of a skirt above the knee and a shaped jacket to display her curves, and under it a blouse that showed her cleavage. Her long legs were shaped by heels of quality. Her hair was up in a big loose bun, her makeup perfect … he found himself hoping that she would place her bag above him.

Then she did.

“It’s Dr. Gillies, Isn’t it?” she smiled. His heart leapt.

“I am sorry, have we met?”

“Several years ago,” she said. Her round bottom eased itself into the seat beside him as if tempting him to fondle it. “Clearly you don’t remember.”

“Were you a patient of mine?” he asked.

“No,” she said. He was relieved.

“Of course not. If you were I am sure I would have realized it? Perhaps you know that I have an area of specialization. You would have no need to call upon me. Perhaps we have met socially?”

“No.” She fastened her seatbelt. Her breasts jiggled. The doctor’s loins became momentarily discomforted.

“So please remind me,” he said. He was not up for twenty questions.

“I was Alex. You may remember that you turned me down as a patient. I had to go elsewhere. I actually went to Korea for my procedures. It all turned out very well, so no harm done.”

“I remember,” he said. He felt deflated. He would endlessly assure his patients that after a full recovery from surgery they should consider themselves as true women, although with a sterility that needed to be explained to prospective partners. But he himself had never been able to shake the thought that these people were just surgically modified me. He had hoped that she was not one. When she said that she was not a patient, he could not restrain his desire rising. Now it had crashed to the ground.

“You will pleased to hear that I have adapted fully,” she said. “I love being a woman. I have a job where nobody knows that I was not always one. I enjoy the clothes, having my hair done, being admired. I have had wonderful relationships, all with men – perhaps that surprises you?”

“I am surprised,” he said, glumly.

“I have friendships too, as I never could when I was Alex. I am nothing like him. He was awful. I am so glad that he is lost to the world. I think that I am a better addition.”

There was no denying that. The doctor found himself nodding. The world needed beauty, and she was that. She was prattling on just as women do. She was delightful.

“That man was a brute,” she continued. “He was so selfish. Only a woman can truly understand. He was good at what he did, but what he did was not good.”

“I am glad that you have found happiness,” he said. The sparkle in her eyes was captivating.

“I know that you have helped a lot of women so I don’t want to be overly critical, but can I just say this: You are a man, and like most men you think that you know what is best for women, when you don’t. All those years ago you tried to tell me what I should be thinking without ever trying to understand me.”

She was clearly annoyed. But more than that, she was beautiful.

“Are you seeing anyone at the moment?” The words seemed so out of place.

“Typical man,” she snarled. “Trying to disarm me in the middle of a battle.”

“I thought it was a discussion?”

“No,” she said. No what? “No, I’m not in a relationship at the moment.”

“I never meet socially with patients, as a rule, but as you pointed out, you were never a patient of mine. I would like to take you out to dinner.”

“Would that be by way of apology for refusing my request all those years ago?”

“No,” he said. “I have suddenly discovered that I really don’t know enough about my subject. I always thought that I could recognize the woman inside, but now I understand that I have failed, in at least one instant.”

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2021

A Family Mystery
A Vignette
By Maryanne Peters

I found this picture in the attic just before Grandma died. She wanted me to bring down some photos of her in her youth, but this one seemed much older. She recognized it immediately.

“That is my grandmother’s brother,” she said. “I know it is hard to believe, but that pretty young thing is a young man.”

I needed to know more. I was deeply fascinated by the image even without hearing about who it was.

“Well, his name was Beverly. I know that sounds like a girl’s name, but back at the beginning of the 20th century it was used exclusively for boys. I think that she carried the same middle name as you – “Bethnel” after the settler ship that brought our family here. And there is clearly a family resemblance.”

Was there? Beverly was skinny like me, but she had that beautiful hair pinned up on her head, which looked that it might fall loose around her shoulders with the slightest shake of her head. What would it be like to have hair like that?

“What happened to her?” I asked. “Did she cut her hair and live out her life as a man?” I could not help but use the feminine pronoun.

“What choice would she have?” said Grandma. “I think that she was only young here, before a beard would appear. Children wore their hair long in those days, while in the care of their mothers, but when the time came it would have to be cut. But he had no sister, so perhaps this was just a flight of fancy – to dress as a girl and pose for a photograph. I just know that this image was treasured. Perhaps he died young?”

“Perhaps he ran away?” I am not sure why I said it. I had an image in my head of Beverly running through a field, hair flying, and screaming out the words “I am free, and I am a woman!” But grandma was right – that might be possible now, but not then.

“Can I hang onto it for a while?” I asked.

“Keep it,” she said. “You know as much as I do, so Beverley is alive in a memory. I have heard it said that people die twice – once when the soul leaves the body, and a second time with the death of the last person who knew them.”

It was an interesting thought, and I suppose it justified Grandma throwing out a lot of photographs that day – photographs of people she didn’t recognize so it seemed nobody would. They are just faded gray images on cardboard with no meaning.

But I wanted to know more about Beverly Bethnel Harvey, more so because I had placed her image on the desk in my room, so I Googled her. There was nothing. I was not surprised.

Still the image seemed to call out to me. I started to wonder about the family likeness thing, and I went to some effort to set up my phone to catch me in an identical pose, with a band around my head and a top thrown together using a sheet. I could see a hint of something, but it seemed that if I was going to perfect the image of me as Beverly then I would have to grow my hair.

Other things intervened but the image stayed on my desk. I remember that my friend Tom visited my room and asked who that was, and I said – “That is an ancestor of mine – Beverly Harvey. Family have said that I look like her. Do you think I do?”

“She is pretty,” said Tom.

I pulled a sheet over my tee-shirt and found that I could pull my longer hair back and up. I said – “What do you think now? Take an image on your phone.”

He did. He said – “Yeah, that’s weird. You look like a Victorian era young lady.” He was smirking. But I saw the image on his phone, and it was weird – I looked just like her. I asked him to send me a copy.

I went back to Google and played around. If she had dropped our surname Harvey then would she keep the other names? The combination of those two seemed uncommon enough.

Actually, there were a lot of Beverlys in old New England, all men, but not many carried the name Bethnel. And there was one person who made me think that I had found my relative. There was a Bethnel Beverly McIntosh, know to everyone as Beth, who would be the right age. Except this person was a married woman. She had married James Coll McIntosh about 5 years after the date on the back of the photograph, and he had been a very successful builder of important buildings in our city. They never had children. They died in the same year of old age.

I found a photo of them. They were old but she still looked good. People look serious in photos of those times, but it was clear to me that they were happy. I could see that it could be her, so I decided that it was. Somehow, she had managed to live a life as a woman, and it had been a fulfilling and happy life. It was an example that could be followed.

After my own surgery I changed my name to Beverly, so we share a name, but my husband Tom and most of our friends, call me Beth.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2023
932

A Friend when Needed
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

Tad looked suddenly very serious. The game was long over and the last two pieces of pizza had gone cold. Beer had been drunk: enough to lower the inhibitions but not enough to drop them both into a stupor. He looked at Jason, squarely in the eyes.

“I can trust you, man,” he said, “I know I can. We’ve been true pals for so long that I feel I can tell you anything. I can, can’t I?”

Jason understood that the conversation was serious. He knew that Tad had broken up with his girlfriend Kellie, and he assumed that it was about that. Even when you are drunk, you can appreciate when gravity is called for.

“Of course you can,” said Jason. “That’s the way things are between us. Friends since pre-school, remember?”

Tad took one more slug from his beer bottle. He needed to collect himself.

“I’m a sick man,” he said.

“Hey, man, what is it?” Jason was concerned. “Is it serious? Is it cancer?”

“No. Sometimes I think that would be better,” said Tad. “No, I’m sick in the head … or sick in the balls. I’ve been seeing a shrink for the last couple years. I’ve been too ashamed to talk about it with anybody… even you.”

Jason was surprised. “What’s wrong with you, man? You seem OK to me.”

“Paraphilic disorders, is what the shrink says it is,” said Tad, putting his head in his hands. “Perverted sexual desires that are taking control of my life. It’s just getting worse and worse. The doctor says that I’ll need treatment to find a way through it.”

“Hey. Hey, I’m here for you, man,” said Jason. “What kind of desires are we talking about? Like nothing illegal, I hope.”

“I’ve started to do anti-social things, so that is a problem,” said Tad. “But I can’t function sexually without feeding my desires. That’s why Kellie left. I was so upset when she went. I just did my best to stay tough, but without her, it’s even worse. I can get into real trouble.”

“So, what do you need to do, or think about? Like whipping or shit like that? Or is it something gay?”

“No,” said Tad, seemingly offended. “Women are my weakness. Women’s clothing, underwear, pantyhose, shoes and hair. I’m just so fascinated by this stuff that I can’t function. I have to see it, watch, feel it, smell it, touch it, jack off over it. It’s driving me crazy. I am crazy.”

“Everyone likes a pretty girl,” said Jason. “What’s wrong with looking at girls’ stuff?”

“You don’t understand,” said Tad. Jason could see that he was distraught. “I buy this stuff, or I steal it from shops or clotheslines. I can’t control myself. I stole stuff from Kellie. She couldn’t handle it. I can understand why. I’m a freak.”

“Hey calm down, pal. This doctor of yours, he said that there’s treatment?”

“Oh, yes, there’s treatment. Sexual suppression. Effectively chemical castration. And denial of temptation. The doctor said that I need support people, but there’s only you. I don’t need a woman. Maybe that’s the problem. I need a friend. Would you be able to help me? That’d work. Would you consider moving in as my roommate to help me through this?”

Jason had always thought that Tad’s inner-city apartment was fantastic. That was where they were sitting, because Tad had a 65 inch TV and full sound system. Jason’s place was a dive across town and his laptop was the only TV. What harm would be done by him helping his friend out? He could spend a few weeks living in luxury. But was he really doing the right thing? Or for the right reasons?

They both worked in IT and could work from Tad’s apartment. Tad was already doing that, and had been for some time. That just allowed him greater freedom to engage in his fetishes. Jason could arrange it. He would be in the city for deliveries. He could help his friend and get some good work done outside the hot-desking, confused environment of his present workspace.

“If you need me, man, I am here for you,” Jason said. “But are you really doing the right thing? I mean, chemical castration sounds very serious. It has the word castration in it.”

“It’s just to stop the sex drive,” said Tad. “It’s not permanent. Therapy hasn’t worked. Anti-obsession drugs haven’t worked. This is what it comes down to. I have to do something. I’ve already had the shots. I just need somebody to make sure that I don’t relapse. I need to get over this thing – the paraphilic thing.”

Jason agreed to stay with Tad. Still, he remained uncertain. It worried him that Tad had been able to keep this internal turmoil from him, or that he had not been more of a friend so as to notice it. And he had never heard of paraphilic disorders. Were fetishes really that bad?

“Maybe you should just get rid of the stuff that you bought,” he said to Tad. “The female clothes and stuff?”

But Tad said that some of it was not his. He could not throw it out, but it should be placed out of reach. So, instead of the dumpster, there was a trunk of stuff put in what was for now Jason’s room (the spare room in Tad’s apartment) and Tad entrusted the only key to him.

“I can’t steal anything from outside,” said Tad. “If I can’t control myself, I’ll come to you. But please say no to me. I need to overcome this.”

Tad’s second PC was moved next to his work one, on the desk by the window in the living room. If Tad felt the urge to surf online to feed his urges, he could not do it from there. His cellphone was the other option so it was agreed that this could stay on the desk as well, when he was in his room. Even taking porn the old-fashioned way, with magazines, was not a possibility. As agreed, Jason would check his room for offending material from time to time.

But according to Tad, the drugs were quickly taking effect. He told Jason that he had been masturbating a minimum of 5 times a day before the drugs, and now he was not jacking off at all. Within a week, he was reporting how calm he felt.

Jason was noticing the changes too, but not in his sexual behavior. There was no doubt that the old Tad could be described as intense, whereas the drug-affected Tad was placid and gentle. These characteristics and his general inclination towards organization and tidiness made him an excellent roommate, or rather, host. Jason paid only nominal rent. He was doing Tad a favor, and Tad knew that. He bought all the food and cooked meals for them both. Because of the person he was, or perhaps the person he was becoming, it was Tad who attended to most household chores.

One Saturday, Tad approached Jason to say that he was ready to go out. “We’ll go and catch that game and grab a few beers on the way home,” he suggested.

Jason was ready for it. He was beginning to feel like a jailer working 24/7. Tad seemed over things.

They watched the game from high in the stands, but close to the end, Jason noticed that Tad was hardly looking at the game at all.

“It seems like even with the treatment, you still can’t stop checking out the pussy,” he said.

“Who would wear that to a game?” Tad was pointing out some scantily dressed girl.

“Somebody who’s so hungry for a fuck, she doesn’t mind the cold,” suggested Jason.

At the bar afterwards, Tad was checking out the women, but seemed more interested in what they were wearing. Jason thought it strange, but he was glad that Tad was not chasing tail. What was he supposed to do if he did? Stop him? Tell her that the guy was a sex addict trying to shake his problem?

Tad was not even drinking beer. For some reason, he had started to drink wine. He was more than a little drunk when they got home.

“I could dress better than those bitches,” said Tad. “Let’s get some of the stuff out of the trunk and I’ll show you. Come on. I’m not going to masturbate over it. I haven’t had an erection for days. It’s just to show you something.”

It was something that Jason did not understand anyway. He could not fathom why somebody would be interested in a set of women’s underwear without a woman wearing it. Still, if Tad was going to wear it, he would not be jacking off over it. He let him take out the pink set and also a pair of black heels and a short dress in a houndstooth pattern. Tad went into the bathroom and locked the door.

Jason sat down to watch the replay of the game on TV. Some time went by and then Jason realized that it was almost midnight. Tad had been in the bathroom for over an hour.

“Hey, Tad,” he said, banging on the door. “You better not be jacking off in there. That’d be a big backward step man, what with all the work you’ve put in, and the drugs and everything.”

“Get back on the couch, Jase,” said Tad through the door, somehow sounding very different.

Jason shrugged and went back to his seat.

The door opened and somebody stepped out of the bathroom, but it was not Tad.

“I got a bit carried away.” The voice, the same voice that Jason had heard through the door, did not seem to be Tad’s either, now coming from this stranger’s mouth. But Jason knew that the woman standing before him in that dress, was Tad.

Instead of the hair combed back off the forehead kept solid with product, all that had been washed out and the hair brushed across, concealing one eye. But the visible eye was made up to perfection, and the eyebrow shaped. And the lips of this vision were painted to perfection, appearing to invite Jason to kiss them.

The short dress showed long smooth legs that would rival the legs of any woman Jason had ever seen, on top of those black heels.

“Why?” That was the word that left Jason’s mouth. Not “What are you doing?” or even “Who are you?”

“I’ve been watching women all night,” she said, “but I haven’t been desiring them. I’ve been watching other people looking at them – desiring them. I want that. This isn’t a sexual thing. I’m over that. It’s an emotional thing. I want people to want me. That’s what I miss. Or maybe I never really had that. It was always me wanting what they had. I’m not sure that anybody has really wanted me.”

She seemed momentarily sad, but then visibly shook herself out of that feeling, as if preparing for action.

“If I thought your paraphilia thing was weird, this is super weird,” said Jason. But what was even stranger was that the erection stirring in his pants as she walked over to the door.

“Let’s go out,” she said. She put on Tad’s black jacket over the dress. Somehow on her it looked feminine, just short of the hem of the dress and making the legs look even longer. She looked at him as she had before. It was a look that invited lust.

“It’s after midnight,” Jason said.

“Take me out or take me to bed,” the creature demanded. She walked right up to Jason now sitting up. He could smell scent on her. It seemed to be driving Jason crazy. He stood up. In her heels they were face to face. Nose to nose. That close.

“This is crazy,” Jason observed.

“What’s crazy?” she asked. He could feel her breath; smell her hair; see a little moisture in her eye; a little tremble on her lips.

“What I’m feeling right now,” Jason replied, looking into her eyes. He was still looking, and she was staring back, as he felt her hand cup his swelling crotch; even while he felt her unbuckle his belt so that his pants could fall, and she could take his cock in both hands. Both those hands were needed, given the size of it at that point.

“What are we going to do with this?” she said.

“I hope you’re going to blow me,” said Jason. It would have seemed outrageous at any other time, to be sucked off by any man, let alone by his best friend, but by this point Jason’s balls were doing the thinking and he knew it.

“Not that,” she said. “This isn’t about sex. I told you: I’m through with that. This is about something else. Maybe even love. I want to look at you and for you to look at me.”

“I like looking at you,” Jason said. He pushed a lock of the hair from her face, and it seemed to double her beauty. And before he knew what was happening, he was kissing her. It was not a violent and hungry kiss, although it could well have been. It was a tender kiss, with his tongue gently penetrating, and her yielding to him.

It was right, and they both knew it.

“I can take you,” she said. “I promise you that you won’t have to see any part of me that you don’t like. Just keep looking in my eyes. I’m stretched and lubricated. I want you inside me.”

She shuffled backwards, still holding him by the cock, through the door to his room. Her tongue was wetting his face, her hot breath making the moistness warm.

“We can put a pillow under my butt,” she said.

Jason was barely listening. His eyes were feasting on hers. His senses of touch and smell and taste heightened by intense desire. She was underneath him now, guiding his cock towards her tightness.

Then he was inside her, and she was his, whimpering with hunger for him – the sound only a woman could make, so he thought. There was no Tad anymore. There was only her, with her body rolling gently with every stroke of his hips.

And with that squeal, as he groaned with more pleasure than he had ever known, they both knew it.

She was cured.

The End

© Maryanne Peters, 2020

A Pearl Among Women
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

“I suppose that I will have to tell you everything then,” she said with a sigh.

“Only if you want to,” he said. “But come back to bed. When you are back in my arms you can tell me anything you like. You know I will listen.”

“You listeners are rare among men,” she said, waving a scolding finger at him. But she flipped the covers and slipped back to where she had laid before.

He put his arms around her and pulled her towards him. Before she had come into his life, he had been alone for a while, and he now felt that he did not want to be alone like that again. He said in response – “Pearls like you are rare among women.”

He could feel her wriggle a little in the delight of his words. He pulled her closer.

“You may not believe this, but I never wanted to be a woman,” she began. “It just ended out that way. I was a man like many men I knew and have known since. To be blunt, my balls were in my brain, or my brain was in my balls. I was led by my sex drive not by reason. It made me burn the candle at both ends, or even live in the fire simply because I liked it hot. I apologize for the metaphor salad.” She turned to look at him.

“I am still listening,” he said. She was not a young woman anymore, but she had a youthful innocence about her that he loved. It made her even more beautiful in his eyes.

“I was bound to get burnt. I was bound to wrong the wrong woman, and I did. Or rather, I wronged the wrong husband. He could have killed me, but he wanted me to live and to suffer. He maimed me. He told me he was going to take away the cause of the problem. It was done surgically to keep me alive. It was my good fortune that the surgeon who did it, had done such surgeries before. Sex reassignment or gender confirmation, whatever you call it, he did a good job. A complete job.”

She reached down to run a finger past the nubbin that had been left and as she felt it respond to her touch she smiled with satisfaction.

“The husband said that he was not interested in keeping me as a prisoner beyond the time it took for me to recover, but he told me that if he ever saw me dressed as a man he would kill me, and after what he had done to me, this was a man whose threats had to be believed,” she said. “I had a choice – follow his orders or kill myself. Believe me, the second seemed the better option. At the beginning I could not imagine myself as a woman anymore that I could imagine myself as a snail. But the need to live is built in, don’t you think? Or I lacked courage? Anyway, I decided to play the hand I had been dealt.”

She turned to him again and played a little with a lock of her hair. It was long but it carried strands of grey that may well have been a hairdressers special ploy in making her face seem even more youthful – especially with the coy smile she now gave him. But she turned away again to speak to the air.

“It seemed to me that there were men dressed as woman all over the place. It surprises nobody these days. And the world and the web are full of advice about how to cope with it. But there was one thing that I knew already – it’s always easier for a pretty woman, so I needed to be one of them. I invested in a bit more surgery and skin and hair treatments. I had the rough edges ground off and did my best to turn a rock into a gemstone. What do you think?” She looked back at him again showing him the smooth line of her very feminine jaw.

“A pearl is not a gemstone,” he said, smiling.

“To be physically a woman is only half way,” she said. “I had to work at this. Women were the ones I needed to convince. I may well have said that I had no need of women now that I had become one, but they are all over the place, so you do have to fit in.”

“You knew that you would never be a lesbian despite the fact that you had only loved women before that?” he asked, genuinely curious.

“Good God, no!” she said. “I have never liked lesbians. Why would I want to be one? Besides women can be so demanding and moody. I never liked them much except for fucking, and that was over for me. And besides, I understand men, and I like their company so much more.”

“So, you understand me?”

“I mean I understand men in general. I know the women that men like. Women like me. Women who love fun and love sex, but can be intelligent and sociable as required. And a man likes a classy woman who adores him, or at least who his friends can see that she adores him. I can be that woman.”

“And so there have been a string of men?”

“I have climbed the ladder. I learned early that I would not need a job so long as I had a man who wanted to give me things. And men do – what to give things to a lady. Successful men want the woman they want but they don’t always have time to charm her. They will pay for her attention, or pay even more if they have let her down or stood her up. Men thing that material things are more important than feelings. The material girl is a not a common species, but I am one of them, probably because I am relatively new to this sex.”

“Not that new, from what you tell me,” he sniggered.

“Don’t push it, Buddy,” she scolded him again playfully. “I look after myself. I need to. But I also have a reputation now and I will not slide back. Every man who has taken me as his mistress has been richer and more powerful than the one before them.”

“But not me?” he asked.

“You I wanted,” she said. “You are an impressive man – older than me but fit and firm. I knew that you would be great in bed, and you were. I suspect that you are wealthy enough, but probably not sufficiently spellbound to part with the cash needed to keep me in the style I require. So, for you, I have this story to tell. I am sorry, kind Sir, but the woman you have just pleasured was born a man!”

“And every man you say that to, storms off in disgust?”

“You get the idea,” she said, smugly, wriggling into him a little.

“And yet here I am, holding you in my arms, and with my penis swelling again,” he said.

“Is it? Oh, it is!” He felt her hand find it and squeeze it. “You are a surprise. Somebody who will take me as I am. Ok, I am up for another roll in the hay.”

“I am too, but what if I want more?” he said.

“What are you talking about?” She rolled over onto him, looking at him face to face only inches apart, her porcelain breasts crushed against his hairy chest.

“You know men who live for sex. You were one yourself. The kind of man that wants an uncomplicated woman who also wants sex, but without a true relationship. Now you are that kind of woman. You live like a man’s view of a woman. But when those men grow old there was always be a woman for them. Who will be there for you?”

“Maybe I will have to turn to lesbianism after all?” she said cheerily. She reached down between her legs again and added – “But I have learned to love real cock too much, I think.”

“I mean it,” he said. “I have found a pearl and I want her to be mine.”

“You would be happy with just one pearl?” she said, looking into his eyes. There was something in them that was different. She had seen all kinds of desire in the eyes of partners before. Desire stronger that the man she had been had ever seen in any woman’s eyes, but this was something different. Could it be love? Could she be looking at the future she had been placing beyond her thoughts all these years?

She rolled pulling him over on top of her.

“Come on, then,” she said. “Pearls tend to roll away unless they are mounted.”

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2022

Erin’s seed: “Feminized by force she understands men as few women can. She moves from man to man with a richer one each time. She's a pearl, one of her lovers tells her, but after she leaves him. She does not love her new patrons - “but a girl has to live, doesn’t she?””

Important Note to my followers, fans and correspondents:
I took a holiday, and for various reasons I delayed my return to writing, but Erin keeps on throwing ideas at me! But one reason for delay is that google have shut me out of my gmail, so I have no access to my edited material! Please excuse errors in this story. What I would like is for all those who have been in touch in the past or who have my email, to send me a private message with their address (all are lost) so that we can stay in touch.
On a side note, does anybody know how I can get my gmail back? A "verify that you are really you" message came up giving the only option as my back email, which now has a 2 step verification using the gmail I can't access. It is very frustrating, but I have had a spare gmail for some time - I must ensure that recovery is through my phone!

A Special Kind of Revenge
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

It never ceases to amaze me that there is such a demand for my services – my very specific services. This particular client may have you believe that I cater for those who seek revenge, but I would suggest that most of my clients have more admirable motives. They may wish to eliminate male-oriented bad behaviour, or simply prefer that a family member be female rather than male, or they may even see some subconscious or suppressed desire that needs something stronger than suggestion to be brought to a proper fruition.

Compulsion is not a word that I like, but it is stronger than suggestion, or even persuasion. But however we phrase it, modern medicine and pharmacology has given us so many operative tools that can effect a change of character, in particular in impressionable young men.

But the canvas is not blank, and it needs to be. There is work to be done to scrape off or even dig out, the deep-seated male traits before feminization can begin. Whitewashing will not do. That is just on the surface. There must be neutralization, or neutering would be a better term. The starting point must be castration. And while you are at it, penectomy and vaginoplasty mean you do not have to go back for a second surgery. All surgery is expensive and inherently dangerous. Go in once and do the lot.

I am sure there are those who think that the complete sex-change should be kept until last, but in my experience, it is better to dispose of the key obstructions as soon as possible. Breasts and hair need time to grow. Skin condition too, needs months to achieve the optimum state. But even substantial genital surgery can heal quickly if done properly, and the finality of it does wonders in eliminating the prospect of walking back the changes that must be made. And breasts, hair and skin improve so much more, and more quickly, in the absence of male chemistry.

I recall this particular client because they were two brothers quite close in age. In many ways I prefer handling enforced transitions in groups of two or three, so that candidates can be witness to the changes in others as well as themselves. It helps them to face the reality sooner. If there is to be any angst, it can be shared. A realization of inevitability by one, will assist in acceptance by the others. In short, paired or grouped subjects can work well.

It is not the first time I have had brothers too. Only a year or so ago a mother sent me her two very unpleasant sons and was happy to get two delightful daughters back six months later – or was it an aunt and her nephews? No matter.

These boys were certainly a nasty pair. Even after surgery I needed to resort to heavy doses of drugs to keep them calm and placid. That is not something I like to do. I prefer those who tend to come to the recognition of their new status as quickly as possible, and drugs do not assist with that. As I have said, they need to face the new reality. They are no longer men. They have the bodies and chemistry of the female sex, and they can live with it or choose another fate.

It may sound cruel, but for some death seems preferable. Still, all surgery has risks.

I consider such women – for that is what they are – to be very sad and foolish. But depression is hard to treat, and stupidity virtually incurable. All I can do is to point out to the newly converted, that life is a wonderful thing, but life as a woman is even better.

I should know, you see. I was a man once. A truly horrid experience.

But returning to this young pair of brothers: In that case my client was not relative but apparently a schoolmate of the subjects. He was a rather intense young man, of doubtless intellect but a clear inferiority complex. The victim of bullying by the brothers in question, is my guess.

But his psyche is of no concern to me so long as his funding is adequate. Apparently, he had success in some high-tech field, and although still very young, he had amassed a tidy fortune. He paid in advance. I was to deliver to him, the two sisters, anatomically correct, pretty if possible, weak as kittens, naked on a bed in a cottage he had hired to receive them. And that is exactly what I did.

I seldom stop to think about what might become of my patients (as I prefer to call them) once they have been delivered. But I must confess, I have wondered if my client might have bitten more than he can choose with those two. You see, they are a spirited pair, and while they might feign shock at his first contact, I can assure you that they understand their new bodies and exactly what they can do. I suspect that a slight young man might be quickly exhausted by these two young women.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2019

A Suggestion
A Vignette based on an Idea from Throne
By Maryanne Peters

I used to say that I could fuck anybody, but it was only supposed to be girls. The fact is that I had a huge sex drive, and it seemed so powerful that it was unhealthy. It was affecting my social life, even with the guys I mixed with. We were all interested in girls, or should I say ‘pussy’ because it was the entrance that shouted at me. The guys would joke about women being meat, but for me that was real. I wanted flesh to fuck.

It was when I started to do anal that I decided I needed to do something about my actions. I found myself looking at some guys and in my head I was imaging them over a table, pants down, with my cock up their ass. It was just another hole to fuck, but it was now becoming gay, and I was determined not to be that.

So, I went to see a therapist. I saw that he offered hypnotherapy, and I told him that I just needed to get these gay thoughts out of my head, just like he might get the craving for a cigarette out of a smoker’s head.

“Have you considered that you might be gay and this whole excessive sex with women might just be your way of denying it?” he said. “It appears that you are not particularly attracted to women if you only see them for their genitals. Perhaps you are truly attracted to men?”

I was pissed by that. I asked him whether he could help me or not – just do what you do. I laid back while he made some “suggestions” as to how I should behave.

The next time I went out with the boys just happened to be the time when I got a lecture about cooling it down a bit with the women we met. I was told that I was too hot and heavy with the girls, and it messed up the chances for all the other guys. I told them that I would stay right away from women that night to clear the way for them. If I had made a promise like that the week before I never would have been able to keep it, but that night was different.

The guys picked up a group of girls and I was the odd one out, I guess. I left them to it and ended up talking to some guy in the bar who was alone like I was. He was not the kind of guy I imagined fucking. He was like me, a real guy, but even more so.

“I see that you are not chasing the girls like your friends,” he said. “Just in case you might be thinking about it, I am not gay.”

“Hey, I believe that men should have sex only with women,” I said. “Somebody who takes a man inside her, has to be a woman … inside somehow. That’s what I believe.”

As I think about those words now, I wonder why I even said them. Or perhaps I wonder why I said them, or why I said them in that way. It was like I was inviting him to think of me as a woman. It was as if that was what I wanted.

What was the suggestion that the hypnotherapist planted in my head? All I know is that the rest of that night was a whirl, and a warm and wonderful whirl. I said goodbye to my friends and the girls they were talking to, and I went to another bar with my new friend and then he took me home to his apartment, where it so happened the girlfriend who had left him months ago was exactly the same size as me, I guess I went a little crazy.

I woke up in his bed and in his arms. The feeling of his hot jizz inside me was still fresh in my mind and I wanted that feeling again, there and then. Everything had changed but I knew that there was more that had to be changed.

It was weeks before I went back to the therapist to ask him what he had suggested. But by that time I was wearing women’s clothes full time, I was styling my hair in a feminine style and wearing makeup, and I was on hormones.

“This was not any suggestion I made,” he told me. “I just invited you to consider another way to get sexual pleasure. You don’t always need to be a giver where you need to be the potent one, feeling that you have to prove yourself. You can be underneath and invite your partner to play a dominant role. That was my suggestion. You were the one that denied you would ever consider a male partner, but I had a feeling that this was a lie you were telling yourself. Perhaps I was right?”

I guess he was. Looking back on it, I was not really attracted to women. I only fucked them to prove to myself that I wasn’t gay. I didn’t need to prove that. I am still not gay. I am a heterosexual woman. I just needed a good man and a little surgery to establish that.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2024
865

From a story idea from Throne he suggested be entitled “Booted” where “A homophobic jerk goes to a hypnotherapist to make himself even more aggressive with the ladies he dates …” but the therapist turns the tables "You turned me into some kind of gay bitch." The therapist tells him that 'bitches deserve whatever they get' from rough men.” I departed a little from his idea with this one, but is it plausible? I would really appreciate some comments. Audience participation has been sparse lately as I complain in a blog a week ago - "Frozen Hands?"

A Suite of Changes
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

The hotel was grander than he had imagined. The lobby was large with glass lift wells going up several stories to reach a high cathedral ceiling with mezzanine balconies and large staircases between them. The reception area seemed a mile away.

“I have a reservation,” he said. “Here is my credit card.” From experience he knew that it was easier than spelling out his name. Plus, he was exhausted. There had been things to tie up at work, and then boxes at home. He just needed a bath and a power nap.

“Oh yes, we have a special room for you.” Some assistant manager seemed to have come over the top of the girl behind the counter and was taking over. “Attention to small details. I am sure that you will find everything in order. Here is your room number and key card. Mo will carry your bag. Thank you for staying with us.”

He followed Mo to the elevator, and they ascended in silence. The room was a suite but not overly large. It overlooked the city. He listened to the lighting instructions and tipped Mo on his way out the door.

He found the bathroom and turned on the faucet.

He sat on the bed to remove his clothes. By habit he folded all the items neatly on the bed, with the polished street shoes on top.

He had not noticed the bag when he had turned on the water, but he saw it now as he checked the temperature and lowered himself in. There was a shelf beside the bath to arrange the items on; shampoo and conditioner – the real stuff, with a note “Hair before body”. He smiled.
There was a bottle of something else. Something called “Pilarid” with a large warning on the side, and instructions in all caps. “SET A TIMER FOR 5 MINS THEN MIX THE ENTIRE CONTENTS IN THE BATH AND STAY IMMERSED FOR THAT 5 MINS. EXIT THE BATH AND SHOWER THOROUGHLY IN COLD WATER AT LEAST 1 MIN.”

“Hair before body”, he said aloud with a smile. He worked the shampoo into his full hair washing away the oil that maintained his manly hairstyle. The scent was floral with a touch of spice. After he let it sit and then rinsed off, the conditioner seemed to be spice with a touch of flowers.

He took one from a stack of towels to tie up his hair while he set the timer on his phone and reached for the Pilarid.

He could feel it burn, but it was not an unpleasant sensation, like a physio heat treatment turned up a few notches. Still, by the time the timer went off he was ready to pull the plug and jump out. Cold water seemed all that was needed to start with, but the fourth item in the bag was an all-over moisturizer which made his body cool and delightfully tingling.

Every single hair had disappeared

Item five in the bag was nail polish. It was not something that he was particularly familiar with, but he had pointed Sonia’s toenails on more than one occasion, when they were together. The nails on his hands were trimmed but well maintained. Why not? It was something to do. It would be relaxing.

There was another bottle in the bag – “Pilarid Face – specially formulated to remove facial hair”. Somehow this seemed a little more challenging. The day had produced the first roughness from thousands of follicles. He ran his hand across it as he did. What would it feel like? Different from a close shave knowing that these follicles had died? There was only one way to find out.

The instructions called for a complete mask for 5 minutes followed by cold wet washcloths and then moisturizer. It was here. It was in his hand. He was naked – naked of clothes and naked of hair. How free can a person be? He sat at the mirror and painted it on. There was a guide as to a line under the eyebrows, with protective covers. He was inclined not to go that far, but when the rest was done her relented.
He went to the walk-in wardrobe. There were clothes hanging up. Women’s clothes. He ran his hand over the fabric. Soft in places and in other places worked with lace and sewn on features. So much work. So different from a plain shirt or a pair of pants. There were shoes lined up too. Day shoes and heels for that special evening. On the dressing table was a hair dryer and brushes and a jewellery box. Everything had been thought of. The earrings were clip-on.

There was underwear in one drawer – panties, and bras with gel inserts to cover any lack of shape. In another drawer there were stockings in their packages, in a variety of shades and patterns.

The timer went off. He went to the bathroom to tear of the mask and throw it in the toilet and bury his face in a cold wet towel.

When he pulled the towel away, he looked at the person in the mirror and he was startled. Or was it that the hair removed from between his eyes and the brows gave him that look. At least they were balanced and even. It could all be repaired. If he had gone too far it could be put right.

This was not his town. He was not here to be him. He was here to be somebody else.

He applied the moisturizer, working it carefully into the skin of the face. It seemed to him that this was like virgin skin. His face had a fresh start. He had never paid much attention to skincare. That was going to change. This was something that he should enjoy doing, perhaps twice a day. He felt the bones in his face and the soft cheeks. A face is something to be treasured. How can he have been so blasé about it before now? Does it really need to be clear of hair before you appreciate it for what it is.

He pulled the towel from his hair. He now realized that there might have been something in the shampoo or the conditioner or both. Something to lift the shade of the hair and make it a little lighter – perhaps almost blonde when dry. He picked up the dryer and worked the hair with his fingers before taking the brush to curl it under.

His hair was full and long and yet he had concealed it from everybody. Other changes had been concealed but most had not even been started. Some things are harder to undo than others. If you want to keep your options open, you have to know that.

Yes, almost blonde. And almost a perfect smooth bob, even in his own less than capable hands.

Clothes are just covering. Nothing final in that. You make your choices and you put your clothes on. If you don’t like it, take them off.
But first, the underwear. Women’s underwear – it was all there was. Little panties that had a panel in the front to conceal the hairless genitals that did not belong beneath something so pretty. The tight bustier with the gel filler put in before it was fully lifted and secured, to create a cleavage from his very own smooth chest flesh. And then the right choice of dress and shoes. There was a choice of earrings, but the handbag chose itself. It was just perfect.

Just a touch of makeup. Could he do it. Eyeliner is a skill. Mascara needs to be slight. Lipstick can be done over as required. The trick is not to overdo it. This is not a drag show.

Any thought of that power nap seemed to have disappeared. He felt energized and invigorated. More than that, he felt beautiful. For the first time in his life, he felt beautiful. He stood in front of the full-length mirror and marveled at what he saw.

“Watch your elbows,” he said out loud, scolding the woman in the mirror in a voice that could have been hers – it was certainly not his.

The doorbell rang.

His body felt electric.

He started to tremble as he walked to the door. He opened it without looking through the peephole.

Mark was standing there. His mouth fell open and his eyes sparkled with joy.

“This looks like a ‘yes’,” said Mark.

“It’s a ‘yes’,” the woman in the dress said. “I hope you have the ring because tonight I will agree to becoming a woman and your wife.”

It was in his hand, but he slipped it back into his jacket pocket. He needed both hands and arms free to take her in them and kiss her as deeply as any man ever has kissed a true woman.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2022

Author's Note: With thanks to Erin for the opening and the title!

A Tear for Bunny
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

She could not help it that she was pretty. I really should ay “he” if I am gonna tell the story, but somehow I just can’t. It just don’t seem right. But maybe I will start that way. The start is his story I guess.

His Mom never wanted him to be in a gang. She protected the kid, as any Mom would. He went to school. He walked through the Hood on his way – kept his head down. Men don’t notice kids until they get big, and maybe start to stare or give some lip.

Sometimes we would use the young ones on the corners, running cash and packages. But those were the ones who wanted it. They knew who was running the Hood. We were.

“I can run for you”. We had plenty of kids putting a hand up. We used to say they were the smart ones.

Bunny never put a hand up. He just wanted to study and play music and not disappoint his Mom. We never said anything about kids like that. Hell – they did not exist. Unless they got on the junk in which case they were customers. They existed, but barely.

Bunny and his Mom lived in the Hood because that was where they could live. No other neighborhood would take them. She was black, but Bunny’s father must have been white. The kid had golden skin and light hazel eyes. The first time I saw those eyes I felt … well, mo’ about that later.

He was a fit for our gang. They say the reason why we are called “The Breeds” is because plenty of our people are half something, and half something else. Most have black in them, but maybe with a bit of Asian, Chicano, even Samoan. We have no honkies, but shades of black and brown. “The Slicks” are pure black, or that is what they say.

Down in the Hood, the only white folk are the cops. On the street it is black against black, or shades of black and brown against each other. I mean nothin’ by it. It is just the way it is.

I am not sure about how it happened, but the kid’s mother was killed. Some people say that the killer was her boyfriend – like the kind that loves a woman one minute and then beats her bloody the next. Some say that he was just a rapist. One thing is sure and that he was linked to The Slicks.

As I say, we never knew anything about Bunny, until he killed that man stone dead. I mean the boyfriend or the rapist or whatever.

Bunny was badly cut up. The guy had knocked the kid down as he tried to shield his Mom and then cut her up something crazy, then turn his knife on the boy – straight into the groin and up to the belly button. It was a carpet knife. Have you ever seen one of those? Not cutting – tearing the meat open.

The pain made Bunny come to. It does that, as I know. He reached for something and found it. Something he would barely have been able to lift if his blood was not up. His blood was up. His Mom was dead. Done smashed the guy’s skull into pieces, the way I heard it. He knew how to stop his own bleeding and call for an ambulance, but he could not find a phone on either body and had none of his own. He had to crawl down the hall to find help.

Anyway, Jamal called me and said: “We got this kid in hospital. He killed a Slick. Go see him and offer him the chance to join. He's already passed the first test.”

We all know down in the Hood that this boy would be dead when he got out of the hospital. Those are the rules: You kill one of ours and you die. Maybe they would get to him in there. But my thinking then was that it was not our concern. He wasn’t a Breed. Why bother? But Jamal calls the shots, for now.

So I went. I got his name and I went to the hospital. I said I was family. The nurse did not believe me.

“Nobody calls him that. Everybody calls him Bunny.” That’s what she said.

“Not any more,” I said. “His mother is dead. He’s gonna have to be a man now. Bunny ain’t a man’s name.” She believed that shit all right, and showed me in.

The kid had his eyes closed in pain when I went over to see him. I just stood over the bed. I wasn’t planning on staying.

I said: “My name is Satch and I am with the Breeds. You are in trouble, Kid, big trouble … with the Slicks. You are gonna need our help. Maybe we can give it.”

He opened those eyes. I looked into Bunny’s eyes for the first time. I saw a woman. I am telling you what I saw.

People say that ain’t so. People say that I saw a boy with his junk cut off, and nothing left down there, so I imagined him with the body of a woman. But it wasn’t like that. The eyes ain’t got nothin’ to do with the crotch. Hell, I didn’t even know about that until the doctor walked in.

“You’re family? Good,” he said. “Bunny has been badly injured. His life has been changed forever, I am afraid. He has no genie tales. We have done some repair work, but without insurance we cannot carry out any more repair work.”

Anyway, “genie tales” was the way I heard it. But he was telling me that Bunny’s junk was gone, like, forever. He said that they had taken the tube you piss through down to near the butt hole so the kid could piss sitting down and wear a pad for some reason, but he hoped that was just temporary. They could do surgery to rebuild his cock and make a sack for some plastic balls, when he could afford that.

Any man who hears that shit has to shiver then check their nuts. It is the kind of thing we don’t like to hear.

I asked him when he would be ready to leave, and the Doc said that he could leave the following day, with painkillers, if he had somebody to care for him and change dressings.

“He has,” I said. “That is what family is fo’!” Because He had family now. The Breeds.

But I wasn’t about to take him to no gang house. They would not “change his dressing” and wash the stitches of a boy with no junk. Hell, they would take his painkillers – use ‘em or sell ‘em, and leave the Kid to suffer. No. Not there. But I had another place in mind.

Patty ran a “Beauty Shop” down on 23rd. She ran with The Breeds. Her man was a Breed before he died in the Battle of Holland Park some years back – The Breeds and the Slicks. There were just women folk there. Bunny would be safe with them.

When the doctor had gone Bunny started croaking out some words. He said: “I am not joining any gang. That is not what I want.” I knew then that this kid had spunk.

I said that it was his choice but a Slick was dead and soon he would be too. If he wanted to live, he would have to hide, at least for a while. I told him that I had people who would care for him and get him out of hospital. The doctors seemed keen to be rid of him.

“That’s because a big African American tried to get in before you came,” he said. I decided that I needed to get Bunny out then and there.

I called Patty from my truck on the way into the Hood. It turned out that she had worked on Bunny’s Mom’s hair once or twice. She was ready to help. The Breeds had asked more of her in the past, and she would not always say yes, but when it came to helping folk she was up to it.

When I left, I said: “Put Bunny in a dress. Hell, he must be about the prettiest boy I have ever seen, so he would look good in a dress. The Slicks are looking for a boy, not a girl.”

Patty told me later that it sounded like an order, but really it was just a suggestion. I think it was, anyway. But the truth is, I wanted to see what Bunny looked like as a girl. I thought that she might be pretty – the girl I mean. She.

Well, I was not disappointed.

Bunny’s hair was not black but a shade of brown, and it was curly rather than wiry, and long enough for some kind of style with a parting down the center. But the makeup was great. Those eyes just look as big as cue balls with the eyelashes and all, and the pink lipstick done made those lips look ready for God’s own blow job. The dress kind of hung off the body, because there weren’t no body (but that was gonna come) but the legs looked like one of them supermodels.

I said that nobody was going to guess that she was a guy.

But she was still hurting. Her body was sore, but that would pass. It was the loss of her mother that cut deeper than the carpet knife. I said that her mother must have been a pretty lady, and maybe when she walked and talked dressed like that she should act as her mother would – sort of like a tribute. Bunny kind of liked that. I think that was where she came from after that.

I said that we could go out, but only if she pretended to be my girl. That way I could stay close.

Patty set her up with some stuff and I took her down to the Hood in my truck.

Jamal said that the Slicks were demanding blood. “They are saying that the bitch’s kid killed one of theirs, and they want him named. To hell with those fuckers. Is the kid safe?”

I said that he was in hiding and he would never be found.

He said: “That bitch in your truck is a fine lookin’ piece of ass.” I had to agree. “She needs a good pair of tits, though. Maybe get her a pair for Christmas?”

The Slicks were not giving up. They went down to the school where Bunny had gone and hauled kids out of class to ask about any contact. There weren’t nothing the teachers could do. Security was a joke. No fool would be standing up to the Slicks in our town, nor the Breeds neither.

We had a small face off about it. I just said that the kid was no member of our gang. “And if his Momma was hanging with a Slick, I guess that makes her one of yo’all. Seems it is just a case of a boy protecting his Momma, just like any of you would.”

I figured that made sense. But we are talking about hatred. It is the kind of hatred that has no sense about it that can be made.

There was a killing a week later. One of ours died and then one of theirs died the day after that.

And then it was Christmas and I bought Bunny those tits. She was my girl, that’s why. She may not have had everything a girl has, but we made do. I said that the Christmas after I would buy her the bottom to match the top. It seemed to please her.

I loved her, you see. As for her loving me, well she liked me to hold her, and liked doing that. It was just that she never really got over her loss, and she needed to be held by somebody the way her mother had held the child. It was like she knew that she would never hold a woman as a man, so the kind of contact she needed was a man like me – somebody who loved her and wanted to protect her.

She was either mad or sad, sometimes both. But somehow tears in those big eyes just made her all the more beautiful. Is that a shitty thing to say?

Everybody knew how much I loved her. They never knew what she was or who she was, because she was the perfect woman – like her Mom she said. But they knew that I loved her.

That is why the Slicks shot her in the head.

Tore me up worse than she was torn. She was only crop to belly button, where I was torn right up to the heart. Inside I mean.

I took down seven Slicks before the cops arrived. Now I sit on death row with only a memory to keep me alive. The memory of Bunny, my girl – the scar of her tear that I used to love to kiss, the tears that I loved to lick away … sad Bunny. I don’t think I ever cried in my life until the day she died,, and it seems like every day since.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2021

Author's Note:
This is a story prompted by a suggestion from BC's own Erin Halfelven who came up with this title suggesting a young gangster torn in a brutal assault, but the play on words seems to compel me to write a tragedy.

A Wife Found
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

It had been a wonderful and exhausting day. They had explored a small beach on that sun-drenched Greek island, walking down a tight trail to where they had swum naked and sunbathed, before climbing back up to the rental car and taking the tortuous roads back to the village. There they had enjoyed a meal and some good wine from Cyprus and had danced with the locals. When they got back, they still found the energy for sex, but it was slow and sweaty in the hot evening air – it was even more perfect than the day had been. Now she lay close to him, playing
with his greying hair as the night insects chirped outside the open window, just a hint of breeze off the blue sea below.

“I love you,” he said. Her hand stroked his chin by way of a reply. “But I know that you are not the woman I married.” The hand froze. “I just want to tell you that I don’t care.”

She propped herself up to look into his eyes. The light was dim, but they could see one another clearly.

“I love you too,” she said. “Do you believe it? I love you with all my heart. No matter how I came to be here, you need to know that I love you now and I always will.”

“I can guess why you did what you did, and in many ways, I don’t want to know more, but I feel that I need to know what happened to her. I owe her that much.”

“I owe you the truth,” she said. “But you will get it all, I tell you now. Just hold me. That is all I ask. This will be as hard for me to say as it will be for you to hear.”

“I will forgive you anything,” he said. “I tell you that right now.”

She took a deep breath before starting to explain - “Her death was accidental, just in case you think you might have to forgive me for that. We were close, she and I. We were together when she died. She knew the risks, but in the end, it was dysentery. Simple dysentery.”

“She always had a thirst for adventure,” he said. Then he felt the need to correct himself. “You had that. The woman I married was that woman. And that is you. I knew what I was getting in for when I spoke my vows.”

“The bride’s vows are my vows,” she said leaning over again to accept his gaze. “Please accept that.”

“As if spoken by you, because as far as I am concerned, you are the woman I married.”

She lay back again and spoke on. “We were adventurous souls stuck in a crisis. We had only one another. I spoke of my life, and she spoke of hers. It seems now that I had nothing to say. My life before her was empty and worthless. I was an international wanderer, living off my flute.”

“You play the flute? I never knew.”

“He played the flute. She told me she was tone deaf, but that is not entirely true. Anyway, she cannot play, and I am her, so I cannot play.”

“One day maybe?”

“Please let me continue. You wanted the story, and I am telling it to you now.”

“I am sorry,” he said. He squeezed her, holding her as she asked despite the heat of the Aegean night.

“She spoke of you. She loved you, but can I suggest not as much as I do? I could not leave you the way she did. She loved the life that you could give her, but most of all she loved that you were there, and that she could always go home to you. She was that kind of adventurer. I never had that luxury. I was without ties but not by choice. I envied her this life.”

She paused, as if her guilty secret was out. Envy. But he was there, and she was loved. “But most of all I envied that she was what I could never be – she was a woman. I was running away from who I was. I was roaming the globe as a man because a man can walk alone more easily, but really because I was wrestling with those inner feelings. I pushed them deep down inside me. But for me she seemed to be everything I wanted – she was beautiful, and she was loved, and she was rich too.”

“I am rich,” he said. “So, my wife is rich. You are rich.”

“We are talking about the person I saw,” she said, a little angry at the interruption. “And the crazy thing was that we looked like brother and sister. Everybody we met assumed that we were. Normally when you meet a couple travelling you assume that they are a couple, but never us. Some said that we must be fraternal twins. We were even the same size, our eyes exactly the same color. It was just that my face was that of a man and my body too. A face and a body that I hated.”

A breeze entered the room, making it just slightly cooler. He squeezed her again.

“When she died, I decided that I should try to be her,” she said. “It was not entirely selfish, but perhaps mainly that. But I also thought of you. You did not deserve to be alone. Nobody would miss the man, but the death of the woman would tear a hole in you. I knew that. I just thought that she deserved to live more than … more than him.”

“She does live, and for that I owe you the world,” he said.

“It seemed like an outrageous story, that somebody would be kidnapped and have their sex changed forcibly, but it seemed that it was a story that I could at least try. All I needed to do was to have her DNA in a blood sample to prove that I was her – to prove that I was your wife.”

“I can understand how you might have been able to draw blood from her body, but how did you keep the sample for long enough to get it to the embassy?” he asked. It was something that he had not considered before.

“It was a humanitarian program. Medicine containers for live vaccines were available. I just had to switch vials when they asked for proof of my story. You can imagine their shock. A man walks in and claims to be a woman who has been forcibly turned into a man. But when the results of the sample came back you could see their amazement. They treated me like a crazy person, and then suddenly every woman at the embassy was filled with horror and genuine sympathy for my predicament. A woman forced into the body of a man – how horrible! But that had always been my predicament. I got no sympathy then. Transwomen don’t, especially secret transwomen.”

“I remember when they called me,” he said. “They could still not quite believe it. They said that if it was female to male surgery, which was being done locally over there, it was the most comprehensive ever seen.”

“I had a self-mutilation scar from years before that helped, but I wriggled throughout the physical and made it hard,” she said. “But what did they say when they called you? I never asked you.”

“They asked me to get your DNA analyzed. Some hair from your hairbrush at home. That would be the definitive proof, but in the meantime they said that I should talk with you to confirm whether it might be you. And then I got you on the phone and I heard your deeper voice and I immediately thought that there was no way. But then you started to cry, and they were your words that came out – it was just the voice that was wrong.”

“The emotion was real. You were my husband, and we had been apart for so long. You are my husband and I never want to be apart from you again not ever. But yes, the words I had heard spoken by her so many times. When two people are alone in a hostile environment, you learn everything that there is to know about one another. Everything.”

“They sent me some photographs of you, Did I tell you that?” he said. “They made me sick. It seemed true to me then. I could see you, but they had taken my beautiful wife and done this to her. They had changed her face. They spared me the views of your body. The suggestion was that they were rogue surgeons experimenting on some Westerner they had bought in a slave market. It was so disgusting that I had real trouble. I just wanted to get the corrective surgery done, as soon as possible, even before you got home.”

“Yes,” she said. “That was all that I had hoped for. If after that had been done, I had simply said to you that you had been tricked into paying for a sex change, I might have been able to walk away with a brief apology, but then you arrived and … and I fell in love with you.”

“At first sight?” this time he rolled over to look in her eyes.

She smiled. “The truth is that I was in love with you even before I met you. She made me love you. Just as she made it so easy for me to become her, it seemed natural that I would fall for you. So the first sight I had of you, while I was still in bandages and in pain, it was love.”

“Do you have any idea when I might have first doubted that you … were you?”

“Was it before I left the hospital?”

“God no. Not for weeks after that. Which I suppose goes to show you just how well I knew my wife. You knew her better than I did. I know that now.”

“You doubted me? But then what?”

“By then you were healed, and well … there is nobody quite like you.”

“So doubt disappeared for a while?”

“No. I suppose I knew then, but I did not care.” He leaned over and kissed her, gently on the lips. They lingered for a moment, sharing one another’s breath. She ached to have him inside her again, but then she always did.

“Forgive me for deceiving you,” she said.

“I am so easily deceived it does not seem to matter,” he said. “It seems to me now that she was like a captive bird, the first version of you. What man does not want a beautiful bird of paradise in a cage to adore and to show to others. But such a bird can never live in a cage. She must be free. And with time I have learned that birds are for the sky, and beds are for people like you and me.”

“I say a big yes to that,” she said.

She reached down and could feel his cock stiffening. He gasped and she could feel the blood flowing to her welcoming fingers.

“I only wander with you, I swear it,” she said. “I have been found and I will never be lost again.”

They devoured one another like wild animals, in the manner of people that much in love.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2022

"Now and Always"
A story idea from Erin
A woman disappeared some years ago but now has reappeared she looks pretty
much the same but is now male she claims to have been transformed by some
unknown process she can answer any questions about her old life and there are
no old fingerprints or such records to trip her up she wants to claim her old
assets, which might be a lot she had a husband and he resists the new her, but
they agree to live together for a time as a trial. Slowly she convinces him that she
is really his wife he testifies in her behalf and the court cases are settled in her
favor once she has been confirmed in her identity she gets an operation to
become female again she and her husband go on a 2nd honeymoon and she asks
him how he would feel if it all was just a scam that she had learned all about the
original woman thru living beside all those years while she died slowly of some
injury or disease he says "It wouldn't make any difference. You're here and now
and you're mine, it's all I want. Besides, it isn’t true is it, you are my wife
“Yes I am,” she says "Now and Always".

I have to say it - this seemed like one of Erin's more far-fetched ideas. but I love a challenge

A Woman’s Eyes
A Vignette
By Maryanne Peters

I always thought that I had a strong face. Girls called me good looking. They said that I had “come-to-bed eyes – China blue. I never had any trouble finding girls, which is why I took advantage. I guess that made me heterosexual. If you are desired by women, then you desire them back. It is simply how things work.

It was not until I met Fabian that everything changed. He told me that I had a woman’s eyes. Nobody had ever said that to me before. I suppose I felt a little insulted – like it was an attack on my manhood.

“With eyes like those you would make a truly gorgeous woman,” he told me. Who says stuff like that to another man. “If you were a woman looking at me with those, I would jump you in a heartbeat. I would spend all my money to make you happy.” He seemed totally serious.

It wasn’t like Fabian was gay. He had a girlfriend, and she was a good looker. But that made it even harder for me deal with. It was like he was looking past my eyes and right into my soul, and he was seeing something that I did not even know was there.

Or perhaps I did know, and I was doing my best to hide it. I had always thought of attractions to men as being admiration or envy, but not as being sexual. Like I said, I had women for that. But somehow Fabian was different, because he saw me differently.

I thought that the heavy brow and the sharp angles of my face would not be right, but he insisted that I go for one of those feminization makeovers, just to prove a point. He would pay and even buy me dinner.

I have to say that I was curious. It was just that insisted that whatever they did it needed to be invisible the morning after. He said that they knew what to do. “They have plenty of guys who just want to take a peek at the feminine self,” he said. I guess I was one of those.

Of course I did not look quite the way I do now. I have grown out my hair, and I confess that I have had my lips plumped since that first night together, but Fabian was right – even in a bad wig I could see that this was who I was. I have a woman’s eyes, you see.

He took me out to dinner as promised, but I was dressed as a woman – the woman I still am. I just felt so comfortable sitting across the table from him, and seeing people in the restaurant smile at us as a happy and attractive couple.

And then after dinner I was in his arms, and even more comfortable there. I just felt limp and yielding, and I loved the feeling. And then I was in his bed and things were settled. There would be no going back.

Once you have seen the world through a woman’s eyes you simply know that is your sex, and that is all there is to it.

The End

(c) Maryanne Peters 2022

A Woman’s Work
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

I had always wanted to be an artist. I guess I felt that I was creative, but what I really liked was the idea of flicking a little paint onto canvas and selling it for $10,000. It struck me that it could be so easy if I had talent.

The art teacher at school said that I was competent, but I lacked “a true creative drive”. He said that artists need to be driven, and that I was just the opposite. I thought that he was an idiot. He was talking about another kind of artist. I was not one of those. Artists can be misunderstood – like Van Gogh. I was one of those kind.

I picked up girls by doing portraits of them. I started at school and then I did it after I left. I would sketch their face and then say – “What I really want to do is paint you, in color”. Then when I got them alone I would say: “Not just your face but your very essence … your whole body … naked”. Plenty went for it.

I used watercolor on paper mainly. Canvas and oils are too expensive. If you don’t get laid you don’t want to waste good materials.

But I was not giving these things away. I might say: “Would your parents be able to pay my price?” Not for a nude, but maybe a sketch. I just needed anybody to buy anything I had done. Nobody did.

So, I had to get a job. It was working in an art department for an advertising firm. Nowadays it is all on screen, although it can start with some sketches. People want to see a hundred variations. I was slaving away at the board or the screen. It was hard work; the very opposite of my dream.

One of our biggest clients came to call on our firm to discuss pitches so I was called in to assist with brainstorming. You know the thing – some wise ass in front of the client throwing out ideas and I scribble an image. I forgot what it was, but the product was aimed at women, so he brought his wife along. He did not want one of his employees and did not trust our executives, so he brought his wife.

After about an hour she complained that looking at stuff while sipping coffee was hard work. She said to her husband: “I have never worked harder in my life. You will owe me a spa treatment for this. A whole day.”

It made me wish that I was there, in the spa. She hardly said a word about what we showed her and what she did say was dumb. I remember thinking that whatever her job was, I would happily do that for a living, because it sure looked like sitting on her ass sipping coffee.

Then I was going through some of the water colors of girls I had painted and fucked. There were some pretty ones, but most were ordinary. But if you want to get a girl to bed you need to tell her that she is gorgeous and show her how you see her. You take out some sharp angles, soften the lines, plump up the lips and the eyes. I knew the tricks.

“Is that how you see me?” she would say. “I look beautiful. Let’s make love.”

I had some self-portraits. When I am not getting laid, I have to keep my hand in, as it were. I guess it is a bit like art masturbation. You use yourself to do what you do and keep limbered up for your next turn at bat. It was just that those seemed to be reducing in number. I was working way too hard.

I pulled out one of my sketches of myself and decided to turn it into a water-color painting of a woman. I had in mind the wife of that client, but it was over my face. I wanted color and eye makeup and lipstick, and her flowing hair. It turned out to be really very good. I found myself looking at me as a woman. I looked magnificent.

I suppose that you think that you look good when you paint yourself. There is a story that when Leonardo da Vinci painted the Mona Lisa it was a self-portrait of himself as a woman, which is why he carried it around with him. I don’t know about that, but I hung my Mona in my apartment, and I didn’t have too much of my own art on the walls. It is actually not that good.

I lured some girl around and she saw it hanging there. She said: “That girl is stunning. Is that your sister. She is really very beautiful.”

I figured that I now had an independent view of things. If I had been born a chick, I would be beautiful. If I had been born a chick, I might be like the trophy wife who inspired that painting – in part. I might be sitting on my pretty ass complaining that doing nothing was just too much.

Anyway, that night did not go so well and I ended up alone. I took down my painting and put it beside my mirror and I used some artists’ pastels to color my face – I mean my real face, not the one I painted. I used a little black water color straight from the tube for my lashes. It was just another exercise, or so I told myself. Like using my face for a canvas, although in watercolor I paint on paper.

But it was uncanny. I was the woman in my painting. I was magnificent, or very beautiful. Far too attractive to work like a slave, or even work at all. That was how I felt anyway.

I had no women’s clothes in my studio/apartment. Why would I. But I did have some drop cloths spattered with paint. I decided to fashion myself a flowing dress and check out the whole thing. It looked great, except for hairy legs showing. A razor soon fixed that.

Artists say that when the creative juices are flowing, don’t turn off the tap. Keep it running. Ride the river. See where it takes you. I tore off a strip of the paint-stained fabric and tied up my hair a little.

Painting a portrait is not about reproducing the light and color that the eye sees, but about reaching into the soul. A truly great painting of a subject should reflect the character of the subject, or at least the artist’s opinion of that character. But now looking at the reflection of my latest work of art I found myself doing the reverse – looking at what I had created and asking – “who is she? What is her story – her personality? If only she could speak.”

“You’re wasting your life here. You will never make money like this. Find a rich man and take his money.” She spoke. Her lips moved, and it was a woman’s voice. It was haughty and disdainful. It was not like me, and yet it came from me.

If you are thinking that this is the thin edge of madness, don’t think that the thought did not cross my mind. But art sometimes involves walking along that cliff edge of sanity. And in this case, I was experimenting with creativity.

I looked at her and laughed. The laugh was mine. I adjusted it to hers. Yes, she had a voice. Yes, she had a plan. I did not. Could she step outside and pursue her plan, whether or not it was meant to succeed? I had no idea, but it seemed to me that I would be a fool for not giving her the chance.

“Find a rich man and take his money,” she said. Then an idea came into my head. I knew a rich man, although I had never met him. It was simple. I called up Malachi Rosen.

“Malachi, it’s Jacob. I am calling about something that you said your father might be interested in. A young female artist in graphic and performance art. Talent is a matter of taste, but interesting she certainly is. I mentioned your father to her and she would like to meet him. Her name is Rebecca. She is actually a cousin of mine. No, she doesn’t do portraits – hers is more abstract, but you could ask. I would love to, but I will be too busy to come with her. Just call me back with a time and I will send her over.”

Once I put the phone down I had a few doubts, but after I has set my camera up and taken a few professional selfies, I felt much better about things. Just wearing the “clothes” I had made, I set the camera to take shots of me in various poses. I discarded most of them, but kept the rest for a portfolio. I called it “Rebecca Peach – The Artist as Art”. I sent a copy to Malachi

But these clothes would not work with Mr. Rosen. I would need something to mold my body and conceal my junk, and then something arty – boho perhaps? I sort of liked boho styles.

I went online and punched in “crossdressing” and was surprised to see that there was a supplier near me. I mean it was a clothing store with a back room to cater for a special clientele. I decided to call in – but dressed as a guy.

Sure enough, I went to the counter to ask about their special service and shop assistant took me out back. She said that I should invest in “a shaper” which had a tight crotch, a corseted waist and gel tits. I found one that would fit. She said that she had shoes in my size with a heel that would be easy for me to handle – “trainer wheels”, she said. She showed me some wigs, but in the end, she said – “If your hair was straightened it could be styled so you wouldn’t need a wig.” She gave me the name of a nearby salon who could do the job.

I walked out of there with undergarments, shoes, a patterned dress, and embroidered jean jacket and a shoulder bag. I then went to a cosmetics store and bought the proper art supplies for what I had to do.

Once I was dressed I experimented some more at home. It was as my portfolio said – “The Artist as Art”. I had created Rebecca Peach and I was adding the finishing touches. Things like the way she walked, or used her hands, or spoke. I needed to work on these things, but the internet is full of useful advice.

It was not until the following day that Jacob called me and told me that his father was interested in meeting Rebecca that very afternoon.

I decided to go to the hairdresser recommended by the “trans-boutique”. I dressed up as Rebecca and went out. I had an extended period of uncertainty. People looked at me, and it seemed to me that absolutely everybody knew that I was a guy dressed as a woman. It made me feel sick. I wanted to run home and hide. But then I started to wonder if they might just be staring at the woman I had become. Plenty of people stare at women – I did. And women too, if they admire my dress or perhaps they are wondering why my hair looks such a mess.

My stride started to become more assured, but I did my best to make sure it looked feminine. I gripped my bag so that my arms would not swing and give me away.

But the lady in the salon knew. I said that I had been recommended, and she guessed where from.

“Oh yes, we can style that hair,” she said. “And perhaps redo your makeup.”

“I am an artist,” I explained. “With my makeup I am going for something striking – perhaps even a little outlandish.”

“How wonderful,” she said. “I think I know exactly the look you are going for, if you will let me…”.

I have heard that women love going to the salon, and initially I had no idea why. The smells if not unpleasant seemed heavy in the air, the conversation seemed pointless, and the time that passed was just money out of my shallow pocket. But it is about beauty. It about changing looks and changing moods with it. The inane dialogue is all part of it, so I felt happy to join in – or rather, to ask questions about what they were talking about.

They say men are from Mars and women are from Venus. If you want to learn Venusian the salon is a great place to do it.

The hair was perfect. Some color highlights and curls that still kept a wild look, but held off the face with a nice clip. And the makeup on the face was right too – exotic without being bizarre. If I thought my own efforts made me beautiful, this work made me gorgeous.

“You’ll walk out here feeling like a million bucks,” she said. I always feel that way – feel like I should have the money anyway, but I did feel great.

I went to the apartment of Saul Rosen, the father of Malachi, the son he begrudged giving money to. Quite how I thought he could be an easy mark seemed a poor decision as I waited for him to answer the bell.

“You must be Rebecca,” he said. “Come up. Get into the elevator and press P”.

The doors opened directly on to the ante room of a plush apartment. Then Saul appeared. I had never met him or seen him before. Hearing Malachi speak of him I expected some stooped old man but he seemed surprising youthful and fit, with greying hair the only sign of age. But he exuded power and wealth. This was what I wanted. He would never pay a man to do nothing, but would he pay a woman to do nothing?

“You seem like a very interesting young lady,” he said, after we exchanged a soft handshake. “Tell me, why do you want to meet me?”

“I have heard from your son through my cousin Jacob that you like beautiful things; that you are a collector of works of art?” Was it too early get straight to the point? I judged that it was not. He seemed like a man who might value the forthright, and dislike wasting time.

“That would be true,” he said. “You have something for me to look at?” He looked to see if I was carrying anything, but my bag seemed too small.

“You are looking at it,” I said. “It is something of my own creation. Rebecca Peach. Something that you might like to add to your collection. Not to hang on a wall, of course. I am best displayed sitting on a sofa; or on a chair at a fine restaurant; or lying on a lounger at a tropical resort.”

His brows furrowed, but I thought – ‘what is the worst that can happen? He shows me the door. I have lost money at a boutique and a salon’. I braced myself.

Then came the smile. It started in the eyes, which seemed to sparkle as if in those old movies when the fool of a male lead falls in love. It made me wonder if my eyes were sparkling back, leading him on. But as the smile went to his mouth, it went to mine too.

“Is this work of art expensive?” he asked.

“Very,” I said. “But I accept payment by instalments.”

I could see him thinking for a moment before he posed the next question – “Is this work visual only, or can I expect more … something … more tactile.”

“Why, Mr. Rosen! I hope you are not suggesting anything improper!” I feigned mock shock.

“Visual only then,” he said, but he did not appear too disappointed.

“I fear that if you scrape through the surface this work of art will be a major disappointment,” I said. “So why would you want to deface a work of such beauty?” I struck a pose and I could see that I had won him over.

That was two years ago. But you can’t go two years – not even two weeks – before looking a little deeper, and perhaps checking provenance, and asking Malachi whatever happened to his friend Jacob? It was just that by that time, this particular work of art had become a fixture in his apartment, and across the restaurant table, and on his arm.

It was just that on the lounger at the tropical resort this particular work of art needed a touch up top and bottom to look good in a bikini. But by then I had become so accustomed to life as a woman, that seemed such a tiny thing to surrender.

Not that I am suggesting that a woman’s work is not as easy as I thought it was when I started. I imagine it could be hard if you don’t know what you are doing. I do. I am the work, you see.

The End

© Maryanne Peters

The image is of transwoman Thayanna Dantas

AGD
The After-effects of Chemically Induced Acute Gonadal Dysfunction
A Scientific Paper (of a sort)
By Maryanne Peters NSD MN (Hons)

The above is an extract from a story that appeared in the Des Moines Register on April 1st 2018. The publication date made many readers consider the story a prank, but among medical researchers the presence of Acute Gonadal Dysfunction is well known, although research is limited by its rarity.

Some three years before this article appeared the presence of four cases in the state of Iowa led researchers to isolate the cause as being a chemical spill into the water supply of the small town of Townshend in the Southeast of the state. A tanker operated by the pharmaceutical giant GenCo had missed a bend on the ridge above the catchment valley and a large amount of waste material marked for disposal had been discharged into the water quite near the collection point. As a result for only a few hours before the contamination was identified, the town water supply contained high amounts of an advanced form of the pesticide component atrazine, a chemical know to effect hormones in vertebrates (see references below). This chemical was unaffected by local water supply purification processes.

Several people ingested the water and those people were identified following symptoms becoming apparent. The most significant symptoms were only indicated in the male population. Adult males exhibited some breast growth and body hair loss in ensuing weeks, but these effects abated over time.

The most drastic effect was on the four boys the subject of this study, who were pre-pubescent at the time of the ingestion of the contaminated water.

Subject A

While other subjects are referred to by pseudonyms, Subject A has already been identified in the above article as Kyle now Kayla Peterson, a resident of Townshend. As also referred to in the item, because of religious convictions the family of this subject did not seek medical intervention so that the changes brought about by the chemical were allowed to proceed unhindered.

The resulting changes are scientifically remarkable. As well as breast growth the male genitals have all but disappeared in a manner consistent with congenital persistent Mullerian duct syndrome (PMDS), with cryptorchidism [undescended testes] and a radical deformation of the prostatic utricle into a true “vagina masculina”.

The response of the subject’s parents was to urge the youth to adopt a feminine lifestyle in accordance with the physical changes being “a gift from God”. The parents believe that the changes will be total over time and that Kayla will be a fully functioning female in due course, although conventional science must rule this out as a possibility.

Kayla has been accepting of the situation, largely because of medical advice that these changes are progressive and that the only possible remediation would be surgical, which her parents would never consent to. She used the phrase: “I suppose I have to give it a shot”. She has grown out her hair and wears only female clothing, although favoring pants.

She described a period of uncertainty and reluctance that caused her great concern. But her parents encouraged her to “follow the plan God has for you.” She made the effort and presented then as she does now, as a very attractive young woman. She developed a special relationship with a young man she has known for some time and with whom she played sport with as a boy.

I interviewed this young man who confirms that he regards himself as her boyfriend. He appears completely accepting of Kayla as female. He explained that he had known the boy as Kyle for many years and they had been close, but the changes had resulted in them initially becoming distanced. Then, as he explained it: “I looked across at her and realized that she was hot”.

While Kayla did not share the same details of it, he claims that they have vaginal sex regularly and that it is more than satisfactory. Apparently, Kayla is able to receive him fully. I have no reason to believe that his phallus is not of normal proportions although I did not request to examine him.

There is nothing in Kayla’s appearance that would lead one to believe that she was anything other than a young woman, and she appears to relish this new identity. She explained that she has had time to come to terms with her situation and with the support of her parents and her now boyfriend, she is determined to be positive. As she put it: “I was just coping and then (her boyfriend) came along and while I may have been a reluctant girl, I love being his girlfriend”.

Her parents too, seem entirely comfortable with the changes to their child, after an initial period of shock. They regret the earlier publicity and would prefer that Kayla be allowed to live her life as a woman, and they hope as a wife and mother, in private. They are convinced that she will give them grandchildren and I was not about to disabuse them of that prospect.

Subject B

This young person, whom I shall refer to as Janet, is also a resident of Townshend with similar symptoms, but has not been accepting of the drastic changes to her body. Janet’s parents sought medical help from the early stages but in accordance with accepted modern medical practice in relation to genital disorders in young people, restorative surgery was not recommended, and early treatments were limited to drugs. There was no response to estrogen blockers or to massive doses of male hormones. This is not uncommon with AGD.

For the three years in which Subject A went from male to accepting female, Subject B continued to live as a male through an effective female puberty, hiding the developing breasts and placing stuffing in the crotch of her pants. But without any body hair or deepening voice, the fact of the female development was difficult to hide, in particular when the circumstances of Subject A were known to all locally.

By the time of the publication of the above article Janet was not yet 16 but there was already discussion taking place regarding surgical options. Given the lack of response to drugs it seemed to advising physicians that a successful transition to an adult male (or a return to maleness) would be unlikely to be successful. Her situation was very different from a female to male transsexual, and this was something that she needed to come to terms with.

At the time that I interviewed Janet she was living as a woman in a stable relationship with a genetic woman who is accepting of her body. Janet has adopted a female name so that she can present as a lesbian without disclosing any disorder, and to tant extent she is accepting of the changes. However, she remains of an essentially masculine nature.

She agreed to a physical examination. Like Subject A she has well formed breasts, a female body shape, no external organs and a very deep prostatic utricle that may well function as a vagina just as it does for Subject A, should that be required in a lesbian relationship.

Her sexual partner declined to be interviewed, but did say to me: “being a woman is wonderful and I hope that, with my help, she will come to know that in time.”

Subject C

Roberta (or Robert as he was then) was visiting Townshend from Bloomington IL at the time the contaminated water was consumed. For that reason, the diagnosis of Acute Gonadal Dysfunction was delayed on the assumption by her doctor that this was a boy with simple gynecomastia. It was only when the testicles disappeared up into the inguinal canal that the attending physicians made the link with the Townshend water contamination.

Roberta frankly admits that she was confused. But she was an outgoing and practical person and found that a way of adjusting to her circumstances was to accept the rejection of her male peers as her appearance changed to that of a young woman, and instead find company among the female students at her school. It was that new circle of friends that directed her towards an acceptance that the feminine gender as offering her the best opportunity for a future.

Her attitude was pragmatic. Once she understood that a reassignment back to a male gender would involve hurdles beyond even that of a female to male transsexual, she saw the difficulties as being significant. She remarked: “I can live with who I am now. In fact, it is kind of fun.”

Certainly, Roberta is attractive and she appears to be very popular at school where she is active in dance and cheerleading. My understanding is that she is sought after by fellow students of both sexes for her enthusiasm and good humor.

Roberta remains not in a relationship with any person at present, but she is clearly interested in men sexually. One statement she made was: “The only girls who are interested in me are not my type, but the guys are just the kind of people I like.”

She appears ambitious and claims to have little time for romance. She intends working in women’s fashion after graduation and she has a wide group of female friends who share her interest in this industry. While not qualified on this subject her clothing choice would appear colorful and avant-garde and designed to show off a body that is definitely female in appearance.

I also interviewed Roberta’s younger brother whom I will call Andrew. He was a witness to the changes in his brother whom he frankly admitted he worshipped as a hero to him growing up. He told me that Robert had been an achiever and a natural sportsman, but Roberta could now barely throw a ball should she want to. This young man is very confused and even admitted to sexual fantasies about his older sister, which probably reflects the fact that she is “a new arrival” and without the presence of the incest taboo that one would expect in a conventional family.

When submitting to a physical examination Roberta did ask about whether she might be able to become a mother when (rather than if) she finds the right man. I was ready to explain to her that this must remain a scientific impossibility, but I must confess that after the third examination of a subject in this study, and given the same incredible transformation of genitals both externally and internally in all three of them, I rather declined to rule out the possibility.

Subject D

This is a young woman (now) living in Michigan, her family having removed her from Townshend to leave behind bad memories associated with the drastic changes brought about the contaminated water.

This is a person who wrestled with the changes. She adopted a gender neutral name so I will call her Jordan. Being an only child, unlike the other subjects, and being the focus of her parent’s attention they were prepared to move homes to help her to adjust to the effects of the poisoning.

Because of the effects of the chemicals, the physical changes and lack of response to hormone therapies, she found it hard to adjust to life as a young man in an ongoing state of prepubescence. Matters were made worse by substantial breast growth – more than other subjects.

The family moved to another town where it was assumed that Jordan was female, and this seemed to allow for less estrangement. But Jordan remained a loner, and spent much time hiking and camping in the woods on her own. It was on one of those excursions that she met her husband whom I shall call Ken. It appears that they found themselves stuck in a cabin during a snowstorm, and this led to intimacy and eventually to a proposal.

Ken remains unaware of Jordan’s past, but she disclosed to her fiancé that she was very likely infertile due to “a birth defect”. However, my physical examination of this subject disclosed some remarkable internal developments that I had not explored with the other subjects, and in particular what appears to be a cervix at the top of the “vaginal” passage.

It appears that by the time of the wedding Jordan had abandoned her gender neutral clothing and lifestyle as her parents proudly displayed the wedding album of their buxom daughter in full bridal gown, hair and makeup and smiling at her husband. She now presents as very feminine although she says that she remains essentially “an outdoor kind of girl”, something her husband clearly approves of.

Her father did pull me aside to question me about the study and whether the chemical that had brought about these drastic changes in his child was still in existence. I pointed out that this batch had been a highly unstable synthetic chemical that had arisen in unknown circumstances and had therefore been dispatched away from the laboratory for safe disposal – that was the tanker that crashed.

He was very disappointed. He explained to me that he was, and always had been, a transgender person who had watched the changes in his then son with some envy. He said that the changes had been so total and that his new daughter was now living the life that he craved so much, that he would pay almost anything to drink that original contaminated Townshend water.

While the chemistry is beyond the scope of this study, it did leave me curious as to whether the processes might be replicated in a way to synthesize the same compound. Certainly the judicious use of it to promote Chemically Induced Acute Gonadal Dysfunction may have some commercial applications.

References:
1. “Atrazine can turn male frogs into females” https://news.berkeley.edu/2010/03/01/frogs/
2. “Atrazine induces feminization” https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2842049/

© Maryanne Peters 2020

Author’s Note:
I was prompted to post this after I ranted a little on a blog here last night about the poor quality of a science paper. I hope that I have shown here that anybody can write this stuff, and maybe better?

Abduction Conspiracy
A Vignette
By Maryanne Peters

Brian had a file in his hand but it was just a prop. He wanted to cross over to Jared’s cubicle and exercise his lizard brain, probably the most active organ in his head.

“God, that temp is so hot. The one outside Finch’s office – the one with the long brown hair, in the short dress and black tights and heels” said Brian. “Do you know her name?”

“You don’t recognize her? She was in the news a year or so ago.” Jared looked up at his colleague ogling the new girl. “For a start she is not a her, or at least she used to be a guy.”

“You’re kidding,” said Brian. She is gorgeous.”

“You’re not wrong there, but that is Arlene Tuckey, who used to be Aaron Tuckey,” said Jared. “Do remember when that Abduction Conspiracy hit the news. Young girls were being abducted by a human trafficking ring and sold into the Middle East, and a few young men as well. Castrated and feminized and sold to be a fuck boy for some Arab. It makes you shudder just to think about it.”

“It does that,” agreed Jared. “So no nuts, huh? I wonder what else they did down there.”

“Why don’t you go over an ask her. I think she is on a break at the moment, and clearly you are too.” Jared had work to do so he turned away.

“I might just do that,”

The fact was that Brian had seen Arlene earlier in the week and had taken any opportunity to stare. Somehow learning that she had not always been a woman made her even more exciting. He had to find out more. It was eating him up.

“Hey, my name is Brian. I work on the other side of the floor but perhaps you’ve seen me?”

“Hello Brian. No sorry. I have been busy coming to grips with things. My name is Arlene.” She offered him a hand – soft with perfect pink painted nails. He took it like a treasured thing – just to hold.

“Yes, Arlene Tuckey. I hope that you don’t mind me being forward, but I have heard your story. I have heard that you were originally a guy. I am just curious … have you got any bits of that left?”

She glared at him, her face thunder. She snapped – “I do mind. I don’t ask you what is in your shorts. It might be a cunt for all I know, and if it is, it is your business, and your business alone!”

Brian’s face went red and then white. He scuttled away.

Arlene accessed the personnel records of this rude man. She had a number to call.

Later that night there was a knock on her door at home. She opened it to the dark man she knew well an ushered him inside.

“Salaam eleikum, Ahmad,” she greeted him

“Al eleikum salaam, Al eina,” he said. He had an envelope thick with banknotes that he slipped into her hand.

“I’inah dhu ruh ealiat , lakinani 'aerifuk ealaa hadha alnahw,” she said.

“Ant taerifuni jayidan,” he said, acknowledging her perfect Arabic before repeating it in his perfect English – “Yes you know me well, and yes, I like them high spirited, at least before their manhood is removed. One again you have earned your fee. Brianna will be beautiful, but not as beautiful as you.”

