A DAY OF REVELATIONS
Copyright Transfemme 2002. All rights reserved.
There was a light April breeze gusting up the driveway as I helped my mother load her bags into her '57 Chevrolet. Mum had been a Chevy girl since her sophomore years, back when Elvis was still young and beautiful and the Beatles were playing artschool socials in Liverpool. She'd aged well through the intervening decades, looking no more than thirty due to her fine bone structure and trim, svelte figure. People often told me I got my looks from her, right down to the opal-green eyes and platinum blond hair.
"You sure you'll be OK here all alone?" Mum asked as I passed a well-packed hamper through to the back seat, "I'll be gone for more than a week this time." Always the sceptic in matters of the heart, she was fretting that I'd be the victim of a home invasion or something while she was off spending Easter at Aunt Lizzie's.
"I'll be fine," I replied for the umpteenth time, straightening my spine with a series of audible clicks. That hamper had been heavier than I'd expected. "Stop fussing, Mum, I'm not a baby any more."
"You're my baby", she replied, brushing my hand with a feather-light touch, "and this'll be longest we've been apart, since ... well, I just don't like leaving you here by yourself. Sure you won't come out to Lakecrest with me? Elsie's looking forwards to seeing you again."
This last statement chilled the marrow in my bones. Mum's Aunt Lizzie was the stuff of nightmares; a woman whose merest glance could reduce grown men to quivering orthodontists. Then there was my cousin Elsie, a socially challenged cyber-geek with coke-bottle glasses and an eating disorder. Dinner with Dr Hannibal Lecter was preferable to a week with Mad Lizzie Woodridge and her nerdlinger daughter.
Besides, I had other plans for the vacation.
"Sorry, Mum - I've got that history report due after the break," I answered, trying to hide my impatience, "Connie Radcliffe's coming over on Thursday to exchange notes, and I can't let her down, can I?"
"No, I guess you can't," Mum agreed thoughtfully, "in the meantime, Connie Radcliffe will be spending Easter with her own family; hunting easter eggs, eating home cooked meals ..."
"Jeez, Mum, I'm not going to starve", I interrupted, almost writhing with exasperation, "you left me enough of those frozen dinners to last six months. I'm eighteen years old, I won't burn down the kitchen. I know how to look after myself."
"Yes, I know," she said, stroking my cheek warmly enough to make me shrink with guilt, "I just can't help worrying. Eighteen isn't as old as you think it is, sweetheart. I'd never forgive myself if something went wrong while I was away ..."
"Nothing's going to go happen, Mum", I almost stammered, looking down at my feet. Like most teenagers, I felt totally mortified by maternal displays of affection. "I've got Aunt Lizzie's phone number inside. I promise I'll call you every night to let you know I'm OK".
"That won't be necessary, darling. I trust you." She gave me a tired, happy look and leaned forward to kiss me on the forehead. Her hair tickled my face. She had a clean, tender smell about her, a mixture of carnations and lipstick and Pond's hand lotion. A young woman-scent, in spite of her age. I fought down an overwhelming sense of embarrassment.
"Alright", she said, running her fingers through my hair, "take care of yourself. I'll phone you up on Good Friday to see how you're doing". She turned away, opened the door and pulled out her keys. "No parties, no loud music and don't stay up too late."
"Yes Mum", I replied automatically. She needn't have worried, I'd given up sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll for lent. Like I said, I had other plans for the long weekend. I stood back as she turned the key in the ignition, gunning the Chevy's engine the way she always did before a long trip.
"Have a good time with Connie," she called over the eight-cylinder roar, then fixed me with a mock-stern look: "but not too good."
I nodded enthusiastically, trying to look as innocent as possible - which, in fact, I was. Connie Radcliffe wasn't coming over to exchange notes (or anything else, desite of what Mum seemed to think). The whole story - history assignment and all - was a lie, a red herring to legitimise my absence from the Manson Family Reunion out at Lakecrest.
"Bye-Bye, honey." Mum blew me a kiss while she backed the Chevrolet down the driveway, dual exhausts humming in deep resonance. I followed her down to the street, keeping clear of the car's wide turning circle. I lifted my right hand in farewell, doing my best to look mature and trustworthy.
"Bye, Mum. Say 'hi' to Elsie for me."
"Will do." She swung away from the curb, gripping the wheel with both hands, and thundered off in hail of gravelstones and exhaust fumes. Top down, hair flying in the April slipstream, she looked maybe half her age, a precocious young cheerleader on her way to the Big Game. I stood in the street waving goodbye until the Chevy vanished over the crown of Summerhill Road ...
And literally bolted up to the house.
