Reasonable

Reasonable

by Brandy Dewinter

"I am NOT being unreasonable," I insisted to my irate wife. "Millions of women do anything I've ever asked you to do, wear anything I've ever asked you to wear."

"Millions of women are STUPID," she declared loudly, unconvinced.

I continued in a calmer tone, trying to get the argument back to the reasoned conversation level, "Look, Julie, I just think you should take a little more pride in your appearance, just as I am proud of you, and of the way you could look if you tried."

"So you're not proud of me now," she pounced on my perhaps unfortunate phrasing.

"I am proud of you," I declared. "You're very beautiful, but I'm also a creature of our society. Certain things trigger my responses better than others. I just want . . . hope . . . whatever, that you'll meet me part way."

She turned away in continuing irritation, her long waves of dark hair shimmering with the motion. But at least she had quit arguing and she didn't storm out of the room.

"Really, honey, the only stupid thing is to argue. I honestly don't think anything we've ever discussed is unreasonable, but if you do, then . . . " I sighed in frustration, knowing I could never force her anyway.

At this she twirled back to face me, irritation still apparent on her face, but an arched eyebrow signifying curiosity as well, about what I was soon to find out.

"How long is your current project going to last?" she demanded in a stunning non sequitur.

I guess I should explain a little. My name is Jay Connors. I'm a contract computer hacker. I break into other people's computer systems in a test of their security, then help them fix the holes I found. I can get in just about anywhere (yes, I even broke into the DOD systems, however they never knew I was there). I provide computer security tools, software only, but better than anyone else has developed (if you ignore my little private back doors). Most of my projects take at least a month since I really do deliver a good service, boilerplating systems against anyone but myself. If there's a better hacker out there, he (or she) is so much better than me that no one ever even found out they'd been anywhere I'd protected. Certainly they'd done no harm, so at least my systems kept out the riff raff. Actually, I believed there wasn't anyone else in my league and that no one had ever broken one of my defenses.

"Maybe three weeks," I answered in puzzlement. "Why do you care?"

"So no one needs to see or talk to you, professionally, for at least three weeks?"

"Yeah, about that time. I could certainly stretch it that long without anyone thinking anything suspicious."

A smile of triumph, a matching tone, framed her words when she said, "Okay, then we'll just see what you think is reasonable. Pick one of your little fantasies and do it yourself. If, after doing it, you still think it's reasonable, I'll give it a try."

"Don't be silly," I laughed. "The things that turn me on are things that women do for men, not things that men do."

"I'm not being silly," she insisted in a parody of my earlier position. "My problem is not with the man-woman thing and you know it. I love you and only you and want to make you happy. My problem is that the things you want are unreasonably awkward or uncomfortable or inconvenient. If you think I'm wrong, prove it by putting up with the inconvenience yourself."

Like a collapsing balloon her anger deflated, replaced by tired sadness. She came close and put her arms around me and laid her head on my chest. "Really, dear, I do love you and don't want to argue. But I think you don't understand what you're asking. If you had to go through what I already go through to please you, you'd understand."

She pulled her head back and looked me directly in the eyes, "I'll even trust your judgment. Pick one of your fantasies and we'll make it real, only with you doing what you want me to do. We'll pick a duration that convinces me you really understand what you're asking for, and if you still want me to do it after that time, I'll give it a try. I'll try my best, too."

"Only one?" I prodded her gently, still not really considering the idea, but smiling to try and keep the mood light.

"Or a dozen," she laughed. "Just so you'll get off my back until you know what you're talking about."

I snorted at the thought, "No, this is silly. Look, longer fingernails, higher heels, maybe a little figure control to make you even more shapely, these are not unreasonable."

Her irritation returned even more quickly than it had left,. "Put up or shut up," she demanded, "but get off my back unless you're willing to try it."

She turned away from my arms and started to walk from the room, fists clenched at her sides in anger all the more terrible because it was silent. I knew I had to do something but I really believed my requests were reasonable, at least for a woman to do, and I didn't want to give up on a more fulfilling love life.

"Wait, Julie, okay. You win. I won't bug you about anything I haven't tried myself."

She turned back with a renewed smile. The easy way that emotions appeared and disappeared in her always surprised me.

"So, what are you gonna try first?" she giggled.

"Huh? Nothing," I said, "I just said I'd quit bugging you."

Her laughing correction was hot on the heels of my statement, "No, actually you said that you'd quit bugging me on things you hadn't tried first. So what are you gonna try?"

Trying to maintain my hold on the "reasonable" high ground, I insisted, "I think my requests are reasonable, but I admit they're not trivial. They're also intensely feminine, not something I could do."

"You could in private," she asserted. "You could wear high heels in private and no one would know. That's why I asked how long before you had to report in person on your latest job. Other things, too. I'm sure I could talk Sally, the manicurist where I get my hair done, into giving you the long fingernails you've been going on about."

"I couldn't work at the keyboard with long nails."

"My point exactly," she crowed in triumph. "I work with a keyboard, too, but you want me to have long nails. They're just too much bother, for me, for you, for anyone."

Now I was getting irritated. I had seen plenty of secretaries with long, glamorous nails, let alone real estate agents like Julie. I knew it was something you could get used to, if you wanted to, even on a job with lots of typing or keyboard use. It was just that I needed to work very quickly in some of my more time-sensitive system penetrations. That was different. I was about to try and explain that when I saw the look of triumph still gloating from her face. Any excuses I might make would just be fuel to feed the fires of her self-righteousness. My own stubborn streak reared its ugly head and I heard myself agreeing to her outrageous proposition.

"All right. You're so sure of yourself. I'll do it. Arrange a private session with your fingernail lady and I'll have nails put on that will show you how reasonable I've been."

"For how long?" she kept pushing.

"For however long it takes to convince you I'm right, up to the three weeks I've got on this project."

"Okay," she grinned, "now, what about high heels?"

An overwhelming impulse, a tidal wave of irritation swept me along on a course I was sure was going to be idiotic, but I heard myself saying, "Fine, and a corset and whatever other clothes you think I'm being unreasonable about. As long as I can keep it private."

"Deal," she said quickly. Too quickly. I began to wonder if I'd been manipulated all along. Her triumphant grin hadn't subsided a bit as I called her bluff. Maybe it wasn't a bluff. Maybe I was in deep trouble.

"When do we start?" I asked tentatively, wondering what I'd gotten myself into now.

After a moment's thought she declared, "Tomorrow. I'll get your clothes tomorrow and set up an appointment with Sally at the time she would normally close her shop, so you'll be the only customer. After you get back from the salon, I'll help you into your clothes. After that, you need to wear the heels and things, and keep your nails looking nice, until three weeks from today."

I nodded abruptly and went back to my cave to hack for a while, still angry at her stubbornness, still worried about what I'd gotten myself into. In a little while I got lost in my work, sneaking into my customer's systems and snooping on his private business. This job would actually be relatively easy since the Spencer Industries general manager, Richard Bancroft, didn't really understand software, and more importantly hackers. He thought this was all about logic and rigid rules. True hacking is more of an art than any old master ever demonstrated. The general manager had only hired me at the insistence of his board of directors, a few members of which also worked for other companies I'd serviced. He was sure he was well-protected and it would be a pleasure to show him just how wrong he was. Maybe this time I'd arrange for a phony set of identification to his company and just show up at one of his meetings with my results. That should get his attention. Part of the service I provided was showing the customer how important his vulnerabilities were by demonstrating how they could be taken advantage of. Sometimes I wrote myself checks (which I never cashed, I just took them in as evidence), sometimes I sent bogus memos around their system, calling people to false meetings. Once I showed up with an already-made-out patent application (that I never submitted) for a customer's most secret new development. It's amazing how much information is floating around company systems these days, and all it takes is intermittent traffic between supposedly isolated systems to let me in to all of them.

The evening passed quickly, becoming night, then morning before I finished the initial stages of the penetration I was developing. It wasn't unusual for me to get caught up in my work, sometimes it was even necessary for me to work deliberately at night. Still, I was exhausted when I finally went to bed and had completely forgotten Julie's challenge and my idiotic acceptance of it.

I woke up at noon, after about six hours sleep, to the ringing of the phone. We have free phone service, a fringe benefit of one of my penetrations, so we have several lines. One of them is dedicated to private calls between Julie and me and I put a special bell on it so I'd know it was her. This was the phone that was ringing so I struggled up through the cotton fogging my brain and fumbled with the receiver.

"Yeah, what?" I said grumpily.

I heard a silver giggle from the other end, then Julie's excessively cheerful voice, "Wake up, sleepyhead, you're buying my lunch."

"What? Huh?" I glibly replied.

Her laughter was my only answer as she waited for me to wake up. After another moment I was tuned back into the real world and able to carry on an adult conversation.

"Okay, where and when?" I said.

"How about Daniel's in twenty minutes?" she asked.

"Better make it thirty," I countered her offer. "I still need to shower and shave."

"Oh, yes," her giggle seemed a little ominous, "you certainly need to shave today, Jay."

Actually my beard was a little sparse and I often only shaved every other day. When Julie has taken the time to really work at it, I consider her a world-class beauty, with lustrous dark hair and shining blue eyes like Lucy Lawless (TV's Xena, did you know her hair was dyed?). I was more of a dirty blond, though my eyes were also a clear, crystal blue. My light hair color seemed to fade away against my arms and it looked like they were practically hairless. My chest was also pretty sparse, with just enough for Julie to catch in her fingers and pull when she wanted to tease me a little. When I looked in the mirror to shave, the face I saw was, as always, disappointingly weak. My facial bone structure was soft and unimpressive, except for high cheekbones that stood out with surprising prominence. Due, I supposed, to the irregular meals I had when I was deeply into a project. That was probably the reason I was so scrawny, too. Even at only 5'9" my 130 pounds were spread pretty thinly. For some reason my bones didn't jut out too much, though. No knobby knees or anything, just thin.

I quickly finished getting ready, pulled on my standard jeans and sport shirt, and launched off. It was pretty much of a launch, my one vice being my pocket rocket, a 300ZX Turbo convertible in bright, flamboyant red. Julie always teased me about that car, calling it overcompensation for my otherwise shy personality. Maybe she was right. I didn't really care. I liked the car and didn't have much to show off in my own body. Computer hackers aren't all nerds, they just seem that way because the private lifestyle doesn't lend itself to building big muscles or developing flashy conversational skills. Anyway, in a few minutes, I was pulling into one of our favorite places to eat, famous for juicy, thick hamburgers. When I do eat, I eat big.

The restaurant was adjacent to, actually sort of a pseudopod extending from the body of, a neighborhood mall. When I went in, I saw Julie already sitting in a booth, surrounded by packages.

"Goodness, somebody having a sale?" I grinned in greeting.

"Not really, but I couldn't wait. I told you I'd be ready for you today."

My look of bewilderment must have been pretty obvious, because she started to laugh.

"You don't even remember, do you?" she chortled, the triumphant grin resurrecting itself on her face.