“Would you like to stay the night?” she asked.

“Allah be praised,” he grinned in affirmation.

She had read extensively about the so-called “Stockholm syndrome”. It is the notion that the victims of abduction as a defence mechanism find themselves in empathy with the kidnappers. Could that be it? Maybe it started like that, but in all her time in the harem she had learnt so much.

She had learned the joy of being a woman, and the joy of pleasuring men. And she had learned that Arab men know that being born male is a privilege and that not all men deserve privileges. Brian was one of those men. She hoped that like her, he would learn to love being female. But if he didn’t, then that did not matter either. She had her mind on the man she adored.

Ahmad was the man who released her and sent her home, on the condition that his activities remain secret. His business was finding women for the harems of wealthy Arab men, of a special type. Women who could be made out of men who did not deserve to be men. She was not about to betray him. She enjoyed helping him.

She lay back and let him enter her and he always did, with a soft prayer of thanks and a hard rod of flesh.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2023

Author's Note: I think that this came out of discussion that I had with Erin on the nature of "Stockholm Syndrome", something that I think was explored in my recent latest anthology on Amazon - https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0CWDK47K7

About Face
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

Tom Younger and I were sexual adventurers together, but he was always better than me.

By better, I mean that he could win them more easily, he could go for longer, repeat more quickly, make them squeal louder. He had all the physical skills of a great lover. He was better looking than me, with his flowing locks and big ‘come to bed’ eyes. And he was more athletic, even a little shorter than me. I just had the money.

When it came to buying the thrills, my wallet opened. We were in it together, but most of the time, I paid. I guess that Tom was part of the show. Everybody is happy to pay for a good show, especially if you are in it.

Tom would fuck anything. I had never had a tranny before Tom introduced me to the experience. It was at the “Cockette Club” on the other side of town.

“It’s not gay if they think they are a girl,” he said, as he ploughed into one. I did “her sister”. Anal sex is OK, but I found it hard not to think what was hanging underneath, no matter how pretty she looked.

When we were done, this same girl Tom had fucked suggested to him that maybe Tom should try it up the ass. Turnabout, you might say.

“If you don’t think you are a girl, it’s not gay,” she repeated back to him. “Plenty of guys enjoy a prostate orgasm. If you guys are trying to have every sexual experience, you can’t say no to that.”

I could. I could say no. I did not like the idea of it at all. But to my surprise, Tom pondered it.

“OK,” he said. “I am up for it. Are you Ollie?”

I guess I must have agreed. These two “girls” that we had hired turned the tables on us. We were going to be fucked. Tom said that, as experimenters, as guys who were seeking every sexual experience, we should not turn this opportunity down.

I have to say that they treated us with care those “girls”. They used lubrication and opened us both up with small plugs just to get us used to something up our buttholes. They both wanted us to get pleasure from this act – as much as they did, maybe.. It was about pleasing us, not humiliating us.

I had the added advantage that my tranny had a fairly small dick, even when erect. Still, I found the whole thing uncomfortable. No, unpleasant. I had tried it, but I would not be doing it again.

Tom, on the other hand, seemed to have a special experience. He got his prostate orgasm, and it was clear from the groan he made, that it was something special.

I would like to say that what followed that night was not driven by some kind of envy of Tom Younger’s sexual prowess, but that would be a lie. That, and the fact that I was tiring of the whole multiple sexual partner thing. I guess that I was looking to settle down, but as long as Tom was pushing things, that did not seem possible. I was not going to quit while he was still going. That would have meant accepting his superiority. It should have been a given, but I was not willing to accept it.

The following weekend we travelled upstate to scout a new sex club, and were sharing a twin room in a rather seedy hotel. It was late, and while we had sampled the wares at the club, Tom was still hungry for action.

“Hey Ollie, why don’t we do the Cockette Club thing,” he said. I knew what he wanted.

“I am not gay, remember,” was my reply.

“I’ll be the catcher,” he suggested. “You just be the pitcher. We don’t need to do each other.”

“Do you think you are a girl?” I asked. “Remember your rule. One party to a sex act has to be a girl or think they are a girl, like the two trannies last week. That is what you said, remember? So, do you think you are a girl?”

“Tonight, I can think that,” he said. “Come on man. Do me.”

He was almost begging me. It was not as if we could not have called out for a whore. We could have had one each. But that is not what he wanted. He wanted what only I could give him.

“I could not fuck your hairy ass,” I said. “You have to be a girl. You are going to have to shave your lower half.”

Now, surely any guy would say no to that? I was giving him the chance to say no. He would not want to shave his body – not even half. What man would? This is a guy who liked to spend time naked. How would he function with half of his body shaved? But that is what he did. He went straight to the bathroom and shaved even more that I required, from the neck down. He had even shaved his ball sack, which I guessed could not have been easy. I was amazed.

“You’re going to have to make girly noises as they did last week,” I insisted. “You have to tell me that you think you are a girl.”

He bent over the bed on top of his cock so that all I could see from behind was his rosebud looking pink against the pale expanse of his freshly shaved buttocks. It could easily have been a girl’s behind. Just a little too muscular, maybe.

“I’m a girl,” he squeaked.

But as he started groaning it was Tom I heard. He seemed to be having a great time. We have shared many rooms where I have heard him make these sounds, when with a woman. The position I was then in was disorienting. It was not improved when his final gasp saw the sheet beneath him soaked with a huge amount of semen.

“Why didn’t you cum?” he asked. Now he seemed to have a slightly feminine tone to his voice. Weird.

“I guess I just didn’t think that ass of yours was girly enough, even shaved clean,” I replied.

“How do you think we can fix that?” Clearly, he was thinking about us doing this shit again. I wasn’t. Well, not at that time anyway.

“Man, those trannies had like, hormones and shit, to soften those asses,” I said, lying back. He was right - I had not cum and I was ready to jerk myself off to avoid a balls ache. “Now that you are in girl mode, you don’t feel like sucking me off by any chance.” I was joking, and fortunately he spotted it.

“Fuck you man. No way.” Now his voice was back to normal.

“That’s good,” I said. “I don’t think I could watch it.” I sniggered: “You would need to be wearing a blonde wig and lipstick, at least.”

I took a shower and did the finishing off of what his ass had started.

“I am just playing around,” he said, by way of explaining his behavior. It’s like I have tried every position as the dominant sex partner, and now I am keen to try some more positions as the passive partner. It’s still just sex, man. It’s not like I’ve turned gay.”

“That was pretty fucking gay,” I said.

“Do you think that you could do me face to face?” He was not letting go of this.

“Honestly, Dude, you should find someone else,” I told him. “I can’t do a guy. Let alone you, Tom.”

“You did that tranny last week?” He seemed to look hurt somehow.

“She was pretty,” I shot back. “If you could be as pretty as her, then there would not be a problem.” He looked at me strangely, like he was considering it, so I felt that I had to add: “I am not talking about a wig and lipstick.”

“I understand,” he said. “I would need to be enough of a girl to turn you on.”

“It’s not going to happen,” I warned.

“If you paid for it, maybe.”

I would pay to see it,” I laughed. But the whole encounter had left me feeling very odd about what had been a longstanding friendship. So odd that I avoided his calls for the following week.

It was not until Friday when I received a call from an unidentified caller. She told me that she was calling from a beauty salon – I forget the name. The caller asked: “I understand that you are to pay for some treatments for Tommy Younger? Up to $900.00?”

It seemed like a lot of money, but I agreed. I smiled at the thought of my old friend coming around to my place that evening in drag. I would be sure to get some photos so I could give him a hard time for weeks afterwards. I keep smiling the whole afternoon. Even after the message I received: “Tammy is coming around for dinner tonight at seven. Make it special.”

Why not. I got I my house lady to prepare a nice meal and set the table for two.

When I got home I took a shower and put on a good shirt. For some reason I gave myself a good splash of expensive musky cologne, although that was not generally my nature. And I waited.

It was 7:15 before the doorbell rang. I buzzed him in, but it was not him who appeared. It was Tammy.

“I know you like redheads,” she said, standing in the doorway and whispering through with the most kissable pair of lips, painted an even brighter shade of red.

She was wearing a little black dress. Skin tight and short, with see through material over the upper half and sleeves. Through the fabric appeared and pair of stunning breasts – some kind of attachment disguised by a collar below her throat.

The hem of the dress was well above the knee. The legs below were smooth and naked. Her black patent leather heels were not too high, bringing her eyes up to the same level as mine.

“Well, are you going to invite me in, or not,” she said. The voice was not Tom’s, but yet it was. The eyes were his, looking past the eye makeup and the plucked brows.

“I’m sorry,” I muttered. “Please, come in … Tammy.”

“Mmm, that smells wonderful,” she said. “Dinner, and the smell of a man.” She grabbed my shirt and pouted. I could have kissed her, had my mind not been swimming with confusion and disbelief.

It was an act. But it was a good one. She looked down and saw just how good it was.

“Well, look at this,” she said, reaching down. “Guess who owes me a face to face fuck tonight?”

“Dinner first?” I suggested. I was still trying to restore my balance.

“It had better be just one course,” she said. “I’m hungry, but not for food.”

My pants were straining to hold their cargo. And she knew it.

I pulled out her chair and she sat down with true grace, sweeping the tiny skirt of her dress beneath a bottom that seemed rounder that I remembered on Tom. I looked at and smelt her hair.

“Your hair looks fantastic,” I said.

“Oh, thank you, Honey,” she said. “Extensions. The best that you could afford.”

“And your lips?”

“A little filler, to give the bee-sting look that I know you love.”

I don’t know how you are going to go to work next week with those lips, and those beautiful eyebrows,” I commented.

“I never liked that job,” she said. “After tonight I am hoping that I won’t have to go back. From tonight I hope to be a kept woman.”

She was smiling, and so was I. What the hell. Let us enjoy the evening, however strange it might be. Tomorrow was his problem. God knows, we have done stranger things in our adventures. I poured out some fine wine – an expensive Margaux. She sipped it with way too much tongue in view - as if she was sucking me off. And then she nursed the glass in her hands, batting her eyelashes at me over the rim. My cock was fighting to escape.

“Mmm, this is delicious,” she said. Her tongue collected a morsel from the edge of her mouth, seeming to linger as an invitation, as if suggesting that her mouth was only there for sex.

It seemed that I could only stare. What could I say to this person? What about: “I like your dress”.

“I just got it on approval,” she said. But if you really like it, you can buy it for me,”

“Sure. Why not?” I said. “And the breasts. Are they on approval too?”

“Borrowed,” she said. “But you might want to buy me the real thing.”

I laughed, as if to reassure myself that this was a joke, from start to finish. It had to be. Right?

“I am looking forward to something creamy for dessert,” she said.

“I think there is a panna cotta in the fridge…”

“No, Silly,” she said. “Dessert will be taken in the bedroom.”

At least Tammy had eaten one course. Tom would not have bothered. But they shared this in common – let’s get on with the sex.

She slid off her shoes and pushed me backwards towards the bed, while starting to unfasten my belt. And when my pants dropped my designs were obvious.

“Unzip me,” she demanded, pulling her beautiful hair to the front, and then letting it sweep back over her naked shoulder blades – those tresses silken and glossy and burning red. I had unclipped her bra too, so that everything fell to the floor except her panties.

She turned around and I could see the perfectly realistic breasts, with hardly a trace of a seam on her smooth body, devoid of even the smallest hair.

“Well, somebody is pleased to see me,” she said. And then when she saw me looking at her panties, she said. “As for me, I had an injection earlier in the week which will keep me floppy. I know that you don’t want to see him. You can leave my panties on if you like. They are just a thong you can push aside, to get inside me. Ohh, I love saying that – ‘inside me’.”

I think that I spotted a moment of uncertainty on her face, almost as if she were worried that I might not go through with it, that she might miss out. Honestly, I was so sexually hyped at this moment that I was ready to fuck anything, but she was the reason I felt this way. Somehow, despite knowing who this was, and knowing how unnatural the idea should have been, all I could think to do was to kiss her. And I did. I would never kiss a whore. But Tammy … I wanted to kiss her.

I felt her body in my arms yield to my touch, going limp and totally submissive, inviting my tongue to go deeper.

She lay back on the bed and wriggled to get a pillow under her bottom.

“I flushed myself out and have perfumed and lubricated my pussy,” she said. She gripped her hands together under her chin. It was a classic little girl pose, like a virgin on the first night. Tom would have seen something just like it a hundred times. But I somehow looked entirely genuine. Nervous anticipation that something very special might happen, very soon.

It seemed so right that she should call it her pussy. That is what women like this should have between their legs. I left the panties on as she suggested. I had seen what Tom had many times before. I did not want to see it on this pretty girl.

I pulled the thong to one side and I entered her, looking into her eyes as I did. Eyes that invited every inch of me, beggingly. And when I was fully inside, she gasped. A wonderful little feminine gasp.

“Oh, Darling,” she said. “Please make me a woman. Please make me your woman.”

I could have cum at that very moment, but I knew that I owed this woman all that I could give. And she relished every stroke as if it were life itself. She clawed my back. Her synthetic tits wobbled. Her new hair flew about until matted against her forehead with the sweat of vigorous love. Her lips pouted and panted making only the sweetest and most girlish sounds. And my hips ploughed deeply into her body, with the slapping or hot moist flesh against hotter moist flesh. Until the moment. The shared moment. The moment when what seemed like a basin full of semen drained out of me, as she wailed in pure ecstasy. Her panties appeared wet.

As my penis came out, she took it and collected some of my cum that coated to put on her tongue and taste.

“Mmm, the perfect dessert,” she said. Her eyes sparkled in a way that I never seen before, not in Tom or anyone else for that matter. It was true happiness.

We collapsed alongside on another and waited for our hearts to return to normal pace. She reached across to feel my chest. She said: “No pressure but let me know when you are ready to do that again.”

“I am not like you,” I said. “My penis cannot stay up all night.”

“Well, its going to be the one we will be sharing from now on, so we will have to work on improvement.”

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2019

Accessing Patricia
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

Part 1

He was a nobody. A laboratory assistant in the testing area at the back of the Padonox complex – a rat wrangler – a tissue slicer. He was unimportant, and he was working in an area where nobody would have known, even if he had been of any interest at all. But he wanted to get ahead. When he had the chance to be important, he decided to take that chance.

The stroke had been kept secret. Had anybody known that Patricia Donoghue, the brilliant mind behind all the advances at Padonox, lay in a coma in that secret testing area, stock prices might have crashed. Ray Underhill knew that, and so did others in the Senior Leadership Team, including Dr. Hans Meissen.

“The thing that we know is that her brain is active,” said Hans. “We can see the brain activity on the EEG. It is so busy we can almost hear her screaming to be free of her body, which has lost all motor function and only remains alive through machinery. The parts of her brain that can act on her body are damaged beyond repair, but there is so much information that is vital to our work that only exists inside what is left of her brain.”

“If only we could access her brain,” said Ray. “Can we do that? Can we decode those brainwaves some-how? Can we download it onto a hard drive?”

“Human to cyber interface is the stuff of science fiction,” said Hans. “But human to human is something that Patricia herself was working on. She was getting old. It was almost as if she could foresee this stroke. Perhaps there was a family history of brain clots. She never said. But she was looking at the transfer of brain data as a way of preserving it. Perhaps it was for herself - to possibly continue her life in another body if she could find a suitable young woman to volunteer.”

“Can it be done?” Are there risks?” These were the kinds of question Hans had come to expect from Ray. Patricia had been demanding and sometimes dismissive of him. Ray needed him.

“Possibly and definitely are the answers to those questions,” said Hans. “The risks are the death of Patri-cia and the volunteer, or more likely that both of their brains will be adversely affected.”

Perhaps it was fate, but at that moment, this young technician appeared to change an oxygen bottle, or something. The two leaders looked at one another without speaking, and nodded.

“Your name is Tyler – am I correct?” said Hans. “You have been with us for some time – yes? That is why we have already trusted you with knowledge of our situation.” Hans gestured towards the hyperbaric chamber that contained the body of the old woman.

“Yes, Sir,” said Tyler. “She was a great lady. Such a tragedy. Such an amazing intellect.”

“Exactly,” said Hans. “I wonder whether you would be prepared to assist us in recovering something of that? Some technology exists for us to access her brain, but it/ must be human to human. It is experi-mental, so there are risks, but we would need a volunteer – somebody young and fit, such as yourself.” Hans did not mention Tyler’s key qualification – expendability.

“Are you suggesting that I might be able to access her knowledge? Or even just a small piece of it? What an incredible thought,” marveled Tyler out loud. “I mean, I have a master’s degree, but I’m nowhere near her capacity. What risks are we talking about?”

“It’s experimental,” said Hans. “We don’t know the risks, but in those circumstances, perhaps you should assume the worst. But we have a massive vested interest in accessing the data, and so your survival and full functioning would be our priority.”

Tyler may have been a nobody, but he did have that degree, and it had got him nowhere. He knew enough to know that he did not know enough. The possibility of accessing the brain of a true genius, even if just for a moment, presented all kinds of possibilities, and seemed worth taking a risk.

“Will I need to sign something?” he asked.

Ray reached out a hand to the young man and smiled. The science was beyond Ray's understanding, but he knew that knowledge is money, and lost knowledge carried the risk of serious loss. He had work to do to ensure that the family of this man had no right to legal action against the company or its officers, in-cluding himself.

“Thank you for taking this on,” he said, shaking Tyler’s hand. “Of course, Panadox will owe you. Rights will need to be recorded. But rest assured you will be safe. We will do our best to make this a success.”

And they needed to act quickly. How long could Patricia’s brain remain as active as the EEG continued to say it was? The documents were prepared and signed that very day, and Tyler was released to go home for the night in his modest apartment near the complex. The following morning Tyler reported early and was soon wearing the woven elastic cap over his head with 186 receptors arranged. Each of these was connected to the same number and pattern on Patricia’s head, although those sensors were linked to wires directly into her cerebrum.

Hans sat by her but called out across the room to where Tyler sat, still a little bewildered by the pace of the exercise and his lack of reluctance. It seemed to him that the downside was hardly worth contem-plating.

“Are you ready, Tyler?” called Hans. Then he whispered in the ear of the unconscious Patricia. “Come on Pat. Stay with us. We need you. Dump it all into the kid. Everything you have. Use him to do everything you wanted to achieve before time ran out.”

The EEG machine leapt into life. Hans could see the mass of jumping lines across four screens, and the large “heat map” screen of her brain intending to show brain activity as yellow and orange against blue seemed to turn bright red as if her brain was about to explode.

He looked across at Tyler who stared impassively towards him as if to ask whether the transfer was under way. As far as Hans was concerned he should be awash with information.

“Are you alright there, Tyler?” he called out.

“Yeah. Fine. Is it happening?” said Tyler. “I do feel something, though. I feel angry and I don’t know why.”

Hans smiled. It was happening. That was her. In his own way he loved her. She was old and she was angry a lot of the time, but she was brilliant, and he was proud to work under her, even with her abuse of him. All genius comes with energy, and not all energy is positive.

He sat back a little and watched as Patricia’s brain ran hot, and then slowly the red faded to orange, yellow then green. Her body convulsed a little. He looked across at the other screen – the one with her vital signs. A toned-down alarm was sounding. Her heart was missing beats; her pulse was slowing; her blood pressure was dropping off. Hans felt that she could not last much longer, but still her brain had only a few spots of dark blue – meaning total lack of brain activity.

He looked at Tyler again. He had spoken of anger, but he saw only confusion on the young man’s face. Perhaps he was the wrong subject? He needed to at least have the intellectual capacity to process what-ever had been delivered. Did he have that? He looked vacant. It was not encouraging. And yet this was it. It seemed like her brain was spent – slowly turning blue.

“Anything Tyler?” he called out.

“I actually have a brilliant idea,” said Tyler, as if surprised that he had even said the words. “Can you get me a tablet? I need to make some notes.”

“Well done, Pat,” Hans whispered into the liver spotted ear past a tendril of thinning white hair. If she heard those words, they would be the last she ever did. Her mind exhausted, Patricia Donoghue died.

Part 2

Tyler’s fingers worked furiously. He was an accomplished touch typist, but he seemed to be working as fast as he ever had. If there were errors he could not see them, but he would need to check when it was done. Even then, he had the thought that no revision would be necessary, but perhaps a little refinement. Tyler was starting to understand what it was like to be more intelligent than he was the day before, by quite some margin. But in all other respects, everything seemed quite normal. He felt reassured.

“Patricia is dead,” said Hans solemnly. “She was a tough boss, but I adored that woman.”

“I saw her, but I never knew her,” said Tyler, coming over to look at the body. She looked exhausted in death – spent by years of effort. And yet he noticed a couple of things about her – her nails were manicured and painted, her eyebrows plucked into an arch, her eyelashes tinted. Her hair was thin and white, but not cut short. She wore it long, brushed for volume in front and tied up in a small bun at the crown. She was a scientist but a little vain, perhaps.

“There is actually another thing that I want to make a note of,” said Tyler. “But first, I need to go to the washroom.”

“Great,” said Hans. “Keep a note of what you know. Let these ideas ride out. Don’t restrain them. Having looked at what you have just been working on, I think we can call the procedure a big success.” It had surprised even Hans but in a good way. Genius had been preserved, at least to some extent. The scale of their achievement was still to be assessed.

Hans sat down at Tyler’s machine to have a closer look. It was the kind of idea that Patricia would have had, but it was complete. He often felt that she held back material for her own reasons, not all of them logical. This was brilliance expressed succinctly. There was scope for many applications in what he could see. It meant money. He called Ray to give him the bad news and the good news – she was dead, but her ideas had not died with her.

“We need to look after this guy,” said Ray. “Perhaps we could shift him into her apartment? She won’t be needing it. I will call in her death to her doctor and have the body collected.”

In the washroom, Tyler was experiencing a moment of unexplained confusion. He went to a stall before spinning around to go to the urinal. His head was full of ideas but quite why this would steer him away from the task was puzzling. And then, as he washed his hands he looked up in the mirror and looked at his reflection. There was nothing unusual. It was him all right, but perhaps with a little more energy visible in the eyes.

But suddenly, he found himself saying aloud – “What a hideous shade of hair color!” Tyler actually slapped a wet hand across his mouth. There was an idea forming in his head, replacing the useful and technical one that he had walked in with. It was growing at the pace of the first one he had while still wearing the cap. He felt the need to “let it ride out,” as Hans had suggested.

He had a closer look in the mirror. He had never noticed it before, but he was reasonably good-looking, or he could be. He was young, and his features were fine. His body was slim and not overly tall or muscled by exercise. He was not a regular eater. His mousy brown hair was not cut short. There was potential here.

Hans was sitting at Tyler’s desk, which would not usually have annoyed him, but it did this time. He was going to act aggressively, but he stopped himself. It was not his nature. He simply stood and waited.

“This is good stuff, Tyler,” said Hans. “Why don’t we take a break? We don’t want to overdo this. I suggest that we finish up for the day. You go home and relax. Take the tablet in case something comes to you, but just relax for a bit. But before you do, why don’t we go up on the roof where I can show you Patricia’s apartment? You might consider moving in there … courtesy of Padonox.”

“Is there an apartment on the roof of the complex?” Tyler asked before he started to remember. He had never been there, and he had never even known it existed.

He felt tired. A period of rest was a good idea. But first, he would look upstairs.

They had to go down to go up. Near the main entrance there was a third elevator separated from the other two by a sculpture wall. There was a keypad. Tyler knew the sequence, but he let Hans punch the numbers.

The doors opened onto a glass hallway elevated a few feet above the expansive roof of the Padanox com-plex. At the end of the hall were the grand doors leading through to what had been Patricia Donoghue’s apartment, complete with never-used guest rooms and entertaining areas and a terrace with a swimming pool, more often used by its owner.

“There is a lot of her stuff here,” said Hans. “It can be disposed of if you want to move in.”

“I would like to move in,” said Tyler, adding – “To be close to the work. But please don’t dispose of any-thing. Somehow being surrounded by her stuff seems to fire me up to do that work. You need good roots to flourish.”

Hans was startled. He had heard that phrase from only one person - Patricia Donoghue.

Part 3

Hans was at work early, even though he had left late the night before, having had a deep discussion with Ray on how to manage Tyler. The call was unexpected, and the caller unknown, but she was put through to him once he had heard the reason for the call.

“My name is Melody Talbot,” the young woman said. “My boyfriend Tyler works for you.”

“He’s not in yet,” said Hans. “He called me to confirm his late arrival. Apparently, he has something to do before work.”

“I know about that, which is why I have come to see you, Dr Meissen,” she said. “I am outside in the car-park. Can I meet you now? Tyler will not be here for a while. I have to know what is going on. I have to know what you have done to my man.”

Hans gulped. He had been wondering if others might have noticed a possible change in personality in Tyler which he might not – he hardly knew the young man. Can overseers really ever truly know those be-neath them? She would notice – they lived together, and perhaps much more than that.

“I will have security let you in … and please, call me Hans.”

When she arrived in his lab, escorted by security as was protocol, her appearance did not surprise him. She was mousy like Tyler, but with a protruding forehead and small eyes. She would never be pretty, but she was clearly very concerned – even emotional. He smiled as he greeted her to put her at ease as best he could. He was not known for his empathy, but he knew when it was needed.

“I think you owe me an explanation, because I am not getting that from Tyler,” said Melody, unable to do anything but spill her thoughts in front of this friendly-looking man in the lab coat. “He has changed. I mean, he is still Tyler but different, and not in a good way.”

“I want to start by telling you that Tyler is a valued employee,” said Hans. “He always has been,” he said, adding a lie that was probably not needed.

“He has agreed to advance his prospects with the organization by enhancing his intellectual capacity a little. It is nothing more than that. Perhaps he is still adjusting to that. We sent him home early yester-day because we don’t want him to overdo things. Work-life balance is important for all men of ability, and that certainly includes your man, Tyler.”

“But that’s just it,” she said. Tears were appearing in her tiny eyes. “He is not my man Tyler. Not any-more. He is not even a man anymore.”

“I’m sorry, what do you mean?” said Hans. A small degree of personality change might have been expected. If somebody’s capacity for ideas is enhanced then they may well want to get busy and perhaps put work first. But what was she talking about?

“He got home last night and he told me that he was not happy presenting as a man,” said Melody. “That’s right – Tyler wants to be a woman. He has never said anything about such a thing before. Whatever you have done to his mind has had a serious side effect. It seems to have made him transgender!”

Hans was confounded. It was her knowledge that they had wanted him to receive, and it was what she wanted to give. Her female sex had never been a factor in her personality – at least as far as he could dis-cern. Patricia had been a scientist first. Perhaps there was a small streak of vanity in her, but she seemed to push that aside, as she did with other distractions.

It was true that on the rare occasions when some public appearance was needed, she might take some pride in her appearance and seek out something to wear that was stylish and appropriate, but he had no eye for such things. It was not her physical appearance that drew Hans to her – it was her incredible mind and her can-do attitude. He had loved her in his own way. But she was dead.

Only ideas were left. That was his part in this. He had succeeded in keeping her ideas alive. If Tyler had feminine tendencies, then Hans had never noticed them, but they must have always been there.

“I am no expert in this, but I don’t think that you can simply become transgender,” said Hans. “Are you sure that he did not have some gender issues beforehand? Perhaps our brain stimulation simply persuaded him to bring these problems to your attention?”

“He is a private person,” said Melody. “That has not changed. But perhaps because of that he has shared everything with me. He would have told me before now. This happened yesterday. He came home as a different person somehow. He is more impatient, and he wants to wear my clothes!”

Hans thought of calling Ray. He was hearing his voice in his own head, saying the word “risk” over and over again.

“Padonox looks after its people, and that means employees and their families and loved ones. You can be assured of that,” said Hans. “I am going to make us some tea. I have my own blend.” He did, and it would serve to relax her a little.

They were sitting there, and he was listening to some of the less-than-interesting things that she and Tyler did with their lives. It struck Hans as a boring life – even more boring than the life that he led outside the lab. At least he was more physically active and ready to travel to interesting places, but for him his laboratory held the greatest prospect for new discoveries. That was the blessing of his vocation, even if it had cost him a family or any long-term relationships.

Then Tyler appeared, and that appearance was truly amazing.

Hans’ first thought was that a stranger had entered the research area past all the security – an attractive young woman wearing a dress in black with splashes of bright colors. Her honey blonde hair was down to her shoulders where it bounced in soft curls that caught the light. She went straight to where the lab coats hung selected the one belonging to Tyler, and slipped it on, flicking the curls over the collar with her back turned for all to see their glory.

When she turned, it seemed that her makeup had been professionally done, as it had been that very morning. It was a daytime look – shaped eyebrows with just nude colors beneath, and natural eyelashes tinted, and eyeliner to show off the green eyes. The lips pouted in pink, but it was a confident smile – not one that would normally appear on Tyler’s face – but it was him.

“I’m sorry I’m late, Hans,” The voice was neither male nor female – something in between – a work in progress. “I just had to go to a salon to get the look I was going for. I hope you don’t mind. Perhaps I should have called you first. You look a little shocked. This is how I will be living from now on. My true self.”

Hans was in a state of shock. It was not as if a work colleague was wearing a dress, but that he had changed completely. The figure was padded but his eyes dropped down to her legs, smooth and shapely, to the floor where he could see painted toenails through the open toes of her wedge sandals.

“Melody, what are you doing here, sweetie?” The apparition spoke again.

“Oh, Tyler! Why?” Melody was in tears. “I came to see what they have done to you.”

“I want both of you to know that this is nothing to do with yesterday, except that yesterday my eyes were opened to my true essence,” said Tyler.

“All that you need to know Melody, is that yesterday, my brain was given a little boost. It opened my eyes to some technical matters that were useful to the corporation, but it also pulled the shroud away from who I really was. Under that shroud, I am female. I was simply denying it my whole life.

“Yesterday, I simply sat down and let my brain do what it had to do. I just got on with things. I formulated my thoughts and gave them to you, Hans, then I went home and started to put my life in order.

“I apologize to you Melody, but we can’t be together anymore. If the apartment upstairs is ready Hans, I am moving in tonight. I am going to live my life the way I want and stay close to the work I am devoted to … but not the way I used to. I plan to enjoy my life too.”

For a moment it seemed as if Hans Meissen was looking at the woman he had always adored, and she was winking at him – at least, I Iike to think that.

Part 4

Like I said at the beginning - He was a nobody. An over-qualified lab assistant. He was expendable but more than useful. After all, he gave me a young body that I have now turned into a very attractive woman. She is far more attractive even than I had been in my youth, all those years ago. Perhaps it was because I was so busy that I paid little attention to my appearance until it was too late. By that time, I was too clever and too powerful to settle for some man of lesser ability and too occupied with my success to look for somebody better than me.

The closest I came to such a man was Hans Meissen. He was a man I respected, even though I never showed him that. When he was smarter than me, I used to cut him down, simply because I could. I was impatient with stupidity but offended by being made to look stupid. Anybody who is a believer in the scientific method will tell you this is wrong. Being corrected is what we need. Ego kills advancement.

But now I have the opportunity to start all over again with Hans. Of course, my body is too young for him, but he is gentle and being fresh from the surgery that I wanted, gentleness is important to me.

He was a nobody, but I have kept his name. I just end it with an A. I am not Patricia. Patricia was a bit of a bitch. Tyla is a pretty young woman who wants to get on. She is not opposed to the idea of sleeping with Dr Hans Meissen as Head of Research to get ahead, and she may well consider granting a few favors to Ray Underhill, who will soon make it to Chief Executive for his role in keeping the Research Division supremely active.

But, as the story I have recounted will explain, Hans loves me in a way that few will understand. I think that he has an idea in his head that I might just be the impressive Patricia Donoghue returned to Earth in a softer, prettier and more loving form to allow him to have sex with the woman he has always adored.

He might be right—who am I to say? I just briefly accessed her, and it changed my life completely—in a good way.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2025

Accidental Princess
My Entry in the Reluctant Princess Contest
By Maryanne Peters

I was really too old to be a babysitter. Too old and a guy. But the truth is I was looking for work that made me money but was casual. I was finding things tough at college and I did not need the pressure of a regular job adding to my stresses. I guess I am just one of those people who does not handle stress well. Babysitting is easy. Play with kids and wear them out. Put them to bed. Raid the fridge. Do some study.

College set up a network to find work. I got a few jobs looking after boys. Everybody assumed that I would be able to go to the park and throw a ball to them, or whatever. I have never been very sporty. I would rather play video games, but even that gets boring for me, after a while. It is just the way I am, I guess.

The I got a job sitting for Daniel Watts Bryant, a banker big in the City, although I had never heard of him. But why would I have? He had two daughters, but he said that he was going to try having a guy to look after them when he was out.

“My girls manipulate other girls too easily,” he said. I had no idea what he was talking about.

The truth is that his situation was a bit of a tragedy. His wife had died a year or so before I turned up, of some kind of blood cancer. She had been a socialite, whatever that is. I heard some say that she was a bit of bitch too, but I never speak ill of the dead, or the living for that matter. So, her death left Daniel with two daughters Lea and Nora, to look after. I guess they were aged only 11 and 12 when she died, as they were 12 and 13 when I met them.

So, I called them “Princess Types” because they had been brought up to believe that if you were sweet and pretty you would find your prince and life would be perfect. I didn’t believe that was possible, at least not then. Who would? Princesses only exist in fairy tales – right?

I suppose they had the example of their mother. By all accounts she was pretty, and charming, and she married a wealthy man. She must have seemed like a princess to them, dressed in her fine clothes and jewelry, as she kissed them goodnight before going out to some grand ball or whatever.

I never met her. Now she is dead. So, it seems that her life did not turn out perfectly. Whose does?

Well, mine, as it turns out.

Daniel had a function to go to straight from work so he called to ask if I could be at his place after school. He had left a key for me to collect and I got around to his inner-city mansion before 3:00pm. I had some books with me, but I was not in a mood to study. Somehow, I seemed even more listless than usual that day – at least, that is what I put it down to.

When Lea and Nora got home, they were keen to play. I said that it was always my policy to play some games with kids in my care. Keep the tempo up and soon they will get tired and be ready for bed. There is no sense in sending kids to bed before they are tired because they just keep getting up, and with two you can find yourself against a tag team that can never be beat.

But usually I arrived much later. Daniel was not expected back until midnight. That was over 8 hours away.

So, the game was dress up. That was their favorite game. They played it all the time. I was just never there long enough to get immersed in it. But this time, I was. And I did. Get immersed, I mean.

Lea and Nora were experts well before their time. You don’t expert expect girls just on teens to be experts in hair and makeup, much less know all about body shape. I guess little girls brought up on Barbie dolls know what the shape of mature woman ought to be, in the world of princesses.

“You can be a princess too,” they said.

Why not? Do it. The look of excitement on their faces was priceless. I just sat back and let it happen. There would be plenty of time to “de-princess” after they were in bed.

“We kept some of Mommy’s dresses,” Lea explained. “Just the princess ones. “They are too big for us. Maybe when we get older. But they will fit you.”

“Surely not,” I said. I was sure that their mother would be smaller than me, although I am not big. It turns out I was wrong about that. The dress was pink with petticoats and beaded detail everywhere. It looked fabulously expensive. It came with clip-on earrings and a tiara to match the beadwork. It had a see-through section in the front, so Nora said that I needed to take off my T-shirt and wear a bra.

“We need to tape across your chest to make a cleavage first,” she said.

I could not believe it. I asked her where she learned this stuff. On the internet, of course. Little girls know that princesses have breasts, and internet savvy little girls know that tape and padding can make their chests look like a princess’s chest.

As for hair and makeup, there must be hundreds of video bloggers out there, and it seems like a good chunk of them are barely teenagers. Nora and Lea just lapped this stuff up.

Their mother had a wig. They said that it was auburn hair just like she had before the chemotherapy, although I have to say that there was just so much hair that did not seem possible. She was so sick she never got to wear it, they told me.

Just those words made my heart melt. These girls had no mother. If their mother had been there she would have been sitting quietly while they went about their work with such obvious joy.

“I am just going to tidy up your eyebrows,” said Little Lea, smiling at we sweetly.

“You go ahead, Sweetie,” I said. I hardly noticed what was going on. I was so unfamiliar with the whole thing. I was just watching them have fun. I seemed as if I was not participating in their game at all, even as their little hands, with skill beyond their years, painted my lips and tended my eyelashes.

Once they had finished with my face, they put the fabulous wig on my head and arranged it, with the tiara just so.

“Can I look at myself now?” I asked.

“Not yet,” said Nora. “You don’t sound like a princess. You need to talk like a girl. You need to say how much you like being pretty.”

Was I? They were getting each other ready, so I had time to practice a princess voice. I cleared my throat, and trilled a high C to get my voice to pitch. I twirled my pink skirts.

“I just love being pretty,” I trilled. “Who would want to be a boy. Boys are so dirty and yucky. Girls are best. Girls like us. We are pretty and happy and just looking for a prince to make happy. I so want to find my prince charming and make him the happiest man in the world. That is what I live for …”.

Both of the girls were smiling and looking behind me.

I spun around and there was Daniel standing there, staring at me.

For some reason the only sound to come out of my mouth was a startled and totally feminine: “Oh. I was not expecting you …”.

“I had changed my mind,” he said. “It is an important function, but it is really the kind of affair that requires a man to have an escort. And of course, I did not have one. Until now, that is.”

“It’s me,” I laughed, telling him that it was just the babysitter underneath all of this stuff. But somehow even those words did not sound like me. It was a bashful titter.

“I know,” he said. It suddenly occurred to me that he was the only person in the room not smiling. He looked very serious as he made his proposition. “I’ll find another sitter,” he said. “Since you are dressed for it, you can come with me.”

“You want to take a guy in a dress to some function?” I asked him incredulously. Why was my voice still up there?

I still had not seen myself, and he must have realized that. He reached out and took me by the hand, and I let him as if that were a natural thing. I suddenly realized that Nora had been at work there too. My nails were painted pink. My hand in his looked so small and soft, and feminine.

He led me into the hall where there was a huge mirror. It allowed me to see myself from head to toe.

I could not believe what I saw. In that dress and with that hair and face, there was a princess standing before me. My dual fairy goddaughters had worked magic – there is no other word for it.

“You look fantastic,” he said, standing behind me and looking over my shoulder. “A princess”.

“Aurora,” Lea suggested. Both girls were standing beside their father.

“I am not one for cartoon princesses,” said Daniel. “You are too real for that. I think Giselle. Princess Giselle. Enchanting. What about that girls?”

“Yes,” the girls both agreed. “Giselle”.

“Come with me to the ball, Princess Giselle,” he said, taking my hand and dropping on to one knee.

It was all so unreal. The transformation was so complete. The atmosphere was magical. The look in his eyes was … beyond understanding. I was if something in my core changed. The right thing to do was to laugh and politely refuse, then change my clothes and go home. But somehow that was the very last thing I wanted to do.

“Your wish is granted,” I squeaked, as if my voice had somehow reached a pitch beyond physical possibility.

The very idea was ridiculous. But I stood there entranced by my own reflection as he called the back-up sitter. I had agreed after all.

But with my ornate dress stowed in the passenger seat of his Bentley coupe as we drove to the ball, my only thought was that I must not embarrass Daniel. That would be the worst thing that I could do. Where had the voice come from? Could I draw from deep inside myself the inner princess that seemed to be hiding there? Could she come out for the night, and shine?

I have thought ever since about her – the concealed me. She must have been there all along, like a Cinderella hiding in the shadows, awaiting her special night. Then that night arrived and she was suddenly in her element, chatting and giggling, and moving with grace and elegance, among the crowd and on the dancefloor. Somewhere inside me there had always been a princess. How else can you explain it.

“You’re wonderful,” Daniel said to me as we danced the waltz in a close clinch.

“You too, my prince,” I teased. And yet I could see that he was looking at me seriously. I found myself staring back at him. If the moment I first saw the princess in the mirror had not already turned the world on its head, that moment would have done it. I longed to kiss him. I ached to do it. But, how could I? How could I kiss a man?

I didn’t have to. He did it.

I had found my prince charming.

We drove back to his house in a dream. “I don’t want this to end,” I said to him. I meant the night. I did not want the night to end. Is that what I meant to say?

“Does it have to?” he said. “You can stay the night if you like. With me.”

It sounded heavenly. Swept of my feet. Kissed. Bedded. What could be more complete? An entire romance compressed into less than 6 hours.

But I was suddenly aware of what lay under this beautiful dress. Hairy legs and at the top of those, what now seemed to me to be an obvious obscenity. The princesses ugly secret. She was really a monster. Not an ogress but an ogre. If only fairy tales were real and I could wish it away. If I could wish myself a perfect fragrant tunnel of love for him to drive into.

But wishes don’t come true, do they?

Well they do, but it takes time. Time and money and a little pain.

But he had money, and we both had time, and I bore the pain. I had to put things right. Princesses can’t have penises – right?

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2020

Accustomed
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

2002

James McAdam had been dating the girl for a while when she told him about the job opportunity that had amounted to nothing.

“It is a private nurse job for this super rich guy, but despite my qualifications and experience he rejected me when I met him earlier today,” she said. “It would be a great job, because is very rich, very old and very sick, and said to be very generous. But he is looking for somebody special, and it is not me. Perhaps you should apply. You don’t have a real job.”

“I’m an artist,” he said forthrightly.”

“Is that what you call it,” she sneered. “Well, you are poor. Perhaps you should offer to take on the job. Honestly, it is not like he has major needs. If you have to lift him out of bed and take him to the toilet of shower then it is better for a man to do it. He has no special medical needs. He has stomach cancer and gets all his treatment at hospital. He just takes pills. He doesn’t need a nurse – he needs an orderly I told him as much when he rejected me.”

James started to think about it, but dismissed it because he was thinking of how much lay unfinished in his studio. But a few moments later he found himself thing – ‘I am not going to get the job anyway, and even if I did there is no guarantee I would earn anything more than a bare wage. So what is the harm in asking?’

The girl did not even have the old man’s phone number, but she knew where he lived, so James decided to pay the man a call. He simply rode his motor scooter around to the address and buzzed at the gate.

“My name is James and I have come about the personal support job,” he said into the microphone. He was not a nurse and never could be, and if he now had the idea that what he really needed was something other than a nurse, James had a chance.

The frail voice on the other end paused for a moment and then invited him in. The gate buzzed open, and at the top of the drive the massive front door also opened electronically. James walked into the giant vacant entrance hall and called out.

A faint voice lead him through the house to a glass walled room that he later learned was “The Conservatory” although he had never been in a room like that before. All that he noticed was the masses of natural light in contrast to the small studio where he produced things that nobody wanted.

At the far end an elderly man lay in a contraption – and electric reclining wheelchair would be the best description. A thin blue veined hand beckoned him closer.

“Let me look at you,” the old man said. “Are you applying for the position of nurse?”

“Personal support, Sir, but it amounts to the same thing.” James stood in front of the man and smiled, intending to show good nature and enthusiasm.

“Good God. You remind me of somebody,” the man said. “You have the job if you want it. It pays very well because I was trying to attract professionals, but I take it that you have no qualifications?”

“None in this field, Sir. My calling is art, but I cared from my mother in her final days. I know what is involved caring for the aged.”

“You know I never considered myself to be aged. I turn 70 next month but until this dreadful cancer took hold of me I still felt very young and fit. Now it seems that my days are numbered. I have surgery scheduled but I am consider too weak to be operated on.”

“I can be here for you,” said James. “When would you like me to start?”

“Immediately if you can,” said the old man. “And the position is full time and live in, if you can manage that? You needn’t bring much here. I have a uniform organized. But you will probably need to make some arrangements? By the way, my name Barrett Conrad, and you can call me Barry if you allow me to call you Jay.”

James nodded. He was thing about money. He knew how much the girl he dated was making, and that this job would pay more. The sum was large. He had been momentarily shaken by being told the job was his, but the prospect of the money was welcome. Looking at the man in front of him he considered that he might be lucky if he worked for a month, including that very day.

“I can start immediately,” he said. He would call the girl to tell her. He did later that day. Now her name has been forgotten. She plays no further part in this story.

He did return to his studio for a few things and to secure it for his expected return, hopefully with not less than 2-3 weeks of the salary in his pocket. He then head back to the home of Barret Conrad which was to serve as his home for however long it too for the old man to pass.

“I have some unusual requests to make, if you are willing to indulge an old man,” Barry said. “By the way, how old are you, Jay?”

“I am 24, Barry,” said Jay, using the first name a little awkwardly the first time, but never again after that.

“Excellent. A great age. Mischief in your past and your whole life before you,” Barry’s lined face smiled. “And you said that you were an artist, so I am going to be asking for you to create a character for me to amuse me in last moments of life. When we met, I mentioned that you remind me of somebody – somebody I cared about deeply. I would like you to be that person, and if you will do that for me I will reward you handsomely on top of you wages. Would you be ready to do that?”

“Yes, certainly,” said Jay. The terms of the handsome reward would need to be settled, but he could guess that it would be enough to make him be anybody this man wanted him to be.

“Let me show you something,” said Barry. On this occasion they were in Barry’s Study near the front door and in his electric chair now bolt upright, Barry was rummaging in a drawer. He then produced two photographs.

“This is a picture of my wife Kaitlyn Emily Conrad, and this is a picture of my mother Mabel Conrad,” he said with some obvious pride. “Can you notice anything about them?”

“Well, they look similar,” said Jay. The photos were clearly taken ages apart. He would have guessed that both women were about 40 with similar ornate hairstyles and impeccable makeup, but the black and white photograph looked like it was taken in the 1950s and the color photo of the wife perhaps only 20 years before, around 1980.

“Well, some say that men look for their mother in the woman they marry. I loved them both beyond all measure, and maybe I am looking for the image of both of them.”

Suddenly Jay realized what Barry was talking about. He said, almost without thinking, his thoughts – “They both look a bit like me, I guess.”

“Would you humor an old man?” Barry gave him a warm smile – the kind of smile someone may dress a request for a great favor with.

Jay felt like laughing out loud, but he held this in check. What was he prepared to do? Basically anything. What was Barry asking him to do? Dress up as a dead woman … or two? It was nothing to Jay to do that, but what was it worth to the poor fool?

“You want me to dress to look like them.” It was not even a question. “It is an odd thing to ask, so I would expect you to agree to specific terms,” said Jay, he eyes serious but his lips betraying the humor of the situation.

“You set them then,” said Barry. “All I want is a little joy for what life I have left, and if you are to get a little joy from what I can give you in material terms, then you just name it.”

2023

Kait could not help noticing that his apartment was slightly bigger and more luxurious than hers. She was happy that it was. She had to be careful of who she got involved with. She knew that at 45 she was a very attractive women – perhaps better looking than she had ever been, because being good looking was now her main occupation.

“Can I make you a cocktail?” said Miles. At 55 he was a good-looking man, tall and fit.

“I need to be cautious until we know each other better.” She smiled with a mischievous look that she had perfected in the mirror, where she spent a lot of time. “Perhaps just a glass of wine. Chardonnay if you have it?”

“I have a Chenin Blanc from the Loire,” he said. “A good one. It needs to be drunk.”

“Ah, there is a white wine that benefits from a bit of age,” she said.

“That’s not the only thing that does,” he said, smiling at her. “Life teaches us to value maturity.” Their eyes met for a moment and Kait felt a warm feeling. It was how things were with Barry, especially towards the end.

He opened what seemed to be a panel in the wall to reveal a tall wine storage fridge, took out the bottle and skillfully opened it with a corkscrew.

“I want to know all about you,” he said, as he produced two long stemmed glasses and poured a good amount into both.

“I am not sure that I want you to know everything,” she said playfully. “A lady is entitled to her secrets.”

“I don’t think that I agree,” he said, handing her a glass. “Secrets have destroyed my past relationships, and to be clear, I know already that I am interested in a relationship with you. So why don’t we trade words of honesty tonight, you and I?”

She thought for a moment before saying – “Alright then. I feel the same way, but I wonder if it all might change when I tell you my story.”

“I don’t think that it will,” he said. “I can tell you that I have done some awful things to succeed in life, but now that I am here, I can spend some of my money to recompense. It is not that I believe in hell or karma, or guilt. It is more gratitude.

“I don’t carry any guilt either. You might say that I married money, although not straight away.”

He took a seat beside her, close enough to touch her, but he gave her space to speak.

“His name was Barrett Conrad. You may have heard of him but if you didn’t it would be because he valued his privacy. I was his nurse, not that I am qualified as that. He thought of me just as a caring person who reminded him of his wife. This sounds strange but he had me change my name to hers. I was to become the second Kaitlyn Emily Conrad. He was dying you see, and I was ready to accommodate him. My first of my two shameful secrets was that I did all of this for the money, and in anticipation that he would die quickly and I could return to my old life considerably richer. But he didn’t die. He told me later that when I came into his life it gave him the motive to extend it. He gained the energy to get healthy enough to undergo surgery that he couldn’t handle before, and that surgery, and treatment afterwards, were completely successful. So much so that he lived on for almost another 20 years.”

“Was that hard to handle?” asked Miles, with genuine concern.

“You know, for the first year I was annoyed I suppose, that my plan had gone awry. I was not annoyed that he was alive, because I learned to care about him as well as care for him, when he was at his lowest. And then when I understood that he was drawing strength from me in a way that made me stronger too, I felt closer to him than I have felt with anybody else. I think that I learned to love him. After a few years I he asked me to marry him and I did. He died peacefully in my arms just over a year ago.”

“Did his family object?” asked Miles.

“He didn’t really have any family. He had nephews and nieces who were awaiting something despite the fact that they never visited him. I say to hell with them.”

“Rightly so,” said Miles. “It sounds like you were in the right spot at the right time but that you did nothing but good for this man, so I cannot see what the second shameful secret might be?”

“Well brace for it, but when I met Barry Conrad, I was man.”

In the silence she looked at his face. The look until then had been one of curious adoration, but she braced for a sudden change. When it did not happen, she was puzzled, but relieved.

“Fascinating,” said Miles. It was like she had been telling him a story about somebody else. But there she was sitting on his sofa in his opulent apartment, her shapely black stocking legs crossed in front of her, now with his hand on one.

“And now here you are, in my apartment, by now a complete woman, I am guessing.”

“Why do you assume that?” she asked.

“Well, a year after his passing you are still you, a very attractive wealthy widow. I am guessing there is no going back.”

“You’re right, of course,” she said. “But quite how it all happened is hard to explain. I suppose that at the beginning I wanted to be Kait because that is what he needed. I tried very hard to be as feminine as possible, and to emulate the women in his life that he most admired – his wife and his mother. I even used to dress as his mother did, at his expense. He loved the look of women in the 50s and I had a local salon do my hair and makeup, and I had all the slips and dresses and high heels. I just got carried away by all of it. I used to love having my hair done. I still do. This ultra feminine look suits me, don’t you think.”

“I think that I have a lot in common with your late husband,” said Miles.

“I think I just became accustomed to being a woman. I learned that I loved everything about being a woman – the smooth soft skin, the lingerie, the dresses, the stockings, the shoes, the hair, the makeup, the nails, the accessories, the salon, the shopping, the attention of men, the camaraderie of women. I just can’t imagine life without it. This is my life now. Anything else is just not right.

“I think you’re wonderful,” said Miles.

“Are you attracted to transwomen? I think that you should know that I have had sex reassignment surgery. There is nothing down there. I never thought that I would go that far at the start. I didn’t even want to take the hormones. I was just worried about losing my hair. And then these breasts sprouted and Barry said that I would look good in a bikini at either of the beach houses or on the yacht, and … well, a bikini with a bulge just doesn’t look right. And Barry wanted to … you can guess. To be blunt, men in their 70s can still have sex, with a little blue assistance. He loved me, you see.”

“I can understand that,” said Miles. After a pause he added - “But I’m only 55.”

“Is that a proposition,” she asked. “Aren’t you concerned about the fact that … I wasn’t always a woman?”

“Is that true?” said Miles. “Or was it just that you had the wrong body? I am looking at a woman. I am looking at possibly the most attractive and sexy woman I have ever been with in my entire life. Of course it’s a proposition.”

“Miles, I am happy to say yes. That is another thing about being a women that I have become accustomed to – just lying back and waiting to be filled and sent into orbit. But you need to understand – I have known love as a woman. I am still looking for that. I have become accustomed to that as well, and I am finding it hard to be without it."

He stood up and took her delicate hand in his.

“Darling, your search is over,” he said.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2024

Author’s Note: This story is down to something posted on FM MB early this year by pantyhoseboy - “Subject: Can someone write a story: I would love to have someone to write story about a young man named Joe that is presented with an offer to inherent an elderly mans’ fortune. The stipulation is that he must live as a woman named Kailin Emily Conrad, the old man’s wife and be feminized at the whim of the old man. The young man thinks that the old man must surely pass away within a year or two and decides to accept the offer believing that he will be able to return to being a man after he inherits the money. Twenty years go by before the old man finally passes. The young man, now a middle aged woman, has been feminized beyond the point of return. He, now she, would not be able to pass as a man even if she wanted to, but does she even want to be a man again? She has lived virtually her entire adult life as a woman. She has worn nothing but women’s clothing, lived as a woman for over twenty years, and has friends and a life as a woman. She doesn’t even know how to live as a man. She has become so accustomed to wearing dresses and heels that she doesn’t feel properly dressed unless she is wearing pantyhose or nylons and she feels absolutely naked without her makeup on, not that she needs it now that she is so feminine and beautiful. In the end she is relieved to find out during the reading of the will that her contract in fact stipulates that she must remain a woman for the rest of her life.”

Not surprisingly given the chosen name the request was for “lots of lingerie, pantyhose, heels, slips, and dresses’ which is not really my thing, but also “maybe romance and Kaitlin's acceptance and love of being a feminine woman” which definitely is.

Addiction
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

“Of course I respect you and your studies,” began Dr Julius Zelig, “But what you are suggesting is contrary to my research and all accepted understanding of this issue.”

“I don’t deny it,” said Dr Gordon Halsey, “But I tell you I have isolated the neurochemical.”

“So, you are telling me that if I was to receive this chemical of yours, for only a week, with any substance at all, I would become addicted to that substance, whether or not it contains any addictive component. I could become addicted to Mars Bars, or lettuce!”

“That is the consequence of my work, although I have not trialed it on human subjects as yet,” said Gordon, seriously.

“Well I tell my friend, I think it is bullshit,” said Julius, sipping deeply from his glass of Scotch. “In fact I will tell you this – try it on me if you like, on some substance. Make me an addict. If you can.”

“I would not want to do that,” Gordon shook his head. “Addiction is a curse, You and I have devoted huge effort into overcoming it. I could not be party to it.”

“That sounds like you doubt your conclusions,” laughed Julius. “But seriously, I want to test your study. All of my work is about isolating the addictive elements in substances and reversing or neutralizing the effects. What you are saying is if addiction is triggered by this chemical “marker” at the beginning, there need be no addictive element in the compound. That is a direct attack on my approach. I want to disprove your findings. No, I insist that you test your theory on me. You well know that some of the greatest advances in medicine have been achieved by self-experimentation. If you believe it, make me your subject.”

“It is because I believe it that I am concerned.”

“Well I don’t,” said Julius emphatically.

“It sounds like your motives might skew the result,” Gordon pondered. “If I were to do it, it would need to be something that you would not want to consume long term, because of its effects, but would have a physical result.”

“How about cheeseburgers,” Julius sniggered. “But no, I like them too much already.”

“No it cannot be food. It should be a prescribed drug. That would produce undesired results but do no harm. Perhaps like a drug that made you lose your hair with continued use. If there is such a thing.”

“Perhaps there is, but only as side effect to other more serious consequences. I honestly do not believe that my full head of hair is at risk. But I agree with your approach.”

“Perhaps add unwanted hair…” Gordon was thinking aloud. Then he raised his finger to signal a ‘eureka’ moment. “Estrogen,” he said. Female hormones. No results for weeks, but if you keep taking them plenty of undesirable results, for a man anyway, without the risk of other health issues.”

“Set it up,” said Julius. I still have family over this side, so I come out regularly. In fact, I will be back over here for a two week stint next month working on a study at a local clinic. You can administer the drugs for a week and observe me for a week. But don’t expect to prove anything. I think you are headed in the wrong direction on this one.

***

Julius looked at the last three Estrogen pills in the plastic jar. Gordon had given him five following the seven he had taken with the damned drug over the past week. He had to think: ‘So I arrived Wednesday last week and took the first round that night. So, the last shot with the Estrogen was on Tuesday night this week. I took another on Wednesday night because I could not sleep. Then I took one yesterday, so if I take one now …’.

It seemed incredible that it was happening as Gordon had predicted. But he could not admit that it was happening. He was trying to convince himself that there been some suggestion, or that some other influence was at play here. Estrogen is not addictive.

The problem he faced was that he would be seeing Gordon for a drink shortly, and he was ready to tell him that he the experiment had failed and that he was not addicted. When he did so, he would laugh out loud, and Gordon would ring his hands, and the world would go back to normal. Addiction was a result of addictive substances in various narcotic substances. Addiction to non-addictive substances was not possible.

Now, when Gordon asked for the five pills he would have t say: “I threw them away”. How else could he explain that he only had three left. In fact, it would be two, because he needed to take another. If he met with Gordon now, surely he would see all of the symptoms of addiction in his shaking body. He needed to take one now. It was a nightmare.

He knew that he needed to get home and try to find a solution to the problem. A manageable substitute, or (if necessary) go cold turkey but in a proper environment. Gordon must never know. One thing was for sure, Gordon must never know how stupid he had been to suggest this. Maybe after he weaned himself off this damn thing?

But after he had swallowed another and saw only two on the bottom of the jar, he felt a panic come over him. If he needed one tomorrow, what would he do? And then he was to fly home on Sunday.

***

Gordon’s mother was pleased to see him. She did notice that he looked a little tense and unwell. It was 3:00pm before he got to her house.

He asked after her health, in a little too much detail. He asked what she was taking for her blood pressure and her angina, then he asked: “You’re not still on Hormone Replacement Therapy are you Mom?”

“Goodness no,” she said. “That was just vanity. I stopped taking them months ago.”

“I suppose you have thrown the tablets out?” he asked, in nervous anticipation.

“No. I think they are still in the kitchen cabinet.”

Although not a religious man Julius Zelig offered up a prayer of thanks. He said to her: “I’ll clean them out for you. You shouldn’t hold on to old prescriptions like that.”

When he found them he took two, and pocketed the rest – several weeks supply. He should not have taken two but he just felt that he needed a better hit. It was Saturday and he was due to catch up with friends for dinner including Gordon. He did not want to be on edge. Then he would be flying home tomorrow. At least he now had sufficient to allow himself to get this monkey off his back.

***

“You look a little different Jules,” said Gordon, after shaking his colleagues hand. “I can’t quite tell how, but different from you last visit. Are you keeping well.”

Gordon had even noticed that the handshake was slightly different.

“I am very well, thanks,” said Julian. But that was not so true. His nipples had been itchy for weeks now. He had learned that he needed to wear a woman’s silk top under his shirt to avoid irritating them. This morning he had noticed swelling and that had brought him to tears. He never used to cry but these days he seemed moody and sometimes it took very little to set him off.

“I have to say that after that trial two months ago, I have sort of changed direction”, said Gordon as they took their seats in the bar near Julian’s research lab. “I am still working in researching neurochemicals, but not in addition after the trial on you failed. It really is your area, so I’ll leave it to you. I was going down the wrong track. I concede that now.”

Julius felt a pang of guilt. All of science could be perverted if people did what he had done – deceived the researcher into believing that a fact was unproven. Not only was he addicted to Estrogen but he had been unable to shake the addiction through many weeks of effort, and he was an expert. He felt that he should say something then and there. But how could he, now the clean leading position, admit to such a grave offence against science.

Worse still, the tablets were running low. Despite who he was the local pharmacy had declined to deliver repeats against his mother’s prescription without her doctor signing off. He had even contemplated forgery. This was clearly addiction.

And that very afternoon when he had asked the GP at the local clinic about a prescription, he said that this drug was dispensed only to women to defer menopause or to male to female transgendered people. He was clearly not a woman. Could he be diagnosed as being transgendered. That would be another lie.

He regretted sitting across from Gordon. Would he see my softer skin, or my lighter colored and silkier hair? Luckily he could not see my soft body and the lost muscles and sparse hair upon it. He could put two and two together and see that for the last 2 months I have been taking female hormones.

Fortunately, Gordon was oblivious, being caught up in his own project, and going on and on about neurology. Jules thought: ‘Sometimes men can be so boring’. He started to imagine himself in a nice warm bubble bath.

***

At the stoplight, Jules looked in his purse to check that number of tablets in the bottle. There were plenty. He congratulated himself. It had worked. He had researched all of the indications of the condition and had been able to convince Dr Perez that she was indeed a transsexual. And he had secured the prescription he needed.

He understood now that he was feeding a habit, just like any junkie. The difference was that there was nothing illegal about the drugs he took. There were no legal consequences. There were just a lot of other consequences.

To win his prize he had to present to Dr. Perez dressed as a woman. There was no chance without it. Dr Perez required proof that his patient was ready to transition. That accounted for what Jules was wearing. A yellow sundress and sandals, and a yellow scarf over his curled hair. After all, he could not take any chances. He needed the pills, and was having trouble sourcing illicit supplies from over the border.

So that meant the he needed to explain everything to his wife Janice. Not the challenge that he threw down to Gordon Halsey – that just made him look stupid. No just that in all his work with addiction, through an accident he had become addicted to Estrogen. It was not his fault. It was an accident. But no, he could not sue the lab, it was his lab after all. He had assured her that he could work his way out of it. He still felt that he could. He told her that it needed to remain a secret. She was up for that – she was just as embarrassed as he was.

But things between them had been strained for some time. The lack of sex had been an issue for months. Then the obvious changes to his body, and the need to borrow her undergarments. He always intended to stick with that story and the claim that he was doing everything he could to end the cravings, so that their marriage could go back to the way it was. But as he dressed to go to visit Dr Perez she looked at him in unconcealed disgust.

“Don’t expect to find me here when you get back,” she said. I will stay with my sister for a few weeks, and if you can kick this problem in that time, I might consider coming back.”

Some women have stayed with their husbands even after transition. Perhaps they had always loved just the person? Even though that person was inside, a woman. But Jules Zelig was no woman. He knew what he was. He was a junkie who would do anything to get his supply. Everything and everybody was expendable. His wife too.

She never came back. They sold the house, and split the furniture. He put all of his clothes in storage, with the items that would not fit into his modest apartment. It had the sole advantage of being near to his lab. The only clothes in the wardrobe were female.

He checked his face in the mirror. Dr Perez was right, he made a very attractive woman.

***

Gordon had been at the lab for about 30 minutes by the time his old colleague was free to see him. He had been touring the facilities with a research assistant.

Jules walked down the hall towards him. Beneath her white coat she was wearing a particularly smart purple dress with black lace trim. The skirt was above the knee and her shiny black heels clicked on the vinyl floor. It was what she liked to wear. The lab cost to be professional, but a knockout look beneath it.

Gordon turned and looked at her in amazement: He simply said: “Jules?” Whether it was a question because he doubted it was the person he knew, or whether he was using the right name was not clear.

“Gordy”, she said. Her voice slightly husky but feminine. “Great you could come by our little establishment while you are out here.”

They walked together. He said: “When I saw that your lab was now headed by Julia Zelig I have to say I was very surprised. I had no idea that you were transgendered”.

“Well, the truth is that I have a dreadful confession to make,” She began. “I lied to you and I broke the fundamental rule of science – ‘when you are proven wrong, admit it’. I did become addicted to Estrogen, just as you promised I would. I have been taking it ever since. Even now, although from a month ago I am no longer addicted. Your neurochemical got me hooked and I took until there was no going back. So here I am. I owe you a huge apology. Your work was sound, and I was not big enough to accept it.”

Gordon sat in a state of shocked bewilderment for what seemed like some time. But then he had to ask a researcher’s question: “So you are no longer addicted. What happened.”

“I had my testicles removed and a vagina constructed,” Julia said flatly. “The testicles were useless already, but I can only assume that the lack of them has allowed the hormones in my system to fill the gap. I suddenly found that I had no craving. Perhaps my own system produces enough. Now I only take Estrogen one week a month. I like to be on a cycle. It makes me feel … more feminine. That’s the way I am these days.”

“I can see that,” said Gordon. “You look fantastic

“Maybe that’s down to you,” she said. “The hormones were your idea.”

“Well I’m sorry if …” he stammered. He was suddenly wrestling with the idea that he had caused his colleague to give up his masculinity.

“I’m teasing, silly. It was your idea, but I’m now totally OK with it. As I said, it’s me who owes you the apology. I was more than unprofessional in questioning your research, I was a prick about it. I am happy to say, that the prick has now gone.”

She was smiling and Gordon was suddenly aware that he was feeling flushed. It was a beautiful smile. She was beautiful.

They walked through the lab a while longer before he said: “Just to show there are no hard feelings, would you come to dinner with me tonight? I think that I would like to know the new you, much better.”

The End

(c) Maryanne Peters 2020

Adwomen
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

Siobhan and I had gone through a similar education for a career in advertising. We shared a modest apartment in the city. We were both young and ambitious, and short of money. The only real differences were that she was a woman, and I wasn’t; and I had talent, and she didn’t.

So, imagine my private disgust when she got a prime job at the Garret Agency, and I was still only free-lancing. She got the job because she was what I was not. The Garret Agency only hired women.

Penelope Garret had been a high-ranking executive in one of the world largest advertising firms, but could not get advancement. She bemoaned that the industry was dominated by men, so she left her job to set up her own business, offering new approaches in marketing and promotion. The Garret Agency was highly successful.

Siobhan was only able to keep her position because of the work I did for her behind the scenes. We negotiated a deal and I received some of her salary package in return for doing a lot of her concept work, including scripting some of her presentations.

But it could not last forever, and when she was offered the opportunity to lead a team (based largely on the quality of the work I had done) she knew that she could not continue as she had done. She could not take the work home and have me do it for her. She needed to perform on the job. The problem with leading a team is that they look to the team leader for inspiration and she had none. She would be found out and she would be put out. Simple as that.

She was given two trainees from the staff but given the opportunity to recruit one person from outside to be on a level above those trainees. That is what led to her extraordinary idea. An idea that would change my life forever.

It was obvious that I should be that additional member of the team, but it was not possible. But Siobhan had the solution. I needed to go from being Eddie Boyd to Emma Boyd. And it needed to happen fast.

When she put the proposal to me I just laughed. I told her: “That is the single craziest thing I have heard in a lifetime.”

“Look at yourself Eddie,” she said. “You are not a big guy. Get rid of that thing you call a beard and tidy up that hair and would not look half bad as a girl. In fact, with those cheekbones and big green eyes, you would make a better-looking girl than a guy.”

I had let myself go a little working from home and not mixing with anybody other than her. The truth was that I lost a lot of confidence in myself. The only thing that I was good at was the work, and I put effort into that. I had lost weight, was pale from lack of sun, my hair was long and I had not shaved in six months – not that much growth had resulted.

“Let’s try a makeover,” she said excitedly. “If I can convince you that you could get away with it, then you have to consider it. And even if you slip up, we could say that you are a transwoman. I can’t see Penny Garret firing you if you are trying to be a woman.”

That last comment got me to thinking that it might just work. I said: “Maybe I could just take the job as a transperson? Like, just half a woman?”

“No,” she said. “That’s our back up position. I tell you, I think you could pass as a girl. You just need to follow my instructions. Now let’s go to work on that face. Starting with a shave …”.

That is what she did. She just gave me a makeover from the neck up. I shaved closely and she washed and styled my hair. When I looked at myself in the mirror I realized that she was right. Provided I said nothing and did not move, I could pass for a woman. In fact, I was quite pretty.

The possibility started to appear real, so I opened negotiations. I said: “To do this I still want a share of your salary on top of anything I earn. In fact, I want the package you are getting, with the difference out of your pocket.”

She was pissed. But she had to bite her lip. “Ok,” she said. “But you are a prick”. She was smiling as she said it, but she meant it. The hell with her. If I was going to go through with this it needed to be worthwhile. Without me she would not have the job. With me onboard we could go places.

We had some time to get me ready, and we needed it. It was not my appearance that was the problem, it was as I said – if I said nothing and did not move I was Ok. I did not carry myself as a woman. It was that way I walked and moved my hands. It was all wrong. I needed to be instructed by Siobhan and to watch women more closely to understand the differences. Fortunately, observation and imitation fitted with my artistic bent, and I picked things up fairly quickly.

When it came to my voice, Siobhan suggested that I keep talking to a minimum. Essentially, she was suggesting that I should whisper with her and let her do the talking. I could see where this was headed so I did my own work on this. I found voice coaching for transwomen on the internet and worked diligently to get it right, but I did not discuss it with Siobhan.

My facial stubble returned a little so we both realized that I would need more radical work to stop me developing a five o’clock shadow around five o’clock. That, and the full body wax was the hardest thing about “my transition”. But when the inflammation had subsided and the moisturizers had done their thing, I found that I quite liked the smooth skin. My hairless body was sensitive, but then there were the silky undergarments. It really did feel nice.

Then Siobhan appeared with a syringe and a bottle of pills.

“Oh no,” I said. “If that is what I think it is then that is going way too far.”

“Look,” she began, “You have to face reality. This isn’t forever, for either of us. But while you are pretending you need to get it right. These pills will stop any beard coming back and will soften your skin and improve your hair. And they will prevent erections. In an office full of women a tent in your dress would not be a good look.”

“And what about the syringe? I asked.

“Yes,” she replied, “They are more of the same, but I am suggesting monthly shots to coincide with a monthly cycle. You will not understand this Eddie, but you will be in a woman only environment. This is essential.”

I didn’t understand, but I went along with it. I am not sure why. I remember thinking as I felt the cool fluid entering my system: ‘where will all this lead me?’. Anyway, it was the last time she ever called me “Eddie”.

When the day came I washed my hair and Siobhan styled it a little. I applied my own makeup as she had taught me. I needed to be confident in my new skills. She had picked out a skirt and blouse for me. The overall look was ‘low-key’. I was to appear uninteresting. That was not my personality, but I could see why – a person in disguise does not want to draw attention to herself.

It suited Siobhan too. She was still the alpha female, or she wanted to be. I was to be the quiet and invisible toiler. Her problem was that even in this outfit, with awkward makeup and manner, and not even being female, I was actually prettier than her. I think she knew it too.

Meeting with Penelope Garret was like 30 seconds in a tornado. She shook my hand, looked me up and down, asked two particularly astute questions, announced her approval and moved on, surrounded by attendants. I was impressed. It made me wonder how Siobhan had been able to hang in here for this long.

The answer was, that at the lower level, there was not the same level of competence. In no time, I was standing out. And I could talk too. Much to Siobahn’s surprise and perhaps disgust, my practised feminine voice sang out confidently.

Almost immediately I ditched her look for me. With my first paycheck, supplemented by a chunk of hers, I went shopping. I suppose my eye for a theme enabled me to develop my own style and colour palette. The same with the makeup and the hair. It was just long enough to wear up, which could be both feminine and practical, and allowed the use of some colour or decoration. I was really enjoying these other creative outlets.

For an artistic person like myself, who believes that an image should tell a story, I understand the advantage that women have over me in their daily appearance. As a man you cannot do this. Even if you do just a little, it is not the risk of being called “a fag” that is the problem, it is the risk of not being taken seriously. My look said colorful, confident, individualistic, practical, and serious about the business that I was in: Advertising.

Penelope liked the look. She sat in on one of my presentations, and she liked my delivery too.

It was becoming clear to Siobhan that I was a threat, but she knew her limitations. So, when I was appointed as a team leader instead of her, she told Penny that she would like to stay on my team. She had to take a pay cut, but she actually made on the deal because I no longer insisted on a share of her salary.

It was all going really well, and I was not giving much thought to anything other than work. I spent long hours at the office, even after Siobhan had gone home. When I was at home I still did some freelance, although I was not taking on any new stuff. And the pills had kept any thought of sex out of my mind. Not that I could have pulled any women looking as I did.

But it was the day when I first noticed my breasts that I was forced to address my situation. It had been a hot Friday and I was having a shower after work. I was using a nice floral body wash but as my hands passed over them I realized that not only were my nipples sensitive but I had two fleshy mounds behind them. Big fleshy mounds. It seemed incredible that I had not noticed them before. Showering in the morning was always a rush, but it seemed crazy that I could have missed them.

Siobhan had been out but when she came home she found me sitting in my robe crying. I seemed to do that sometimes lately, but now I had a reason.

“Look what your injections have done to me,” I wailed at her. “These aren’t going away. I’ll need surgery to get rid of them.”

“Just not yet,” she said smiling at my new assets approvingly. “It’s still early. Let’s go out and show those girls off.”

I could not believe what she was saying. I thought that she was my friend. Sure, I had overtaken her at the agency, but we still shared an apartment and worked together. But her idea was that any problem could be solved with a night on the town and a few too many cocktails.

Her contribution was a push up bra and little black dress. Somehow when I put them on I brightened a little. The bra did its job and with the assistance of some well pleased gel inserts, from the next down I looked like a porn star. For my face and hair, I played around until I had something I liked. Then Siobhan changed and we went out.

I had the occasional drink after work, but I had never gone out like this. It only occurred to me when we were in a bar that it was almost a first being among men. I say that because every day I commuted among men, sometimes lunched where men were, and I had even met male clients, but this was different. I could feel and sometimes glimpse men watching me. Watching me approvingly.

The funny things is that Siobhan was right. It did make me feel good. Not the drink, it was being surrounded by people having fun. And I almost felt that I was the cause of some of it. People (men that is) wanted to be around me and talk to me. I was chatty but a little coy. You have to be when you have a secret in your panties – even just a little one. It seemed as if there was a year of smiles and laughter around me, in just that one evening. I forgot all about my growing problems.

I must have been propositioned at least 10 times. I mean propositioned as in “let’s go somewhere quiet”, or “I’d love to meet up with you again”, or “here’s my number – call me”. I found 4 different business cards in my handbag when I got home. Siobhan had one!

I did not go into the office on Saturday morning. Instead I went shopping with Siobhan and bought some evening clothes. We went out Saturday night to – somewhere completely different. Siobhan and I latched on to a couple of bond traders, and they took us for a late night supper.

“I would jump this guy in a flash,” she said as we were both in the Ladies Restroom. “But I know you can’t, so it would be too complicated.”

For a moment I had a pang of regret that I was unable to “jump” my one of the two. He was handsome and rich, but a really nice guy to. If I was a real girl I would have been happy to have sex with him. Afterwards the idea that I could have that thought made me shudder. I had never had a gay thought in my life as a man. Now I was sad that I could not have sex with a man?

I did go into the office on Sunday to work on a campaign, and while I was there Penny popped her head into my workspace. For some reason I was wearing a floral dress over my push up, instead standard Sunday sweats. She remarked how good I looked.

“I think that you should come with me to a dinner on Wednesday night,” she said. “It is a potential new client, and a big one. All men, but they want us to help them break into the female market. Let me tell you, we girls have got to use all our assets to win the business, and you have assets.”

Siobhan was almost beyond being envious when I told her. But she just said: “Win and the client and make sure our team has point on the project. We need to pick up the annual bonus next month.”

It occurred to me that with all that had happened, Siobhan might have every reason to be burning up with jealousy. I was better at my job and more attractive to me, and it was all a lie. But she appeared to be driven by practicality, as if she knew her shortcomings but knew that we could do well as a team. That was the way it appeared.

There would be eight of us at the dinner. Penny and I, and another partner in the firm, Grace, on our side; on their side the Chairman of the client and his wife, and 2 male executives and one female executive. Penny suggested that she, Grace and I all go to the salon together after work to get ready, and we talked about what we would be wearing.

We also talked strategy. Grace was strong on the numbers, Penny was broad strategy, and if the opportunity presented I was to be creative - float some specific ideas. We spent the whole day preparing, but I knew that I could not develop effective ideas until I understood the client’s intentions.

The salon was a new experience but I loved it. Penny persuaded me to lighten my hair, and to add some curls. She even added some curls to her own hair which was usually straight and quite severe. We had manicure and pedicures for our open toe shoes. There were also facials and a little eyebrow shaping. Then makeup applied by a professional beautician.

In that environment I found myself talking with Penny almost as an equal. I think that by the time we were out of there I had a much better understanding of her personality and her ambitions. My admiration for her only increased. She was a total professional but imaginative and creative – a perfect advertising person.

I chose my dress. It was asymmetrical and a little weird, but it spoke of my style and the colors were perfect. And there were my breasts on display. I understood now what role they had. They looked round and ripe. I felt really good. It seemed strange to me just how different it was being a woman. Sometimes just looking at yourself in the mirror could be uplifting. I don’t think that I ever had that feeling as a man.

At dinner I found myself sitting between Tom Fielding and a guy called Piers, and opposite the Chairman whose name was Frank. Penny sat on the other side of Tom with Grace on her other side. Tom was older but tall and handsome. Piers was younger and also very good-looking. I later found out that Piers was Tom’s son and that the Fielding family owned the biggest stake in the business. But initially I just thought that he was the young marketing guy.

We started talking to one another about the latest trends in marketing theory and we could not stop. Frank raised some business questions and we politely remained silent for a bit, but then went back to our own conversation.

Penny who had been focused more on business turned to me and said: “We could do that; don’t you think Emma. Targeted at women, should it be a woman selling it?”

I had no idea what she was talking about. I was in my own world with my new friend. Then suddenly an idea just came into my head. Not even into my head – it just came off my tongue.

“I think a man should sell it. Woman do listen to men. But he should tell everything about why it would not be preferred by men. That marks it as a product for women. They will listen to him but buy it because he wouldn’t. I think that could work.”

There was silence around the table, so I felt I needed to add: “Just an idea. We would need to talk it through”.

Tom said: “What do you think Piers?”

“Let’s do that,” he said. “Let’s see that idea developed and presented. So, I guess that means you’re hired ladies.”

It surprised me that it was Piers who made the decision. He seemed only a little older than me, and I assumed that he would be low level. He made the decision to hire us. Then he turned to me and he didn’t talk about it all, he went right back to what we were discussing before business rudely diverted our attention.

After dessert Frank and his wife left, then Grace, and then everybody except Tom and Penny and Piers and me. Tom suggested that we go up to the sky bar for a night cap. It was clear that he was interested in Penny beyond business. I understood that he was no longer married, and everybody knew that Penny had always been single. There was some thought that she might have been a lesbian but it was pretty clear to me that, at least in the case of Tom, she certainly was not.

We had a cocktail, and then another. Piers whether I would mind joining him on the terrace, I think he said for a cigar. I told him that he could light up but that I did not smoke.

“Neither do I,” he said. “It was just to get you alone for a minute.” I laughed.

It was a little cool at that height and he chivalrously put his jacket around my shoulders. He said: “It looks like we might be working together so I felt I needed to ask what your view was on office romances?” He paused. “As a rule, I discourage them, but all rules must accommodate exceptions.”

It felt like more than flirting. It felt like something very serious was under discussion. The truth is that I sort of liked the idea of romance. But of course, there could be no intimacy. I had a penis for God’s sake. The thought that my attraction to this man might be sexual, let alone homosexual, never crossed my mind at that point.

I found myself saying: “As a rule, I don’t like rules. They don’t fit with my rebellious and creative …”.

He kissed me. What I should have done at this point was to push him away and spit out any of his saliva that may have entered my mouth. So why, oh why, did I throw my arms around his neck, making his jacket fall from my shoulders onto the tiles. But his arms were there, wrapped around me.

“I feel I may have taken advantage of you,” he said. “Maybe too many drinks. If you still feel as passionate as this in the morning, then we must talk. After business hours, of course.”

When we got back inside, I saw that Tom had his arm around Penny. I was now starting to get a little worried that evening might close with sex, and that meant me being outed as a tranny and a fraud. I suggested that we share a cab and she agreed.

“In all my years in this business,” she said as the cab pulled away with only us in it, “I have never fallen for a client. But no at forty, a career businesswoman, I think I have just found the man of my dreams.”

“Me too,” I said, slightly dreamily.

“It must be the work first, Emma,” she scolded. “But what a guy – charming, intelligent, witty, good-looking and so, so rich.”

“Penelope Garret,” I scolded back. “You sound like a gold digger.” And we both giggled like school girls – like school girls talking about boys.

So exactly what was going on in my head. It wasn’t until I lay in bed in the morning that I even thought about it, I slept so well that night. But lying there I needed to rationalize the fact that I had returned the kiss from Piers, perhaps with interest. The hormones must be turning me gay. Or had I always been gay, or bi, or perhaps transgendered. That might account for how easily I had fallen in to the role of Emma, how comfortable I felt in her body.

But I had to get to work.

After my shower, I looked at myself in the mirror with my penis tucked between my legs. That made more sense. I looked so much better without it. I looked normal. I looked like a normal but very pretty, young woman. When I opened my thighs, it flipped out. I looked like a freak. I burst into tears.

On my way to the office I wondered how I could ever have a happy life. I was so much happier as Emma than I had been before. I had all of the skills that were needed but with the looks and confidence to sell those skills. I had style and grace too. And now I had romance. But it was all a lie.

It was as if I faced to options. I really was on the horns of a dilemma, and about to be gored. I could go back to a drab life and look forward to a man’s future of responsibility and fatherhood, or I could choose the vibrant and colourful world of womanhood and surrender my last vestiges of manhood. There was no other way.