I was almost fainting with excitement by the time I reached the front door. It had been months since I'd had the place to myself, and I was trembling with expectation as I considered the day ahead of me. Locking the door with a swift, loud clack, I scampered through the living room, kicking off my sneakers without a second thought. I was free, alone to do whatever I pleased over the next nine days.
Loosening my t-shirt at the waist, I hurried past the staircase, dodging though to the main hallway. My pulse slammed into overdrive as I imagined all those delicious satin treasures closeted away in the Back Room. The walls seemed to flash by in a strobing montage of frames, prints, and fashion illustrations.
The Back Room was a spacious, two-level extension with picture windows, spotlights and high ceilings. It was festooned with potplants, drawing tables, dressing torsos and sewing machines. Mum used it as both a design studio and a reception area when she was meeting with clients. It was a feminine, creative place, rich with her aromatic presence: scented bath oils; long departed roses; a touch of Chanelle. I loved this room almost as much as I loved her.
The back wall was lined with mirrors. They dominated the studio from corner to corner, but were little more than a facade for the long, walk-in closet which housed my mother's private collection. Very few people even knew it was there, mainly because it contained the pieces she never intended to sell.
Mum's design sense leaned towards the strange and the fantastique. She often drew her inspiration from the excesses of fashion history - La Belle Epoch, French Rococo; anything with a Parisian flavour. Needless to say, it had been an absolute wonderland during my early childhood, seeding my dreams and igniting my most volatile desires. In the course of years, the Back Room had become my stage, the theatre on which I enacted my most secret fantasies.
Did Mum suspect? Possibly; there was very little she didn't know about me.
Halting by the wall of mirrors, I scrutinised my reflection critically, putting a slim hand to the back of my neck. Removing a sequined elastic binder, I allowed my thick, blond hair to cascade past my shoulders. The image in the mirror immediately began to alter. With my hair sweeping down in a shimmering arabesque, I looked small and fragile; a pretty teenaged girl in oversized blue denim.
A shiver swirled through my tummy like a dash of ice water. Quivering with delight, I threw off my t-shirt and jeans, tossing aside the meaningless vestments of my male identity. Turning back to the mirrors, I adjusted my hair to cover my slim shoulders, almost dizzy with anticipation. I felt short of breath, my thighs started to shake with high-wire tension. I was impatient to finish the change, eager to climb into my costume and begin the afternoon's performance. Stepping closer to the mirrordoor, I studied my face and figure for imperfections. There were very few, even at this range.
I was rather fortunate in this respect. Possessing a sexually ambiguous appearance, I could easily pass for female. I had the androgynous lines and huge, liquid eyes of the Waif. My Mother once remarked - in all seriousness - that I could have modelled girls' fashions on any local catwalk. Even lingerie.
I padded over to the closet, revelling in my bare thighs, my smooth, ivory skin. It was so wonderful, so liberating, to shed my male identity. Nearly three months had passed since I'd emerged from my gendered prison; twelve agonising weeks locked in a boy's rancid body, counting off the empty, interminable days. Well, all that was finished now. Literally.
Although I didn't know it at the time, this was the very last hour I'd spend on Earth as Ben Woodridge.
3
Stepping through the mirrordoor was like entering a world of whispering shadows. The Walk-In was my portal to another realm, a place of enchantment and silken magic, a shrine to all things feminine. For me, it would always epitomise the exotic and the mysterious; the questions I could never ask, the knowledge I could never share.
My veins were throbbing with sultry heat, my belly felt as tense as a coiled spring. Aroused, exhilarated, I wandered naked along the rows of brassieres and corsets and garter-belts and bustiers and luscious, gleaming panties, my head spinning like a vortex. I was drowning in a whirlpool of shame, bliss, guilt - and longing. Longing; vast and endless.
Reaching the end of that tunnel of forbidden pleasures, I arrived at the Alcove.
The Alcove was my Mother's private dressing room, a little salon housing mum's favourite pieces. Over the space of maybe a hundred visits, it had become my theatre of dreams. Its charm and fascination were bound up with its essential femininity; the room was heavy with the presence of woman. I could almost taste my Mother's perfume in the pastel-print wall paper.
The Alcove was set out like a 1920s bourdoir, furnished with art deco lamps and trinket boxes. A small but elegant make-up table stood at the far end of the chamber, its dark, enamelled surface littered with cosmetics and picture frames. Next to the table was a hand-carved chest of drawers. It was an antique, over ninety years old according to my mother.
I knew from prior incursions that it was full of imported hosiery; French Dior stockings, Spanish thigh-highs, Italian lacetops. There was full-length mirror beside the chest and low, padded stool near my feet. Overhead, a flurry of European underwear hung from a customised clothing rack set into the wall. The Alcove resembled a high class lingerie store; tiers of shimmering unmentionables seemed to stretch off as far as the eye could see.
Mine.
All mine, for the next nine days.
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