That grin did it, reminding me of the stupid commitment I'd made. I was tempted to back out but that same irritating grin got my stubbornness up and I decided that I'd just go ahead and show her how reasonable I could be.

"Yeah, I remember. What did you get?"

Her answer was a giggle, "No peeking. Let me see your hands."

I held them forward, palms up, but she motioned me to turn them over.

"No, I want to see your fingernails. Well, at least you don't chew on them so Sally will have something to work with. You're all set up. Her last appointment is over at 4:00, so you be there by then. Now don't get wrapped up in your project and forget. If you stick it out, you'll have plenty of time at home later."

My response was a growl, "I'll stick it out."

"Look, dear, I'm not trying to make you mad. I'm just trying to make the point that what you're asking for is unreasonable. Don't do it if you don't want."

"I don't want this to be the way I have to convince you," I replied, "but I also don't want you thinking I'm unfair or anything. Your attitude's a little different than last night, though. Last night it seemed like you were pushing me into this, now you seem reluctant. What do you want, really?"

She sat pensively for a minute, then shocked me when she said, "Actually, having you dress up is a fantasy of mine. I've always thought a man that understands women better would be a better lover. I know you try, dear, and I love you for it, but sometimes I think you just don't understand my needs any better than I seem to understand yours. I thought this might be a way to find some common ground. After I got to buying the clothes, though, it began to seem a little extreme. I'll back out if you want."

Now it was my turn to sit pensively, doing a little overdue soul searching. I had always thought I kept Julie pretty happy in bed and in our lives. It seemed I was too focused on my own wants and needs to really pay attention to the one I claimed I loved. For the first time I thought maybe I was being unreasonable, not about the absolute amount of inconvenience from long nails and high heels, but at least about the amount I could reasonably expect from my wife when I gave so little in return.

"I never knew you felt that way," I said softly. "I'm sorry. I've been very selfish. I'll do whatever you want. I owe you that much, and much more."

"Oh, don't get too down on yourself. It's a two-way street. I know I haven't fulfilled you, either. Let's just go on from here. You try this out for me, and the good ideas we'll keep. Besides," she continued with another silvery giggle, "it's deliciously naughty. We might find that this is fun."

"Yeah, right," I said with a snort, but I was still thinking about how little I had done to please Julie, and how much more I should do.

We switched to less emotional topics for the rest of our lunch. I ate my usual ridiculous hamburger, causing a visible bulge in my stomach. Julie laughed when she saw it.

"Enjoy that burger, it's the last one you get for a while?"

"Why," I asked.

"You'll see," was all she would reply. "Now, don't be late for your appointment."

She gathered up her packages and got ready to leave.

"Can I help you with those?" I offered.

"Not on a bet. I told you no peeking until later. I'll see you at home."

I had intended to go home and work on my project, but Julie's gentle accusation that I didn't really understand her needs made me look around with a more open mind than I usually had. With sudden clarity I could see just how much she had had to put up with. I generally left coke cans laying around, and computer magazines. My clothes were seldom picked up and while they were durable enough to stand the mistreatment, the house looked messy. I started back into my cave again, but the disarray stopped me at the doorway. Instead of working on my project I spent the afternoon cleaning up. Everything except my cave, that is. I had spent years getting that place into the shape it was in and it wouldn't recover in one afternoon, but I got pretty busy working on the rest of the place. The time snuck away on me and I was a little surprised when all of the sudden it was close to 4:00 and I had to hurry. Nonetheless, when the time came to go to Julie's salon, the dishes were all washed and all the clutter was picked up in the other rooms of the house.

My pocket rocket got me there in time, though. Just as I was pulling up my mind caught up with the hurry my body had been in all afternoon and I realized what I was about to do. It still seemed silly, also sort of frightening as I entered territory I had been taught was forbidden. But I realized at some level I had never studied in myself before that it was kind of exciting as well. Maybe it was just the naughtiness as Julie had indicated, or maybe it was the thought that I was getting closer to Julie. But I realized I really wanted to do this, really wanted to try out some of the things I had been pushing on my wife. It was clear this adventure was going to bring lots of changes in our lives, not the least because it had made me really think about our relationship.

The last customer was paying her bill as I entered the salon. It was still light outside but dim in the salon since most of the lights at the stations were off, leaving only the lamps at the manicurist's table. The lady leaving had incredibly beautiful nails, glamorously long without being ludicrous, polished to a deep crimson shine, shaped in an elegant style. I noticed that the girl behind the counter had equally beautiful nails and I leaped to the obvious conclusion that this was Sally, the manicurist.

Sally greeted me with an airy, "I'll be with you in a minute."

The other lady asked, "Oh, are you going to get a manicure?"

"Um, yes, my wife set it up," I stammered.

The lady chuckled at my discomfort, "There's nothing to be embarrassed about. Lots of men get manicures. It won't turn you into a woman."

Sally's mouth twitched in a grin at this comment, but she said nothing. The customer left and Sally escorted me back to her table.

"Now, the first thing," she began talking and working, "is to take care of your cuticles. Mrs. Sanders was right about men getting manicures. I can help your hands even besides the "special" you're getting.

I gulped, "Special? Just what did Julie tell you to do?"

"Actually, she didn't tell me much, except about the background for your agreement. As I understand it, she's agreed to wear her nails long if you will first try it out and then remain convinced it's not too inconvenient. I'm to let you pick the length and shape and type of nail extensions, but she told me to remind you that she won't go any longer than you do."

At my nod of confirmation she continued, "So what type of nails do you want."

"I don't know," I shook my head in confusion. "You mean there's more than one type?"

"Oh, yes," she laughed. "Many types and styles. What did you have in mind?"

"I guess I never thought about it. Your nails are very pretty. I think Julie would look good in them. That lady that just left had good-looking nails, too."

"So this is just for Julie, huh?" she asked with a hint of teasing in her smile.

"Of course," I insisted. "This whole thing is to convince her that what lots of women do, you for example, is not that bad. She should try it."

Sally pushed a little further, "I agree she should try it, but what about you?"

"I'm only doing it to convince Julie. Whatever we choose should be what's best for her."

"Okay," she backed off. "But I don't think you want what I wear. My nails extend almost an inch past my fingertips and they take a lot of getting used to. You should probably start out shorter and work up to this length."

I disagreed. "No, this is a one-time deal. Once is enough to convince Julie to try it and I don't want her using a short length on me to avoid doing what would look best on her."

"Well, how about a compromise? Mrs. Sanders wears hers about half an inch past her fingertips. We could split the difference. You said her nails looked good."

"Okay, that sounds fine. Let's get started."

"Not so fast," Sally laughed again. "You still need to pick out the type and style."

"Do them like yours, or like that other lady's."

"Those are two different styles, didn't you notice?"

"No, they looked about the same to me, except for the color."

The expert in Sally started a patient explanation, "Well, hers are squarer on the tip, that's a more professional look. She's an attorney. Mine are actually just extension tips, but these are relatively fragile. I only recommend it for those who don't have to work with their hands, or who can come in anytime they need to get repairs. Unless you want to come back every day you'll never make them stay on, especially if you insist on a glamorous length right off. "

"So what do I do?" I groaned, becoming overwhelmed and we hadn't even started.

"I recommend a durable silk wrap if you don't mind the expense. It will look very good, just a little thicker than my nails, but it will hold up a lot better. That's what Mrs. Sanders uses.

"Okay, okay, just like hers except longer, just get started."

"Once we get your cuticles done. I already told you we have to start there." she chuckled.

However, she had been working as we talked, and it wasn't much longer before she was putting the first of the forms on my fingers. She worked quickly, but carefully, struggling a little with the wider profile my masculine fingers had. Still, she insisted, my hands were well within the range of woman's hands that she had worked on, actually rather slender and shapely.

"All that computer typing you do, I'll bet," she smiled.

"How did you know I do that?"

"Julie tells me lots of things. Women talk when they're forced together like this. What else should we do?"

"Oh, I see," I considered. "What else did Julie tell you about me?"

"Well, I never really repeat conversations. That's one of the reasons ladies feel comfortable talking with me. I guess it's safe to say, though, that Julie is really looking forward to this. I think she's more excited about seeing you dressed up than about how this little experiment turns out."

"Did she really tell you that?"

Sally shook her head, "No, she didn't say anything like that. It's just an impression I got. You'd be surprised, though, at how many women have that fantasy. A man who really understands what a woman goes through makes a much better lover, at least we all think he does. It's even better when a man will do it because his wife asks him to as a sign of love and willingness to please. I'm jealous of Julie, so maybe I'm reading more into it than she intends."

"You're jealous of Julie, about me?" I asked in surprise.

This brought a blush to Sally's cheeks as she realized that she had let the conversation slip from hypothetical third person fantasies to her own personal interests. But she didn't deny it, just looking intently at my hands as she worked on them. Finally she glanced up to see if I was still waiting for an answer, and her eyes were caught by mine as I stared in continued curiosity. A small nod bounced her hair before she looked back down.

"Sorry, Sally, I'm taken," I grinned, trying to defuse the tension but flattered by her interest.

"I know," she blushed again, "I didn't mean anything by it."

"Thank you, though," I said softly. "It's been a long time since any woman has indicated I might be interesting. I'm flattered, just taken."

She grinned as I indicated I wasn't angry, and also that I wouldn't try to take advantage of her admission to be forward with her, then bowed her head again to her task, working industriously. I was amazed at how restrictive the forms on my fingers were. Every time I tried to move my hand, I bumped one form against another. I got the obligatory nose itch part way through the session and went quietly nuts trying to ignore it. Finally it was not so quietly, and I carefully raised one hand to rub my nose with the back of a knuckle. Sally chuckled as she watched me struggle with the impedimenta of her trade but didn't say or do anything except to check and make sure I hadn't screwed up her handiwork. After what seemed like hours, but was really about 20 minutes, she sat back.

"Okay, what color?"

"Color?" I repeated stupidly.

"Right, this style requires a color coat. The materials aren't natural color so they need to be covered. Besides, the sun will cause the gels to yellow. Oh, that reminds me. Julie told me to tell you that she won't use any more noticeable color than you do, either. If you choose some pale, fadeaway pink, so will she. For this elegant look, I suggest a bright, fiery red. It will go well with your hair color."

"What about Julie's hair color? That's what matters."

"Well, she should probably use a darker color, which will be okay. That's no more noticeable than the bright red I recommend for blondes," assured Sally.

I struggled with the concept. "I really have to have them polished?"

Sally laughed, "Yes, and you'll either have to re-polish them every couple of days, more if you chip them, or come in here for me to do it."

I suddenly realized I didn't know how to terminate this trial. "How long does this last?"

"Forever, unless you break one or something. This doesn't come off. I could probably file them down to look more ordinary, but unless something unusual happens they're with you until your base nails grow out, probably 3 or 4 months. Is that a problem?"

"I'll say," I shouted, "this is only supposed to last three weeks at the most!"

"Calm down. Nobody told me that. Well, I'll think of something. In the meantime, pick a color so we can finish."