What would you do?

Penny almost decided for me. When I presented my draft proposal a week or so later she asked to speak with me privately.

“Tom is getting very serious with me,” she said. “And he tells me that his son is crazy about you.”

“His son?” I asked.

“Piers is his son,” she said. “Your young Mr Millionaire and his father, Mr Multimillionaire. I think that we have hooked them both.”

She was smiling and so was I. My first thought was not about the money, it was the feeling of knowing that somebody was ‘crazy about me’, especially when that guy was as great a guy as I knew Piers was. Then I had a sudden thought in my head of my life as the wife of such a man. Loved, and living in luxury.

I had to take a grip on myself. I had to shake off these thoughts. I was a man. A man in a dress. A man dreaming about my prospective husband.

“This is going to be difficult,” I said, sadly.

“So, you still have your tackle?” she asked.

“My what?” At that moment I simply had no idea what she was talking about. But there was no doubting that she was looking at my crotch.

“How long have you known?” I felt deflated. Who else knew my secret.

“At the dinner I noticed something,” she said. “It raised the possibility. You have now just confirmed it. I never would have guessed. You are a perfect woman. So, I can only guess that you have not had the operation yet.”

Yet? I simply said: “I had never regarded it as necessary. Before now, that is.”

“You need to tell him,” she said. “Many men would not consider a relationship with a transwoman. You need to let him pull out. But if he wants you, then I think you should make a life together. He is a fine young man. No woman could do much better.”

She walked over to me and hugged me. I realized it was because my eyes were full of tears. I am not even sure why. It was just too much emotion, I guess.

She told me that we were presenting to Piers the following day, so we needed to get ready. That meant both presentations – the material and the ladies in charge. Get together with my team, and book the salon again. I rushed back to my station to tell everybody the good news.

It did not even notice how angry Siobhan was. Maybe she had been angry all along and I never even noticed? Maybe I was like Pollyanna, prancing gaily through a happy life as evil grew around me. Everybody has their breaking point, and I suppose when somebody like Siobhan learns that the girl (who is not really a girl at all) who took your job, has now attracted the city’s most eligible bachelor, something has to give.

When we presented, I was hoping that Piers and I would be winking at one another across the table. Tom was certainly doing that to Penny. We both looked stunning. Why was he so cold? It was worse than that – when I did catch his eye, the look was a millions away from the looks we had passed only a few nights before. It was a look of disgust. I knew that he knew what I was. I just did not know how.

I suddenly felt physically sick. I had to excuse myself in the middle of the presentation. I rushed to the ladies and I threw up. I retched and cried a million tears into the toilet bowl.

Penny came to look for me. She told me that they had bought into the campaign, but Piers had requested that I not be involved. I burst into tears all over again. She put an arm around me and hugged me. Somehow that made me feel a little better.

“I suppose Siobhan can manage it?” I said, trying to focus on the work.

“She would be the natural replacement,” she said. “But she apparently knows who she is and will not have her. Something about betrayal. I don’t understand what that is about.”

“I do,” I said.

I had to go home. I could not function. Two people that I cared about were now dead to me, or I was dead to them. I was an emotional wreck, not assisted by now being hopelessly female. Sometime we girls just have to take a box of tissues and sob it out.

I was expecting to hear Siobhan at the door. I had put the chain on so that her key would not be enough. I wanted to confront her. I was steamed up. I was going to do something awful to her. I swung the door open with a face that I sure looked as wild as harpy.

Piers was standing there.

I wonder now how I must have looked. I had been crying and throwing up all afternoon. My special hairdo was a mess. My makeup was totally ruined. I must have been the ugliest woman on the planet, if I were one. And I would have looked as mad as hell. But then suddenly, not. Then I would have looked at him with utter despair, the despair of somebody who could have known such perfect, and who had lost it through her own selfish deceit. What kind of look was that? Surely just as unattractive.

Why then did he take me in his arms? Because I fainted, that is why. I did that most feminine of things when confronted with the ultimate shame – the shame of being seen for what you are. A worthless impostor.

“Emma?” My name through the haze. My name. Emma. Not whatever that other name was.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

“Oh Piers,” I said. “I am the one who should be saying that. You have every reason to hate me.”

“You might be right about that,” he said. “But for some reason, I don’t. I thought I would, maybe I even want to, but I can’t.”

“I must look awful,” I said. What a thing to say. I was slumped in his arms. He must have caught me before I hit the floor. He was holding me, brushing the hair away from my face, still wet with tears.

“Pretty bad,” he conceded. “But still beautiful to me.”

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2019

Albino
A Vignette
By Maryanne Peters

People stare. You just have to get used to it. My mother told me that there was albinism in our family. Others had learned to live with. In particular, the women in our family seemed to have it easy. Blond hair and pale almost hairless skin – they could paint on their eyebrows and darken their eyelashes to look normal. As a boy that was never an option for me.

I grew my hair long to try to hide behind it. It was almost white so it drew some attention by itself, but somehow, I could retreat behind a veil of hair.

I thought about going goth – you know the thing – dye my hair black and wear makeup. Sure you are not hiding – you are doing the opposite in drawing attention to yourself – but at least you are a freak by choice.

Maybe I could have bought the hair dye and done it in the sink, but instead I decided to go to the local salon. To my surprise one of the stylists was albino. This was crazy as the incidence in the European population in the States is 1 in 20,000 and I knew 6 from my own family so the odds seemed crazy.

She seemed to relish her albinism. She had long curly hair but pulled back from her face which was only lightly daubed with color if any at all. The result was striking, and beautiful.

“I know exactly what you are going through,” she said. “But going dark is not the answer. You have such wonderful hair – thicker than many like us. Will you let me do something with it to bring out a version of you that you will be proud to present to the world?”

I had not been convinced that the goth thing would help, but I was ready to give it a try. Now she was offering to do something else. She asked me to take off my shirt, in private because my skin was so white it was an embarrassment. For some reason she wanted me to wear a smock of some kind while she set to work on my hair.

I have thought since whether there was something in the solutions she put on my face and in my hair, or whether it was the pungent scents in the salon that played with my mind, or if I was just so keen to find a way out of my impending depression that I was ready to walk through any open door. Anyway, that door opened.

She took a photo of me in the moment that she spun me around to see myself in the mirror. It was just a hairstyle, but it had a huge impact. She had done hardly anything to my face, except a good clean and the removal of dirt and whiskers. It was the hair that showed me that I could be somebody else. I could be like her. A stunning blonde – a natural blonde.

It is a start, but it has shown me that I might just be able to find a way in the world for myself, as an albino, and now as a woman.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2023

All Grown Out
by Maryanne Peters

All about Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome
A Vignette
By Maryanne Peters

He slipped out and fell onto the mattress beside her. She was smiling and so was he.

“You really can go on top next time if you like,” he said.

“I’m too big,” she said, with a sly smirk. “I’d be frightened I might crush you.”

“You’re no taller than me, I don’t mind telling you that I absolutely love your body. It is so smooth and soft. You’re not fat. You’re just a lot of woman.” Was he teasing her. She looked over at him to check.

“I suppose after three dates and two nights in your bed … and God knows how much sex, I must tell you something,” she said. “Have you ever heard of Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome?”

“No,” he replied honestly, but with a little nervousness.

“Well, it is fairly rare, but there are still a lot of people who live with it. It is a condition where the person who has it cannot be affected in any way by androgens – the male sex hormones. They are only shaped by female hormones. Men have female hormones and women have male hormones, but their bodies are shaped by the dominant hormone – androgens for men and estrogens for women.”

“So why are you telling me this,” he leaned over to her and pushed a lock of her copious soft dark hair away from her face.

“If you could imagine a person unaffected by male hormones they would develop to be more of a woman than others, because their womanliness would be unaffected by any male hormones. Even if that person had XY chromosomes that would normally signal that they develop as a male, even from inside the womb they would not. They would be born with the appearance of a woman – they would appear to be a girl at birth and right through until puberty. People with XY chromosomes and Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome don’t have wombs, you see – they don’t menstruate and they can’t have children.”

It struck him that there was a tinge of sadness in her voice. He heard and understood everything that she had said, but what concerned him most was that sadness.

“Are you telling me that this is what makes you a big woman?” he said.

“A stature driven by the XY set up, and the absence of any real puberty have an affect, like a gelded stallion, but so too would be massive doses of estrogen with no androgens to neutralize them. The feminine features of the adipose in the skin and feminine fat distribution … androgen insensitive women can appear more womanly than XX women.””

So what you are really telling me is that you don’t have a womb and you can’t have children?” he said.

“That’s right,” she said.

“Well, like I told you I have five children out of two ex-wives so I have no plans for more,” he said. He added the period by kissing her full on her soft cushion lips.

“So you have the Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome?” he said.

“Did I say that?” she said. “It just seemed easier to explain it that way than tell you that I spent the first ten years of my life as a competitive jock called Brad who finally plucked up the courage to get himself denutted, cut and tucked and go through ten years of hormone therapy.”

“You’re teasing me?” He pulled back a little. She was grinning.

“Would it matter?” she said.

He looked at her with her hair across the pillow, and that smile that drew him to bed with her every time he saw it. Even now he was stiffening – something that appeared almost unnatural as it had only minutes since he last orgasmed.

“No,” he said.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2023

Hanne Gaby Odiele, Belgian model with XY AIS

Alma Mater
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

Oliver Furness came to me in 1898 – I remember that it was the year that the Spanish American War ended. He had a scholarship to the University, or thought he had. He saw that my boarding house and health clinic offered lower rates for “students with refined manners” and considered that described him well enough. He was a slightly built young man, seemingly ready to study, as I had been at the same age.

I have always run a proper establishment, the dining room, lounge and day clinic on the first floor with young women residing on the second floor where my rooms were, and young men on the floors above. Residents of both sexes could breakfast together if I was at the table, but otherwise not. But I quickly came to realize that Oliver was intent on breaking the rules of propriety, so I considered it my moral duty to take steps to protect the honor of young women in my care.

The University also had high moral standards for the recipients of scholarships. Who could not approve of that? It is noble to allow those of limited means to study and achieve in this great nation of ours, but to give that privilege to the immoral or depraved is to reward sin, and we cannot have that.

Young Oliver came to me in some distress not long after he moved in before the college semester commenced. I may well have chosen to close my heart to this youth, but that is not my nature. I am not that kind of landlady. In fact, I invite all those who stay with me, because they are so much younger than my “middle age” to call me “Mother”, and that was how Oliver addressed me.

“Oh, Mother, what am I to do,” he wept real tears in a very unmanly display. “I am too ashamed to head home but without the scholarship I cannot remain here. All of my future is lost.”

Well, it was, and because of his lust and indiscretion. How pathetic he seemed to me – a man in bed but so much less than a man in the business of life. I had but one course to commend to him.

“I can get you a scholarship with my alma mater,” I explained. “I have influence with the Board of Deans and there are funds available. My old school is attached to the University and you can do most of the courses that you enrolled for, but you will need to do a few others. There is only one drawback and it means that you will need to make a sacrifice.”

“Anything,” he said, with disarming alacrity.

“It is a school for young women only, so you would need to attend as a woman, but I could help you with that.” I just said the words and then leaned back to let the idea sink in. I could see a whole bunch of thoughts running through his head starting with surprise, then effrontery, and passing through consideration, and maybe even a thought of mischief.

“How do you think that I could pass as a woman?” he asked, with a trace of indignation.

I replied – “That hair of yours is long enough to draw up and we can use hairpieces to affect a woman’s style. We would need to pluck out your beard, but the rest of your body will be shaved. It will all grow back in time, but we will need to work on keeping the skin smooth and soft. And corsetry will do the rest – corsetry and a concealment device between your legs.”

“A concealment device?” he said.

“To conceal your maleness and allow you to function as a female,” I explained. “I just happen to have such a device in my possession. It is essential to conceal your true nature.”

“And I continue to live here, as a student?” he enquired.

“You may, and at the reduced rate that I offer to female students,” I said. “Being a past scholar myself, I wish to encourage academic pursuits among the fairer sex, and that is a sex that will include you, should you wish to get an education such as you desire.”

Right then and there he agreed, although he did waver a little when he saw the contraption I pulled from my old portmanteau.

“This will allow you to pass water as a woman must,” I explained to the shocked youth. “And to pass stools, and to receive enemas.”

“Enemas?” he said.

“I should explain that after my studies, sponsored by the Seventh Day Adventist Church, I was employed by the remarkable Dr. Kellogg at his Battle Creek Sanitarium. We experimented with a range of herbal enemas and the incredible healing and body improving properties that they revealed. I consider that a course of regular enemas is essential to be able to cope with your time at college, in the status that you have accepted. I am happy to deliver that care without cost. You may be aware that Dr. Kellogg demands considerable fees for his health-advancing treatments at Battle Creek.”

“I have heard of him,” Oliver remarked, examining the device. Clearly he was concerned that the course I had prescribed would be arduous and uncomfortable, but he needed to weigh up his options. I waited for a moment displaying some impatience. As I say, the boy had brought his predicament upon himself, and needed to decide whether to abandon thought of education or accept my offer.

He was smart enough to understand that he was ill-suited to manual labor, and unwilling to accept a life as a low level clerk given his propensity for study. He accepted my proposal, as I hoped he would.

We resolved that he would be known as Olivia, and that he move down to the second floor and the room next to mine which had a connecting door and my own bathroom. I was able to assist in the preparation of his body to become for all intents and purposes, her body.

As I expected, she made a remarkably attractive young woman. I had arranged for her to present herself at my alma mater on her first day with another female student also staying at my establishment, and to sign up for the “well-being” courses in addition to the subjects in the original major. My alma mater had been established with the sponsorship of my church which places great emphasis on the health of the body as well as that of the mind and the soul.

Ladylike behavior is something that is readily acquired by being surrounded by women in an exclusive school and by women in a segregated boarding house. Young women from the country have also been known to display crude behaviors but to learn sophistication through association and the occasional correction by the lady professors of my alma mater.

Olivia was ready to learn and became very comfortable with her fellow students. It made me very comfortable with all I had done, to see her fit in so well. It seemed to me that as a man in an aggressive and competitive environment she would never have been able to achieve, but among women who are by nature co-operative and supportive, she developed.

But so too, she developed in other ways. She came to see me about it, in a state of some distress.

“Mother, I am growing breasts!” she said, with a trace of those tears again. “Breasts like a woman!”

I examined them at her insistence. They were quite beautiful. They were nowhere near as large as mine, but then I have been growing mine for a long while, but I knew that hers may well grow even larger than mine, given what had appeared after only a few months of the herbal colonic irrigation.

“Praise God, you are being assisted in your pretense,” I said. “This may be an indication of divine assistance in our endeavor. We should look to consider some other clothing which might take full advantage of this. Don’t be concerned about your body. You have never been healthier, I can assure you. Any unwanted features will disappear over time.”

Olivia seemed reassured to some extent, but perhaps it was the new dress that displayed her new form that made it easier to cope with what was happening.

The fact is that Oliver had been a young man with sexual appetites, but those had waned as a part of the treatments he was receiving regularly. It was all part of the work I had done with Dr. Kellogg. The purpose was to rid the human body of unhealthy toxins but also to reduce lascivious desires and other unhealthy appetites. To a very large extent we had succeeded due in no small part to my being a volunteer in those early years.

I suppose that we had learned that some herbs have effects that make them unsuitable for men, and that when delivered directly through the walls of the colon the effect is multiplied and immediate. It just so happened that given Olivia’s position, this was just what was needed.

The changes had resulted not only in the breast but in the softness of the skin, and the softness of the sexual organ, minimizing the discomfort of the concealment device.

But sexual desire is not just rooted in the genitals, but also lies in the mind, and is mixed with the other sins of covetousness and envy. The fact is that with her new increasingly sexualized appearance, Olivia was becoming the object of considerable admiration by men of my establishment and of the university and was responding to that admiration as might be expected of any young woman.

By the end of her first full year at my alma mater, Olivia Furness was for all intents and purposes, female. Her hair had grown long and soft and she wore it up in the style of the time. Herbal therapy and corsetry had reshaped her body completely, and her restraint meant that she not only carried out her ablutions only as a woman could, but that she could, if she wished, engage in a form of fornication that while sinful, was satisfactory to her and from the man’s point of view, entirely natural and in preservation of a guarded chastity.

I cannot be judgmental given that I had used the device in the same way at Battle Creek years before. I was happy to hand it down having reached an age when such activities are no longer so important to me.

Olivia never completed her degree, but nor did she return to life as Oliver. That did not surprise me either. Ours is a world where achievement is still dominated by men, but where comfort and happiness can be more often achieved by finding the right life as a woman.

There was a wealthy man involved. She was swept off her feet. She writes to me occasionally. She is happy and I am happy for her.

I have never begrudged Dr. Kellogg for the experiments in those early days at Battle Creek Sanitarium. He believed in experimentation and taking advantage of the results. We would never have the cornflake without that.

He was shocked by what had happened to me and he moved on to other herbal compounds, but I found my place. I also found a man, and I even married him and took his name, but he has passed on. Obviously, we had no children and yet I consider myself a mother with a huge family.

In some ways I think of myself as a human alma mater. It is Latin, as you will be aware. It means the mother who nurtures. I have the breasts and I can even lactate, but that is not what I am talking about. I am a mother to my residents and those who come to me for care. I help to nurture and develop their inner person, and if that person is female, then (with my assistance) that will come out.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2024

Author’s Note: From an idea from Erin

Always Fi
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

There was no voice. With a buzz the gates swung open and the cab continued up the drive to the large house.

It was impressive. Large columns beside the entrance. Two storeys with attic rooms visible. Wings extended either side. A fountain in the forecourt. At least one of us has done well, Gary thought to himself.

He wondered for a moment whether his war buddy would meet him on the step, or whether he would have to ring the bell. Only for a moment as he could see the figure stepping out of the house.

This would be a first.

He thrust the 50 to the driver and pulled in his kit was on the seat beside him. He was only just conscious of the blue dress waiting outside. He slipped through the door and stood up.

There “she” stood. It was a blue sleeveless dress down to just above the knee. Her hair fell in soft brown curls around his shoulders. Her eyes were green. He had never noticed before. Outlined in black or dark brown. Sparkling like her ruby lipsticked smile.

“Gasman,” she said. Her voice was high like a woman's but his tone was familiar. The name he had been called a thousand time by this person, and the others. “Not even a man hug for your old buddy?”

He walked to her as if in a trance. It was so unreal. She hugged him, one arm over his shoulder, the other below. He could feel her large soft breasts pushing against him. He could smell her floral perfume. He could feel the soft fragrant curls against his face. Only now he he returned the hug. He could feel a bra strap under the dress.

The whole thing seemed so strange.

“Thanks man,” he said, suddenly realizing that this might now be the wrong word. “Thanks for putting me up for a few days.”

“Are you kidding me?” she said. “You didn't even need to ask.”

She broke the hug and held him by the shoulders, her grip as strong as he ever remembered. “It's so good to see you again.”

He could see her too. He knew the face, but this was a woman. He was looking at Frank's sister. Frank's pretty sister. His penis seemed momentarily confused as he became aware of it.

“You too,” he said. “But for me, it seems like … for the first time.”

She smiled. It was a wonderful smile.

“Not too weird?” she asked.

“Hey. No. Fiona? Right?”

“Call me Fi,” she said. She picked up his kit bag.

“No, let me,” he said.

“You think a lady can't carry a heavy bag?”.she asked. He knew she was joking. “19 kilos”, she said, guessing the weight.yelashes ulled at it as he lifted it.

Gary could now see that she had long shaped nails painted red. “I wouldn't want you to break a nail on my account,” he said.

She handed over the bag with a laugh. “Drop it in the hall,” she said. “I will take you to you room later. First come and meet my husband.”

Gary knew all of this. He had heard all about Frank. The guys from the unit had talked about it. But somehow every new word spoken that was inconsistent with the man he knew, seemed immeasurably strange.

“Sure.” He tagged along behind her. She was wearing heels that clicked on the marble floor of the grand entrance and the corridor. Her hips swayed as she walked and her hair bounced. They was a cloud of womanly smells about her. He was not expecting the physical response to all of this.

“I'll grab you a beer on the way through,” she said. The kitchen was huge and well equipped. There were several fridges. One glass fronted fridge was just for beer. Gary accepted a bottle. Fi had a bracelet around her wrist and had somehow used it to flick the cap off, catching in mid air and placing it on the kitchen bench. The move was so Frank.

They went outside and he could see a wheelchair under an umbrella beside a large swimming pool. The sun was out but the chair was shaded. He could see that the occupant was slim and white haired. The face was tanned and good looking, despite advanced years.

Fi went over to him and kissed him on the forehead. She said: “Darling, I want you to meet Gary Howarth, one of my old buddies.” She stood behind him with her hands on his shoulders. Her hands seemed to be almost giving him life as he stirred into a response. She said: “This is my husband, David Fielding.”

“Pleased to me you Gary,” David said, the word appearing to clear something from his throat. “I would jump up to greet you but I am afraid the second stroke in a year has put paid to that. I want to tell you that you are very welcome here. You can stay as long as you like.”

“Thank you sir,” said Gary. He knew that he liked this man. His humor shone through whatever was his disability. Gary added: “Truth is I came down this way looking for work, and well, Fi asked me to stay. How could I say no?”

“Exactly,” he said with a smile. “Nobody can say no to my wife. And I should add, I never get tired of listening to war stories. I never served, so that makes me even prouder of her.”

He looked up at her and Gary could see the love. She kissed him again on the forehead, tenderly. Then she went over to sit by Gary. She had collected a beer for herself, and she held it to Gary so they could chink bottles.

“Cheers”, she said. “Here's to war stories.” They drank. Gary deeply, but she sparingly.

“Have you seen much of the guys?” asked Gary.

“Sure,” she said. “Everybody but Waldo. Tom and Foxy have visited me here, and I have been up to VA to see Cal two or three times. Just Waldo has a problem with me. Sad, but not a worry for me.”

“Waldo owes you his life,” said Gary. “Maybe we all do, but him in particular.”

“There are no debts between us,” she said with finality. Gary thought again how much he had admired Frank for his wisdom, his clarity, his decisiveness. This woman had all of that, and more besides.

They finished their beers and then she took him for a walk around the grounds while David read.

“He seems like a great guy,” said Gary. “And all this, besides. But he seems very old.”

“I know what you are thinking,” she said. “But he has only recently been like this. When I met him he was fit and active. We had some great years. Now he needs looking after. That's what I do, right?”

“Yeah,” agreed Gary, “that's what you do.”

She stopped to smell some roses. The sunlight was in her hair. Gary found himself thinking again how beautiful she was. How could the man he fought alongside have turned into this creature? He found himself correcting his feelings yet again.

“Does he have family?” he asked.

“Oh yes,” she said. “There's a story there. I had real hostility to start with, but things have turned out quite well. They insisted on a pre-nuptial. David was opposed, but I backed them. It expired a few years ago, and I pushed for a trust in their favor. They understand that I am not after his money. Although I will never want for it, even after he dies. And now that he is, well, and invalid, they are supportive.”

“So they are OK with your … your background?”

“As I said to his daughter, with a trans-stepmother there is no risk of adding to his children. And I assure you that up until the last stroke, David was very active and entirely capable of getting a woman pregnant. My children are his grandchildren. They are great kids, or will be with the right handling.”

Gary laughed. He knew what she was talking about. He said: “The job I am looking for tomorrow is at the Stanhope Academy. All of those lessons will stand me in good stead.”

“I hope you get the job,” she said. “We would practically be neighbors.”

Within an hour they had done a complete tour and Gary's kit was in his room, a generous guestroom with a view over the pool.

“I am going to suggest that David has a nap before dinner,” she said. “We are having a dinner prepared tonight, to spare you my cooking, and if it goes on into the evening he will need some rest in advance. When he is settled, I am going for a swim.”

“I would join you, it is a warm day, but I didn't bring any trunks,” he said.

“You are a big guy, but I will find something to fit you. See you down there in 15 minutes.”

She arrived at the pool a little later than that. She was wearing a robe and tossed him the trunks. He stood up checked them against his waist and thighs. They would fit. Were they David's? Or an old pair of Frank's?

She said: “I always said you big guys were a waste of rations,” she said. “Waldo and I were the ideal size for long range ops.” She was teasing him. He slipped off his shirt.

She let he robe fall onto the lounger. She was wearing a bikini. It showed everything. She had the most amazing rounded breasts, full in size but perfectly proportioned. He knew they must be silicone but they looked so natural. Her stomach was smooth and soft looking, with no sign of the abdominal muscles that Frank had been renowned for. For some reason Gary had an urge to lick something off that perfect belly. Then her groin. A perfect feminine mound where once Frank's junk had hung. No doubt about it – gone for good.

With skillful she twirled her hair up and clipped it into place with a clip of some kind. She moved gracefully on bare feet, with legs the envy of a supermodel and walked down the steps into the pool.

While her back was turned Gary slipped down his pants and reached for the trunks. His penis was engorged with hot blood – not yet hard but heading that way. He had some difficulty in getting everything in. Hopefully the cool of the pool would reduce the obvious.

She turned to face him. He moved quickly and dived in.

“Careful,” she said, as he emerged. “I don't want to get my hair wet.”

He decided that a few lengths might help to settle his organ and take his mind off whatever was exciting him. She just quietly breast-stroked in the shallows.

He stopped near her. She could see some confusion in his face.

“Don't worry about it,” she said. “With the money I have spent looking like this I would be disappointed if it did not have some effect on any red-blooded male.”

Gary thought about denying it, but he knew this person, and he knew that she knew him.

“You make a great looking woman,” he said, sheepishly.

“Thanks”, she said with a smile.

“It's just that, we must have fucked a hundred women you and I. I just can't understand. Who were you? Was any of that real?”

“I have learnt that it is too hard to explain to anyone who doesn't share the problem,” she said. “But I have always been Fi inside. Frank had a wonderful life. He did great things, had great friends, but it could never last. I couldn't hide from the truth. I had to be a woman.”

“Sure,” he said. He still did not understand.

“If you have any lustful thoughts it is because you now see that I am a woman. You are not turning gay. I am a woman you know.”

“Sure,” he said. He still did not understand. He walked up the steps out of the pool. She had brought towels for both of them.

He needed to change the subject. He said: “Can I ask: Why Fiona? It's kind of a … not a common name?”

“Have you seen Shrek?” she said. “The princess inside the ogress. Or in my case the ogre.”

“But she was really the ogre all the time?”

“Yes, well, not in my case. The princess is free. Princess Fiona.” And to emphasize the point, she unclipped her hair and it fell down around her shoulders.

His penis stirred yet again. He was now officially disturbed by all of this. She was lying on the sun-lounger in his full view, a person who had once been a close friend and fellow soldier, and he was hiding an erection behind his towel.

“I have some stuff to prepare for tomorrow,” he said. “What time do I come down for dinner?”

“I about an hour for drinks,” she said. “Say seventeen O five.”

He knew the phrase. 17:05. It was a joke that only his unit understood. It meant be there by 5 o'clock or buy the next two rounds. A marine is always in the action early. He left the pool area with a smile. No matter what, friendships forged in battle are special.

Gary and David were casually dressed when they arrived on the Terrace for drinks, but Fi had taken some care. She had a bright colored dress on, her hair was up and she was wearing drop earrings. She was late, to make an entrance. So as she walked past Gary she whispered: “17:05. I guess I'm buying.”

Despite being in a wheelchair and with weakness in one arm, David had made martinis, and despite it no being his favored drink, Gary joined in.

David spoke freely about his life and work, but encouraged Gary and Fi to talk about their adventures. The words seemed to flow around the fact that Frank had been at the heart of these stories, but Gary found it surprisingly easy not to mention his name. He would say: “And then Fi shouted out ...”. He would look to her to finish the story.

As they ate Fi stayed close to David. He had explained to Gary that the stroke had affected his swallowing so he needed to be wary of choking. He drank fine wine, and plenty of it. They all did.

And then after dinner, there were more drinks, and more talk.

David disclosed that he knew the Board of the Stanhope Academy. One word from him and the job was Gary's. Gary was uncertain as to whether he should accept the offer of help.

“But I want you to have the job,” said David. “I want you to be nearby. We both do.”

Fiona smiled at Gary. And she smiled approvingly at David.

As David offered more Gary said: “If I don't stop now I'll be drunk at the interview.”

They all agreed to retire and said their good-nights.

Gary undressed for bed and lay in his boxers on the quality sheets. The window was open. The night was warm. He thought about Fiona and contemplated jacking off. Somehow that still seemed unnatural. He forced his mind back to other times. So many thoughts.

An hour later, or so it seemed, he was still not asleep. He heard the door to his room open.

She was standing at the foot of his bed. She was wearing a short white nightie, low cut in the front revealing her wonderful breasts. Her long beautiful hair framed her pretty face. It must be a dream.

“What are you doing?” he asked.

“David asked me to come to you,” she said. “He has an idea that you are attracted to me. He is worried that he cannot …, well, he likes you. And he is always thinking about my happiness.”

“Come here,” said Gary. It was the first time he had ever commanded this person to do anything, but the time was right to be firm and direct. A bit like another part of him at that moment.

She undid the nightie, which was somehow held together in the front. It slipped from her broad shoulders and he could see her now, as he had been imagining her almost since the first moment that day. The perfect body, with the little bush now visible. She walked to the bed.

“Only if this is what you want,” she said.

“Are you kidding?” he said. “I want it. I need it. I think that I will explode if I don't get it.”

She pulled down his boxers and his erect penis sprang to full on-parade attention. She stroked it with a gentle hand as it pulsed to full stretch. She straddled him and gently lowered herself onto his pole.

She was lubricated and the moisture was warm and inviting. But the tight entrance to her vagina massaged him all the way in. When their pubes met she ground them together a little, just to get comfortable, and then she started to move. Up and down slowly at first. She leaned towards him. Her hair fell into his face. She kissed him on the lips. Her saliva tasted like sugar and cherries. He reached up and ran his fingers through her hair. Her first moan was like electricity.

Within seconds she was bouncing on him and his hips were thrusting up to meet her, his back arched almost to breaking point. She was moaning and he found noises coming from his mouth quite unlike his usual grunts. It was like the sound of amazement.

At the point of orgasm, he heard her squeal. It was such a female noise that if he had even thought about whether this was a real woman, that doubt would have been blown away in that moment. That sound triggered his own orgasm - a release beyond his experience. It seemed as if a bucket of fluid had been drained from his balls that must have turned them inside out.

She felt it as hot as lava inside her.

They rolled slightly so that she crashed on the bed beside him, his shrinking penis coming out of her with a satisfying 'plop'.

He propped himself up on one elbow and pushed her curls aside to look at her smiling face in the dim light.

“Who fucked who just now?” he asked. “I don't normally lie underneath.”

“I know from experience what fucking is,” she said softly. “That was not fucking. I think what we have just done, is made love to one another.” Her eyes seemed to sparkle even in the darkness, as if with their own energy.

“I think you're right,” he said.

They lay together in each other’s arms. He marveled at how soft and smooth her body was.

He said: “I cannot believe the change has been so amazing. Not just the body … everything.”

“Really?” she said. “You see, to me, the body is the only change. I have always been me. I have always been Fiona. Semper Fi.” She pronounced it ‘fee’ rather than ‘fy’.

“Semper fi,” he echoed.

The End

Amazon
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

I was born in Morocco into a Moroccan Jewish family. My family had been living in Morocco for many generations after my ancestors were driven from Spain by the Christians. I have always considered myself to be North African.

My family were had been involved in growing flowers and I was brought up in a town called Migouna. I spoke Arabic and Berber as my native tongues, French, and I also spoke English. My mother had been educated at a Jewish school in America, and I had traveled there with my parents several times. When I was old enough I was sent to spend my later high school years in America.

For some reason I had looked forward to a career in law enforcement, and while I pursued a pre-law degree, I sent my details to the FBI. I received an encouraging response, but also an invitation to join the Central Intelligence Agency. It was only a few years after 9/11 and they were keen to recruit Arabic speakers for monitoring communications.

The CIA paid for my studies, and I worked for them in minor roles in the North African section. I told my parents that I had received a scholarship but I did not give them further details. When I went back to Morocco I kept secret all details of where I worked and what I did.

At the time I started in the North African section, Muammar Gaddafi was an enemy of the US, despite the fact that he had condemned the 9/11 attack as part of a wider plan to bring Libya back into the international community. It was soon after I started that Gaddafi’s regime was removed “State Sponsors of Terrorism” list, but agency plans to remove him remained in consideration.

In September 2009 I was part of a team that followed Gaddafi and his entourage which visited New York (pitching a tent at Donald Trump’s private estate and entertaining business proposals in return) to address the UN General Assembly. It was then that I first encountered Gaddafi’s “Amazons”.

From the 1980s Gaddafi began an internal campaign promoting equality for women, and it was assumed that his forming an unit comprised only of women was a part of that push. But in using them for his personal security, it was suggested that he believed that “assassins will not want to shoot at women”. Whatever his reason, he would always have a team from this Amazon Unit present in his home or wherever he traveled, including overseas.

The idea of infiltrating Gaddafi’s bodyguard to engineer his assassination is not unsound, but the idea of using a man to do it seems ridiculous. The problem was that our observations established that this was not just show – the closest bodyguards to Gaddafi were women. If you wanted precise removal, avoiding for example remote (drone) attack, then you had to get past them. Or be one of them.

Up until then we had assumed that the “Amazons” were just a gimmick. They were all hand picked for their beauty and Gaddafi was very precise in requiring them to appear glamorous, even in fatigues. They all had nice hairdos, makeup and nail polish, and were often dressed in what might be described as “Sexy-soldier” outfits. But these women were serious bodyguards.

We had verified that members of the unit had successfully defended Gaddafi during an attack by Islamic fundamentalists in 1998, at the cost of the life of one of them. Gaddafi was devoted to them. Maybe he just liked being surrounded by pretty women, but these women could do the job to.

I was on the panel looking to recruit a woman to take on this job. Based on Gaddafi’s requirements she needed to be African, Muslim, an Arabic speaker, beautiful, and a virgin. And she would have to stay a virgin while being a member of the Amazon Unit.

We were having problems and we started to discuss using surgery to beautify the one candidate that we had. We extensive briefings on what could be done. The physician we spoke with made the flippant remark that he could turn anyone of the panel (and we were all male) into a beautiful woman with the right procedures.

We all took that in good humor right up until our only candidate got pregnant and announced that she was no longer interested in deployment. One of the panel (I am not sure who) said: “Maybe it should be one of us. At least we are not going to get pregnant.” But nobody laughed.

It had to be me. I was by far the youngest, and the shortest – it was important that I be shorter than Gaddafi, even in heels. I was North African and a native speaker of Arabic. What is more I knew Gaddafi’s Bedouin people and felt that if I could get in front of him, I would be selected. The only obstructions were physical.

“Everything is reversible”, I was told. As a virgin it was expected that I could tuck my genitals away, and that I would simply need breast and butt implants. Even though young I did have a slightly receding hairline which would require surgery to bring forward the considerable volume I had at the back. Then, to make sure that I would pass the test, there would be work on the brow, nose, chin and throat. My voice could also be modified.

It could all be reversed when it was done – whatever that might be. We still did not have a kill order.

The real problem that I faced was how to behave as a woman. It was agreed that before any surgery was even considered I would complete a series of tasks to see whether I could “pass” in my raw state.

Believe it or not, the CIA retains behavior coaches to help operatives in the field in all manner of pretenses. I sat down with an expert for only two weeks and I passed the test. I say only two weeks, but it is better to say 200 waking hours of living and breathing as a woman.

Before we even passed our plan up the line, I was sent to Field Training Group 4, which was the group that specialized in training undercover operatives. The most important rules were (1) Never break cover; (2) stay in touch with a handler unless that compromises Rule (1); (3) If possible, carry out the objective without breaking cover. For me “cover” meant a whole lot more than all of the other guys I was training with, but none of us could disclose details of what we were each headed off to do.

My North Africa team received approval for the plan and I was personally commended by the Director for volunteering. I received my citizenship of the USA that day. My future in the Agency was assured, if I got through it. I also received what I was told was a winning ticket in the Vermont State Lottery nine months out – not a big win but a little “thank-you” for putting myself in harm’s way.

I presented myself for surgery. I have to say that any misgiving that I had were overtaken by the excitement of being on my first deployment, and it would be a big one. My face looked as if I had gone 12 rounds with a heavyweight, I could not speak from the throat surgery and my chest was uncomfortable for a while, but that was all bearable. It was the beauty treatment that was the killer. I had an all body waxing and a “face peel” which seemed to me to be 2nd degree burns administered even before the swelling had gone from my face.

I remember looking at myself in the mirror and thinking that if the plan was to turn me into an attractive woman, it was a complete failure. Where I was not bandaged, I looked beaten and burnt. I felt as if I was at least entitled to a purple heart in service of my country.

Then I went in for the extensions in my hair. Part of the surgery on my face brought forward my hairline, but although I had not cut my hair since the well before the whole plan developed, it was not long enough. The extensions were the finest available and would be undetectable to everyone except a professional, and I had a cover story for that.

My hair was to be quite long. I was told that Qaddafi preferred that. Some of his African bodyguards wore long wigs over short hair, but in my case, it was suggested that we go with my own hair and these extensions. I often thought later that if I had just been able to pull my hair off, I would not have done as good a job as I did. Having women’s hair 24/7 forced me to be more feminine. You always need to pay attention to it.

Then the lessons began – hair-care and deportment first, and then skincare and makeup when I had begun to heal. That was a gradual process but when it was over the transformation was amazing. I was indeed, a very attractive woman. I ought to be, we had the funding to do things right. Now it was up to me.

My cover story gave some protection. I was a village girl from the edge of the desert in Eastern Algeria. I had learned French and some English from the local school, but otherwise I had little knowledge of cosmopolitan life, other than from magazines. I could say that I had no real experience of more ornate hairdressing, makeup and fine clothes. But my story was that I had always dreamed of having all these things. It was a motivation for all the members of this truly elite group pf women, to have access to a life beyond poverty, seclusion and the absence of honor.

I knew how village women behaved from my own childhood. Muslim women need to be very reserved in public, but I often think that they were expected to make up for that in private, at least with other women. Convincing Gaddafi and the men around him that I was female would be the easy part. The hard part would be passing as female in close proximity to (other) women.

When it was felt that I was ready, I was sent back to Morocco as the female me, and I used an embassy staff member to help me mix with local women. I had a few issues, but with each mistake I improved. If mistakes were to be made, they needed to be made before I was fully immersed.

This was a long term project, so we had the luxury of time, but my own team was becoming impatient. I think that there may have been some suggestion that I was starting to enjoy my cover a little too much. It might be true that in becoming used to acting as a woman I was starting to enjoy some of the benefits, at least when I was “Stateside” or in the big cities of Morocco. I was attractive enough to earn glances if not stares from men. While it initially unsettled me, I started to quite enjoy the attention.

Once we arrived in N’Goussa, Algeria it was very different. This was a small village not far from the border with Libya and the town of Gadamis. If you look for these places you will see that there is nothing but desert, except that there is an airforce base at Gadamis. That is where the man posing as my took me to introduce me as a volunteer.

At the time, the Amazon Unit (in Arabic al-rāhibāt al-thawriyyāt or “the sisters of the revolution”) was expanding. It would soon be at its maximum number. “My father” was able to get a letter from the base commander and transport to Tripoli for us both.

I was put through a series of academic tests, which I was able to pass easily, even though I was feigning a level of education below my own achievements. Nothing much is expected from young Muslim women in reading and writing. I was also subjected to a physical check-up, but, because it was done by a man and in accordance with accepted practice in Islam, my secret was safe.

Within 6 days of leaving Algeria I was accepted and began training.

I hoped that very soon I would be in the position of being close enough to Gaddafi to kill him on command.

I was given only four passwords: “Desert Fox” was the kill order, “Desert Mouse” was to cancel the kill order, “Pink Roses” was to get out of Libya, and “Eleven Pink Roses” was to get out immediately.

Again, I had the advantage in training of some experience that I needed to conceal. That is not to say that I had a military background (I did not) but I had received some operational and combat training even while I was just an analyst, and that had been beefed up when I was chosen for the field.

When I arrived back from the training camp I was placed in a group under the supervision of Yasmin, a woman from Senegal. Her father had been French but she had been raised by her mother and her grandfather, who was a strict Muslim. She was genuinely devoted to Gaddafi. She called him “The first among Africans”. At that time Gaddafi had given up on the ideal of “Arab Unity” or “the Modern Caliphate” and was concentrating on “African Unity”. He liked to wear a big badge in the shape of the continent on his chest.

Like him (although he never said it), Yasmin disliked Arabs, but as I was Berber, I was African. I fell in with the notions she spoke about, and we had discussions about how we could help our great leader achieve his ambitions.

I was not long before I met the man himself. It is often said that he chose each member of the unit himself, but that is not strictly correct. After we had gone through training he would decide who would actually be close to him. Yasmin said that he was looking for devotion, but also good looks. The simple fact is that his Amazon Guard were a status symbol, and he simply liked to surround himself with beautiful women. Yasmin said that we would both need to go to the salon to make sure I got picked.

At the same time she warned me that I should not try too hard to please him. She suggested that I should explain to him that I was a devout Muslim, and if it we not for the requirement of the job, I would be covered. She said that he respected piousness, even though he drank alcohol and was probably guilty of other offences against Sharia. She said it had worked for her. I did not suggest that she was not as pretty as I was, but that should be obvious.

I was not at all nervous when we were both summoned in. To my surprise he was very relaxed and even charming. He spoke to me in Berber and asked me about my family. I had a complete story to tell. He asked whether I could look after a camel, and milk one. When I told him that I could he asked me whether I could kill one and butcher it. If it was a test, there was no sign of that. He seemed to have an easy nature. Not at all what I was expecting.

He said that he would prefer to live in the desert, and that he hated cities. I think that he was suggesting that I was heading in the wrong direction. I told him that I was a believer in African unity and that I believed that he was destined to achieve it. I told him that I was looking for the honor of being a part of that great enterprise, for the people of our continent, and for the glory of Allah to whom I have committed my life and my chastity.

To be honest, this was not my prepared speech. It had grown from Yasmin had told me. But to my surprise it rolled off my tongue in almost poetic Arabic. I could not have done better.

It worked. Or maybe it was when Yasmin whispered to me the suggestion that I play with my hair. It was clear that this man did enjoy the sight of pretty women, so I did my best with remaining demure and pure.

The following day I received orders to accompany the President on a trip to Benghazi. It was a trip he took almost every week, but it was a sign that I was in the inner circle.

The dominant Amazon in that inner circle was Fatima Baroud. She was devoted to Gaddafi in a special way. Yasmin said that it was very possible that she had a sexual relationship with Gaddafi. She was from East Africa (maybe Kenya or Tanzania, she never said) with an Arab father, but she spoke English better than she spoke Arabic. Yasmin thought of her as not religious, so therefore likely to engage in casual sex without moral convictions. I have no such views, but it was clear that she was closer to the President than most. The other sisters feared her. I simply gave her the deference that somebody with her status clearly deserved. We got on fine.

I think that she understood that my job was to be the eye candy, and her job was to be there for when the bullets started flying. She tended to stay back like a conventional bodyguard, watching for problems. She was happy to push me forward for appearances, But I was able to convince her that I was useful by pointing out things from that forward position. I slowly earned her respect.

The other thing that I could do was speak to Fatima in English. It was a little difficult to start with because I was pretending that my ability in English was very limited, but she corrected me, and I told her that I was using the internet to improve.

Gaddafi himself, sometimes spoke to her in English, especially if he thought others could not understand him. Because he had spent time in the British Army, he spoke English quite well and used it when talking to his good friends Silvio Berlusconi and Nicholas Sarkozy, as well as other world leaders, but not Americans. He used interpreters with them.

With an apparent improved knowledge of English and also French, I was a natural addition to the team for foreign trips. My first overseas trip with Gaddafi was on his visit to Russia, Belarus and Ukraine in 2009. This is a photo of me (wearing the beret) with Gaddafi and the President of Ukraine. On that trip Gaddafi was offered, and accepted, a team of “Nurses” to add to his entourage. Again, it seemed that these women were primarily selected based on their looks, with blonde hair and big busts being the key qualifications.

Fatima was less than happy about these new interlopers, but I was able to talk her around. It was always useful to have medical assistance on stand-by, and as it turned out, these women were qualified and useful.

I became quite close to one of them – Oksana Balinskaya. She actually procured and administered some drugs for Gaddafi, such that I formulated a plan to have him killed in that way, should I eventually receive the order.

But the order did not come.

In fact, shortly after that trip, Gaddafi went to address the United Nations in New York and I and 12 other Amazons were part of his approved delegation of 350 people. On that trip we kept our uniforms only for the camp that we set up. His organizers had tried to find somewhere in New York where could set up, but no reputable venue would receive the Libyan delegation. Instead we accepted the invitation of Donald Trump to erect Gaddafi’s Bedouin tents at his “Seven Springs” estate in Westchester. I actually met Trump, but Gaddafi declined to do so, despite entreaties. Gaddafi described him as “the worst kind of capitalist”. Instead Tump took the Libyan ambassador (Ali Aujali bin Hamid) to Mar a Lago in Florida, but he had no success in accessing investment funds from Libya.

However, it was clear that the administration did not need to dispose of Gaddafi. When I had been placed in his entourage to be in a position to eliminate him, he had been international public enemy number 1, but when I made contact with the agency in New York the message was that I should simply sit.

We toured Africa in 2010. Gaddafi seemed to be at the height of his powers. But at the beginning of 2011 things started to go wrong for the President. There were protests in Benghazi similar to the protests that that had occurred in Tunis and Egypt. This was the beginning of “The Arab Spring” which would see the downfall of several dictators

Gaddafi tried to pretend that it was not really happening. He had his police shoot into the crowd at the protests in Bengahazi in February 2011. Only a few months later he actually visited Italy as if nothing had happened, partying hard with his friend Silvio. On that trip he suddenly and inexplicably replaced Fatima with another Amazon, Fairoz. She had been part of the unit for some time but had only recently come to prominence. She was a very unpleasant person, and very suspicious of me.
Gaddafi and Fairoz in Italy 2011

But time was up for my target, and as it turns out, for me too. The formation by Gaddafi of his “National Transitional Council” was the beginning of the end. It was an admission that he knew that his days were numbered and that the best he could do was to negotiate with the NTC and find an exit for himself and his family. To do that, the best Amazons were people like me, who could speak international languages.

So, I found myself with him at “the Battle of Sirte” – his last stand. His last run for it left me behind as the soldiers burst in. At first I was relieved. It was over. A day later Gaddafi would be dragged from a culvert and killed by a mob, but I found myself a prisoner of Major Hassan Jaleef. Locked in a room in the mansion of the local administrator.

Major Jaleef burst into the room and closed the door behind him. “Your leader is dead,” he said, as if taunting me.

“I am glad of it,” I said to him. “I have always wanted him dead. I would have done it myself if had ever got him alone.”

“We are alone now,” he said. “What are you going to do to me?”

I was ashamed to be so weak, but the hormones had robbed me of all my strength. He had me pinned with one hand underneath me and the other in his powerful grip. With his free hand he was reaching for my panties. I knew what was coming next. I was going to die.

And then my panties were off, and I was exposed. My penis and balls, shrivelled by the chemicals and almost two years of tight confinement, were open to view. I looked at the ceiling and braced myself for the blow to the head or the hands at my throat.

He was not growling. He was laughing.

“Now, that’s a surprise!” he said. He released his grip, but I just lay there. There seemed no way of escape.

“So now you know what I am,” I sniffed. I realized that I was crying. I probably had been from the moment he started to attack me. “What are you going to do to me?”

“I am going to roll you over, Little One,” he said. “My cock is as hard as iron, and I need to put it somewhere.”

It occurred to me that I might get through this. I just needed to play this right. I said to him softly: “I have never done this before. Please be gentle.”

“It seems that there is lubrication here,” he said. He had found some hand cream, and I was glad he had.

And then he was inside me. And there was pain. But worse than that there was the humiliation.

I think that if he had been quick, that is what I would I would have taken away from the experience. A man raped and debased. But he took his time. He enjoyed himself. And he told me so. He sighed and whispered his approval of my assets, sometimes playing with my hair. The cream warmed in my ass and squelched as he moved, and I found that there was a strange warmth growing inside me. Against every belief that I had ever had about myself I realized that I might actually be enjoying this.

When he came inside me and I felt his hot fluid fill me, I quivered and out of my limp penis a thimble full of liquid wet the sheets.

He saw it and looked at me approvingly. I lay in front of him. Smooth pale flesh, perfect breasts, wonderful hair falling across the bed, and a tiny penis still oozing a little. I must have looked a strange sight, but the look was still approving.

“Are you going to tell anybody about me?” I asked.

“Well, how can I?” he said. “How can I put him to the shame of not being able to tell the difference between a man and a woman? Did our president know? I didn’t think so. He had many vices, but not that one. So you are a clever one, you. Too valuable to die, I think. Besides, I enjoyed that. I will protect you Little One. I don’t mind that little cock of yours. I don’t like the balls. They will have to go. And keep that whole area plucked or shaved. Understand?”

“Yes,” I said, as passively as I could muster. Survival, you see.

He had me wear a bourka for the trip back to Tripoli. Somehow this form of dress had re-emerged from nowhere in only the last few months.

My focus was to get back to the palace and re-establish communications with my handler. I never got there, but I did get a message. I was taken by Major Jaleef to his house near the palace and left there. He returned that evening with a bunch of flowers – eleven pink roses, several days old.

“These are for you,” he said. “I would have bought you fresh ones, but these were at the palace, with your name on them. They have been there for a while. The petals were falling off, but I shook them over the bed, and that night he had sex with me for the first time face to face. It made me forget about the pain of losing my manhood, watching his dark eyes look into mine as he brought us both to that sublime climax. Something he liked to do often.

I was thankful to have a protector, somebody who cared for me, even loved me. Some of the other Amazons had no such good fortune. Many were raped, I suppose as I had been, but I suppose that it was my good luck that we were alone, and that Hassan was of what you might call, flexible sexual orientation. I was happy to be his third wife for a while, until I was able to escape Libya.

I live back in Morocco now. Back in North Africa where I feel at home. I work managing “Le Clinique du Parc” established by the great French gynecological surgeon Dr. Georges Burou, and which continues the work that he pioneered in the 1950s. It seems like a good fit for me these days.

In 2015 I received a presidential commendation for service to the United States of America from President Barack Obama that mentioned “the great sacrifices” that I had made, but somehow now it does not seem so great a sacrifice. I am happily married now. I love sex as a woman. I am doing good work. Casablanca is a modern westernized city. I sometimes visit my home town which is more traditional, and where my family have (in the main) accepted who I have become. So have I. I will never be a man again, I know that. But I am a special type of woman. I am an Amazon.

The End.

© Maryanne Peters 2019

Ambiguous
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

My name is Tracy. It was before and it is now. When I was young I never really thought of it as being an ambiguous name – like, for either a boy or a girl. Maybe it was just because we had no female Tracys at middle school. I mean, you think of Tracy McGrady and maybe Tracy Morgan, or the guy I was named after – Tracy Lawrence – some country singer that my Dad still loves to listen to. Then in high school somebody said – “Tracy is a girl’s name”. Suddenly the world seemed full of women called Tracy.

People started saying to me – “I’m sorry, I thought you might be a girl” – shit like that. Mom said it did not help that I wore my hair long and that I was not a particularly big guy. I got a bit sick of the whole thing and seriously thought about telling everybody that I preferred to be called Tom, but then I decided that I was just going to live with it. It was about being confident in myself.

I am not sure why I ticked the “not stating” box under “sex” on the college form. I was applying with a couple of other guys, and I suppose that I was just fooling around. The guys said that because of my name I could be either – let them guess. My contact number was on the form. They could have sought clarification at any time.

It was just that positions for on campus accommodation were becoming scarce. Before I knew it, I was assigned to the girl's dorm. I knew it the moment that I walked up. Who wouldn’t – there were girls milling around, and me. I should have turned around then and there, but I strolled through the dorm and lounge areas. It was way better that the male dorms I had seen – clean, comfortable and with more facilities. The contrast was like the difference between a hotel and a vandal-proofed prison.

The truth was that I was serious about college whereas I was not so sure that the guys I was with felt the same. They were not my close friends, but it seemed that they fully expected me to be a part of the heavy social program they had in mind, largely based on consuming large amounts of beer. I never ever liked beer – I still don’t.

I wondered if I could take up the room that was assigned to me. After all I had ticked the box, and had been assigned the room. The sign said “all male visitors must be out by 10:00pm” but I was not a visitor. But it was pretty clear that I was not female, or at least that was what I thought.

I was standing in the room when a couple of girls stepped in. They introduced themselves as Dotty and Lena – my neighbors.

“Tracy huh? Maybe that explains it. It is a girl’s name I guess,” said Dotty.

I could argue, but I decided not to. The room was great. And neither Dotty nor Lena seemed to mind that I was a guy. In fact, they helped me move in and I helped them with some heavy stuff, and even in that first couple of hours it seemed like we were destined to become friends.

I made all sorts of jokes about being a fox in the henhouse, or the sultan in the harem, but they just laughed. It was like they did not see me as a sexual threat, which was nice in a way, but also a little hard on the male ego. Why wasn’t I a threat? The truth is that I was a bit of a virgin. I had been with girls, but I could not be called experienced. I probably considered myself clumsy and inadequate, so I was not active that way.

But whether they realized that or not, they wanted to include me. They talked about me “giving a man’s perspective” on personal relationships or even on courses being studied. It was like they had decided that I might be useful and worth keeping around. They did suggest that it might be easier all around if I adopted “gender nonspecific clothing” around the dorm, just because it was supposed to be women only. It so happened that both Dotty and Lena were the same size as me and they could help me with some items.

I also decided to dip out of the welcome ceremony and go through some of my textbooks. It seemed to me that I had lucked out in securing my own great room in a much quieter dorm than my male pals had to put up with. I could just get on with my study and catch up with the guys when that suited me.

After the welcome ceremony Dotty and Lena were gushing about all the fun they had and telling me that I should be able to do “some girl stuff”, but that might mean dressing as a girl.

Of course, I said – “No way!” I said it more than once, but after a while my resistance faded. You have to understand that we were close and getting closer. We were always in and out of one another’s rooms. There were always feminine garments, makeup and hair styling stuff around. I even had some of their clothes hanging in my closet, because I did not have much more than a jacket and a raincoat – both “gender nonspecific”. Beyond that I had jeans and T-shirts and a few sweaters – come to think of it, it was all pretty “gender nonspecific”.

I would go to classes as a guy, but somewhere on my way back to the dorm I would turn into something else – maybe something neutral. Then when either Dotty or Lena came into my room, I was one of three girls.

I remember the first time we went out as three girls I was not wearing much different from what I normally would. I was wearing jeans and trainers and a check shirt. It was just that they were not mine. I was just wearing a padded bra under the shirt, and some of Dotty’s “shaping panties” under Lena’s tight jeans, and the effect was 100% female, even without the work that they did above the neck.

But it was there that my gal pals really went to work. They just washed and styled my hair and applied makeup and just brushed my eyebrows – maybe just one or two hairs between them removed that first time.

“But it is how you carry yourself that will make sure that you appear female,” said Lena. She showed me how, and she was right. We went out to a bar and had guys hitting on us and buying drinks. It was a wonderful night, and not because of the attention and the free booze. No, I was among friends, and it made me realize that as a guy I had been a loner, and that was not who I wanted to be.

I have to say that I was looking forward to our next girls’ night out. And then the one after that.

Somewhere along the line I lost touch with the guys I had come to college with. The truth is that I was doing arts and they were doing commerce, and that would probably do it over a year, but also, they were noticing that I was changing, even though I didn’t.

“Hey Trace, are you plucking your eyebrows? And what’s with the hair? You look kind of gay, Man.”

I was doing my best to stay gender fluid I suppose – to have the ability to be both male or female as I liked, but slowly and perhaps without me even knowing it, I was drifting into the other camp.

I did not want people to think of me as gay. I did not feel gay. I lived in a women’s dorm among women, and I felt like one of them. I did not think of myself as attracted to men. I preferred the company of women, but it was for companionship, not sex. We liked to go out together with me as a woman, starting to experiment with hairstyles and makeup and dresses – all of us – not just me. It did not seem weird.

And we studied together too. We used to laugh at boys in our class who never seemed to be as smart as us because they were distracted by things as most freshmen are. We were clever and studious, but also pretty and desirable.

Like I said, I was not attracted to men, but that is not to say that they were not attracted to me.

I cannot recall when the hormone therapy started. Dotty and Lena were both on the pill, and I think that the suggestion was that I should go on it too, “to keep our cycles in sync”. It was a joke, but it got me thinking that maybe I should visit the student medical center and discuss my general health.

The attending (female) doctor assumed that I was female until she asked me to remove my blouse and (empty) bra.

“Are you on hormones?” she asked. “Birth control pills are not for you. I think that you need patches or suppositories, or maybe both. They are more targeted and less damaging to the liver. Let me write you up a script.” I never even said that I was transgender. Mind you, I did not deny it either, and perhaps if I wasn’t I would have.

Somehow it just seemed right for me. It made me feel that I belonged where I was. The effects took a while to become visible, but the mental effect seemed to have been immediate. In many ways that drift across was already complete.

So, when Paul came into my life, that seemed like no big deal. He was studying astrophysics. He called me “Goldilocks” not just because of my blond hair but because in astronomy Goldilocks means just right.

“Dotty is too chunky and Lena is too scrawny, but Tracy, you are just right,” he said. I said that I was too flat chested and that I did not have a booty, but that was changing.

“Dotty is too chirpy, and Lena is too high and mighty, but Tracy, you are just right,” he said. It is true that I was more cautious than Dotty, but more needy than Lena. I wanted to have somebody think of me as perfect – is that wrong?

I worried about what my parents would say when they saw how much I had changed, but for Paul I wanted to be as feminine as possible. I wanted to be beautiful so that when I clung to his arm people would think that he was a lucky guy. That is what I wanted.

Stupidly sex never entered my head. If it had I would probably never have got involved with him. Because once he was involved, he would want to undress me, and then everything would turn to shit.

It was going to happen, as sure as night was going to follow day. I just kept putting it off.

I even considered running away, and just leaving him a note, but I loved college life and my studies were going really well, and I had the two best friends in the world, and Paul … who said that I was just right.

I decided that I would need to tell him. I thought about doing it in a public place, for my own protection, but that would be wrong. I needed to trust that he was the person he was, and that I was in no danger. In some ways I would have been happy to take a pounding because I knew that the true agony would come from him walking away, which seemed certain.

But it was not like I had a choice. He needed to know, and I needed to face reality. Once he was out of my life I could make my own decision as to whether Tracy was a man or a woman. It seemed that as a person without Paul, I was ambiguous – I could be either one or the other. With Paul I could only be what he wanted me to be.

I had asked Paul to come by my room, and I asked Dotty and Lena to be in their rooms to back me when needed – to be there when I collapsed in tears.

I sat him down and explained that I was devastated to disappoint him, but that his Goldilocks was not the perfect anything, except perhaps the epitome of lies and deceit. I just sobbed it out, keeping a distance from him. I said that I was a boy, not a girl at all.

“You are transgender?” he said. He sounded surprised but not disgusted. I suppose that surprised me too.

The funny thing was that nobody had ever asked me that question. I didn’t even know the answer.

“I want to be a woman. I would like nothing more than to be your woman, but…”. It was true.

“It is a condition,” he said, like the scientist he was. “You are a woman with a physical problem that can be corrected with surgery. It means that some doors will be closed to us, but it is our task to work with what we have. Have you heard of Fermi’s Paradox? In astronomy the presence of planets in the Goldilocks zone suitable for life has been proven, but in an infinitely large universe why have we yet to see life? It is too much to ask that true perfection is common. It may not even exist anywhere, but you Tracy, are as close to it as I want.”

Dotty and Lena heard my cries and came running, but they were cries of joy. Unambiguous cries of joy.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2022

2415

Erin’s Seed: “A guy with an ambiguous name gets to college and gets assigned to a girl’s dorm. He doesn’t complain and neither do the girls. He enjoys their company without being really sexual about it though he calls them his harem in joking, and they like having him there to get insight into how guys think. It is all going well until they decide he needs a boyfriend.

America’s Princess
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters
A Darker take “Alchemy and Essence” by Laika

I was born on August 14th 1932 – that is to say that my body came into the world on that day. So my life now draws to a close. My second life.

There is something that I need to get off my chest. That is an English metaphor that is so true, because it has been a weight that has sometimes felt has been crushing me and preventing me from breathing. It is guilt. I took her life. She could have led that life, but I took it. I wanted so much to lead that life, so I took it.

I led that life, and I led it well. I told myself that every good thing I did, I did it for her. She made a mark on the world. She never would have done that without me – I told myself. But I never gave her that chance

My curse was to see her in the mirror every day – the little girl that I killed. Even now that my hair is white and my face wrinkled, I still see that child, so sweet and innocent, picking flowers there by the lake. I took her then. That was the person I was – the man I was. I was the monster that I portrayed in all those movies.

I wanted so much to be her, that I did something so outside my nature that it has appalled me in all the 79 years that have followed. People said that I was good and kind. I believed it. But it was not true. I took her life. I buried the man I was.

After the funeral I went there only once, and not because I wanted to. Only a few years ago I buried my husband at Forest Lawn Memorial Park and I walked right past the headstone: “Max Grosz, Actor and Gentleman, November 22 1879 - March 27 1941”. And murderer.

What drives a man to that? Desperation. We all understand it now – gender dysphoria. Back then it was simply a perversion. A huge lump of a man fit only to perform roles in horror movies, but inside longing to be a woman, and to live that life.

I drove her small unconscious body back down to California, back to Encino which in those days was just a rural village where my house could be isolated. I kept her sedated to the point of unconsciousness because I could not bear her tears and wails. I was a soft-hearted man, which makes it all the more unbelievable that I would have done this.

I needed to be her. I ached to be her. I had devoted a lifetime to achieving the impossible. A life spent in the study of neurology (so poorly understood then) and spirituality – to achieve transfer. I was the from, but I needed a to. It seems so cold to put it like that. She was a person in her own right, until I took her, without mercy or compunction.

This is what I have had to live with all these years.

I had to dispose of his body. I remember looking at it and thinking how big and ugly it was. Of course, I knew that this would be a task beyond an 8-year-old girl, but I had prepared a place to be buried. I left a trail by leaving my car and a note at Pismo Beach and digging my own grave beyond my property in a place where her little body could operate the lift and drive the tractor.

It would be suicide, plain and simple. A fading movie star – “Actor and Gentleman” taking his last curtain call – exit stage left. In Hollywood, even in the 1940s, such things were commonplace.

All that was needed then was for her to find her way through to Glendale, so I had booked a cab to pick her up and take her to the unit I had rented for her there. She would need to have some time to accept me, and for me to learn about her.

Until all of that was done, I had no time or thought to bask in my incredible achievement, but when I did, I found joy beyond all imagination. Such joy makes it easy to shelve your sins. But those sins remain, and shelves collapse.

Everything that I could do to prepare, I did, even though the chance of success seemed slight. I had all the papers fabricated. Tammy Kirby was not a complete fiction, but had died in childbirth years before, in Salt Lake City. I just needed a name and no parents – Tammy’s had followed her soon after her death – perhaps a succession of broken hearts.

Her real parents were alive. They were my other victims.

But there can be no such thing as an 8-year-old girl alone in Hollywood. What I wanted was to become the daughter of Saul “Zolly” Perleman, my agent and the man I respected most in life.

I went to the funeral in the outfit that Max had bought for the purpose, and I went right up to Zolly and Flora and said, “Mr. Perleman, I understand you were Max’s agent and that you are a good one”.

“I’ve had some success for my clients,” he said. “The ones with talent. I just wish Max had taken my advice more…”.

“Well I’m an actress,” I said. “And despite my tender years I’m quite good. And I’m in need of an agent. If you would see fit to let me read for you”

He just started yelling: “This is a funeral! Have you no decency?! I just lost my best friend. Listen Girlie, you might have the ruthlessness it takes to go places in this town, and you might even be talented---the next Shirley Temple---and will make some agent a rich man. But I’d sooner be a rag picker than speak another word to you!”

It was not what I wanted. It seemed to me that my plan was coming apart. I had everything I wanted, but without Zolly it would be hard. So, I followed him. The tears were real. They come so readily as a woman or a girl.

The under the monument to Tom Mix I confronted him again. This time I had to play the last card I had.

There was a young guy Jimmy, who used to live next door outside Encino. He claims that he knows that I am really Max Grosz. He was at the funeral. He claims that I told Zolly that I was Max. Well nobody believes him, so why would Zolly. No, what I di was to tell Zolly that Max whad sort of been my adopted uncle and mentor, and had given me “the Cassandra File” with instructions to give it to him – Zolly. Out of respect for Zolly and Flora I will not speak of the contents of the file, other than to say that Zolly wanted it and would destroy it. Zolly asked me if I had seen what was inside it.

“No,” I said. “I am only eight and on my own. Max said that you would look after me and help me get into the movies. You can have the silly file thing.”

That is why he hugged me.

I told Flora that my parents were dead and that my wider family in Utah were crazy Mormons and wanted to marry me off as a child bride when I turned 10.

We stopped off at the unit to pick up my things, and I moved into their place. Zolly got his file and Flora got the daughter she had always wanted.

I don’t know how they managed to adopt me, and given my tender age they did not burden me with the details. They seemed to get it squared away legally, but I suspect it had cost them.

Zolly may have been a bit suspicious at the start but he never showed it, and he grew to love me as I loved him. His love came from pride, because I proved to be everything that I promised to be. How could I not succeed? There was a lifetime of experience in an eight-year-old.

I became: Tammy Kirby, “America’s Princess” after my first credited role in “Happy Hearts”. Two other movies followed before my first Christmas special 1942: “Tammy In Toyland”. With that came to endorsements, all managed by Zolly. I never begrudged him making more money off of me than perhaps he should, because I had a life, and that was what I really wanted.

The life of Max was never that. He trudged and strained under the burden of having been born in that awful body. Tammy was truly alive – now a woman in a girl’s body, growing up into womanhood. I felt so blessed.

Yet in my solitude there was that steel vice of guilt that would squeeze me as if my bones would crack.

To make it worse, Zolly kept up contact with Jimmy and his parents, Max’s old neighbors. It was in the time before Jimmy started to voice his thoughts, but it seemed to me even then that he suspected something was not right. He was watching me for signs of Max. I knew things that Max would know and a young orphan girl would not.

How could speak out. With the beginnings of fame come the nutcases, and he could well be one of those. Perhaps I had the confidence to press him a little. But there would be a showdown much later.

In 1943 came my first big break – the title role in “The General’s Daughter” where I played the army base brat doing song and dance routines with the new recruits. “America’s Fighting Men”, the song I sang for those GI’s up on the table in the mess hall, became my signature tune. I would be invited to sing it for the troops who shipped off for Europe or the South Pacific, from where many would not return. But it was my bit for the war effort, and made me and all who watched me, proud.

Around this time, the parents of the child I had abducted sought me out. Zolly sheltered me but I asked to see them. Zolly always regarded me as having “wisdom beyond my years” (which was a fact) and left such calls to me.

“I am so sad to hear about your daughter, and I may look a lot like her, but I am not her,” I explained to them both. “I remember my own parents and my early life quite clearly. It was not happy. I wish I had been your daughter, but I am not. I hope that you find her.”

Only an actor could recite this stone faced in front of such emotion. Only somebody with 40 years of skill could hide the emotions boiling inside me. This couple were good and kind, and devastated by what had happened – what I had done.

If there was a time to surrender everything, it would have been then. But what could I do? I am your daughter, but only her body. Her mind has gone, and that was the thing that you loved and that loved you back. If I had said that, would they have believed me? Then what would I have done?

This was a burden that I was locked into. An iron maiden that I wear all my life – my second life.

And yet the iron shell I had worn in my first life had seemed just as bad. The iron shell in the form of Max – the Hollywood monster. A shell with immense hands and feet, body hair all over, and male sex organs. A true-life horror.

So after they left I set about the business of success. America’s Princess with that smiling face and those adorable curls, seemed so facile against Max’s body of work, but the smile was more genuine that the monster’s growl. As long as I was not alone with my problem, I was happy.

Movie offers kept coming, and Zolly was kept busy, because I refused a studio contract. I had learned from prior experience, although I could never claim that. A child has little experience if any.

I won special praise for the work I did with Tracy and Hepburn the screwball comedy “Junior Referee”. Everyone was amazed at how I could go toe to toe with them both, never missing a beat, just as a actor with years of experience would. That picture was when folks started to see that I really had something. After that I was going on the radio to sell war bonds and popping up everywhere.

While still not a teenager until well after the end of the war, I was already setting the style for that whole Bobby-Soxer generation to come.

As fame grew there were more questions about my past. Where was I really from? Releases spoke of my being an orphan with my birth records being lost in a fire, or some such. It seemed that no two biographies on her quite matched when it came to my early years.

But nobody cared because I did. As I said, I had stolen a life and my duty was to be the best person that I could be. I had the example of Max, who, up until his malevolent deed was such a wonderful person. He was “a gentleman” and “about the nicest man you ever meet”. I was even nicer.

I studied too, because I wanted a future beyond Hollywood, but also because I wanted to experience a girl’s youth, with slumber parties, teenage crushes, prom dances, everything that had been denied me as a man. As a famous child star in Hollywood you can only achieve an imitation of such a life, but it was real enough for me.

With other girls I shared the stresses of adolescence, the first period, the first sexual encounters, the first scare of possibly pregnancy, the first love and the first loss of love. These were all the things that I craved and which had haunted me for sixty two years before I became Tammy Kirby. I lived them all with joy.

But then I returned to acting and at just twenty years old, I received my first Oscar nomination in 1953. When I finally won the award in 1961 as Best Supporting Actress in “The Stepchild”, with Betty Davis and Anne Bancroft playing the abusive daughter. I dedicated the award to Zolly who died only a week before the Awards Ceremony. I felt that I had achieved everything I could in acting.

The review for that movie in “Variety” said: “Who would have thought that the girl once known as America’s Princess could convey an evil screen presence not seen since the days of Max Grosz?” I felt that I had not only proven myself but proven my whole prior existence as well.

I was ready to find something else – something that made a real difference. That was when Jimmy contacted me again, after all those years. He asked to see me, and I agreed, because I try not to refuse.

He came to my house. He was sort of a family friend, after all. After minimal nervous small talk he just blurted out: ‘How much do you know about Max Grosz?” It was like an accusation.

I told him that we had met. That was a lie. You cannot meet yourself. The child met him, when he took her from beside the lake that spring afternoon, but I was not her – I was just in her. It brought it all back.

“I only met him briefly, but he gave me a letter to give to Zolly that kicked off my career, so I am grateful for that…”.

“You are him!” The words sounded like madness, even though I knew them to be true.

I jumped up a shouted: “Get out. Get out of my house!” It was loud enough to bring Al my security guy into the room to eject the man. He backed away, towards the door.

“I just wanted to know, that I wasn’t imagining something or crazy for thinking this,” he said. There was the look of sadness and frustration on his face that spoke of a lifetime being disbelieved. “I am not threatening you. If you ever want to call, I am someone you can talk to about this. I will keep the secret.”

That word sounded like blackmail. I shouted that I would call the police. So he left. He said that I would never hear from him again, and I haven’t. But there were times when I wanted to call him. He died a few years ago. There will never be peace for me there either.

I felt that the time had come for me to leave Hollywood in the hope that by leaving I could somehow leave my guilt behind. I married a wealthy movie backer from Madison Wisconsin, and I followed him home. I became a wife and mother. I experienced the joy of love and childbirth and of seeing children grow. I became involved in charities, cause and then politics. I became Mayor of Madison and then a Senator for Wisconsin. In that role I proudly championed the people of my adopted state and did good wherever I could.

But it seems that, despite the halls of power being full of the opposite, for some no amount of good deeds can satisfy a conscience.

Family is a source of happiness, and mine has grown. But somehow with the loss of my husband even a life longer than any person could ever have, becomes meaningless while there is pain. Not physical pain, but something much worse. The pain of guilt. The pain of regret.

My family could never understand it, and with the loss of my husband it became more acute. Thy offered me drugs. Now I am in care I have heard them as N&Ns – numb and neutral. I deny myself that. My wrong deserves pain.

I have lived the life I have always wanted, and now I must pay the price for that.

© Maryanne Peters 2020

Author's Note: There is a story behind this. A few days ago Veronica sent me her story “Alchemy and Essence” which was essentially a mind transfer tale within an homage to old Hollywood. I asked whether she would allow me to write my conclusion. Her Max was a very nice man, but what struck me was the loss of the little girl's future, so this became a tale of guilt. Veronica will re-post her story so everybody can have another chance to enjoy it.
Maryanne

Androgen Insensitivity
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome is a rare disorder, but not as rare as many may realize. In fact, 1 in every 100,000 genetically normal males are born with this condition. The consequence is that in many cases it is never known that they are in fact, male. The bodies of people with AIS are totally unable to respond to any male hormone. Even at birth the genitals will appear female, and upon puberty the body will only respond to estrogens that are present, without androgens taking over. In fact, AIS “women” are often more womanly than genetic women, precisely because no male hormone can affect them. In general, AIS women can function socially, but a vagina does not form and of course, AIS people are sterile.

Acquired Androgen Insensitivity however, is extremely rare. Nobody seems to understand how it could happen. AIS is congenital – people are born with the condition. How the ability to respond to androgens could suddenly be lost, is a medical mystery. It is not as if the androgens are not being produced – the body simply does not recognize them. With AAI somehow the body spontaneously ceases to recognize them. At present it is estimated that there are less than 100 people in the whole world suffer from AAI. I am one of those people.

I can clearly recall the very day that it happened. I awoke on morning to discover that the sheets on my bed were covered with body hair that had fallen out in the night. Not all the hair had fallen out, but it was clear that something was wrong. While I am no hypochondriac I confess that I immediately thought about cancer. My doctor had no idea and the tests carried out in hospital drew a blank as well. The simple answer is that there is no test for AAI – the hormone levels in the blood are unchanged. The only evidence was the changes taking place in my body.

By the time I finally got to an endocrinologist who had some knowledge of the condition, the symptoms were already well advanced. Virtually all body hair had been lost, my skin had become soft, small swellings had appeared in my chest and my genitals appeared to be shrinking away almost completely. Even then this specialist had to reach for his reference books to learn more about AAI.

As explained to me, the major problem facing anybody with AAI is treatment. It is not like an estrogen producing tumor that can be cut out. Estrogens are always present in the male body (where they serve important functions including promoting fertility) – with AAI they are simply not dominated by the androgens so their effect becomes obvious. Even massive doses of male hormones could do nothing for me, because my body cannot respond to them. Even if the swellings in my chest could be removed and my genitals surgically enhanced, I faced the future with a soft hairless body. The only facial hair I would ever have would need to be glued on.

While I had always regarded myself as a masculine, I have never been tall and once my muscles had wasted away and the whiskers and hard edges of my face had been lost, I appeared increasingly feminine. AAI meant that I would always look like that – like a drag king – a woman in men’s clothing.

My endocrinologist was able to put the facts to me from known incidences of AAI in the western world. Curiously in other parts of the world social conditions were friendlier to those with AAI. But in the western we see only man or woman, masculine or feminine. It was going to be a problem for me.

Remission or reversal of the condition was unknown – my predicament was permanent. Several with AAI had tried to live as men and all but one had been unable to cope – there had been depression and suicide. The most successful outcomes had been where the subject had elected to change sex. In each case this had been a complete role reversal – normal heterosexual men had chosen to live as women. As such they had merged unseen into society, perhaps more easily than transsexuals, as their bodies had already ceased to be men without artificial assistance.

I immediately dismissed that possibility, but the alternative would appear to be to live in a netherworld where I was unable to function sexually, and where I would appear to be either a woman in male clothing or a feminized man. For me this was hardly an option. I had lived my life as a man in all respects, and I could not imagine trying to live that life in my present condition. If I did nothing I would need to leave town - leave my life and all my friends behind me – and start anew, perhaps as a sexless person.

In truth, that would also be hard. I counted myself one of a very close group. I had established myself in a small business as a specialist automotive spray painter. Having an artistic flair I design and painted car-bodies, motorcycle fuel tanks, airplanes and boats, and after several years I had two guys working for me full time, including my late father’s oldest Friend, Larry Grayson. I was close to Larry and a group of others my own age, all in the automotive industry, all keen on motor-racing, football, shooting, and getting together over a few beers as regularly as possible. I shared an apartment with two old friends from schooldays, Warren and Jake. They were single like me and we played the field. Before AAI I was no Don Juan, but I had sex with women regularly without having to become entangled.

My friends had noticed changes in me perhaps even before I did. Whenever this thing started it was not clear to me – it was not an accident or event that I could pin down. My friends would ask me whether I was putting on weight, or losing weight, or coloring my hair – all sorts of stupid questions that made no sense to me at the time. They could see the subtle changes, which I missed before I was diagnosed.

In my first week in hospital for tests, every one of them had called in to see me. Like good friends should be, they were worried about me. But when I learned what I was suffering from I was too embarrassed to tell them. I knew that the changes would continue, and I did not want them to see me.

When I was told the options for treatment, I ruled out the sex change idea as not an option. I felt so much a man on the inside I could not imagine pretending to be a woman. But insensitivity to androgen does more than just effect your body, and other changes followed. Firstly, I found myself sobbing about my predicament – this from a man who had not cried since he was eight. And I found that I felt the need to be looked after, I wanted to depend on somebody. This was not the man who had made his own way in the world as I had done. When I asked my endocrinologist as to how I could drive out these feelings, he told me he could not help. I was no longer responding to the androgens that foster aggressive and dominating behavior. Even women respond to the small amounts of this male hormone even present in all women. But I could not. Estrogens were affecting me. So, I was not only physically feminized but increasingly mentally feminized as well, with no obvious remedy. Worse than that, I was more feminine than the average woman. What hope did I have pretending to be a man?

I remembered that my friends had noticed these mental changes in me also, even before my tests in hospital. There had been instances where I had not reacted to something as I would have previously, and they had seen it. They were too concerned to comment. But it now became clear to me, that I was changed already.

I was starting to understand why those AAI who chose not to change sex had found themselves unable to continue long term. I began to ask about the sex change option, just to understand it better. Before I left the hospital after the tests, my endocrinologist introduced me to a patient of his - a transsexual called Sally. She offered to help me sample life as a woman. She suggested that I might like it.

I was not ready to go back to the apartment, so she offered for me to stay at her place after I was discharged. When I called Warren to tell him that I would be out of town for further tests, he said “Man, its sounds like someone has you by the balls!” I had not noticed that my voice was changing too. I wondered if I would ever see my friends again. It seemed hard to imagine that I could face them as I was at that point.

I called Larry too, but I took care to make my voice sound deeper. He said that I was not too worry as he would look after the shop and pay my share of the apartment rent and some spending money into my account. He was really nice, and told me just to concentrate on getting over whatever I had. I could not tell him that was impossible.

Sally took the view that I should go the whole way for a few days just to try it. She said that I could simply put on a bra and some lipstick and call myself a girl, but that in order to do the job properly I should go from being a man’s man to become a woman’s woman. I could always drop the ultra-feminine trappings later, as she had done. She said that as a transsexual she had started by going over the top, but she had now tempered her style to blend in. She told me that she now never thought about her life as dressing up as a woman – she was a woman. But she felt that for me it was important to go through that phase. I had concluded that I would at least give this option a try. I had no faith that it would work, but there was nothing else. And I was prepared to follow her advice.

She was to start from the top. My hair had softened and become a little thicker with changes in my body, but it was not so long. Sally immediately suggested extensions. According to her, this would allow me to experiment with feminine hairstyles. They could always be cut off, but for now they would give me an unmistakable woman’s head of hair that I would need to style before going out.

My face was to receive some attention. The loss of the influence of male hormones had led to a softening of my features, and I always had large and wide set eyes with good eyelashes, but the brows were to be thinned and skin moisturized.

My chest had acquired what was known as “A cup” breasts – Sally was of the view that I should obtain implants, but as I was still trialing this thing she arranged for me some “breast forms” which could be attached if required and would fill a bra. This clothing item was entirely new to me, although had acquired some skill in removing them from girls I had taken to bed. I have to say that from the moment that I put a bra on for the first time I was overcome by what was happening. Again, I found myself in tears. Sally said something like “You hold it together now, girlfriend”, and I found myself comforted, curiously more by the last word she had spoken.

The panties went on next, and I found that whatever was left in my groin fitted easily within the flat lacy front. Looking at myself in the mirror confirmed that my body was not male.

Sally inspected my hands and she was troubled. I explained that I was a tradesman and had used my hands. Her response was that there was one way to put a stop to that – long nails. She explained that these would also help with feminizing what were quite large hands. AAI would have no effect on them, or my feet. We discovered that my feet were the same size as hers and that I could borrow any one of the many pairs of fashion shoes that she had accumulated over the years.

Naturally her extreme regime required practice in high heels, which curiously I mastered in quite short order. This included climbing and descending stairs, getting in and out of cars, bending over and other maneuvers. I also put on a dress for the first time and when through the same exercises plus sitting and standing from a variety of chairs and positions.

The whole exercise was undertaken with great humor and with great patience and understanding from Sally. After a day with Sally and staying at her place overnight discussing things, the following day we to a salon operated by a friend of Sally’s. Sally introduced me to Erika. I had an idea that Erika may have been a transsexual also, but of course I would not assume anything – not now anyway.

Erika got to work on attaching extensions to give me a head of hair longer that shoulder length in a honey blond color, not too far from my own natural hair color. At the same time a manicurist worked on my hands, attaching fake nails and filing them. After the hair and nails were done I was given a full facial, an eyebrow wax and eyelash tinting. Erika was keen to do hairstyling and make up, but that was not Sally’s strategy. I was to do my own work with what I had.

The first thing that I noticed was my hair. It was long and thick, and it fell about my face. Sally introduced me to a variety of hair clips, bands and scrunchies. With extensions I used a brush, only using a comb to work a center parting. Sally said that hair was a woman’s joy and that she had longed for hair as I now had, since she was a child. She was thrilled to share with me a joy for trying simple styles. It had initially seemed a hassle for me, but I could see how much fun it could be. We did high pony tails, French braids, buns, twists – admiring them in mirrors from all angles. I did the same styles on Sally, initially with hilarious results. We fell about giggling. I started to feel that that little things like this were a joy, and that being a girl could really be fun.

Long nails were harder to cope with. I could not put my hands in my pockets – but as Sally explained, I would not need to. I also found that long nails made me use my hands differently. I had to pick things up daintily. I had to hold my hands to protect my nails. And of course, Sally was right, when it came to doing any significant manual chore I was pretty helpless.

Make up was one thing that I took to easily. My background in artwork allowed me skill with the brush and pencil, and a good make up job seemed so much like a custom paint job with the blending of colors and the use of highlights. Initially I followed the simple rules that Sally had laid down, but then I started to experiment on my face and Sally’s. She said that I had a real talent.

My artistic flair also came to the fore on clothes. Sally had a large array of fashion and women’s magazines and we would go through clothes, hairstyles and make up trends together. I quickly developed a sense of what looked right. It seemed strange to me then (and now) that I had never noticed women’s clothing at all. So much money and attention is paid to fashion yet for men (as I had been) it meant nothing at all. The only clothes that I had liked on women were those that I could see through or that hid nothing. Colors, cut, drape and detail meant nothing to me. The artist in me could now appreciate all of these.

When we were not poring over magazines, Sally had a strict regimen of soap operas and chick flick movies. She would point out movements and behaviors’ that were distinctly feminine and we would act them out later. Initially I hammed it up but I found that I was slipping in to these actions without deliberation.

Of course, in the movies it always ended with the girl winning her man, something that we had always wanted to happen, and in which we shared her joy, often with tears. But it prompted me to ask Sally about men. She explained to me that before she had changed her sex she had regarded herself as a heterosexual man, albeit with gender confusion. She had never really considered sex with men until after her operation. Now she considered herself a heterosexual woman and had never felt sexually attracted to a woman since. The whole idea seemed very strange to me.

In fact as I looked at myself in the mirror, I found the whole thing beyond belief. There will be people hearing my story who will say the same thing – a man does not become a woman. My only explanation is that after AAI took over my body I ceased to be a man. If you went through what I did you would understand that. That is not to say that I became a woman. But now the face looking back at me was a woman.

I wondered about myself. Why had I asked Sally about men? It may seem stupid, but while all of this was going on I had not considered my sex life after AAI. I suppose I assumed that I would find a way to go on winning women to my charms, even without a body that could perform as a man, but that now seemed ridiculous. Dressed as a woman, the idea of chasing lesbians for sex seemed weird, but that is what I would be doing. I started to check out the men in the magazines and the movies. Did I find them attractive? Could I have a relationship with a man?

The turning point was when I was watching one particular movie with Sally, for training purposes. It was a classic high school melodrama with the good-looking dweeb chasing (and ultimately winning) the cheerleader away from the jock. I suppose I looked at the dweeb and wondered whether I could ever have him make love to me as a woman, but when the jock took off his shirt and smiled at the cheerleader I felt something unmistakable. It was pure womanly lust – my first experience of it. I told Sally which of the two men I would prefer in my bed. She laughed ... and agreed.

For me the remarkable thing was not that I had apparently switched sexual preference – the truth is I was still not sure that I had – it was that the man I preferred was so dominant. It made me feel even more feminine and even submissive. The sexual partner that my body seemed to respond to would be on top, fucking me. I realized that I would never fuck anybody again. Because in truth, I could not. With male hormones to animate it, my penis was just a piss nozzle.

There was no decision to make. AAI had made it for me. I was to become a woman. I called my endocrinologist and told him to arrange the operation. Sally jumped for joy and insisted that we celebrate.

I borrowed a floral dress, a pair of heels and a bag from Sally. We took a cab downtown. We went to visit Erika and had our hair put up in special but essentially casual styles. I had my ears pierced and CZ studs inserted. Sally coached me on how to tone down my appearance and behavior to appear more normal. Actually I never really took to the hyper-feminine thing anyway. I felt that I could get away with acting like a tomboy as long as I looked good – and that night, I did.

We went to a high-class bar with a hefty cover charge for men, but women free. We ordered cheap champagne. We smiled at men and had them buy us more expensive girly drinks - camparis and stuff like that. Sally said that as women, we needed to be careful not to get drunk. My smaller body mass could not hold the liquor and as the weaker sex we could never let ourselves be taken advantage of. But as women we could use our sex to the max.

Two guys took us for a late supper at Gerry’s Grill. A guy called Mitch sat next to me and put his hand on my leg more than once. I lifted it off the first time but put my hand on his – I figured it meant “no sex but keep up the attention” – at least up until a few months ago that would have been how I read that signal if a girl had done it to me. So it is like having all her tools with a man’s knowledge on how to use them.

We parted company with the guys outside the restaurant. The cab had stopped, and we were explaining what a big day we had coming tomorrow. Mitch asked for my number and I explained that I was just in town a few days staying with Sally. Sally had already given a number to the guy she was with – a fake one as it turned out. Mitch said he would call her to reach me, and that as I was a visitor he could show me some sights. As we parted he moved to kiss me – I knew the move as I have done it before. The idea is to leave the girl with enough to make her want to take that call. I decided that I would do the classic response and turn my head to let him kiss my cheek, but as his hot breath neared my mouth I found my lips part a fraction to receive him. I could feel his lips were hot; I could feel his whiskers against my soft skin; I could taste his tongue – musky and sensual. I almost swooned. He could certainly feel my body yielding. When we parted I could see that if I was affected, he was doubly so. It was as if my impulsive docility made him need me. I could see it and could feed of it. I began to see that as a woman I could have power over men.

I went into hospital the next day. There was none of the counselling associated with transsexuals. The operations were an established treatment for AAI. It was covered by my medical insurance. The actual procedure followed a few days later after my body had been poked and prodded, and my overall health assessed.

The aftermath was painful – no escaping that fact. I had a small plaster on my nose (a little size reduction included), my chest was encased in a formed bandage and my groin was wrapped in cloth with a urine tube coming out. To say that I felt kicked in the balls would have been a gross understatement. Sally came to visit, and she had the advantage of knowing what I was going through. Within a few days and with her support, the pain subsided.

I had stayed in touch with my friends and my business by email. I had dared not call as my voice had changed. Lying in a hospital bed I had access to email through my laptop and found myself clattering away. I had not only been able to send messages but I was able to price some jobs and even send concept drawings down the line using a computer graphics that I used. Fortunately, I had Larry looking after the shop, so I could do concept, pricing and admin from a distance. But the truth is that the big work needed me on site. If my business was to survive I needed to get back to it.

As I recovered I decided that I needed to prepare everybody for my re-entry into our group. I felt that it might not work. To say that I was the same guy who had left three months earlier was so obviously a lie. I was a very different person. Not just in the body of a woman, but a person who now loved dresses, spent hours at the mirror and had kissed a man and loved it. Perhaps it would be hello and goodbye to all my prior friends, and off to a new life with them forgotten. I knew that I would have to prepare for that possibility, but it saddened me.

So, I wrote an email and copied it to Larry, Jake and Warren and a few other pals:

“After numerous tests the doctors have discovered what is wrong with me. I have a very rare condition which has affected my endocrine system. My body no longer responds to male hormones and has become feminized over time. Some of you may have noticed these changes. The condition is untreatable but is not dangerous. The only question that it raises is whether I can continue to live as a man with the physical effects that it has. I have decided that I cannot. When I next see you, I will be a woman named Anna. Some of you may not want to meet her, and if that is the case then I understand, and I thank you for your past friendship. But I have made my decision because I feel that I have no choice.”

It was the last message I sent from my old email address. From my new address I set out an invitation to Anna’s birthday party. I had arranged to have it at an Italian restaurant near to my workshop that Saturday.

I invited Sally. I had said that I wanted it low key, but she said that I needed to dress well. She suggested a knit dress cut low in the front. I thought it was outrageous but as she put it, in that outfit nobody could mistake me for a man. We had our nails done and some curls put in our hair.

I had not intended to make an entrance. I wanted to be there to greet everybody as they arrived. But believe it or not we had a flat tire on the way. Both Sally and I could not fix it. How embarrassing for all my years in the industry not to be able to fix a tire, but with the heels on and the nails just done and everything. Luckily when standing beside a flat tire wearing that dress, 3 cars stopped to help! It still took a while, mainly because of all the efforts to chat up me and Sally.

So, when I arrived I walked in looking a little flustered but about as gorgeous as I could be. I was told afterwards that my friends had agreed that they would applaud when I entered, but in fact I just looked at maybe 30 faces with their mouths hanging open. I was so pleased that everybody had turned up, I could barely hold back the tears of happiness. I just stammered out: “Hi, I am Anna.” Once it had been confirmed the applause started.

Nobody could believe that it was me. Some said that when I walked in they thought the whole thing was a monumental practical joke – that the email was a lie and I had hired a stripper to pose as me. But there was enough of the old me there to dismiss that idea. Still, in another circumstance I wish I would have thought of a prank like that.

It certainly helped that AAI had worked its wonders on me, as that it how I view it now. I could have had any other condition that could kill me or rob me of quality of life. Instead I my condition simply gave me a new life. A different life. I am lucky for that, and the fact that I have true friends.

So how is it for me now, over a year after that day?

I continue to work in my paint shop, but focusing on design. At the drawing board I can dress smart and keep clean, but I still like to mix with the boys on the shop floor, and I have the background to relate to them. But I work more with the clients. We still get the work from our reputation and wide network in the automotive industry, but Anna offers a new feature in some of our promotional spreads and I am picking up more work. I promise “personal attention” and some guys really appreciate that.

So, I like my look to be either sexy or concealed sexy without being over sexy. By that I mean that I would never dress like a whore, except in my underwear. At work I like to appear professional but with something a little suggestive or quirky. I like my hair pulled back (not too tightly) clean and sleek but with a little curl off my forehead or in front of one ear. This is like my hood designs – smooth and sleek with a little something extra.

I like to wear dresses (especially when it is hot – men should envy us), but I like jeans as well. I love to wear nice shoes – there is nothing like a good pair of shoes to make you look good, and so feel good. If I must wear sweats I wear a floral t-shirt or something in my hair to maintain my femininity.

I moved out of the apartment and got my own place. Jake and Warren both have girlfriends and we go out together, five of us, or six if I have a date. I am more one of the girls and talk with the girlfriends about our stuff, but I still have a special bond with my buddies. I do not go shooting with them as before, but we get together to watch motor-racing and football, if the girls are included. I am more inclined to sit on the couch with them.

Larry has become my dad in a way that he never could before. I call him “Pop” and I introduce him to any new boyfriend as my father. He looks after me. I think it is really important for a girl to have somebody like Larry.

Lately I have met a guy who really is the first guy Larry properly approves of. His name is Dan and he is a management consultant, so nothing to do with my industry. He is tall and dark and pretty good looking, I think. We have great sex. The first time he came inside me, it almost blew my brains out. But he is a gentle and generous lover, and a nice guy. I have told him that I have XY chromosomes and that I am sterile, but 100% a woman. He has researched AIS but I have not told him about AAI. Is that wrong? It is almost the same thing, so I figure.

Anyway, we went out with Jake and Warren and the girls last weekend and in a quiet moment he proposed. I said yes but I told him we should have had a special date for a question like that. And he said: “I thought you might like to check with them before you said yes.” I am going to say that he was joking, I think. But if he was not, then it just shows that he understands that I am still close to my buddies.

But when I said yes, it was with the understanding that the boys are still my boys, but this man is the only man I want in every sense of the word. I want him with me. I want him to care for me. I want him to share everything with me, as I will with him. I want him inside me.

So here I am, just married. I had a wonderful day as the bride, and I am looking forward to a lifetime as a wife to my Dan.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2020

Angel A
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

I saw it in him almost immediately. Maybe it takes a sissy to know a sissy? Even if the poor child had no idea herself. Here was a boy who acted like a boy, but his inner voice was screaming: "I am a girl!" It seemed that I was the only one who heard it. Not even he himself.

Andy's father is the kind of man I have always wanted - a manly man. The kind of man who recognizes in somebody like me, the true woman, being so committed to womanhood so as to give away manhood. Andy’s father was a man who could make anybody feel like a woman if his tool was inside you. God knows he does it for me. A real man.

How could such a man spawn so delicate a creature as his youngest son Andy?

If there is one thing that I have learned about being trans, it is to be open about it. I guess that I know that I am attractive enough to be able to ignore the reaction. People accept me as a woman because I carry myself as a woman. I can live with: “Wow, you look like the real thing”. I am not so happy with: “So, what have you got … you know ... down there?”.

We told Andy early in our relationship. He just stared at me, but I could see the flicker of something in his eyes. Was it envy? Something less vicious than that - a sadness, or a longing. I knew it straight away. It was not that he wanted me, as might be expected of a young man meeting his father’s new girlfriend - he wanted to be me.

"Don't cut your hair, Andy" I told him. "It really is the most beautiful naturally blond hair."

He just seemed prepared to do whatever I asked of him. He had a dreamy look in his eyes when he watched me, and he was always watching me. What was he thinking? Perhaps: If only that were me?

I think that he knew that I was ready to guide him towards his true destiny.

I told him that we were a pair, he and I. We could do everything together, just the two of us. He was thrilled with the idea. He told me that was what he wanted. He told me that he would do whatever I wanted.

"It's what you want," I said, as I lined up the puberty blockers and female hormones. "What I want is for you to be the person who you were supposed to be."

What child would not be reluctant to take that first dose. I just gave him a big hug and he swallowed the tablets. A youngster just needs a little push every now and again, to set them on the right path.

I explained everything to his father. Naturally he was shocked, but when I explained to him again the tragedy that faces people like us if we are unfulfilled, he understood. As for reassuring him of his child's future happiness I insisted on immediate sex between us, and that left him in no doubt. It is wonderful to be a woman! It makes me wonder why anyone wants to be a man. But if you have the mind of a woman inside you, she must have the body she needs to enjoy sex like that. How sure could I be? As sure as somebody who has been there.

"They are calling me a sissy," Andy complained to me. Children can be cruel. But what is a sissy? What is wrong with feminine traits? What is wrong with being soft and delicate? Look at me. I love being the way I am.

"You can bear being a sissy for a while, and be proud to be one," I said to him. “For soon you will be a girl. A teenage girl. I never had that chance. Puberty for boys is such an awful thing – spots and hairs and a voice that is all over the place. Moods … mainly anger. What is good about that? But for girls it is a blossoming. Acquiring true beauty – the form of a woman. And for girls like us, without the bloody bits and pieces that are only the downside. For people like us it is only up from there.”

He seemed uncertain, but by then he adored me. To reassure him I gave him another girly hug and promised him that there would be more. I could feel his response. We were close. What stepmother could expect anything closer? We shared a special bond. I knew it.

We had a choice of high schools and the best plan was to send him to the one where he could make a fresh start as Angela. I like that name. I called her Angel A.

Again, the boy needed a little push to make the big jump out of pants and into dresses, but the truth is, there is nothing that he would not do for me, so there is nothing she would not do to follow me.

From that moment that Angel A stepped out of her room, she was ready to explain to her father just how much she wanted to be her. All those silly doubts in her head were gone, surely?

Her father said that she was a little worried that this might be going too far, too fast. How would a man like him have any understanding of girls like us? I told my Angel that she should not bother discussing any such issues with a man. They are from another planet. She seemed concerned that I might be angry with her, but I held her tight, and when her pretty little face was between my boobies, she was happy again, and ready to take on the world.

As I explained to her, school can be tough for a sissy, but not for a girl. Especially a very pretty girl. We are talking a girl who is so pretty she just has to be included by the other girls, and so draw strength from them. Don’t mess with boys. If you are pretty they will admire you from afar and then desire you. Ignore them. Hang with the girls and be the prettiest of them. She had it in her. I knew.

Angela did as I instructed, and naturally all thoughts of boyish activities just disappeared.

She said something about old friends among the boys, but as I said to her: Boys will break your heart - get ready to break theirs. Don’t get active - get gorgeous.

There might still be a few boys with snide comments, but she had a fairy stepmother and protector with some experience in this. Stand up my Angel A! She learned that her best defence was to forget any notion of walking some crazy middle line wavering between male and female. There was only one side to be on. My side. The female side. She wanted so much to be on my side.

Angela was able to enjoy all her high school years as a girl. It is something that I missed out on. She was able to be a cheerleader, dress up for the prom, date boys, go to sleepovers where she could try other girls’ clothes and experiment with makeup and hairstyles. That meant that her formative years were lived as a female, and that she had memories with photographs and a yearbook confirming that she had always been she. How lucky for her.

And then before college I was there beside her when she had her surgery. Anybody could understand her concern about the pain of surgery. That must have been what was behind her fear and reticence, for every girl in our position cannot wait to be rid of that last obstruction.

And of course that she was worried that she could not have a family, but that is just a question of finding the right man, and considering all of the options open to a loving couple. And of course that will happen. She already found a young man at college who is fully accepting and in love with her. What man could not be?

Yes, I have been right there beside my little Angel A, as all this has happened as it never happened for me. I am so happy to be able to share her joy, as if it had all happened to me.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2021

Anomaly – A Star Trek Story
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

“I am fully aware of the Prime Directive, Spock.” Captain James T Kirk found himself again annoyed by his friend’s reference to the fundamental rules applying.

“Nevertheless Captain, we have an unexplained anomaly,” Spock continued. “We have a small population of humanoids, with a low level of development, perhaps a little less than Earth’s dark ages, and right in the middle of all populations our sensors detect a highly sophisticated power source. It would appear that there has already been interference by advanced visitors. Given the Prime Directive it is unlikely that it would be one of the United Federation of Planets.”

“Perhaps a remnant of a prior more technologically developed civilisation?” Jim asked.

“Possible. But unlikely,” replied Spock. “We have a functioning machine of some power, with unknown purpose, right in the middle of a primitive society. In my opinion, Captain, investigation is warranted.”

Jim Kirk pondered and muttered some misgivings.

“There is precedent Captain,” added Spock. “You will remember the Archons.”

Jim Kirk had a good memory: “That was certainly remedial. In that case we knew that it was alien influences doing harm. We have no such information here. But I am inclined to find out. If you are unable to gather further data remotely, we will need to put together a landing party.”

“I will work on a language module based on what we have,” said Spock. A small probe disguised as a rock had been dispatched earlier to listen to the speech of these beings.

“Compromising the Prime Directive is a big call,” said Kirk. “I will need to go myself. I’ll take you Chekov, and get somebody from security – Laine or Briggs. And ask Mr Scott to send me somebody with experience in alien energy generating machinery. You will be in charge onboard, Spock.”

“Yes Captain,” Spock and Chekov responded simultaneously.

***

The beam dissipated and the four of them found themselves standing behind some bushes next to a pathway. There was Kirk, Chekov, Laine and Garcia from engineering. They were dressed in the best that could be prepared for them in the way of medieval garments, but on close inspection it would be clear that the fabric was not hand woven. Such inspection should be avoided. Communication and weapons were concealed and earpieces were in place for remote prompting from the language module.

“We’ll join the path and turn right towards the energy source,” said Kirk. The language module repeated the command in the local language, or at least the best determined translation on the material then available from remote sensing in orbit based on detected conversation only. The module would evolve to improve language as they interacted with anybody.

Garcia used an energy sensor that he could keep hidden up his sleeve. A few paces on he said: “Increasing energy levels Captain. We must be getting closer.”

In the clearing ahead, there were three men. They appeared 100% percent human. They were olive skinned and had some features that looked a little out of place, but they appeared very close to earth-originating homo sapiens. Proof again of the miracle of random mutation creating intelligent beings on entirely independent tracks.

Two of the men were seated and clearly unwell. The other was older, perhaps mid-thirties in Terran terms, but he looked strong and fit. He had a scar on his face and other scars on his forearms. A fighter or a hunter who wrestled with dangerous prey was Kirk’s best guess.

“Strangers,” the humanoid greeting the crew members of the Star Ship Enterprise. “Are you bound for the Tarrakan?”

“Yes,” Kirk said. ‘Yes’ was a word he had learned in advance, but he had no idea what the Tarrakan was. It seemed that it might be their name for the machine.

“Let us travel together,” the warrior said. “My fellow travellers have had time to catch their breath.”

As they walked together another of the inhabitants asked Kirk: “Were you chosen or did you volunteer?”

Kirk listened for options and chose: “We are all volunteers.” It was the least likely to produce a response.

“It may not look like it, but I too, am a volunteer,” said the warrior as they walked. “I am weary of battles, and want a home and a chance to breed, as I think I have strong blood to pass to the next generation.”

“I agree,” said Kirk. “I have the same thought. The time will come to raise a family.” He still wondered what this was all about.

The path spilled in to an open area beneath a cliff with two tunnels driven into the rock. One appeared to be an entrance, and the other some distance away, an exit.

Garcia approached and whispered in Kirks ear: “The energy profile has been heavily masked by the rock, Captain, but our instruments have been able to detect it from orbit. I am getting very strong readings”.

The warrior turned to Kirk and said: “I am not one to pause before battle, so I urge you to come with me stranger. I will pause only for a moment to give thanks that I can offer so much to the future.”

“We need to follow this man inside,” Kirk said to the landing party. “It looks as if we come out over there.”

As if to confirm it, at that very moment a woman stepped out of they had guessed was the exit tunnels. She was wearing a coarse robe many times too large for her. Two women who had been waiting took off her robe so that she was naked, her soft golden-brown body looking fresh and toned. The women then put a clean and fine robe about her and showered her with flower petals.

The warrior rose from his moment on one knee, evidently saying his prayer of thanks, and he walked to the entrance tunnel, beckoning his companions, and Kirk and his party, to follow.

Kirk gave instructions: “Collect your readings Garcia. Images please Chekov. Laine, cover the rear.” He strode forward.

The tunnel was not straight. It wound through the rock as if following seams of softer rock, sometimes with a higher hanging wall of hard rock visible. But it was illuminated by what appeared to be electric lights disguised as glowing minerals. It was not long before both sides of the tunnel disclosed developed machinery. It was almost as if they were walking through an old diagnostic machine, but much longer.

“I am getting very strong readings,” said Garcia. “We are being bombarded kappa rays, captain. Not lethal at these levels, but not advisable.”

“Should we go back, Captain?” asked Chekov.

“I think that we need to go all the way through,” replied Kirk. “You scanned the woman who excited before we entered, and she was healthy?”

“Yes, Captain,” answered Chekov. “Perfectly healthy. Exceptionally healthy.”

The tunnel opened out into a large cavern in front and below them.

The three from the planet in front of them leapt from the ledge. It was a sheer drop for the first few meters but then curved into an incline curving to flat so that the three below them took to their feet uninjured by the fall.

“That answers your question about going back, Mr Chekov,” said Kirk. He leapt and the others followed.

The warrior approached him at the foot of the slide and embraced him. To Kirk’s puzzlement he said: “Welcome sister”. Kirk tapped his concealed earpiece to check the translation.

Then they all stood to watch an apparent miracle.

The beard on the warrior’s face fell off. Kirk noticed there was other hair on the floor of this underground chamber. The hair on the warrior’s head seemed to grow, and to sprout from his scalp where no hair had been. His body seemed to lose mass. He seemed to shorten slightly. The strong arms seemed to lose muscle.

The warriors companions were changing to. They had appeared unwell but now appeared to gain colour. The hair on their heads also grew. Beneath their robes they seemed to be changing shape.

“This is interesting Chekov,” said Kirk, without turning. “What do you make of what is happening to these men?”

Chekov replied: “It’s happening to you too, Captain.”

***

“This is the Transporter Room, Mr Spock. The landing party has returned sir, but I think that you might want to come here before they leave.”

“Very well,” said Spock. He had no idea why he would need to do this, but he was happy for the exercise before handing the con back to his Captain.

When he arrived, there were four women with the crew member. There were two small dark-haired women, a tall blonde and a rather intense looking woman with golden brown hair. They all wore simple clothes like those the landing party had been given.

“What is going on,” said Spock. “Where is the landing party?”

“We are the landing party, Mr Spock.” The intense woman was talking to him, in English. And then he recognised the brown eyes that she had.

“Jim?” he asked.

“Yes,” she replied. “Yes, and Laine, Chekov and Garcia.” She waved a delicate in the direction of the other women.

“Interesting,” said Spock in his usual flat and infuriating fashion.

“Not the word I would have chosen,” said the woman who had been James Kirk.

“We should follow quarantine protocols and proceed to sickbay.” Spock was seriously considering adding the word “Ladies” but it would have been only as a joke, and Vulcans do not joke. However, he thought, the strangeness of the situation might have allowed an exception.

“This might explain a population anomaly that we have identified in your absence, Captain,” he said.

“What might that be, Spock?” she asked.

“There are no women on the planet below the age of sixteen, so far as we can detect. It would appear that the survival of this planet can only be assured if a portion of the male population can become female, past childhood. Evidently this machine you have identified, does that job.”

“Spock, why have you brought aliens into my sickbay?” asked Dr “Bones” McCoy testily.

“These are not aliens, Doctor,” Spock responded. “This woman is your Captain, evidently transformed by some genetic process.”

“Jim?” McCoy was even more incredulous.

“It’s me Bones. You had better do a full diagnostic”. She was now becoming exasperated. Did she have to explain the situation to everybody?

It took less than a minute to identify the issue. So Dr McCoy was as direct as usual: “The Y chromosome has been knocked off. Knocked off all of you. The changes are at a cellular level. You are all fully functioning females, although your uteruses are still taking final form even now.”

“Uteruses?” Kirk stood in disbelief, but the word seemed to trigger a sensation from within. Something was there that had not been there before.

“It is an incredible feat of medical engineering to be able to target such a genetic modification across the whole body like this,” said Bones. “Truly incredible.”

“I am sure somebody needs to be congratulated,” sneered Kirk. “But how can we fix it? Can the machine we went through reverse it.”

“Jim, or … Captain, the Y chromosome is an add on. You can delete it but you cannot add it,” explained McCoy. “We have the ability to synthesise some DNA on a cell by cell basis, but there are 15 trillion cells in the human body. Every one of those has been changed by the elimination of a small amount of genetic material. I don’t think that we can undo this. Maybe if you found out who developed this technology you could have them fix it? But it is easier to delete a gene than synthesize one. We have discovered that over the years. What has been done is through a highly advanced process. Undoing it would seem almost impossible, based on current human technology anyway.”

“I asked them about the machinery – they call it the Tarrakan,” said Kirk. “They told me that the machine has been there for centuries. Nobody knows who built it and where the builders came from. One thing is clear is that the technology is not from this planet, or at least from this time. There is nothing else like it down there.”

Bones shrugged his shoulders. He said: “If it’s any consolation, Captain. You make a very attractive woman.”

It was not a consolation at all, but Captain Kirk felt strangely pleased at the compliment. He smiled, and maybe even blushed.

***

Captain Jemima Kirk was checking her hair and makeup with the mirror function on her PDA. She was pleased with the look today. Her hair had stopped its fast growth lately and had settled to a length that was ideal for the practical updo that she wore today.

She looked ahead to where Toni Chekov sat. Her hair also looked good today in the French roll she had adopted as her standard. Sulu was looking at her adoringly. It was the Captain’s business to know who was sleeping with whom onboard. If the relationship interfered with their work Jem would have to reassign one of them, but her inclination was now more inclined to accommodate personal feelings.

Chief Engineer Scott had taken to Gabby Garcia most recently. It was a difficult situation as unlike Sulu and Chekov, Scotty outranked his new girlfriend and that raised questions. But again, Jem was understanding. She had to be. She outranked Spock, but she needed a man in her bed.

What was clear to her now was that the change of sex also included the addition of a healthy libido and a hunger to become pregnant. After all, procreation was the purpose of the Tarrakan. At least that was something that could be controlled. If not the hunger, then the conception. The hunger she could live with, as long as Spock was up to feeding it with regular sex.

While Vulcans pride themselves on being unemotional, their race has also evolved from primitive species and still derives extreme pleasure from orgasm, as a reward for copulation. In the case of Spock, Jem found her ability to destroy his ability to reason during the act of sex was strangely satisfying. She had discovered the ability to conquer logic with her perfectly formed body when Spock was inside her. At last she had the measure of him. The thought made her smile, and her vulva tingle.

For Security Officer Pauline Laine, control had been conquered by her new desires. She was the one who had been Paul Laine, the fleet champion hand to hand fighter and a renowned rake. She was now pregnant by somebody in the crew - it could have been anyone of eight by last count. But, doubtless but the effect of the Tarrakan, calculated by its builders (whoever they may be) she is looking forward with relish, to a life of motherhood.

The End
© Maryanne Peters 2020

Are You Awake, My Darling?
A Vignette
By Maryanne Peters

He held up a mirror in front of my face and he peered over the top to enjoy my reaction. I was still in my hospital bed wearing a patient’s hospital gown and I was only just recovering consciousness, but I could see that he had been at work, or perhaps had the work done by somebody with skill. My face was as smooth as polished marble and fully made up, and my hair had been extended, colored and styled. It was arranged on the pillow to show every inch of my beauty above the shoulders. I might still have the eyes and the jaw and chin of Greg Mullen, but everything else screamed woman.

“What have you done?” I croaked, but the sound that came out seemed to confirm that there was much more than the face. There was no scar on the throat, but it was not a man’s throat and neither was the voice a man’s voice.

“You are complete my darling … complete in every way,” he said.

I knew what that meant but I could not reach down to confirm it … or did I even want to? Perhaps it was some muscle relaxant which wore off over time, but in that moment, I was helpless, just looking into that mirror with half-closed eyes still clearing and knowing that he had won.

He had seen me perform in a drag show and had asked me for a date, dressed as a woman. It does happen from time to time – that a fan is attracted to the creature on stage, and the response needs to take the opportunity presented, without causing misunderstanding or disappointment. The best way to do that is to claim to be a heterosexual man, even though I wasn’t that. It just makes it easier for him to understand that it will go no further than a few drinks and a meal alongside somebody who appears to be female.

To that end I know how to present as female rather than being in drag. Drag is performance art, whereas presenting needs to be real life, although so as to meet expectations, my female appearance would need to be “fabulous”. Then the conversation would turn to the show with encouragement for him to come again and bring all of his friends, and then perhaps suggest a small gift of cash to help a struggling performer. Almost all drag queens caught in this situation should collect something for their efforts.

He paid, and his gift was generous. But he was not interested in the show. He spent the whole time talking about whether I had consider living as a woman full time and having a sex change. It didn’t matter how many times I told him I was a man and lied to him that I had a girlfriend and had never considered for a moment having sex with a man. He just stared at me as if he was deaf to my words, delivered in as deep a voice as I had.

“I am rich and powerful, and if you were a woman I could give you a life others can only dream of,” he told me. I stayed until the end to collect, but I found myself more troubled as the evening went on. There was something about him that told me he was a man who always got what he wanted.

It was not until afterwards that I discovered who he was. Yes, he was rich and powerful and he had got there through criminal activities, some involving violence. And he wanted to date me again.

I just avoided him. I ignored his cards, flowers and other gifts. When he turned up the show, I would glimpse him and then never look in his direction. I just had to hope that he would go away. He kept pestering me for a date, so I finally accepted, but I turned up at the restaurant dressed as Greg Mullen, which is who I was then. I had not shaved for a few days, and I did my best to look and behave as manly as possible.

“I don’t know you are, and I don’t want to,” he snapped at me. “You are keeping me from the woman I expected here tonight and the woman I want. You should know that people who get in my way have short lives.”

I fled, but I hoped that I had made my point. He had seen the real me. I was no woman and I never would be.

And then I woke up and I was her, and I was beautiful.

But there is no going back, and as a matter of personal safety, no walking away let alone running.

Until my vagina healed, I was forced to take him in my ass, but my guess is that he would have realized that he was not the first. I had been with many men, and they were my preference. But, given his reputation I was expecting a brute – he was surprisingly gentle with me.

And then the moment came for me to receive him as the woman he had made me, into the passage he had constructed among the wreckage of my manhood. It would be face to face without any awkwardness in entering the other way while looking me in the eyes. It was body on body the way nature designed that people should have sex. I told myself that this was my fate, to lie back and take the man who had mutilated me and just accept my agony.

But it was not like that. It was a joy totally unexpected.

When he collapsed beside me, he said the words I had never heard before and somehow doubted I ever would – “I’m hopelessly in love with you, but I guess you know that.”

I do now. Now, it seems for the first time, I am awake.

The End
991
© Maryanne Peters 2025

Aunt Katherine
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

My mother’s aunt Katherine had always hated men. She had never married, and that had served her well. She thought that her sister had married badly – to a man of course. The wealth that they had inherited was frittered away by my grandparents, where she had kept hers and multiplied it many times.

“No man will ever get his hands on my money,” she would say. And she meant it.

My mother’s older sister Geraldine (Gerri) had three children – two boys and a girl, Maddie, who was only a little older than me.

“Those boys will get nothing,” Aunt Katherine would say to Aunt Gerri. “Everything that will go to you will go to little Maddie”.

My mother had two children – a boy and a girl. Well, that is a lie. She had two sons. I am not really a girl.

It is just that as far as Aunt Katherine was concerned, we could never say that.

We knew all about this from the very beginning. I was given the name “Ashley” because it was what we would now call “gender-neutral”. My mother would always refer to me as “she”. So would Aunt Gerri and my cousins. The whole family was agreed that when she died, the estate would be split between the family of the two sisters, or if they died first for any reason, between Maddie and me. That way the wealth would pass on fairly. Maddie and I would be committed to looking after our brothers.

Then there were the occasions in my youth when I would visit Aunt Katherine, or the two or three occasions when she deigned to visit us. I would need to appear as the female version of myself. My mother had me keep my hair long throughout my youth to cover this eventuality. It could be a boy’s style all the time, but could be styled and have barrettes or ribbons added for encounters with my great aunt.

I wore dresses for the early visits, but I guess that she understood that I was a bit of a tomboy, so I could get away with pants if I wore a feminine top and something nice in my hair. I could not be too boyish because, well, my aunt hated boys as well as men.

As I got older and more frail, she stopped visiting us, but we still had to visit her every now and again, including staying over for Thanksgiving. She had a big house with a room for each of her nieces and each of their daughters, to stay over for at least one night. Boys were not encouraged to visit.

The problem was that she was still very much alive when I started approaching puberty. My mother was terrified that I would be found out. Aunt Gerri shared her concerns because we were all agreed that the eventual inheritance should be shared, but we did not want to risk her giving any part of it away.

Gerri and Maddie came around to our house a few weeks before Thanksgiving to discuss the problem. Aunt Gerri suggested that we needed to hold off puberty. She said that it could be done chemically. She ought to know as she worked in a drugstore. My mother seemed to be agreeing, but I was horrified.

“Hey, all the guys at school are about to go through this and you are talking about shutting me out of it?” I complained.

“Every boy has the change at a different time,” said Mom. “You might just be a bit later.”

Somehow it was understood that if Aunt Katherine’s estate could not be split into two equal shares, a chunk would go to charity. So, it meant a lot that I stay as the beneficiary on my side of the family. So much so that delaying my puberty seemed (to Mom and Aunt Gerri anyway) a small price to pay.

When I started taking the pills. What none of us were aware of was that my body would change, but in a different way. You see, the spiro-something drugs neutralizes male hormones, but male puberty includes a whole bunch of hormones including the ones that the spiro does not affect. I am talking about the estrogen hormones. The female ones.

Anyway, I was still neutral, I guess, when we went to Aunt Katherines for Thanksgiving. We stayed two nights in the big house. Aunt Katherine, like she always did, said that she was not long for this world and that we were her hope for the future, intelligent young women. That was us, Maddie and me. But this time she gave some jewellery items to us, split evenly. She gave me earrings and said that I should have my ears pierced so that I could wear them for the thanksgiving dinner.

She also said that both of us should have our hair put up and be dressed like proper young ladies for the occasion. It would be her treat. She would arrange a makeover and two classy party dresses. For both of our moms too. A proper ladies’ dinner, with five of us in our finery. In fact, there would be six, because she had invited her lawyer, Miss Jade Lowe.

Miss Lowe was a spinster like Aunt Katherine. I understood that they were around the same age, but whereas Aunt Katherine was thin and wrinkled, Miss Lowe had a round face and quite smooth skin, but blotchy. She was a big lady with a belly and bosom that filled her green dress. Her hair was white and thin, and wound into a bun on top of her head.

Jade Lowe could be very Jolly and funny, and she told clever jokes in her husky voice. But she could also be very serious when the topic was business, or matters concerning Aunt Katherine’s will.

“Jade will be acting as my Trustee and tending to the education and welfare of the heiresses to my fortune after my death,” Aunt Katherine announced. “I am concerned to see that these you carry my fortune forward with grace and class, and I know of nobody better that my lawyer and oldest friend, Jade Lowe, to see than done.”

It seemed like even after she was in the ground, she would be trying to control us from the grave. I wondered if I would ever be free just to be a normal guy.

It got even worse when we went in to the salon to get prepared for “The Ladies’ Dinner”. Aunt Katherine was very specific. We were to wear cocktail dresses that she would pay for, and shoes with heels, and our hair and makeup were to be done professionally. And I had my ears pierced. That would require some explaining at school. But it was not as bad as the eyebrows. Mom said that we might have to shave them off afterwards. It seemed like a nightmare.

I had my earrings in and a necklace around my neck, and my hair pulled up, and there was no mistake that I looked very classy. I sort of liked the look.

At the dinner, Maddie and I were allowed to drink wine. We were only just teenagers but we were throwing back glasses of wine called Sauterne – it was sweet and tasted really good, and I was told that it was expensive too. We actually had fun. Aunt Katherine talked about all the places she had visited and all the fine people she had met in her life (all women) and Miss Lowe told jokes and funny stories about her clients.

Aunt Katherine got a bit sad when she said that it would be the last Thanksgiving we would have together. She hugged us before we went up to bed. She had never done that before.

It turns out that she must have known something, because by the end of the winter she was dead. If you had had asked me six months before I would have been happy with that news, but after getting to know her at that dinner I found that I was quite sad. She was an intelligent woman who had done well because she had good judgment, and she always looked classy, even in old age.

Jade Lowe did not delay in making contact with us. She said that the will left the entire estate to Maddie and me, but on trust until we reached the age of 18. And in the meantime, Aunt Katherine had set out some rules. It was as we feared, the old woman wanted to keep tabs on us, even after death. At least until we were 18.

Maddie and I were enrolled to attend a Swiss finishing school for our high school years. It was the same school that she had attended, and so had our grandmother. We had to go there too. Graduation was a condition in the will. Graduation required that we meet standards of behavior rather than academic milestones. It would see us graduate at 16 so we still had the option to come back home to do a final year at high school in the US.

But what it meant for me was three years living as a girl. And Miss Lowe would be checking up on us.

The other condition that Aunt Katherine had imposed was that we were not to have any sexual relations with males until we collected our inheritance. Maddie sighed, but that was one thing I could live with. Sex with females was not ruled out.

What I had a problem with was that not only would I be sent away to an all girl’s school in Europe, but that I would need to postpone puberty for a full five years – quite possibly the most important 5 years in a young person’s life.

We had some private family meetings to discuss what we could do. My mother had asked Miss Lowe what would happen if either of the nieces declined to go to the school. The will had made provision for that. The inheritance would go to charities.

We even talked about just accepting half and splitting it. But there were complications with the gift so that that looked problematic too. No, I would have to bite the bullet and spend most of my high school years in drag. But everybody recognized that this was asking a lot of me, and that I deserved a proper reward for my sacrifices. Would anything be enough?

Could a boy hide in a girl’s only swiss finishing school? You would not think so, but then those hormones that I was talking about kicked in. I started to grow breasts. In fact, I started to show all of the signs of female puberty except menses. It was weird, but in a way convenient.

The only thing I had to worry about was what was in my underpants, but that had become only a little problem. I mean, it had become little, so much of a problem. Every guy at my school was getting hairy and had big swinging dicks on display in the changing room, and I was wearing binding under my shirt to hide my titties, and I had the groin of a 10-year-old.

To be honest, when I got on the plane to Zurich, I was happy to be going somewhere where nobody knew me, and where I could just disappear in the disguise that I needed to adopt.

I will never know what my high school years could have been like, but it turned out that high school in Switzerland was pretty cool. The fact is that it was not really a finishing school at all. They were a thing of the past. The school that my Grandmother and Aunt Katherine had attended had become an “International School” with presentation and etiquette only being a small part of it. Classes were in English and there were girls from all over the world there. French and German were taught and widely spoken, and also Italian. All four of those languages are widely spoken in Switzerland.

Maddie and I had a full five year education there, and we shared a two bedroom room throughout, as Aunt Katherine had arranged and paid for. Not only did I manage to conceal my male genitals for all that time, but I hardly even gave them a thought.

Our term allowed a summer break and a Christmas break when I could go home. When I was home I could go back to being boy Ashley, but I have to say that it got harder and harder to drop the girl Ashley. One reason is that my circle of friends had changed. I hardly knew the people that I went to middle school with. When I met them they would look at me oddly. I guess that I must have looked childlike or gay, or something, even in jeans and a baggy shirt that hid my breasts.

Also, some of the girls from my Swiss school lived nearby. Maddie and I could get together with them. So if we did, I would need to change into girl clothes to go out, then come back home and … why bother changing? Vacation time was supposed to be boy time, but I didn’t miss it if it didn’t happen.

Also, Aunt Katherine had set aside money for my Mom and my aunt to come to Europe for the short spring and autumn breaks, and when they did, we just travelled around as four women. Maddie learned German and I learned Italian, and we both learned French. They were just a week or so, but we travelled all around on money from the estate. It was great. What high school kid, boy or girl, could claim better school years than that.

I suppose the only thing that was a bit confusing for me was boys. I mean relationships. The girls from the US were always talking about boys. I learned that it was the drug I was on that kept my sex drive way low, so I was not that interested anyway, but I suppose I sought refuge with other girls. In particular I made friends with two Arab girls – Miriam and Latifah. Our school remained a single sex international school, unlike the others, so it was popular with Arabs and other traditional societies. I mean, Miriam and me still played around with short dresses and hairstyles and makeup and stuff, but boys were off limits. That suited me.

Miriam and Latifah are still firm friends, and whenever they are in America they tear off those robes and we go out together, sometimes with Maddie.

But I suppose that I was also a bit worried that I was not attracted to any of the girls either. I mean, there were some gorgeous girls there. The daughters of the rich and famous can have pretty good genes from the trophy wife side. I admired some of them, but not in a sexual way. It did concern me, but also without the distraction I was able to be very successful at school.

I graduated. That meant that I just had to go home with the diploma and collect the cash.

There was only one intervening complication, and his name was Norris Carter. Maddie and I had decided to fly home through Paris. We could legally drink in France so we went out on the town to celebrate. Jade Lowe (she asked us to call her Jade rather than Miss Lowe) had sent us some money to buy some nice outfits and we decided to wear them out to a very high class bar in Paris, one serving $50 cocktails. We were going to put our properly finished charms to the test after 5 years or study and practice.

We did not have to buy a single cocktail. Norris and his friend gave us the time of our young lives. Do not ask for details as I would be hard pressed to remember, but the vivid memory is the kiss. It was my first. Man or woman, I had never had a single erotic experience until that night. I was completely unprepared, probably because I had always assumed that my first such kiss would be one that I planted on a girl. Instead I was the girl, and I loved it.

He would have gone further, but he was American, like me, and I was only 17 and still a schoolgirl – enrolled until the following day. Then there was the unpleasant fact hiding in my panties that he would never know about.

Still, the experience was formative, as I now know.

So, I went to see Jade Lowe the day after my eighteenth birthday

She sat down in the chair opposite me, smoothing out her dress over her knees. I was wearing a dress too, but it did not go down that far.

“I was most particular that you be described in the will as “my sister’s grandchildren” and not as “The daughters of my niece”,” said Jade. “Because we would not want the distribution under the will to be questioned should your secret come out.”

I was gobsmacked. I said: “Secret, what secret?” How could she know? What is more, she seemed to be saying that she had known all along. Since the time that Aunt Katherine had signed the will, some years ago at least.

“Well you see, Ashley,” she said. “I have a secret too. In fact, we have the same secret you and I. Exactly the same secret. And rather than explain, and I am going to do something rather crass and unladylike, and I am going to show you.”

And with that she spread out her legs and pulled back her dress to reveal a pair of rather robust looking neutral colored underpants. Then she pulled those aside to reveal a small but obvious penis. There was no scrotum. Just a penis.

I was so shocked that I just made a noise, sort of like a mumble with your mouth open, I guess.

“You see, I loved your Aunt Katherine,” Jade said. “I always have. But she had no eyes for me. She has always despised men. I could not bear to have her despise me. So, I had to adapt, you see. It was hard to be a lady lawyer when I first reappeared as that, back in those days. There were not many women practising law. Nothing like it is now. But I had Katherine and her parents as my cornerstone client, and then there were others who sought out the advice of a woman rather than a man. I specialized in estate work. I did very well.

“Did Aunt Katherine know?” I asked, still in disbelief. “Did she know that you were … not a woman?”

“Goodness no,” Jade said. “She would have hated me had she …”. Jade paused for a moment to think. “You know, now that you ask it, I cannot say for sure, but she never said anything. She never noticed me as a man, so when I came before her as a woman, she accepted me as one. That’s it how it appeared to me anyway. We were just two old spinsters, she and I, growing old together. We talked to one another every day, and every week we would share at least one meal together. And every Christmas…”.

There were tears in her eyes.

“I had no idea,” I said.

“We had a happy life,” she said. “All I want is that you should have a life at least as happy as ours. I want to help you to do that. Nowadays there are so many surgical options …”.

“Oh no,” I stopped her. “I think that you misunderstand.”

“I don’t think so,” she said. “You don’t get to live as long as I have straddling the sexes not to recognize and kindred spirit. You can never live as a man. You know that, don’t you?”

“Yes,” I said to her. “I think you are right.”

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2019

Author's Note:
Here is one from two years ago that I missed posting. Thanks again to Bronwen for her editing and helping me sort out my stories muddle!

Bait
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

I came to, laid out on a bed in what was clearly a dimly lit cell. I tried to think back to work out how this had happened. I was on the street. The surveillance van was around the corner. I must have been bundled into a van. It must have been quick. There was a small chemical burn on my chin. I had been drugged with ether or chloroform, was my guess. It must be him – the killer.

I momentarily excited. I had done the job. He had gone for the bait. But I quickly realised that if he had fallen into our trap, it had not closed on him. If my abduction had been observed, by now the team would have broken down the doors to this place to arrest him, and to rescue me. It was supposed to be an immediate arrest.

Without even knowing how long I had been out for, I knew that there was no reason for the team not to act instantaneously. No, now was the time to worry. They must have missed it – my abduction. They would now fear the worst. I was in his hands.

I struggled a little to shake off the panic. “I am a police officer”, I told myself. A rookie, maybe, but trained and well briefed on this operation. I had volunteered because I was young and of slim build, fitting the victim profile – Young transvestite prostitute. Of course I was neither a transvestite nor a prostitute, but again I had been briefed on performing a role. My life might depend on continuing that performance now.

I could hardly say: “I am an undercover police officer and you are under arrest.” His knife would slit my throat like the others. My best hope was to use my knowledge of his profile to survive. I
would need to be the person I was pretending to be - Wendy, transgendered, innocent, ready to sell her body to get the operation she wanted so badly.

There was no sign of him. I was not bound or tethered in any way, so I could inspect my surroundings, even in the limited light. I decided that I should check the doors and windows, just in case. There was a small high window, the only source of light. It was too small even for me to crawl through, and there was reinforced glass to be removed. I went to the door. Bang. I got an electric shock from the door knob. I could hear that it had also set off a buzzer. At the bottom of the door was a small hatch that a food plate could be passed through.

I knew that he would soon be upon me. Should I arm myself? Stand behind the door? For the first time it occurred to me that there might be more than one? I decided that I could be best served by seeing what I was up against first. Letting him enter carried risks, of course. He could just kill me. But that was not how I expected him to act.

From the profiling that had been done we expected a large mature male, probably well-educated and likely to be wealthy. The theory was that he was fascinated with transvestites or shemales and sought them for sex, but after abducting them he became disgusted with himself and killed them, after mutilating their genitals. Post-mortems had disclosed that there was time between abduction and death, sometimes up to 10 days, during which the victims appeared to have washed regularly and ate expensively. He toyed with then tortured his victims - some of genital mutilation took place well before death, possibly under anaesthetic, possibly not. It was horrific.

There was a peephole which was uncovered for a moment letting a needle of light enter the room. He was outside. Then the door opened. I went back to sit on the bed, as I would expect Wendy to do. I needed to act as she would.

He was tall, as expected, but I was surprised to see that he was athletic and handsome. He was dressed in clean and even pressed jeans, and with a smart casual long sleeved shirt. He looked like he had stepped out of the pages of a gentleman’s magazine.

“I hope you slept well, Sweetheart,” he said. The last word felt like a slap. His voice seemed to confirm that he was educated. His tone was unexpectedly friendly, but his eyes were threatening. He was a killer, there was no doubt about that.

“I wanna go home,” I said, doing my best to force out some tears. I was just not that good, but I managed to project fear and panic, probably because they were both real in the moment. In the end the tears came easily.

“Well,” he said. “I’m not ruling that out, but first we need to get to know one another. So I think you should come upstairs in an hour or so. But for now – you are a Size 6 right?”

“I guess so”, I said. The truth is that I had no idea. I was dressed for this job by a woman officer on the team assisted by Kelly, a trans-person consulting on the case. I needed to be more careful.

“Don’t go anywhere,” he said with an ironic smile. “I’ll be back with some clothes for you. In the meantime I will put the lights on. You can shower in there.”

He was pointing at a dark wall which, when he had left, opened up as the lights came on. I could now get a better view. The room I was in was clean and painted dark green. The floor was grey tiles. The only furniture was the bed, which was larger than a single and had clean white pillows and sheets, and a grey duvet. The section of wall had slid to reveal a washing area with a shower and toilet in sparkling white. There was a selection of shampoos and body washes. I recognised the perfume from the body of the last victim. She had been washed just before she had been bled to death. Was this shower to be my death sentence?

Despite the cleanliness of everything, my situation made me feel dirty. I put my wig on the stand provided beside the basin and I took the shower. I used a different body wash, perhaps to ward off bad luck.

I was towelling off when he re-entered. He put some clothes on the bed. He said: “Make sure you wear everything. And lock the shoes on with the little padlocks.”

I needed to examine what he had brought to understand what he was saying. It was all pink and white. There was a pair of panties, and what I now know is a bustier, a sort of combined corset and bra. There was a camisole, Petticoats and a frilly dress to go over them. There were white elasticated stockings with bows at the top. And there was a pair of pink stiletto heeled shoes to be strapped on, and then padlocked so I could not take them off.

The intention was to hobble me, and this would be effective. Before I first ventured out on the street I was shown the expected footwear for a prostitute and I had several hours of coaching in walking and almost running in awkward shoes, but created special problems as I would discover. I would soon learn that the entire property was soft soil and accessed by a gravel road. These shoes were as effective and cutting off a leg.

I put everything on as instructed, in the right order. I did not put on my wig, or any make up. There was nothing available anyway.

We he entered for a third time I pointed at the wig, but he said: “We can do better.” He took me by the hand to lead me upstairs. His grip was gentle but firm. I was being guided rather than led, but I was not about to be released.

The high heeled shoes were locked on as instructed. I was able to move freely on the tiled floors as I clicked along. On carpet they were already a little unsteady. “Toe first” I told myself.

The house was old and enormous, with high ceilings and timber panels. It was clearly some kind of mansion – a house of horrors. I could see immediately that I was well out of the city. Out of each window I could see trees or lawns, and there were hills nearby, but no recognizable landmarks. I was walked past an entrance hall. I was on the look-out for a telephone or a PC, some means of communication, but nothing was obvious here. We entered a large dining area. An ornate table was set for two, to be dining together at one end. The setting appeared to be for a meal of several courses and with wine glasses at the ready.

“You can freshen up in here,” he said. There a small dressing room with a toilet just off the entrance to the dining area. There was a dressing table with a wig and some make up. The wig was not like my blonde prostitute’s wig, it was honey brown and styled ornately with curls pinned up.

The makeup had me at a loss. Before each night out Kelly would do my makeup in a suitable fashion. All I was taught to do was freshen my lipstick and mascara. So that is all I did. I spent the rest of the time getting the wig on just right – pushing my shaggy hair into a cap and then pull the wig over and checking the edges. I needed to continue to be Wendy.

He held the chair for me, so I sat. He lingered behind me for a minute and I confess that I wondered whether he was going to cut my throat then and there. I could feel his breath on the back of my naked neck. I may have shuddered. He came around to sit in front of me.

“You’re not at all like the others,” he said. That was a good thing, right? He said: “You are not at all slutty. You’re brave I think, but scared. It makes you look very pretty.”

I looked in his eyes and I could see it. This guy was crazy. Crazy enough to kill me. But he was not going to kill me just yet. Whatever I was doing, it was the right thing. My decision was that to survive I needed to stay on this track. Keep my eyes open. Try and find out where I was. Find a means of communication. Get a message out. Until then, survive.

There was a serving dish with a heavy lid on the table, and from it he served soup. I confess that I do not know high end food at all, but he told me it was lobster bisque, and it was delicious. His victims had been fed well, as I was told. At the Medical Examiners I had seen the stomach contents in a bowl. I concealed my gagging at the thought.

“What is your name?” he asked.

“Wendy.”

“No. I don’t mean you whore name,” he said. “What is your real name?”

I had think fast. I had a handbag which I had obviously lost when I was picked up. Just as well – it had my real ID in there, plus my phone (a burner with only my lieutenant’s special number on it), a lightweight pistol and a can of mace. My undercover name was just “Wendy”. I was bait only. No back-story needed. I needed to build one from scratch just now. I could not use my real name. He might check on me. My disappearance might be in the news.

I said: “John Tessier”. Mother’s maiden name was Tessier. Her father’s name was John.

“I don’t like Wendy,” he said. “I will call you Joanna. Your name will be Joanna Tessier.”

“Whatever you like,” I sighed. “You’re in charge here.”

“I am,” he confirmed. “You live at my pleasure. And I don’t think that I want you to die. So please do not give me a reason to kill you.”

That gave me a sickening feeling that lasted for several minutes of silence – a atmosphere of threat that I needed to end. So I asked: “So what should I call you?”

“You should call me Master,” he said.

“OK,” I said. “But I would prefer to call you by name.”

“No yet,” he said. “I don’t know you. I don’t trust you. Maybe later.”

I had been put in my place again, so I waited before I asked what was really on my mind: “What do you want from me?”

“I want you to finish your wine while I get the main course.”

He brought out another dish on plates. Again, high class food, meat in pastry - delicious. He said: “Forgive me that I am going to and fro like this, but getting staff who are as discrete as I need them to be, has proved impossible. I have to serve both of us.”

“Does anyone visit you here?” I asked. “It seems like such a big house and you are all alone. You obviously enjoy entertaining.”

“I do,” he said, clearly happy to be engaged in conversation. “But it will be clear to you by now, that I have some issues. I like to say that I am easily misunderstood, but it is much more complex than that. In truth, my life is a little lonely. My brother visits now and again.”

“I have a lonely life too,” I lied. “I needed to leave home and try to live as the woman I should be, but it meant giving up family and friends.” I was building a story for him. I wanted him to see me as a person – somebody with feelings – rather than an animal fit for slaughter.

“So, you left to be a whore, selling yourself on the street?” He was getting angry. It was not a good thing. “How many men have ass fucked you?”

“None,” I answered. “I just need the money. I thought I would try it. I just don’t think I can do it.”

“Are you telling me you are not a whore?” he sneered. “That you are an anal virgin.”

“I am an anal virgin, and you put it,” I said. “And I don’t want to be a whore. I was prepared to be one, for the money. But I have turned everybody away so far. I guess I am just too scared to do it.”

He leaned forward and asked: “Are you telling me that if I checked your asshole I would find you still unstretched?”

I nodded. I was true after all. I said: “I guess I hoped I could just do a hand job.”

“Or a blow job?” he asked.

“I have never done one,” was my honest response.

But if I wanted one you would have to give me one, right?”

“How much?” I asked. Again, the wrong words just seemed to spill out of me.

“Are you serious?” he said, a genuine look of astonishment crossed his face. I was sure I had gone too far. “You want me to pay? What about your life? How much is that worth?” he asked.

“If you are the Transkiller then I am dead already. You kill people like me. People who do not want to hurt anybody. People who just want to live the life that nature has denied them.” There were tears coming now, and they were real. I was not sure where the speech was coming from, but I was running with it. He seemed unsettled. That might be a good thing.

We drank more wine. I wondered whether I could persuade him to drink enough to give me some advantage, but he drank only as I did. I could never last as long as he could – he was so much bigger.

Then we ate a dessert that he brought out.

“Can I say that it is very hard for me to believe that you are the Transkiller,” I said. “You say violent things, but you don’t seem to be a particularly bad person. I simply don’t understand …”.

He stopped me with a raised hand. “That is enough for one day,” he said. “Let me take you downstairs.”

I tottered off on my high heels, in the ridiculous froufrou clothes.

I sat on the bed and he unlocked my shoes. I actually thought about kicking him in the head, but it seemed to me that the risk was too great. I needed to wait for a better opportunity.

“I apologise for the room,” he said. “Perhaps I can move you upstairs. We shall see. You are my guest and I want you to be comfortable, but I need to be careful. I am sure you understand.”

I really did not understand, but I sensed that something had shifted. I was a guest rather than a servant to a master. Maybe that was why he had cut things short.

“I am trying to understand,” I said.

“Oh, by the way,” he said before he left and locked the door. “What is your name?”

“Joanna,” I replied. “I am Joanna Tessier. I am your guest.”

He smiled as he closed the door.

So far so good. I was still alive. I had dined with my captor and he seemed to like me. I figured that for so long and he liked me, and enjoyed my company, he would not kill me. All I needed to do was to get a message out.

He must have entered the room while I slept, because when I got up there was another dress beside the bed, this time a little more practical. And another pair of heels also with a padlock which I snapped closed after I had washed and dressed. The wig this time was a brown bob.

He led me upstairs for breakfast. It was in a room adjoining the kitchen with the morning sun flooding in. It was a beautiful day and it reminded me again that life is precious and so I needed to be careful.

The room had plenty of windows and a view of the garden. As we ate breakfast he pointed out the trees and shrubs, and some of the bird life. I gained the impression that as well as being a good cook he was also a keen gardener.

“Take off your wig,” he said. I did what I was told. “You hair is all there but quite short,” he noted.

“I told you,” I said. “My journey has just started. But I have burned my bridges and I will be a woman.” Then I added: “If I survive I will be a woman”.

“I hope that you do,” he said. “And Perhaps I could have a hairdresser come around to see what can be done with your hair”

“Oh please, could we,” I implored as if it were true. I thought that a visiting hairdresser could be somebody that I could send a message out through.

“Tomorrow morning,” he said.

After breakfast he gave me a box with lunch in it to eat in my room. That would be the daily pattern – breakfast with him, lunch in my room, and most nights dinner with him.

“I will bring you some things,” he said. “I have women’s’ magazines and I can bring you a dressing table with some items to help keep you pretty. You would like that, wouldn’t you.”

“More than anything” I lied enthusiastically.

The following day there were different clothes laid out for me, and no wig. I had not had a haircut since leaving the academy, just to assess the permitted limits, supposedly clear of the ears and collar, but after I had been suggested for undercover I was free to grow it. So it was probably a month past regulation. Short, but with room for some styling.

The hairdresser was short and maybe Filipino. She had a mass of hair with soft curls and plenty of makeup on – advertising her skills.

My host introduced her: “Joanne, this is Connie, I have asked her to style you and give you a facial, make up and a manicure. Sadly you won’t have much to talk about as Connie is deaf mute, but she is very skilled in her job.”

I still believed that I could communicate some kind of distress message, but he was always about, and I could not seem to get across to her the situation that I was in. I promised myself that if I could get her back I would try to smuggle her a written message. But for now it seemed to difficult. There was also a concern of the consequences for her if I was able to pass any message at all.

She went to work. The result was that about 3 hours later I had a short blond bob hairstyle, plucked eyebrows and a fully made up face, and nails painted to match my lipstick. And I was no closer to getting a message out.

“Thank you, Master,” was all I could say. He looked pleased. He was looking at me strangely. He looked at me like that all the way through dinner.

I have to say that I felt different about myself dressed as a woman but without the wig on. There is something about a wig which says disguise. Without one it was just me. The problem was that I looked so much like a woman it scared me. Connie had given me the shade of lipstick and I freshened it twice at the table with a compact mirror.

Back in my room I just looked at myself in the mirror for maybe 15 minutes or more. Just looking at all the angles. I looked so good I jacked off to my own reflection. How weird is that?

That night I wondered if I could trust Connie even if I could pass a message. She must have seen my shoes with the padlocks. She must have known that I was a man. She could have guessed that I was a prisoner.

A couple of days later a different opportunity arose. Over dinner the Master was talking about sex assignment surgery.

“That’s all I want,” I said, spinning out my tale.

“Maybe I can get a doctor to visit,” he said. “We could get you a hormone prescription. Some shots and tablets to push you on a little.”

“Oh please, pleeease, could we?” I begged. I knew that the doctor would not be deaf and would probably want to speak to me in private. This seemed like a much better chance. If I could have a doctor brought to me I could get a message out. This monster would be in jail and I would be free.

“You be on your best behaviour,” he said. “If you see the doctor make sure that you be as ladylike as possible. And talk only in your best lady voice. Promise me?”

It was a week later and Connie came around to style me a gain. I had a note written on paper from a magazine using eyeliner pencil, but I kept it concealed even after she had left. I had a bit of a crisis in my head and began to wonder if she would just pass the message on to him. If she did I was dead – no question of that.

I had been returned to my room and I was sitting at my dressing table in a sundress just about to jack off at my reflection again, when the door swung open and I heard a voice say “Joanne, could you come up to my study for a minute. There is somebody I want you to meet.”

The voice was coming out of the air-vent in the ceiling which obviously had a speaker in it. But more importantly the door was open. He was not there. I was not wearing locked on heels. There was a pair of fairly flat sandals that I could wear. I could try to make a run for it.

I knew the house better by now. The study was by the front door, but there was a back door and French doors from all the main living areas. But there were locks. There may be open windows. I had not been upstairs. But the grounds were large and I had no idea how far we were from another house. If there is a visitor there may be a car. What to do?

I walked into the study. My master stood and so did the other man. About the same age but bespectacled and thin.

“Joanna, this is Doctor Street, the specialist that I was talking about.”

He reached out his hand and I took it, to offer mine rather than to shake his.

“Please to meet you, Doctor,” I simpered.

Then I could see that as the Master moved behind him he was holding a knife. It was a curved threatening blade. The doctor was in a life or death situation and the killer wanted me to know. I needed to find the opportunity.

“I have heard all about your situation, Miss Tessier,” said the Doctor. “One look and I understand everything You present as a very attractive young woman. That will certainly help to make your transition easier. Unfortunately I do not have time for a full examination today. In fact I have a pressing appointment in town and some way to drive. But I would be happy to help. I will have my receptionist arrange an appointment for you to come and visit me very soon. But in the meantime, I can get the prescription through and the paperwork started.”

And with that he shook the hand of my captor warmly. The knife had disappeared. The doctor was gone. I was standing there. Yet another opportunity missed.

“Forgive me the melodrama,” he said. “I like this doctor. In fact I have known him for a very long time. We could even be called friends. But you need to be in no doubt that I would have killed in the way I showed you just now, to keep our secret.” I did not doubt it.

He picked up the prescription after I was safely locked up. He gave me the injection every week and he watched me take the tablets every morning with breakfast. I took them with pretended joy, of course. They were my road to womanhood after all. And that is what I wanted. I was now aware that I was counting off the days.

At least I was alive. I knew that the longest period between abduction and death before now, had been 10 days, and I was now more like 10 weeks. Survival was good. More time for my people to find me was good. But what kind of clue could they have? My shoulder bag had been lost. There would probably be no trace of my captor near the scene even if its location could be pinned down. I was starting to get worried again.

When I was talking to my master over breakfast or dinner, I was becoming increasingly relaxed. My story had now been run through so many times that my fear of being caught out by some inconsistency was fading. The story had become my life.

And the femininity seemed to have become equally natural. What was pretence, with the real risk of being discovered that I am not transgender at all, was now becoming almost reality. Now it was just how I spoke and presented myself. I found that if you pretend to enjoy have your hair done, you start to enjoy having your hair done. If you pretend to like fashion clothes in the magazines, you feel happy when you put them on.

Then one day he took me upstairs for the first time. He showed me a room. It was bright and sunny and decked out in pink. It was feminine but not wildly so. He said: “Next week, this will be your room. From next week, you can call me Scott.”

For the first time since I had been taken I felt at ease. Those words seemed to confirm that he now saw me as a person. And I felt that “Scott” would be a lot less likely to kill me.

With that relief, I turned my back and I looked out the window. I could see over the hedges and the fence. I could see how big was the land we were on. But I could see a neighbouring house in the distance, maybe two miles off. I thought that I could see freedom. I said to him: “This is great.”

“Next week,” he said, “All of your dreams will come true.”

Maybe all of Joanne’s dreams, or Wendy’s dreams, but not mine.

What I now know to be a few days after that, I woke up in that bed, in agony.

I knew immediately knew what had happened. This was the genital mutilation that I had seen in the pictures at the briefing. I was expecting a gaping wound. It was a small mercy that I had been unconscious while he had done it to me. Next he would kill me. I thought I was getting somewhere, and now this.

I pushed back the covers and struggled to raise my head, to look down. But before I could even look to see what had happened to the area in pain, I saw that there were two mounds on my chest, in a bandage. Only then did I have the sensation of another discomfort on my chest. I had been given breast implants.

But the pain was below. I stretched up further. But instead of seeing my body opened up I saw a neat bandage over my groin. It was surprisingly small. Hardly there at all. But it confirmed what I wished was not true – he had taken my cock and my balls.

I realised that all the pain was internal. God knows what he has done, I was thinking.

I started to think about those other mutilations I had seen in the crime scene photos. Tidy removal of the genitals and then crazed slashing of the entire area. Like a surgeon gone mad. Horrifying. Sickening. And like a surgeon gone mad. Small traces of anaesthetic in the system of these victims, so they died sometime after they came out of unconsciousness. After surgery. A period of recovery. Consciousness and then death. Death by the obliteration of the surgery done.

Even in my pain and my shock of what had happened to me, I was starting to understand. He botched sex change operations and then went berserk to obliterate his handiwork. And what I knew now was, that on the basis of the condition of all the prior victims, my time was up. He would appear and I would be slashed to death.

And as if my thoughts had summoned him, he came through the door.

He walked up to the bed and asked with nonchalance: “How are things?”

“Painful,” I replied honestly. “But I love it,” I added the lie with my best effort at a smile. “I haven’t used it yet, even to pee through, but I know it will be perfect.”

“Do you think so?” he asked.

“I know it,” I said. And then to confirm my thoughts I asked him: “Did you do it yourself?”

“I am a qualified surgeon,” he reassured me. “I am still new to this procedure, but getting better every time. I have done my best to preserve all feeling for you. You have a working clitoris. I can’t wait to see it myself. I think I am quite pleased with it.”

That had to be good. If I had to lose my genitals to stay alive, that suddenly seemed to be a price I could pay. I had to reassure him that his work was worthy of preservation. That I was worthy of preservation.

“It feels so swollen,” I said. “Please give it time to settle down. I want to look my best, even down there.” This was hard to say, but the survival instinct permits reason in a moment of extreme pain. I felt sure that whatever triggered the frenzied last act for all the other victims, it could be avoided if he did not view his work just yet..

So it appeared that all these attacks just practice operations. Operations that he got wrong so he then defaced the work and killed the patient. The profilers had not mentioned this possibility. Certainly his treatment of me seemed not to match the profile. If the profile was right, maybe he did want to have sex with me? Then would he become so disgusted with himself that I would have to die? It did not seem right. He seemed so in control.

There was no doubt in my mind that he was insane, but what was the nature of his insanity? I needed to know so that I could use it to my advantage, to survive.

“I can remove the packing and then we could look at when we can do the forming.” His words meant nothing to me, but he arranged me on my back and pushed my legs apart. He did it tenderly so that when I winced he moved with greater care. He removed the dressing and I craned to see the nature of the injury he had done to me.

There was not much to see. Bandages stained with disinfectant. Glimpses of inflamed and swollen flesh, and then he commenced to pull from inside, yard after yard of absorbent bandage. It seemed enough to fill a large bucket, as if a cavity that size was now inside me.

“You are healing well,” he said. “That is because you are a healthy woman.”

Was I a woman now? I was a mutilated man. But I needed to say the opposite.

“Thank you, Doctor,” I gushed. “Thank you. Thank you.”

He was obviously pleased to hear the gratitude, but he said: “I said that you can call me Scott.” He then pulled a long dildo shape from a sealed plastic bag and started to insert it inside me. It hurt like hell.

“This is a soft forming device,” he said. “It will keep you in shape until you have healed. Then we can use these.” He produced 3 more large dildoes in different colours. The largest one was so big I almost fainted at the thought of having it inside me. I am a small person. That is how I ended up here. Surely, I could not have enough room inside me for that? It seemed crazy that I was pretending to accept all of this with gratitude. This monster had mutilated me and was now expecting me to plunge a foreign object into my own guts.

“Will it hurt?” I asked in my little simpering voice. It now seemed to be the only voice I had left.

“There is no gain without pain, Sweetheart.” And sadly, that turned out to be true.

But weeks later it was going inside me. Right up to the blunt end. They were all painful to start with, even the smaller ones, but with him watching I had to do it. He even offered to do it for me, but I declined as politely as I could. It is one thing to fuck yourself with a dildo, but I did not need a psychopath shafting me with one.

And then, after I was “dilated”, and he told me that this exercise would a permanent chore, I discovered that it did not have to be. I discovered that I could bring myself to orgasm – a female orgasm – if I did it properly. The first time it happened I was frightened that he would see it. But I wondered if he would not be happy to see me enjoying his handiwork. I decided that the next time I would keep it private, but give him a glimpse of my enjoyment.

The risk of course, was that he might want to have sex with me. The thought was horrifying. Despite my new anatomy I was a man, with no attraction to other men. Sex with a man was revolting to me. Would I do it to survive? Of course I would. And I knew now that I could pretend to enjoy it.

The surgery and its aftermath had knocked me around, but I was walking now, with nothing between my legs, and I was starting to gather my strength. I started to consider whether I was ready to make a run for it. For the last few weeks I had simply been too weak to consider clambering out the window – the door was always locked. Add to that it had become cold, and there were no clothes suitable for outdoors if I were to make a run for it, even I tried layering multiple garments.

I asked for warmer clothes, although I was not cold. He suggested that we turn up the central heating instead. I preferred it tuned down. Maybe the extra layer of fat from the hormones made me uncomfortable if it was too warm.

The first snowfall that I saw outside seemed early. I figured I had been a captive for four months, but it may have been longer. However long it had been, there had been physical changes beside the surgery. The hormones had worked on my body, and their effect accelerated after my balls had been removed. My skin and flesh were soft, and muscles had reduced to very little, and the nipples on my augmented chest had grown large and pink. My hair had grown more than seemed usual, I learned later because Scott had added biotin to my orange juice as well as hormones. It was down to my shoulders, soft and shiny with the regular brushing he insisted upon.

I had thought it was barely the beginning of December when he told me that we would need to prepare for Christmas. He told me: “I am going to have a family member over, and if you promise to be good, I you can share Christmas with us. Otherwise, you will be in the basement.”

While the though crossed my mind that a family member might be as crazy as he was, it seemed to be an opportunity to get help, go I promised that I would follow whatever rules he set, and otherwise tried to convince his that I was a grateful and pliant patient, rather than a captive.

He cut a small tree from the woods nearby and we potted and dressed it with decorations he had in storage. He had me help him prepare a meal, but he was still careful to see that I did not have the chance to handle a knife. Then he told me to get myself ready.

Connie had only visited a few times, and we had problems with communication, but she had shown me a few things that I could put to use. I used a curling wand to make my hair look even better, and I used the makeup as she had shown me, with a little additional guidance for the magazine. They even had suggestions for “festive season looks” with bright makeup and a green red and white them in the clothes. As I went about my work It seemed as if being a woman was very different, but could be fun. In particular when you look at the finished appearance with such satisfaction.

There was a knock on the door while I was upstairs, so I went towards the entrance hall. There was a moment when they both stared at me, and I wondered whether I had gone too far with the Christmas thing. But the Scott made the introductions.

“This is my brother Magnus.” And then to him he said. “This is Joanna. She is staying with me for a while.”

Magnus put out his hand, and for an instant I was confused. When I took his hand I did not shake it as I would normally, I just let him hold mine for a moment.

“I so pleased that we will have some feminine company this Christmas,” said Magnus. He was obviously Scott’s brother although they did not look alike, but the main difference was his gaze upon me. There was no doubt that Scott was manic, but Magnus appeared to be warm and genuine, with kind and happy eyes. I hoped that it was true.

Magnus had a bag of gifts which he took to the tree, while I got some snacks from the kitchen and Scott poured the eggnog. I wondered if I would be able to be alone with Magnus. Even if the opportunity arose, what would I say.

As it was, when it happened I did not need to say much. I am not sure what caused Magnus to ask, but after we had sat through a long meal and drank quite a lot of very nice wine, Scott had to go to the toilet and leave us alone.

Magnus waited until he was well clear before he turned to me and asked bluntly: “Are you here of you own free will?”

I was shocked, but there was only one answer: “No. I am a prisoner here.” Then I added, so as not to seem an enemy: “Your brother is not a well man.”

“You have to trust me,” he said. “I will get you out of here.”

I did trust him. But really, I had little choice. Here was somebody who had volunteered to help me. As the brother of my abuser he had the best chance to convince him to let me go, but it seemed to me that was not a possibility. After all that he had done to me, and the connection back to other murders, he would not be surrendering. This would need to end in death – his or ours.

Sure enough, they were in another room when the shouting and the violence began. I decided that I needed to go and help Magnus, and I looked around for a weapon. But before I could find anything Scott entered the room. He was dishevelled but not injured, although there was blood on his knuckles.

“You need to wait downstairs,” he said. That meant the windowless dungeon.

“No, Please Scott,” I implored him. “I will be good. I don’t want to go with Magnus. I want to stay with you.” I was sure he intended to kill me.

He dragged me roughly downstairs and pushed me into the room, locking the door behind me. I remember thinking how much I liked to live upstairs. I liked my room, and my dressing table with everything on it, and my wardrobe full of clothes. Now I was back here. I lay on the bed and cried a little.

Not long afterwards the door opened and a body was dumped into the room. It was Magnus, he had been punched and perhaps hit on the head. He was bloody, and concussed. I rapped him in a blanket and attended to his wound with what I had. I was able to tear up a pillow case to bandagfe his head.

There was only one bed in the room, and I was larger than a single but no quite a double bed. It was much colder in the dungeon room, so I got into bed with him, so that we could keep each other warm. After the adrenalin had dissipated, we slept.

Morning light came in through the small window. We were lying together with his back to me. When he sensed that I was awake he rolled over to face me.

“I am sorry,” he said. “He is my brother, so I know that he has problems. There have been abductions in the past, you see. Our parents paid people off, but since Mom and Dad died I have tried to look out for him. I guess I knew something was not right through dinner. I tried to talk to him, but he just snapped.”

“I think that it is more serious than just abductions,” I said. “He has basically admitted to me that he is the Transkiller. We are talking about multiple murders.”

Magnus appeared deeply shocked. He said: “He is a doctor, a surgeon, although he lost his license to practice last year. He is sworn to save lives not take them. How can you be sure?”

“I am sure,” I said. I did not feel that I could explain who I was, or rather who I had been, and what had happened to me. The important thing was that now two of us were prisoners, and we had to address that problem.

The other immediate problem that we faced was the cold. The warmest place in the room was the bed, under the blankets and close to one another. If there was nothing else to do that is where we would be. But we needed to look of means of escape. Magnus was taller than me and stronger, so he was able to reach the ceiling and explore, until it was cold and he needed to get back into bed with me.

Scott delivered us food through the hatch in the door – two bowls of hot porridge in the morning, a sandwich each for lunch, and two bowls of hot stew in the evening. Scott said nothing despite Magnus calling out to him. But two days later he pushed through a box of sandwiches and two bottles of wine with a note that he would be away for a few days: “with love to you both, Scott”.

We both wondered if this was a chance to escape while the house above us was empty, but we had already checked the room and the adjoining bathroom. There was no way out.

“Our best hope is to get him to open the door,” said Magnus. We’ll just have to wait it out.

We went back to our bed.

I am a heterosexual male. At least I was. I never thought that I could be attracted to a man. I do not believe that I was when it started. It was just a physical thing. He was warm and I needed that warmth. We had laid together for two nights me against his back, or him against mine. But that day we lay face to face for the first time.

“Would you be upset if I kissed you?” he asked.

How different would my life be now if I had said no at that moment. I often wonder. But I did not say anything. My immediate thought was that he was a very good-looking man – better looking than his brother. His body was against mine and it was so different. His body was hard, tanned and muscled, where mine was soft, pale and hairless. His eyes were warm and inviting. I did not say anything at all. I just kissed him on the lips.

Before I knew it we were in a rapturous embrace with our tongues entwined. I could feel his erect penis against my thigh, and base instincts seemed to take over. My instinct seemed to have changed, I was on my back and happy to be there. He was on top and showering me with kisses on my neck, and my belly, and my nipples. Oh, my nipples.

As he pushed my thighs apart I worried about lubrication. All that I could think to do was spit on my hand and smear it on his erect penis. It was the first time that I had ever touched another man’s penis, let alone an erect one. It seemed huge, and so much bigger than the one I used to have. I was now worried whether Scott had made me large enough to take something this big. I suddenly appreciated using the largest forming tool.

I will never forget the moment that he first entered me. I think that my eyes almost popped out of my head. But the sensation of his penis stroking my insides was fantastic. I remember think how much more pleasant it was to have it done to you, rather than doing it. But that was before the orgasm. As it turned out, Scott’s surgical abilities were of the highest order, and he had not only been able to achieve sensitivity, but he had placed the proto-clitoris for maximum effect. The phrase “mind-blowing” is not enough to describe it. Every inch of my body came alive and my mind was blow. I cried out, thankfully in a feminine shriek.

He called out too. There was no hiding his ecstasy. That might even have been the second orgasm, knowing that you had moved a man that much. It made me think that I had never really cared about the joy experienced by any female sex partner of mine, but somehow his joy was important.

I could feel his seed leaking out of my pussy. It was wonderful.

It was wonderful to have a pussy. I was wonderful to have had a man inside me. It was wonderful that he had filled me with his hot semen. I smiled at him and he smiled back. We knew that this was something very special.

And the truth is that we made love again and again over the next few days. Even when the sandwiches ran out and we contemplated starving to death in that dungeon, we would have done so with his penis inside me. That would have been a death.

And between each love-making session, we talked. He was an architect, and by all accounts a good one. He lived in the city, in a townhouse that had belonged to his parents. The house we were in had belonged to his parents too – the country estate where he and his brother had been brought up. His parents had died some years before in a boating accident. Their estate was resolved by each brother receiving a house.

His brother Scott had been troubled from an early age but was (like Magnus) highly intelligent and quite driven. Magnus had been married and divorced but Scott had always had problems with women. Magnus confirmed that Scott was a homophobe, possibly pointing to his own latent gay urges, but he always desired women. He liked to flirt and had an urge to dominate.

I did not tell Magnus that I was a police officer, but I did talk to him about the what I believed Scott had done.

“But why would the Transkiller be interested in you?” he asked. “You’re a woman.”

“Well I am now,” I said with a smile. But I could see that he was surprised or even shocked. He had no idea that I was not a real girl. “I’m sorry. I thought you knew. I told you that he was the Transkiller. He targets transwomen … like me.”

He just looked at me. Was it disbelief? Or disgust? I could not tell. We had made love countless times, or so it seemed. All I wanted was to be in his arms again, to have him inside me again. But that look seemed to tell me that it was suddenly over. How could that be? Surely his feelings for me were too important to disregard?

I found myself starting to cry. Not just a sniff, but a body racking sobbing session. After all that I had been through – the abduction, the incarceration, the mutilation, I had not shed a single tear. Now this?