She held out the vibrant red she recommended and I numbly nodded, too overwhelmed by the thought of months with these strident claws to care about this final shock. By the time she had the first coat on, though, I was recovering and realized I had made another unthinking commitment. My nails almost glowed with a riot of brilliance, shining, shapely rubies that flashed in the lights of the table lamp. My hands looked long and elegant, even, I admitted to myself, beautiful and feminine. Those feelings of excitement I had recognized as I entered the salon resurrected themselves and I realized that I really wanted to do this. Earlier I had wondered if Julie had somehow manipulated me into this adventure. Now a part of me wondered if I had manipulated myself to this point, a part of my subconscious prodding me to things I didn't really know I wanted to do.

Sally applied several coats, I lost track but it must have been at least four, cycling me through the dryer. She carefully explained her technique, reminding me that I would need to do the same every couple of days unless I wanted to admit it was too inconvenient. Part of the price of maintaining beautiful nails, she claimed. Finally we were done and she led me to the counter to pay. I had been waving my hands around, watching the highlights gleam in the depth of the polish, but hadn't tried to actually do anything with my hands. My first trial came when my nose itched again and I almost poked my own eye out.

"Careful," Sally laughed. "I told you they take some getting used to."

I nodded, then reached for my wallet. I almost lost my first nail right there as my hand reached my hip pocket well before it should have. Only the tough silk wrap kept me from immediate disaster. It didn't solve my problem, though. I couldn't get my wallet out of my pants! When I carefully slid a finger down beside it, the long nails kept me from curling the tip to get a purchase on the smooth leather.

"I, um, have a problem," I stammered.

"What? Oh, I see," she giggled, then waved her own even-longer nails at me.

Finally I managed to work my thumb down one side of my wallet, and one elegant finger down the other and extract it. I had further problems trying to get the correct bills from within it, but after an interminable and frustrating delay Sally was paid (don't ask how much, if you don't know how much a full set of long silk wraps cost, it would shock you). I didn't even try to put my wallet away, just holding it in my hand. Sally escorted me from the salon and closed the door behind me. Keeping my fingers carefully folded so that the nails were hidden against my legs, I walked to my bright red sports car. I had left the top down so there hadn't been any reason to lock it and I reached for the door, learning to be careful not to bang my nails on the handle. I was surprised to see that the nail polish almost matched the color of the car, which set me to wondering about subliminal choices while I casually reached into my pants for my car keys. Right. Casually reached right to the edge of the pocket on my tight jeans and was stopped even more thoroughly than I had been by my back pocket when I went for my wallet. I wasn't sure I'd ever get those keys, but I finally managed to work them out and then noticed the first chips in my polish. Damn, not even 15 minutes. I never realized that polish was that sensitive. I had the bottle and was about to toss it onto the seat when I realized that I couldn't have Julie seeing my hands looking tacky or she'd use that as evidence that the nails really were too much bother to keep up. So I carefully opened the bottle, my long nails waving like flags around the base and the applicator, and carefully applied polish to the chipped area. Thankfully Sally had used a pretty good polish and it filled in seamlessly. I put a second coat on for good measure after the first one had dried, then carefully closed the bottle and drove home. Carefully.

I ended up carrying both my wallet and my keys as I approached the door to our house. It was unlocked and I managed to get inside without further damage to my beautiful nails. I was really beginning to get enamored with the flashing ruby highlights. Setting my things down on a table in the entry way, I went to find Julie. My nails still made me self-conscious enough that I kept my fingers folded while I walked. As soon as Julie saw me her eyes went to my closed hands, though she couldn't really see anything.

"Show me your hands," she demanded with a laugh.

I held my hands out to her, palms up as I had done in the restaurant. My eyes were on her face, and I saw the almost immediate look of exasperation as she was frustrated in her desire to see what my new nails looked like. As soon as she realized I was holding them upside down deliberately, her eyes flicked up to meet my wide grin.

"Gotcha!" I bounced my own laugh off of her, provoking an embarrassed blush. While she was looking at my face I turned my hands over. She noticed the flicker out of the corner of her eye and her glance darted back to the target of her interest.

"Wow!" she said breathlessly. "You really went all out."

"Nothing is too good for my wife," I teased.

"They're beautiful, so long and elegant. How can you stand it?"

"Oh, they're not so bad. I did have a problem getting my keys out of my pocket, though," I admitted.

Julie laughed, "I'll bet! Did Sally help?"

"No way, her nails are even longer than mine."

"Well, we'll just have to get you a purse to carry your things in," she teased.

"Not likely," I denied her offer. "I may have to work something out, but I'm not carrying a purse. With these nails, I'm probably not even going outside. You were right when you said I'd have plenty of time to work on my project."

"But they're so beautiful, and so feminine. You ought to show them off."

"Earth to Julie," I called. "This is just a test. You're the one that will be showing off."

"Maybe," she smiled, "but only if you stick it out for the three weeks."

"I'll manage."

"Maybe," she repeated with a mischievous grin.

"Now," she continued, "go strip off your clothes and go to the bathroom. We have to get you ready for your other clothes."

"Ready? Bathroom? Just what do you have in mind?" I asked with a combination of suspicion and growing concern.

"You'll see. Wearing a woman's clothes takes preparation. That's part of the price, part of the inconvenience. If you won't do what it takes, the test doesn't count."

She pointed toward the bedroom and made a shooing motion with her hands, the grin regaining its triumphant air as she asserted the power that controlling our little test had given her. I went to the bedroom and stripped down to my underwear, managing to get my sport shirt off fairly easily and my belt undone. However, the zipper on my jeans almost ended the trial right there, as I first got frustrated, then irritated, then angry enough to consider ripping those incredible nails right off my hands. Somehow, though, I managed to get a hold on the tab and lower the zipper. I toed my shoes off and walked into the bathroom in my socks and underwear.

"No, no, no, that will never do," she chortled. "I said strip!"

"What do you think you're going to do?" I demanded as I complied.

"We're going to remove that unsightly body hair. It won't look right with your new clothes and it might cause the stockings to run. Stand in the shower."

I was a little surprised the shower wasn't already running to set the temperature, but even more surprised when instead of a razor she reached for a pink can.

"What's that stuff?" I asked in growing concern.

"Hair remover. Now hold your arms out to the side and stand still."

She applied the cream from the can liberally all over my body below my neck, except for a small area directly around my masculine package. Even though I found my glamorous nails strangely exciting, the hammerblows of succeeding surprises were too much for my saturated mind to accept and I was completely deflated, even when she moved my cock and balls around to spread the cream into hidden areas. Julie set a timer for 20 minutes and cautioned me to stand still, then left the room.

The twenty minutes stretched on and on, seemingly without end. Without the timer I would have sworn it had been hours. My arms got tired after less than five, but the worst part was the itch that started after about ten minutes. It seemed like the foam was making my skin crawl and I began to twitch and shiver as my nerves exploded with the strange sensation. I was watching the timer creep down to the end, calling up all the stubbornness I could muster to keep from calling out and giving up, when Julie came walking back in.

"That should be enough. Let me rinse you off," she offered.

I stepped out of the direct flow of water just long enough for the temperature to rise above freezing (it must have been just barely above freezing, it was certainly cold) and then moved into its blessed relief. Julie's gentle hands and a sort of rough sponge helped me rinse all of the stinging foam off my body. I was so grateful for the relief from the itch that the rubbing scrub Julie from was giving me that I didn't realize just how smooth and sensitive my skin was feeling.

When she was sure all the foam had been thoroughly rinsed, Julie motioned for me to step from the shower. She blotted my skin with a thick, soft towel and then reached for a powder puff. Before I realized what she was up to, clouds of softly scented powder were settling onto my shiny body.

"Why'd you do that?" I asked, once again feeling helplessly attached to the tail of an out-of-control tiger.

"Your skin needs the softness of the powder after that chemical. You know, you really do have beautiful skin. It must run in your family, just like your thick, soft hair."

My father and both grandfathers had full heads of hair even when they died. Just as importantly, my female ancestors also had thick, full heads of hair. Women can carry the bald gene, too, it just shows as thinning hair rather than actual bald spots. In any event, baldness was one thing I didn't have to worry about. I kept my hair reasonably short, mostly so I could ignore it rather than worry about it, but I never thought of it as special. In fact, I always considered it plain and uninteresting.

The mirror in the bathroom had fogged up and I couldn't really see what I looked like. I could tell the thin hair on my arms, legs, and chest was gone, but it had never been all that obtrusive. Before I could really start examining myself, however, Julie pulled me back into the bedroom. On the bed were boxes and bags in a bewildering array of sizes and shapes. Surely I didn't need that many clothes! They were still closed, though, so I couldn't tell what she had included.

"Okay, Mr. Reasonable. Do you remember all the things you've been nagging me about wearing?" Julie launched her attack.

"Now, honey, I haven't really been nagging you, just making suggestions," I counterattacked, weakly.

"Once is a suggestion. More than once is a nag. You've been nagging," she threw in her reinforcements.

"It wouldn't have been a nag, if you'd even really considered my suggestions," I retreated in grumpy disarray.

She laughed and picked up the first package, "Actually, I'm going to go easy on you. I'm going to help you out with things you didn't even know enough to 'suggest', like removing your body hair so it doesn't pull when you slide on your stockings. This is another example. It's called a camisole, and it will keep the corset from pinching your beautiful, smooth skin."

Julie pulled out shimmering wisp of nylon, tinted a pale pink, edged in delicate lace. She gathered it up and motioned me to put my arms in it, then draped it softly over my torso. It fell in gentle waves, lighter than air, so cool and smooth. Despite my sense of being overwhelmed I couldn't help but be impressed, pleased, even delighted at the sensual feel of the thin material. I found my hands smoothing it out over my waist while Julie busily adjusted the straps for a proper fit, whatever that meant. She didn't say anything, but the grin that was still prominent on her face took on a less triumphant air, filling in with a more quizzical expression. I was too distracted to notice.

"Ahem, now for the next item," she interrupted my reverie.

In the second package was a snowy white corset, decorated with delicate pink lace that matched the border of the camisole thing that I already wore. I recognized it in a general sort of way, but when I had urged Julie to wear one I hadn't understood just how many different styles there were for figure control. She proceeded to explain about the one she had chosen for me.

"This is a traditional corset, called Victorian style. It's out of date for today since bras have come along. Most modern figure control clothing, basques and merry widows, incorporate bra cups but you don't really need that, do you?" she teased.

There were laces down the back of the garment, but there were also hooks down the front, hidden by a cover panel. Julie quickly undid the hooks and wrapped it around my waist. When she started fastening up the hooks again, I thought it was a little snug but no big deal, really.

"That's not so bad," I commented as she was finishing the last couple of hooks. "I don't know why you made this seem like such a big deal when I asked you to wear one."

For some reason this made her giggle carol out, silvery and full. I was surprised at first, but then a little concerned when her hilarity continued beyond a quick chuckle. What was so funny?

She walked around behind me, struggling to get her laughter under control, then managed to blurt out between titters, "I'm just getting started. Hang on to the bedpost."

I tried to turn around to look at her, but she caught my shoulders and held me facing the bed, then rotated them to make me lift my arms. I was still trying to look over my shoulder at her, though I was also reaching for the bedpost, when I remembered how much slack there was in the laces when she first showed me the corset. She wasn't going to try and pull out all that slack. Surely not!

Surely yes! With a strong tug she started pulling on the strings of the corset. My hands grasped the bedpost in reflex to keep from being pulled back and I started to complain, but she beat me to the first comment.

"Be still. This is what a corset really means. If you want to understand it, then stand still and take it."

I could hear the triumph back in her voice, and it triggered a response that was fast becoming a conditioned reflex. That sense of triumph she felt caused my always-adequate stubbornness to assert itself and once again I decided to show her I could take anything she could dish out. I held my tongue and grimly determined to ride out this latest indignity.

She had started her lacing near the top, squeezing much of the breath out of my lungs, anyway, so talking would be difficult. There must have been six or eight sets of holes that she pulled the slack out of before tying off the ends near my much-reduced waist. I tried to breathe a sigh of relaxation, but the inadequate breath her tight lacing had left me was choked off even further when she started pulling out slack again, this time from laces near the bottom of the surprisingly long garment. I tried to look down to see how much my waist had already been pulled in, but all I saw was my own chest, barely captured within the top of the corset and squeezed up until it almost looked like I had a bust. She worked the lower laces up my waist and I was beginning to consider capitulation, giving in and admitting I couldn't take any more, when she went back to the first set of laces again! I was too surprised to say anything when I felt her strong fingers pulling out additional length from strings I was sure were already drum tight. She only went about half way up the top set of laces, starting at the lower level of my ribcage, but she managed to yank out enough to increase the already crushing embrace of the corset a noticeable amount. Finally she tied off these laces a second time and stood back.

"There, that should about do it, for now."

"For now?" I gulped softly, trying to get some air back into compressed lungs.

"Yep, after about an hour, we should be able to get a little more out."

"Don't be ridiculous. This is already too tight." I whined.

"That's what a corset is all about," she maintained. "Now, if you had really tried to understand what you were talking about and asked for a waist cincher or body briefer, you might be a little less constricted, blessed with modern stretchy materials instead of satin and stiff boning. But no, you were always so sure you were being reasonable that there was no need for understanding."

I said nothing. This example added to the self-assessment that had started when she told me at lunch that she felt unfulfilled and I began to think I hadn't been reasonable at all. But maybe I was just getting lightheaded from the lack of breath.

While I had been lost in my thoughts, she went to a small package and I heard the whisper of long, sheer stockings. When I glanced at the sound, I saw her set those carefully on the bed, then pick up a handful of small elastic straps with clips on the ends, I recognized them after a second as garters. When she began to attach them to hooks on the lower fringe of the corset I tried to interrupt her.

"Wait a minute! Don't I get any underwear?"

"Did you ever ask me to go without?" she replied with a grin brimming with mischief.

"Well, yes, but only once, a long time ago. You said that doesn't count as a nag." I offered in my defense.

Julie giggled and nodded, "You're right. I have underwear for you. They're even men's underwear, though not like any you've ever worn. But they go on over the garters so you can go to the bathroom, or remove them quickly just in case you're in a hurry."

My pretty tormentor chuckled as she gathered one of the stockings neatly, then knelt at my right foot. I had considered offering to do it myself, but she was obviously enjoying her time dressing up her full-sized Barbie doll. Besides, in that infernal corset I probably couldn't have bent over that far, anyway. The slither of the smooth, shimmering material up my smooth, shining leg reminded me of the camisole, and a bit of excitement returned. I was still too deflated from the intensity of the corset to get fully erect, but my dormant cock started to stretch down my leg. Julie noticed, but didn't say anything. Her giggles did damp out though, and I saw that quizzical look return to her eyes. In a moment she had the first one hooked, to three garters as my saturated mind finally absorbed, and started on the second. Normally, I take a bit of pride in being pretty aware of what's going on around me. Unless I'm deep into cyberspace of course, then the rest of the world doesn't exist. But anyway, when I'm not lost in space, I try to pay attention to things. However, it was only with the second stocking that I noticed they were dark and elegant, and seamed! She had carefully straightened the seam on the first one without me even noticing and when she started to do the same to the second, I became a bit overwhelmed. My pride in my awareness came tumbling down and I realized I was truly out of my depth. I shuddered a little and reached for the bedpost to steady myself.

"Are you alright?" she asked in concern.

"I think so," I murmured. "But this is just going too fast. How much more is there?"

"Just a few things," she promised.

She opened another package and drew out a tangled set of thin straps in a bright, vibrant red. Untangling the straps, she revealed thong underwear, the thin bands emanating from a small triangle of material. Once again she had me raise my feet and started pulling the tiny thong up my tautly covered legs.

"You want to do this? Or do you want me to?" she asked gently, still a bit concerned.

"I'll get it," I offered. My cock was still soft, a condition that didn't change when I poked it with my long, clumsy nails, so I managed to get it back between my legs and then pull the underwear up to cover my masculine (how masculine was I, really?) package. The bands of the thong barely drew up above the globes of my ass, just enough to keep from sliding back down (I hoped). Still, they were high enough that they had to be tucked under the lower fringe of the corset, which extended from my armpits to my hips. I could see what she meant by the need to put underwear on over the garters. If my ordinary underwear had been trapped up under the corset, I never would have gotten them down.

Those tiny underwear were strange, but putting them on myself had allowed me to absorb their strangeness and I didn't feel quite so out of control, so I stood up a little straighter (mostly a thing of my legs and head, since my torso was already rigid) and smiled reassurance at Julie. An answering smile of relief lit her face and her good humor returned with the lightning speed of her normal emotional transitions.

"Okay, almost done," she assured me. "All we have left are heels, skirt, and blouse."

The unfamiliar words echoed in my mind, threatening another overload. I carefully husbanded the little breath the corset allowed to me and waited for these latest assaults on my senses. The blouse was first, all lace and ruffles, extravagantly feminine. Another of my "suggestions" at work, that she should dress in more feminine styles. I sighed (well almost, I didn't have enough breath for a real sigh) and fed my arms into it. It fastened up the back, of course, all the way to a ruffled, stand up collar. I had deliberately set up my career so I could work at home and avoid wearing a tie and here I was with even more stuff around my neck.

"Does it have to be such a bright color?" I complained.

She giggled, "It is rather red, but red is really your color. It matches your nails. Besides, women wear brighter colors than men. This is what you get when you go for dainty, feminine styles like you nagged me about."

Whoever had tailored the black skirt had decided to use the material for fullness rather than length. It was definitely shorter than typical for Julie (me and my big mouth, but I thought her legs were beautiful and deserved to be displayed). When she slid it up my legs I watched my knees reappear below the hem, then more and more of my thighs as well. Finally she zipped it up behind me and closed the single button.

"Good, the size is fine. In fact, I could have gotten a size smaller. With that corset, you could wear a size 7, I'll bet we'll be able to share clothes. Now, this is just a simple cotton/polyester blend, but it's lined, so you don't need a slip," she explained. Thank God for small favors I thought to myself.

"Oops, I forgot, you need a belt," she exclaimed, then drew out a wide, stretchy, fish scale belt in shining gold. She quickly wrapped this around my waist. I noticed there were no belt loops, and while the belt was stretched a bit it was hardly tight since my waist was so compressed. What good was it, anyway?

My thoughts on the uselessness of the belt had distracted me while Julie turned to yet another package, obviously a shoe box. When she turned around this time, I finally had to call a stop to the nonsense.

"No! No way! I'm not wearing those shoes," I declared.

They were some sort of sandal things, open toed, with a single red strap over the foot that was an inch or so wide at the sides, but twisted into a knot in the middle, obviously right behind the toes. Near the back of the shoe there were two long, thin red straps that must tie up around the ankle in some way that wasn't immediately clear to me. Those features weren't too bad, though I didn't know why she hadn't just chosen some simple slip-on design. But the heels were unreal! They towered up at least 5 inches, maybe more, covered in the same bright red as the toe strap.

"Those are just too high, be reasonable," I heard myself blurt out. As soon as the words were out of my mouth I wanted them back. I was claiming reasonableness for myself and didn't want to lose control of that word by letting her capture it. Too late, though. And worse, it provoked that irritating triumphal grin back onto her face.

"Reasonable?" she jumped on the word. "You mean you don't think these shoes are reasonable? I'll have you know these heels, in my size, are less than an inch taller than the ones I was wearing the last time you nagged me about my shoes. In your size they're up a little more, but overall only about an inch over what you found inadequate. Now that's only reasonable, isn't it?"

I was really caught, now. Flinging my own words back into my face was bad enough, but doing it while wearing that damn grin was too much. My own stupid stubbornness reared its perpetually ugly head and I growled back.

"Fine, then, have it your way. How do those things fasten up anyway?"

I tried to bend down to pick one up, but that stupid corset kept me almost straight and I couldn't reach them. She quickly grabbed one and held it for my foot. Guiding my stocking-clad toes into the toe strap, she wrapped the other straps around my leg in a pattern that still wasn't entirely clear but left them elegantly poised at the thinnest point of my ankle. She fastened the tiny buckle and motioned for me to raise my other foot.

Right. Until that point I hadn't been putting any real weight on the high-heeled shoe. When she made it clear I needed to lift my other foot, I tried to roll my hip a little, but found I needed to step up instead. I immediately swayed, trying to find some sort of balance between my toe and heel. Clutching at the bedpost, I felt unfamiliar muscle tensions as I tried to stabilize my leg. I was so distracted by the effort that Julie had the other shoe fastened before I realized what was going on. After a moment, I realized that I really could put some weight on the heel, though my toes were clearly bearing the majority of the load. Still, that did give me a few inches of wheel base to work with, better than just the ball of my foot. It also let me relax the arch of my foot a little which helped with my leg muscles. I gingerly put some weight on my other foot and then slowly let go of my death grip on the bedpost.

"There, that's not so bad, is it?" Julie teased.

"I'll manage," I gritted out, still tottering but not in imminent danger of falling.

"Would you like to take a look at yourself?" she offered, moving back so I could turn to look in the full-length mirror.

"Not really," I denied, but as the panic brought on by the towering high-heels subsided, the excitement I had previously recognized flooded in behind it and I knew I wanted to see what I looked like. I turned toward the mirror, too quickly and almost fell, but I caught myself with a small step and attained a clumsy, awkward balance. I had turned far enough to see myself in the mirror, though, which was all that mattered at that moment.