But then his arms were around me. He was holding me tightly and kissing my hair. He said: “Please, darling. Don’t cry. It doesn’t change anything. I think that I am in love with you.”

“Really” I said, looking up at him through my wet eyes. “You know that circumstances have forced us together. Relationships formed in crisis do not always last.”

“I think that this one will,” he said. He kissed me. It was not like the kisses we had shared of late. It was a loving rather than a sexual kiss. I thought that he might be right.

When a meal was slid through the hatch in the door, we executed the plan that we had hatched. Magnus had fashioned two shivs from the ballcock mechanism out of the toilet and had one. I had the other and I was lying on the bed with some blood on the sheets that we had arranged.

“She’s bleeding from her vagina,” Magnus called out to his brother through the door. “She can’t move. She’s in real pain Scott.”

“Get away from the door,” came the reply. “Stand in the corner and I will come in.”

As Scott entered, Magnus had the shiv at his throat.

“You won’t cut me,” said Scott.

I leapt out of the bed with my shiv and I was upon him. I said: “But I will.”

He always carried cable ties to bind me, and I was able to use these bind Scott’s hands and feet, and leave him in the cell. We rushed out of our prison cell. There in corridor at the bottom of the stairs, was a woman lying. She was bound with cable ties and had a hood over her head. She was gagged but I could hear a deep voice muffled. As I approached, I could see that it was not a woman.

Before I could pull off the hood to tell her the good news, Magnus grabbed my arm. He motioned for me not to talk. He pulled me back into the room and pushed the door so we could talk. Scott shouted at us to cut him free.

“Please let us deal with this ourselves,” said Magnus. “We need to release this victim, as soon as possible, but don’t let her see us. We can lock Scott in here and deal with him later.”

“He’s a criminal Magnus,” I said. “Surely this latest victim confirms, that he is the Transkiller. She needs to go to the police. He needs to go to prison.”

“Please. Joanna,” he said. “I don’t want my name drawn through the mud. I don’t want to be known as the brother of a murdering pervert. We can leave her somewhere.”

“And what do we do with Scott?”

“You decide,” he said. “I can tell you now that he will not go to prison. He is insane. We could have him committed. Or he could die, if that’s what you want, for what he has done to you.”

Could I execute this monster? His own brother would allow it – even participate. I looked at Scott bound on the floor, struggling and whining. Magnus was right. This was a sick man. And I looked at Magnus, his brother.

Deciding upon this course was the final bridge burnt in my progression from boy cop to Joanne Tessier, sister in law to a serial killer. Magnus took the poor creature lying in the hall, to the place where I had been abducted. He drove her still hooded, in the van that Scott had in his garage and which I recognised from the interior was the vehicle that he used. We made sure that there was no DNA or fibres left in it, and we abandoned and torched it. We drove back in Magnus’s car which I had driven following the van.

Scott was still tightly bound when we got back. He had given up shouting and was trying to appeal to our humanity to stay alive. Finally, he said: “You look so good together. Joanna is perfect, but she would not be here if it were not for me. Maybe I have given you the ultimate gift, Magnus?”

He was right. Without him I would not be a woman, and I would not have found love with this man of mine. Without his care in fashioning my female genitals Magnus and I would not be able to share the moments of total bliss that we constantly looked forward to. We would not be able to marry one another as we did.

So instead we contacted the mental health authorities. We explained that Scott had been violent and had struck his brother, but that he had expressed murderous desires and may well have caused injury to others in the past. That, combined with a history of mental ill-health, persuaded them to take him in.

As it happened it did not take them long to confirm his madness. He had functioned as a loner, but in a community he soon exhibited his violent tendencies and was placed in a secure wing. That is where he remains, and where Magnus and I have visited him from time to time.

I have not disclosed my name and I will not do so. The person that I used to be was declared dead shortly before Magnus and I were married. He was later described as “the last victim of the Transkiller - An undercover police officer who may well have played a role in ending a reign of violence against the transgender community.” That was because the killings ceased, and the assumption was it was down to the young heroic volunteer whose fate was a mystery. And I felt proud because it was true.

But as I read the news article while I was having my hair put up for the wedding, I had no desire to step forward and back from death to bask in that glory. My glory now was the huge diamond on my finger, and my perfect dress, and a man who was devoted to me and could give me everything I wanted in life.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2018

Bald
A Short Sory
By Maryanne Peters

Attached as a pdf to view the images better.

Beachfront
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

He wanted a home by the beach, so he spent weekends down on the coast just looking – hoping to find the place of his dreams. He would try to do a different section or neighborhood each time, spending some time in local coffee bars to read the vibe, looking in realtor’s windows, and just looking for units for sale. He had some funds and an income from his work-from-home job that would pay a mortgage loan. He was sick of renting and seeing that money disappear forever. He was sick not being able to improve the place he lived in. And being a young man brought up on the plains now living among the angels, he wanted to live by the sea.

But it seemed like there was nothing. It seemed like all dreams exist only to frustrate the dreamer.

And then suddenly, just as he was thinking that this particular stretch of sand and the small streets behind it would be ideal if only … he saw the sign. It read – “Applications for Purchase Considered / contact the Owner / Email: orvillejplanche@geemail.com.”

It seemed like an odd “For Sale” sign, but he sent an email from his phone, and decided to go back to the nearby coffee shop and order another, just in the faint hope that a reply might be immediate. It was not, but he was still drinking his coffee when his phone beeped. He quickly replied – “I’m nearby. Could I come to meet you and see the unit now?”

The reply came back “yes,” and included an address. It was the bottom apartment of a block of four stories. The one with the sign on it was the third floor.

The door opened and there stood a tall man with dark hair greying a little at the temples. He could have been forty or even older, but he looked athletic and intelligent.

“Are you Corey?” the man asked. “I’m sorry to have wasted your time. I thought that you might be female. Corey is one of those names, I suppose. You could have been, but you aren’t, so I won’t be receiving an application from you.”

“Just a minute,” said Corey, trying hard to conceal his irritation. “Are you telling me that you’re only receiving applications for purchase from women? It seems to me that is sexist, or just plain wrong. Can’t I persuade you to let me have a look?”

“I’m sorry, young man,” said the man at the door. “I will sell to who I like, and I’m not asking an unreasonable amount just in case you think it’s about money. I just reserve the right to be choosy. I own the whole block, you see. Four titled units. I live in this one and I have one available for sale … just not to you.”

The door was closed. Corey was incensed.

He walked down to the shore and saw the apartment and the view it would have of the sea. He assessed the size and calculated that it would be ideal. It had large windows and sat well to the sun. He imagined himself sitting on the balcony watching the sun go down over the shining sea with a drink in his hand. That was what he wanted.

He tried to accept that this was just not available, but he could not. It was the ideal property, and yet it was denied him.

He decided that he would walk back to his car and call his house hunting over for the day. Rather than follow the beach he cut through the streets and the homes and odd stores. He was upset. Then suddenly something caught his eye. It was a small beauty salon – not something he would look at normally. There were some photos of hair styles and makeup artistry on display in the curtained window, and a before and after image. It was a picture of a man and beside that what appeared to be the same man made to look like a woman. It was a remarkable transformation.

Corey said to himself – ‘If I looked like this man, I might have a chance.’

He was about to walk on in disgust, but then he paused seeing his own half reflection in the window against one of the images of a woman’s hairstyle. At that angle he could see himself as something other than male. Would it be possible?

He checked the time. It was not that late. The beauty shop was open yet empty. He went inside.

“I noticed the man in the window transformed to look like a woman,” he said. “Could you do that for me? Could you make me look female?”

The woman in attendance was on her own; rose and looked him up and down. “Yes,” she said. “When would you like an appointment to do that?”

“Could you do it now?” he said. “You don’t look busy.”

“Sure,” she said, not a little surprised. “Have you brought some women’s clothing with you?”

“No … um … this is a little spur of the moment,” he admitted. “I suppose that I will have to buy something?”

“I actually have some clothes that I am guessing are the same size as you,” the lady said. “I could let you borrow them as a part of the service. And you were obviously looking at the image of my ex-husband in the window. He has left some other things that he has no need of. But first I need to turn the sign to closed and lock the door. You will need to get down to your underwear.”

Before Corey knew what was happening, he was undressed and having his arms and legs shaved down and some compound applied to his face.

“Is all this necessary?” he felt he should ask.

“The outfit I have is bare arms and legs,” she said.

“Do you have a wig?” he asked.

“I’m afraid not,” she said. “But you have plenty of hair to work with. I will just add some washout color and a few curls. I’m looking forward to this. While I’m working my transformation miracle can I suggest that you do something about that voice of yours? I can have you looking like a woman, but then you will open your mouth and the vision will collapse. Can you sing falsetto? Let me hear your voice in a higher range.”

As she went about her work, he had a moment or two of misgivings. What was he trying to achieve here? Did he think that he could seriously pass as a woman or was he just going to turn up and confront Orville J. Planche showing how desperate he was to be in the running to buy this property? The possibility of passing seemed to be increasing as he conversed with his beautician in a voice becoming higher and higher.

She said that her name was Pamela. She left his lightened hair in curlers and disappeared for a moment returning with a dress and shoes and what looked like a skin-colored woman’s swimsuit. When she held it up, he could see that it included fake breasts and a female crotch, all in a single garment made of latex or something similar.

“If you can put this on, then I will do your makeup right down to your neck,” said Pamela. “You could walk down the beach naked and appear female … that is, if you know how to walk? I will give you a few pointers.”

Corey never thought to ask why she was in possession of such a garment. She had transformed her husband, so she had said. It was a miraculous transformation. Could she do as good a job with him? Better, as it turned out. He looked into the mirror in amazement.

“Can I return this stuff to you later tonight?” asked Corey in his feminine voice, while fumbling for his wallet and ready to pay whatever she asked.

“Return it tomorrow,” said Pamela. “And let me find you a bag for that wallet. A lady always needs to have a bag. I will drop in a lipstick and a few other items.”

Corey stepped out into the sun and felt it shine on him as if for the first time. His smooth arms and legs exposed by the colorful dress tingled, and the dress itself made him feel alive. He turned back to see his reflection in the salon window. Somehow Pamela had turned his mop of light brown hair into an almost blonde retro style that was unbelievably feminine. He smiled, and that smile stayed, all the way back to the home of Orville J. Planche.

Corey knocked, and he answered.

“Good afternoon,” said Corey in that voice he had been practicing with Pamela. “A friend gave me your address and told me that you had an apartment for sale. Is that you?”

“Yes,” Orville said. “What was your name?”

Corey was momentarily caught by surprise. He needed another name, and quickly. “Sunny … Sunny Shaw.”

“Before I get your details, why don’t we view the apartment?” said Orville. “I will just get the key and we will go up.” He slipped back inside for a minute.

It was everything Corey dreamed that it would be. It had the view and the sun, and the rooms were large, and furnished.

“Does it come with the furniture?”

“I paid out the last owner who exercised the Bikini Option and she left everything,” said Orville.

“The Bikini Option?”

“It’s something I can explain later,” he said. “She reached a point where she can call for me to buy her out, and in this case she was getting married to a guy who could give her everything, so she had no need for this stuff. It would be included in the price – nothing extra – if you want it.”

“I have some stuff but it is not as good as this.” Corey has no eye for such things, or had not had until now. Somehow it seemed that everything in this apartment was just right.

“Come and look at the bedroom,” said Orville, leading the way.

It was perfect. It was wonderfully feminine, with the bed covered with cushions as well as the pillows, and a soft toy – a pussy cat – lying across the patterned cover. There was a full length mirror on the sliding wardrobe door. Corey glanced at the woman he saw, so pretty in the patterned sundress and bouncy blonde curls.

“Plenty of storage space,” said Orville. He pulled the door open and to Corey’s surprise, there were garments hanging there – women’s clothing. It was not full. There was room for more.

“Surely the clothing is not included too?” said Corey. He stroked a velvet black cocktail dress, and noticed it was the same size as that sundress he was wearing.

“They could be,” said Orville. “What I really want is a person who truly wants to live here. Somebody who would do anything to make this place their home. Could you be that person?”

“Oh yes,” said Corey. “I am that person. I don’t think that I could live anywhere else. I belong here. I feel it.”

“Well that’s good because I think that you might be right,” said Orville.

Corey was so excited he just wanted to throw his arms around this man. But he held himself in check, just clasping his hands in front of his bosom and beaming with delight.

“So why don’t we drop the pretence, Corey,” said Orville. “Or should I say Cora, or Coral. That is it, Coral, given that you will be living beside the sea.”

Corey was in shock. But not a word seemed to be able to come from his mouth.

“Pamela has done a great job,” said Orville. “The person who was once her husband lived here, but after his final surgery she moved on. Before that, she swapped silicone breasts for the real thing, so she clearly gave those back to Pam. Let’s do that same for you, shall we?”

Corey could only mumble. Still, the words could not come.

“You do want to live here, don’t you Coral?” asked Orville. He reached out a hand to stroke the smooth cheek. The touch of him was electric.

“Yes.” It was not just confirmation, but total submission, and it felt good.

“Well, let’s seal the deal then, said Orville. He undid his belt and his pants fell to his ankles.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2022

Erin’s Seed: Corey has a chance to buy a house but for some reason, the seller who lives next door does not want to sell to a guy

Author’s Note:
This story marks my return to writing after a short break and also the publication of my 18th collection of short stories to be published on Amazon. The above tale is one of the “Strange Romances” included in that book – stories of mine that include an odd or inexplicable component without lurching into the world of magic! I am working on another collection in that vein which I hope to publish before the end of the year.

Beauty Boy
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

Why can’t a guy be a beautician? It is a trade, right?

The truth of it is that I was not smart enough to be an accountant or an engineer. Hell, I was not even smart enough to be an electrician. I tried that. I always assumed that I would find a trade that suited somebody like me. I was not big and strong, and I did not like dirt. I liked to think that I was a bit artistic, but not enough to do design or any of that stuff.

I got a job in a department store working in men’s shoes. I could do that because I could talk a bit, but I was not like a great salesperson. It is not really a trade. Shop assistant is just a job. Other jobs in the department store looked way more interesting. I wanted to have a skill. That is something that you can keep forever. With the right skill you can get a job anytime you want

Have you ever noticed that when you walk into any department store, the first place you walk into is the beauty section? It is always the first place. Like the most important part of the shop. That’s what Mrs. Hartley who ran that section would say. “People are lured into the shop by beauty. The colors, the smells, the displays, the consultants …”

That’s what she called her staff – consultants. Doesn’t that sound like they are really important? Like business people – professionals. A consultant. “Just a minute, I will consult my consultant”. Wow. That makes you sound important.

Mrs. Hartley said there was no reason why a boy couldn’t be a beauty consultant. She said the other big department store had a guy working in their beauty section, named Gordon. I went in there to see him, maybe talk about things. That guy was a screaming fag, in his mascara and clipped beard. That was not what I wanted to be.

“You don’t have to be gay,” said Mrs. Hartley. “But you need to show people that you know the product. If you don’t use makeup yourself, you need to work even harder.”

I said I was ready to try, so she gave me a start. She said that she liked my attitude. I mean, I am not afraid of work, provided that it is in a clean environment, I am being a little creative, and that I am doing work that I am proud of.

It seemed to me that beauty work did that for me. Mrs. Hartley said that I had a real talent with color. I could pick up on the colors that my customers liked or presented, and I could create a makeup look to fit. Not everybody in beauty can do that. But when a customer looks at herself and says something like: “You have worked a miracle” or “I can’t believe that I could ever look this good” you can feel so proud it is like your heart wants to jump out of your chest.

But on the application side I was lacking. I knew the look, but applying it took way too much time. Mrs. Hartley was right, because I didn’t use makeup myself, it was harder.

I didn’t wear makeup like that guy Gordon, I just practised with it at home. What the hell - why not? There was a model sitting in the mirror, and I needed the practice. Every morning I washed my face and shaved if I needed to, and I went to work without makeup on. I just needed to use a proper skin treatment, because customers expect that from their beautician, man or woman.

There were some study courses available, and I was the only guy. But in some ways that was OK. I must confess that when I first got interested, the idea of being surrounded by beautiful women was a plus, but when I did the courses, I found myself looking at women critically rather than with sex in mind. I found myself looking at the makeup job or the overall look and thinking: “That clashes badly. That is just plain awful”.

I studied and I practiced. There is a qualification, and there are examinations to get that. But this was something I could do. There was nothing technical except a few skin conditions and a few ingredients; everything else was just about how it looked. All the rules that other students memorized just seemed natural to me. It was a breeze.

But one thing that annoyed me is that people did not approach me. I got referred by others on the floor – girls. Mrs. Hartley said: “Women are more likely to approach a woman with her beauty concerns.” It was like telling me that I was always going to be second rate.

Anyway, I said that I practised at home, in the apartment I shared with my mother and my older brother. I liked to work on a look after dinner and before I washed up and went to bed. Then one evening there was a fire alarm in our apartment block.

To make matters worse I was wearing my mother’s black robe. When you are using makeup it is never a good idea to wear light colors like my own blue and white striped bathrobe. But in the rush to get to the stairs I completely forgot about how I must have looked.

So we were standing around, because the firefighters would take more than an hour to clear the building. My brother was dressed so he said he was going to a bar with some other guys. My mother was talking to some old ladies. I was just standing alone, in a quiet alcove holding the robe together because it was a bit cold.

A guy walked up to me. I thought I recognized him as being from the penthouse in the building, even though that apartment has a dedicated elevator.

“You look like you are getting ready to go somewhere classy,” he said.

I was about to say something, but I realized from the look on his face rather than the words, that he thought I was a chick. I stepped out in the light a bit so he could see me, like, I was showing him he was wrong. But he smiled. He still thought I was a chick. It was the makeup. It was an evening look I had been playing around with.

“I have just heard from the on-site fire chief that there is a small fire in the ducting, so it could be hours before we get back in,” he said. “Can I buy you a drink at the Birdcage Bar at the Palace Hotel around the corner?”

The Birdcage Bar at the Palace Hotel? Have you heard of that place? That is what you can call classy.

I should have just shook my head, maybe with a sneer. Or better yet, said in my deepest voice: “Fuck off Charley”. But I didn’t. I just showed him the lapels of my robe, as if to say: “Sorry. Not dressed for a date”.

“The boutique “Atelier” around the corner is still open,” he said. “I am sure we can find you something to wear.”

Atelier? What kind of world did this guy live in? It was open because it was not even a store. Just a brass plaque and a doorbell. Word is you can only come inside if you have a platinum Amex card. I have to say I was curious. But what I did next was downright reckless. I smiled at him, tilted my head slightly and nodded.

I had seen women do that. I knew all the signals. It was a “why not – let’s do it” look. As if I had just said: “Shall we be adventurous and try black lipstick?”

As he escorted me around the corner, I suddenly realized my mistake. I did not want to speak but I needed to talk my way out of this.

“I have a bad throat, so I would not be good company,” I whispered, so my voice would not betray me.

“A lady like you does not have to talk,” he said.

“I might give you what I’ve got,” I whispered. But he just smiled. I was talking about my pretended cold, but he seemed to think it was a promise of things to come. We were standing beside the brass plaque, and the button was already pushed.

“Thomas Denham,” he introduced himself to the voice above the button. “My escort tonight needs to be dressed for evening cocktails.”

He was ushered into a waiting room and I was directed into an area with racks of clothes. In the light of that display the middle-aged shop attendant could see my hairy legs under the robe, something he had missed while looking at my face. That was understandable, I mean, the makeup job was great; some of my best work. Eyebrows brushed to a cool shape, smoky eyes, cheekbones highlighted, lips glossy and inviting.

“Mr. Denham does have a taste for the exotic,” she said when were alone. “But if it’s a cocktail dress those hairy legs will need to go.”

She gave me a small electric tool. Not a shaver as it turned out. Something that plucked the hairs out. It left my legs sore, but she handed me a pot of soothing cream.

“You will need stockings after all,” she said, without a trace of sympathy for my pain. “Can you wear heels, dear?”

Whether or not there was, I imagined that there was a sneer to her voice. It made me mad enough to say: “Of course”. I wished I hadn’t the moment I had them on.

“I hope you don’t have far to walk,” she said. Cheeky bitch.

She had a bag for me as well, and some lipstick, but not in my shade. Luckily there was some in the black robe. She asked me about it.

“Evening Crimson”, I told her. “One of our biggest sellers.”

Somehow knowing I was in retail helped break the ice. It got even friendlier when she understood that I had an eye for color and for style.

Although women’s clothing was not my thing, I knew what looked good on a woman, and so I knew what looked good on me. As it turned out, more than one outfit in Atelier. I suddenly discovered a woman’s joy in shopping. Imagine that!

But I found what I wanted. Thomas just waved his credit card. Everything. The shaped undergarment, the dress, the shoes and the bag, even a hairbrush that I used to attend to my hair with a bit of borrowed spray. I was not into long hair at the time, but anybody in the beauty business knows when volume and height is needed. It was long enough to appear feminine even on the sidewalk. With a little work it appeared close enough to fabulous.

I learned later that Thomas had spent well over a thousand dollars in that store that night. But as I also earned, he is a man who is prepared to spend any amount of money to have his woman look just as beautiful as he likes them to.

We went for that drink and I didn’t fall off my heels.

I collected my qualification, so I have a trade.

But I don’t need to work anymore.

I have one client, who insists on me constantly attending to keeping just one person beautiful, and I am happy to serve him.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2020

Author’s Note: I owe the inspiration for this story to a fan Brittini Blaire. Thanks Britt! The images are of Romolo Cricca, a Brazilian (male) makeup artist.

Victor Carroll and Max Daniels had known one another since high school. They moved in different circles, but they lived close to one another and would often go home together. It was the kind of friendship where it was just them. Their other friends were groups, and each had their own, but when they walked together or rode their bikes side by side they were as close as two boys can be.

But life took them in different directions. Vic went to college and earned a business degree which took him into finance. He married his secretary and borrowed money from the company he worked for to buy a house. His wife Viola got pregnant and gave birth to their daughter Rosaline. To all intents and purposes, theirs was a happy home, but the leafy suburban streets hide many secrets and sadnesses.

Max was a talented musician and artist and won a scholarship to study fine arts. He looked forward to a future doing what he loved, but he never finished at art school. His tutors described him as “overly deliberate and tidy” and “a competent technician lacking in inspiration”. For an artist each one of words like that that is a dagger in the belly. He returned to music and joined a band. He was competent there too. But art of any kind can be the hardest of lives to live. Max with happy with his achievements, but they went largely unrewarded. He was poor and too proud to seek help from his elderly parents.

On the other hand, Vic was wealthy, but the key problem that he faced was that Viola was unbalanced. She was pretty and Rosaline took after her in that regard, but she never bonded strongly with her daughter. This seemed to make Viola a troubled soul. She did not want another child, even as Rosaline started at school. She was always looking for something else and Max and Rosaline were not it. She simply left. She left a brief note but never made contact with either of them after that, despite Vic trying to reach her.

In a way, Vic was happy she was gone. He now had the burden of caring for a daughter on his own, but with Viola there, he was caring to two dependents, and only with the child did he feel able to meet the needs he understood.

At about the same time Max’s band broke up having failed to make it. He could not pay the rent on his apartment and he was short on cash. He never would have dreamed of contacting Vic to ask for money – it was sheer chance that brought them back together. Max was taking one of his guitars into a pawn shop and at the same time Vic was checking the value of some junk jewelry that Viola had left behind. Time had passed but they recognized one another immediately and they embraced.

Neither wanted to speak of their problems, but as the solitary friends they were at school they left the pawn shop and went to a coffee shop to talk, and it all came out.

“I have no job at the moment, so if you want me to help out at your place for a bit, I could do that,” said Max. “I wouldn’t want to payment. This is friendship - right? Just a room and some meals. Just until I get back on my feet?”

“That would work for me,” said Vic. “Rosaline is a great kid, but I can’t give her the parenting that I would like, being so busy at work. But I really should pay a childcare rate.”

“And I should pay rent and buy groceries, but I can’t at the moment,” said Max. “I can keep track and we can work it out later. For now, we both have an immediate need, and a way to fix it.”

Max didn’t have much, but it was moved into Vic’s spare room, and Vic was introduced to Rosaline. They liked one another immediately. Max painted portraits of all of Rosalines Dolls and soft toys, which made the young girl very happy. Next, he set about learning some basic parenting skills.

Top of the list was learning how a seven year old should dress, and also how to braid Rosaline’s long blond hair. Max had noticed from the photos around the house that since Viola had left Rosaline’s hair did not look good. It was not something that Vic ever tried to learn. Rosaline had some idea about braiding and offered to show Max by braiding his own long and thick brown hair, but Max decided that he would go on line and learn some new skills of use in caring for the child, as well as other skills in caring for the home and all those in it.

Rosaline was happy to help with the housework. She explained to Max that when her mommy was living with them, she was messy, and Rosaline preferred things tidy.

“So do I,” said Max. He had to recall the comment from his art tutor - “overly deliberate and tidy”. To Max much of modern art just looked like disorder for the sake of it. He had never really belonged in that place.

Max also discovered that cooking could be an art form. It was not just making a meal and understanding the flavors that worked together like colors on a palate, but presenting a plate to amaze. Max found a joy in the kitchen that was totally unexpected.

“You’re turning into a real housewife,” Vic teased his friend, when sampling a dinner that was both eye-catching and delicious. “But seriously, you can stay as long as you like. This arrangement is working for all of us.”

But despite happiness at that exchange Max became aware that it was not working entirely well for Rosaline.

Max found her after school playing with her dolls as if she was a mother caring for them, and then he noticed that she was crying.

“What’s wrong, Rosaline?” asked Max. “Why are you so sad.

“All my friends at school have a mommy, and even my dolls have a mommy - me, but I don’t have one,” she sobbed. “Mother’s time is coming up and I can’t join in.”

Max put his arms around her and held her close. “I wish I could be your mommy, sweetheart,” he said. “But you just have to understand that you have the best daddy in the whole world.”

“I know that, but could you be my mommy, Max? Could you? Please? Even just pretending for a while?”

Max heart swelled. He had become so close to this child in only a few weeks and already felt that he would do anything to make her happy. With a big comforting smile on his face, he said - “What would I need to do?” He was thinking that at this age everything must be so simple for a child, that even her father’s old school friend could fill such a huge hole in her life.

“We could put you in some of mommy’s clothes,” said Rosaline excitedly. “Daddy keeps them in the attic. And you could do your hair like mommy. You are so clever with hair. And maybe paint your face like mommy. You are so good at painting faces.”

Max’s heart melted to see her so needy. There was no way he could refuse. He pulled down the stairs to the attic and they both went up, and went through what was there – not only clothes but also hair ornaments and makeup in abundance. Viola was vain as well as pretty, and a little extravagant with it. Curiously, it seemed that Max and Viola were a similar size. Even her shoes seemed to fit at a squeeze. They brought down some items and spread them out in Rosaline’s room.

“This stuff is for grownups,” said Max. “If I am the mommy then you are my daughter and the dolls are just our friends, and we will all play together.”

Rosaline nodded enthusiastically.

“I need to get into this underwear first,” said Max. “Under these clothes I do not look like a mommy should look.”

“I understand,” said Rosaline. “You will need to shave your legs.”

Max was a little startled, but he had to agree. He took some of the garments into the bathroom. He had had a shower, and in there he shaved his legs and his armpits, and washed his hair. He dried himself and felt strangely satisfied with the smoothness of his body. He slipped on Viola’s underwear and used what he could find to build some padding where it was needed. He then blow dried his hair with a side parting and tied it up on top.

He was good at painting faces and was to discover that the same applied to applying makeup to his own, spending time outlining his eyes so that that the blue stood out, and painting his lips to look full and luscious. He wondered whether he should have done this, in case Rosaline would seek to do the same, but he decided that she was a girl who knew how mothers dressed and he would have to meet her expectations.

Rosaline was most impressed with the look. “I think that you might be prettier than my real mommy,” she said.

Max smiled, and did a little pose. It seemed to him that Rosaline was trying to encourage him with kind words, but in the mirror he was pleased with what he saw – especially for a raw beginner. “Which outfit do you think I should wear?” he asked.

Rosaline found something nice and Max slipped into it, and put on the shoes as well. They both looked at his reflection in the mirror. They could easily have been two females – mother and daughter perhaps. Rosaline looked up at Max and put her arms around his constrained waist. She did no have to say anything, but Max knew what she was thinking – it was as if Rosaline’s mother had returned for a visit.

“What game should we play?” said Max.

“Let’s play “American Idol!” said Rosaline. “Every toy can put on a performance and then we need to be the judges, but you need to use a mommy voice – not a daddy voice.”

“I will do my best,” said Max, putting on a higher pitched voice that sounded a little awkward to him, but perfect to the child. I sounded a bit like her real mom, who had smoked too many cigarettes and could sound a bit husky. “Alright Rosaline – who are we going to see on stage first? What will they be doing?”

It seemed that the child had a lot of toys, and whether the act was dancing or singing or just doing silly voices, so of the performances became involved and time when by quickly. It was when Rosaline’s unicorn “Tusky” came up to do showjumping assisted by Rosaline that Vic arrived home and was not even noticed until he walked into the room.”

“Bravo, Tusky, it’s a big yes from me!” The taller judge was clapping furiously until she noticed Rosaline’s gaze, and she spun around to see Vic standing there. Her mouth fell open and she struggled for words.

Vic too, found himself speechless. He was confused to start with, as if confronting a stranger in his home, but a welcome one – an attractive woman, with a face a little like his friend Max. But then it slowly dawned on him what was going on.

“Oh, Vic, please forgive me!” It was still the voice of the woman. Max had to clear his throat to rid himself of it. “It’s just a game. We had an idea that I should dress up as another lady judge. It’s American Idol, you see? I shouldn’t have used Viola’s clothes. It is my fault. I apologize. I will get changed immediately. Please forgive me.”

“No, don’t get changed on my account,” said Vic, the trace of a smile appearing on his face.

“Oh – what time is it? The meatloaf is in the oven! I need to get the vegetables on”. Max was on his feet, and about to get busy.

“Let me do that,” said Vic. “Why don’t you finish the game, Miss … what did you say your name was? Let me help in the kitchen. You are staying for dinner of course. We could do with having another lady joining us for dinner, couldn’t we Rosaline?”

“Oh yes, can she stay for dinner, Daddy? said Rosaline. “You don’t mind do you Daddy?”

“Please stay for dinner,” said Vic.

“Then let me finish he cooking,” said Max. Somehow the feminine voice had returned without him even being aware of it.

“Just wear an apron over that beautiful dress,” said Vic, grinning. He led the way to the kitchen and pulled one from the pantry door. “Allow me tie it around your waist for you.”

Vic tied it at the back looking up to see the hair drawn up at the back of Max’s head. It was so unbelievably feminine that it seemed to trigger something in his loins. Had he been way too long away from the company of a woman? This one seemed to be so real. So much so that he stood when she came to the table and slid her chair under her bottom as she sat, something that suddenly seemed to acquire an erotic meaning.

“It’s just a game for Rosaline,” Max whispered.

“But I am enjoying it too,” said Vic. “Please don’t stop until after she is in bed tonight.”

And so Max remained in a feminine form throughout the meal, and continued that right up until Rosaline delivered another blow.

“We have a mother’s festival coming up this weekend,” the child said bursting with enthusiasm. “Now I have a mommy, we can all go to the show.”

“What is this about?” asked Vic, looking at Max.

“I don’t know,” admitted Max. “What is this about, Rosaline?”

The little girl adopted a serious pose, as if to instruct adults in the mysteries of life – “Every year my school has a special night on the night before mother’s day to say thank you to all mothers, or people filling in for mothers like Max. I was sad because I had no mother to go with me to the special night, but now I do – right, Daddy?”

“I think that celebrating mothers is a great thing,” said Vic. “And who would have believed that Max here could make such a wonderful looking mommy?”

“Oh no,” said Max. “You want me to go to an event dressed like this?”

“We will need to check what is the expected dress standard, of course, but a mommy should look like a mommy.” Max could see that Vic was smiling, but this was no joke being played – no tease. It seemed to Max that Vic was struck but his appearance as a woman, and wanted to see more.

“I don’t think that this is a good idea,” said Max.

“Oh please, Max. Pleeeease!” Rosaline started to look very sad very quickly.

“It’s just one night, Max,” said Vic. “Although, to be the perfect mommy I think that we should get you ready for the big day starting tomorrow. It will be my treat. I will make sure that you mommy looks her best for this mother’s festival, Roz.” It seemed as if Max’s opinion barely mattered. Rosaline was clapping her hands with glee.

“What do you mean starting tomorrow?" asked Max.

Vic’s plan was simple – for the next few days and right up until Sunday, Max was going to be Maxine Daniels, and dress and act accordingly. It seemed like a massive thing to ask of him, but the truth is that Max could not refuse his friend for all that he had done, and he was committed to Rosaline’s happiness and this had now become a big part of that.

Vic brought home some special garments for Max to wear “to present properly”. These included the form of a woman that could be worn under clothes, which added gel-filled breasts, pinched the waist in and the butt out, and concealed any sign of male genitals. Vic suggested that Max wear it “to get used to it for Saturday night.” Vic also bought some other clothes for Max to wear so that Viola’s could be returned to the attic.

Max decided that the best way to deal with a tidal wave is to ride it, and he threw himself into the role of Maxine, dutiful wife and mother, applying his artistic flair and natural good humor. Whether Max noticed it or not, Vic and Rosaline found themselves often looking at one another with satisfaction – Max was perfect in both roles.

On the day of the Mother’s Night, Vic arranged for Max to attend a salon to have his hair and makeup done for the evening, but the beautician in attendance insisted that the work to be done should start from a properly prepared canvas. Max had to endure some discomfort, but by this point he was strangely excited at the prospect of stepping out of the salon into the open air dressed as a woman, having entered wearing a tracksuit with his feminine clothes in a garment bag.

It was Maxine who stepped out into the sunshine that afternoon. I was she who sniffed the air and sensed the fragrance of flowers a man would never had noticed. It was she who flipped to hem of her dress across a shaved leg to check that the painted toenails that matched the polish on her hands, were visible though the stone encrusted sandals. It was she who giggled a little to herself knowing just how good she looked as she walked around the block even though the car was -parked just outside the salon.

But if Max felt outrageously feminine in a way that no man should, it was to pale when she got home and Vic presented her with the dress he had bought for her to wear that night.

“Tonight is a celebration of mothers, and I think his dress can be called a celebration?”

Max felt tears welling up in his eyes, and his only thought was that they would ruin the makeup. He could only mutter – “Oh, Vic. I don’t know what to say. It is just so beautiful.”

“Not as beautiful as it will be with you in it,” said Vic. He was right. And it made Max feel as if he was floating on air just to wear it.

There was a part of Max that wanted to throw his arms around Vic and kiss him, just for bringing such joy into his life, even if that joy came from a totally .unexpected direction. But there was also the restraining thoughts – that Vic was a man, and a friend, and this was just an extended game of children’s dress-up.

But Max took Vic’s arm as they walked to the car, and she held Rosaline’s hand with the other.

“Your hair is so beautiful Max,” she said as she took her seat behind her mother for the night.

“The style is a French Roll,” Max explained. “And it was talked into having the blonde highlights. I was shown how to do this style myself. Imagine that?”

“It suits you,” said Vic. He was fighting his own feelings. Who was this person sitting in his passenger seat, with her beautiful hair and perfect makeup, and her painted hands holding the clutch bag in her lap about those shapely legs?

He could only introduce her as “Maxine, a close friend of mine for many years and a mother figure for Rosaline in the absence of Viola who has been gone for quite a while”.

The other women warmed to the newcomer in their midst immediately. Who wouldn’t, at a function where women are there to be honored?

Some remarked that they admired he “stepping in for Rosaline’s mother, who – let’s face it – was a self-centered and irresponsible woman!”

“Not every woman is cut out for motherhood,” said Max, trying to excuse Viola somehow, although it might have sounded as if it was a claim that she was – “she” meaning Max.

The mothers were paraded and applauded and in some cases sons and daughters stood up to say a few words of thanks. Max didn’t even notice that Rosaline had taken the stage until Vic motioned that she should turn around to see Rosaline at the microphone.

“Maxine is not my real mom, but you don’t have to be a real mom to love like a mom’s, and you don’t have to be Max’s daughter to love her like a daughter should!” Rosaline smiled at Max through the applause and then hurried off stage and into her arms. Everybody around them could feel it, like a heat wave from the explosion of love, radiating out from the mother and child embrace.

“That was the most wonderful night of my life,” said Max as they stepped back into the car. “But it is late, and we need to get a certain public speaker to bed without further delay.”

Vic was curiously quiet on the way home. His head was full of thoughts. But Max and Rosaline chatted endlessly about the friends from school and which were the mothers that Max had met, and who she liked best.’

“You know, women are so good with other women,” said Max. “I never realized before how close women can be with one another. I guess it is the kind of thing men can never understand. It really is special.”

But the chatter had to end when Rosaline was finally home, and washed, and tucked up in her bed. There was a special kiss for Rosaline who reached up to stroke Max’s hairdo. They smiled at one another as closely as two people can. Vic watched it from the doorway, and blew his daughter a kiss before he turned out the light and closed the door.

“Do you feel like a nightcap?” he said to Max. “Because I do.”

“Sure,” said Maxine in the voice she had used all night. She watched him pour two glasses of liquor. They had shared a drink like this before, but never like this. They were still standing as the glasses met and they both took a heavy first sip.

“You were magnificent tonight,” said Vic. “You are magnificent.”

“Vic, I loved tonight, but I feel as if I have slipped into a dream so deep that I can’t escape from …”.

Max had no time to finish those words because Vics face was against hers and his tongue was in her mouth, and she wanted nothing except him.

Their arms became entwined and somehow they managed to stagger together like a creature with 4 back legs, bumping into walls and slurping and groaning until they reached Vic’s bedroom. Somehow Max was able to remove the pins from her hair so that it fell about her shoulders like cornsilk, with his hands buried deep in it.

Their actions seemed driven by their lizard brains – that primal node that controls the instincts of a man, and of a woman. It is a drive that must end with penetration, and with submission, and logic or sexual conventions have no place. So only when Vic was deep inside Max and they were both calling out to God himself, could any horizon appear.

“I want you to stay the way you are tonight,” said Vic. “I want you to stay here, with me, and with Roz. I want you to live as my wife, and as Roz’s mother.”

“This is too much to ask of me,” said Max. There were tears in her eyes. “This is all so confusing. I feel as if I have become another person – a person who can love you as a woman. But that is not what I am. We are kidding ourselves. It was just a game. I know that it seems real … I wish it was – but it is not. I am not the person that you want … or you need.”

“I am trying to tell you that I have fallen in love with you,” said Vic. “I don’t know how it happened. I don’t know if this makes me gay, but if it does, I don’t care. I don’t want to be without you.”

“We need time to sort this out,” said Max.

“Sure,” said Vic. “We can sleep on it, but in my bed.” It sounded like an instruction, and Max decided that he could do that. But first he would need to undress and take a shower and even wearing the nightie back to bed Vic could see that the body of the person that he had made love to was not female.

But curiously even with the nightie, the impression was that Max was a woman. She had brushed her hair and it was hers. Her chest was flat but smooth. Her body was shaved even down to the pubic hair which what remained concealing nothing of any great size, above long feminine legs.

Even in the morning Vic reached out to her and seemed to stroke every part of her body except the parts that would have spoken the truth.

But Max knew the truth and he had decided what he needed to do. He loved Rosaline so this would be hard, and he was falling in love with Vic so that made it even harder, but the only way to resolve his inner turmoil was to leave.

He got up while Vic was in the shower and collected a few things and left.

Vic and Rosaline were both distraught. They spent most of that Sunday just holding one another, and hoping that Max would walk in the door to tell them that it was all a misunderstanding. For the first time he could remember, Vic called the office to take a day off “for family reasons”. He had not even taken the day off following Viola’s departure, so it was strange that on his only day off, she should return.

She knocked on the door because she had lost her key, or more likely discarded it. But there she was, years after leaving and cutting off her family completely, stepping back into the home she had abandoned.

“Where is she, this woman who has taken my place?” she demanded. It soon became apparent that through some channel or another she had heard about the woman who now claimed to be Rosaline’s new mother.

“It seems that I cannot keep women in my house,” said Vic dolefully. “She has left just as you did.”

“Well, I’m back Vic, and I want us to try again,” said Viola. “I know that I have let you both down. Christmas is coming up and we should be together as a family. I’m asking for another chance.”

Rosaline was sad to lose her new mommy, but also happy to find that her real mommy had returned. She made her feel welcome with a big hug. Vic saw that a realized that perhaps it was Max who had reached out to Viola. That might make sense. Max was conflicted, and restoring things the way they once had been might be the solution, from that point of view. The problem that Vic faced was not as easily resolved as in the immature mind of his daughter. She could love freely. The problem with Vic was that he now understood that if he had ever loved, that it was Maxine who held his heart.

Vic was right not to trust Viola. It was only a few weeks later that the strain started to show in the face of his ex-wife. This life was not for her. She was envious of another who seemed to live it with joy, but she could not. She told Vic that she was leaving again.

Vic had never stopped looking for his friend Max, but it was only when Viola was packing her bags to go that he realized that he had been looking for the wrong person.

“I went up into the attic to find some of my clothes and I found boxes of men’s clothes in a size way too small for you. Lots of them. Who do they belong to and why were they left here? Well, it’s none of my concern anyway. I am out of here.”

“What about Christmas,” said Vic. “You said you wanted to be home for Christmas.”

“I hate Christmas, and I always have,” said Viola

Vic realized that the male clothes had been left behind. He should be looking for Maxine, not Max.

He adjusted his searches and her name soon came up. She was working as an art tutor in a city just over the State line and she was doing hair and makeup part time. Vic phoned to see when she would be in and when she finished work, then he drove over to find her.

He timed his arrival perfectly. Maxine had just finished work at the salon and was on her way out the door as Vic walked in. They looked at one another for a moment, but that was all it took. They knew what the other was thinking – that kind of longing cannot be hidden. The other ladies in the salon saw it too.

“Vic, I’m so sorry,” said Max. “I did come back, shortly after I left following Mother’s day, but then I saw Viola there so it seemed that you got your family back, the way it should be.”

“So you didn’t call her?” asked Vic.

“I wouldn’t know how too,” said Max. “But you deserve a real woman. Viola is that, with all her flaws. I can’t be that, despite every I have done since I left.”

The problem is that I don’t love Viola,” said Vic. “I love you. And Rosaline loves you too. Even while Viola was here, she told me she wished that you were her Mommy. Yes, Viola has gone again, and this time for good. We want you back. But wait … what have you had done?"

“Oh Vic, I never went back to being a man, not for a single second since I left you,” said Max, the tears starting. “You made me a woman that last night we were together … or perhaps I was always a woman but you made sure I could never be a man again. I have had the surgery. I am still healing, but I am doing well. I have a life as Maxine now. It is just that there a couple of things missing.”

“Well, it is not breasts,” said Vic, for the first time noticing that she was wearing a V-neck revealing two perfect breasts.

“No, Silly. It’s you. It’s you and Rosaline. That is what is missing in my life. We need to be together for Christmas.”

The customers and other staff in the salon were staring at the exchange throughout, but now they were all smiling, and some with a happy tear in their eyes.

"I haven't even thought about Christmas," said Vic.

“I love Christmas,” said Max. “I always have.”

One of the women watching them called out – “For God’s sake kiss him, Maxie!”

So she did.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2024

I submitted this story to my hard working volunteer editor Bronwen about a month ago and she suggested that it could be an entry into this years Christmas story contest, with the huge impact Maxie had on little Rosaline. I just made a couple of tweaks to put it in season and here it is - my humble offering and a Christmas gift to all my readers on Big Closet Top Shelf.
Maryanne

Cruising the Sis Seas

A Short Story by way of a Promotional Brochure

By Maryanne Peters

Themed cruises are the new travel sensation. It is just a question of meeting a demand. In the travel business we have discovered that there are some “kinky” cruise options which may not be able to fill a whole ship, but if we charter for a whole bunch of different sexual proclivities in a single voyage, the only common and required ingredient is tolerance.

That was what we did for our “Open to Experience” cruise last year, and by far the most successful package on that cruise was “Sis Seas”. Some who signed up were in doubt, but with the profiles we categorized on the applications to sign up, we were able to match our sissies and their masters so well that even our experts were surprised.

Just have a look through our success stories and consider whether you might want to sail into excitement this year or next.

Mike is an extremely wealthy bond trader and was until recently, happily married with three adult children, but there was a huge hole in his life, and it could only be filled by the right ladyboy.

“My wife put our family first, and looking back I am grateful that she did that,” explained Mike. “I guess I always knew that an ordinary woman was not how I was oriented. It just took meeting Kimberley to show me what I have really been looking for. She is more of a woman than an born woman, probably because she feels that she needs to be, but she doesn’t have to prove anything to me.

The pair were matched for the cruise and since they have been sharing a stateroom they can’t seem to get enough of one another.

“Mike is great!” says Kim. “He has so much experience of life that I am just in awe of him, and he is great in bed too! We are already planning our lives together. It is a dream come true.”

Scott had experimented with cross-dressing for a good part of his 71 years, but he could never be the convincing woman that he craved being.

“I became trapped by the frustration,” said Scott. “I never wanted to be a transvestite, and I sought out all manner of treatments to stop the urges, and then I learned about how I might fulfil my fantasies vicariously, through another. What I really needed was to find a sissy, which is why I booked a cruise on Sis Seas and how I met Pamela.”

“There is a feminine side to Scotty that I really appreciate,” said Pam. “He is warm and sensitive, but he is too much of a man to ever go as far as I have. My job is to be the woman that he can never be and by doing that make him feel like the man he is. It is good for both of us”

“I enjoy shopping with Pam, but the clothes look so much better on her,” laughs Scott. “And she has all her hair, and is growing a wonderful pair of breasts. She is my girl, in every sense. We have a very special relationship.”

“I love being Scott’s woman,” says Pam. “He wants me to be gorgeous for both of us. It's hard to imagine a relationship being more fulfilling than ours. So, of course, I cannot recommend Sis Seas highly enough. Maybe others should try it out.”

At 63 Jeffery is athletic and active, and following the tragic death of his wife he was looking for somebody ready to share his life with interested in similar things.

“I am not gay, and I had never thought about exploring a relationship with anybody other than a woman who had always been female. It was just that the kind of woman that I wanted seemed to have disappeared off the planet,” said Jeff. “I was looking for somebody intelligent, sporty and with spunk, but somebody with perhaps and old-fashioned view of a woman’s place in a relationship. I was endlessly teased by my family that such a woman did not exist – she was a man’s dream of what a woman should be. Like a creature out of the mind of a man. Well, Lisa is just that.”

Lisa clings to her man, beaming from ear to ear. They make an attractive couple.

“I have always been effeminate,” explains Lisa. “I was a gay tennis pro and I performed in a drag show in the evenings, but my use of hormones put an end to my future as a man. I have been living and working as a female for years, but I still qualified as a sissy and was approached to try out another kind of cruising. Until Jeff I had never been with a straight guy before, so I guess that makes us both heterosexual. For the first time in my life, I feel normal.”

“I would like to pay for the last bit of surgery to make that true,” says Jeffery. “But it is up to Lisa. We are enjoying an active sex life at the moment and her body is her body, but I want our relationship to continue after we finally dock. As I have tried to explain, I am an old-fashioned guy, and I have at last met an old-fashioned lady, with a tiny imperfection.”

“Jeff is right,” says Lisa. “I am a man’s view of what the perfect woman should be, evolved over many years. I want to be perfect for him. I have a decision to make.”

Georgette is a sissy who sought a master of similar age, but she had some concerns.

“I heard about Sis-Seas - a holiday on a cruise boat where sissies don’t pay,” said Georgette. “It seemed too good to say no to. We get our hair done daily and we wear pretty clothes, and even swimsuits despite not always having the bodies to fit. But most importantly, we get to be ourselves. We get be overly feminine and as pretty as we can be. The only problem is that we are to be paired with men who want to try out life with a sissy partner, and I was a little uncomfortable about that.”

So, Georgette invited her oldest friend Todd to go along with her, with the both of them splitting the fare he needed to pay.

“I was ready for a holiday, and it was George who came up with this idea,” said Todd. “But it was made very clear to me that I would not be seeing George again for the whole time we were away. Instead, when I came aboard, I met Georgette for the first time, and I found myself totally smitten! I could not believe that this was the same person who I had known for years, probably because it was not the same person. Georgy is new to me completely, but she knows all about me. I am just learning about her – this beautiful woman who has been hiding in plain sight all this time. She is so wonderful I can hardly believe that this is happening.”

“I have realized that I am hopelessly in love with Todd, and I probably have been as long as I have known him,” sighs Georgy. “It is just that our love could never be while I lived as a man. Now it seems that phase of my life might well be over … for good. The cruise has changed our lives.”

Here is a story of a lonely man living with his secret desires for most of his 65 years.

“I experimented with sex with men, shemales and with transwomen but nothing seemed to fit,” said Keith. “Sissies are different. We are talking about partners who are totally subservient to their men. They exist only to please in their appearance, demeanor and actions. When I first saw Diane, I knew that she was the one I wanted. Her eyes begged me to pick her, and ever since then she has been out to prove to me that I made the right call in going with her. I think I have.”

“I could see that he was a newbie,” teased Diane. “I think that it is a crime that so many men live their lives without ever tasting sissy juice. There was a longing visible in his face. He had come as far as signing up for the cruise but he needed to be brought on board by the right kind of girly boy – that would be me.”

“She is right,” says Keith. “A big part of my life has been wasted in pursuit of relationships with people that have little in common with me. I have always preferred the company of men, and when it comes to intimacy I could buy the attentions of some young man and then hate myself for doing it. What I really needed all along was what I have now – a sissy like Diane.”

Some sissies come to the ship with more money than some of our masters, and that is certainly true of Nancy.

“I have always wanted to be as feminine as a woman could be, and I spent my entire working life nursing that dream,” said Nancy. “It was only after a successful career in currency trading that I was able to retire early and pay for everything I wanted. I paid for the surgery to get the body of a woman, and for some other work too, but not to hide my age. I had everything that I had craved, except for somebody to enjoy it. A woman needs to have somebody to admire her and to have a body he worships and wants to use. So, I signed up as a sissy with Sis Seas just to see what was out there in my age group and I was paired with Charles. We haven’t looked back since we met, just as he can’t stop looking at me!”

“It’s true that she fascinates me,” says Charlie. “I love the way that she carries herself. She exudes class and I have always valued classiness in a woman. It is that mixture of power and femininity that I find intoxicating, and a mind that is best reflected with maturity. But look at that body! An athletic build with the breasts of a teenager. I am still sexually active entering my seventies and this is my dream woman – nothing is sagging – nothing.”

“I need to be on the lookout for gold-diggers, but with Charlie I like what I am getting,” explains Nancy. “I have spent my whole life searching for the chance to be adored by a man, and he does that. Like he says, he will never match my wealth, but he appreciates the finer things in life, and I like to think that I have turned myself into just that.”

“For me it is really about the sex,” says Eric. “I find women of my age attractive, and to be honest, I seem to have nothing in common with much younger women. But the problem is that it is hard to find a lady, and I mean a lady, of my age who can keep up with me between the sheets.”

“But now you have!” the stunningly beautiful Amy butts in. “The thing is that girls like me have the libidos of the men they once were. I just can’t get enough of Eric. I have recently invested in a vagina and I have pointed out to him that I have a program of required dilation. He is up for that.”

“Yes, some of the sissies available on Sis Seas Cruises have completely abandoned maleness, and I am glad of it,” says Eric. “I used to say that hungry tigers like me can’t just feed on cows, but now I understand that what I really needed was a hungry tigress. Now I have found her.”

“You can call me old fashioned, but I came looking for romance,” says Alan. “I never thought that I would find that in the arms of a woman who used to be a man, but that was because I never really knew anything about gender change. I just looked at the brochure and saw all those beautiful hyper-feminine women clearly having fun, and I wanted a piece of that. So I figured what is the harm in trying out something different. Then I stepped aboard and I was introduced to Debbie. We have never looked back.”

“I guess I had the same motivations,” says Debbie. “ Sure, I wanted to express my feminine side without inhibitions, but there is no way better to do that than to have a man on your arm. I wasn’t so sure about the sex – I was an anal virgin before the cruise, but once I was done, I was done completely.”

“We are talking about what happens next,” said Alan. “But whatever it is I know that we have to be together. We have both found what we are lookin for … in each other.”

Yes, Sis Seas Cruises can allow our special customers to step aboard a real “Love Boat”.

Is Sis Seas for you?

Why not book a cruise and find out?

© Maryanne Peters 2024

2222

Berlin 1945: A Story of Survival

A Short Story based on Historical People
By Maryanne Peters

It seems hard to believe with everything that happened afterwards, but in the 1920s and 1930s Germany was at the forefront of the battle for rights for homosexual and transsexual people.

The Berlin based sexologist Magnus Hirschfeld led a campaign throughout Europe with the formation of “The World League of Sexual Reform”. He toured America in 1931 with the Hearst newspaper chain dubbing him “the Einstein of Sex”. It was Hirschfeld who first outlined the full spectrum of sexual variations, by gender and orientation.

When he died in 1935 the homosexual and transsexual (he termed the phrase) communities in Berlin and elsewhere, mourned him. He was not just studying them; he was championing them. He was our champion, for I was a part of that community then.

This was Germany at the height of the Weimar Republic. It was democratic, liberal and centrist, so a target for the extremes of both left and right – The Communists to the left, and to the right the factions that were to come together as the Nazis.

Magnus was Jewish and was attacked by the Nazis from early in their history – to them he was the example of Jewish perversion and debauchery.

But they were yet to come to power, and in that prior age of laissez-faire Germany and Berlin in particular became the Mecca for homosexuals and those fascinated by the bizarre. Visitors came from Britain, Western Europe, Eastern Europe and North America. Tourism publications of the time touted Berlin nightlife. There were cabarets and nightclubs everywhere – in fact the show and movie “Cabaret” is based on this period in Berlin’s history.

One famous show was the “Tiller Girls”. Our show was a similar chorus line except we were not entirely girls – none of us was.

I worked at the “El Dorado” which was known as a transvestite venue. Even visitors commonly arrived in drag, or at least men in suits would apply a little rouge and lipstick. It was a honey pot for artists, authors, celebrities, and tourists wanting to admire a piece of “decadent” Berlin or catch a glimpse of someone famous.

Every night would start with a performance by us before rows of chairs before tables were brought out for coffee at 10:00pm. Then at 11:00pm all tables were cleared for dancing. As employees we would perform, serve coffee and be available as dance partners. It was barely a living, but there were private rooms presenting other opportunities to make money, and I had my admirers who sponsored me.

It enabled me, and a few others, to work and live in Berlin as women, which was all I had ever wanted. As soon as I could escape my little village in Pomerania I went straight to Berlin to be able to do that. I grew my hair, which was already blonde, I shaved my legs and I put on a dress, and I never wanted to go back.

I was prepared to do anything to become female, and Magnus would help me.

At Magnus Hirschfeld’s Institute of sexology there were two doctors who he said could help me. Both of them were working with Magnus at the time, although they would soon be forced to shun him.

The first was Dr. Adolf Butenandt who was to receive a Nobel Prize for his discovery of female sex hormones. He had been able to produce progesterone from the urine of mares and was keen to see the effect of the chemical on male subjects. Magnus recommended me and I enthusiastically agreed.

The second doctor was Dr Erwin Gohrbandt, a surgeon of some repute. Erwin had been born in a village quite close to mine, and he seemed like a very nice man. He spoke to me about surgery to give me the body of a woman. At the time he was the only person known to have performed such surgery. His first patient was working for Magnus as a maid and cleaner - her name was Dora Richter. Only the year before I met her, in 1932, Erwin had removed her penis and constructed a vagina – she had been castrated at the institute some years prior.

Dora was quiet and plain, but totally feminine and a hard worker. She was totally loyal to Magnus, but by the time I met her Magnus had been absent from Germany for some time and he was never to return. She stayed at the institute through the destruction by Nazi thugs in 1933 and was said to have died at the hands of the invaders. But as it turned out, that was not the case.

Erwin is perhaps more famous for his second sex change surgery, only a month after Dora, performed on a Danish artist named Lili Elbe. More famous only because this was a more publicized event. Sadly this surgery was not as successful, and Lily died.

But that did not put me off. Again I was a willing volunteer and submitted to surgery in March 1932.

Then in the summer of 1932 everything went up in flames. Even before the Nazis took power, the pressure imposed by them on Chancellor Franz von Papen, a Catholic conservative, was too great. He ordered a crack-down on "sexual immorality" which resulted in everybody associated with the Institute being attacked. The building itself remained open until the following year – the first year of Nazi rule. On May 6 th of that year a group of university students who belonged to the National Socialist Student League stormed the institution, shouting “Burn
Hirschfeld!”. People were attacked and said to have been killed, and books were burned. All of the years of research by Magnus and others carried out over decades, was destroyed.

I was not there. The El Dorado Club had to adapt to the new reality. I remained as a waitress. At least I was physically beyond discovery, unlike some of my colleagues.

Doctors Butenandt and Gohrbandt were not there either. Like the club, they needed to adapt to survive. Dr. Butenandt signed the “
Vow of allegiance of the Professors of the German Universities and High-Schools to Adolf Hitler and the National Socialistic State
” following the attack, and was to go on to join the Nazi party and apply himself to their evil work, as I shall explain. Erwin had been a field surgeon in the First War and something of a hero (I learned later that he had been awarded the Iron Cross First and Second Class) so in time he was called up for service in the Second War, but we stayed in touch.

10 days after the attack on the Institute Magnus Hirschfeld died in Nice, France, having learned of the destruction of his life’s work. Only those with courage attended his funeral, but there were many. The Nazis were watching. It was the beginning of a period of the systematic genocide of the homosexual and transsexual communities in Germany.

I witnessed many of the awful events of 1933. From Hitler becoming Chancellor in January, all civil liberties were gone by the end February, the first concentration was built by the end of March, all Jews were removed from professional practice by the end of April when the Gestapo was established, and eugenic sterilization was the law by the end of May. Homosexuals and similar behavior became a crime punishable by death.

Even just working at the Club had people wondering about me. I felt that as I was now no longer just dressing as a woman, perhaps it was no longer the place for me. But it was still the place where my friends were, even if it had lost much of its spark under the heel of the Gestapo boot.

It was actually Erwin Gohrbandt (who was still working in surgical research in Berlin) who suggested the solution: Join the army – the Wehrmacht. Everybody knew that joining up meant a physical examination, so if I passed that, my status was assured – I was female. Plus with the testimonial of a retired senior army officer, I could achieve a good posting

It was also a way to escape the Lebensborn program. Under the Nazi regime women should become mothers – preferably wives and mothers, but if not, just mothers. For example the SS Marriage Order of 1932 prescribed that every member should father four children, in or outside marriage. There was no room for sterile women such as I was.

By joining the Wehrmachtshelferinnen and becoming involved in training I could become indispensable and not be expected to marry and give birth. It meant that I had to follow the directives of following the hateful Nazi ideology and “to remain feminine and never to become rough warriors”.

Clerical skills were in demand, and I had none of those, but I had been in charge of a chorus line. So I quickly adapted to the role of drill sergeant for all the young women who were joining up for the first time.

Even in uniform, German society looked down on us for not being mothers. Perhaps because of my background I was used to that and I knew how to cope. I told my women to be proud to serve the Reich. Most were, but for me it was just a place to hide.

It might have been easier if I was plain like Dora, but I always wanted to be pretty and I was pleased that I was. I was not about to present myself any other way. That meant that I got plenty of attention. It also meant that I had to give myself a little. I am not ashamed. I had a vagina that functioned well enough for all but the very largest of men.

I had several proposals of marriage, which I was able to dodge by a variety of means, from trumped up incompatibility to finding fault with lineage in my desire to protect my Aryan heritage. And as a last resort I could organize a transfer and say: “For the Fatherland we must part”.

To do that I needed promotion, and I won it. When war broke out our numbers increased, as did our increasing involvement in anti-aircraft operations and civil defense. These were roles that did not require us to become “rough warriors” and at the start of the war were insignificant. The first Allied bombing of Germany was upon industrial areas in the West, where I went to learn. From August 1940 Berlin was being bombed regularly and I was in charge (only of the women) of almost 100 anti-aircraft installations.

People were dying, including civilians all around me and some of my own women soldiers. Nothing can prepare you for this much horror and sorrow, but perhaps I was used to dealing with stress better than the average woman. That is what I felt I was. Nobody questioned it and I kept my secret.

One of the sites my crews were charged with protecting was the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Biochemistry, which was designated as being ”kriegswichtig“ – essential to the war effort. By sheer chance on a visit there I met up with Magnus’s past-friend Dr. Adolf Butenandt who was then the Director. At first, he was uncomfortable to see me because of the connection, but then he became curious to examine me as an example of the long-term effect of female hormones on a male.

I was ready to refuse, but I was curious, and I asked him to explain what he was doing. It was my condition for helping him, so he explained it to me in complete confidence, which is a confidence I kept in all the time he remained alive.

He also gave me my first shot of hormones for many years. I loved the feeling of it. I had no testicles and earlier treatment had given me some breasts tissue, but I hungered to feel as womanly as I felt with those drugs inside me. He promised to keep me supplied with enough for an ampoule every month, and that was a promise he kept.

Dr. Butenandt examined me with particular attention to my breasts and bottom, and my soft skin and hair. He asked me a number of questions about my work in the army. I don’t think that he had any idea about what the Wehrmachtshelferinnen was, but I explained that we did what we could, not fight because we could “never be rough warriors”. He seemed very excited, as he said that his research on others was inconclusive.

H e told me that he had been experimenting on others, volunteers from a place called Buchenwald. I had never heard of this town, but in my naivety I imagined it as a nice place where you could sit and read books among the trees, as the name implies. Like many Germans,
I was completely unaware of the horrors there, but I could hardly be surprised given all the friends of mine who had died at the hands of the Nazis for nothing but their gentle nature.

He told me that if it could be established that hormones could render men incapable of violence, some method of mass dosing might render the enemy passive, allowing German men to end the war by the force of their own sexuality. The idea seemed laughable to me, but Nazi fervor could make even scientists ignore logic.

This kind of thinking marked the period in our city’s history that we call Endkampf - the final struggle. Not just weird and wonderful ideas, but the recruiting of children and the arming of the Wehrmachtshelferinnen including me.

To prove how wrong Dr Butenandt was, there were plenty of women who knew nothing but female hormones who were as blood thirsty as men, under my command. But I did my best to avoid conflict for all our sakes and led my teams west in order to surrender to the Americans rather than the Russians who seemed bent on vengeance.

And it was as a prisoner of war that I met Herb Gaffney, the man who was to become my husband and take me back to America. He called me his “Little Soldier Girl”, but the truth is I was none of those things. I never told him who I was. Records of my past life were destroyed, in any event. All he knew was that I spoke English because I was involved with tourism before the war, which led to me becoming involved in that after we married.

I had told him that I was unable to have children, and that I was under treatment from a specialist based in Berlin (Dr. Butenandt). He wanted kids so we went back to Germany in 1946 and adopted 3 German orphans. Even then things were very depressed in Germany and Berlin was slow to rebuild, whereas the USA was entering a boom time.

I never went back to Berlin after that, but before he died Dr. Butenandt wrote to me of his joy in seeing the divided city reunited after so many years, when the Berlin Wall came down. He was unable to supply me with hormones after that, but having recently lost my husband, I was ready for menopause by then

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2020

Author’s Note:
The German doctors in this story as well as Magnus Hirschfeld (and Dora and Lili), were real people. Dr Gohrbandt served as an advisory surgeon in the army and after the war was Vice President of the Berlin Red Cross. He died in 1971. Dr. Adolf Butenandt collected his Nobel Prize only after the war, but the work he did during the war remains a mystery. His institute received funding for concentrated research marked “important for the war” some of which was involved in blood chemistry for high altitude pilots, almost certainly involving concentration camp prisoners. There is some evidence of the possible use of female hormones as a weapon. He stayed with the Institute after the war (then renamed the Max Planck Society for the Advancement of Science). He died in 1995, at the age of 91.

Author's Note: So many thanks to Rose who sweated over this to present the whole story with images, for me. Just in case I attach the pdf file.

Best Wife
A Vignette
By Maryanne Peters

I married my first wife when I was young. All my friends had paired off and had steady girlfriends, and she thought I was great, so I guess I was attracted to her for that reason. We did things with other couples, and as they got married the big question was when we were going to do it. She suggested a date and so I proposed. That was it.

We had three kids. That was probably one more than I wanted, but I love them all. They are my flesh. I am happy to be together with all of my kids, but there came a time when I was not so happy to be together with their mother.

People grow apart … or whatever. I just put up with her. She was always demanding and yet never gave me much. She was lazy, not good at looking after the house, a lousy cook, not great in bed, and not as good a parent as I was.

I am not saying I was blameless. You can probably guess – I have my opinions. But I think I am a good person, and better without her.

And after we separated, I found that my business took off too. I paid her out with the house and a lump sum for alimony and then I went to work. There was extra effort, sure, but without her, my head was in the right space. Things went well.

I had my kids every second weekend, and I tried to make that at least a three-day weekend, sometimes more. That is giving your kids a better part of you. After all, when their parents were together, they hardly saw the real me. They just saw the man arguing with their mother.

People asked me if I would consider remarrying, but I always said no. My friends who stuck with me after the divorce would sometimes set me up with women, or even put my profile up on dating sites. I just never found somebody suitable.

“Women are too demanding,” I said. “They want to change you and if they can’t they hound you. If they succeed in some way, then they grow to hate the changed person. Women run hot and cold. You never know who you are going to wake up next to. If only there was a woman who really knew what a man wanted. I am not talking about a servant, but an equal - someone focused on my happiness, not just themselves.”

Ok, so I can go on like that. But I really felt that I was not going to put my hand back into the same fire. I had been burnt once.

Before I start to talk about Crystal, I should state quite clearly that I am not gay. I would not be ashamed of it if I was, but I am not; or that is my opinion, and you may have another.

One of my friends had a younger brother. I never knew the guy – he was much younger that both of us. This friend asked me whether I would consider giving this brother a job, because he was finding it hard to get work “in his present circumstances”.

“He is trans,” this friend of mine explained. “You know – a sissy boy. Living as a girl full time. He is clever but can’t get the job that he is qualified to do because of the way he dresses. If you say no, I understand. But I have to ask – could you give him a job.”

I looked at the resumé and it was just what I needed. It is not that I am a “positive discrimination” employer or anything like that, I just figured that I needed somebody and why should I care what they wear to work provided that it is tidy. So I gave Crystal an interview, with my HR woman beside me.

I have to say that I spent most of the interview trying to see how anybody could mistake this woman for having ever been a man. She had a great body with big breasts under a sensible top, and she had dyed blond hair worn up in a professional style, and she was pretty in a clearly feminine way.

She looked like a woman, so I treated her like one. Sissy boy seemed like an insult in so many ways. I started to think that his brother, my friend, was a bit of a prick.

I think that I could see the way she looked at me, even then. But I am a man, so I guess I just read it as admiration for my achievements as I outlined the business. She just hung on to every word. It is a sure way to ensure that I would give the nod of approval. But my HR assistant confirmed that she ticked every one of her boxes too, so she got the job.

Although she worked mainly in another part of the building, she made a point of bringing stuff to me personally, and when she did it was often accompanied by a beverage and a tasty treat.

“I love to bake,” she said. “I am just a homebody at heart.” Her food was always great. Other stuff too. She said: “I would love to cook for a classy dinner party, but it is just me.”

She lived alone, just like I did. But she cooked and I didn’t – except a plastic tray in the microwave.

I am not sure if it was her idea or mine, but when some overseas visitors suggested a traditional home-cooked meal, she was happy to act as chef and hostess. It is a hard thing for just one person, as I am no help at all, but she did an amazing job.

After they left, I went into the kitchen where she was washing up and offered to pay her for acting as caterer and pay her well.

“No, please. I enjoyed it. I love to cook, and I love people. And your guests were charming. I had a wonderful evening.”

She had cooked and served us and sat with us at the table and nobody had thought for a moment that she was not what she appeared to be - a woman. Perhaps I had drunk a little much wine, but I don’t think so. I was grateful and she was modest and accommodating. And she was dressed well with those impressive breasts on display, and somehow the apron on top of that outfit made her look even better – if that was possible.

I just kissed her – on the mouth. She was a woman, and I was a man. I suppose I was her employer and should have respected those boundaries, but this was my home. It seemed to be not a big issue.

But before I knew it we were in bed and I was fucking her like a man possessed. It never even occurred to me that this was the first time I had ever entered an anus. It was there and it was on offer, and it was tight and squeezing me with practiced skill. It drained me dry.

All I saw and felt were her soft jiggly tits and her long blonde hair. And those eyes. I knew what that look was now: She adored me. There is no aphrodisiac like it.

That is her making me French toast the morning after. The panties and the stockings and that apron. I love that photo. The morning after our first night together. And every morning since seems just as good.

She moved in. My kids love her just as much as I do.

I have a code. No workplace relationships, so she had to resign, once I made her another offer, one where the relationship is the job.

So I married again after all. Maybe just not to a woman, although she is one of those legally now. But she still jokes that: “Sissy boys make the best wives”. Who could argue? Not me.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2020

Author's Note: Just one of those things I do, riffing on this image ....

Big
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

Guys my size can never become girls. That is what I thought.

When I was little, I would cry myself to sleep wishing that I had been a girl, but then I would wake up and face the reality. I was male, just like my father and my two brothers.

I often wondered why I was this way. My mother had a stillbirth between my older brother and me – a girl. Can a mother wish so hard for a girl that the next boy in her womb is born to feel like one?

She never treated me like a girl. I was just a boy like my brothers. We were all big and strong. Muscularity was in the family. My father was a wrestler and a college football player. We all followed him into the sports he loved. It was just expected.

He built and raced stock-cars as well and hiked and hunted in the woods. He took his sons with him. We loved him. We wanted him to love us back, and he did. A real man and his three sons – all chips off the old block.

In that environment, you suppress any thoughts of being a girl. And when those thoughts pop into your head, you look in the mirror and you see what you are. Your father’s son. A real man like him. You can’t hate yourself for being just like somebody you love.

I decided that I was not going to cry myself to sleep any more, I was going to be the best man that I could be and make my father proud. You must live with what you have got. I mean, some people are born without arms or legs. Do they cry? They just get on and live life with what they have. Some of them say: “I don’t need legs. I wouldn’t have them if you offered them to me”. That is the spirit. My curse is that I don’t have a pretty little vagina between my legs. So what?

But then you see pretty girls who used to be guys. It seemed to me, because I kept thinking about it, that they were all over the place. Somehow, I just had to tell myself that I could never be one of them, because I was a big guy.

I messed around with girls because all my friends were doing it, and after all, I was just like them - a guy. I met a great girl and we formed a relationship just like any other. Guys do some things as just guys, like going on the town together, and some things as couples. That is the way life is.

My feelings about the woman who was to become my wife were complicated, I guess. I mixed with men but loved women from afar, so as far as I was concerned, I was never attracted to men sexually. I liked everything about women – their clothes, their hair, their makeup, their bodies. So why did sex seem wrong? I could function sexually, but it did not seem right.

Because I was a big guy, I would let her go on top. I would close my eyes and imagine that I was a girl being fucked. That would send me off to another place, and the orgasms where from another planet. How would she know what I was thinking?

We got married because other guys were doing it, my brothers included. But I had trouble going through with it. “Do you take this man?” She said yes, but it occurred to me that it was a lie. I was not a man at all, inside anyway. But her oath came second. I had already agreed to take her. It was done.

I felt that I needed to tell her. We had a special relationship of trust. But I could not do it straight away. I did not want to upset her, but I had the feeling that I had betrayed her by marrying her in the first place. She could have a real man. That is what she deserved.

I had picked a truly good person to be my wife. She is the example that I have tried to live up to ever since. She was sad but sympathetic. I told her that if she wanted to shout and abuse me, she should.

“No,” she said. “You need to be the person you are meant to be.” Who would say that?

“Look at me,” I said to her. “I look like a man. I could never look like a woman. And I way too tall – too big.”

“Your shoulders are not as broad as your brothers,” she said. “Your hands and feet are not as big as theirs. Those are the things that surgery cannot change.”

Surgery? For the first time I started to consider that. My whole life had been spent wishing or wondering “if only”. Surgery is real. A knife into flesh. If only there was magic in the world. Instead we have cuts and stitches, and pain.

Really it never would have happened without her. She gave up her husband so he could become a woman. It was just that he was going to be a big one.

But she was right. The parts of me that I could not change could be concealed or disguised, and everything else could be changed by modern medicine: Surgery and hormone therapy. I just wanted to be pretty. I felt that if I had to be a big woman, I should be a big beautiful woman. There are plenty of examples to strive towards. Plus size models proud to be big. Transwomen who look more like women that most women.

I worked hard and I made money, and I saved. And when I was ready, I took the plunge. I told my family. My father was disgusted with me, but my brothers were strangely approving, as if one of us had been eliminated from the competition for Dad’s approval.

My mother was just confused. I think that she still is. She still doesn’t know what to call me. If she asks my father for guidance, on this point he ignores her, as he ignored me as I went through my changes.

I had facial feminization surgery first. I only wanted to prove that I could be attractive enough. It seemed that if I failed in that, maybe I could become somebody other than me - perhaps some kind of sexless in-between creature, without need of further surgery. But as it happened, when the swelling was down my wife and I were both surprised at how beautiful I was. It almost seemed to confirm that I had made the right choice.

The hormones were equally surprising. They seemed to eat away my muscles leaving in there place the most wonderful soft flesh under my newly smooth skin. My growing hair seemed thicker and soften, and lighter in color.

Some big girls are self-conscious of their height. They wear only flat shoes and often they stoop or bow their heads. That is not me. I like to walk proud. My legs look great in heels. But you could see people whispering – probably imagine the words: “That has to be a guy”. My challenge was to make it hard for them to believe it. “It could be girl, just a big one”. That was the whisper I wanted to hear.

I suppose that makes you pay more attention to something they call “deportment”. I took some courses. The trick is not to overdo it. No effeminate flourishes, just grace and elegance.

The voice is important too. To be totally convincing and then open your mouth and know the game is up, can be disheartening. I decided to have surgery to tighten my vocal chords. I was lucky there too. After almost a month of silence the tone developed into something perfect.

I discovered that being a girl is expensive. I was still able to work, but the woman I wanted to be needed more money than I could make. It was aggravated by the fact that my wife and I agreed to separate. We still love one another, but as girlfriends. She needed a man in her life, and I was no longer that. And I soon discovered that I needed one too.

She stayed with me through the final bottom surgery. She wept for the penis that she had lost, because it was no loss to me. I could not wait to test myself for depth, and pee sitting down. It was what I had always wanted. She understands because she loves being a woman. So do I.

I am not sure that I ever went looking for a man. It was just that once I knew that I was a complete woman, I am sure that I exuded it somehow. That combined with my now statuesque figure, long blond hair, long tanned legs, and no-nonsense attitude, attracts a certain kind of man.

I think some men look at big girls like me and say: “She would be a challenge to bed”. Sometimes I would tease a guy by wrapping my legs around him to pull him in, just letting him know that I had the strength. But the truth of it is that guys like their girls feminine, and that is the way I like me too.

I never wear pants, unless they are short. I have great legs, and I like to have a summer breeze breath directly on my gossamer thin panties so that my pussy feels almost totally exposed. I suppose it reminds me just how good it feels to have one.

Anyway, after dating a few guys I met Gilberto.
Of course, he is smaller than me. Actually, much smaller. When I am wearing my heels, his face is level with my tits. He doesn’t mind. He likes being level with my tits. He likes to put his face in between them, and I like that too.

I told him once that if I put my arms around him and fell on him it would be a killer body slam. He said that to die in my embrace would be to die happy. That is my guy.

But I am so girly that he knows that he could make me cry with a few nasty words, but he doesn’t do that. It is just my nature now. My aggressive past is all behind me now. I am a girl, which all I have ever wanted to be.

Just a big girl.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2020

Author’s Note:
This is for all those out there who have asked for a story about a big transwoman. Unfortunately the image is of cis-woman Victoria Silvstedt and her husband, but it is just perfect!

Bikini Bottoms
A Vignette
By Maryanne Peters

I like to think that you can see the old me in this photo – the blonde haired surfer with the broad shoulders. But I guess the beads ruin it … the beads and the one of my breasts visible.

He saved my life, you see. Surfers like I was like to think that there is no sea we cannot paddle out of, but the truth is that some still drown, especially when surfing isolated coves with known rips.

Our boards are our only hope, but when that is gone you are treading water without a life preserver. He was in his boat and he dragged me out of the water as if I was a rag doll, and lay me down on his deck, forcing the water out of me and giving me the kiss of life. That was truly what it was.

“I owe you my life,” I told him.

“I’ll take it, then,” he said, with a smile. I had no idea what that meant.

His name was Andre. He said that his father was Chinese and that according to Chinese tradition - “once you've saved a person's life, you're responsible for it forever.”

I said – “That sounds stupid. I am not responsible for anyone. I believe in what I see and feel – the sky, the wind and the sea”. I was full of that shit in those days.

“It doesn’t matter what you think,” he said. “I am bound to care for you, and if you look around you, I think that you will see that I can afford to do that.”

It was an impressive boat – a luxury ocean-going sailboat - the sky, the wind and the sea. My board was lost and my car I could pick up later. It seemed like a good idea to ride this wave wherever it took me. That is what you do when you catch the best wave. So I agreed to stay.

“I have clothes below that you can wear,” he said. “Not my clothes because you are clearly larger than me. My ex-wife was your size. Why not go to the master stateroom and find something.”

It may sound crazy, but that is how it all started. I found a floral dress in my size and I took out my man bun and went back to the helm where he was sitting expecting him to laugh out loud at how ridiculous I must have looked. He just nodded in approval.

Before we docked I had received him inside me a dozen times, my first experiences of gay sex, although that was not what it seemed to be. I have lived with him ever since – not on his boat but in his mansion on the point beyond the marina that carries a Chinese name – Tianfenghai, meaning the sky, the wind and the sea. Was it coincidence or was all this meant to be?

Somehow it seemed that way. I just fell into the role of a woman and a wife to Andre as if this was a future that has always been waiting for me. It is like the past never existed, or has gone the way that I suppose my car parked behind the dunes must have gone – rotted out by the sun and salt and covered in sand blown in by the wind. Things not needed simply decay and disappear, although that is not always true

I have not surfed since we got together. Now the breasts have grown through the hormones I wanted to take to please him, I can wear a bikini top and I often do. But something stands in the way of me being able to wear bikini bottoms.

Andre will pay to make it happen, but perhaps you understand how I feel. A little fearful and a little excited. Perhaps that is why I am fiddling with the beads. What should I do?

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2024

Billy’s Desires
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

I had convinced myself that being born male was the best thing in the world. I mean, men run it – the world I mean. Men are in charge. Women have babies. Women are meant to look pretty and look at their men adoringly, but they offer nothing when it comes to leadership or innovation – that was my position, back then. Somehow it seemed that the more I said it out loud, the truer it became.

All it did was piss my Mom off. I understand why. It was for me. It was to assure myself that I really wanted to be male. Even the fact that she was pissed made me feel more like a man.

So, then she decided that I needed to be taught a lesson. She had decided that I had to be a girl for a whole 48 hours. It just so happened that it was prom weekend, but that didn’t matter to me. I was not going. Prom was for girls so they can get dressed up, and I didn’t mix with girls, because that was not who I was.

I had to concede that I had been a prick and I agreed to take her punishment, thinking that I would have to just wear a pinny and help her around the house.

“If this is what you think being a woman is all about, then it just confirms that you need the full experience,” she said. “You’re not going to like this, but you are going to the prom tomorrow night as a girl. You remember my hairdresser Lisa? Well, her son needs a date and that is going to be you. You need to experience what it is like to look pretty’ like you said girls are meant to.”

How ironic is that? My own words coming back to hit me over the head. Despite whatever was going on inside, I dreaded the idea of having to step out as female.

It so happened that Mom had a prom dress. Mom was a dressmaker and this outfit had been abandoned by the girl who was to wear it to the prom, who tossed it at my mother after a fight with her boyfriend. My mother brought it home and started talking about how a dress like this had to be worn and admired. I didn’t realize it but she looked at the sizing and she looked at me, as I was ranting at her about some stupid girls on TV. I had no idea what was going on in her head. It was not until she had decided on my punishment that the dress reappeared.

“This dress will fit you perfectly, if we shape your body a little,” she said. “A prom dress needs a prom and now we have one.”

“I am not going to my school prom in drag!” I protested.

“Not your school, no,” she said. “Lisa’s son Roderick goes to the military academy on the edge of town. If you don’t want to go in drag, then you will have to go as a girl. That means looking like a girl and acting like a girl. That way Rod will be the only one to know your secret.”

My brother had gone to that military academy, paid for by the Army after my father was killed in Afghanistan. I could have gone too, but it was not for me. My brother was now in the service, and I was alone with Mom and not doing much. If she wanted to throw me out of the nest, there was no safety net. I would have to agree to what she wanted. It was to be an ordeal I would have to endure, as my father would have said it.