My glance started at those silly shoes . . . which weren't so silly anymore. They lifted my foot into a graceful arch and the thin straps made my ankles look slender and delicate. The dark stockings led my eyes up glorious, long, smooth, sculptured legs to the short, dark skirt that nipped into a waist so tiny it couldn't possibly be mine. I saw the value of that stupid gold belt as it provided a magnet for the eyes in celebration of that slim, dainty waist. My glistening nails caught a highlight from somewhere and I realized my hands looked as elegant and feminine as my legs. Though my hands would never be called dainty, with the long, glamorous nails they looked slender and beautiful. The bright red blouse exploded in ruffles at throat and wrists, surrounding the delicate airy lace that threatened to reveal a bosom that I didn't really have. Not a real risk anyway since I knew the blouse was lined and fully opaque. Actually, I had a bit of a bosom with that corset squeezing my chest up almost to my throat. The Victorian style of the body shaper prevented any definition of breasts that weren't there, nonetheless I had a definite bust, especially in contrast with that impossible waist. The image I saw in the mirror buried my anger under bewildering amazement, confused excitement, and I realized, pleasure.

It might have been okay if my gaze had stopped there, but my eyes just had to go and complete the examination, finally reaching my face. While Julie resisted my suggestions about clothes, she had always been proud of the beauty of her face and glorious hair. Even before we met she had developed the skilled, subtle touch of an artist with cosmetics and had always taken the time to care for her tumbling dark tresses. The only comment, other than compliments, I had ever offered on her makeup or hair had been a single complaint the first time she had worn curlers to bed. I had asked if that was really necessary and she had curtly said it was. However, I noticed that after that night she had started using hot rollers in the morning, at least most of the time.

Anyway, I had always loved the way she enhanced the considerable natural beauty of her face, and loved the flowing cascade of her darkly shining hair, and never "nagged" her about either one. As a result, she hadn't done anything with my face or hair and what I saw in the mirror was a man's face over a gloriously beautiful, amazingly feminine body. Actually, that wasn't quite right. With my soft features and squeaky-clean shave, it looked more like a boy's face over a woman's body, but still desperately, foolishly, pathetically incongruous.

Julie had already seen what I looked like as she dressed her grown-up Barbie doll so she had been watching my face as I studied the vision in the mirror. It must have shown surprise, wonder, then growing pleasure as I looked at the body she had created. Then it must have shown dismay bordering on pain as my line of sight finally lifted to my head. I was too overwhelmed by the unending stream of shocks she had introduced into my life to maintain any control over my expression and I must have revealed every thought as emotions flooded through me in trip-hammer succession.

"Jay, what's the matter?" she said in alarm.

"Huh? What? Oh, nothing," I denied, the lie still written on my face.

"Don't give me that. I haven't seen you look that unhappy, not angry or frustrated or worried, but just plain sad, since I can't remember when. Now what's wrong?"

I tore my gaze away from the mirror and looked at my loving wife, all gloating triumph gone from her worried face. In truth, I wasn't sure what was wrong with me. I didn't really want to be a woman, did I? If not, then why was my face what I wanted to change in the image and not my body? Why was I feeling so proud about my tiny, decidedly feminine waist when I knew it was due to the corset I hated so much? I did hate these clothes, didn't I? I was just putting up with them, in private, to win an argument point with my wife, right?

The confusion rampant behind my eyes must have flowed across my face, leaving Julie just as concerned as ever. I was too consumed by the sensations to speak and just stood there, swaying a little on my unaccustomed heels. Finally, she broke the frozen silence.

"Look, this has gone far enough. Let's get you out of those clothes."

"No!" I cried, an expression torn from my confusion without conscious thought.

"What?" Julie asked in surprise.

Somehow that one word that had forced itself from me had caused my locked up systems to re-boot and I was able to speak again.

"I don't understand what all this means, love, but part of me is really excited by these clothes. So much that I'm worried about it, but I don't want to give it up, at least not yet," I explained.

My thinking out loud continued, "This has all been a little too much for me. This little game we were playing has gotten entirely too real. I'm sort of out of control, here, and I need to get myself back together. But when I looked at myself in that mirror I was so pleased with what you had done to me that I was about to explode. Something about dressing like this is reaching deep into wants and needs I never even knew I had. Do you think I'm really gay?"

"No, don't be silly," she assured me. "I read somewhere that most cross-dressers are thoroughly heterosexual. You obviously enjoy our marriage, just as I do. Actually, all of us have a little man and woman inside, nobody is 100% male or female. Maybe you've just repressed a little more femininity than we knew."

Building excitement bubbled in her voice, "Maybe I was more right than I knew when I said that you needed to understand what it means to be a woman a little more. Not just so you'll understand me better, but so you'll understand yourself better!"

Julie continued, "But I don't understand why you looked so sad, there. I can understand being confused. I'm confused by what's going on and it must be much worse from your side. But what made you so sad?"

I was finally resurrecting a bit of control over my tangled, frantic thoughts as the shock of my appearance was absorbed and her words began to help me understand things, at least a little. Her question was enough to prod me back into a single, clear emotion. Embarrassment. I felt a flush set my cheeks on fire and I ducked my head, staring at my elegant shoes.

"Now what's the matter?" she asked in exasperation when I didn't answer.

I tried to take a deep breath to calm myself, but though I was getting used to the corset enough it was not actively uncomfortable, I still couldn't manage more than tiny sips of air. So I closed my eyes for a minute and took a mental breath instead, then looked at the beautiful woman I loved.

"I was disappointed when I saw my man's face on a woman's body. I wanted it to be a pretty woman's face instead. And hair, lots of beautiful hair, like yours," I finally admitted. There it was out. Now what would she think of me?

"Oh, Jay," she cried, tears forming in her eyes. I knew it. I'd blown a good marriage. I should never have agreed to this stupid test in the first place. I should have been satisfied with my gorgeous wife just as she was, instead of being so selfish. I should have . . .

Julie interrupted my mental self-flagellation by wrapping her arms around me and hugging me tightly, almost tightly enough to feel through that infernal, magical corset. She looked up to me with tears in her eyes, but instead of disgust or anger I saw glorious love there.

"Dearest Jay," she murmured into my . . bust, "you can't imagine how much I hoped you would feel that way. I always wished you would want to do this. I used this silly test as a way to get you to go along with a more important test, not about fashions, about us. It's a secret I've kept from you these years we've been married, even before that actually. With your face and features I just knew I could make you look like a woman, even a beautiful one. In my fantasies I dreamed of making love with a woman, but it always turned out to be a man under a woman's clothes and you were the man. This test, the clothes I dressed you in, were all the sorts of things you nagged me about, but you never complained about my face or hair so I had no excuse to do anything to you there. But I so hoped you would want to complete the transformation in your appearance. Do you? Do you really?"

Somehow, holding her had helped me find a mental stability that had been lacking all evening, not to mention a little help with physical stability as I struggled even to stand in those incredible heels. The warmth of her body next to mine, the soft scent of her hair, the gentle emotions she displayed added memories from the previous parts of our marriage to the confusion of that night, building a combination that buttressed the new experiences with an enduring love that was more than just a man-woman physical attraction. I knew that I could count on her, no matter where this strange adventure led us, and that chased away the fear that had lurked in the back of my mind like a dark cloud. It seemed the fog of confusion was dissipated like the fear, and with sudden clarity I knew what to do.

"Julie, honey, will you show me how to do makeup? And is there something pretty you could do with my hair?"

The small, tentative, hopeful smile that had quirked her lips gave way to a genuine grin. Her eyes glistened with new tears, but this time I knew they were tears of joy. She wiped quickly at her eyes and stood back.

"I can do better than that," she proudly declared. "Come sit over at the vanity."

She moved quickly over to the seat and turned it around for me. I stepped after her, but almost fell from the skyscraper heels, feeling as clumsy as an oversized gorilla. She giggled, which didn't help much, then offered some useful advice.

"Take shorter steps. Let your hips swing so you can put one foot directly in front of the other, like you were walking a tightrope. Point your toes."

I tried out the things she had suggested and they really helped. I still felt clumsy but I wasn't in danger of catastrophic contact between my nose and the carpet. At least not as much danger. I walked slowly and carefully over to the seat by all of Julie's cosmetics and gratefully lowered myself into it. No slouching though, that stupid, wonderful corset kept me stiffly upright with forced perfect posture.

"No, stand up again," she commanded.

I struggled to my feet and looked at her quizzically.

"When a lady sits down, she smoothes her skirt to keep it from wrinkling. Try again."

I sat again, still with excellent posture but this time with a smooth swipe of my hand to straighten my skirt as I lowered myself to the seat. She nodded acceptance of my effort, then looked at her vanity table. To my surprise, Julie just shoved a bunch of her bottles and things to the side and got yet another new package, this one from the closet. She looked embarrassed for just a minute, then admitted, "I got some for you, in the colors you'd look good in. You couldn't really use mine. I mean, you could use them if you wanted, but they wouldn't look right."

While she had talked she had been pulling bottles and tubes and small plastic boxes from the package, arraying them on the cleared space like an army positioning itself for combat.

"Okay, how far do you want to go with this. I won't do anything permanent, of course, but some of what you need will take a little while to go away. For example, I need to shape your eyebrows."

"Do whatever you think is best, gorgeous. The reason I never complained about your makeup is because you do it so perfectly. It would be pretty stupid for me to interfere with your genius. These silly nails are with me for a while anyway, so hit me with your best shot. Fire away."

She gave a little-girl giggle and reached for her tweezers. In a second I was reflecting on my idiotic habit of leaping before I looked, getting myself into things without really understanding the consequences. Pulling my eyebrows out hurt! Not badly, but the series of little stings went on and on and on. I figured she hadn't left any hair at all long before she was done, but she just kept at it. Finally she tapered off, spending more time looking than pulling, carefully balancing out their shape. At least, that's what I hoped she was doing. She had me facing away from the mirror.

"Okay, that's the worst part. The rest won't hurt a bit, I promise."

"Good, if it's all that bad I'm ready to admit defeat right now and never complain about anything you do, or don't do, again."

She laughed and shook her head, but her mind was clearly on the selection of cosmetics she had spread out.

"Hmm . . . Actually, with the right hairstyle, now that your eyebrows are shaped you could pass as a woman just as you are, with maybe a little lipstick. You really do have the right bone structure for it. Still, this is not about getting a passing grade, you're going to ace the course. It's going to take a few minutes but when I'm done, you'll be the best-looking babe on the block."

"Not while you're around, beautiful," I disagreed, but my excitement was building. If she, with her expert knowledge, thought I had potential, maybe I really did.

It took more than a few minutes. I didn't understand everything she did, at that time, but she seemed to be reaching for skin-colored or even colorless things for a long time before she started with what I had always considered was real makeup. She spread creams and lotions over my whole face, even undoing the collar of my blouse and lowering it away from my neck. Finally, though, she started to lightly dab soft colors onto my eyelids, gold and pink and purple. Even then she returned to neutral colors adding a smoky gray, even a little white. At her direction I looked up and down and wherever while she stroked a pencil to line my eyes, then I repeated the eyeball exercises when she added mascara, and then more mascara, and then still more. By the time she was done, my eyelashes felt like they weighed a couple of pounds apiece.

"You're lucky," she interrupted my thoughts, "your natural eyelashes are already pretty long and full so I won't have to use false eyelashes."

Goodness, if that's what she did to long, full lashes, what would she do to thin ones? Once my eyes were done, she moved on to more definite colors to add shape and contour to my cheeks, though even then she blended it in so thoroughly I thought she might have rubbed it all into obscurity. Finally, she took a small brush and started to paint a careful crimson outline on and around my lips. She must have used the color to expand their size a little, since it felt like she had exceeded where I felt my actual lip shapes to be. After she had the outline the way she wanted it, she filled in the space with bright, ruby color, a suspiciously good match for the shine on my nails.

"Just how long have you been planning this?" I asked, though I smiled to let her know I was pleased, not angry.

"In my dreams, just about forever, but I didn't actually buy anything until today," she claimed.

Julie stood back from her creation and I started to turn to the mirror.

"Not yet," she stopped me.

She buttoned my blouse back up, then went to her jewelry box to get a gold chain with a shining heart locket, just right for the antique style of the blouse. A quarter-sized pair of gold earring disks, leftover from before her ears were pierced, were clipped to my ears and a couple of rings with colorful crystalline gems were placed on my fingers. My men's watch was removed, then she tapped her finger against her forehead for a second in thought, snapped her fingers and reached for her perfume.

"Now this we can share. I think Opium works well even on blondes, especially if they're as hot at you look. Oh! That reminds me! Whatever was I thinking?"

With that cryptic exclamation she went to the closet and drew forth yet another new package. This one looked like an old-fashioned cylindrical hat box, except much taller. It must have been two feet high. Reaching inside she showed what the box had protected, a glorious golden wig. Unlike my dirty blond color, this wig positively glowed like pure sweet honey. It flowed over her hands as she positioned it with the same sort of honeyed, liquid grace, highlights dancing within the warm color.

It would be wrong to say I had gotten bored while I was sitting there, but perhaps not too wrong to say I had become a little more relaxed. The struggle to breath through the corset's constriction, the unnatural arch of my feet, the sense of coolness as the room's air currents played beneath my short skirt had all receded into the background of my mind as I waited for Julie to finish with my face. That gorgeous wig brought it all back, though. My chest tightened in a way that even the corset couldn't match and I forgot to breathe for a long moment as the wig came closer. Julie carefully placed the cap over my own short hair, tucking up any loose ends, then pulled the bangs and locks of golden beauty into position to properly frame my face. The ends spilled over my shoulders down to the level of my breasts . . uh . . bust and I felt soft, gentle whispers of it caress my cheeks.

Finally, hours after she had started, or at least a half hour, Julie stood back. The look of triumph was in her face, emphasized with smug satisfaction that would have been intensely irritating except I knew that this time I would share in that triumph. She reached out one hand and gently helped me to my feet, as polite as any courtier, then held my shivering shoulders as she turned me around to look in the mirror.

I don't know how long it had been since I had breathed. It didn't matter really. I had passed beyond breath, beyond any mundane limits. I was air itself, and sunlight. I was shimmering flame and molten gold. I was sparking diamonds and dancing rubies. I was beautiful. Now my image was complete. My unbelievable figure hadn't been diminished at all but now it was topped by a delicately feminine face and a liquid cascade of flowing honey.

Probably I did start breathing somewhere in there, because I know I stood frozen in homage to the image of perfection in the mirror for a long time. Finally Julie poked me in my armored ribs and said, "Not bad, huh. I told you I'd make you into a real babe."

"Oh, Julie, this is incredible. You're a genius. I love you!" I gushed.

"Good, cause you're stuck with me," she grinned.

Then she ordered, "Now, go practice your walk while I change."

I struggled to get myself together again, mentally, for the umpteenth time that night. Reviewing her advice, I started to sashay across the bedroom, delighting in the swish of my hair and the flip of my skirt.

"Here," she called, tossing me a red leather purse with a long shoulder strap. "Go get your wallet and keys and put them in this. I'll pick out the makeup you need to take along."

It finally penetrated my bemused state that she was changing from the casual clothes she had been wearing. I saw a pair of darkly elegant pantyhose laid out, as well as a snug leather skirt and a shimmery satin blouse in a deep blue that matched her beautiful eyes. High-heeled pumps were sitting near her feet (not as high as my heels, of course). She was obviously getting ready for a night on the town.

"What's going on?" I demanded.

"We haven't had dinner, yet. I'm hungry, aren't you?"

"Well, sure, but we can't go out. I figured we'd fix something here."

"Why? After all the trouble you've gone to in order to look hot and sensuous, quite successfully I might add, why should we hide in our house?" she asked as though it were silly to consider any such thing.

I stammered out a not-very-coherent protest, "But . . but you said . . uh . . we said . . that this would be private What will people think?"

"Look in the mirror, you silly girl, and tell me what people will think," she laughed.

She was right, of course, no one could possibly tell, at least not by looking at a static image, that I wasn't a natural born woman, a spectacularly beautiful one at that.

"But . . . but . . I don't know how to act like a woman. How to talk, what to do." I stammered on with only borderline coherency.

"Then it's high time you learned," she declared relentlessly, then softened a little. "Look, darling, you need to approach this with joy. It'll be fun."

"Say, that's your new name. Joy. See that you live up to it," she commanded with mock sternness. "Now go get your wallet and keys. Remember your walk."

I stood dumfounded for a moment, but she turned back to the mirror in absolute dismissal, her body language totally precluding the possibility of further discussion as she attended to her own makeup. In a sort of daze I turned to the door and went toward the table where I had left my things. The purse already had some tissues and a compact in it, and something I recognized as a tampon. There were also a couple of breath mints, a lipstick in Julie's shade, and some other things that seemed unnecessary, but somehow typical. There was plenty of room for my wallet and keys, though, so I put them inside and turned back to the bedroom. By this time my walk was settling down. I knew I had to quit looking at my feet and made myself keep my head up all the way back down the hall to the bedroom. It actually worked easier, since my body quickly adopted a swaying rhythm of hips and gracefully pointing toes. When I got back to the bedroom, Julie had finished her makeup, dressed, and was slipping on her pumps.

"You never get dressed that fast when I want to go somewhere," I accused with a laugh.

She excused herself with a giggle, "Well, I didn't do my hair and I only needed to add a little flash to my makeup."

Julie motioned for me to hand her my purse and looked inside. The compact and lipstick that were there came out, to be tossed among her stuff, then a compact from my array went in, along with lipstick, eyeshadow, blush, and mascara.

"What, no eyeliner," I teased.

"Oops, thanks, I almost forgot."

"I was just kidding. I won't need all that stuff."

"Actually, you might," she disagreed. "It takes attention to keep yourself looking good and I expect you to do your best."

"Yes, ma'am," I agreed meekly, then felt myself giggle as well, somehow caught up by the mood into a feminine mannerism.

She praised me for it, "Good, remember that giggle, but otherwise you better speak softly and let me carry the conversation until we train your voice a little."

"Yes, ma'am," I repeated, this time in a soft breathy voice not much more than a whisper.

Julie nodded and motioned for me to precede her from the room. I realized she was trying to get me to adopt more feminine mannerisms and that I certainly needed the practice. When we got to her Thunderbird she opened the door for me, whispering quick advice on how to sit. I placed my heels as close to the car as I could, clamped my knees together, and sat, or rather fell, into the seat. Once my weight was transferred to the car, I lifted both legs together, knees still carefully squeezed, and swung them in. Not too bad, I thought, but getting out will be tough. Julie went around to the driver's side and slid into her seat with a similar motion, but with a grace I envied desperately, a grace made even more impressive by its lack of apparent effort. She backed out of the drive without the launching rocket style I used, but we were quickly on our way.

"Where are we going," I asked in my normal voice.

"Joy, you need to speak in a more feminine manner at all times," she chided me. "Keep your voice soft, but let the tone vary, and don't be so abrupt. It would have been more appropriate to say something like, "Oh, I do so hope we can find a place with a fabulous salad bar!"

"Oh, I do so hope we can find a place with a fabulous salad bar," I giggled, trying for the soft tone she indicated while still gushing with emotion, then I laughed through the rest of my wish, "and a thick, juicy prime rib."

"No, no, no," she chuckled in response. "Ladies don't wolf down thick slabs of red meat. I'll bet you couldn't anyway, while you wear that corset."

"You know, you're right," I realized. "I was hungry earlier, but right now, I don't feel a bit hungry."

"That's because your stomach is too compressed to be empty. Be grateful. It will help you preserve that girlish figure," teased Julie. "We better get something to eat, though, before we go bar-hopping."

"What?" I cried, in a surprisingly feminine tone since my full-bodied shout was too robbed of air for strength by that infernal corset.

"You heard what I said," Julie declared. "By the way, you don't mind if I remove my wedding ring for the night, do you? We'll just be two hot women out for a good time. Why should you be the only one that looks 'available'?"

She suited her actions to her words and worked her wedding ring off her finger, dropping it into a side pocket of her purse. I hadn't worn one for years since it was always getting in the way when I put in some upgrade or another into my computer. I suddenly realized it would be a long time before I put in any upgrades myself, if I kept my nails this glamorous. That distraction kept me from really absorbing the sense of her statements, that we were going to go trolling for men!

The first place we stopped was a yuppie soup and salad place. Julie caught my eye with a stern look that I didn't understand at first, then she ordered only the salad bar, skipping both the soup and baked potato options. A second stern look to me following her order and it was finally clear that I was to order the same, though I would normally have sampled all of the soups (with big bowls) and stuffed a potato until I could hardly carry it. This girl thing looked like it was going to be boring, at least in the food department, but I ordered in accordance with her orders, or order, or whatever.

The girl behind the cash register barely looked at me when she said, "That'll be $5.32, Miss."

Miss, she said, not even ma'am. I must look like a young lady as well as a pretty one, at least to this inattentive attendant. That reminded me of the rapidly expanding circle of witnesses to my impersonation, none of whom were paying any more attention than the cashier. Or at least, no more than the cashier had been paying me just a moment before. As soon as I started digging through my purse for my money (why couldn't Julie have just paid for us both?) those long nails began to show just how inconvenient lady's fashions could be and I started to hold up the line. Worse, Julie was standing there with that damn amused grin on her face as I struggled, just waiting for me to admit that it was too much for me to handle and ask for help. It's a good thing I looked up to see that smile, or I would have asked for help. Somehow I fumbled out enough money and handed it to the cashier.

"I don't know how you can put up with those long nails," the cashier sighed wistfully, "but they sure make your hands look beautiful, so slender and elegant. I wish I could learn to handle them."

"I only had them put on earlier today," I admitted in a soft voice. "I'm still learning myself."

"You're very brave to try," she grinned, "but then, if I looked as hot as you do, I'd probably make the effort, too."

"Thank you," I replied, ducking my head to hide my blush. This caused a flow of my hair to surround my face and reminded me of just how extreme my disguise was. Maybe I could get away with this, after all.

The purse that Julie had inflicted on me had a shoulder strap so I arranged it carefully, then took up my tray and walked to the salad bar. The swaying motion made necessary by my towering shoes and the partial obscuration by my bust of the items on the tray kept me nervously imagining a cascade of silverware and crockery from what I carried, but I reached the salad bar in safety. While I was working my way down the array of items, I felt a funny, itchy feeling at the back of my neck under the softly tickling mane of golden hair and shook my head to try and settle it better. The itch didn't go away, and I shook my head again, even more sharply, provoking a sensuous ripple and quick flip of the ends. That didn't help either and I was considering trying to balance my tray and reach behind me to scratch that itch when Julie came close and hissed at me.