The weekend was still some way off, but as those weeks passed I found myself increasingly agitated by the thought of this prom thing, if agitated is the right word. I started to have a series of dreams. In each of them I had breasts and a vagina and long hair, and I was dressed in lacy underwear or a minidress or a ballgown or a bikini. I was either just being a girl or, on a couple of occasions I was in the company of a handsome young man. My only hope was that once this was done and over, these weird thoughts would end.

Then the evening before the Saturday prom my mother had me go around to Lisa’s salon to start “the preparation”. I soon discovered that this was going to be an all-over waxing, and had to be done the day before to ensure that any inflammation had time to decide. Lisa had opened the salon late just for me, and so like the horror movie, there was nobody to hear my screams.

“Your squeals are not high enough,” Mom said, less than sympathetically. “You need to raise your voice a few octaves to sound like a girl, rather than just spend the whole night not talking.” I guess the pitch did go up, but with not much effort on my part.

Mom spent the whole time telling me that I would not regret going to this effort. Lisa was telling me what a great guy her son Rod was such a great guy, and that he would look after me and ensure that I wasn’t embarrassed.

“Rod knows who you are, and he wants your secret maintained as well,” Lisa said. “So, it is up to you. I suggest that you spend some time watching girl movies and try to observe and imitate. A masculine step or a clumsy gesture might give you away.”

Next came the work on my hair. It was not going to be a wig but extensions in my hair that was already longer than most boys in my class.

“Is this necessary a full 24 hours in advance?” I had to ask.

“You need to get used to having hair like this,” said Lisa. “You need to care for it tonight and all day tomorrow, and then come back before the prom to have it styled. Makeup too – I will do it for you tomorrow, but I will show you how to do the basics tonight – mascara and lipstick. You may need to freshen up at the prom, so you need to know how.”

When I headed home I had long hair and I was wearing makeup, and when I got home Mom produced the undergarment that I would be wearing. It was a very tight one piece cinched my waist and had gel pads and a push up arrangement to allow for a visible cleavage. In the crotch was a place for my penis to lie in a channel and point down so I could pee like a girl. Over this I could wear lacy panties and a bra as well.

“Let me get the dress and we can try it on,” Mom said. “Maybe I need to take it in a little. Wait here.”

I stood in front of the full length mirror in her bedroom looking down at my legs, as smooth as a billiard ball and the redness already having disappeared. Then I looked up and into the mirror.

I saw a girl standing there. She could have been naked. The shaping garment was flesh colored and almost invisible in dim light. A pretty naked girl stood there with her breasts and her hairless feminine crotch, looking afraid and yet gorgeous. He bra strap-length straight hair hung down and her makeup showed her big anxious eyes. She was beautiful.

Beautiful women make people smile, and she smiled back. She flicked back a lock of hair and turned a little, angling her leg to show off her shape and how good she might look in heels.

The crazy thing was that whatever masculinity I thought I had seemed to have evaporated so quickly that I wondered if it was ever there in the first place.

Mom appeared with the dress. I think that she caught me admiring myself but she said nothing. She had me put it on, and she had found a pair of shoes for me to wear – black heels that would look great with the red dress – even I knew that.

The dress was a perfect fit, but not the shoes.

“That settles it,” said Mom. “We will need to go to the mall tomorrow and buy a new pair.”

“Ok,” I said. I was looking at the girl in the mirror – she was looking forward to a shopping trip.

“You will need to remove that makeup and tie back your hair, and put on some night cream,” said Mom. It all sounded so feminine and so inviting somehow. I did exactly what was instructed. I used one cream and then the other, and marveled at my smooth skin.

I fell asleep easily, and those dreams returned. But this time I was on a bed lying naked with my ample breasts exposed and my crotch carrying just a small tuft of pubic hair above my wet vagina. Inside that vagina was a cock, and attached to that was a man, smiling down at me and shaking my breasts and my curls which each of his solid, manly strokes. Rather than wake up with a start, I just laid my head on the pillow and hoped that it would last forever.

In the morning Mom suggested that we head to the mall early.

“Rather than watch movies you can watch girls in their natural habit and learn their behaviors,” said Mom, imitating a wildlife documentary. “Now, we just need to put together something to wear that would not embarrass a girl your age. I may need to go into my stock to find something.”

She had plenty. She picked out a few and asked me to pick something.

“Good choice,” she said. “You are really getting into this, Billy. In fact, while we are out, I will need to call you something else. What about Willow?”

That was who I became that day. Willow and her mother went to the Mall and enjoyed moth daughter time. It was wonderful. We found the perfect shoes and sat at the juice bar just watching all the other women who were just loving life being women. That was the way it seemed. Men seemed to be gruff and determined and they were often alone. Women like groups, and talk, and pretty things. It was like finding where I belonged.

We had a late lunch and then found that it was time to go to Lisa’s salon for the final makeover. This time the salon was full, and it seemed that everybody knew that the pretty girl at the end of the row was Willow and she was going on her first prom with Rod, Lisa’s daughter.

Their excitement made the excitement build in me, and when I saw the final version of me ready for my social debut and was ecstatic. I looked so beautiful I could not believe it. All of the feminine feelings that I had bashed down my whole life seemed to just spew out of me. I now understood – this is who I dreamed of being. All the rubbish I spouted had been just a way of denying who I was.

I could not wait to get home and put on my dress. As I rushed out the door the ladies in the salon, staff and customers, applauded and wished me well.

I looked around my bedroom and I knew things had to change. I ripped some posters off the wall right then. I needed the dark colors to go and to get some light in there, and plenty of mirrors to admire the new me. I might even paint in pink. But that was all to come later. I needed to be ready for Rod.

I had a moment of concern as I waited for the doorbell. What would he be like? Surely he would not be nasty and cruel like Billy? But more importantly, would he like me? Then I realized that these were the thoughts that any girl would have. That was what I was – a girl like any other girl.

I went to the bathroom, and I sat down to pee, pulling down my panties and peeing with the assistance of what I wore underneath. I decided that I would put a panty liner in place, just in case.

Then the doorbell rang. I primped a little as Mom called for me to come down, and then I paused. This was going to be my entrance. It could not be rushed. I slipped on my brand-new heels and walked down the stairs.

There was Rod and my mother waiting. Mom was beaming with pride, and Rod was beaming too. In fact, he looked awestruck, which made me feel awesome.

“My mom told me that you were a stunner, but I was not prepared for this,” said Rod. His voice sounded like warm molasses and as I drew near I could see that he was taller than me even in my heels, and that under his suit he was muscled. He was a little older than me perhaps, but he was a man, in every sense of that word. He had a corsage for me and he slipped in on my wrist.

“Hello Willow,” he said. “Will you accompany me to the prom tonight as my date?”

It was all arranged so this was unnecessary, but it was a wonderful question to hear. I sounded just like “will you marry me”, so of course, there was only one answer.

“Yes.” I breathed it as if it was my last breath.

He had a car and driver waiting and he held the door. It was heavenly. As we rode through to the academy he briefed me on who would be there – his friend and their girlfriends. I just looked at him and nodded, thinking nothing except how wonderful this all was. It was a Cinderella story. I had been living in ashes and now I was a princess, in the backseat of a car with a prince.

“Nobody knows your secret,” he whispered as we arrived. “It is just between us.”

“Why me?” I asked. “You could have any girl. I can see that. But I am not yet a girl. I am incomplete.”

My words seemed to confirm to myself that I was not going back. I had taken a step into the ocean and I was not getting out until I got to the other side, there made complete.”

“I have always dreamed of a girl just like you,” he said. “My mother has known about it, and she must have talked to your mother. I want to help you to become the woman that you need to be.”

There, in the car, he gave me the first kiss we ever shared. There would be plenty more, that night and every day since.

And after that prom we shared an even deeper connection, if you know what I mean.

Oh my God! His name is Rod, and I know why.

The End
2540

© Maryanne Peters 2024

Author’s Note: I must have written dozens of little vignettes on this theme – rebellious teenager is forced or persuaded to dress as a girl to date a young man to the prom

Births Deaths and Marriages
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

Allan Bingley was not the sort of man who you might think of as a criminal.

He has a small open and honest looking face on a small non-descript body, slightly flabby. He had very little hair on his head. Alopecia rather than pattern baldness, had robbed him of his hair when he was not yet thirty. His mother assured him that it would grow back. It never did. And now she was dead.

He did not need money so much that he needed to steal it. He had no vices or expensive hobbies. He watched TV. He read, particular books of a maritime nature. He prided himself that he was a sailor, and had once thought to save to buy a boat. But sadly, he was prone to seasickness. Only rarely would he go to sea on a rented boat, and that was only when the weather was calm and wind too light to get him out of the bay.

His only other interests were calligraphy and scrapbooking. He was quite an accomplished calligrapher and his stationer occasionally gave him small commissions – birth announcements, wedding invitations, funeral sheets. Highly coincidental perhaps, because that was his work too – births deaths and marriages.

He had worked for the BDM Registrar for his entire working life. Not a choice, really, just where he was placed. The work was not particularly interesting, but it helped to feed Allan’s romantic notions about lost family members, children swapped at birth, bigamist weddings, incest, rape and murder. What else can one think about in a room full of paper?

No, it was not money or the lack of it, but boredom that drove him to consider a new life. Not for that end, but for the interest and excitement that would be generated getting there.

But how could he commit a crime? He did not have the skills. He spent some time working on developing skills in forgery. His interest in writing and in setting out documents were a good start, but he still lacked a target. And then he happened upon something at work that gave him an idea.

It concerned an insurance claim upon the wife of a woman who had apparently never left her husband’s home. The insurance company had her body but needed to check whether she was the insured life and that she was married to her husband claiming under the policy.

Without any particular object in mind at that time, Allan decided to create a wife for himself, purely from documents.

According to the birth certificate, Melissa Jane Devlin was born about two years after him at the local hospital, only daughter of Gareth John Devlin and Elisabeth Dido Devlin nee Caulder. They had birth certificates too. And happily, a marriage certificate. And less happily, a death certificate each. Melissa and Allan had met and got married less than a year ago. It was a private affair. Registry Office. Officiating had been a celebrant (now deceased) with Allan’s mother (recently deceased) being one witness and the other being Melissa’s best friend Monica, since returned home to the Netherlands.

Allan even had a wedding photo. He was most pleased. He has constructed it using photo editing software on his personal computer. He was the groom, and he was the bride too. He had tried feminising himself on the photo only, but he discovered that it was easier to buy some make up from the pharmacy and do some work on himself before taking a few shots. He then selected a hairstyle and a wedding outfit from the internet (nothing too fancy for a private affair) and added those. His round face and large eyes made for a pretty face without his glasses on.

He was so pleased with the look that he was able to achieve that he bought a floral dress and a wig over the internet and took some more shots of his female self. He kept one on his desk. If anybody asked he would say: “Oh, that’s my wife.”

In fact, few people noticed the photograph - few people noticed Allan. Of all of those who did the two or three all remarked: “Together you just look the perfect couple.” They meant that Allan and his wife looked made for each other, like two parts of the same person, which (of course) they were.

There was almost as much fun to be had in creating Melissa as there was in planning for her death and the pay-out on her policy. But first he had to insure her and wait a decent period of time before knocking her off.

“You should have reciprocal policies,” the insurance agent said. “You get paid out on her life, she gets paid out on yours. We discount it to a single policy cost if there is no pay-out should you both die simultaneously.”

It sounded reasonable, and the premia were not as large as Allan expected, but there was a catch. “You will need a medical check-up and confirmation of general good health to get this policy,” the agent said.

Now here (sadly) was the end of the whole idea. Melissa could not get a medical certificate, because there was no Melissa. To find someone to stand in broke Allan’s first rule for the Perfect Crime: ‘No accomplices. And forging a medical certificate, even though Allan thought he could do it, left too many holes. There would be no medical records to back up such a document.

Under the reciprocal policy Allan could get a certificate, which would undoubtedly establish his own good health, but that meant only Melissa would get paid out. And the whole idea was that Melissa would die, not Allan. But it was not as if Allan really had a life worth preserving. And maybe a widow might be paid out sooner.

So, before he even bought the policies Allan began to consider his own death. It would be easier if he died. A boating accident. While he was at sea, solo. That made more sense. He did not like the idea of Melissa’s loss at sea, because he would have to be there, and face questions as the survivor. No, a husband’s death is easier to explain, in particular because she so rarely left the house. I mean, nobody had ever seen her outside the house – for reasons obvious to you, me and Allan.

He bought the reciprocal policies. He still had options. He dies. She dies. Or he just chickens out and nobody dies.

The problem with his death would be that she would have to lodge the claim and collect. She needed to be real, only for a few small tasks. The photograph on his desk of the small pretty woman in the sundress with the bob hairstyle, would need to come to life, if only for a few short scenes. That was a daunting prospect.

He decided that he needed to try to appear as Melissa in public. Not near his home or workplace, at least not at first. He needed to test his ability at a distant location, at least until he was confident.

Being a methodical person, Allan did some research in “passing as female”. He was surprised to find a huge amount of information on the internet, together with helpful videos from the many men who appeared to have chosen to live as women. Many of them appeared much less plausible than he did with not much effort.

The internet offered him a huge insight into transvestitism and transgenderism. Allan had no such inclinations, but the whole thing was quite fascinating to a person who had so few interests. This whole exercise had become a major focus for Allan – an exciting adventure with a clever crime at its heart, and now with exotic disguise and deception. Delightful!

Again, making sure that anything he did was anonymous, and not near to his home town, he obtained a prescription for contact lenses and bought some over the internet, coloured blue. He liked the idea of Melissa being a blue-eyed blonde, and he altered the wedding photos to match. He shaved his entire body, which he could easily conceal at work. Over the internet he bought body shaping underwear and a few items of women’s clothing.

On weekends he would dress as Melissa and drive some distance to a neighbouring town to visit the supermarket or browse the main street, in women’s clothes and the wig, with a little makeup. He found that he had a talent for makeup after following some guides on the web. He found that it was a bit like scrapbooking, as strange as that may sound. There was outline, color, balance, and the overall look.

Like his head, his face was almost devoid of hair. With makeup he felt confident that he looked female. And he had looked at online videos on deportment. He could even introduce himself to strangers using these skills and the voice he was developing. Then he would drive home and drive straight into his garage, using the connecting door to the house.

Allan Bingley was a methodical and conscientious man, and he applied these traits to developing he feminine alter ego. He was careful when pushing the boundaries, but seemed to achieve when he did. He started to use the telephone as Melissa, even calling the office to excuse Allan for a sick day – a day to be spent entirely as Melissa.

When he was confident he decided to sit a driving test as Melissa, to add to her paperwork. That involved sitting the test at the D & V dressed as Melissa, and then sitting the test alongside the examiner for almost an hour. The examiner was an older man who clearly never guessed that he was not sitting alongside a woman. He called Melissa “Darling” a few times, and was very helpful and complimentary of her driving. Melissa was shy but competent, and became obviously excited to pass. Allan enjoyed the whole thing, perhaps a little more than he should.

Allan also invested in a life size doll, so that Allan could be seen to take Melissa for a drive. They needed to be seen together. He really did not want anyone to have a close look, for obvious reasons, but he felt that he needed to eliminate the risk that a relationship might be doubted. For that reason he would make a point of pointing out “my Wife Melissa is in the car over there,” or such things to that effect.

He also had Melissa apply for a Social Services number and a passport. For each he dressed and was photographed as her. All of it was preparation for his demise. But he had plenty of time to prepare.

Now, Allan had the advantage of privacy. He lived in the house that had belonged to his parents, surrounded by a garden. He was able to spend time at home as Melissa. When he did he dressed as her completely. He had even opened the door as her a couple of times. Once a neighbour called about a drain problem up the street, and invited Melissa to call in for coffee. She politely declined, but only to defer it. She would need to be able to do it, sooner or later.

Allan began to enjoy unwinding as Melissa. He worked in the garden as Allan, but curiously he found that around the house, Melissa was tidier, cooked better than he did, and most certainly ironed his shirts better and faster. She preferred television to reading. She was better at the scrapbooking side, than calligraphy, which was his thing.

That is not to say that some kind of split personality was developing. It was just that Allan was different when he wore a dress and became Melissa. He liked being her. Especially when he went to bed. For some reason he now went to bed every night in a nightie instead of pyjamas.

It was not the thrill of crossdressing. Allan had read about that. There was no masturbation or anything as tawdry as that. He just felt more relaxed. He thought of Melissa as a less complex than himself, and perhaps a better person. The crime he was executing was his doing, not hers.

An odd thing happened when he was turning out some of his mother’s old stuff, looking for something that might be useful to Melissa. He found some jewellery that he thought might be useful, and then he happened upon a large box of oestrogen HRT tablets. He recalled that his mother had acquired a prescription to treat some menopause related problem, but it appeared that the box had never been opened. It just fell out onto the bed. He opened the box and swallowed a couple of the pills. It was just because he was dressed as Melissa. He took them only when he as dressed as her.

The most immediately noticeable effect was that the hair on his head started to grow back – fine and fair, and all over his head like a young child’s hair. He had to shave his head before going to work, to keep looking normal. But he decided that when he was dead, the new Allan would have a full mop of hair. There would be a new Allan after the old one would be lost at sea and the Melissa disguise ditched. He would be a very different person – he felt sure of that.

That new Allan was another exercise that diverted him. To be safe he created three new male identities, all of which could be used. Their names are unimportant now, but all had real birth certificates and family connections beyond verification. All had their own back-stories cleverly composed by Allan, with a little help from Melissa.

Allan had chosen the date of his death, but it came and went. His plan was good, but Allan lacked the resolve. He had become comfortable. Or maybe it was her. She enjoyed the simple home life, and the promise of life on a distant shore was less magnetic. It seemed almost as if she was holding him back, but the truth is that Allan liked to have her living is his house, and he liked driving with her beside him, even if she was only plastic.

But Allan decided that the third deadline he had set, must be met.

The plan was simple: Melissa would drop Allan at the boat he would charter after work on Friday evening. He would make his presence known for placement purposes, and then go below for the evening. After he disappeared into the cabin, Melissa would then drive to Hardwicke and park the car. He had bought a small dinghy in Hardwicke for cash, some weeks before, with an outboard motor. Under cover of darkness he would motor back to the marina and tie the dinghy to the back of the boat before heading out.

He had an idea that he would sail about all Saturday and be seen, but the weather forecast was not good so he decided that he would do everything that night. He had worked out how to sink the boat quietly, while getting aboard the dinghy. He then had to endure the trip back to Hardwicke in increasingly bad weather. He made it and got back to the car for the journey home.

Melissa woke up on Saturday morning feeling free. She put her wig on and looked at herself in the mirror. She could of course, be Allan today and work in the garden, but he was dead. The garden was his thing. She decided that she would go into the village instead.

“So, you’re Allan’s wife,” said Leticia, the lady in the gift shop. She was the only person to take any notice, only because she was the local busy-body.

“I am a bit of a home body, I’m afraid,” explained Melissa. “I don’t get out much. Allan does the errands but he is away on a solo sailing trip this weekend. I can’t stand boating. I get seasick very easily.” She found it quite easy to natter away. I occurred to her that she was far more sociable than Allan thought she was. Far more sociable than she should be.

She bought some wool and knitting needles at the gift shop. It was a whim. Now she would have to learn how to knit. The forecasted storm came in that afternoon so she had time.

On Sunday evening Melissa Bingley called the police: “It might be too early to be worried, but my husband Allan has not come home. He was supposed to back well before dark.”

Of course, the Police have a policy of waiting, but when missing at sea is a prospect there is a call to coast watchers. Melissa was able to give some details of the boat. She told them: “I dropped him off on Friday night and we had a meal onboard. He was going to head out at dawn yesterday, and be back before dusk tonight.

The storm supported the story of Allan Bingley’s loss at sea. It was not a major one, but could clearly cause difficulties for a solo sailor of limited experience. It was only a few days later that the Police told Melissa to be prepared for the worst, and only a day after that the life ring bearing the name of the boat was recovered – a sort of bright orange headstone confirming his death, displayed in a picture in the local paper.

Two police officers called – one male and the other female. “It is still subject to a coroner’s inquest, but we have to assume that your husband has be lost at sea, assumed dead.” It was blunt, a little heartless, and just what she wanted to hear. But despite that, tears flowed from Melissa’s big blue eyes. Perhaps it was the realization that Allan was really gone, and gone for good.

With Allan being such a private person, Melissa expected no other visitors, but she was surprised when they came. There was Leticia from the gift shop, with two other local ladies, and a small group from the BDM Office. The local vicar called. Melissa found herself entertaining – just to offer tea and receive warm commiserations. To her surprise, she liked having visitors. The only annoying thing was that she had to behave as a grieving widow, which was not her inclination Melissa was essentially a happy person.

After a period that anybody would think of as reasonable, Melissa her claim with the insurers. There were forms to fill in, the right to an immediate payment, and a process through to the final large pay-out. That process involved waiting for the coroner’s verdict, but also a visit from the insurance investigator – Mark Dovey.

He sat on her sofa with a cup of the tea she had just made. He began with the usual sympathies before being very direct: “This is a very large sum of money, and a policy less than two years old, so the insurer always looks closely at such claims.”

Melissa dabbed her eyes. For some reason she had put on quite a lot of mascara that day, probably because she knew that it showed off her big blue eyes beautifully, and she had something to bat at the man who would help her collect. She said: “Nothing can compensate me for the loss of my husband.”

She thought that she saw something in the nature of genuine sympathy in Mark’s eyes. For a man who called it bluntly the tender look seemed out of place. The thought occurred to her that she might have won him over. She tucked her hair behind one ear. She felt very feminine, and slightly empowered. It was a good feeling.

“Can I ask why you took out this policy?” Mark was referring to a questions sheet.

“It was all Allan’s idea. He just wanted to ensure my life. He said I was the most valuable thing in the world. It was the insurance agent who suggested his life be insured too. Reciprocal was what it was called, I think. You should ask the agent. His name is on the policy.” She answered this and other questions on the sheet.

“I see that we do not a medical for you on file,” he said. “But we have one for him, and we are only concerned about him. He was healthy, so his sudden loss must be a real shock.”

It was, of course. But he was the one who had to die. That was now confirmed.

“I will call on you again,” he said, as he left. “I’m afraid that the coroner’s verdict will take time, there being no body. The policy allows for your full support in the meantime.”

Melissa received that support, plus there was a pension from the BDM Office. There was a good income being received, Allan’s mortgage free home was now hers, her expenses were low.

Leticia and her husband were keen gardeners and came around regularly to work in the garden for her. They refused her money, but she always made them a Sunday lunch, with wine.

“I just have never liked gardening,” said Melissa. Which is strange, because Allan loved it. “I prefer having friends in my home.” Which was something Allan disliked intensely.

Through Leticia and her husband, she met others in the village. They all remarked that her late husband Allan, despite living in the village for many years, since he moved there with his parents at the age of fourteen, had been rarely seen. He was an introvert – quite the opposite to her obvious extrovert nature.

After a few months Melissa felt able to confide in her new friends: “We were probably a mismatch, Allan and me. I am not withdrawn like him. I let him keep me to himself because I did love him, but I am enjoying life without him. Am I sinful to say it?”

One morning, well after Allan’s death but still a month before the coroner’s inquest, Melissa stepped out of the shower and looked at herself in the mirror. Without her wig on she could see her short fair hair had grown out. On her chest were two definite breasts. Her hairless body seemed almost curvy. She tucked the incongruous penis between her legs to complete the picture. She wondered how this body would look in a bikini on the foreign beach Allan had dreamed of. This body, not his, or any one of the other three men she could become.

She suddenly realized that since Allan had disappeared she had never lived a moment other than as Melissa. She woke every morning and dressed as Melissa, she took her pills, she cleaned the house as Melissa, she watched Melissa’s favorite TV shows, went out and met people as Melissa, she cooked her meals and went to bed as Melissa. Allan was truly gone

Summer was coming and she was learning to dislike the wig. Could she get away with her own hair? She made an appointment at the local hairdresser.

“But you have such beautiful hair, and a lot of it” said the hairdresser that afternoon. “It is short but we can give you a pixie cut, or maybe even a few light curls.”

It was Melissa’s first time at a salon, but she decided that she liked it, and that she would be going to the hairdresser more often. She liked the pampering and the chatter. It made her feel more like the woman she was.

“You have cut your hair,” was the first thing Mark Dovey said to her when they met at the inquest.

“I am trying to change my life,” explained Melissa. “I am trying to move on. I hope that we can settle things after today.”

She sat through the witnesses. There was the Boat charter company and the man on the wharf who reported seeing the car arrive at the boat, Allan on it, and his wife drive off before dark. The cabin lights were on when he left the dock. The policeman referred to the likely time of a sinking during the storm on Saturday afternoon. He produced the life ring and some other items of flotsam, but referring to tidal charts he concluded that: “The location of the wreck is unknown and finding it would be almost impossible. The body of Mr Bingley may never be recovered.”

The verdict recorded was: “Death by accidental causes at sea in the region of Hardwicke Harbour”.

Melissa found herself squeezing the hand of Mark, who was sitting next to her. For the first time she fell a pang of genuine sadness for the death of Allan Bingley. It was as if he really was dead.

“Thank you for being here,” she said to Mark. It was his job to be there, but she thanked him anyway.

“Can I take you for a drink?” he asked her. And there was nothing she wanted more.

“I’m going to fast track things as quickly as I can,” said Mark. It was close to the end of his third large scotch, and he slurred the words slightly. Melissa was well through her third Chardonnay, which was now her drink of choice. Her capacity for liquor seemed to have reduced, but she knew that the goodwill of this man was essential to achieving her objective.

“Neither of us are driving, so I think we should share a cab,” he said. The night was warm as they stood together on the kerb. He said: “I like your hair style but I do confess I prefer longer hair.” His hand was touching it.

“I will grow it longer, then,” she said.

He kissed her. It was totally inappropriate. Why then did she drop her handbag so that she could put both her arms around his neck?

They got into the cab and sat apart. He said: “That was wrong. I am in the middle of an assessment. It was unprofessional and I apologise.”

She now knew her objective, which had been unclear when she found her lips against his. She said: “I enjoyed it. I want to do it again. But I agree, only after the claim is processed. It would seem to me that after that, our personal lives are our own affair.”

Whether those words counted or not, things did indeed, advance quickly. Within a week Melissa had formal notification. The money was hers. It just needed to come in.

Mark called and suggested that he take her out to dinner to celebrate. He told her where he was taking her and she knew that she would have to wear something nice. She decided to buy something. She had the money, even if she might have no need of women’s clothes within a short time. She found the right dress, and to wear it she needed a push up bra with special inserts. She was surprised at the bosom she was able to achieve with minimum added volume, not to mention the way the lower part of the dress hugged her hips and rear end.

She went to the hairdresser and had a slight wave put in her hair, and a professional evening make up job. She bought black heels and tights. After all, this was a celebration so she wanted to go all out. The result was amazing.

He thought so too. She had to laugh as she reached out to push up his chin closing his open mouth. She asked: “Have you never seen a little black dress before?”

She talked and talked. She flirted shamelessly. When she got up she bent over so that he could see her breasts wobbling in the cups. She was using the body she now had. She had to flick off her shoes under the table and she found her foot caressing his leg, then he thigh, and finally making contact with his crotch. She smiled at him. He was 100% entranced by her. She had never known such power and such joy. She was totally absorbed by it.

She had a thought that this was Melissa’s last big night out. After she collected she would sell the house and move away. She would choose a new identity. She now had the added complication of having breasts that needed to be removed, but she would become a wealthy man in some distant spot, as yet not determined.

“Do you like children,” asked Mark, out of the blue, as they finished dessert.

“I have always wanted children, but Allan was not keen,” said Melissa, musing towards the ceiling. The words had just popped into her head but seemed honest. “Why do you ask that question?”

“I am a widower with three children,” he said. “Maybe I should have said so before. But I’m alone like you. I think that you would be a great mother, and I am sure that you would be a great wife…”.

She looked at him directly. He was looking at her. Somehow his eyes seemed to be larger than usual. Melissa was suddenly very confused.

“I was just hoping that you might be mine. Wife, I mean. Melissa, this may be far too early for you, but I am telling you now, I want you to be my wife.”

“Mark, this is our first date.” You could hardly call the drinks after the inquest a date. But she could see that he was serious. Melissa should have been in a state of panic, but she was so flattered she hardly thought about the position she was in.

“I feel I know you completely,” he said. “It has been almost nine months since I first met you. I think that I fell for you then, but it seems that with each week that has passed since then you have become more and more beautiful. And, just so you know, I am not a gold digger. I am in fact, quite wealthy - through my family, not my work as an insurance assessor. I am only interested in you, not your money.”

The money. It was not yet in her hands. It occurred to her that Mark still had the power to stop the payout. She could not upset him by a blunt refusal. She needed to delay him.

Options: ‘I’ll give you an answer when I have the cash’ – cynical; ‘It’s too soon after Allan’s death’ – not plausible. ‘I don’t know you well enough’ – a little insulting after what he had just said. So, Melissa said: “I’d love to meet your children. Let’s see what they think. I am making no commitment.”

The cab stopped at her house first and he got out to open the door for her and walk her up the path. They kissed on her doorstep. It was wonderful. It felt nothing like it should. There was nothing unnatural about it. Just a man kissing a woman. And her kissing him back.

She dreamt of him that night. She dreamt that she was a bride. Not like Allan’s bride, but as a beautiful bride in a church wedding with attendants. He was in front or her saying “I do”. Then her white stockinged legs were in the air, and in a sea of taffeta he was between her legs, plunging into her warm and wet pussy, crying out “Oh Melissa, I love you, I love you”. She woke with a start. Her hand went to her crotch. She felt a penis there. But rather than feel relief, there was a tinge of disappointment.

As she got dressed for the visit to Mark’s home she thought to herself: ‘If I could, I would marry this man, but it is impossible. I just need for his children to hate me and that will be an end of it’. But she was not prepared to look bad. In fact, in the sundress with the flower clip in her hair, she looked great.

Neither Allan nor Melissa had any knowledge of children, other than the fact that they had once been a small lonely boy, an only child with an inability to make friends. It was something that Melissa was trying to put right.

But she was totally unprepared for the welcome that she was to receive from Mark’s two sons, and his lovely daughter Amelia. Her first question for Melissa was: “Are you a princess?” And Melissa felt like one. She decided very quickly that she loved children, and she also decided that Mark was a wonderful father. Was there any imperfection to be found in this man?

When the children finally went to bed, she and Mark sat on the sofa and watched some TV. She snuggled up to him. She had recently come to the realisation that she needed to be in physical contact with another person to be truly happy. This was a new thing entirely, but it was now undeniable.

“The children love you,” he said. “But I knew they would. They want you to be their mother. They want you to be my wife.”

And that was what she wanted too. It was just that it could not be. There was a small obstruction. A small but serious thing in the way.

So when the money did arrive the following week, that little thing had to be removed. Melissa had to take her leave of the man she loved for a month to make the necessary changes. He only agreed on the basis that she agreed to marry him upon her return. Which is what she did.

Now Melissa has all that she wants: She had a house and a family, and a husband who makes love to her at least twice a week, bringing her to orgasms beyond her wildest dreams.

She reasoned that there was no crime after all. Allan Bingley was a real person and he had died. He was no more. Like many who are gone, there was nobody left to mourn him. After his house was sold there was no trace of him anywhere. Except maybe the dinghy in the Hardwicke boatyard, and the man who had seen it come ashore with the small bald man on board, the night that man was supposed to have been lost at sea.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2018

Blind Date
A Vignette
By Maryanne Peters

I would like to be able to say that I had no hand in it, but that would not be true. We all knew what we were doing – it was a joke at Al’s expense. The problem was that we all seemed to have left Al behind. We were all fully developed as men by the time we graduated high school, but Al never seemed to have quite got there. I suppose that we might try to excuse what we did by saying that we teed him up with a blind date that might help him to “man up”, but how would a transwoman be able to do that?

The fact is that I did not even meet “Tiffany”. The guys who did, said that she looked pretty good, but she would be bigger than Al. I am not even sure whether she still had her man-tackle, but I am told that you never ask the question. Anyway, Callum and Luke paid her some money but told her not to mention it to Al. This was a blind date, not on a job.

We learned later how it all went down. She had spotted Al straight away and introduced herself. He did his usual - “My name is Alister. My friends call me Al, but I prefer Alister.” We were told that Al did not realize she was anything other than a woman until she told him, but by then they had got to talking and so the date kept going.

Maybe it was something she said or maybe it was later when they got to his place and sex was not going to happen, but at some point she said – “You’re not really much of a guy, are you?” Well, not those words, but the message was clear. Al says that she saw something in him – that he was trying to prove something to us that could never be proven. Anyway, she said – “Maybe you should try being a girl. It has worked for me. I have never looked back. But then I always knew. Maybe you don’t?”

It still makes it hard for anybody to understand why Al would have agreed. What we were told was that while he was initially terrified, she was able to persuade him. It was intended as an experiment. It was about giving him a view from the other side. It would make him a better man, or prove that maybe he was not a man at all.

Tiffany had a gentleman client and she arranged for him to take “Alice” out for another blind date. All she had to do was to bring “Alice” into being. We were told that it was easy to do, and with what we know now that seems to be very true.

This gentleman client (his name was Hugh) was clearly fascinated by transwomen, but he was indeed, a gentleman. He just treated Alice like a lady. He told her that she was beautiful and that she – “moved with a grace that cannot be imitated and confirms that in your soul you are female”. He probably says that to all the “girls”, but I guess it had an impact on Al.

The reality is that Alister became Alice, and all of this happened because we had set up this blind date. We were all waiting to hear what had happened and the only thing that we had received from Al was a message that he would tell us all about it when we got together for a few beers a couple of weeks later.

We were busting to know, so we all got to the bar early and had a good laugh. The guys were taking bets about whether they had fucked, and who was on top. I was part of that, I have to admit.

And then Alice walked into the bar. She walked right up to us. I think that we could all see that this girl looked a bit like Al but I for one did not believe that it was him. I thought that it was some clever practical joke and I looked behind her to see whether Al was following, maybe hiding from sight, while he had turned the gag onto us.

“Hi guys,” said Alice, in a perky feminine voice. “The date was a huge success. I am Alice now.”

Callum and Luke were just staring with their chins almost in their beer mugs. None of us could say anything. “Alice” did a little twirl to show off her floral print dress and shapely shaved legs above heeled sandals. There was no wig – just a dyed blonde pixie cut – and the makeup was light, just as any girl might wear.

“Thanks to you guys I met Tiffany, and through Tiffany I met Hugh, and they were both able to show me who I really am.” Alice was fizzing – nothing like the Al we knew. But it was him alright, or it had been.

“Do you like what you see,” she said, addressing the wall of silence in a playful mood. “Russ?” She turned to me, as if sensing that I was drawn to her, which I was. “Do you like the new me?”

I muttered something about being surprised … but supportive. The other guys nodded.

“We had no idea that you were trans,” mumbled Callum.

“Here’s the thing – neither did I,” she said chirpily. “I have found out a lot about myself in the last few weeks. I love being a girl, and I really like sex with men. Do you guys know any?” She looked around the three of us, accusingly, I suppose.

“I would date you, but not while you still had a dick,” said Luke, trying to put a smile on things.

“I have an enlarged clitoris but a functioning back pussy, and a tongue,” she said, poking the tip of it out between painted lips.

“I would date you,” blurted Callum. I had the impression that his pants had suddenly become very uncomfortable, but I was not about to look under the table to confirm that.

“Oh goody!” she squealed. “But you should be warned that odd things can happen when you date a T-girl? Are you sure that you can come through a date with your manhood intact?”

Callum seemed only too keen to try, and despite his misgivings Luke seemed up for it as well – at a later date of course. But as for me – I admit that I was reticent. She was just so different and so full of life and fun; I have to say that there was a part of me that wondered if I was that sure of my masculinity.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2023

Erin’s seed: A young man, 18 or 19, very underdeveloped but has been trying to be a guy for his buddies. They set him up with a blind date who turns out to be a transwoman. She tells him that he really is a poor excuse for a guy and maybe he should try being a girl. He's kind of afraid of this idea but she is a bit pushy, perhaps thinking she's saving him from doing the wrong thing, so she educates him. He's gorgeous as a woman and he decides to go see his friends and they have trouble believing he is the same person. In fact a couple of them think he's cute enough to date. He warns them that based on anecdotal evidence being a girl seems to maybe be contagious?

Bloomer Girl
A Short Story suggested by Eric
By Maryanne Peters

The following story, the first seven paragraphs of which are shown here, comes from the Sporting News (then a baseball-only newspaper) of December 4, 1924:

WHEN PETTIGREW LOST HIS GIRLISH FIGURE
A Little Story of a Veteran Minor Leaguer
PONCA CITY, Okla., Nov. 30 --- "Gents, meet Miss Maude Nelson." It was thus back in the early 1900's, that Ned Pettigrew was introduced to the members of the baseball teams throughout the West and Southwest, when their respective towns were visited by Jack DeRoss' "Bloomer Girl" team. It was, to be exact, in 1901, that these "Bloomers" visited old Oklahoma Territory, playing at Guthrie, Oklahoma City and various other towns in what is now Oklahoma.
Ned Pettigrew was the star pitcher for the girls' team. Almost all the other members were girls, who had been organized into such a team and were piloted about the country by DeRoss. There was no girl that could throw a ball equal to the occasion, however, and Pettigrew -- who has since lost his girlish figure -- was secured to do mound duty. And he was exceptionally good. On the day the Bloomers played at Guthrie, they shut out the home team, 6 to 0, with Pettigrew in the box.
Pettigrew was in Ponca City the other day, helping in the organization of the new Mid-Continent League for 1925, to be composed of Cushing, Ponca City, Enid and Blackwell in Oklahoma, and Arkansas City, Wingfield and perhaps Eureka and Wellington in Kansas. He was here with the Cushing fellows and it is generally understood that he will again manage the Cushing team next year and play centerfield as usual.
"We had a lot of fun while the Bloomer Girls were on the road," said Pettigrew. "I had to keep my mouth shut, of course, from when we got into a new town until the game was over, for I had too deep a voice for a girl, but I had the figure all right, and in almost every instance we got through a game without the fans knowing that I was not really a girl.
"My playing name was Maude Nelson, and as such I was introduced, although I was supposed to be DeRoss' wife. Jack always carried my glove to the baseball field and played at catch with the rest of the team until I arrived. He would always refer to me as his wife. Invariably, he would give some local boy the glove and say -- 'Sonny, take this glove out there to my wife.' And then when the boy would reach me with the glove, some of the girls on the team would always say, 'boy, tell Jack that Maude wants some peanuts and to send her a dime, Of course, such conversation would easily get around among the fans and as long as I kept still, I was all right."
Pettigrew played the outfield for Wichita, Kan., over a long term of years, both in the Western Association and the Western League, and it was while he was with that club that he had the climax of his girlhood days in baseball. He tells the story:
"I heard an awful yell from one of the boxes and it turned out to be Jack DeRoss. It was the first time I had seen him since I quit playing with the Bloomers at least eight years earlier, and while renewing the old acquaintance Jack suddenly motioned to a woman to come down to the stand and meet me; it was Jack's actual honest-to-goodness wife. Acknowledging the introduction, I said to Mrs. DeRoss -- 'I do not want to cause Jack any embarrassment, but you perhaps do not know, Mrs. DeRoss, that I was Jack's first wife.' " ...

I don’t really know how these things happened, but somebody picked up the story and I headed down to Ponca City Oklahoma to meet Ned Pettigrew and get his story for the December edition of the “Sporting News”. I would have taken the journey to talk to a fencepost, back then. I was young and keen and knew little of the world, but I loved baseball, and I loved to travel around this great country of ours, and this sounded like an interesting story.

I knew very little about the Bloomer Girl Baseball teams except that they travelled around parts of the country playing exhibition games with local teams, usually sending up those serious amateurs by playing better ball. The girls were professionals after all, but not all of them were girls.

I learned that later on, the fact that some of the team were men dressed as girls came into the open, and was seen as all part of the joke. These games were meant to be entertainment, and from a baseball perspective there was still plenty of high quality skills on display. As long as the crowd was happy and the turnstiles could pay the Bloomers’ fee, everybody was happy. But back when Ned became Maude, things were a little more serious; Bloomer girls had to be girls.

The team run by Jack DeRoss arrived in Ponca City in the fall of 1901 when Ned was only 19. Ned had been required to retire from playing but was still more than capable on the mound. He was not a big guy and was of slight build, but he had a good arm and an even better technique. He had a range of ball deliveries that could keep any batter guessing. He was just what Jack DeRoss was looking for, in a girl.

All I knew was that Ned had turned out for the Bloomer Girl team and that he had been able to pass himself off as female for at least five years. From what I had been told, from around 1906 it became more widely known that not all the girls on the field were really girls, and even with that knowledge the exhibition games continued until the U.S. entry into the First World War. It was said that Ned had continued to play for a Bloomer Girl team up until as late as that – up to 20 years playing professionally. It struck me that Ned would have a story to tell.

I had an address. It was in a comfortable suburb on the outskirts of the city. It was a large house with a wide porch, and a grass lawn in front right down to the street, and big trees around it. I had the cab drop me off and I headed on up and knocked on the door.

A woman answered. She was around forty, shapely of figure, attractive, with brown hair styled in what I now know are called Marcel waves. She wore a green dress and shoes with heels.

“Eric Pither from the ‘Sporting News’,” I said, introducing myself. “I am doing a story of Bloomer girl teams, and I am looking for Ned Pettigrew.”

She looked suddenly very uncomfortable. She stepped out of the house and onto the porch and motioned that we walk towards the outdoor sofa seat where we could sit.

“You won’t find Ned Pettigrew here. But I may be able to help you,” she said. “I played for a Bloomer girl team way back when. I played as Maude Nelson, but that is Maude with an E, so not the same Maud Nelson who played out in Boston.”

“It’s just that I understand that Ned played for 20 years for a girl’s team. There must be some stories he could tell.” She saw me pull out my notebook and she seemed willing to talk.

“Ned did not play as long as I did,” she said. “And there are stories to tell. And I am happy to tell them to you. But can I ask that you keep some confidences when you publish. Some of us have gone on to lead happy and rewarding lives after baseball. I can tell you the whole story, including all about Ned, if you agree that you will only publish what I say that you can.”

“Well maybe I could just talk to Ned, if you can tell me where I can find him.”

“You will not be able to talk to Ned … not ever,” she said with a determination that made me believe that, for whatever reason, that was true.

“Fair enough, Miss Nelson,” I said.

“It’s actually Mrs. DeRoss,” she said. “But you can call me Maude. And no, I never played in Boston. I just took the name Nelson to play off a little confusion.”

‘Now Mrs. DeRoss.’ I knew who Jack DeRoss was. He ran the team. I had heard that he had died only a few years before. His widow would be able to give me the story I was looking for. So I sat down with my notebook and she sat beside me, arranging her dress over her knees, and she began her story:

“Small towns in this part of the world are hungry for entertainment, and sport is the best thing going. Every town has a local team and might play neighboring towns. None of them are good enough to play a team of professionals, but most of them think they can beat a team of women, even if they are professional. Townsfolk will pay to see them in such a contest. That was the idea behind Bloomer girls.

“My husband Jack recruited only girls until he came here, to this city and found himself without his pitcher. It was injury so they say, but for whatever reason the girl he had was no longer able to play. Ned was available. It was a disciplinary thing, a morality issue. I will spare you the details. It was a big disappointment for Ned. He had always nursed an ambition to play semi-pro-ball. It was just that if he wanted that dream, he would need to do it in skirts. As it happened, he looked damn good in a dress. He had to keep his mouth shut, of course, from when we got into a new town until the game was over, for he had too deep a voice for a girl. He got better over time. But he had the figure of a woman, with a little help, and a good mop of hair that grew like a weed. He wore it quite long back then.

Some of the girls on the team were in on it, but not all of them. It is a credit to Ned that he was able to pass even with people he was close too, so long as they were not in the same changing room. So that is why Jack took Ned into his room in every hotel that the team stayed in. And well, you know this part of the country. Hotels around these parts don’t take to men sharing their hotel bedrooms with unwed women. So, it was not long before Jack realized that the only way this was going to work was that if Ned were to become Mrs. DeRoss.”

“So I assume that there was no other Mrs. DeRoss?” I said.

“You would be wrong. Jack had a wife and two kids but gave up family life to go on the road with his ball team. I met her once. She came to a game. It would be about eight years after I started. He called me over to meet her. I told her straight. I said to her: “I do not want to cause you any embarrassment, but you perhaps do not know, Mrs. DeRoss, that I am Jack's wife now’. She died during the epidemic in 1918 which explains why I am looking after our grandchildren out back – which is why we are out here on the porch.”

“Have you got any stories?” I asked. “Something I can use in the article?”

“Patience, young man,” she said. “I told you that you would have a story and you will.”

“Jack played the wife thing to the hilt. He always carried my glove to the baseball field and played at catch with the rest of the team until Ned arrived. He would always refer to him as his wife. Invariably, he would give some local boy the glove and say -- 'Sonny, take this glove out there to my wife.' And then when the boy would arrive with the glove, some of the girls on the team would always say, 'boy, tell Jack that Maude wants some peanuts and to send her a dime, Of course, such conversation would easily get around among the fans and as long as I kept still, I was all right …”

“Excuse me,” I said. “You said ‘Maude’. Was that Ned pretending to be Jack’s wife, or you.”

She bit her lip. She looked up, and then she looked down. She said: “For a kid reporter you have a lot to learn. They are one and the same. I am Maude. I was Ned.”

Well, I knew that I was green, but I did not know just how green until that moment. Now we live in times of Christine Jorgensen and the like, but this was way back in 1924. That kind of thing did not happen. And how could this woman have been a man? I had to ask.

“But, but, how can you have the body of a woman?” It seemed almost indecent to use the word ‘body’ in those days. “I mean your figure. It is … you are … womanly.”

“Time, young man,” she said. “You start with just skin and bone and a little muscle, but you spend time as a woman, and in particular a woman in the arms of a good man, that gives you the body of a woman. Even Ned Pettigrew had to lose his girlish figure. Perhaps you should make that the sub-title of your story?”

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2020

Author's Note
Eric sent me the article that spawned this, together with a bunch of historical information about bloomer baseball which I knew nothing about. I hope that he will comment upbraiding me for taking liberties with the facts, but why shold they get in the way of a good story?

Bonding Time
An Illustrated Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

pdf file

Bonnie Lies Over the Ocean
A Short Retelling of History
By Maryanne Peters

Aye, it is a heavy burden to have the fate of an entire nation borne upon your shoulders. More so when that nation has such a fine tradition of bravery and resourcefulness. Surely the Scots are special folk. I only wish that their hero could have been strong enough to live up to the expectation.

They still sing for their hero – “my Bonnie lies over the ocean”. And that is where he lives still. Cry to bring him back, but that will never happen. That Bonnie lives in peace and happiness. Not like me. Not here, in shamed exile.

The history will be known to all. The Crown of the United Kingdom was passed into Hanoverian hands in 1714 under “The Act of Settlement” which excluded a Catholic monarch. By all rights of succession the crown was there for the Stuart clan, and had been since James I succeeded Elizabeth.

There were plenty in England, Ireland and Wales who opposed the German king too. James Francis Edward Stuart should have been James II, but instead he will always be “The Old Pretender”.

As for me, I am “The Young Pretender”. I may no longer be young, but I am still pretending. I am pretending to be Charles Edward Stuart – Bonnie Prince Charlie.

The man who would have been Charles III was born in exile – in Rome near the end of the year 1720. He was brought up to believe in the divine right of kings, and the legitimacy of the Jacobite succession over the incursion of William of Orange in the Revolution of 1688. But he was brought up in luxury, and in a mild climate nothing like the Scotland he claimed to love.

His father too, had grown soft living on the continent. James Stuart led the first uprising in 1715 but fell ill and was forced to return to France. His abandoning of the clans caused ill feeling in Scotland, and brought him no credit in France either, which is why he moved to Rome. James knew that his name could never be held high again so he named his son Charles as his regent and the new focal point of revolution.

There were those Scots who believed in Prince Charles Edward Stuart and travelled to Rome to pledge allegiance to him. My true name is of no importance now, but I was born a Stuart and with the features common to our family – the large eyes, long nose and round chin. People would call me “bonnie” too, although that was usually used to speak of a pretty woman.

But Prince Charles was bonnie indeed. Too bonnie to be a king, I think.

Bonnie Prince Charlie landed in Scotland in July 1745 to start “The Rising of ‘45”. As a cousin and a loyal follower I was placed in his “entourage” as the French call it. Charlie’s voice was high and he spoke English with an accent and Gaelic with difficulty, although he had been tutored in both since childhood. But luckily there were others - rough Highland born there to speak for him, while he nodded wisely. He had phrases and small speeches that he could deliver, but it was the sight of him that drew people to him. For sure he was bonnie, and he had the bearing of a prince. At least it appeared that way, because surrounded by the ruffians who backed his claim, he looked royal – even god-like.

But all this history is well known as I have said. An army was raised and he was placed at the head of it. It was an army of highlanders and other clansmen who were strong and brave and a little bloodthirsty. With clan leaders like George Murray (a British army veteran) and John Drummond (leader of a mercenary Scottish regiment in the service of France) Bonnie Prince Charlie needed no soldiering skills. But what was needed was supplies and more soldiers.

The British Army under the Duke of Cumberland was too strong a force, and as the supplies ran out, we were forced to stand and fight too early. The French failed to give the support promised, so we had to do battle with what we had. What we had was courage, that can never be denied. But steel wins battles – steel and lead.

The Battle of Culloden was a disaster for Scotland, although we only knew the half of it at the time. But for Bonnie Prince Charlie it seemed like the end of his life. Here was a man who had been brought up with a single purpose and convinced that it was his destiny. He stood in a blood-filled bog with thousands of his followers dead or near to it, and it was clear to him that the goal was lost forever.

He was escorted from the battlefield by his “Lifeguards” cavalry, and the commander of that unit urged him that he should “put yourself at the head of the men that remain with you and live and die with them”, but I suspect with one glance about him, the thought of living with them, let alone dying with them, would have seemed unthinkable.

That was April 1746. The story from there saw Bonnie Prince Charlie escape from Scotland to France in October of that year. In the intervening period “nobody knew where to seek for him” as it is said.

There are many stories. Some have been put to song. But let me tell you what really happened.

First you need to understand that Bonnie Prince Charlie was a broken man, and then you need to understand that in truth he was not much of a man at all. There were those that still believed in the Jacobite cause and that Culloden was a reversal but not the end. I was one of those people. Such men believed that the idea of Bonnie Prince Charlie was more important than the man.

Secondly you need to understand that a reward of 30,000 pounds is a fortune. It is certainly enough to turn many a man from his principles. Bonnie Prince Charlie needed a foolproof disguise and a decoy to put his pursuers off his trail. That was to be me.

I have mentioned that we had a family likeness. It was enough. I was given the role of Bonnie Prince Charlie and it is a role that I have played ever since. It was not our design at the time. The idea was that the Young Pretender would recover given time, and that when we were both on the continent, he could reclaim his place.

But for his own safety, until that day, he could travel and live as Betty Burke, an Irish girl and the sister of one of the many Irish soldiers fighting for the Jacobite cause.

Bonnie Prince Charlie had the advantage of being both bonnie and soft, or softer than any grown man in the moors of Scotland. He also wore his hair long under his wig, and he had a plumpness that could be shaped with a girdle made for the purpose. Some might also say that the most complete disguise for a king and a leader of men is to appear to be the opposite – a woman and a servant. But the truth is that Charles was a king and a leader no longer, if he had ever been that. Sadly perhaps, it was as if Betty Burke was his true self. In her he could escape from responsibility and the memory of the horrors of Culloden.

As I said at the start - it is a heavy burden to have the fate of an entire nation borne upon your shoulders. Betty had no such burden. I took that burden on, comforted perhaps, by the knowledge that I was not in command. But then neither was Prince Charles in truth. So I have carried that burden, and still do as I lie abed in Italy, waiting for death.

So Betty appeared much earlier than the tales and the songs would tell you. By the time that we were both in the Western Isles, Betty and I, after six months on the run from the British, Betty was Betty and I was Bonnie Prince Charlie.

It is true that Flora McDonald knew the truth, and she told her tale and went to prison for it. Flora was from the Isle of Skye but she was married to Allan MacDonald who was the Captain of the Highlanders who had actually fought with the British at Culloden. That certainly helped to secure her release.

The story goes that she helped the Young Pretender escape to board a French frigate by claiming that Betty Burke was her maid on the ferry across to the islands. This is true. The ferry was being watched by the British and all men were being stopped. It seemed a good idea to have the two women proceed while the men found another way across.

What Flora did not say was that the person she was travelling with had left her prior identity well behind her. She was Betty – a bright eyed Irish girl without much of a care for anything. How could such a creature go back and assume the burdens of failure and guilt?

It was I who crossed over by small boat in the darkness of a moonless night some days later. It was I that boarded the French frigate and arrived safely in France to announce that the search across Scotland for a half a year had failed. It was I who became the focal point for the Jacobean cause, albeit that as a cause it had faded away to almost nothing.

And what happened to Betty Burke?

Well, on the island while we awaited the French ship she met one of the sons of Norman MacLeod, the 22nd Chief of Clan MacLeod of Skye. Norman MacLeod was well known as “The Wicked Man” for his role in the Rising of ’45. He had originally backed the Jacobites and then switched to the British, but he and his men never fought at Culloden. He stayed on Skye and then returned with his men and the Campbell clan to help “clear the highlands” in return for a bounty paid by the British Government.

It was the Wicked Man who arranged to send a ship to the Americas filled with Scots plucked from their land to be sold as indentured servants in the new colonies. Betty Burke was on that ship, not as a prisoner but as the wife of Angus MacLeod, and mother to his children. What became of the first Mrs. Angus MacLeod is unclear but given the reputation of that family anything is possible. Suffice it to say that Angus had cause to flee to America and he wanted to take his children and a woman to pass as his wife, and Betty was ready for that.

As it turned out, Elizabeth MacLeod was well suited to life in the Americas. There was a refinement about her which was much sought after amid the growing sophistication in the new cities being established. She seemed strangely well educated for a woman and encouraged education for other women of standing across the ocean.

She remained a loyal Jacobite and no supporter of the British. I know this because she wrote to me. I have the letter still. It speaks of our time in hiding together, and of her new life, and the role that she and her husband and their children played in the American Revolution and the building of a democratic republic. And to close, she thanks me for relieving her of “a weight my feminine body was never designed to bear”. It is signed simply “Betty”.

I often wonder about that feminine body. I wonder how she can still live as a woman after all these years. Is she still as bonnie as she once was? Has she taken steps to rid herself of maleness so that she can remain youthful as I have grown old? Is she a wife to Angus MacLeod in the full sense of that word? How could that be?

She was bonnie, that is for sure, and there was a charm about her that was special.

I feel that the song was not written for me – “The Great Pretender” – that song will never be written. “My Bonnie” was surely written for her, not the one I pretend to be. I lie just across a channel, in a bed in nearby Italy. She is the one who is over the ocean from Scotland, not I. “Bring back, bring back my bonnie” they sing. She will never return. She has found happiness and perhaps a new purpose.

The Jacobite cause is finished. It will die with me. Pray God that be soon.

The End?

TRANSCRIPT OF A LETTER
Dated the 3rd day of February 1788
3 days after the death of Prince Charles Edward Stuart

Your Royal Highness,

While you have told me in your prior letters that your time no longer has value, I must still for a moment of it to once again give thanks.

I live by your grace and kindness, Sir, and I believe that I am bound by that to make my life a worthy one, in your name, and in the name of Clan Stuart, the rightful heirs to the Crown.

These months since I wrote to you have seen excitement, happiness and a wee sadness.

The wee sadness is that I report the death of my husband, Angus. In honesty he was a brute of a man with too much of his father in him. I often thought that our physical love was driven by his need to dominate more than just a woman, but I took joy from it. In recent times with his failing health we found a truer love.

But his greatest gift to me has been our children. My oldest son, David, turned 50 just yesterday. The excitement is that he is involved in the completion of a truly wonderful document. Our new home, the United States of America, has a constitution! It has yet to be circulated and ratified, but it sets out how this new country will be governed, and David had a hand in its creation.

The happiness is that only weeks ago I was present at the birth of my first great grandchild. I have attended the birth of my many grandchildren and each time I have felt the sharp dirk of regret that I could never bear a child, but with the next generation that seems no longer important.

I tell all of my descendants that it is not the blood of the clan that matters so much as the blood of all Scots. Your Royal Highness, I believe that Culloden was not a low point but a high point, when men of Scotland stood in defiance before unbeatable odds. Now I am not a man, but the men that I have raised will learn of the ’45 and never forget it.

I remain, Sir, your humble servant.

Betty

(c) Maryanne Peters 2022

Author's Note
This is one of the 22 stories from my latest book on Amazon "TransHistorical" - tales that retell history with TG characters some real and some imagined from even before Sporus in ancient Rome right down to J. Edgar Hoover. I will be posting a blog soon, but here is the link:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B09Z7S7V5D

Bordello Boys
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

My mother said that she prayed that her children would not be male. A brothel is no place for boys.

But I was a boy, and so was my real cousin Dee, and my pretend cousin Jay.

Dee was older than me by three years, but Jay was only a few months younger than me, so we played together. Dee looked after us a bit, I guess. Both of us looked up to Dee.

I suppose I first became aware of our situation when Dee was set to leave elementary school, so I would have been around eight or nine. Our elementary school was close the building that we lived in, what had once been a large home in the middle of the city. My mother and my aunt lived in one of the top two floors set aside for permanent accommodation, and there were still two floors below plus the basement for the business. At night we never went downstairs, and the basement was permanently off-limits, but during the day we had the run of the downstairs halls and the street down as far as the park.

But when Dee finished elementary school, the Junior High School selected was miles away. Dee was pretty unhappy about losing contact with school friends, but not as unhappy as learning that from the first day at that new school, he was to become a she.

I understand more about it now. The idea is that if anybody who works in the business has a child, and they want to keep that child and stay working, they need to follow the rules. Every mother wants to have her child with her in the first years of life, so that was allowed. But after a certain age, children in a brothel do not belong. That particularly applies to boys.

We had girls at the business. By that I do not mean young women, I mean children. Of course, they were not for hire, but no man objects to the presence of young girls. Old men dream of what little girls become. Boys, on the other hand, become men and men visiting a brothel do not want to see men. Boys cannot stay. The problem came to a head when Dee’s mother put up a fuss.

My mother was less than understanding. She would always say that pregnancy should never happen. It was bad for business. If it happened, she would say that the options are: “Abortion, adoption or relocation”.

Now Dee had already broken the rules by staying upstairs way past his early years, but we were living there too, and as my aunt was the boss, I suppose she let it go. But it was always on the understanding that after elementary school Dee would be sent away, like all boys before, and many girls. The rule was that only girls had a right to stay. Little children and girls.

I also think, with time to consider it, that neither my mother nor my aunt, liked men. They were the essence of the business, but not the kind of people to have around 24/7. I am leaving aside whether or not they were lesbians, I mean that they did not like men in their space. For them a male child was not a man, so long as he was nothing but a child.

At eleven, Dee was hardly a man, but he was starting to act like one. That meant that if he was to stay there would have to be some major changes. No man-like behaviour could be accepted in the house we lived in. This was a household of women and children only. So, if Dee was no longer a child, he would have to be female.

Now, it was not as if there was no choice. Dee could have said no. Relocation was an option. Maybe if it was me alone, I would have called for that. I would have said goodbye to the home of my childhood and chosen to go to private school, or to accept a life in the country better suited to a boy. Even prostitutes can have family who could take an innocent young man in. We didn’t have such family, but others did.

I can say now that if I had family, or anybody who would take me in, I would have done that. But like us, Dee did not have anywhere to go. And maybe it was because of me and Jay. We were three. He was older and we were younger, but we were three. He would lead and we would follow. Where he led us, it was nothing but fun and happiness. So much happiness that all the filth and sadness of the life of our mothers we never saw. Maybe Dee just could not leave us to that.

Dee was the best person I have ever known.

So, he was enrolled at Junior High School as Delicia, so that we could still call her Dee. And we all got about preparing her for her new life as a girl.

“It will not be forever,” said Dee. “When we I go to high school, I will cut my hair and burn the dresses. We can all go back to being boys.” That sounded great. But for now, if Dee was going girl, then we were going girl too. That was how Jay and I ended up following. We were three.

I suppose that we could have put it off until we were set for Junior High, but we wanted to do the same thing Dee was doing. We could hang out as three girls and have just as much fun. Dee was still Dee, and I was still Sammy, now short for Samantha, and Jay was still Jay, now short for Jaylee. The only difference was clothes and hairstyles. That is what we thought.

But then we learnt about puberty. I was nine, almost ten, so I knew something about it. At ten, kids are smart enough to know that girls and boys are not so different but that it would all change before high school. Dee needed to take medicine to ensure that she did not change into a he. We did not need to, but I got some of what she was taking just to try.

Later I was told that the reason why Jay and I are so little is because of that medicine we took. We are not so little for girls now – just a bit above average – but we are too small to be boys. Jay is taller because he took the medicine later. But we all took it before puberty so that we would not grow up into boys. Not until we were allowed to, that is.

Our mothers had nothing to do with it. I say it now in case you think that my mother and Jay’s mother wanted us to be girls. That is not what they wanted; I believe. But they wanted us around, and so by being girls we could live at home for as long as we could pass as girls. Maybe they thought that puberty would come, and it would be over. Maybe they thought that it had already come when it should have, and we were just doing a good job of hiding it. I don’t really know.

We had made the choice, and we had to live with it.

“It’s great that you have decided to dress up to stay with me,” my mother said. “Just so long as you look for a life outside of this place. Study hard and meet people who know nothing about where you live. Find yourself a real life.”

To us we had a real life as bordello boys, but now we needed to adjust to living as pre-teen girls. I now know what an important time that is in the life of any girl. There is so much happening in terms of finding a place in the world and forming styles and attitudes that might last. Just imagine how different it might be if you were a little girl with an ugly secret in your panties.

I suppose that is the first thing that we all learned, Dee first. Nobody at school knew that she was not a girl, not even the staff. She had to hide her package, and she was able to learn how to do that from one of the “special ladies” in the brothel. As for above the waist, thanks to the drugs, she was developing just like all the other girls in her class. Junior High is puberty school for girls, although for boys it comes later.

We were developing too, even on only half doses; maybe a little too early. We were still in elementary school as boys, just changing into girls on the way home.

To say that Dee developed like other girls is not quite right. Of course, there was no menstrual period. That is a big deal, so Dee needed to fake it once she knew how to behave. She said that it seemed like every girl in her class reacted differently, but she decided to be one who had dealt with it at home and was fully comfortable. I think that we are just lucky that none of us needed to go through it.

But the pre-teen years are about trying things out for the first time. For girls that means clothing and hair styles, types of music, and types of people. Long before full high school, Dee had decided where she fitted in. She decided that she was interested in fashion, and she got us interested too.

I suppose when you think about it, the deeper we got into clothes and styling, the further we moved away from masculine pursuits. But it was not really deliberate. Dee liked the joy of it, and we felt her joy and joined in. She was not nerdy, or rich enough to be preppy, she could not be sporty given that little problem, she was not a goth, nor a punk or emo, and she did not want to be a loner. She did not want to be in the popular clique because it was sensible to stay a little anonymous given our situation. In the fashion group nobody asks where you come from, just what you are wearing.

We had plenty of stuff to work with. We lived in a house full of women, and there were several who sewed, including Dee herself in order to get things done.

After school we would dress up and go window shopping with Dee, not just to look at styles but also to visit the second-hand boutiques and junk stalls for ideas and fabrics. We liked designer stuff too, but it is how you wear it. A Chanel bag is great, but a Chanel bag with a tassel or a scarf tied around one handle, is super stylish

Jay and I grew our hair in elementary school so that we could tie it up when we got home, and play with hairstyles with Dee. We got really good at it. We just had to subdue it over night so that we could be boys at school. But Dee never went back to boy mode … ever. She was having so much fun that Jay and I could not wait until we could put an end to this masquerade - being boys during the day, that is.

It may sound weird, but that is how it felt. We were having so much, but not as much fun as Dee. When the first day of term came around and we went to Junior High in dresses, we were overjoyed.

By then Dee was heading an arty and clothing student group, and we were junior members as her “cousins”. It was a great introduction. But only a year later Dee was off to high school, blazing a trail for us there too.

It is hard to know when exactly Jay and I gave up the idea of returning to being male. I think that for Dee it happened right then, in that last year in Junior High School. By the time she was in high school she knew that she was going to stay female.

She did not tell us, and maybe if things had turned out badly, I would have been angry at her for not doing that. I mean, she was the leader and she led us in that direction. But we followed because we liked the place she led us into. I still do. It is just that we lost a chance for another life, all three of us, even if we might never have been happy in that life.

I think that for Jay and I things became irreversible when we went to High School. Our unbreakable trio had slightly drifted apart by then. Dee had a boyfriend by then, and we did not spend as much time with her. Her boyfriend was a jock named Ham – Hamilton Granger III. She told him about her secret after they had dated for a while. He dropped her and he was too embarrassed to tell. But when another guy started moving in on Dee, Ham got jealous and then it was back on again.

Dee talked about making a life with him. “I am not into girls,” she said. That seemed obvious.

Jay said that she was still ready to go back to boyhood, even if that meant dropping out of high school. The problem was that Jay, like me, had breasts and nothing much between the legs, and she was gorgeous too – better looking than me and Dee. As one of the fashion girls she dressed well, always had great hair and makeup, and was being sought after by the popular set. Of course, guys were interested in her. She drove them crazy by rebuffing them.

I looked good too, but I worked hard. I had decided that I wanted to be in the business of fashion. It seemed unimportant to me whether that career would be as a man or a woman. If you like, I had a choice. But for now, expressing my love of women’s clothes by wearing them, just seemed right.

I was not interested in guys, but I was not interested in girls either.

But it was a guy who turned things for me. His name was Victor and he was persistent. The thing about persistence is that it is annoying at first, and then you find yourself flattered by it. He was always trying to do romantic things to win my attention. In a moment of frustration I told him that he should not be interested in me because I had “a genital deformity”. I don’t know what made me say that. I suppose I just did not want to destroy him completely.

A day later he was back, talking about the miracles of modern medicine or something like that.

“I don’t want to see it if you don’t want to show me,” he said.

I showed him. He was shocked. I put it back and I thought that was that. But I was surprised to find that I was crying, and when I did, it became a shuddering sob.

Victor put his arm around me and said: “Hey Sammy, there is no problem that can’t be solved. There are plenty of girls just like you out there. We can find a way to fix this.”

The word he used was “we”. Previously I had only ever seen that “we” meant Dee, Jay and me – the Bordello Girls. Now I suddenly realized that I needed somebody in my life to be a “we” with. It needed to be somebody who would always be there – somebody persistent.

After her operation Dee married Ham and Jay and I were bridesmaids. Victor was with me too, looking for pointers for when our day arrived. And Jay arrived looking as fabulous as usual and on her own, but ended up pairing off with Ham’s best man. Who knows where that might end?

In the meantime, she is a runway model for my first fashion show next week. Everybody from the house will be there. My mother is very proud. I have made the life for myself that she wanted.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2020

Breathless
A Short Story suggested by Veronica
By Maryanne Peters

I have always been able to hold my breath for a long time. On long car rides I would sit in the back seat and just hold my breath for minutes on end. I would do it in my room too – not take a breath for the length of song, then two songs, then three. I loved to swim and stay underwater as long as possible. I would watch other people try to match me and end up breaking the surface gasping for breath, while I just stayed there. And then they would come down again and have to go back up again before I did.

My mother used to say: “Well at least you have a skill, but it is not a skill that you will ever be able to put to use”.

That is not entirely true. In school I discovered the sport of underwater hockey. Have you ever heard of it? It’s a tough sport where you push a puck around the floor of a swimming pool. You have to pass to somebody else when you need to go up for air, but if you don’t need to go up, you can just stay on the puck. I was not as big as some of the other players, but I could push the puck the length of the pool, including ducking and weaving, without surfacing. I made it to the USA national team and fresh out of school, I went to the Underwater Hockey World Championships in Korea 2019.

It was there that I got the offer of a job, using the skill my mother said would amount to nothing.

“We are recruiting for a mermaid show,” said Larry Fierstein, “The longer you can stay underwater the better. But you need to look good underwater too. You need to move gracefully, and you have to fit the costume.”

I could do all of that. I suppose I thought that I would be like a “merman” or something, but Larry soon put me straight on that: “No. We have a couple of guys for that. Big muscular guys. But people come to see the girls. You’ll be one of them. In costume, that is.”

What are you going to do? Turn down a job using the only special skill you have because of a costume? Hell no. I had no other plans. Truth is, I was not bright enough for college, or to stick it out there anyway. And this was show business, or sort of. It seemed exciting. Of course I said yes. And I called my mother, just to tell her that she was wrong.

“Fortunately your hair is long enough to have extensions in,” said Larry. “People expect mermaids to have long hair and wigs don’t work underwater. The girls will show you how to look after it. And they will give you all the help you need with the costumes and the makeup.”

It was sort of like being caught up in a whirlwind. I was suddenly surrounded by five girls all treating me like a novelty, a kind of living doll that they could dress up. They were all very nice, and also very attractive, but somehow I didn’t have time to chat them up or even properly admire them. They were all over me prodding and plucking.

I said: “Hey, what with the hair and now the eyebrows I am going to have trouble looking like a guy!”

“Don’t bother,” was their advice. “You are one of us. Hang with us when we are not in the display pool. We train and we rehearse, and we have fun when we are not performing.” It was like this was the show business life. They all loved it and they were sure that I would love it too.

There were two guys in the troupe too, but I was hardly one of them. They were both tall ex swimming jocks, concerned with staying buff. They looked at me as if I was insignificant, which I suppose I was.

But I was better than any of them when it came to holding my breath. In the glass sided pool there were air stations that could allow everybody to breath in some air while staying underwater, but all the moves were while holding breath. But I could take centre stage while everybody else was taking air, so I sort of became a central figure with some solo moves. Over time I would become “Marina, the mermaid princess”.

But after the first performance, we all agreed to hit the town to celebrate, and I had to find a way to live with my new look.

I had long thick brown hair freshly installed and a face that did not look manly. In addition, I was completely shaved down. I could have not shaved my legs as for the show these were inside the sleeve of the mermaid tail outfit, but even the guys shaved down to work underwater, so I was smooth all over. The eyelashes and makeup had been removed after the show, but with hair tied back and in a tee shirt and shorts, I looked like a girl.

After going to our first bar and every guy staring at me with a sneer, one of the girls suggested that we go to another bar but that I should wear and little lipstick and mascara. I was reluctant at first, but when I discovered in the next joint that there were no more sneers, it seemed Okay. There were still the stares, but not the sneers.

“Are you the mermaids from the show,” one guy asked us. All the girls looked at me to say the words. It was a mean trick. There I was having to clear my throat and warble the words: “Yes, that’s us”. All the girls laughed, but the guy had no idea what the joke was. Suddenly I had found a female voice, which was to come in handy.

But that is how it all happened – on that night after my first performance I sort of accidentally moved away from being a guy.

It was just easier. I hung with the girls. After the show we would get out of our mermaid costumes and put on something nice to wear out. For quite a while I chose clothes that I guess they call unisex or gender neutral, but after a while I borrowed clothes from the girls that were not that. I some cases they were a long way from that.

I got used to doing things the way the girls did; talking the way they did; acting more like them. It was not deliberate. It just happened.

Larry approved. He said that this was not an underwater drag queen show. Nobody knew I was really a guy and that was the way he wanted it. He said that he would prefer me to appear off stage as a woman, just like I did during performances and promotional occasions. And because it was easier all round, I was OK with that.

The one day Larry called me into his office. Apparently, some guy had raised a question about a lump in the front of my costume. I mean, it had always been there, and I suppose people might have thought that it was something in the outfit, or a wardrobe malfunction. Anyway, the question had been asked and Larry was not happy.

I said something like: “Geez, Boss. What can I do about it?”

He said: “You will need to use tape or something, but Marina, I would be happier if you lost that lump completely.”

He called me Marina all the time. I mean, people use the character names all the time. Like: “Ariel, you tumble to the right, Calypso, tumble left”. In rehearsals you talk to the character, but it occurred to me that Larry had called me Marina from my first show, and nothing else.

I told him that I would fix it, but I remember I walked out of his office with a strange feeling in my chest. It was sort of breathlessness, which for me, was very strange.

He bought me a dress. Larry bought me a dress. It was a floral sundress, green so that if set off my eyes, so the girls explained. I loved it.

A couple of days later he asked me whether I would travel with him to a neighboring state to look at an aquatic show with him. “But you will need to travel as a woman. I mean … I mean, it is just that …”.

I knew what he was talking about. I just said: “Sure”.

I wore the dress he bought me. For some reason I taped myself tight before we headed off. It was not something I did outside the show, although I used control panties. It was just that in that dress and sitting in the passenger seat as he drove, with my dress on and checking my makeup in the vanity mirror, I just felt better being tucked up tightly.

We saw the show and It was not as good as ours. There were too many bubbles which confirmed the value in having people who could hold their breath longer. But there were a few tips we could pick up, so it was a worthwhile trip. But it was late, and he suggested a diner meal and a motel room, and an early start in the morning. I just said: “Sure”.

It was one of those motel rooms like a million across the country. Two double beds and a bathroom. Guys in business share them all the time. It was not like a bridal suite or anything. So like anybody else he slips of his shoes and takes of his pants and turns on TV. And I am there in my green dress wondering what to do. Should I undress in the bathroom? Why?

So the dress falls to the floor, and I am in my body shaping garment. Larry looks away from the TV. He looks me up and down, and I just stood there. Maybe I was even trembling a little. I don’t know why.

“You have great legs,” he said. “They are always in the tail costume so I never see them top to bottom.”

“Thanks, Larry.” I guess I said that.

“And I love the camel toe.,” he said. “And the breasts.”

They were all fake. I had junk in my panties and gel in my bra. I felt ashamed. I knew what he wanted in that moment. He wanted me to be a woman. And in that same moment, that is what I wanted too. I don’t know where it came from but I felt that tightening again, and before I knew it I was sobbing quietly.

Larry got up off the bed and came over to me. He pushed my curls away from my face and looked into my eyes. I had always thought that he was a good boss and a nice guy, but in those eyes I saw something else. He was a better man than I thought. Maybe even the best there is.

And he kissed me. It was not a hungry kiss. It was a gentle reassuring kiss. The hunger came from me.

We made love that night. He left me breathless.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2020

Author’s Note:
Veronica has just sent me through an idea for a story (her review to "Forget Silicone") which reminded me that I have not posted this one, that also came from an idea and a link that she provided:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZrP0Mqj9U_c(link is external)
It's a bizarre and occupation that would be even more bizarre for a biological male to somehow wind up in, a member of the sisterhood of sirens … I'd love to see what you could do with this theme

Bridal Choices
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peter

I now understand why it happened. I have been a fool all my life. I imagined a life for myself that was dictated by the shape of my body, not the shape of my soul. I now know how wrong I was.

I loved the idea of a wedding; the flowers, the vows, the confetti, but most of all, the bride. How beautiful she would be, as I stood there beside her. Everything about her would need to be perfect – the dress, the hair, the makeup, the posy. I had a clear image in my mind long before I even had a girlfriend. That is just not normal thinking for a guy.

I wanted Eloise to be that kind of bride. It was me who persuaded her bridesmaid to pretend to be sick so that I could help choose the dress. I made a show of being reluctant, and maybe I was a little, because I knew I was too invested in it. I could not believe what Eloise was thinking. Her ideas were awful, either slutty or frumpy, and nothing in between. It was almost as if she wasn’t interested, or at least, not as interested as I was.

The woman in the bridal shop realized that I had a vision of what was needed. So when Eloise stormed off she made her crazy suggestion. She quickly assessed that I was the same size as Eloise, or would be with a little padding and corseting, so she suggested that I model the dress. We would then call Eloise back and present the total look to her. ‘The total look’; not just the dress. That meant next door for hair and makeup as well.

No man would agree to that. So why did I? As it was all being done, I imagined a whole series of explanations for my decision, but none of them was credible. Even now there is only one possible explanation: I wanted to be a bride. I have always wanted to be a bride.

I never said anything about that. How could I? That woman said something to me like: “Perhaps if you go through all that a bride needs to go through in order to be the best she can be on the day; you will have a better understanding.” It was like a lesson. I would suffer having my face and legs waxed, my waist squeezed and the flesh on my chest molded. But I had to keep secret the fact that this was like a dream coming true.

Then there was the hair. My hair was long enough and very full. It was fair, but for some reason I let them lighten it even more. It could then be drawn back and a complex updo fashioned with blonde hairpieces. It was the kind of thing the other part of the salon, the part next door, specialized in. In my corsetry and with all that was male on me pushed into oblivion, and just a peignoir robe, I was bustled through to hair and makeup.

But even then, I still thought of myself as a guy with some fixed ideas about how a bride should be. I would show Eloise and she would clap her hands and agree with me. She would be the bride and I would be the groom. We would be married. I would take her to bed, and we would live a normal life.

That did not happen.

Wearing the dress I had chosen, when I looked in the mirror I fell in love. I fell in love with myself. I realized that the old me was a repulsive creature. This person looking at me was something truly desirable. The perfect bride.

I somehow knew that Eloise would never achieve this standard. She could never be the woman for me. What woman could be? The woman I wanted was looking at me from the mirror.

“I can’t go through with it,” I said out loud.

“There is hope for me yet, then.”

I turned around and he was standing there. Tall and very good looking, with a voice like warm caramel sauce, and a look in his eyes that … well, a look that spoke to me.

Is it possible? Is love at first sight really a thing? Can a person fall in fall in love twice in less than a minute? I had seen the perfect woman in the mirror. Perhaps my senses were already heightened by that vision. And then the perfect man appears. The perfect man meets the perfect woman. Surely there can only be one outcome? Except for one very unpleasant reality. But I was not thinking about that, not then, not in that moment.

I wanted to say something, but I realized that the voice that would come out of my pretty face would betray me as not being the woman in her bridal finery. I just smiled.

“I’m Nathan Boland,” he said extending his hand. “This is my mother’s bridal business.” He took my hand and rather than shaking it, he kissed it, as if I was a princess. Which is exactly how I felt.

I just smiled.

“I have come to take my mother for lunch,” he said. “But if you can’t go through with your wedding, then you may be available to join us?”

Should I speak? I had to say something. Could I do a woman’s voice. I cleared my throat putting my hand to my mouth in a fashion that was somehow automatically dainty and feminine.

“I am just trying a few things on,” I said. It came out well. A little husky maybe, but girly.

“But you may be considering whether this marriage is right for you?” he asked, with sincere interest.

“I think that I have decided that it is not,” I said, openly expressing the decision that I had just made. Eloise was not right for me, and clearly I was not right for Eloise. Not looking like this.

“In that case I insist that you join us for lunch,” he said. “If you are happy to have her join us, Mother?”

He was looking over my shoulder, so I turned to see the elegant older woman he was addressing. She was not one of the people who had lured me into this costume. She must also assume that I am female. Nobody else came forward to explain. Everybody in the place seemed busy.

“I just came in a track suit,” I said. “I don’t have anything to wear.”

“Nonsense, my dear,” said the older woman. “We have something in your size. We might remove that decoration from your hair, which looks wonderful, I should say. And are …?”

Jim. I could not say that. “Jessica,” I said. Suddenly I had become Jessica.

I accepted the loan of the beautiful blouse and skirt, and the shoes, and I went to lunch with Nathan Boland and his mother. I could recount everything that happened, but I can only say that it was a whirl. It almost seemed like an out of body experience. Certainly, everything that happened was on another level, a level somewhere between earth and heaven. Somewhere perfect, where every word that he spoke was music and every look that he gave me thrilled me beyond belief, and where it seemed that I was having the same effect on him.

Before lunch was even over, his mother said: “I am going to leave you two to finish on your own. I feel like an intruder.”

We both protested out of politeness, but really, we had reached the point where conversation was for us, unnecessary. All that we needed to do was to look into one another’s eyes – to swim in each other’s soul pool.

After lunch we kissed. He started by kissing the nape of my neck under my glorious hairstyle as they processed the payment of the check, but when we got outside, he took me in his arms and I just melted. If I had thought that I was meant to be a woman when I saw my reflection in that bridal dress, in his arms I knew that it was true.

But he thought I was a woman. I was. I just needed to put it right.

We got back to his mother’s bridal shop. I was hanging off his arm and laughing at something he was saying. And there was Eloise. She was back and she was trying on some stuff. Not the dress I had been wearing. Something tacky and awful. She really did have the most appalling taste.

She had no idea that it was me. Not at first.

One of the women attending her said: “It’s a pity that you did not see your fiancé in that dress earlier. Such a good choice. But look at the hairstyle we did. We could do something like that for you.”

The slow realization would have been amusing at any other time, in any other circumstance. But now it was just terrifying.

“You were engaged to another woman?” Nathan asked in disbelief.

“Were engaged?” said Eloise in equal incredulity.

“It’s over Eloise,” I said to her, in my vastly improved feminine voice. And to Nathan I said: “Even if you could never want me after you know everything about me, I want you to know that it was over with her before I even met you, and then … and then … if such a thing could happen so quickly … I am in love with you. I want to be with you … forever.”