"Stop that! You're just showing off. You don't want to pick up any of these guys."

What was she talking about? I turned around and saw men sprinkled through the restaurant, all of whom seemed to be staring right at me. That itch had been the funny feeling I get when I'm being watched, magnified beyond anything I'd ever felt before by the number and fierce intensity of the stares of the men. I wish I'd have known that was what it was, not only because I would have been able to understand and discount the itch, but because when I turned around, my eyes met those of several of the staring men and at least two got up and started to walk my way. I looked around in panic for Julie and saw her nearing the end of the counter. This provided me with more than enough incentive to hurry through my last selections and catch up with her. Thankfully she led us to a table away from my pursuers, if that's what they really were, and we sat down to our skimpy meal.

Julie was still mad at me, maybe jealous? Anyway, she started in again with another harshly whispered comment, "Quit flirting with these guys. They're losers. You let yourself get picked up by one of them and you're on your own, girl."

"I wasn't trying to flirt!" I whispered back just as intensely. "I felt an itch at the back of my neck. You know how it is when someone is watching me. It was just so intense! I've never felt it that strongly."

"Well, those guys thought you were tossing your hair to get their attention, which was a stupid waste since they were already so focused on you that a dozen elephants could have paraded through here and they wouldn't have noticed," she giggled, her good humor restored when she realized my distraction hadn't been deliberate. "Eat up, and we'll go where the hunting is better."

"I'm NOT hunting for men!" I insisted.

"Hah!" retorted Julie. "With those looks, all you need to do is smile and they'll keel over at your feet. You're a knockout. Don't tell me you're not flattered by their interest."

"I am not!" I denied her claim, but a part of me wondered if she were right.

Looking around the room, I tried to keep my eyes moving too fast to make eye contact with any of the men, but also to figure out what made them such losers in Julie's eyes.

"How come you think these guys are so bad?" I asked. This was a mistake since my own thoughts had moved on to other issues and I had forgotten Julie's last comment. She hadn't though, and thought we were still on the topic of my alleged flirting.

"See, I told you so! You are interested in them!"

"NO, I'm not," I insisted. "But I don't understand why these guys are so bad if we're looking to be picked up anyway."

"We're not looking to be picked up, at least not really. But we are going to have a good time tonight. We're just not going to let anyone come home with us. We're not going to waste our evening on these losers, though. Look at them."

I looked again, and again failed to see what she found so objectionable . . . or did I? I had never really considered men from an attractiveness standpoint before. For me, they were just part of the scenery, unless maybe I was worried about a confrontation of some sort. Those I avoided whenever possible since as a man I was too short and thin to be much of a fighter. Now, I looked at the men in the salad place with new eyes, considering them as counterparts to my displayed gender. Maybe I was beginning to see what Julie was noticing. The men seemed to fall into two categories. One type was a bit overweight, trying to control it just as we women needed to by eating a light meal. The ones that were not harmlessly attached to other women were constantly looking, staring, evaluating, trying to decide if they could meet a worthwhile woman in this female feeding ground. A bit desperate, I could now see. The second type of unaccompanied man was a geek even worse than I had been at my worst. Thin, gawky, usually with unflattering glasses, they looked at the unescorted women with a hunger that was definitely desperate. They seemed the bookish type that read all about nutrition and came to places that offered what the books indicated, even though they would have been better off with a meal loaded with fats and carbohydrates to add a little bulk to their scrawny frames. Definitely not my type. What did I just say . .er . . think? No men were my type. Were they?

I buried my gaze in my salad and ate carefully, trying to guide the fork with my glittering nails without sticking one in the dressing, or my mouth or whatever. I had heaped a pretty good pile of things on my plate, even if they were all salad things, and started in greedily to make up for the lack of potato and soup. After less than half of it, however, I found myself picking at the plate, literally unable to stomach another bite in my squeezed condition. I had held myself primly erect throughout the meal, what there was of it, so overall it seemed quite dainty and feminine, an effect no doubt magnified by the need to periodically sweep my ruby nails through my glowing blonde hair as it cascaded sensually down the front of my blouse.

"You're doing it again," Julie hissed, but there was enough laughter in her eyes to show she wasn't angry.

I froze in confusion, completely caught up in my internal musing and so comfortable with my feminine attire that I had forgotten that people were watching . . closely . . every move I made.

"We need to go," I whispered back. "I can't eat any more anyway."

"Told you so," gloated Julie, "while you wear that corset, you're going to eat like a lady, at least."

I nodded her the victory in this little point of contention, but I stood up to walk out. I picked up my tray to take it to the conveyor, when Julie hissed at me with yet another mistake I had made.

"Don't forget your purse, Joy," she grinned, then whispered, "from now on that needs to be welded to your arm, wherever you go. Welcome to another inconvenience of womanhood."

I put my tray back down, carefully arranged the strap of my purse, and picked the tray up again, all the while maintaining my balance on those teetering shoes, which had begun to hurt just as soon as I stood up again.

"We'll have to go home," I pleaded, "my feet are killing me."

"Oh, poor baby," she grinned wickedly, "do you want to just give up now, or at least wait until we get to the car. I'll help you take off your wig."

"No!" I whispered back. "I don't want people to know I'm not a girl. I just want to rest my feet."

The gloating triumph was back in her smile, "High heels aren't worth it, huh?"

"They aren't that bad, but it takes a little getting used to. With practice, I'll be fine, just not all in one night."

"Too bad. I'm going out for the evening. You can come along or make your own way home," she giggled, knowing I wasn't ready for a solo trip.

"Oh, all right. Have it your way. I can handle it."

"Good, follow me," she ordered, and headed for the exit. I had to hurry a bit to catch up and that make me put even more wiggle in my walk than normal (what was normal, anyway?). I know a heard a low whistle, and maybe a deep sigh as I left, but I wasn't about to turn around to see who had done what. We escaped into the parking lot and made our way to the car, where I repeated the careful attempt to preserve what little modesty the short skirt allowed.

The next stop on Julie's agenda for the evening was Feathers, a nightclub that we had heard about.

"We can't go in there," I gasped.

"Sure we can. I've wanted to check it out since it opened," she said blandly.

"But it's a singles bar," I protested.

"So what? We're single, at least for tonight," she grinned.

By this time she had parked the car and swung her own shining legs out. She stood up and walked to the front of the car to wait for me, that irritating challenge back in her smile. It worked, as usual, and my own determination overwhelmed whatever good sense I might have possessed, not much it seemed, and I struggled out of my own door. I still couldn't stand up in those high heels from that low seat without showing everything I owned. At least it seemed that way.

As we were walking toward the door, yet another problem occurred to me and I grabbed her arm, "Wait! I don't have any ID. They won't let me in. They check ID even for people more obviously over 21 than I look."

"Oh, don't worry about that. We'll get in."

"How," I demanded.

"Look, I've known you for a little over two years and we're both 24. What does that tell you?"

"Huh? Nothing. What's that got to do with anything?" I answered with my own question.

"Don't ever say, 'huh', dear. It's not ladylike. A lady says, 'excuse me' or 'I'm so sorry, but I don't seem to be able understand what you mean'. It means you didn't even meet me till I was over 21. You've never seen me get into a bar while I was underage. You can do it, too."

"Right," I snorted. "What works for a beautiful woman won't work for me."

"Why not?" she asked. "You're a beautiful woman."

It's amazing how much you can get used to. There I was standing near the entrance to the nightclub dressed in a short skirt and towering heels, with a corset squeezing my middle and long golden hair tickling my face in the gentle breeze, and I had forgotten all of that. It seemed quite natural to be dressed like that. On the other hand, while I recognized the problem with ID, deep down inside I still didn't consider myself a woman. When Julie called my appearance back to the front of my mind, my cheeks flamed in embarrassment and I quickly looked around to see if anyone was about to call the cops on me, or something. No one was paying particular attention, though we were getting scoped out by most of the men and some of the women who where making their way to the same bar.

"Just flirt with the bouncer at the door a little while you hold your ID out. Twirl those gorgeous nails in your hair, drop your head a little then look up at him through your lashes with your head turned slightly to the side. Smile. Improvise a little, use your imagination. Do whatever you need to do to keep his attention on you and not on your ID. It'll work. Trust me," she urged.

"I couldn't do all that," I gulped.

"Then you'll get bounced and I'll have a good time by myself. Your choice," she said with a dismissive toss of her own lustrous hair.

Without another word or any possibility for further argument, Julie headed toward the door. Once again I was forced to hurry to follow her, putting that extra wiggle back into the orbit of my hips. When she got to the entrance, she blandly extended her ID and passed through effortlessly. Of course, her ID was real and there wasn't any reason for her not to be passed. Mine said I was a man, but I sure didn't look like one.

When I got near the door, I fumbled in my purse for my own ID. I finally got it out and held it before the bouncer with my scarlet wands carefully draped over my picture. My other hand was clutching at a lock of hair and I nervously waited for him to check out the person in front of me in line. The bouncer was a good looking dude, with dark, curly hair balanced by a mass of even darker hair curling up from the open collar of his shirt. I realized my nervousness would absolutely be my undoing, so I forced myself to relax (or at least pretend to relax) and started a slow twirling of the hand that held my hair, letting the ruby highlights of my nails flash in the lights of the entrance. I thought back on the things that had flustered me when I was on the receiving end of a girl's flirtation, and the memories brought a smile to the lips Julie's magic had made so full and red. Those private amusements started a matching smile lurking behind my lashes as I looked down again to see if I had my ID properly placed. Glancing up at the bouncer, I saw his eyes on my hand and hair and then looking into my eyes. For some reason, I found myself caught up in this flirtation thing, enjoying the power it gave me, a power that just didn't happen the other way around. His eyes flickered back to my twirling fingers and I felt my own eyes drawn to follow his gaze.

All of the sudden I saw a tiny spot of salad dressing on one of my fingernails. Without thinking I popped it up to my mouth and licked it off, freezing when I realized the bouncer was watching me. A crazy urge captured my out-of-control mind and I decided to see just how much power I had as a flirtatious woman. I slowly completely licking along my nail, my middle finger as it turned out, all the while letting my eyes smolder at the handsome bouncer. His eyes bulged out at the gesture and I could see a flush start down from his hairline. I reached out with the long, nails of that hand, wiggling them to keep his attention captured, and lightly plucked at the curly hair peeking from his collar.

"I understand that lots of chest hair is a sign of lots of testosterone production. Do you suppose that's true?" I mused in my soft, breathy voice.