He took hold of me by my arms and looked me squarely in the face. What a man he was; perfect, strong, dominating. He said: “I don’t care about your sexuality in the past, I want you too. I love you too.”

“You have to be kidding me,” said Eloise. “Your new girlfriend is a …”.

But my sexuality was in the past. Nathan was true to his word. I was true to mine. Love is between two human beings. He is a heterosexual man. I was one too. I was...

I got to wear that bridal dress after all.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2019

Bridge Construction
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

I work construction. I always hated the fact that my only real job skills were some of the manliest. I would lift lumber or cement and work power tools. Every day I would wake up and put on my construction clothes and tie my hair back into a low ponytail and put my company hardhat on. Even with pink cotton panties underneath I would feel awful. I just looked disgusting.

I really wanted to dress the way that I felt, and that was not like a man. I used to dream of wearing dresses, but I am married. I made for myself some secret time and I had a secret stash of the most feminine clothes to get dressed into. I had to wear leggings under my dresses to hide my hairy legs because I could never shave them. Hairy legs in bed were just expected, no matter how unnatural they seemed to be to me.

He likes me to be like him. Yes, I am married to a man – a gay man. My Jason.

There are so many stories about men hiding their feminine desires from their wives, but none about concealing your desires from your husband. Of course, he knew that I cross-dressed, but he never approved of it. He said he was attracted to the manly things about me, like the fact that I work construction.

The truth of it is that I chose my trade because it was manly. I wanted to suppress the feelings inside me, the feelings of femininity. I picked a job that no woman would undertake, or very few. I worked hard to be good at my job, and I am, but sometimes I wish I was a hairdresser or a florist.

Jason always hated feminine things. I am not saying that he hated women, but I suppose you can say that he did not care for them. I think that it was so much worse for me because even the wife of a crossdresser or a transwoman can appreciate why their husband might like feminine things. Jason never could. He wanted me to be manly like him.

I love him, so I tried to be that person.

Sometimes, the moments that made me feel happiest were just sitting on the sofa looking across at my man and knowing that here was my handsome husband beside me. In those moments I would image myself as his pretty wife. It gave me true happiness, which I took whenever I could.

I just wished that he would hold me like a man holds a woman, but he was not like that. We were two men who loved one another, and men express love differently by being both men. Jason liked us to be equal in bed too, to do one another. I would be happy just to be his but he likes for us to do it hard. He likes my body to be strong. This is not me at all. It is just the person I wanted people to think that I was - most of all him, even though he knew there was something sapping my soul.

He could see my anxiety but he expected me to “man up” in a way that no woman would – no wife. But he was a husband and so was I, or so he thought.

I got so anxious that I developed incontinence. Strangely, wearing diapers made me feel better, perhaps because they are sexless. During the day I had to use male guards which did not have the same effect as fluffy diapers, but they did help me cope with releases.

It was all getting on top of me, and I felt as if I was going to split wide open at any moment. And my biggest fear was that I would lose Jason. He would suddenly see that I was really a woman pretending to be a man, and he would leave. Our relationship would be over.

Then Jason got a job working at an Indian casino. He had always worked in hospitality and this job was a big move for him. It would involve us moving into accommodation on the tribal land, but as he explained, there was plenty of construction work available. The casino was paying for development of housing and community buildings including a new Health Center.

I was looking forward to it. I would follow Jason anywhere.

I found work training some young men of the tribe in construction work. I spent less time on the tools, but I was outside, and we were doing good work. I felt good about the move we had made, and I told him. But after only a few weeks in, Jason started to feel unwell.

There was a doctor at the Health Center who could find nothing wrong with him, but the lady on the reception desk suggested that he talk to the Indian healer who also had a consulting room at the Center. This person was a healer of two spirits.

Jason was initially dismissive, but then he went to see this person. He came back and told me about it. He said – “This healer is a trannie. Some kind of Indian half-assed cross dresser. He or she or whatever has suggested that we go in together, for some reason.”

I would have urged him that we should even if I had not been curious about this person. The Medical Center was funded by the tribal organization which had hired Jason so there was no cost, and I did say to him that it would not be a good look for him to ignore their traditional indigenous practices. So, we went.

The healer was tall and clearly a man, with long hair as many men in the tribe wore, but otherwise presented as a woman, and acted perfectly as if she was one. “She” seemed entirely appropriate.

But from the moment that we walked in, her focus was on me, not Jason. Without looking at him she said – “I know exactly what the problem is, Jason. You need to release your spouse from bondage.”

Jason was there under sufferance, so he was not impressed. But what this healer said next threw us both. She kept her eyes on me.

“You are two spirits just as I am two spirits,” she said to me. “Do you know what that means? You have the spirit of a woman inside you, but you are also a man. Because you are of two spirits you can be twice the person that your husband is. Perhaps he does not want you to be that?”

Although I don’t think that Jason understood what was going on, he disliked the accusation against him. But I understood. This person had no idea who I was. She had never met me and had no idea that I should be anything other than what I appeared to be – a rough and ready construction worker. And yet she had seen right through me and had seen what I was. I had the spirit of a woman inside me.

She turned to Jason and said – “Your illness is because you are trying to drown the spirit. You may not be affected among white people, but here in this land the spirits are strong. So long as you try to suppress a spirit in another, you will lose energy. It could be serious. People have died from this.”

Jason did not believe a word of it, but he needed to be polite. He liked his job, and he understood that it might entail a greater understanding of a culture he had no experience of, but I think that he felt this was an intrusion.

He did not exactly storm out. He found an excuse and left me with the healer.

For the first time I let it out. “I feel that I have a female spirit but if I wanted to, how could I release it and still be a man?”

“But you are not a man. You are something else. Two spirits people lie in the middle, with a spirit of each. For some, like me and also like you I think, the female spirit is stronger. It has nothing to do with your body. For all people the body is an obstruction to the spirit, but in our case that obstruction is unhealthy.”

I had never looked at it like this before, but I could really relate to this idea. Just hearing it was a release. There is a woman within me, as well as the man. She cries out to be free. My body is her prison. I could almost picture her banging her head against the bars of my rib cage.

“How can I free this spirit?” I asked.

“A knife freed her from within me,” he said. It took me a while before I understood what that meant. “But we now have modern medicine next door. There are hormone suppressors that can let her out without destroying her cage.”

This was like a turning point in my life, but I knew there would be problems for Jason.

“You don’t believe in this bullshit do you?” he said when I got home.

“I wouldn’t except for one thing,” I said. “Everything she said was true. It has been years since we talked about it because I know that you don’t want to, but there is a woman inside me. How could this stranger know that if it were not a gift?”

“I don’t want to lose you,” he said. Then, probably because he never liked to appear sentimental - “But this is a great job I have here at the casino.”

The following morning he could barely get out of bed. His illness had taken a bad turn. He even started talking about being the subject of an Indian curse.

“Look, let me just try to see whether I can make you well again,” I said to him. “You don’t need to do anything except let me. I will do the rest. If it doesn’t work, then I can stop.”

The drugs that the medical center provided were effectively a chemical castration, to match the healer’s physical castration except totally reversible. But even then, I was fearful of that first tablet. It seemed to me that I was boarding a train that could take me anywhere – in particular away from the man I loved. “You can get off any time you like” sounds OK, up until the train is moving so fast that you cannot.

But I wanted to do this. It seemed to me that fate had presented me with the chance to have a little peek at what life might be like on the other side. For somebody who has dreamt of that place all their life, that was too hard to ignore.

And the effect on Jason was immediate. He recovered, and every day that followed he got better. And I did too. I felt as if my anxiety was disappearing. The other changes came over time.

Jason complained that the drugs also caused me to have low sex drive and hopeless erections, but I was still ready for sex if he did all the work. What I noticed was reduced facial and body hair and then I started to notice a swelling in my chest.

“Surely this is not supposed to happen?” I said to the healer. “This is like taking female hormones.”

“The spirit of woman inside you is strong,” she said. “Maybe you should try female hormones?”

I refused but only because of Jason. I was in constant fear that he would see the woman in me and leave me. But at the same time as the fear mounted, I also felt delight, and somehow those emotions seem to fit well together. I saw glimpses of the person that I dreamed I could be, and they thrilled me.

In fact, from the moment that the male hormones stopped controlling my body, I had felt content. Now as things progressed I felt a little more happiness in my life every day. Jason could see it.

I did not cut my hair. I told the young men that I was training that I might wear my hair long as older Indian men did. But the truth is that I liked it long, and perhaps because of the blockers it appeared fuller and softer.

But of course Jason noticed that too, and of course he was upset. It seemed to him that I was becoming something other than a man. I spoke to the healer about it and she asked us both to go and see her again, together.

“Do you love this person?” She put it that directly to Jason. To be honest I was a little concerned at his delay in replying, but I was happy with the answer when it came.

“With all my heart,” said Jason. “But I am in love with a man, not a half man half whatever.”

“If you fell in love with this person, you fell in love with whatever,” the healer said. “Would you love this person less if they had one arm? The body is not who we love. We may desire what we see on the outside, but we can only love what is on the inside.”

“I am worried that if I no longer desire his body, I might no longer love him,” he said.

“Then this is a test of your love – a test as to whether it is true,” the healer said. “Because I see more changes ahead in this person. I have told the tribal elders about your partner, as I believe that she is a positive force in our community.”

“She?” said Jason. “Are you talking about my guy as if she is a woman?”

I was dumbstruck. I just sat there. I felt as if just the use of the pronoun in referring to me had drained all the man out of me on the spot, and it was not a bad feeling at all.

“I have suggested to the chief that your wife join us here at the medical center where her energy is needed, and that you as her husband be accorded more honor in your own job. He agrees.”

“What are you saying?” said Jason. The healer had called me his wife. I was almost faint with euphoria.

“It is a promotion for you,” said the healer. “More than that, it is an invitation for you to join our tribe, for so long as you are married to … what is your female name, Child?”

“Bridge …,” I said. “Bridget”. It just came out. It was a name that I had nursed for years. It was unspoken, so almost a magical word. I said it without thinking whether it would bring my world crashing down or not. But by renaming myself I somehow knew that I would never go back.

Jason looked at me in horror, but I remained calm – I think the word is demure – perhaps even ladylike is a better word? He had a choice to make as to where his future lay. Would he accept even further advancement in a job he enjoyed, and become a part of a community that he increasingly admired, and love the person rather than the body? Or would he walk away from everything?

I now had all the courage that I never had before to become the person I always knew that I was.

I no longer work construction. I work in healing, and I learn more every day.

And I live as a woman. I try not to flaunt it too much in front of Jason, because I know that he does not care for feminine things, but I am his wife and he has come to accept it, just as everybody in the tribe does.

I am still a man in bed for him, even though I cannot perform as a man anymore.

I tell him that I am still the person that he married, although my hair is long and my skin is hairless and soft, and bulges in places where Jason disapproves. He has learned to accept things, because we live in a very different place now. We live in a community and in a society that accepts that not everybody is exclusively male or female, and you love the person, not the body.

But I still love his body. Oh, how I love my man. Perhaps even more that I am now a woman.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2021

Author's Note
In a recent comment on my story "Butch" which is about "the flight to hypermasculinity" a reader told their own very personal story, which I thought raised these novel issues. Being the romantic I am I wanted to find a happy ending somehow.

Bulges
A Vignette
By Maryanne Peters

Candace was my neighbor, and my fantasy. I always wondered what good deed I had done to deserve having a neighbor like her. She was beautiful and buxom and she had great style.

She was always well turned out with great clothes and hair and makeup always perfect. I met women all the time who just never seemed to be bothered – they were not interested in looking good, but Candace was. She seemed to me to be the ultimate lady.

Her apartment was across the hall. I used to time the moment I left my apartment to run into her in the hall, even waiting by the peephole to see her come out.

Sometimes I would say – “Good morning. Once more we are on the same timer.” Or something like that. Any excuse to just get a smile from her.

Or sometimes I would step out a little later just to watch her tall body strut down the hall in her heels. Then I would call out – “hold the elevator please!” just so I could ride it with her and drink in her perfume, and grab a little glimpse of her cleavage over her shoulder.

It does sound a bit weird when I tell it.

But then she suggested that we swap keys. She was going away and wanted me to water her plants, and she suggested that it might be a good idea for somebody in the building to hold my key too.

I just went in and watered the plants that weekend. I was seriously tempted to check out her lingerie drawer, but I suppressed the desire with some difficulty. Had I done so I may have found some things there which did not belong, but instead I respected her and her privacy. So walking in on her the way I did was a total accident.

I thought that she was away – she was supposed to be out of town for a week. I passed by her door after I got back from work, and I could see from her peephole that there was a light on. I thought it might be an intruder so I went to my apartment and got the key and I sneaked in to catch an image of the burglar on my phone. I turned the corner with my phone in front of my face and there she was.

She was getting dressed to go out. I found out later that she had been called back to attend some special function. She was wearing nothing but expensive underwear. I could see those magnificent breasts in their entirety, almost bulging out of her bra. But there was another bulge too!

“Oh, I am so sorry Candace! I thought you were a prowler!” I just turned and exited as quickly as I could, the sound of her gasp ringing in my head. She never said a word.

I got back to my apartment and shut the door, holding it shut with my back in the shock of the moment, sliding down to sit on the floor. My phone was still in my hand, and there was the image staring me in the face – the three bulges. My perfect woman was not a woman at all!

I sat there until I heard her door a few minutes later. I looked through my peephole to see her walking down the hall in a glittery cocktail dress and heels. How was she not a woman? It seemed incredible.

I wanted to jump out as I would have done – “Hold the elevator, Candace, I am on my way out too!” But the phone was in my hand, and there were the bulges, all three.

That evening contained more emotions in five hours than I have ever felt before. There was confusion, disgust, anger, regret, disappointment, hope. I was a mess. It was like my world had collapsed. You might say that the rude discovery should have made is easy to put her out of my mind – she had gone from being unattainable to not worth thinking about in a single glance – but that was not what I was feeling.

Somehow that extra bulge made her all the more fascinating.

Perhaps I need to make it clear that I had never had a gay thought in my life, but this did not seem to be one either. I simply could not regard Candace as being anything other than a woman. As I have said she was the very essence of that. She was just somehow more exotic and mysterious as a result of that little something extra.

I jammed my door open and went to work on my computer with the sound off. I wanted to hear her get home. I wanted to greet her in the hall and apologize again. The thought of her lying in bed knowing that her neighbor knew her secret seemed so wrong. I needed to assure her that night that I respected her privacy, and her as a person. She could rely on me and sleep soundly.

It was well after midnight when I heard her key in the lock. I rushed to my door but it seemed I might be too late and have to go over and knock. But she was standing in the hall. She had seen my door jammed open. And now I was standing there.

“You had better come inside,” she said.

Her look was not angry or scolding. It was perhaps a look of resignation, or submission. Whatever it was it led me to follow her and close the door behind us.

Her dress was spectacular and showed off everything, except the third bulge. There was a flounce of tulle in the full skirt that was split at the sides to show her strong shapely legs. It clearly allowed for no view of her crotch.

“If you don’t mind, I will take off my heels,” she said. “I have been on my feet all night.”

“I just wanted to apologize again for bursting in the way I did,” I began – it was going to be a long blubbering prayer of contrition, but she just waved it away.

“Do you think that I am less of a woman seeing what you have seen?” she asked.

“No. No!” I insisted. But then there was nothing else that I had to say. She was waiting for something.

“There is nothing for it, I will need to prove something to you,” she said. With remarkable speed and skill she reached behind her own back to work the zip and the dress fell to the floor. “Well? Get your clothes off! Or do you want to go home and jack off in the shower?”

I just looked at her gorgeous face rather than the bulges. Her eyes seemed to be begging me. Whatever it was I started to feel an erection growing. It was one of those moments when you find yourself suddenly naked without even being aware that you had undressed yourself.

“Go into the bedroom while I just prepare a little,” she said

I did as I was directed. I went to the bed that I had dreamed of lying in so many times before then.

She only took a moment. She had already removed her panties and her bra. She lay down on the bed and placed a pillow under her bottom. All her bulges jiggled. She cupped the third one with her hand.

“You can forget that it’s there if you like,” she said. “But I do like having a man play with it. Only if you don’t mind doing that?”

I had never engaged in anal sex before then either, but to me what she was presenting to me looked nothing like an anus. It was pink and winking at me, letting a small amount of clear lubricant escape. To me it was an entrance that was uncomplicated and had the beauty of simplicity. There were no folds, no hooded nubbin, no hair at all.

I had the sword to fit that sheath and within seconds it was where it belonged and I was humping her for all I was worth.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2022

Author's Note: It was suggested to me that I write something a little more explicit for another site, and this was one of the stories I wrote. It is not my usual fare here, and if it is not well received I will refrain in future.

Butch
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

I always said that I needed violence. I said it then: There is nothing like another man’s blood on your knuckles to make you feel like a man. Or that moment when you know a stand-off is going to turn to blows. The adrenalin is surging in your blood as you imagine the sound of his face being crushed. Yours or theirs, it makes no difference. It’s the buzz I needed.

And I know why I needed it. Because I knew that deep down inside me, I was a girl. I fought that every day of my fucking life.

I used to hang with guys who I thought were the same as me. Aggressive men. We worked construction during the day, and at night we would go looking for trouble. Not every night, but on the nights we did, we are alive. I was one of them. A man. A violent man.

We drank, but we stayed on top of it, just in case. We would look for another group not less than us in number. We were usually 3 or 4 in those days. There’s no sense in picking on one or two guys who will just walk away, of maybe even run. We wanted a fight, so we had to give them the idea that they might win. They never would. We were good. We knew how to fight.

For a moment when I stood over the guy I had felled, or he and his pals had run off, I would feel good. I would feel nothing but male, right to my core. But it never lasted.

I would go home, to my shitty little dive. I would wash the blood off my hands and out of my mouth if I had taken a blow, and I shower before bed. And in the shower, I would hold my cock between my legs and I wish I had a pussy. I would pull my hair up at the back, and wonder how it would be to have the nape of my neck kissed, and when I lay in bed I might hold my pillow and pretend that it was a guy, who liked to play with my tits, if I had any.

How fucked up is that?

I was doing my best. I was fighting it with everything I had.

I fucked women. I fucked them hard. Then I would want them to go, or I would have to go if it was their bed. I could fuck a woman but not sleep with a woman. When I go to bed, I sleep better with a nightie on. Not even a whore should see me like that. In fact, I lived in fear that there might be a break in, and some burglar would find me in my nightie, looking like a fag. I would have to kill him. I was ready to do it. Nobody could see me like that and live.

Sometimes I would think about where I might escape. I had a fantasy that there is a shack in the woods that is decked out like a boudoir inside. I could pluck out my beard and most of my eyebrows. I could put up my hair. I could just dress like a girl. I could do the housework. Maybe do some knitting if I knew how; or sewing. I would read some magazines, or maybe watch a nice romantic comedy on TV. Then my man would come home. He would pick me up because he is so much bigger than me, and he would smother me with kisses. He would pull up my pretty frilly skirts and shove his dick into my wet pussy. I would ride his cock and my high-pitched wail would fill the forest.

Fuck. It would scare me to think what I sick little puppy I was.

I thought about going to a shrink. But I knew what my problem is. Everybody knows what it is: Trans-fucking-gender-thing. And everybody knows there is no cure. Only acceptance. And I was never going to do that.

I had my gang, and we were tight. I was not alone. But I was.

Maybe I could have sneaked away. Maybe I could have learned how others were able to cope with this problem. But I did not want to mix with people who had what I had. Queers, faggots, trannies. Not people like me.

There was no way out of it. Suicide is for pussies. If I was going to go out, I was going to go out in a fight. That meant nobody coming to my aid. I had to fight it out alone.

I knew where to go. Somewhere we had been before. A place where there would be guys itching to pick on one of our number and mess him up bad. If I died in a pool of blood, all this shit would be over. I would die a man, because I sure could not live as one. Not in my own head.

It was a fight night with the boys, but I pulled out. I said I had business. I did. The business of ending it all, so I figured.

I went to the bar I had picked out. I went up to the counter. Within seconds maybe three guys came up behind and one of them called me out.

I turned to see him coming. “I remember you,” I said. “At least I think it was you. As I recall you were bleeding from the mouth and crying for your mommy.” I threw my glass of beer over him. I got maybe 4 or 5 punches in, and then it was lights out.

Dead. Sadly, no.

But pain, yes. My face was beat up, and I guess I had cracked ribs, but the pain was below that. They call it testicular torsion. As I learned later my nuts could have been saved if I had got treatment within 24 hours, but I was dumped on a vacant lot like a piece of meat. I lay there unconscious until Simeon Smith found me.

It was the worst possible result. As bad as jumping off a bridge and ending up a quadriplegic and unable to kill yourself. Maybe worse. Here I was: A pretend man who can no longer pretend to be one. How can a man without nuts hang with the guys I hung with?

Maybe without balls I could be pussy enough to throw myself out that hospital window? No.

I learned all about my condition from the doctors and the nurses on the first morning, and then they told me that I had a visitor. I did not want visitors, but they said it was the man that found me, and he was picking up some of the bills for my care.

I felt as if I could say to him when he walked in: “Thanks for nothing motherfucker. Better to have left me to die that leave me nutless in a macho world.” But when he walked in, I said nothing. And I’m glad I did. He was a tall, athletic, good looking guy, with warm eyes.

“How are you?” he said. What a fucking stupid question?

“Alive,” I said. Alive, thanks to you, and castrated. And in a hospital bed.

“I drove you in here,” he said. “You were delirious. You talked quite a lot. I learned all about you. The real you. I think that she is very different from the person from … the person you pretend to be.”

What about that? Land one hundred blows and kicks to my bruised body and then the king hit was just a few words. I just turned away from him and bit my lip. If I could cry, I would have. The secret was out, to this guy anyway. I was a pervert. A fem-boy. My worst fears. Did other people know? I told you that if somebody finds out they have to die.

“They will discharge you tomorrow, although I have said that I will pay for you to have some remedial surgery to your face this afternoon, so it may be the day after. They are going to discharge you to my care. You had no ID on you. I have told that you are my cousin, and …”.

“What do you want from me?” I interrupted.

“Maybe I want what you want,” he said. “I know what you don’t want. You don’t want anybody to know what has happened to you, and we can keep that to ourselves if you come with me. Or you can go home, to the life you obviously hate.”

“So, nobody knows that I am here? Nobody even knows I’m alive?”

“That’s right. No ID on you. Maybe you planned it that way. Maybe your attackers disposed of it. So you just sign the forms for the facial repair and I will take you out of here the day after tomorrow. Then we can decide what to do. Are you Ok with that?”

So, I said I was. I did not even know what my face looked like, but I did not care. To me, I was always ugly.

Sure enough, the forms arrived after he had left and I signed them. I went into surgery and came out all bandaged up. It felt no worse the day after surgery than the day I went in.

So, I had the whole of that day to think what I was going to do next. By agreeing to go with this guy Simeon Smith I had the option to wipe him out if I wanted, and my secret with him. If nobody knew who I was (like, I was his cousin or something) then I might even get away with it. But could I then go back to who I was before, but without balls?

I had no idea. It just seemed to me that I was spiraling even deeper into the shit that was my life.

Then on the Tuesday, I think it was, Simeon comes to collect me and takes me back to his place. A big place. A whole building in a nice leafy street. Three floors plus a basement and a rooftop terrace. Simeon Smith was a rich man. He could afford the care. I could recover at his expense. What’s the harm in that?

My arms and legs were bruised too, but not broken. So, I hobbled up the stairs in the sweat-suit the hospital discharged me in, and he showed me the room that I will be sleeping in.

I asked him: “So, is this like, your daughter’s room or something?”

“Its your room,” he says. It is decorated and equipped for you. Everything you need. So, get off those sweats as soon as you can. Leave them outside the door. Change into whatever you like. There is plenty to choose from.”

And he left. He left me alone in the room of my dreams. Like the boudoir from the cabin in the woods. So how did I feel? Mad as hell, that’s how. I thought: Is this guy trapping me into becoming some kind of tranny for his perverse pleasure? What a creep. I’ve got to get out of here.

But then I saw a little powder puff on the dresser, sitting on top of a ceramic bowl with a lid, a bowl of perfumed talc. It is the most feminine thing that I have ever seen. The light furry puff with a little embroider cloth tag to hold it. The lid of the bowl with flowers painted on it. The powder with just a hint of peachy pink, and smelling of rose petals. It was bewitching.

There is a monster in the mirror. A swathe of bandages, like the Mummy from the movie. Holding the powder puff.

I wondered: Could it be that under these bandages it is not me at all, but somebody else? What I knew for sure was that I was not going to run out the door and down the street looking like this, even if I could run. So, take off the sweats and put some clothes on? What was there?

Nothing. Everything was women’s clothes. And I mean, all women wear jeans and T-shirts and stuff that both sexes wear. But there was nothing like that in the closet or the drawers of the dresser, or the dressing table. Dresses, blouses and skirts, panties, bras, pantyhose, shoes but not a single pair of trainers anywhere. He wanted me to go downstairs in drag.

I felt trapped.

You might think that all of my dreams were coming true, but that was not how it felt. Not then.

I decided that I would play the game. I found a knit dress. You know the kind. It shows off every curve and is quite short. On me it looked ridiculous. It show my flat chest, big arms, broad back. Fuck, you could even see my dick poking out. And below the dress my two hairy male legs, and feet in maribou flat slippers. Take that, you prick. I went downstairs.

The only light on was in the kitchen. It was large, with a small dining table under a large window. In the middle of the table was a single burning candle and a casserole with the lid on. The table was set for two. Simeon Smith stood behind it.

“Well, that’s quite an outfit,” he said. “What should I call you?”

“What about Stoolie?” I said.

“If you can’t think of a better name, I will call you Belle.”

“I guess that makes you the beast,” I said walking closer.

“You clearly know your cartoon romances,” he said. “As every girl should. Please come and sit down.”

As I took a seat, I said: “You are clearly having fun with me, but I am hungry, so you can do what you want so long as I get too eat whatever is in that pot.” It smelt great.

“I am trying to do what you want,” he said. “A few days ago, I heard a girl crying to be free. I want to free her. Will you let me.”

“She doesn’t exist,” I told him flatly.

“She could do. In fact, she is coming. When those bandages come off you will see. When you start feeling the effects of the female hormones flooding your bloodstream. When you let go. When you flush that attitude down the same toilet as your testicles.”

“What have you done?” I asked.

“You’ll find out, Belle,” he said, as he dished out the full-flavored French stew. “You’ll find out and you will thank me.”

There was no knife on the table. Just a fork for the big bits and a spoon for the sauce. I now wondered whether, if there had been a knife, everything might have turned out very differently. I was hungry and the smell of that food had me drooling, but there was still just enough man in me to have done violence that evening. Just enough male chemistry to have gone back to what I knew – violence.

Instead I ate. I ate and I said nothing. And after I had eaten the pain had tired me, and I went to bed. The sheet smelled of flowers. I was always a fitful sleeper. My mind was a constant struggle between the person that I wanted to be, and the man I am – the tough guy.

But in the morning, it seemed that the last trace of masculinity was gone.

As I lay in bed, I reached down to my dick. It was still there, but it was not swollen as it was in the mornings. It seemed tiny. My scrotum was still full of stitches but only dressed with light tape rather than bandages. I seemed to me that the whole package could be hidden in an egg cup. When got up and looked in the mirror on the dressing table, it the half-light with the curtains still closed, it seemed that the figure with the bandaged head might be a woman.

I drew the curtains and I could see that he had been in my room. He had laid out a pair of panties, one of those slip things that women wear, and a robe in coral pink with white lace detail. When I put the panties on, I was basically smooth up front, with just a noodle and an empty coin purse hanging down.

He must have heard me moving around. He tapped on my door, saying: “Belle, are you up?”
I did not want to be called Belle. I am not a cartoon. I chose Laurel. I told him it was so he could be Hardy, but that was a silly afterthought. I just liked the name. He did too.

He ran a bath for me in the big bathroom at the end of the hall. My room had a shower, but the bath seemed the right place to soothe my bruises and shave my legs. He insisted on that.

He also insisted that I should always wear panties if I was naked. He did not want to see any part of my maleness. As far as he was concerned, I was female. That is the way he liked it. And, as I came to know, I liked him to think of me that way.

But from the moment I stepped out of that bath without him in the room, I was truly naked. I felt the air on my shaved skin as I had never felt it before. It was as if I was a blank slate, or a plastic figurine to be painted with the colors of a woman.

But it still seemed to me that I could only ever be a poor imitation, until the bandages came off and the swelling in my face went down. That was when I saw just how much Simeon had done for me. My heavy brow, the mark of male aggression that dominated my face and reduced the size of my eyes, was gone. My eyes looked huge, and my eyebrows, still largely un-plucked had moved up as my hairline had been pulled down. My nose had been large and knocked to one side by many punches, but in its place was a thin and sculptured nose. A pretty nose. My heavy square chin had disappeared, to be replaced by a gentle shape. My cheekbones appeared higher, but not angular. There was a softness.

Even though to was bruised and swollen when the bandages first came off, it was clear that I had a woman’s face, and an attractive one. With some cosmetics it could be far more than that, but that was something that I knew nothing about, then.

My size could not be changed. I would always be big for a woman, but not overly so. Simeon was bigger than me, and in his presence I could almost feel petite.

But size is not important if your body is feminine, and with time, the hormones would work their miracle.

“I have a question for you and I want an honest answer,” I said to him in the soft voice that seemed to come out of my mouth. “Was it you who took my balls?” I had been nursing this fear for some time – that the whole thing might be his doing.

“No, it wasn’t,” he said. “I honestly came upon you in that vacant lot when I was out for my evening walk. In fact, this house is very close to where you were found. We have little violence around here so I am guessing that they brought you some distance. I heard them drive away but I never saw the vehicle. I just heard you moaning. You face had been pulverized and your groin slashed. I used my shirt to stop the bleeding and I called for help.”

“And you heard me talking?”

“Yes, I heard you talking. I mean it was you, not him.”

“And you paid for all of this?”

“I happened upon a tragedy,” he said. “But it was far worse than a man in pain. It was a woman wronged by nature, and also in pain. I did what I could.”

He told me, but would it really have mattered? I should have said thank you to him then, for anything that he had done. But it seemed to me that I was still hopelessly unprepared to be the person that he had heard call out to him that night.

For example, I knew nothing about women’s clothes. In my dreams I was hardly ever dressed. My dream was to have the body of a woman. To stand before my man naked and have him take me in any way he liked. I barely knew a dress from a drape, blouses from bloomers. Even if I had seen those things on a woman, I would only have been concerned to get them off her and throw them in the corner so that I could fuck her and prove to myself that I was male, and nothing less.

If Simeon expected me to acquire these skills overnight, it would require magic. But that is not what he expected. He expected me to stay with him in his home and slowly become female. He was patient.

The physical changes to my body certainly helped, but they were slow. The first thing I noticed was that my muscles seemed to be wasting away. My reaction to this was confusing. My physical strength had been my means of survival, and now with these drugs it was as every time I went to the toilet is was like flushing away a part of myself. I had chosen to sit down even, when just peeing. It made it seem that the man was just falling out of the bottom of me.

Simeon told me that I should be glad. He said that he could see the new me appearing as the old me literally rematerialized. I couldn’t.

And that leads to the second thing – crying. The absence of tears also marked me as a man, but those days were over. And I seemed to cry most when I was in Simeon’s arms. He would hold me and tell me that everything was happening as I had wished for, and that I would emerge from my ugly shuddering pupa as a butterfly.

These two things I noticed well before the softening of the skin and the development of the first signs of breast tissue. It was the loss of muscle and the arrival of feminine moods that told me about the path I was on. It was a path that led into the unknown. The old me had no fear, or none to speak of. The new me was terrified.

“What you left behind was so awful that you preferred death,” said Simeon. I had told him everything. “So, whatever the future holds for you it must be better than that.” Of course, he was right, but the new softer unmanly me was so different – fearful and indecisive.

Then one day I looked in the mirror and I could not see the old me at all. I am not sure that it was any dramatic overnight change, I just decided that I looked so little like me that I could face obliterating the last signs of him totally. I needed a makeover.

“So, we need to step outside,” said Simeon.

“Could they do a house call?” I asked softly, as the new me should.

He frowned. He booked an appointment. He told me that the salon was on the same block. We could walk there. I did not have to wear a dress or anything like that, but I would be stepping out of the house in women’s clothing. As he said: “This is not the kind of establishment that admits men. I will go with you and be there when you come out, but while you are there, you will be on your own.”

It was terrifying. I felt as if I had shed my skin completely, and I was there, soft and pink and unable to face the elements of the outdoors and any interaction with people who had the benefit of skin on their bodies. That is what these hormones had done to me. Not made me into a woman, but into a blancmange, rose pink and wobbly like jelly.

He went out and bought me some clothes - something other than the nighties, silk pyjamas and robes that I had worn around the house. Women’s clothes were so foreign to me they might have been a spacesuit. Instead of a dress there were long black loose-fitting pants, and for the top there was a loose fitting green blouse that could have been a shirt had the buttons been the other way around. And under that top was a bra, white and big enough to fit around me and over my shoulders but made my little cones of flesh pretending to be breasts look truly pathetic. And there were matching panties, that could not possibly accommodate what was left of my genitals, but they did. Over it all was a coat that I could button and then belt at the waist. Then finally, fashionable boots with a heel that was no more than some cowboy boots I had worn. It was a feminine outfit, but it was pants, a shirt and a jacket. I could do this.

I wore a scarf over my head and big dark glasses. Simeon suggested that I take him by the arm, which I did, mainly because I felt that if I were to lose him in a crowd I would be lost forever, or found out, and stripped naked to reveal my tranny shame. But the sidewalk was basically empty in both directions. He led me as I clip-clopped along.

It was a cool winter’s day which I guess reminded me that I must have been staying with him for several months. It was only just fall when I had ventured out for the last time as Butch. Now we were walking into a beauty shop and he was introducing me as Laurel.

I was expected. The ladies fussed over me. They knew that I was a man, but they treated me as a woman, just as Simeon did. After initial tension, I felt that I could relax in their presence.

“Call me when she is ready to be collected,” Simeon told them. “Whatever is needed, put it all on my account.”

My heart sank as he left. I had been with him and only him all this time. He had been holding me together while what had once been strong became weak and needy. Part of me wanted to chase him out into the street, and have him throw his coat over me and hide me.

“What a guy you have there,” one of the ladies said. Did I have him? Was he mine? I knew that he had me. I was his, to do with as he wished, that much was clear.

“We’re going to have to undress you for a full body wax,” they said. And then we are going to give you a good facial before we do your hair.”

I seemed so much bigger than them, but somehow smaller too, and weaker. They were in control, and I was not. I was a thing. Would I ever be a person again? Yet more of me was being yanked off me, as the hot wax set on my naked body. I relished the pain, as I did after a fight.

“What lovely little breasts you have,” said one lady. “And a pretty face. And a good head of nice soft hair. Long enough to style into something truly beautiful.”

If I had images of myself as a woman, those images were not of a beautiful woman. The princess dream had gone with my childhood. The vision I had developed when I was Butch, lying in bed with my dick tucked between my legs, was just a female version of myself. If in my dream I was a fat slut with stringy hair and living in a slum, I would have been happy so long as I had a vagina deep enough to take a big cock and tits for my man to fondle. Beauty was too much to ask for. I just wanted to be female.

So, what began to emerge that day, was revelatory. That day changed my life.

The repairs on my face had fashioned a dainty chin and delicate nose. My nose was never going to be small, but it was nicely shaped. The chin meant that I had lost forever the ability to jut my jaw and take a punch. Now feminine chin without being a weak chin, was plain to see.

My lips had been only slightly curled to become fuller, but had not been filled in the manner that looks so unattractive in some women. I would call them “kissable”

My eyes were never going to big either, but with eye makeup they looked good. And staring into them, I could find no trace of the man who had once lived behind them. He was gone. This eyes now looked tender and caring. The very opposite of him. And yet excited and questioning: Can I be this person?

But best of all was the mass of long dark hair that seemed to have come from nowhere. There was no mistaking what I was now.

Even with my shoulders still broad, although no longer muscled, and in nothing but a white tank top, I was clearly a woman. And an attractive one.

My breasts were not swollen by implants. They were growing day by day naturally, and when I stood naked they appeared womanly, but primed for further growth.

As I stood there, looking at the body in amazement, and seeing the face that would enable me to realize the dream of a life time, Simeon came up to me.

“May I touch you?” he asked.

“Touch me,” I said. “Please touch me.”

His hand on my breast made me gasp. My nipples hardened immediately. He reached up and rand a hand down my hair. My lips quivered, as if calling upon him to still them with his own. They did.

“I will never force myself on you,” he said. “But I want to make love to you so much I am not sure if I can control myself.

“What makes you think that you could?” I said, grabbing his arm by the wrist, and squeezing as tightly as my wasted muscles would allow.

It was my last show of resistance. The last trace of the brute I once was. He picked me up as if I was a feather. He took me to his bed and laid me out, spreading my legs as he did so. I looked into his loving eyes as my dream came true. A man’s penis was in my vagina. Better than that, the penis of the man I loved, the man who had rescued me, and given me everything I had ever wanted, was inside me, working my pink passageway. When that orgasm hit me, I thought that I could never achieve happiness like that in a thousand lifetimes. But that was just the beginning.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2019

Author’s Note:
I her review of my last story D. Eden touched on something about how many (including me) have tried to suppress their dysphoria with ultra-macho behavior or career choices, sometimes with self-destruction in mind. I invite comment

Call for Help
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

I could hear the distress in her voice, my little Hannah: “Help Daddy. Mommy is really sick. Please come.” A heart-rending call for help.

“I can’t do that sweetie,” I explained. “Daddy is not allowed to be with you without the special ‘yes’ that I told you about, remember?”

“Please Daddy, please,” she said. I could hear Melody crying in the background. The sound of both of my children in distress was too hard to stand. What father could refuse to act, even in the face of the Court order.

Barely thinking about it, I found myself running down the stairs and out the door, my cell at my ear.

“She is really cold Daddy,” said Hannah.

“You find some blankets, Honey,” I said. “Tuck her up snugly and I will be there soon. I am going to hang up the phone now, but you be ready to open the door when I get there …”.

It was seven blocks, but it seemed to take an age to run it. I found myself cursing Erin under my breath. I passed the street where I knew was the 300 yard mark. I was now in breach of the order, but I had to get there.

Hannah was looking out the window. Her sweet sad face made my heart melt. She buzzed me in (she could barely reach the button) and opened the door for me.

I could see immediately that Erin was dead. My once pretty and happy wife was now wizened and cold, but the features that had attracted me to her were still visible. The curse of heroin had robbed her of everything else.

She told me that she had kicked it. I had. It had been hard, but in truth it had been easier without her. We always seemed to trip one another up when we were together. She had been able to persuade everybody that it was my fault, that she was the innocent, that she was the better parent. Now she lay there dead, with fresh tracks on her arm, and I was clean.

She was covered with a blanket with only her face visible. Melody was holding her cold hand, with a look of heart-rending concern.

Something made me sit down beside Erin’s body and pull it to me. I had loved this woman once, and now that she was dead she could not hate me. I could hold her.

There was something black oozing from her lifeless mouth. I wiped it with my T-shirt.

“When is she going to wake up, Daddy?” Melody asked plaintively.

“I don’t think that she is going to wake up, sweetie,” I said. “Mommy is going to sleep forever. We are going to have to find a way to live without her.”

Hannah put her arms around me. Melody let go of her mother’s hand and came over to hug me as well. It was a sad but beautiful moment. I knew then that we must never be apart again.

But there was a problem. In fact, more than one.

For reasons that I will never understand, Erin had taken out a restraining order against me. I admit that it made me angry, so I had breached it a couple of times, and I was on “watch”. I was not supposed to be anyway near where I was.

The result was that Erin had sole custody and I had only supervised visitation rights. Of course, I could seek custody, but I knew her parents would oppose anything I did. They hated me and would do anything to keep me from my kids. And they might succeed, what with me having no job or stable living arrangements. I was basically couch surfing and had been for close to a year.

Then there was the welfare check. She had income and I had nothing. My only hope of income was the comics that I had been working on for years, but nothing major expected anytime soon.

And then there was Erin’s body. What would the police say? Sure, it was an overdose, but I was there, and she had accused me before of being her supplier. The police knew that our relationship had broken down, so might they suspect that I had killed her with a deliberate OD?

There was her blood or bile on my T-shirt. I took it off. I looked for something to put on and just grabbed her silk kimono hanging nearby and slipped it on.

“So, are you going to be Mommy now?” asked Hannah. It was so sweet that I found myself smiling. I needed to be her with my kids. If only I could just slip into her shoes. She was the approved parent. With all the lies she had told amount [about] me, I was a monster, denied even supervised visitation. If I could just take over, nobody would even notice if I disappeared.

If only.

Was it such a crazy idea? I was no tranny, but I had done drag a couple of times for Halloween and fancy dress. I had the advantage of being slight in build, no bigger than Erin. Her clothes would fit me. Even her shoes. But pass as female?

Then, if I could, could I pass as her? Who knew her?

“Hannah, honey, who visits Mommy?” I asked.

“Just Mrs. Plummer from the Welfare Office,” said Hannah. “I don’t like her. She is very mean to us. And her friend Jake comes sometimes.”

Jake. That would be Jake Hearst. That is where the drugs came from. I found her phone and scrolled through looking for calls. There were texts to him and from him. The last one from her just read: “I need”, and his reply was: “Coming over fully loaded”. Only yesterday.

I texted him: “I am not doing this anymore. I need to be clean for the girls. Do not come again or call me ever”.

I checked her emails. There was a message from the Welfare Office about a home inspection on the evening of the 16th. Fuck, that was only 2 days away. It was not signed off as anybody Plummer, but rather the local supervisor.

I replied: “I would like to delay this visit, and because of her behavior towards my children I will not permit Plummer to enter our home”. Cross my fingers and hope that they will send a stranger. It will need more than crossed fingers. If the person they send knows Erin I am sunk. If they do not know her then I will have to pass myself off as her.

“Who else comes around, Hannah? Who else does Mommy know?”

“You know her Daddy. She won’t let anyone in the house. Mrs. Greene used to baby sit but she doesn’t live here anymore. We liked Mrs. Greene.”

“We need to get you both to school,” I said. “Does Mommy take you?”

“Sometimes,” said Hannah. “But we can walk by ourselves.”

“Get yourselves ready,” I said. “I am going to be Mommy now. When you are ready you will need to say your final goodbyes to your old Mommy. And then we are not going to say anything about this to anybody. Do you understand? If you want me to stay and be your new Mommy, nobody knows. OK?”

“But I know what’s happening Daddy. Mommy’s dead,” she said. There was a small tear in her eye, which I matched with my own. What father cannot feel their own child’s sadness?

“We can be sad at home, Honey,” I told her. “Just the three of us – we can cry together. But the only way that I can be here is if both you and Melody keep it a secret. OK?”

She nodded. The truth is that Hannah had been forced to be responsible too early, because her mother was such a mess. Of course, she knew what was happening. She was forced to be aware well in advance of her age. I knew that I could count on her. She would talk it over with Melody. This could work. I would just need to keep my appearances in public to a minimum. And I would need to make sure that my first appearance was a winner.

For that I needed help, and I thought that I knew who to call.

I was a drug addict. So was my wife Erin. It is a dark place, but you need not be alone. Drug addicts have no friends. Everybody is expendable when you need what you need. But you need friends to climb out of there. I had three, and I am not including Erin.

Dolores (Dolly) had trained as a hairdresser, so she had a good job, but she needed to work as a prostitute to earn the money for drugs. In her day job, I would never have known that she was not a real woman, except for learning her limitations as a sex worker.

I was stronger than Dolly, and Zack, and Bertus, in leading us out of that place. We had a “call for help” pact. Zack and Bertus had called me once each, Dolly had called me three times. She owed me, maybe she even owed me her life, and she knew it.

“It’s early so I can pass on my bookings,” she said. “I can be there in five, but only for a couple of hours.”

I got the girls ready for school. Melody said that if they were down on the street 15 minutes before the school bell, they could walk with Mrs. Delaney and her kids.

They were barely out of the house when Dolly rang the doorbell. I had time to hide Erin’s body. It was so small and thin that it folded into a large suitcase.

Dolly looked great. She was clean. She was looking me up and down.

“You could pull off the look,” she said. “But voice and movement will take time. Weeks if not months.”

“I don’t have that,” I said. “I need to leave the apartment, but I cannot be seen here. Unless you have a better idea, I need a good disguise. I need to go out as Erin.”

“I don’t even have a wig,” she said. “I would have to work a miracle with what you have there, even though it is long enough to work with. You had better show me what Erin has.”

She did not ask where she was. As I said, she owed me. She knew that she needed no explanation as to why I was alone in my estranged wife’s apartment, so why even ask?

“We are in luck,” she said. “No wig, but this is a hairpiece to add volume, and in her hair color, and there is plenty of that in her cabinet. And there are other good quality products. And we have curlers and pins. Yes, as I said, I can pull off the look, But, you have about 90 minutes to learn to act female, something that has taken me half a lifetime. Hmm.”

“Where do I start?” I asked.

“Run a bath,” she said. “We need a total shave down. And I need a plastic basin to do your hair.

I followed instructions. Dolly knew what to do. She focused on my face and my hair, plucking and plastering, washing and blow-drying. And all the time she did this she had me yodeling and doing other vocal exercises to lift the tone of my voice.

“Good hair and good skin will go a long way,” she said. “And when you open your mouth, we need a woman’s voice to come out, but movement will be your biggest problem. You walk and move your arms like a man, but if I tell you not to do that you will look like a drag artist. It has to be very subtle. I meant it when I said it took me years. We just need to follow some simple rules for the time being. Avoid walking. We will use props to keep your hands in use. We can figure this out if we are talking about a limited exercise.”

“To be honest, I don’t know how long I will need to do this,” I told her. “Maybe after a while I can just come forward and tell them that I have been looking after them while Erin is on a bender. It would have to be long enough to prove that I am a good parent.”

“There you are,” said Dolly. “Have a look in the mirror.”

I moved to the bedroom to have a look and when I saw the reflection in the mirror, I could not believe that it was me. Dolly had me dressed down in a fairly plain dress, but beneath it there was a garment that she had brought with her to give me shape. The freshly shaven legs looked great, and the almost flat shoes were practical, but it was above the shoulders that she had really worked her miracle. The hairpiece was for Erin to glam up, but Dolly had had cut and curled it to add feminine volume at the back, while blow-drying my own longish hair to have volume in front. There was a side parting and a colorful barrette, but the hair was off my face showing beautifully shaped eyebrows, just a hint of eyeliner and mascara, and neutral lipstick. It was so understated, that it was totally convincing. But what was so totally unexpected was just how pretty I was. Really pretty. Embarrassingly so. Better looking than Dolly. Better looking than Erin.

“I, … I,” I stammered. “Thank you. Great job, thank you.”

“Voice,” she snapped.

“Thank you,” I said it again, the right way, adding: “You’re a sweetheart.” But I could not take my eyes of the woman in the mirror.

“Look after that do,” said Dolly. “If it comes astray you will need to come to the salon to have proper extensions, and they will be expensive. If its long term that’s what you need, and something more lasting on getting rid of that beard. Until then it’s the closest shave you can get, plenty of this concealer, and then this skin tone. And that won’t last a full day.”

I was still admiring myself when she left to get on with her work.

But I had work to do too.

My daughters had a key to the apartment and let themselves in after school. I was in [delete?] wearing a large apron and rubber gloves as I was in the bedroom wiping down with bleach Erin’s body and the suitcase containing it. When I heard them come in I closed everything up so that I could greet them in the living room.

“Hi girls,” I said, in my best effort at my new voice.

They both stood staring for a moment. I took of the gloves then the apron being careful not to disarrange my hair and struck a little pose to show the new me. Hannah just rushed at me to hold me, followed quickly by Melody.

“Mommy, Mommy,” said Melody.

“You’re going to be the best Mom,” said Hannah. It hurt a little that what she was saying was that I could be a better mom than Erin, but I wanted that to be true. That aside, it was a moment of true family bliss, the feeling only a parent can understand. Before I knew it, we were all sobbing with happiness.

I had dinner on. Soon after Dolly had left, I made my first venture out. I just needed to go to the deli around the corner. I had a bag over my shoulder to put both of my hands on the straps as Dolly suggested. Rather than walk I did an almost skipping, almost running, bustle, that would be less noticeable.

“You’re new,” the young man behind the counter said.

“Just covering for my sister,” I explained, in my best voice. I realized that it might be a good idea to be seen and known should anybody ask about me, so I swapped some small talk as I ordered some meat, fresh pasta, sauce herbs and vegetables. Things went well. I was able to hurry home and get a meal on.

I wanted it to be good. I wanted my kids to have a good quality home-cooked meal. God knows what they had been eating if their mother was strung out.

As it happened, they loved the meal. And afterwards, rather than watch TV we looked through some old photos and the like and talked about their mother. We all cried a little. It is funny how wearing a dress makes it so much easier to cry, but I was glad that I could. I held them close, one on either side of me, just three sad females. It was an experience that I will always treasure. It was … transformative.

More importantly, we were a family. Me, and my two daughters. A solo mother on welfare, with her two daughters. We could pull this off. I had one more day, then the following morning I would have a home inspection. I knew what to expect, as Erin had told me about one before: The inspector would call in the morning before the kids went to school to ensure that they were up and fed and ready for their day. I would be ready.

I decided that part time work might help. I could put in some hours without losing welfare benefits, and it would look good. I would ring another of my “call for help” pact, Zack Barrett, who was back at work running a machine shop nearby. He was always complaining that he was buried in paperwork.

“So, let me get this straight,” he said over the phone, “You are not looking to get paid, just have a job for a bit, and you want to do it in drag.”

“Not in drag,” I corrected. “I am living with my kids now as their mother. It’s a long story, but she is not around at the moment, and I am filling her place.”

“To be honest, pal, if you can help tidy up our shit, I’ll be happy to pay you, over the counter or under,” he said. “You’re hired.”

“Text that to me at the number I will give you,” I said. “And while I am in her place, call me Erin.”

“OK Erin,” he said. “Can you start today?”

So, I got dressed and went around to his workshop. My hair was still holding together and after shaving and applying the concealer, I did my best with some makeup. I decided that it would be messy, so I wore a pair of Erin’s skinny jeans, which I filled out much better than she did with her scrawny frame. I put on a brightly floral top over a filled bra. With just a morning’s instruction from Dolly I thought I had picked the best piece in the wardrobe. It did not accentuate my shoulders and was long enough to conceal an over large camel toe when I walked. Now that walk was a little less hurried and more confident. ‘Keep it free and natural’, I told myself.

Zack could not believe it was me.

“I had no idea you were transgender,” he said. It seemed like the easiest explanation. It was certainly better than to say that my ex-wife’s body was stuffed in a suitcase and I was filling her shoes to keep the welfare check coming.

Zack’s office was a mess. It was as if any piece of paper was just thrown in, and nobody actually seemed to work in there. Bills got paid when creditors followed up, but invoicing was COD and not in order, and following up debtors seemed to be not happening at all. I spent that day just getting it organized, but by the time I was due at the salon, I told Zack that I expected to bring in a lot of money, just from debtors and invoicing uncollected goods and work in progress.

I had put in four hours so I welcomed the chair at the salon. Despite the strange smells and goings on, I think that I was learning to understand what a haven this could be.

Dolly had lined up hair extensions. I thought that she was going to run with a wig, but she said that my hair had looked so good the day before that extensions would be better. But she did warn me: “You will have hair that you will need to look after, but it will look great.” She gave me instructions and I was ready. I went home with it in a sort of bonnet and enjoyed a long shower.

I embraced the girls when they got home, and asked: “What do you think?”

“Oh Mommy, its so pretty”, said Melody. “We can braid it for you. We can do lots of styles. We did it for Mom … for the other Mommy … you know … we did it for her when she couldn’t. When her hands were shaky. And her makeup too. We are really good at hairstyles and makeup. Oh Mommy, we are going to have so much fun.”

I almost burst into tears of joy. All of my dreams seemed to have come true. I was with my children. I was sad to have lost Erin, but the truth is that she had been the problem for so long, and now we were (not to sound too cold) better off without her.

I let the girls brush my hair that night. We played around a little, but I wanted to make sure that all the bonding held firm. Tomorrow morning was going to be a key test.

And when we rose in the morning, I was ready for a few surprises.

The first one was the happy surprise that the inspector had never met Erin and accepted me as her. This I had hoped for by disqualifying the regular visitor, but happily there was no photo of Erin on the papers, just photos of Hannah and Melody.

The second surprise was that I was so successful in passing myself off as a woman, that I became aware that the inspector was attracted to me!

His name was Grayson Boult, but he said: “Call me Gray.” He was a little older than me. Early thirties, I guess. He came from a mining town in Pennsylvania and had gone down the mines when he finished high school, but he wanted something more. He went to night school and Community College and graduated with a degree in social work. He loved kids and wanted to help disadvantaged families. He said that he wasn’t a talker, but he seemed to want to tell me everything about himself. I let him because I was still uncertain about my own voice. I said as little as possible. Just lots of smiles.

I made him coffee and fed him cookies.

“Did you make these?” he asked.

I just smiled as if I had. He needed to think that I was the best mother in town. I think that I left him with a good impression.

Still, I had a plan in my head that required me to move out of the city. I figured that if I was to get back to being a real father, and not just a father pretending to be a mother, it needed to be somewhere else. But I still depended on the welfare payments, and they were local.

“I can help you with a transfer if that is what you want,” said Gray, with what sounded like a hint of disappointment. “But your girls are settled in school, and I am sure they are your priority. And now you have a job, which I will check up on tomorrow. It looks good for you here. And I am her to help you … I mean, the Department is here to support you … and your family.”

I gave him my sweetest thank-you smile. He just looked at me. It was kind of weird.

I turned up for work the following day, and things became even weirder. If Zack had been surprised to see me dressed as a woman on my first day, he was staggered that I should reappear on my second day at work looking the way I did.

“You could be a model,” he said. “You’d better stay off the workshop floor. You will drive my workers crazy, looking as good as you do.”

And he was right. First the social worker and now these guys.

That night I borrowed the workshop van so that I could dispose of Erin’s body. I had some scrap metal from the workshop to weight the suitcase and I knew the isolated bridge where I could ditch it. I needed to drive for miles that night. Then I needed to load the weights inside the suitcase while on the bridge, as it would have been too heavy to manhandle otherwise. Luckily it was a very quiet night, and nobody saw me.

As I watched the bubbles, I found myself wondering how life would have been if things had been different. Maybe if Erin had never met me, her life could have been happy. Maybe if she had met somebody like Grayson Boult, who wanted to do good in the world, she would have led a rewarding life of contentment, surrounded by children. It could have been a wonderful life. Wonderful.

I was just worried about leaving my girls alone. I hurried back but it was almost morning by the time my van pulled up outside our place.

Grayson came around a few days later with papers to transfer welfare out of state. This time I had baked my own cookies. I just followed a recipe, but they turned out really well. He loved them.

“Look, this is breaking all the rules, but before you consider moving, I wonder if you might consider going out to dinner with me? After you have moved then I will have no conflicts to deal with, so … what do you say?”

What could I say? I think of a whole host of things now, like “I don’t think it would be appropriate” or “I’m not looking for any attachments in my life right now”. That would work. But instead a little girly voice came out and said: “Oh, that sounds fantastic, I would love to.”

Fantastic? As in – a fantasy. Fantastic.

Well, it was. He picked me up a couple of nights later. He had even arranged a sitter for the girls. I wore a little black dress over a body shaper that Dolly had provided, with gel inserts that wobbled just like real breasts. She helped me with evening “smoky eye” makeup and dramatic lipstick. I got myself ready way too soon and ended up clip-clopping around the apartment in my heels until the bell rang.

I don’t think that there is anything quite so satisfying as taking a man’s breath away with that first look at you. It is like a compliment on a masterpiece that you have created, but where you are both the creator and the masterpiece. And in his eyes, you see the power that you have. The power to move a heart. And that was not the only part of his anatomy that I moved. But I was not thinking about that then. I am not sure what I was thinking but it was not that.

“Wow,” he said.

I offered him a soft freshly manicured hand, to lead me to his car, and to an evening of bliss.

Of course, the problem is that fantasies are make believe, and this was too. The reality was filthy. This goddess that he was admiring was a man in disguise. A previous drug addict. A man who had disposed of his wife’s body so that he could take her place and appropriate her welfare payments. A villain, but with a noble motive – my children.

But as I sat there, playing with my hair, and laughing at his jokes, and hanging on his every word, these thoughts were miles away. In fact, it was not until he drove me back to my block and kissed me on my doorstep, with his tongue in my mouth, and his hand fondling my silicone… - But not even then. At that moment my stomach was not turning at the thought of kissing another man. My only thought was that I wished that breast was real so that I could have felt that caress.

How is this possible? Can a man become so completely absorbed by his disguise that even his own sexuality is changed? When I was back inside and the babysitter had left with him, I feverishly stripped everything off and stood in front of the mirror. There I was, the slim, pale, hairless body, with no breasts, and a penis that seemed so much smaller than it ever had been – almost as if it was responding to the change in me by shrivelling away to nothing. I could now look at myself and ask: “What are your feelings towards Grayson Boult?”

My hair was still feminine. Even with all the makeup gone, my face did not look masculine. The eyes were big and … full of tears. In that moment I knew that I was falling in love with Grayson Boult. Whatever I had been before that moment, what I ever I was now, I knew that I wanted to be a wife to Grayson Boult.

I woke up early, the day after that date. I surprised myself by sleeping soundly, but it felt as all the emotions that I had gone through that night, when I was with him and when I got home and I was alone, had sapped me to exhaustion.

I awoke at the first light of dawn and everything was as it had been. I felt my chin. I was a man. I was a man wearing a nightie. Thinking that I could pretend to be a woman. It was madness.

And yet how had it come to me so easily? It had turned out that the face that I had, which seemed almost featureless as a man, looked very good as a woman. But why did my gestures and my actions not betray me? How had I fallen into this role so easily?

As I did the night before, I stood in front of the mirror in that dim light. With my penis tucked between closed thighs and my hands cupped on my chest, I struck a pose. If I had a woman’s body everything would be so much simpler.

It was not as if I had many options. I was now trapped in benefit fraud, on top of any crime associated with disposing of Erin’s body. And, in a seeming death wish, I had dated the social worker in charge of my file, or rather the file of my late wife. I was walking a tightrope.

If I was going to continue, I needed to take drastic steps to ensure that my disguise did not slip. I had shaved three times the day before. I needed to do something about the beard. Dolly would know what to do.

Once the girls were off to school, I called her.

“You sound like you need to have your hair done,” she said. “Girls in crisis need to pampered for a while and then step out looking gorgeous.”

“Hair on my head is not the problem,” I said. “It is the hair on the face.”

“You don’t have to tell me, Honey,” she said. “Luckily, I do a side-line in electrolysis, starting with my own issue with facial hair. You can come and see me for a session, but the hard part is that you cannot shave so my electric tweezers will have something to grab. You will need to get whiskery, and cover up.”

I shaved that day and went into work. I told Jake that I would need to have the rest of the week at home with all of the files to do a mass reconciliation, indexing and archiving. It meant that I could allow for some beard growth and stay inside. Dolly could then bring her equipment around to my place on Sunday afternoon.

“Let’s lie you back in this chair and get you started,” she said. “And let’s talk. I’m a good listener.”
I was ready to talk. It was not always easy as she started on my chin and top lip and I could only talk with a rigid face, but she seemed to have acquired the ability to understand people talking under such limitations.

“I am starting to think that maybe I am gay,” I said. “These feelings are not me, but they seem real.”

“Or you could be trans,” she said. “Like me.”

“I know what that is,” I said. “That is something that you are born with. You carry it always, and so you need to make changes when you are able.”

“Some people can lie to themselves so well that they don’t even believe that it is a lie,” she said. “Some who find a little happiness in their lives as men, will successfully deny that they are trans, until something happens to remind them that manhood was the lie all along. Something like meeting a man like your man Gray.”

“I have a wife and children,” I said, which would have been true, once.

“And yet here you are, in a dress, having your beard plucked out, permanently. Or as permanently as I can achieve it.”

“This is how I am living,” I explained. “I have to live as a woman for now, but I don’t need a relationship.”

“We all need a relationship, Honey,” she said. “And I am guessing that your wife is no longer around if you are playing the field.”

“You’re right,” I said. “But I have the care of our daughters.”

“Three women and no man,” Dolly noted. “Is that the family unit you want?”

“Grayson wants to be a father,” I explained. “But he wants to focus on fostering children. He believes that children at risk need a proper home with two loving parents. I think he is right.”

‘Well, I didn’t ask about his ideal family unit, but the mere fact that you mentioned him means that he is already included in yours.”

I found myself suddenly getting a little tearful. “But I am not a woman. I could never be his wife.”

“You might say that you are not a woman yet,” she said. “But in fact you are a woman, and I think you always have been one, you just not anatomically correct yet.”

“But I’m …”, I began.

“Everything can be fixed, Honey”, she said. “Now dry your tears and let me finish. Your beard is actually fairly sparse even though it does grow quite quickly. I think another couple of sessions, and your face will be as smooth as a baby’s bottom.”

She gave me cream for my face and showed me how I could use my hair to conceal whiskers on the side of my face and a scarf to hide growth on my neck. That meant that I could go to work and go out, if I took care to hide any sign of a beard. Dolly was right. It would only take three sessions.

I went around to her salon for the second electrolysis session, and she presented me with a jar of hormone tablets.

“Don’t be silly,” she said. “Look at yourself. Don’t take them because you need them. Take them because you want them. This is the essence of womanhood. If you want to feel what it is like to want to be feminine, take them. It’s up to you.”

I took them away with me and had the intention of putting them in the bathroom cupboard as some kind of …, I am not sure quite what. Anyway, I had no real intention of swallowing any, until I did. And from then on, I always have.

Grayson had called to ask me out, so I ask Dolly to give me a makeover. She had removed the hair from in front of my ears so she said that I could wear my hair up, and I should wear a top with a high neck to cover the hair on the neck still to be worked over.

“Just make sure that you keep the top on and that he keeps his hands to himself,” she said.

I loved the look that she gave me. It was less dramatic than my first date. It was sophisticated. Dolly said it spoke the words: “Look but don’t touch”. But he did both.

He told me that I looked fantastic. I could see that he believed it. I knew that my look was different from the first date and somehow, I seemed to have adjusted my personality to fit it. I felt slightly more aloof with my hair up in this special hairdo. Maybe I could keep him at arm’s length.

Or maybe not. Before long we were necking in the booth at the restaurant.

“Don’t touch the hair,” I scolded. “It’s special for you but I don’t want it messed up.”

“But maybe later?” I knew what he was expecting. Life would be so much simpler if I could just give it to him. But I could not. I cared for this man, and I was stringing him along in a lie. But it was too dangerous to speak the truth. Not that he was the danger, it was just all the questions that he would ask – like: If you are not the mother of the children, then where is she?

“I’m sorry, Gray,” I said. “While you work for Social Services we can’t …, I want to but …, I really want to explore a relationship, but … I mean, you could be in trouble for this, yes?”

“Yes,” he confirmed. “I just think about you all the time. The risk is worth taking because I want to be with you like this.”

“I don’t want you getting in trouble,” I said. “Maybe the next time you could come to my place?”

So that is what he did.

But first I had my last session with Dolly. And at that session we discussed surgery.

“You might think that this is just something you need to do for a while, but to me it looks fairly permanent,” she said. “You should think about breast implants.”

“Are you crazy?” I spluttered. “I have no money.” But why say that? If I had money, would I do it? I think I was just imagining what it would feel like to have Grayson fondle my real breasts. It was thinking that which made me gasp when he ran his fingers over the silicone forms in my bra, but how good would it feel if they were flesh?

“If you have the money you could do everything in one shot, like I did,” she said. “Breasts on, genitals off. Pole gone, hole installed. Easy.”

Surely, she was teasing me? I tried to laugh a little.

“Get a price, and see what you are aiming for,” she suggested.

“I’m not getting a sex change,” I said.

“Stay informed,” she said. “Things will change before your sex does. I know what I am looking at. And there, that is just about it. Your face is truly feminine now. You no longer have any ghastly male facial hair, and I can see the softness of the estrogen coming through. Clearly you are taking your medicine. You are well on track to becoming a woman.”

Was that what was happening to me?

When I got home I researched sex confirmation surgery. I thought that I was just trying to find out exactly what she was talking about. But if it was all there, why did I send an inquiry, from Erin’s email, asking about schedules and prices.[?] I was pretending to be transgendered, right?

Grayson came around and I made dinner for all four of us.

“I like Grayson,” Hannah whispered in my ear. I just smiled. I liked him too.

But it was harder to accept what Melody asked me while Gray helped Hannah with her homework. She said: “Can Grayson be our Daddy?” It was as if I could never be a daddy ever again. I was a mommy now.

I made some tea after they had gone to bed, and Grayson and I just talked. We started sitting on the sofa together, but soon I was lying on him with my head on his chest while he played with my hair.

He was talking about us again.

“You don’t know me,” I told him. “I have baggage. I am not a good person.”

“I have seen you with your children. Whatever you were once, I know that you are a good person, or now you are.”

“A better person, maybe,” I conceded. “But not somebody good enough for you.”

“You told me last time that you felt the same way as I do about parenting the under-privileged, and the abused, and the needy. That makes you the same as me.”

I was starting to imagine the things we had spoken about before. I was starting to draw a picture in my mind. It was like a Norman Rockwell painting. A big house with a white picket fence. Me standing on the veranda with my girls and a score of other girls and boys playing on the grass out front, and with Grayson Boult standing beside me, with his arm around me, both of us with smiles bigger than the sun.

“It’s a wonderful dream,” I said. “So many sad children out there.”

“Fostering is tough, but I thought that you were up for it,” he said. “Right now we have kids with learning difficulties, gender issues, and stuff like that, in institutions where their problems are magnified, not resolved.”

“Gender issues,” I said – not a question, just repeating the phrase. “A little close to home.”

“Oh,” he said. “Is one of your daughters …?”

“No,” I said. “It’s me.”

It took a moment, but I could feel his body go rigid under me. He took his hand from my hair. I braced for the moment when he would throw me off, onto the floor perhaps, maybe kick me in the belly. Shout, or cry. Or something.

“It can’t be,” he said. He said it softly.

“I should have told you earlier,” I said. “I am a trans-parent. My partner was female, but now there is just me. A solo trans-parent".

“Do you love me?” I could hardly believe that I was hearing those words. How could he ask this? I had deceived this man in the most monstrous way imaginable and he could ask that question? I rolled away to look at him. Our faces were fairly close together. His eyes were wet. Not crying but close to it. Mine were too. Beyond close to crying. There were tears coming from my eyes.

“Yes,” I said. There was no doubt about it. “I ‘m sorry for hurting you, but yes. I do love you.”

“Kiss me then,” he said. So, I did.

He slept with me that night. I had to disappoint him further by removing my breasts, but I think that we were both happy to see the first signs of growth of natural breasts. My groin was something that I kept concealed from him, and he was happy for that.

He asked me about surgery, and I showed him the email I had sent. It was as if I had dispatched it on an impulse which now proved to be inspired.

“I have money so we can arrange things straight away,” he said.

I was nowhere near getting the required approvals. Instead he took the whole of his new family to Thailand the day after he quit working for Social Services. Surgery there requires only a willing patient, and I was that. And support people are encouraged – I had three: My fiancé Grayson Boult and my daughters Hannah and Melody.

It was not long before we had that larger family that he wanted. Some come and go, but they all know that Grayson and Erin Boult will give their all to be good parents. And every Christmas our house is that Norman Rockwell painting.

And any other time, any of our children, by blood, adoption or just temporary foster care, know that if they need anything, we are their parents and they can always call us for help.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2019

10 years on flanked by Melody and Hannah with 5 boys in our care.

Camping
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

I am not sure how I came to find out about Suzy. I remember that Sam and I were talking about transgenders or something, and he just said: “I am one of those”.

Just like that. I had no idea. He was my best pal. We did everything together. It was “The Jack and Sam Show”. We had a circle, but we were our own team within the other team.

He had not even told his parents. His Dad had moved away, and so he was close to his Mom, but he had not even told her. I was the only one he told. I guess that shows just how tight we were.

He said: “I hope this won’t change things between us.”

“Why should it?” was my reply. I was just naïve, I guess. I did not want it to change anything. I should have just moved on – changed the subject. But how can you do that? “Do you dress up?”

“I don’t want my Mom to know,” Sam said. “I have some stuff, but it’s difficult. You know what she’s like.”

I did. Sam’s Mom was over-protective and crazy religious. I could understand why it might be difficult.

“Bummer,” I said. Like, I was saying that it sucked that my friend could not dress as a girl if he wanted to. Which was weird – right? I knew something about this transgender thing – that it was not a choice – that these people suffered. My friend was suffering.

“So, you are still OK to play ball and shoot baskets, and go into the woods and stuff?” That was changing the subject. That was getting off girly clothes.

“I love all those things, Jack. You know I do,” he said. “it’s just that I don’t want to be a man.”

“I understand,” I said. I didn’t. What guy who likes to do the stuff we did doesn’t want to be a man? Sam was not a mommy’s boy, sitting around the house. We were always doings things outside, usually with me. How to make sense of this? There must be somebody else living inside Sam.

“Does she have a name?” I asked. “The girl you want to be?”

Sam had been looking worried the whole time we were talking about this, but that question seemed to brighten him up. “Suzy,” he said. “I want to be Suzy.”

“I would like to meet her,” I said. I said it because I wanted to understand how this could be. Did he have some kind of split personality? He was looking worried again.

“Maybe that’s not a good idea,” he said. I was almost relieved. “You might freak out.”

“No. Of course, I wouldn’t.” I only said that because it should not happen. Nothing a close friend has to show you should freak you out – right?

“It would be difficult. You would have to come to my place. I can go home now, and you could come round after dinner. Just come up to my room. Mom cannot see.”

We headed home and I ate with my folks and my older brother and sister. But I was thinking about what Suzy might be like.

I got to Sam’s place after 7:00 and his mother answered the door.

“Hello Jack,” she said. “Sam is up in his room, so you can go on up, and just remember you have to be out of here by 9:00. Tomorrow is a school day.”

I thank her politely. I am a polite guy. Then I went up to Sam’s room. The door was locked, but when he heard me try the door he whispered: “Is the coast clear?” and then opened the door and let me in.

Suzy was wearing a very simple dress in a dull red with a small pattern on it. She had combed her hair across with a side parting and had a red barrette on the other side. She was wearing just a bit of mascara and very light colored lipstick. I should have recognized that this was my friend Sam in a dress, but something was so different that for a moment I was unsure. I think it was the way she was standing in front of me, with her hands together under her tummy, and with one of her legs bent in front of the other and looking at me shyly.

“Don’t freak out,” she said, and it was her speaking – a soft girlish voice.

“Wow,” I said. I didn’t say it to encourage her, but that would have been nice. I said it because I was speechless. I mean, she had done nothing much to become Suzy, but she was Suzy.

“It the only dress I have,” she said apologetically. “I made a false bottom in the wardrobe and I just have a handful of things and … I probably look stupid.”

“No, no. You look fine,” I said. “You look great … Suzy.”

That last word made the room light up - or rather, the smile it produced. She raised her head and she smiled. And I could see that Suzy was beautiful.

It was a shock.

“I can’t take any risks,” she said. “Mom would go ballistic if she knew.”

“I could get you some more clothes and some other stuff, if you like. My sister is about your size and she is always throwing stuff out. I could keep it at my place. I could bring it round here for you.”

“But you would need to take it away afterwards,” she said.

The best thing about that night was that I had met Suzy and Suzy was not Sam. So when I saw Sam at school the following day, we were just like we always were. I never mentioned Suzy, and I felt that he was happy that I didn’t. We were just Jack and Sam. We still had that bond, with nothing weird about it. But I have to say it – I was thinking about Suzy. I was thinking about what Suzy could be. I was imagining her in a bikini, with a body to fill it to perfection.

It was almost hard to even mention Suzy, but when we were walking home, I said to Sam: “I am putting some stuff together for Suzy, are you OK with that?”

I wasn’t sure if the reply would be in her voice, but it was Sam who said: “Thanks Man. That would be great.”

But a few days later my Mom discovered my little cache of stuff discarded by my sister that I was keeping in an old gym bag under my bed.

“Do you have something to tell me, Sam?” she said. “Do you dress up as a girl? Do you want to be a girl?”

“No way,” I said. “But Mom, what would you say if I was? Transgendered I mean”.

She had been looking a little angry, but suddenly she looked heart broken. She said: “Oh my poor darling,” and she was coming over to give me a hug.

“I’m not transgendered, Mom,” I said, to stop her. “What I said is true. I know somebody who is in need of some clothes, and well, Sis doesn’t need this stuff, so …”.

“You’re a good person, Jack,” she said. “But I want you to know that if you were transgendered, both your father and I would be fully supportive.”

“Great to know. I’m not.”

But it was good to know. I had great parents, and Sam had his mother. I am not saying that she is a bad person – she just wants the best for her child. She would want Sam to be happy and lead a normal life, and not go to hell at the end of it. That is the way that people like her think.

What it meant is that I had to be the support person for my friend. I had to be there for him.

And there was the added advantage of being with Suzy.

The first time I took my gym bag over and she opened it up, I knew that I had done the right thing.

“Oh, Jack, this is gorgeous!” Her voice sounds even better when she is excited.

She took off the same old dress she had been wearing. There was nothing on underneath. I had seen Sam’s body many times, but somehow this was different too. It seemed softer somehow, but more importantly where his dick should have been there was only a little bit of pubic hair visible and two lines of brown duct tape visible.

Suzy could see me staring, so she said: “I have learned how to tuck, so I can wear these lovely panties you have brought with you.”

The panties looked good on her, but she needed to stuff the bra with some socks. She was not going for a busty look – just a little bit of shape. With the floral print dress on she looked spectacular.

This is where things started to go wrong. It may have been that night or one of the other visits to her room in the weeks following, but I found myself having to hide an erection. I mean, the first time I tried to will it away, but you just can’t do that – right. I had to sit with the gym bag in my lap just nodding my head and hoping like hell that Suzy will not notice.

“I want a full-length mirror,” said Suzy. “This tiny wall mirror is driving me crazy.”

You are probably thinking that it was time for me to invite Suzy to come to my house, but somehow that seemed impossible. Suzy only existed in that room. Sam had been over to my place, even after I had met Suzy, but Suzy could not turn up on my doorstep. How could that happen? We needed another place.

“Let’s go camping this weekend coming,” I said. “We could go Friday afternoon and be back Sunday.”

Suzy looked at me oddly. This was not a suggestion for her. I should be talking to Sam about this at school tomorrow.

“You can be Suzy,” I confirmed. “Me and Suzy. Camping.”

“You can’t take a mirror camping,” she said.

“I’ll be your mirror,” I said. She smiled. My raging hard on almost tore through my jeans. I pushed the bag down hard into my crotch. It seemed to me that this was going to be a problem when Suzy and I would be in a tent alone, but it was a problem of my making.

Sam’s mother was ok with the idea and of course my parents were only too happy to drop us off at the head of the trail. We had study periods on Friday afternoon so we could clear an early departure from school and get well into the woods before dark, but Sam wanted to become Suzy from the moment that my Dad drove off. Sam was wearing shorts and a tee-shirt, but he had no other clothing in his back pack. I had everything. We swapped back packs.

Sam went behind some bushes and about ten minutes later, Suzy stepped out.

“Where did you get these?” she said. She was wearing a crop top and skimpy shorts, and she had a colorful scarf in her hair. She was holding her breasts and jiggling them.

“Oh those,” I said. “Gel inserts. My sister is big enough now that she doesn’t need those things. They look good on you.” They did.

She had applied more make up than usual, with some eyeliner, and some bright red lipstick. You might think that this was way over the top for a girl going on a hike in the woods, but somehow it was not. She looked fresh – healthy looking. I had never seen her in the sunlight up to that point. I decided that was where she belonged – in the sun, looking at me with that sunshine smile.

“Let’s get going,” she said.

I walked behind her, watching her cute little butt grinding away in front of me. I think that walking prevents you from getting a massive hard on. That would make sense. But you can still get a little swollen down there when that is what is right in front of your eyes, sometimes close enough to sniff.

We found a spot to pitch our tent. It was a flat area, well drained, with a stream nearby with stones to set up a place for a fire. We had packed food and a pot to make some hot soup and beverages.

As Suzy set about her work, helping me to set up our camp, I could see that she moved like a woman. I don’t know how – maybe she had been practising – but nothing that she did seemed masculine, or anything like Sam. I suppose that I realized that Suzy was female – that somewhere inside the guy I thought I knew, was this woman, and all she needed was to be released. How else can you explain it?

I learned later that some transwoman toil for years to achieve this kind of feminine movement, but not Suzy. She was a natural.

“I am going to get changed,” she said. “I have laid out the clothes you brought with you and I want to dress up before we eat.”

It was getting late. The sun was low and the rays were turning orange.

“As promised, be my mirror,” I heard her say behind me. I turned around and there she was, with that orange light shining on her like a spotlight on a movie star. She was wearing a long flowing dress. It was simple – not dressy. The kind of thing that a girl would thrown on to be comfortable. Not out of place in a campsite. It was lightweight so the slight breeze moved it a little across her body, suggesting the curves beneath it. She had gathered her hair back from her forehead and fastened it with a jewelled clip, while the rest hung about her ears. She had added some more eye makeup.

“Talk to me, mirror,” she said.

I could not say a word. I was transfixed. That is the word. It took me an age to be able to move one foot towards her, then another. I could not say a word, because my lips were against hers and my arms were around her body, and it was collapsing so that I was supporting her weight, and she was yielding to the strength of my arms.

No words on the page can tell you how deep and meaningful that moment was. I pity those who go through life without experiencing such a moment – a moment when your world changes and goes from being an existence to a life full of joy and hope.

“Be gentle,” she said. What had she brought with her? I brought the clothes. She had brought with her Vaseline and condoms. She knew what was going to happen, or perhaps she just hoped. I did not know. That is what I tell myself even now. It makes that time and that place all the more special.

When I say that time I mean more than just that evening, when with the last rays of the sun shining on our little tent, I entered my Suzy for the first time and spurted into her the seed that had been building in me for all those weeks beforehand; I mean the morning after that, and the day and the night, and the Sunday.

And on that Sunday, just before we were to dismantle our tent and make our way down to meet my parents as arranged, Suzy and I spent a moment in each other’s arms.

“After that, I don’t think I can ever go back to being Sam,” she said.

“That suits me,” I said. “Because I only want to see Suzy from now on.”

When we got back down to the head of the trail my parents would meet their son Jack, and his girlfriend and lover, Suzy.

“This is going to be difficult,” Suzy said.

“Yep,” I said. “But just so you know it, the sex was great, but that’s not what it’s about; it’s about love Suzy. I love you.”

And she said, looking at me with those pretty eyes: “Me too, Jack. I have always loved you, but now in a different way. An even better way.”

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2019

Caring
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

Nobody wants to be a burden on their family and friends, but a man with Multiple Sclerosis is a burden.

MS is an autoimmune disease that affects the central nervous system. It is more common in women than in men and is usually diagnosed much earlier that it was for me. Less than 5% of MS sufferers are diagnosed after the age of 50. I was 51.

MS causes widespread nerve damage which leads to a number of symptoms including difficulty walking or moving limbs, loss of balance, as well as bowel and bladder problems. For some these symptoms are on-going basis and progressively debilitating, while for others, like me, there are attacks that may last for weeks or even months at a time. If those attacks are severe, I am effectively immobilized and unable to care for myself.

There is no cure for MS, so the best that I can hope for is medications or therapies that minimize the severity of the attacks and slow the progression of the disease overall.

I had been successful in 25 years in business, and so I had money for the treatments available to only a few. And, being largely alone in the world because of my devotion to my business I had money to pay for care when I needed it.

I had two children, raised by my ex-wife, but I could not expect them to attend to my needs. Since my wife left, my relationship with all women was casual, which suited me. Only a handful of friends would visit me as my activities in business declined. I was left to hire strangers to attend to my most personal needs, during bouts of debilitation. And that seemed convenient.

But there was one friend who suggested an alternative, and it was an interesting one.

Kevin Duckworth was the son of an older associate of mine. He was a keen golfer and had joined his father to play with me and friends on several occasions. Kevin was a little aimless and his father had prevailed upon me to find him employment in one of the businesses I had invested in. He had not lasted.

I thought of Kevin when I was turning out my golf clubs. They were an expensive set, but it was unlikely that I would play again. He came to visit me. Of course, by way of explanation for the gift of the clubs, although it was not my habit to do so, I told him something of my illness.

“I could be you carer,” he said. “I would like to be. But I would do it only if you could tolerate my transition.”

I had no idea what he was talking about, but I liked the man, and I could see some advantage in having somebody I knew living in my house.

“Transition?”

“I am transgender,” he said. “I plan on transitioning from male to female. If I could do that while I work here with you, that would be ideal.”

Well, I had no idea. I had always thought of Kevin as being a normal man. He did not seem effeminate in any way “gay”.

“Does you father know of this?” I suppose the reason for the question was because I felt that some approval would be required, although Kevin must be almost 30.

“I have been staying with him, but I need to move out,” said Kevin. “don’t worry. I will tell him. I have to. Things will start to show soon.”

I wondered what he was talking about, so I forced myself to examine him a little more closely. His hair was longer and tied back in a style not un-masculine, and he sported the usual sparse facial hair that passes for fashion. But otherwise, nothing.

I thought that maybe as I went through some of my disabilities during severe bouts he might rethink his offer, but he nodded his way through everything and he seemed genuinely interested and thoughtful. I offered him the job and he took it.

A few days later he moved in.

I learned later that he had not told his father until the moment he walked out the door. It was not something that I approved of, and it did awkward later, but perhaps I understood why he would not want to endure a long period of angst under the same roof. I was resolved to be more accepting.

The utility of it became very clear later on. Her was somebody with the soft touch of a woman for those tender tasks, but the strength of a man for when I needed to be moved. But from the moment that Kevin arrived he asked that I call him Kate and when speaking of him to others I use she and her. Of course, I would, even though other than the clothes he did not appear that different to me.

The clothes were practical for around the house. Because of my condition I liked to keep things warm, so “she” favored shorts and tops that had collars or details around the collar that were clearly feminine, but not outrageously so. The only thing that marked Kate as feminine was the shaved legs and something in her hair – a different clip or band every day, always colorful.

When people would call upon me she would answer the door and escort them in, and some would refer to her as “The unusual young man”. I would always say: “No that’s Kate. She’s not a man. Not anymore”. Or something like that – to reaffirm her chosen gender.

Kate did not seem to be putting much effort into being beautiful. She was, if you like, the very opposite of a drag artiste. She was concentrating on being a woman rather than looking like one. I mean the beard had been plucked out and the hair made to look full and feminine, but otherwise that was not her focus. Instead, she spent a lot of time talking to me in a feminine voice, and exercising the higher notes. She worked on the way that she walked (including clpping around in heels in the kitchen), or the way she held her hands, or took a stance. It really was very interesting. I never knew how much was involved. I never realized that there was a feminine way of pouring a cup of coffee, but Kate could do it.

She would say something like: “Do you thing that what I am doing is feminine behavior?”

Sometimes I might say: “Maybe not. I can’t tell you why, but no, that seems not feminine.”

That was what she wanted. She was perfecting her presentation. It was an interesting exercise and I enjoyed being a part of it. I felt that I was helping her while she was helping me.

Of course, I was paying her, but she was just saving it up. She lived in a room in my house, she ate with me, and never wanted to go out. We would sit together and read. Sometimes there was something that we could both watch on TV, such as a major gold tournament. She would spend just a small amount of money buying some clothes on line and dressing in her room. Otherwise she was saving money towards medical procedures.

I was sure that she did not go out because she was worried about what people might think. I did say to her that she should perhaps try some makeup or something.

“If we need to go out together, I will try not to shame you,” she said.

It was some weeks before I first heard from her father who gave me a dressing down for: “aiding and abetting this awful charade”. I have to say that as Kate had proved herself such a capable carer and a pleasant companion that I responded with both barrels. I did not hear from him again, until much later.

It was my habit not to go out when I was incapacitated, but the occasion arose when I needed to, and I wanted Kate to go with me. She said that it might be a little too early in her progress, so I offered to buy for her a “makeover” at the local salon. She made a show of declining, but I could see that she was excited.

On the morning of our engagement, which was a shareholders meeting of a company I held a majority stake in, she went off to the salon wearing a simple dress. I was hopeful that when she returned, she would feel confident enough to be able to appear in public and attend to any problem with me that arose. I was totally unprepared for what returned to my home that afternoon.

When she walked into the room, I could barely believe what I saw. I understand that there are TV shows that display fabulous makeovers, but this was not like that. What had been done was very subtle, but the effect was remarkable. Her hair had been colored and styled and put up at the back. Her eyebrows had been shaped and there was just a little eye makeup and lipstick. She looked sensational. A woman, without a shadow of a doubt.

“What do you think?” she asked.

“I think that you look fantastic,” I said. “Have you eaten yet? The meeting starts at 3:00pm so I would like to take you to lunch. Maybe we should stop off somewhere to buy you something to wear. Something a little more professional looking.

She insisted that she had money, but I waved that away. She was my carer at home. If I was asking her to attend to my needs outside the house, and I expected a standard of presentation, I should pay for that. As for lunch, who would not want to take this beautiful woman to lunch?

It had the effect that I hoped for her, it would have. She was happy with what she saw in the mirror, perhaps for the first time ever, in her life. It allowed her to lift her head high.

We went to a boutique that my ex-wife had spent a fortune in, so I was remembered there. I told them that my assistant would need something suitable to wear to a business meeting. It should be powerful but feminine.

“She has excellent legs,” the saleslady said. “We should show those off with the right hemline, good stockings and elegant shoes.”

And that was how she was dressed when we had lunch at a very nice restaurant in the city. I felt so proud to be sitting with her. I had frequented the place often, when I was working in the city. It was in the heart of the financial area and was close the shareholders’ meeting venue. It was the kind of attended by financiers so women were in the minority at lunch. I could see men at other tables look at her and stare, and whisper to one another. Probably something like: “Look at that lovely young woman having lunch with the guy in the wheelchair – assistant, mistress or daughter?”

At the shareholders meeting she was definitely my assistant. I needed to be there because there was going to be a attempt to change the board. I was out to stop that, but my presence allowed for some negotiation. I was prepared to let one of the interlopers join the board of the corporation. In my experience the best way to show people that everything is well, is to allow one of them inside. But which one. I asked Kate for her opinion.

“I think Joel,” she said. “I think that they trust him, and I think he will give them the facts, if that’s what you want.”

It was. Had her call Joel over. I watched her walk over to him. She looked spectacular from behind. She whispered in his ear and he came over, following her and enjoying the same view I just had.

“I support you,” I told him. ‘But on the basis that whatever you report to your colleagues you report to me as well. Kate will give you my number.”

I didn’t know it at the time, but she gave him her number as well. Only because he asked for it.

Kate had chosen well. Joel was honest and direct, which is more than be said for the others in the discontented group. It struck me that for a person who had only just become a woman, Kate had a woman’s intuition. It was a useful thing, and I made use of it again, more than once.

I suppose she became my assistant first, as well as my carer. It was only after that, that she became my mistress.

Mistress is the wrong word. It implies something dishonest, but also something of a sexual nature beyond my capacity, and also, at the time, beyond hers. What she did for me was to allow a man to experience the joy of sex while incapacitated. I will not do her the disservice of describing the details, save that I experienced climax beyond all my expectation, and if she did not then she had fun watching my joy. Kate was a giving person.

“I long for a vagina,” she told me. I wanted her to have one. Not because of me, but because of her.

“I cannot let you pay,” she said. But I could not let her pay. I told her that if she would accept this gift from me it would make me truly happy. And it did.

Being without her was hard. Much harder than I imagined. But when she returned it was hard to know which of us was happier. She was so full of joy she seemed to bring our home alive. It was really our home by that time.

As a reward not for my gift, but for enduring her absence with acceptance, she offered me an unveiling. She sat me on naked on my showering chair with a Kleenex in my hand while she stood in front of me in just a bathrobe. Then she let it fall.

My God. I have never seen anything so breathtaking. Her hair was longer now and fell around her broad shoulders. Her breasts were perfect with a little augmentation but not appearing at all artificial. He waist and hips were in perfect proportion, and then there was the slightest hint of pubic hair atop the most perfect female genitals I had ever seen, and then those legs that seemed to go on forever. She had something inside her. She put on a mock show of surprise about it, or was it me, or the part of me gaining height. She pulled it out from between her legs. It seemed huge to me. It was pink and plastic and had “Thank you” written on it.

I erupted. The best solo sex in the shower I had ever had, and I didn’t even lay a hand on myself.

I enjoyed every such thing she could do to me, but more than that I enjoyed what she did for me. Sometimes it was enough for me that she could just sit on my lap or curl up beside me in bed.

Mistress is the wrong word too, because it implies something transient, whereas this was more like family. Would it be too weird to call her a “daughter with benefits”? I knew that she would always be mine but not mine to have to the exclusion of the love that I could not give her.

So when Joel came calling upon her, I received him with some satisfaction, rather than jealousy. I will always believe that I made Kate a woman, and that when I give her away on her wedding day she will know just how much I care for her.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2019

Catch and Release
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

I remember talking to a man once – he was a fishing boat skipper just like me – about death by drowning. He had been dragged off the boat by a net line. He was tangled in it. He struggled but could not get free. There was no air left in him. He looked up at the surface of the water and saw the sun on its dappled surface. He would die in the ocean that had sustained him. It seemed right. He opened his mouth and took in the water. There was peace. He was weightless. There was no pain. The dappled light faded away and death seemed so gentle to him. And then he found himself on the deck of the boat with a crewman pounding his chest and seawater spewing from his mouth. Life was violent, whereas death was peace.

“Drowning is the way to go,” he said. It gives an old salt like me some comfort that death is just over the side and it is not a bad way to end.

Perhaps that is why I can understand why she wanted to kill herself by drowning, not that she had heard the story. Or perhaps it is because a drowned body seems so perfect. There is no gaping wound, no crushed skull from a fall, no distortion or discoloration from strangulation by hanging. It is like a person who died and came back – a drowned body looks clean and peaceful. She looked that way. But this time I was the one banging her chest and tipping her over as the water flowed from her lungs.

I was alone that day. The boy who was nearly always with me had failed to appear and called in with some excuse. The sea was calm so I could do the job alone. It was like a millpond in fact. Perhaps if there had been any swell she may not have survived. I never would have seen her.

I thought that she was dead. She seemed so beautiful with the long light brown hair and the absurdly pretty face. There was warmth in her body enough for me to try to bring her back. As I worked her chest I saw that it was flat like a child, although she seemed older. I thought nothing of it. If you are trying to save a girl’s life you cannot be checking out her tits.

It was only when she started to convulse as her lungs fought for air, that her thin floral dress rode up and I could see that inside her panties was some kind of strap that concealed a deformity. She lacked the proper form of a young woman so fair – she had a penis.

For some reason I accepted this not with disgust but with sympathy. It was out of place and concealed. It was her embarrassment, not mine.

I wrapped her in a blanket, and I went below to make her a hot drink.

She said: “You should have left me to die.”

I told her: “A man who lives by the sea must save the lives of people he finds in the waves. It is a code. I leave the judgement of death to God alone.” Or it was something like that. I am disposed to use phrases of fake wisdom from time to time, but as often as not it sounds true.

She had realized that I had seen her secret. She said: “I cannot live in this body. I would rather be dead than become a man.”

“Then don’t be one,” I said. “You don’t look like a man to me.”

She smiled at me. I was telling the truth, but suddenly I saw something more. That smile was like a sunburst at the end of a long storm; like a calm harbor after days in huge swells. I knew what I had to do.

“Let me help you,” I said. “A life was lost today. A young boy died. The sea took him as the sea does. He will never be seen again. Then today also the sea delivered up, as it does. When you catch a mermaid, it's bad luck to throw her back.”

But that is not the name of this story. I am so much older than her, but I am not ashamed to admit that I fell in love with that girl that day, and she sat on the deck of my boat, wrapped in a blanket and smiling like the sun.

I took her home and I was there through her transition. I paid for everything. I had the joy of seeing her blossom. I shared the moment of thrill when she came through surgery with the body that she always wanted.

But a young woman like her is like the perfect fish, but undersized. You can admire it, and want to put it in your box, but it has a life to lead, and that life is not yours to take. Sometimes you have to let go what you love to prove your love.

I may be hardened by the salt and the wind of years at sea, but I cried when I gave her away as a beautiful bride, years later.

She kissed me on the cheek and said: “Thank you Daddy. I owe you everything.”

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2021

Author’s Note:
Another story inspired by my muse Erin about a transgirl attempting suicide: “A kid decides he's had it with trying to be a boy he puts on a girls swimsuit and swims out of sight of land intending to drown himself but the captain of a boat saves him and doesn't realize he's a guy (long hair, padded breast, gaffed)…”. I thought that it might be better if he did know.

Chauffeuse
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

“Actually, I thought you were a woman when you first applied,” said Elspeth Mabey, as she sat in her drawing room sipping her tea. “You put your surname first, you see: Bonnie Keith. And here you are, Keith Bonnie.”

“I have been in Europe, Ma’am, where they write their names that way,” the newly recruited driver replied. “Were you looking for a woman?”

“Not really,” Miss Mabey said. “It is just that it is an all-female household. Just a small group here in the townhouse, just Mrs. Bull my housekeeper, Nadine the cook, and Maria my lady’s maid. But I think having a driver who is male is a good thing. I am not suggesting that women are not good drivers, but I like a man to open my door for me.”

“I can do that,” he said with a warm smile.

“There are some men on the staff up at the country house, but I don’t go up there that often these days, I am a city dweller at heart. You don’t mind being surrounded by women, do you?”

“No,” he said. And there was no temptation. The cook was in her forties and did not live in, Maria was from El Salvador – plain and very religious, and Mrs Bull was pretty much as her name suggested. The most attractive was Miss Mabey herself. Past middle age, although quite how old he could not guess, she was one of the heirs to an established and successful beauty business. She was very wealthy, and presently unmarried.

“As a man in the house you may be called upon to perform duties you are better suited too. I take it that presents no problem?”

“The position called for flexibility,” he said. “I assure you that I can put my hand to anything. I have waited tables, helped in the kitchen, decorated interiors, whatever you require.”

“Your primary responsibility will be the Rolls Royce and the Maserati,” she said. “Keeping them in order and driving me. Other staff and really bound to the house, but if I require anybody to go out and do things for me, that will be you.”

“I understand,” he said. “When do I start? To be honest, the live-in post is a real attraction as I have nowhere to stay at the moment.”

“Straight away if you like,” she said cheerily. “I can show you where your room is. Don’t worry about your belongings, I have a uniform for you, and Maria can make any alterations that are needed.”

Bonnie was more than relieved. It was a borrowed suit and shoes – not a great fit but good enough. He could not even afford a haircut. He pushed it back, saying: “I should probably get a haircut too.”

“Don’t”, she said. She struck him as a kind and gentle person, but somebody who knew how to give directions. He would do as she instructed.

The room was in the top storey of the grand old house. There were two bedrooms looking out on the street, and a storage room. One room was for Maria, who greeted him warmly. He could see that her room was largely bare, with just a crucifix on the wall above her bed, and a bible on her writing table. Next to hers was the room allocated to him, and it was the very opposite. It was papered in patterned pink with lace curtains and a large dressing table.

“The last occupant left a lot of stuff behind,” said Miss Mabey. “I am not sure that you will be able to use much of it, but you may take anything you need to wear. That includes anything in the bathroom that you share with Maria. None of that is hers.”

“This is great,” he said. It was ridiculously feminine but somehow felt warm and inviting. “Thank you Miss Mabey. Thank you for the opportunity. I will work had, I can assure you.”

She smiled approvingly. “Maria will take your measurements,” she said. “I have eaten but Mrs. Bull has made you some sandwiches.”

It was just as well, he was starving. He followed her back downstairs.

“I really should look at the garage,” he said. She approved of his organized approach. She showed him the internal access and then excused herself.

Both cars were late models. The Maserati was a grey Quattroporte Gran Lusso, and the Rolls Royce a blue Phantom VIII. There also a red Porsche Boxster under a cover at the back. The keys for all three were on a board beside a range of car care products and a toolbox that looked untouched. Bonnie took manuals from all three machines back up to his room with the plate of sandwiches.

He needed to get his suit off. He hung it up for return. His underpants had a gaping hole in the crotch and had to be tossed. He had some others in similar condition in the bag he had left at the hostel. He needed to take a shower, but first to look for something to wear tonight and tomorrow.

The wardrobe was half full, and the other half made empty for him. What was in there was only women’s clothes. The chest the same, empty drawers for him and other drawers full of women’s clothes – underwear, nightwear, hosiery, leggings, feminine tops. There were no empty drawers in the dressing table. One drawer contained stationery, and all other drawerss were filled with cosmetics, scents, hair accessories – nothing of use. He took an apricot coloured lace trimmed robe from the wardrobe to go to the bathroom. There was just one empty drawer and all other drawers filled with lotions and similar products bearing the logo of the company owned by Miss Mabey’s family.

Bonnie showered and used the family soap and shampoo, both heavily scented but pleasant.

He flicked through the automobile manuals until he felt sleepy, and then rather than crawl naked between the fresh sheets, he found a nightie in the drawer which he thought might be the least girly, and he put that on. It fitted him well and was soft and comfortable. He slept as soundly as he ever had.

Maria knocked on his door in the morning to wake him. She had adjusted his uniform and it was hanging outside his door. It was very old fashioned, but he liked it. It was dark grey with a high collar and double breasted front. The pants were tapered. There was a hat too, and shoes in his size. He just needed to find something to wear under it. Underpants and a top, and socks. He could use anything he could find in the room, so he did.

It felt good, and it looked good. There was a full-length mirror in his room. His clean hair looked a little full under the cap, but apart from that he looked manly. Nobody could guess that underneath he was wearing a silk blouse and red woman’s panties and black half stockings. It was not as if he had much choice. That was all he could find. None of it was visible under the uniform. The shoes were patent black loafers, designed for comfort, with a slight heel to rest close to the gas pedal.

Bonnie went down to the kitchen with his books to complete his study of them over breakfast prepared by Nadine, with Mrs. Bull and Maria. It was the best food he had eaten for a long time, and the three women were totally different and good company.

Mrs. Bull was intelligent, severe, but kind. Nadine was a little silly, good natured and kind. Maria was just lost, but hard-working, and kind.

Bonnie was handed a phone and shortly afterward he received his first text message from Miss Mabey with just a time she expected him to be outside the front door and the vehicle he was expected to drive. He was ready when she stepped outside.

“You look very smart, Bonnie,” said Miss Mabey. “Just tie back that hair rather than cut it, and use some of our D&M cream on that face of yours. You can use it all over if you like.”

“Yes, Ma’am,” he said, closing the door behind her and jumping in the driver’s seat. “Where to?”

He had intended to go back to the hostel after he had dropped her off, but for what? Somehow everything he had no longer seemed to belong in his life. It was all worn and filthy, and here he was, clean and with the feeling of silk against that clean skin, sitting on a leather seat, with a job, and a pay packet not far off. For now, he could make do with what he had.

He could have gone shopping. He had time and could have found the money, but somehow he thought that he could make do. Why bother for now?

That very evening was Wednesday, and Miss Mabey had dinner in the kitchen with staff on Wednesday. Nadine cooked something hearty and tasty rather than fancy, but she had culinary training and a genuine feel for food. She did not live in but quite close, and she had plenty of time off.

“Would you help me, Keith?” she said. “Ability in the kitchen is always useful.”

Why not? Bonnie felt that Mrs. Bull and Maria seemed to be so busy compared to him. The house was large, and he only had two cars to look after – three if you include the sports car.

They sat down together, and Miss Mabey talked about the frustrations of her day.

“But, with all of these problems,” she said, “I consider myself fortunate that I am helping to make the world a more beautiful place. That is what our family business is all about, making people beautiful.”

Mrs. Bull smiled politely. Nadine nodded eagerly. Maria just looked confused. Bonnie just considered what she was saying. Yes, beautiful women do make life seem happier. Miss Mabey was not just enjoying the fruits of the family business – she believed in it. It was just a pity that her own household seemed such a poor reflection of those thoughts.

Bonnie could not help thinking: ‘After Miss Mabey herself, I would have to be the next most beautiful’.

The D&M cream was in the bathroom upstairs. Unlike some of the other products from the business in the cabinet and the drawers, these pots were unlabelled, just with “D&M” written on them in marker pen. Bonnie guessed that it should just be applied before bed. It felt so soothing on his face that he took up her suggestion and applied it to his legs and arms too, and his shoulders and tummy. It tingled a little as he lay in bed, but it was not unpleasant. It became a nightly routine.

His daily routine was picking up and dropping off Miss Mabey, and also running errands for Mrs. Bull and collecting supplies for her and Nadine. He was also happy to help Nadine in the kitchen and Maria in her workroom, where she had a cutting table and a sewing machine. She had skills which he admired. She had made his uniform from scratch, and she now made him a second one, in dark green.

By the time the weekend came around he had intended asking Miss Mabey for an advance on his wages, but for what? Where would he go? What would he buy? He was entitled to time off, but he thought that for now he should just be on hand and make himself indispensable.

So, on Saturday morning he put on a clean pair of panties from the packed drawer of them, and reached for some of the half stockings that served so well as socks. It was only then that he noticed that his legs were completely hairless. His arms too. Come go think of it, his razor had run over a very smooth face that morning. Even the bottom half of his eyebrows seemed to have fallen away. And looking at them he realized that his eyebrows were as far up as he had applied the D&M cream.

He used his phone to search the web. “D&M Cream - Depilation and Moisturization”. He needed to look up “depilation”. He was momentarily horrified. Momentarily, because as he stroked his smooth cheek and chin, he felt strangely comfortable. The only issue was the eyebrows.

He got a text from Miss Mabey. She wanted to go up to the country house.

“I had no idea that the D&M cream would be so effective,” he said to her as they left the city. “I have lost some of my eyebrows. She leaned forward to view him in the driving mirror.

“I can fix that for you,” she said. “But look at your skin. It has responded so well. Be sure to keep out of the sun. You should use the T Formula face cream from now on. And the J Formula on your hands.”

The drive was not so far once he was on the freeway, and the connecting roads were good, all laid out on the GPS showing a commonly used route. One of the remotes opened the wrought iron gates, and Bonne steered the vehicle up to the main door. The house was massive, and whether old or modern, was built in the style of an ancient stately home. The man walking across the lawn towards them added to that. He was dressed like the gamekeeper of literature, in tan pants and a olive green plaid jacket.

He got to her car door before Bonnie, and greeted Miss Mabey.

“Good morning Stan,” she said to him. “This is Bonnie. Perhaps show him where the car belongs.”

Bonnie put out his hand and Stan took it gently, rather than delivering the firm handshake the driver expected. Stan’s hand seemed so rough in his that gripping it hard seemed inappropriate. Stan smiled warmly, his eyes sparkled in a way that Bonnie found unsettling.

“Sure,” he said to Miss Mabey. “I can show her the garages. You go straight inside.”

The pronoun was almost lost on Bonnie, but not on Miss Mabey. She laughed, and said: “Bonnie is not a woman, Stan, although she would be a very attractive one.”

There was no mistaking the look Bonnie saw on Stan’s face: Crestfallen disappointment if not shock.

Rather than get in the car he walked ahead of it around the side of the house to a large garage. There was a late model SUV, a more rugged looking 4WD, and a small collection of classic cars under covers at the back, plus space for the car he was driving, and others. It was very roomy.

Stan managed the property, land and buildings. There was a cook and a maid living in the house, but under his direction. He had a cottage and there was accommodation in the stables for a groom for the horses and gardeners or groundsmen. Bonnie would happily have taken a bed there, but Miss Mabey insisted that he stay in the spare maid’s room.

“I’m staying overnight, so find something comfortable to wear if you want to look around,” said Miss Mabey. “But first I’ll get my maid to tidy up those eyebrows of yours.”

A few minutes later Bonnie was looking in the mirror with a better understanding of how Stan could have mistaken him for being female. There he was standing without his cap on. His hair was a little long, but looked full and shiny, no doubt due to the shampoo in the bathroom. His face was smooth and clear, and his brows were thin and arched. Even his lips seemed to have color, and his uniform with the tunic, straight pants and loafers, was distinctly gender neutral.

Looking around his borrowed room, he could find nothing to wear that could reassert his masculinity. Just like his room at the city house, all the clothes were female, except that in this room the décor also screamed femininity.

The best he could do was to find a fairly plain blouse and a pair of tight riding pants and some boots to go with them that seemed to fit well. Again, the clothing was gender neutral, but it seemed thoroughly appropriate for a walk around the estate.

He met Stan by chance, behind a large barn out of sight from the house, on his way back from a lengthy solo walking tour. He heard the sound of wood being chopped, and he came around the corner to see Stan standing shirtless, with an axe in his hand.

“I’m surprised that Miss Mabey doesn’t buy her wood chopped already, or have someone other than her manager do that,” said Bonnie. “There seems to be so much money.”

“I do it because I like it,” said Stan. “Its constructive, in that I make a neat woodpile; it’s useful in making fuel; and it’s violent enough to work out some frustrations.” And with that he swung the axe down on another round of pine tree.

“You’re frustrated?” Bonnie had to ask, for whatever reason.

Same stared into his eyes. He was not sure if it was hostility, but somehow it seemed deep. “Yes,” he said, bringing the axe down again.

“It’s getting dark,” Bonnie observed, for some reason making small talk. It occurred to him that Stan was not in a mood to discuss whatever was on his mind.

“You’re right. Miss Mabey has guests tonight, so I will need to scrub up and play butler. But then there will be leftovers in the kitchen for our dinner, if you can wait.”

“Will I need to do anything? In the city I help in the kitchen.”

“Good,” said Stan. “Let me get my shirt. Follow me back to the house.”

The cook was glad to have the help in preparation. She was only cooking for six, but it was to be a 5-course meal. The leftovers were outrageously good.

“Tomorrow she will want to inspect the back block,” said Stan. “I drive her usually, so perhaps you can help the cook with her traditional Sunday High Tea. Do you bake?”

“Why not?” said Bonnie. The truth was that he liked to be doing something. This was an easy job in pleasant surroundings. He had never had it so good. He was keen to stay, but he was also keen to learn new skills that might be useful in the future. He had never baked before, but he was keen to learn. He remembered the smell of the muffins his grandmother made. The best memories are smells.

He talked with the cook until it was quite late. He went upstairs and took a nightie from the drawer, barely looking to search for another option. As expected, the company’s product was in the dresser drawer. He applied formula T to his face, and Formula J on his hands, just as Miss Mabey suggested.

It the morning he needed to find something else. There were no pants, but there were “jeggings” - leggings in the form of jeans. There was a white singlet with a red patterned blouse to wear over it, and red and white striped plimsolls. If only he could run across to the stables in his underwear to borrow some real clothes, but his underwear consisted of frilly panties. He would have to get by with this.

“A nice ensemble,” said the cook. “But you will need to wear a pinafore over that to keep the flour off those pants. And I have something that will go perfectly with those colors. But take that shirt off.”

The pinafore was fine red and white stripes so that it looked pink, and it wrapped around at the back. From at least three angles it looked as if he was wearing a dress.

“It’s practical,” said the chef.

Despite himself, Bonnie loved it. It was so comfortable. His hairless bare arms seemed free to get about his work under the instruction of the cook.

The cooking smells drew Miss Mabey into the kitchen. She saw Bonnie hard at work.

“You should take that outfit home with you,” said Miss Mabey. “In the town house you’ll fit right in wearing that. Compared to here, in the city we keep a very feminine household, I suppose.”

The cook nodded. She had several more like it in other colors. She called it “The complete household working outfit”. Bonnie was to discover that was so true.

The high tea was served on the veranda, and all the staff and two maintenance guys were in attendance, with Miss Mabey holding court.

Bonnie perched on the veranda rail, in his pinafore, letting the slight breeze run through his hair. He looked across to see Stan staring at him. He smiled at Stan, but he did not get a smile back. It did not concern him. Soon after this he would be back in his uniform, driving back to the city.

When he went to collect the car a few hours later, Stan was in the garage working on a car in the back.

“I just drive them,” he said. “You obviously know much more about cars than I do.”

“Leave this sort of stuff to me,” said Stan. “You just keep wearing pink. It suits you.”

Was it supposed to be an insult? An accusation that Bonnie looked like a fag? It seemed explicable as that. Here he was, up until a few minutes ago a grown man prancing around the house in leggings and a pinafore. As Bonnie got into the car, he thought that it might be, but as he saw the look on Stan’s face in the rear vision mirror, he doubted that. Stan looked sad to see him going.

He drove Miss Mabey back to the city. They talked about the rural estate and also about Stan. She said that he was a widower with a son and a daughter, twins, both grown and at college out of state. She said that he was competent and thoughtful, and highly valued by her. “But a little lonely, perhaps?” she said. Bonnie felt sad for him. Not just a thought – a real feeling.

When they got back there was time to clean the car and still have time to offer help to Nadine in the kitchen.

“I have some clothes suitable for cooking,” said Bonnie, presenting himself.

“That looks gorgeous,” said Nadine. “When you are not in uniform you simply must wear color.”

He looked at himself in the mirror near the door to the dining room. He liked the way he looked in that pinafore. He pulled the tie from his hair. It fell beside his face, soft and shiny. His smooth face, and those eyebrows in a feminine arch that somehow he had not noticed before. He barely looked like a man at all.

“We keep a very feminine household” is what Miss Mabey had said. Had the house changed him?

“Yes, you’re gorgeous,” said Nadine, “But we have work to do.”

They did. ‘Gorgeous’. Bonnie felt warmth where perhaps he should have been appalled with what he had seen. Somehow he had never been particularly attractive as a man – the shape of the face or the eyes too big or too wide set, perhaps. But yes, if you could imagine for a minute that this person was a woman, gorgeous seemed the right word.

He spun around with a smile. He went about his chores with a new energy.

That night he spent more time in front of the mirror. Initially he viewed himself naked. Slim and now hairless. His groin looked out of place. He rummaged in the drawer for the best garment to conceal the incongruous. There was something. Thick panties high waisted and in a nude color that seemed made to conceal his maleness. They even made his butt look fuller.

He decided that his lips needed a little color. It was just to see how feminine he could look. Where is the harm in that? The drawer of the dresser was full of the stuff he needed. And those eyelashes needed a little more darkness. Just a little.

But the outcome of such a small effort seemed so drastic. That was a woman in the mirror. A flat chested woman. There was another drawer full of bras, and some stockings to roll up and stuff inside.

After a while he put on his nightie and cleaned his face, applying a night cream. He slept and dreamed women’s dreams, as if nothing was more normal. But you don’t choose your dreams. They happen. Sometimes you wake in a cold sweat, and sometimes you open your eyes to the morning light and you feel enriched by the experience. Every morning now seemed like that.

Bonnie decided to use a little color on his face every day. Perhaps a little more each day. Nobody disapproved. If anything the comments were how good he looked – how he appeared happier and healthier – which is exactly how he did feel.

His cellphone rang. He was surprised that it was Stan. They had traded numbers but had not called one another.

“I am coming to the city,” he said. “I will be staying at the house, as I usually do when I come. I will only be staying one night – or perhaps two. Mrs. Bull knows, so I am expected, but I am calling you to ask you whether you would do something for me while I am there?”

Bonnie was somehow excited at the prospect seeing Stan again. “Sure,” he said. “Whatever you want.”

“Please wear the pinafore, or something similar,” said Stan. “Just nothing masculine.”

A week or so before he might have responded by shouting something down the phone and hanging up. But now that did not seem such an unusual request. And he wanted to see Stan. He wanted Stan to see him. To see the small changes that he had made to his appearance. Would he notice? Would he approve?

He found himself waiting for Stan’s arrival as a child waits for Christmas.

He wanted to be in the kitchen or the garage when Stan arrived. He had the impression that Stan worked hard and that he thought a driver’s job was far too relaxed. He wanted to show the older man that he was useful and making a more extensive contribution to the household, even though it was Mrs. Bull who was running the city establishment.

“Pink suits you … nothing masculine”. The words had him in a quandry. His wardrobe was full of pink. Not much was masculine except his uniform (which looked increasingly unisex) or overalls, which now on him, looked more like a jump suit. He was mindlessly trying on almost everything, when the doorbell rang.

He did something only a man would do. Without thinking about what he was wearing, without even checking his hair, which hung around his shoulders, he ran down the first flight of stairs, appearing on the second-floor landing when Mrs. Bull opened the door.

Stan looked up and smiled. At the top of the stairs he could see Bonnie, wearing a pink dress, looking breathless and slightly dishevelled, and gorgeous.

“Hello,” he called up to the figure, with a confused Mrs. Bull having followed his gaze.

“Hi.” The single word out of his mouth in reply, sounded feminine and hopelessly shy.

Mrs. Bull smiled. “Am I interrupting something?” she said. And in the silence that followed she realized that she was. She bustled off leaving them alone.

“You look wonderful,” said Stan.

Bonnie looked down, suddenly aware of how he was dressed. He seemed almost naked. His legs were bare, and strangely hairless. The dress was slightly crumpled, so he smoothed it. He was wearing women’s clothes. He wore them all the time, in his room, as he has done since he had arrived here, but now he was in public, standing at the top of the stairs, in full view of this man.

And the man was looking at him. And saying that he looked wonderful. Wonderful!

“Thank you,” he said. But he was just being polite, surely. “I haven’t had time to dress properly”.

Miss Mabey appeared, evidently advised of Stan’s arrival, coming to greet him warmly. But she too followed his gaze up the stairs.

“Well, Bonnie,” she said. “Don’t you look so pretty in that dress? It seems to me that you were born to wear clothes like that.”

“It’s just something I threw on, Miss Mabey,” he said. “You know that I don’t have a lot to choose from in the way of clothes at the moment.”

“Quite right, dear,” she said. “We’ll have to fix that.”

She turned to talk to Stan, buts she too could see that there was something in the gaze being shared by her two employees that was extra-ordinary. She thought for a minute.

“Stan is here to take me to the Mandeville Society AGM and lunch,” said Miss Mabey. “To be honest, I don’t care for the AGM, but the lunch is a very fine affair; wealthy landowners from upstate, but always good food and conversation. You should join us Bonnie. You and I can let Stan go to the AGM and take the time to get appropriately glamorous.”

“You don’t need me to drive you?”

“Goodness no. Stan will drive us. Just put some shoes on. We can leave straight away. I will meet the costs. My treat.”

Sensing the uncertainty, Stan stepped forward to the bottom of the stairs and called up: “Would you?”

“I’ll get my shoes,” said Bonnie. So, he did. A pair of sandals. Something in keeping with the dress.

As he put them on, he started to wonder what was happening. How long had he been working here? Could it be that long? What had happened to him over that time? He was not this person when he arrived, so why was he now wearing a dress?

“We keep a very feminine household” were the words. He had been surrounded by women. Had it really been that long? It seemed that the only man he had even talked to in ages was Stan, and his feeling for him was not friendship, it was something very different. Admiration perhaps? Even more than that?

He decided that he needed to get out of the house, and now he had that opportunity. It seemed that today he was not going to be a servant as he was every day, but something more like Stan was to Miss Mabey – a senior employee – closer to a partner.

He descended the stairs and helped Miss Mabey exit the house and climb into Stan’s big SUV.

“Take us to the Juniper Salon on Spring Street,” Miss Mabey instructed Stan. “You can go to the AGM around the corner, and we will join you for lunch.”

Miss Mabey had arranged everything. She was that kind of person. Not only was the salon booked to give them the works, but she had a nearby boutique arrive to measure them both and display a range of dresses while their hair and nails were done.

It was new to Bonnie, and fascinating. ‘If this is how the rich live then I like it’, he thought. Somehow the experience flowed over him and wrapped him in something warm and pleasant. Somehow the chatter of Miss Mabey and the staff of the salon seemed comforting, like an easy conversation with close family.

“That is the dress for you,” said Miss Mabey. “And those shoes are essential, but you will need to practice a little walking in heels.”

Somehow that did not seem odd, especially when he had the opportunity to view the full look. His hair was up, styled into a mass of curls high at the back, the make up perfect for a daytime function. The dress was black, and elegant, and according to Miss Mabey Bonnie was not over- dressed for the lunch.

“Although this is the kind of outfit that you could wear right through to the evening.” Which is exactly what he did, although by the end of the evening, he was no longer he.

They walked to the function, in the dining room of a nearby exclusive club. Stan was already there, networking with other members of the Mandeville Association. They approached him from behind. When he turned around, he was close enough to smell the scent Miss Mabey had recommended – a reputed “man-magnet”.

His mouth fell open. His pupils dilated. Bonnie could sense his desire. It changed everything.

“My God,” he said. “I can’t believe it’s you. Who are you?”

“Bonnie,” she said. “Bonnie Keith, the Mabey Chauffeuse.”

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2020

I guess I am just one of those people who can’t stand to see injustice being done. Sometimes I felt that it was my duty to stand up for people who can’t fight injustice by themselves. The way I see it, this has nothing to do with being gay or trans, it is about freedom, and that means being free to be who you are.

But we all know the minorities gay or trans people are a minority, and the way I figure it, democracy only works if you look after minorities. Look at Nazi Germany – the majority wanted to blame a minority for their problems. That would be a democracy, but not the one I would want to live in. A democracy that doesn’t look after people is not about freedom.

It is just about bullying. I don’t like it. I have never liked it and I won’t stand for it. It is not because I have ever been bullied. I was lucky to be born to be an athlete and a sportsman – one of those people who are popular in school and never get bullied. I think that makes me more inclined to help those who are not as lucky as I am. That is the way it should be.

Some people called me a crusader, like that is a bad thing. I call myself a person of strong principles, who is prepared to go to extremes to stand up for what I believe in.

I think people are born gay or born trans, just like people are born small or weak. A minority can get bullied. Often the majority lets it happen. I went to school in North Texas so I should know. There in school I felt that it was my duty to stand up for those people.

Guys would say things like – “Hey, Malc, why are you backing the fags? Are you turning gay or something?”

“Maybe I am! If I was would you bully me?” It made me wonder whether they would, but it also brought home to me that I really had no understanding of what it would be like to be in the position of one of their victims.

I never liked being called “a fag lover”. What does that even mean? I am a human being brought up to love my neighbor – whether he is gay or not, black, red or yellow – I love my fellow man. It was just a term of abuse that says to me that I am not a victim, I just pity the victim. That never sat well with me. I suppose that is why I decided to put myself in the same group as them. Can you truly be an activist as an outsider? You have to join them to champion them. From there I could call out the bullies.

Besides, somebody once told me that activism can be fun and enlightening.

I didn’t even know Alison when I started, or rather I did not know who she was before – what her male name had been. But that didn’t matter. She was Alison and she was the only transgirl in our school … before I joined her.

“I want to share your journey,” I said to her. “I want to transition with you. I want to support you against all the bigots and rednecks and we have plenty right here.”

“But you are on the football team!” She could not believe that a guy like me could be trans. But I had done my reading. I knew all about the big girls trying to run away from their femininity.

“Now I am on your team,” I told her. “I am going to be your BFF. We will be transgirls together for as long as it takes to get you accepted. I guess that I have some accumulated goodwill in this school, and I am going to put it work for you, and for all other gender variant people in our school, and our city, and our state.”

She hugged me. I remember thinking then that it was important that I should receive this hug as the person she expected me to be – as a fellow transwoman. This was not a sexual thing, which is not to say that transwoman cannot be lesbian and there is nothing wrong if they are, but this need to be a hug shared between to women – transwomen.

And so our journey began. I pulled out of football training and I joined Alison on hormones. I told the coach and the principal the same thing – I was just the same as Alison and we were going to support one another through our transition. I started by asking for their support, which is not something that Alison would have been able to do.

When the coach said that it would be hard to break to the guys on the team I volunteered to do it myself. It was at a pre-season meeting in the locker room. I just put it out there in words that the guys would understand.

“There is a medical reason where I have to drop out,” I said. “I am trans and I am transitioning to female. I know that everyone of you guys are probably thanking God or whoever, that you don’t have the same thing to worry about. Just remember the code we all signed up to every time we charge into the opposition, we support one another. Even after I pull out of the team, I still expect you to back me, just as if I was holding the ball in open play. Support me and protect me, in the way I always have for you guys.”

I mean they were all shocked by the news, but to a man they nodded, and some even shouted out a team call. Generally, they followed the promise given that day, and where they didn’t, they had reasons as I will explain.

Public announcements were made, and the school staff generally followed Education Department guidelines that placed to interests of students first, but there were the usual issue with parents.

“One of these so called ‘girls’ is a ex-football player. There is no way that this guy should ever use the girls restrooms,” is one I remember because it targeted me. I said that I had no desire to use any space where I made cis-gendered people uncomfortable. In fact, there was a unisex staff toilet that we could have keys to.

The fact is that Alison and I we re agreed that there was only one strategy to meet these attacks. Firstly we were not going to crusade for the rights of others. If there was a simple way to avoid confluct we would follow that route. Secondly, we needed to be the best women that we could be – more feminine and more conscious of the rights of all women, than the general body of female students.

Alison had the advantage of being small and slight, whereas I wasn’t. But I guess that I soon discovered that I had a face that worked as a woman – that is to say I was going to be quite beautiful in a striking kind of way with my fair hair and blue eyes that looked even more blue with eyeliner around them.

Rather than go with a slow transition gradually changing clothing choices and slowly picking up feminine affectations, I suggested to Alison that we go all out and get it done. There might have been something of the coach’s approach in this, but Alison agreed.

We went to get hair extensions and facials plus makeup. My mother made the reservations but it was not until I got back that that both of my parents finally realized that I was serious about all of this. I looked surprising good, but that was not going to cut it. Both Alison and I needed to learn and learn fast to not look totally stupid the following Monday.

Obviously, my parents had reservations about what I was doing, but they both understood the kind of person that I was and they admired me for it. Still, there was enough resistance that I decided that it was better not to discuss the hormones. I just felt that I needed to follow what Alison was doing, so I arranged to have the same shots that she got, albeit from a different source. They would take months to show their effect but for Alison and me the challenge to “pass as female” required immediate changes to our behavior.

I felt that I might struggle in this, given that I accepted that Alison had always lived with a feminine soul while I was just adopting one, but the fact is that it was easier for both of us having somebody to observe and correct. We soon learned that what the advisers had said was true – don’t overdo it. It is far more subtle than you think.

What we were also advised about was hostility. It was just that I was ready for this, and I was ready to use my status and popularity to defend Alison.

“I cannot blame guys for lashing out,” said Alison. “They don’t understand.”

“No,” I told her. “Boys fear us because we show them that they are only eight inches away from being female. That is why I am here to show them that anybody could be like you, and maybe they are lucky … or maybe we are the lucky ones.”

We both got our fair share of the stares, sometimes some anonymous abuse as well, whispered in a crowd. More often it was indecent suggestions, or intrusive and stupid questions.

“That is what it is like for us,” she said. But we were in this together. Alison was grateful for the support. I was glad to be there for her.

But we were not alone. Over time some of the girls at school included us in their activities as “newly minted girls”. It helped that Alison had a flair for dress design, and she is a whizz on the sewing machine. She made some things for herself and helped me with clothes because I was bigger than most of the girls. We started to get more adventurous with our clothes and dresses and skirts became our choice. I suppose that Alison felt that more feminine garments were her way of breaking free of her masculine past, and I was right there beside her, doing the same.

But it seemed to us that we had a bigger disadvantage with hair and makeup. The girls at school had grown up with this stuff, but it was new to us. Slowly they started treating us as two more of them, and including us in their activities. Alison and I were invited to the homes of other girls where they did things like curling or braiding our extended hair, and doing makeup “looks” for a variety on occasions. And there were fashion shows that included some of Alison’s special outfits. It was at last making it into the team after all that effort, or a special club that is very selective.

When you are with the girls then it becomes even harder for the boys to pick you out for abuse. My position as Alison’s champion, was that I was always ready to respond to anything that was directed at either of us, but it very seldom came to that. Guys knew what I was doing because of who I was. I was storing my experiences away and it might come back to hurt them later. We were part of an even wider group, but still my presence added something. I was there for all women, because I now was one.

I had always been proud of myself as being a person who could make sacrifices to help others. My sacrifice in giving up my masculine gender, even if only temporarily, was a huge sacrifice to make, especially in our state where masculinity is such a scared thing. Somehow that made me even more proud, but to be accepted as a woman among other woman seemed like the biggest achievement of my life.

Yes, I suppose that when this all started I just believed that Alison would reach a point where she could go about her life without my help. A champion is there to fight battles on behalf of another but not to live their life.

But I learned that there are two problems with that. Firstly, it is not just the transition that is the challenge – in reality, the lot of transwomen is to encounter the issues that concerned me, right through their whole lives. The start has special challenges but no protector can be there forever. The same applies to all women to a lesser extent.

The other thing that I did not expect was the effect that the transition had on me. I spent some time thinking about how much of this might be the drugs that I was taking – drugs that neutralized the male hormones and substituted female ones. Do they affect the brain as well? I could see that I was losing muscle mass on my arms and legs, but instead of being concerned I was pleased. Even the soft mounds that appeared on my chest I enjoyed cupping in my hands and then delicately enveloping them in my padded bras.

I loved my hair too. I could not stop playing with it and washing it then brushing it until it shone. The idea of cutting it off was starting to terrify me. All of this should have felt wrong, but it didn’t.

I found that I had fallen into the feminine role with such ease that I wondered whether I might have had some kind of transgender tendencies all along, even though I could not recall ever feeling that way in the past. I had always relished the male role, but now the female one seemed to be drawing me in as if by some strong but invisible force.

I suppose what really pushed me over the edge was when Kevin McKinley asked me to go on a date. I had played football with Kevin, and he was quite a bit bigger than me. Now suddenly he saw me as female, and he was attracted to me.

All my girlfriends said that I should date him, and I did not want to discuss with them anything of my sexual orientation that might prevent me. The truth of that was that even that was now in doubt. I liked the way that Kevin looked at me. I started to imagine what it might be like to be held my him and to feel his strong, hard hairy body against my soft and smooth one.

I said yes, on the condition that he find another guy from the team to double date alongside Alison. That would see the two transgirls at school going out with two guys from the football team – the ultimate acceptance of the fact that we had made it.

We had a great night, but Kevin’s friend did not hit it off with Alison for reasons we should all understand, but Kevin remains as keen on me as ever. I was his date at the graduation prom and in what has become a local tradition, that lead to sex that night and settled the question of sexual orientation forever.

Alison had her own similar experience and now faces the future as a confident woman in a stable relationship with a man.

Kevin has a football scholarship and wants me to come with him to his new college. It really does mean that I need to make a decision, but somehow, I don’t think it will be a difficult one. He is my champion now, and my role is to help him to be the best that he can be.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2024

Author’s Note:
I wrote a short vignette based on a captioned image exploring this idea of a teenager helping somebody through teen transition, so when Big Closet posed a Christmas Challenge for a story requiring “the selfless act of a main character helping out someone, somewhere within a story” I thought that this story could be more fully explored. The image from Courtney’s original caption is included, as this is my vision of the hero/heroine. In reviewing the posting of my vignette riffing off this Courtney said – “Feel free to do more. This was one of my fav caps since it's a different scenario.”

2663
2024-09-08 18:41:30 -0400

Charley's Cousin
A Short Story (with images)
By Maryanne Peters

Because of the images I have attached this as a pdf.

Cheer Coach
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

To me, it was a natural extension from gymnastics. At college I was a gymnast, but injury put an end to my career.

People do not understand that when you devote your life to something, and one day it is just gone, it leaves a huge hole in your life. People said that I was fixated on gymnastics, but to be successful in anything that competitive, you need to be. Every waking moment, and many sleeping ones too, I lived what I loved. And then it was gone. In a freak accident both calf muscles were ripped. I was left without a future in gymnastics. The chronic pain was of less concern. I would happily have carried twice as much as that to able to continue as a gymnast.

Without the discipline and the exercise regimen of gymnastics, my body became soft and weak. I became depressed. I let myself go a bit I suppose. I didn’t cut my hair or shave my face. I looked like some kind of flabby troll.

Somebody suggested coaching. But to my dismay I discovered that I could not coach gymnastics. I cared about it too much. I would get so frustrated that I would get emotional, which is not something that a man should do.

Then my little sister suggested that I coach her cheerleading team. It was a team that supported our college football team, the Cobras. I used to watch the football, not the cheering, but when she put the idea in my head, I started to watch, and to see potential.

I had skills in all the apparatus, but the floor routine was my specialty. The key to a good floor routine is to have all the tumbles and compulsory moves down pat, but string it all together with constant movement. I suppose that some people would call it “interpretive dance”. It needs to be graceful and show the potential of the human body. Then you release the coiled spring with speed and height. It should be beautiful.

Some of my friends called my moves feminine. I would call them graceful. I suppose it can be an issue for male gymnasts doing a floor routine, but you need to maintain movement, or the routine looks disjointed. The Cobra Cheerleaders had some skills, but their routine looked like that - disjointed.

Their coach was having a baby and it was getting close. She had to stand down at a crucial point in the season. Could I take over just temporarily? Of course, I made a show of being reluctant, but I wanted to do this. I was excited for the first time in ages.

Their heavily pregnant coach introduced me to the squad at training, and I set my terms.

“I think that you are good, but you can be so much better,” I said. “If you work with me then we could be state champions, but I expect commitment.”

I knew that there was a contest, but I knew nothing about it. I just believed in competition and a target to aim for. Not everybody was interested in that, but a core of the girls were. Those girls promised commitment, and I promised the same in return.

To seal the deal, they presented me with a cheerleader’s outfit with my name across the back, matching theirs. It was a joke, and I knew it was. I am not sure that they expected it, but by way of a humorous response I turned up to my first training as coach, in that outfit with my hair tied up in a high ponytail like most of them wore.

Everybody clapped, and I did a classic curtsey. It set the scene for a good first session, with plenty of humor and friendly exchanges of ideas. It was just what I wanted.

“Pull off those whiskers and you could be one of us,” one said.

“If you can pull off all of the moves that I am planning this weekend, I will let you,” I said.

I had set a list of things that I wanted but I did not expect. They were not difficult moves, but they involved timing and fluid movement, which is not something that you expect to achieve in just two sessions, but on the weekend, they pulled it off. The moves, that is. The beard followed later.

Monday was declared “beard-plucking-day” and I had to endure it in good humor. I had expected a shave would do the job, but they were holding me to it. It turns out that they had done two other sessions on their own to get our moves right, just to put me through a bit of suffering. It was not nasty behavior on their part, it was about testing my commitment to them, and I approve of that. It was just that my beard did not grow back. Not then, and for entirely different reasons, not ever.

I do not regret one minute of the pain that I went through because from that moment I was part of the team that I was coaching. Gymnastics is fundamentally an individual pursuit, but cheerleading like football and soccer, and baseball, is a team sport. You are only as good as your worst player, so everybody needs to work to lift the performance of everybody else. And to do that, you have to know that everybody is prepared to go through the same pain. Even the coach.

I have to say that the cheerleader dress they gave me on the day that I started had a special place in my heart. I wore it with pride. It was not a fetish thing - it was a team thing. Just like the hair – when I wore the high ponytail it was in solidarity with my team. The makeup came later. It was just that if you wear a dress and put up your hair, then …, well nobody wants to look stupid. Nobody wants to let the side down.

It was an all-woman team. I was part of it. We all had the same problems. We all fought the battle of keeping our limbs smooth, and our hair shiny, and our faces bright and smiling, no matter what we were going through. No matter how hard it was, and how much the pain, we had to endure to be the best. Everybody, including me.

I suppose that there was a day when I stepped off the field after co-coordinating our performance from the sideline and I looked in the mirror and I saw somebody who was not me standing there. She was wearing her Cobras outfit, with bleached hair up in a high bow, plucked eyebrows and false eyelashes, lipstick and fake tits. And it was me.

I supposed the biggest surprise was that the person looking back at me was not bad looking. And I wasn’t the only person who thought so.

Cheerleaders have their own hangers-on, and there were always boys. Most of them were younger than me, but not Ted. His youngest sister was on the squad and he would collect her from practice some days. He also attended games that we cheered at, and he would come down to the sideline to talk to me.

Somehow, he got the idea that I was a girl. Now where would he have got that idea? I mean, look at me.

Of course, the right thing to do would be to point out his mistake and tell him to run along, but, weird as it may seem, I sort of liked the attention.

So, one thing led to another and he asked me out. Now was the time to tell him that he had gone far enough, but somehow, I just couldn’t. I told myself that I didn’t want to disappoint him, but the truth is that I didn’t want to disappoint myself. I had suddenly realized that in all the years I had spent at the gym perfecting my skills, I was missing something – intimacy and relationship.

Of course, it could not be Ted. Ted was a guy and so was I, or I thought I was, when I wasn’t with him.

But when I was with him, I was somebody else. Somebody happy. I mean, coaching the cheerleading team had given me purpose and lifted my spirits, but fundamentally the man in me was still depressed and lacking self-esteem. There was another version of me who had no such problems, but that version wore a dress.

I bought it on a whim. It was just that Ted was talking to me and I was sucking on a bottle of Powerade – not in a suggestive way … much. He said that the blue brought out the color in my eyes. What a pick-up line! An energy drink! But I fell for it. I must have done. I saw the blue dress in the store window. They had it in 12 so I bought it. I wore it that night.

I was trapped but I didn’t feel that way. I felt great. As long as I was her, I felt great. When I was back to being him, I didn’t feel so good. I almost hated him for being so sad and helpless. He was a failed gymnast. She was a successful cheer coach.

And I was successful. My team entered the state cheerleading competition and we picked up first prize. I received a special commendation for my choreography. It was a big deal.

I bought another dress for the after-party. It was silver and low cut in the front, so I had to use some tricks and some gel inserts to fashion my flabby chest into a sexy cleavage. Ted went as my escort. We danced together all night, slow and close a good part of the time. And he kissed me. Long, lingering, sexy kisses. Kisses that made me want to be the woman he thought that I was. But that could never be. Like Cinderella I ran away from the ball in tears, leaving Ted very confused.

But I decided that this was not something that I could walk away from. My team needed me, and (in a way) I needed them too. And, whether or not Ted would want me when he found out, I wanted him, as long as I could have him.

So, I went to the doctor and I went on hormones. It’s only been a few weeks but I think I can see the difference already. I know I can feel it. There is a chance Ted may want me. It’s a chance I need to chase. It is like I said, but to be successful in anything, you need to be a little fixated. You need to live for what you love.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2019

Author’s Note: I have had a Patreon page (https://www.patreon.com/maryannepeters) for over a year now. This is where I post all of my stories first, plus collections of other small posts and the occasional essay - around 250 total postings. I also receive commissions and suggestions from fans. In particular the self-declared chair of my fan club sent me four story ideas as a challenge, and this is the first of the four short pieces that resulted.
Maryanne

Cheong Sam
A Vignette
By Maryanne Peters

My grandfather fought in Vietnam. He was the same age as I am, when he was drafted. He said that he had long hair just like mine when he was called up. They ran the clippers over his head and left him with a quarter inch all over.

“I can’t criticize long hair when yours is no longer that mine was at the same age, Sam, but we were still men in my day. Now I am not so sure.” He was always talking like that. “You have these bisexuals and metrosexuals and gender-sexuals, and whatever. We had to fight a war. I can’t see your generation doing that.”

Maybe he was right. How would I react if it happened here and now?

“Bring me my war trunk and I will find something for you. In fact, what I have in there has your name on it, Sam. Let me dig around in here and find it for you.

I learned the joke when he produced it – it was a cheong-sam. Not a Cheong, Sam, but a cheong-sam. It was red embroidered silk and I thought that it was beautiful. Not that I was an admirer of female clothing at that time, but you can look at something and see the beauty without having to wear it.

But in this case something told me that I had to wear it – something other than my grandfather, that is.

There were his old fatigues in the trunk too, and his number 1 dress uniform, but they would hang off me. The cheong-sam he had bought for some woman over there, but never had the chance to give it to her. Instead, he had brought it home.

“This has never been worn, but it should be,” he said. “It’s got your name on it.” He was joking about the name, but somehow, I felt drawn to try it on.

But not in front of my grandfather. That would be weird. I took it home. I tried it on. It changed me.

I am not sure that it is supposed to be worn with black tights. I tried it on with bare legs first, but then I felt compelled to shave them, right up to the crotch. Somehow that seemed right, and all that was needed was to fill out the bust and the butt.

I tried to use padding, but silk shows everything. It occurred to me that the cheong-sam needs to be filled with flesh. It doesn’t have to be a lot of flesh – Asian women like the girl my grandfather was pursuing, are hardly buxom. The only flesh I needed could be created with the right drugs – a cocktail that is available on line.

It was only a matter of time before I could fill out the cheong-sam, but the journey to that point was the best part of my life – so far. This garment had come into my life and changed me. It needed to be worn and it needed to be filled, and slowly but wonderfully, it was.

Now all I need to do is step outside and introduce to the world the new Sam, in a cheong-sam.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2023

Another volume of romantic stories by Maryanne!

Choosing Change
by Maryanne Peters
Buy on Amazon

Sometimes change is hard. Resistance can come from family, friends, even ourselves.

If given the choice, would you maintain your humdrum life... or would you choose change?

Join Maryanne Peters in another volume of Mostly Happy Endings, full of heroines who decide the rewards -- and the romance -- are worth the risk.

Twenty more gender-bending tales from Maryanne as her heroes-turned-heroines, in the midst of crisis, choose the romantic option.

Story 1: Black and White
A Christian Feminization Story
By Maryanne Peters

For me it was a chance to start again. You may mock me or even attack me, but I can always rely upon the strength of my faith.

The words of scripture are clear: “You shall not lie with a male as with a woman; it is an abomination." Leviticus Chapter 18 verse 22, and If a man lies with a male as with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination; they shall surely be put to death; their blood is upon them." - Leviticus Chapter 20 verse 13.

And in the New Testament where in his letter to the Romans Saint Paul condemned those men who “gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error”.

That penalty is damnation. Everlasting hell fire. My soft flesh burning in the fires of hell forever. What choice did I have?

It is black and white. Repent and forgo the sinful life. God knows I tried. I mean, He does know. He was right beside me through it all. My God. If there had been any other way, he would have revealed it to me. But perhaps he did show me the way – He led me to The Christian Feminization Academy.

Like many in my position I was unwilling to accept this way forward. I was a passive man – a receiver if you care to call it that – but I was still a man. But that was the problem, and the urges that drove me to sin were so strong. It was a test from God. And then through prayer, and through taking advice from the right church, the way out of my life of sin was presented to me. The Christian Feminization Academy.

They took me in . I was not alone. There were others who were suffering like me. For some it was a crisis of faith: “I believe, so how could God punish me with these feelings?” I have never questioned God. My condition is a test. Many are born into adversity or have handicaps to overcome. God has a plan for all of his people. It was just not made known to me – not then.

“You will be pretty,” they said. “Men will want you.” It was exactly what I wanted.

“But you can only avoid sin by becoming a woman. And not just a woman, but a perfect woman before God. Better even than those he has blessed with the body of a woman. You new existence will be an act of sacrifice and an act of supreme worship.” I wanted that too. I wanted to prove to God that I was His dutiful servant.

I took the drugs and when they came to me weeks later and told me that the surrender of my manhood would be next, I told them to make it quick. They said that there would be pain even with the use of local anesthetic, but I would have borne that pain gladly as a mark of my faith.

It is in the Bible. “Eunuchs who choose to live as such for the kingdom of heaven”. Matthew 19:12.

I grew my hair. I attended the classes on how to be the women preferred by God. I wore the clothes.

White is the color of purity. Buttoned to the neck. Sleeves to the cuff. Above the collar long hair pulled back and arranged in a large bun so wonderfully feminine drawn up from the nape of a neck crying out to be nuzzled, makeup tastefully understated …

But below, and pleated skirt, in black. High heels, patent leather, black. Stockings not pantyhose, in black. Am I wearing panties? If I am, they would be black.

Black is the opposite of purity. Some things do not change. I want a man. A good Christian man of course, but a man who can enter what God did not create, but He has given the skill to the surgeons to make. I want to be a wife. I promise to be a good one.

As Saint Paul said in his 1st letter to the Corinthians, I must find somebody to marry: “if they cannot control themselves, they should marry, for it is better to marry than to burn with passion”. Please consider making me your wife. It is not so black and white. Maybe I can do both?

The End

 
Story 2: My Chosen Wife
A Christian Feminization Story
By Maryanne Peters

I am shy, I guess. I speak with God all the time, but I could never seem to talk to people. At work I have my own space and I keep it that way. I don’t like the telephone. Emails are good for me. Not personal ones – not then anyway.

The only time that I mixed was at church. You might think it strange that I could barely talk to another person but in church my singing voice would boom out. It is the glory of God, I think. The miracle of faith in Jesus Christ.

If I talked to anybody it would be our pastor, Pastor Jacob. He was concerned for me. I always told him that I have my faith and that is enough. I told him that I was not concerned about having a family. Our church is full of children who can make a positive influence on the world, and I don’t need to add to that.

“What about companionship?” he said.

I am not without physical urges. I considered myself pious and devout, and I thought that a spiritual life is more important than anything else, by I had needs. These are the words of Saint Paul himself from 1 Corinthians 7:1: “ Yes, it is good to abstain from sexual relations. But because there is so much sexual immorality, each man should have his own wife, and each woman should have her own husband.”

Pastor Jacob told me that if I had no need of children, I should consider a graduate from The Christian Feminization Academy. These are women who have answered the call of God to overcome sin by changing their sex to female. They are women in the eyes of God and of all churches of true faith, for they have surrendered their past to meet the laws of God.

Paster Jacob told me that there were many such women available. He presented me with photographs to consider and to choose to meet a prospective wife.

I chose Georgette from the photo I was sent. Hers was the only image set in a church, although the dress that she wore was red, and showed off her chest a little more than might be considered modest. Nevertheless, there was something about her smile that drew me to her, and the setting showed her to be a woman of faith.

Pastor Jacob arranged for her to come to my church so that we could meet in Atrium and then walk in a pray together. I was a little disappointed that she was not wearing the red dress but something more conservative, but that was the only disappointment. She had that beautiful brown hair arranged at the back and swept off her face in front, and the sparkling eyes that hinted of desire. I suppose she looked a little uncertain. We both were.

We prayed together in silence, but we both sneaked sideways glances and caught one another with a quiet smile.

There was a coffee machine in the hall, and we went there to talk.

“I am only a recent graduate of The Christian Feminization Academy,” she explained. I have had all the surgeries to become a complete woman.

I told her that I would like to see her again but wearing the red dress.

“Oh, I can guess what kind of man you are,” she said, although I was not sure exactly what she meant. “I should explain that I am a virgin in front, because it is so new, but not round the back.”

She adopted a shy and modest look and added with a whisper: “The wages of a sinful life, now behind me, I swear.”

She was close enough to me for me to be immersed in the smells of her: Her breath of mint, her hair of floral shampoo and her body of sweet musk. For a man like me who might only experience such things rarely in the right crowded elevator, it was intoxicating.

There was no mistaking it. I had an erection right there in the church hall. It was big enough for me to have to adjust myself and for her to see it.

“And I love to suck cock,” she said. “Oh, I have missed doing that. I pray every night for God to send me a man to pleasure. That is what I was praying for in the church just now. Is that wrong?”

I said to her: “I hope not, because right beside you, I was praying for you to be the one to pleasure me”.

The End

 
Story 3: Why?
A Christian Feminization Story
By Maryanne Peters

Scripture is the truth. I believe it. The words of the Book of Deuteronomy (22:5) cut me deeply: “A woman must not put on men’s clothing, and a man must not wear women’s clothing. Anyone who does this is detestable in the sight of the Lord your God.”

God must love me, not detest me. So why would he place in me an urge so strong that I would risk the hatred of God.

I was different from the others at The Christian Feminization Academy. I was not gay. I had a girlfriend. I just needed to dress like she did, every now and again, but preferably as often as possible.

She understood. We would pray together that this affliction should be removed from me. It seemed that in prayer the thoughts would go away, for just that moment. But then I would turn and see a woman in church wearing just the most gorgeous dress or earrings to die for, and it would start all over again.

People like me always ask: “Why would a God who loves me make me this way?

I had heard about the Christian Feminization Academy, but it did not apply to me. It was for those attracted to people of the same sex. Mine was a different problem. But I was persuaded to visit and meet with Madam Sharon, just to share my concerns with somebody within the church who would not judge me for my perversion.

“They group them altogether, not me,” she said. “Homosexuals, bisexuals, transsexuals, transvestites, trans-whatever … deviants. Deviating from the way of the Lord. Acting in a manner contrary to scripture. We all acknowledge that the way we were was innate in us, and is therefore the way God made us. He did not give us the power to pray away our disorder, but he has blessed us with the ability to realign our bodies to meet his commandments.”

It was an interesting thought. But what about my girlfriend? If I became a woman I would be a homosexual woman. I would be moving from one sinful life to another sinful life. I needed to find another way, and to fight on against the urges that consumed me.

But Madam Sharon was wearing just the prettiest blouse, and a black skirt with a flounce, and patterned tights, and her hair was up, and her makeup was perfect, and I wanted to be her!

“I am not sure that I could ever be attracted to a man,” I told her.

“You just need the right man,” she said. “Surgery can give you the ability to enjoy God’s gift of carnal love in the way only a woman can. And as a person who has experienced love as both a man and as a woman, I can tell you which is better, and oh, by so much you would not believe it!”

When I spoke to my girlfriend about it, she wept. We had sinned and fornicated together, and we knew that joy. We had intended marriage but we both wanted to overcome my issues first. Now, if I was to go down the path of Christian Feminization, that could never happen.

We prayed. Oh how we prayed!

Would the love of my girlfriend and the sex life that we had together be enough to rid me of this curse?

No.

I signed up to the Christian Feminization Academy with a heavy heart, but from the moment that Madam Sharon laid out the underwear, the dress and shoes that I would be wearing, my angst evaporated immediately. And when I stood there looking in the mirror and she told me that I would never have to wear men’s clothes ever again, I was in ecstasy.

The Christian Feminization Academy has a firm policy of proceeding with readjustment at pace, so as to give little time to look back. No man, except those who are no man to begin with, likes the idea of losing their testicles, and I was no different from the others, but this was a path approved of by God and a prayer that is answered seems so much better than a million prayers ignored by Him.

Somehow a resignation and a calm descended on me. And living and sleeping in the clothes I had always dreamed about gave me comfort and saw me through the pain. That and the company of others, who were not quite like me, but were on the same path.

The key difference was that they craved men and I did not.

But as Madam Sharon promised, there was a man for me. Madam Sharon told me that I was one of her most beautiful “converts” and she found a man who desired me more than I could have imagined. He told me that I was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen, in a way that I believed it. Surely there is nothing better that can be said to somebody who has wanted to be the image of feminine beauty for their whole life.

Sex was as Madam Sharon promised – joyful and now, after our marriage, without sin and as ordained by God.

I loved to dress for sex. Women’s clothing still means so much to me. Now with real breasts to fill the cups of my bra and panties not misshapen by an unsightly bulge, it all looks that much better. I love my crotchless panties and my negligee, and so does he.

Now I don’t just dress as a woman – I am a woman. It does work for me after all.

But I confess that I still think of my ex-girlfriend, now married herself to man not unlike my own husband. And I have the occasional sinful thought when I see a pretty girl walking down the street. But for that I have prayer and God’s forgiveness.

The End

 
Story 4: Marrying my Man
A Christian Feminization Story
By Maryanne Peters

“His cheeks are like beds of spice yielding perfume.

His lips are like lilies dripping with myrrh.

His arms are rods of gold set with topaz.

His body is like polished ivory decorated with lapis lazuli.

His legs are pillars of marble set on bases of pure gold.

His appearance is like Lebanon, choice as its cedars.

His mouth is sweetness itself; he is altogether lovely.

This is my beloved, this is my friend...”

This is the Bible. The word of God: Song of Songs 5:13-16

Tell me if it is not the best gay poem ever written.

No woman describes her man like that. Only a man does.

I still think of him that way. But I am no longer that.

We were believers, he and I. Can we be that still?

We were prepared to do anything to meet the laws of God and to be true and faithful in his eyes, but our love could not be denied, even by God. It was as real to us as He is. But perhaps, like all things not divine, love too, must perish.

We drew lots. When prayer for a sign drew nothing, we left it to chance to decide which of us would go to the Christian Feminization Academy. I would be the one. I would be the woman and the wife. He would be my loving husband.

It was not easy for me. I was gay, sure enough, but not a simpering mincing sissy. I had to watch the body that I had cared for turn to soft flab with spongy mounds where there had once been tight muscle. I had to relearn how to talk and how to sit down and hold my hands or cross my legs. And I had to endure the loss of the genitals I had been so proud, and which had caused me so much pleasure.

But I told myself that these were sinful pleasures. The Bible is clear. To experience sexual pleasure with a man is sinful, if you are a man. And now, as was confirmed by the Academy, I was a man no longer. I could look forward to sex with the man I loved now pure and good in the eyes of God, after we had exchanged vows before our priest.

But I knew even then, that things were not right. He told me that I was beautiful in my bridal gown. I felt as if I was. All the witnesses from the Academy were there to assure me that it was true. No man could fail to be moved by my beauty.

Except maybe a gay man.

I told him that I was still very sore that night. Such surgery takes a long time to heel. I offered him that part of me he knew so well, shielding the new passage with a pad, and receiving him face to face in accordance with proper approved practice. Even then it seemed that despite everything that was missing in me, I took full joy, whereas there was something missing in him.

In time, I wanted him to enter my vagina, but he seemed reluctant, even cool.

“It’s me. I am the same person. We are in love, remember. If I was paralyzed or disfigured would you still love me?”

“Yes,” he said, and I believed him.

But not as I am. My arms are no longer rods of gold; my body no longer like polished ivory; my legs no longer pillars of marble.

Oh God! What have we done?

The End

 
Story 5: Women’s Prayer Group
A Christian Feminization Story
By Maryanne Peters

Take heed, new women. Here are my words for every one of you. Listen and do as I say, for these are the words set out in scripture:

Do everything without rancour or argument so that you may become blameless and pure, “children of God without fault in a warped and crooked generation.” Then you will shine among them like stars in the sky as you hold firmly to the word of life. And then I will be able to boast on the day of Christ that I did not run or labor in vain.” These are the words that Paul wrote to the Philippians 2:14.

You come from a warped and crooked generation. There is work to be done. Do not run from it. Do not labor in vain. Change as we instruct. Become blameless and pure. Become women.

In his letter to the Colossans 3 Paul said: “Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.”

The sinful man in you is dead. His sins are with Christ the forgiver. The woman you have become is pure and without sin. Be her from now on. Leave the evil behind with the meat that you have discarded from your bodies.

“Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, since as members of one body you were called to peace. And be thankful. Let the message of Christ dwell among you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom through psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit, singing to God with gratitude in your hearts. And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.”

In this body of believers we call The Christian Feminization Academy you find peace is prayer and in song, your voices now high, just as heaven is higher than the earth. Bass is low. Alto is high. Be high.

We shall work together. You shall learn and correct one another, in your new feminine lives.

“Who shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body, according to the working whereby he is able even to subdue all things unto himself” Phillippians 3:21.

Surgeons will do it! “Therefore, I urge you, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice holy and pleasing to God—this is your true and proper worship.” Romans 12:1.

The change in your bodies is pleasing to God. Your action in discarding the vile appendage in favor of a body of purity, even more clean by the absence of the issue of the flesh by blood. By submitting yourselves to the Academy and surrendering your bodies to be made clean of sin, you have delivered to God that true and proper worship.

“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here! 2 Corinthians 5:17.

You are new creations, all of you.

“Wives, submit yourselves to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord” Colossans 4.

Your new purpose is to make the men you once craved with carnal lust, better Christians by your example. You have gone to extremes to be pious and pure, and you should expect the same from your husbands. But your role is one of support, respect and submission. You are women now. By sin you have forfeited the right to be men, but now you have even greater value in the eyes of God.

Let us join hands, sisters, and pray.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2020

Author's Note: I wanted to add a caution - "WARNING: Pokes fun at religion" as I know that our little community includes some deeply religious people. But I have already posted Volume 1 of these stories based on the existence of "The Christian Feminization Academy" that offers a service to gay men who cannot be therapeutically converted and so must be surgically modified in order to be cleansed of the sin of homosexuality. It is of course, a ridiculous idea, as are the stories I have written, and some of the teachings mentioned.

Story 1: Expecting
A Christian Feminization Story
By Maryanne Peters

I want to tell all sinners and sodomites of the kind that I once was, about the joys of womanhood and motherhood. I confess that I had my doubts, but my parents were worried sick about my soul in the life everlasting. But I now understand. You have to be a parent, or an expecting parent, to truly understand the love that parents have for their own children.

When they sent me to the Christian Feminization Academy, I howled blue murder. I believed in God then as I do now, but I thought of him as tolerant and understanding of my weakness, and I believed that forgiveness was my due. But I was wrong.

My guides at the Academy led me through the scriptures to a true understanding.

“To receive forgiveness God seeks sacrifice,” I was told. “You need to give away what is sinful and be reborn.” That is what the Bible says.

I did what I had to do. I surrendered that which did not belong on a person who desires men, and I took on the form that pleases all men who are true to God’s vision of real me. I became a woman.

Josiah was the man chosen for me. He may not have been the man that David may have chosen to be his partner, but David was guided by demons and thought only of sinful pleasure. Josiah is a good man – a Godly man. He guides me and desires me, because the Academy has taught me how to look good and act in a way pleasing to a man.

He always wanted children, and from the day I married him I wanted to bear his children. But somethings are beyond even the skilled surgeons contracted to the Academy. But prayer (and science) can assist in all things, and the Academy is there to assist me through my “pregnancy” just as if it were the real thing.

Josiah’s sister was prepared act as a surrogate, but of course she can only provide the egg and the womb. The seed of her brother can play no part, for that is a sin. And we both wanted my children to be of my blood. But by the grace of God there are laboratories and test tubes, and fertility experts blessed by God with knowledge and skills. Surely in vitro embryo development and implantation are God’s gift to women such as me.

I pray forgiveness that my last sinful act as a man and a sodomite was to imagine those infernal thoughts so that I could have issue forth from that malignant organ to seed I needed to grow my own family before those infernal genitals were surrendered to God.

Praise the Lord!

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2021

Story 2: New Believer
A Christian Feminization Story
By Maryanne Peters

I am not a believer. I never really believed in God. And if he existed why would he say that only men and women exist? And why must only men and women love one another? We know that is not true.

No, I am not a believer. I am a sissy. Maybe I have always known it, but it was a feeling that grew stronger and stronger in me as I got older. Being a sissy, I mean.

I am not a Christian, or at least I was not before. But then I got to hear about the Christian Feminization Academy. I am not quite sure how. They offered to help men to overcome homosexuality by "persuading them" to become women.

I was not even sure that I was gay, but I was ready to be. I suppose sissies just want to be treated like girly girls. Maybe a woman can do that, but it seemed better if it was a man doing it.

But what seemed better than anything was to be “persuaded” to become female, preferably with some vigor or even force.

Some may judge me – call me odd or even perverted, but that's just me. I know who I am, and I know that this part of me will not change. But as they say at CFA: "We do not try to change what cannot be changed, just what can be.”

I was not ready to go as far as they were talking about. I just liked the idea of being feminized. Thinking about it kept me awake at night.

I read about all about CFA. Parents paid for their sons to be adjusted, but mine were long gone. There were sponsors for some, and there were scholarships for others, and “work to change” plans which involved working as a maid in a Christian household. I liked that idea too.

You had to be a believer. I bought a book about the Bible, and the Bible itself. I read all about faith and the faithful. It did not seem difficult.

So one morning I told my girlfriend that I was leaving. I was giving up my job and seeking my destiny in another place. I was going to become a Christian.

"But you don't believe in that," she said.

That was the last time I ever heard her voice. I was on a new course. I was excited by the whole idea.

“Do you believe in God the Almighty? Do you believe that he sent his only Son to Earth that we may be saved from our sins?. Do you believe in His promise of the life hereafter?"

“Yes. Yes. Yes.” Whatever.

They got down to it straight away. I was bathed and shaved, given a shot of hormones and put into a dress. I was instructed firmly on how I would have to behave. I was a woman now. Any masculine behavior would be punished. Feminine behavior would be rewarded.

I was thrilled. It was everything that I hoped for. I threw myself into it. Many of the others found it harder than me. They were more masculine than I was, I suppose. They had their own issues. Being girly might not be in their make-up. It was certainly in mine.

Madam Sharon, Feminization Supervisor and Miss Veronica our Disciplinarian held me up as an example to the others.

“This is what we are looking for!” I was so proud. I strutted and giggled.

I was a little disappointed at first when they told me that my job as a maid at the Haldane household would not go to me – the uniform was adorable! But they said that they wanted to enlist my assistance in the program and suggested that I study Hair and Beauty with Miss Anderson and Fashion with Madam Laura. I loved the idea.

Still, every now and again I would make a deliberate error so that I could receive a cane across my butt – just for fun. But generally I preferred to be the teachers’ pet.

The hormones were having an effect on my body, but I loved it. It made my skin look so good and even improved my hair. But the breasts were delightful. I had wondered if the effect on my sex drive and the inability to get an erection might put an end to my sissy urges, but I have to say that I am not surprised that they did not. In a way my feelings just seemed to affirm that my choice had been the right one. The ultimate sissy existence is to be told that you are really a girl and that you need to live as one, forever.

But that is not really what I wanted. I just wanted the feelings. I didn’t want to lose my nuts and my peenie. So all the talk about surgery was making me feel uncomfortable. Those who came in after me were lining up to be cut, and I was just saying that I was afraid of the pain and needed time.

But I have to say it, the thought of going to the brink started to give me the desire to go there. Not all the way, of course. You still have to sign the consent. CFA operates within the law. You submit to punishment at the beginning, and when you are ready to take the final step there are two good Christian doctors to properly inform you that things are irreversible, and all that stuff.

Still, it fascinated me. It is like standing on a balcony at the top of a high apartment block and feeling something pulling you towards the edge. The allure of the abyss.

How far could I go without falling?

I went through the interview, and before I signed, I asked: “Can I pull out if I change my mind?” And they assured me that I could.

Some of the others had reached the same point. They were all talking about it. Some were stressed by it all and praying. Of course I was one of them, so I knelt with them and watched their faces. We talked too. Mostly they seemed worried that they would not be accepted as women even after the changes to their anatomy. They all said that it would be so easy for me – so pretty and so feminine.

They had no idea who I was and why I was there.

But we were all on the elevator to the top. They were jumping off. I would be riding back down. What did that mean for me? Would my thrill ride be over? Would I go back to my old life and consider these months as the ultimate sissy trip?

I went all the way to the surgery with Geraldine. She was nervous and I was there to reassure her. I agreed to take a shunt in my arm the same time she did, but she would receive the general anaesthetic and I would not. That would be as far as I would go. Even after the drug was injected into the drip line she continued to chatter on about how much she hoped to be a woman reborn without sin. I thought that she would never fade out.

I never even saw the syringe go in above my head. Unlike Geraldine I passed out immediately.

My story from here could be a horror story. The one where a man awakes to find his body mutilated and his future a life of misery in the body he was not supposed to have. There was a bit of that. Maybe quite a lot. But as we say: “Give me strength to accept the things I cannot change”, or things that I cannot undo once they are done.

And the truth is that I have discovered that the ultimate sissy trip is not to walk to the edge, but to wake up at the bottom, and find that all the things that you loved as a sissy you can love even more as a woman.

And for that I have to thank my husband Mark. I said that what I really wanted was to be treated as a woman, and that it would not matter if a woman treated me like that, or a man. But it is better if it is a man. I know that now. And when I lie back and feel his hot seed filling my wonderfully constructed vagina I give thanks to God.

I guess that makes me a believer now.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2021

Irrepressible
A Christian Feminization Story
By Maryanne Peters

This is me now. A virtuous Christian lady married to Matthew, a good Christian man. I follow the code. The ushers at church and the elders who patrol our neighborhood are very strict. Pleated skirts to the knee, blouses buttoned up. Long blonde hair brushed to a sheen. Restrained makeup. But the nail polish might give you a hint. And the smirk. I am a bad girl. I have not always been one, but I am one now.

Oh, I have always been a bit bad. That is no change. It is just that I have not always been a girl.

My parents despaired of me from a much earlier age, but when I became sexually active, they went nuts. Once I discovered that I was gay I just could not get enough sex. They were horrified.

I got the whole “to lie with a man is a sin” thing. Who said anything about lying with a guy? – we were fucking or sucking, or licking or dicking – not lying around.

So, it must seem like every gay guy’s nightmare – to be abducted by people from your own church, then castrated and feminized. The Christian Feminization Academy. They say that they use prayer and persuasion. There is a lot of that, but it was never going to work on me. Failing the whip, it was the knife for me.

But what do these people know about human sexuality? They think Eve sprouted from a rib! What is with this whole de-sexing thing? What is the largest sexual organ? It is the brain. I have still got mine. My sex drive lives in my brain, not in the bits they cut off.

They lined me up with Matthew. He prays a lot, but he has a great cock. I mean, it is big, and with all I know about cocks, I can make it way bigger. It was like he never knew what it was for before he met me. There won’t be any procreation with me, as I explained to him. You cock is for pleasure, and that is something that I know all about.

He talks about our partnership reflecting God’s will or whatever, and companionship, but I just want him inside me.

I am like one of Saint Paul’s widows. You don’t know about them? 1 Corinthians 7: “If they cannot control themselves, they should marry, for it is better to marry than to burn with passion.” Well I am married, and I am still burning. And I am setting a fire under my guy Matthew morning and night.

Sometimes he falls to his knees and says some shit about temptation and the devil, but I just give him that look that I am giving you right now, and I say: “Knowing your wife in the biblical way is no sin, my Sweetheart. Now drop that book and come on over here.”

And he finds God like I do, when we cry out His name at the moment of orgasm.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2021

In Praise of Rebirth
A Christian Feminization Story
By Maryanne Peters