"I'll be glad to show you," he grinned, then captured my wandering hand. He brought my fingers to his lips in a genteel kiss, provoking a most amazing shiver to run up my arm. Before I knew what was happening, he had captured the nail of my middle finger, the one I had just licked, into his own mouth. I felt his tongue flick the very tip of my finger, hidden under the nail, lightly but very rapidly. It was clear that he was offering to use that talented tongue to flick another place on my body, or one he thought I possessed. Now it was my turn to gasp, and to blush. I pulled back at my hand, but for just a second he held is as easily as if it had been set in concrete to show his power, before casually letting me go. I dropped my eyes, then returned my gaze to see if he was looking at me. He was, but he was also motioning me to move on into the bar with his grinning eyes.

I found my feet carrying me along, though I was still too dazed by the sensations that had come flooding through me to manage more than the most basic of motor skills. A bit of awareness returned as my wandering hand was again captured, this time by Julie.

"You're wicked!" she hissed, but her grin threatened to split her face. "I told you to flirt with him, not fling yourself at him."

"Um . . uh . . I just did what you said," I protested.

"Oh, be still. You're not even convincing yourself, let alone me," she giggled.

"Okay," she continued, "here's the plan. We're going to separate for a while, to check out the single men, before we join up."

"I obviously don't have to tell you anything about flirting," she giggled as she ostentatiously straightened out the golden locket that surrounded the antique collar of my blouse. "Just remember, a lady never gives a blowjob on the first date, and use the right bathroom when you have to go."

"Blowjob?" I hissed, "I'm not going to do anything like that!"

"After that show with the bouncer, I'm not too sure just what you'll do. Besides, haven't you nagged me about that as well?"

"No!," I denied, "at least, not lately, not since you . . um . ."

"Well, I still haven't sucked your cock till you came, so I obviously haven't swallowed your cream. You asked about those, too. If you want me to put out, you have to put out. Think about it."

"I couldn't," I gasped.

"Then I won't ever hear anything about it again, right?"

I bowed my head in defeat, but some things are just too much. Nodding unhappily I looked up to see her already disappearing into the crowd, leaving me standing there open-mouthed and alone. I hadn't intended to go anywhere near the bathroom that night, either, but the power of her suggestion started working on me immediately and I felt the first twinge of need.

I started to go after her before she disappeared completely, but found myself stopped by a wall that had magically appeared directly in front of me, a wall of living muscle, neatly dressed in a stylish shirt and a butter-soft tan leather jacket.

"Pardon me, but you look like you could use a drink," a subterranean voice rumbled from somewhere in that massive wall.

Looking up . . and up, I found myself face to face with the biggest man I had ever seen. At my normal 5'9" I am only average in height at best. With my skyscraper heels, though, I was over 6 feet tall and had gotten used to being a little taller than most of those around me, at least I was over average height for once. However, next to the mountain that blocked my path I was short again. Then I recognized the mountain in front of me. I may not be very athletic myself, but I watch the games on TV and my blond roadblock was Steve Gage, pro linebacker for the Montana Thunders and MVP at the latest Super Bowl. I felt like some latter-day Dr. Strangelove as I watched the crimson spears on my rogue hand reach out without my conscious command, out and up that is, to lightly touch the shoulder that blocked out about half my field of view.

"Goodness," I said softly as I let my nails tap on his muscles, "I always thought your shoulders were so big because of the pads. Now I'm not sure you wear any pads at all. Is that all you?"

"Yes, though I do wear pads on the field" he said with pride. "Now, how about that drink?"

He didn't really wait for an answer, but took my elbow with surprising gentleness and steered me toward a booth. A couple of other Thunder players were there already, some accompanied by spectacularly pretty girls. It came to me suddenly that Steve Gage must consider me in their class if he was willing to bring me over to meet them. Introductions were limited to first names so when they got to me I just said, "Joy" and then looked up at my massive escort for guidance.

"Sit down. You guys slide over a little. Make room."

Remembering Julie's instructions I smoothed my skirt and slid into the booth, trying hard not to show too much leg. I started out okay, but as I slid over, my skirt started to rise up more and more and by the time I was in position the top of my stockings was showing, along with a bit of creamy thigh. The corset also made me sit much more formally than the lounging lions around me, or their fawning attendants.

"Relay, Joy, we don't bite, except on game days," another of the players, John Taggert, a defensive back, promised.

"Sorry, it's just that you guys are so . . tremendous," I smiled.

"Get her a drink, Steve," Billy Swift, a wide receiver, ordered, "or I will."

Steve stood up and waved at a scantily-clad waitress. While she was on the way over he asked for my drink choice. Just in time I remembered that ladies don't guzzle beer and asked for an innocuous white zinfandel instead. The waitress nodded, took refill orders from the rest of the crowd, and vanished back into the dim nightclub.

"So, beautiful, where have you been keeping yourself?" Steve asked me.

"Isn't that supposed to be your opening line?" I giggled. "Not that offering a drink is a bad opening. However, it was your imitation of a wall that really got my attention. Just how tall are you?"

"Only 6'6"," he claimed with false modesty. "Old Studdly Wellhung over there (pointing at a defensive linemen at another table) is 6'10" and we've got a rookie that's over 7 feet."

At the obvious reference to the lineman's masculine equipment I had blushed and ducked my head, for an instant reminded of my own hidden secret. I realized as I lowered my gaze in embarrassment that I had been so absorbed by the role I was playing that I had forgotten I was not a real girl, or at least, forgotten that I was not interested in men.

"Dammit, Steve," said one of the other girls as she slapped him on the shoulder, then winced as her hand hurt, "Joy is obviously a lady. Don't be so crude."

This embarrassed me even more as the lie I was living moved another girl to come to the defense of my supposedly delicate sensibilities. I was getting in deeper and deeper, drowning in the rapidly-expanding flood of implications from my masquerade.

"Perhaps I should just go," I offered quietly, still staring at my hands.

"Please don't," Steve said gently. "It was my fault. I should have treated you with greater respect. I'm truly sorry. Will you forgive me?"

I looked up to see if he was teasing me, but I saw real remorse in his eyes. He was either even a better actor than a football player, or he truly regretted his coarse comment. I brushed back the golden hair from my face in a gesture that was fast becoming an instinctive reflex, then nodded and gave him a shy smile.

"I'm sorry, I'm just a bit new to the city. You men are so . . huge . . that I'm feeling a bit out of my depth."

"Huge is right," Swift, a black man, said with a leering grin. His reward for his comment was a slap to his own hard shoulder by the girl seated nearest to him. Perhaps more importantly, it got a serious sort of growl, wordless but nonetheless very explicit, from Steve. Swift immediately showed his own embarrassment and turned away to speak to the girl on the other side of him.

"Perhaps we should go," Steve offered, still looking angrily at Swift. "It seems my friends can't tell the difference between a lady and the animals they play with."

I found my voice responding in a surprisingly subservient tone, "Whatever you say."

He smiled as this comment placed at least my immediate future in his hands, and slid from the booth. Holding a hand out to me, he pulled me easily from the booth, seemingly oblivious to my skirt riding even higher, though I thought I could detect a small quirk of a grin for just an instant. As we turned away from the booth the waitress finally arrived with our drinks and Steve snared my wine and his beer from the tray.

"We'll let Billy pay for them," he whispered to me with a conspiratorial grin, then once again deftly steered me through the crowd with a gentle touch on my elbow. The nightclub consisted of a lot of small rooms surrounding a dance floor. Many of the small rooms or high-wall booths held only a few or even one table. The design of the rooms varied so that some were quiet, the dance music only a murmur, while others were exposed to the full fury of the pounding rhythm. As we moved away from Steve's friends, who had been sitting at a sort of intermediate volume level, we passed first through an explosion of sound that threatened our eardrums with immediate destruction, then down a passageway to surprising tranquil corner. In it was a single table, shielded from view as much as from the noise.

"Goodness, imagine finding this table unoccupied on such a busy night," I said in wonder.

"No surprise, I had it reserved and pay the bouncers to keep it clear. I like the guys on the team, but I'm not really a party person. Every now and then I need a chance to get away and hide," he claimed.

"You play in front of 100,000 screaming fans, and who knows how many more on TV, and you tell me you like to hide?" I said in disbelief.

"That's different. On game day I'm . . . different . . I guess you could say. I get pretty focused, pretty intense. Off the field, though, I'm just like other guys."

I giggled at him, but smiled with new respect, "Yeah, other guys who can do a convincing imitation of a wall."

"That's the second time you've mentioned that. What do you mean?"

"Well, when I bumped into you, I was trying to follow my . . sister who was disappearing into the crowd. You're so big I couldn't see over you, couldn't get around you, and couldn't move you. That sounds like a pretty good description of a wall to me."

"Oh," grinned my massive escort without a single shred of guilt. "Where is she now?"

"I don't know. She said she was going to circulate a little, then get back to me."

"Well, let's ask her to join us," he offered, pushing on an unobtrusive button set in the table, obviously still trying to put me at ease after his crude remark. Right, like that was the problem. If he found out what had really embarrassed me, I'd be a grease spot under the table. My problem was that part of me was feeling so guilty I wanted to be turned into a grease spot, while part of me was thrilled by the attention he was paying to me. At this rate I'd not only have two external appearances, but I'd develop a split personality and have two people inside me as well.

Almost immediately one of the waitresses showed up. That button not only requested service, it got it quickly, at least when Steve Gage pushed on it. He explained to the girl about my sister, letting me fill in a description, and asked her to find Julie and bring her to our table. There must have been a couple of hundred people in the place, and the design was deliberately set up for hidden places so it couldn't have been easy to find her, but Steve and I had only started to talk again when Julie appeared, escorted by our waitress.

"Thank you," I smiled at the girl. "That was quick."

"She was looking for you. I just went to the place where you can best see around and found her scanning the crowd. It usually works when people get separated."

Julie hadn't said anything, only staring at my companion, huge even while sitting.

"Julie, this is Steve Gage. He got in my way when I tried to follow you earlier, so he offered to buy me a drink and find you," I explained.

"THE Steve Gage?" she asked in awe. She's not as much of a football fan as I am, but she was certainly aware of who won the Super Bowl MVP.

"At your service," he said gallantly, standing as she sat.

Julie had brought a drink with her, so the waitress left and we started to talk.

Steve politely drew my "sister" into the conversation, "So, Julie, Joy tells me this is her first day in town, and that she's your sister. Are all the girls from your neck of the woods so beautiful? I may find a new home for the off-season."

With a wickedly amused grin directed at me, Julie said, "I guess there's a lot of girls like me, but I think I can safely say that there's not another girl like Joy in our whole family, or in our whole home town."

I tried to seem unconcerned, but somewhere in her tone or expression there was an implied threat to reveal my secret and once again I ducked my head in embarrassment, sending waves of honey flowing past my face. This time it was Steve's giant hand the softly brushed the strands away from my burning cheeks.

"Don't be embarrassed, Joy. I agree with your sister. You are a unique beauty."

Julie strangled a giggle while his eyes were on me, but I saw it and it finally moved me past embarrassment to irritation at her teasing me for a situation she had done a lot to get me into. I glared at her quickly before looking back at Steve.

"Thank you, sir. You're a gentleman, even if not everyone in this booth is a lady."

Julie burst out laughing at the meaning buried within my comment, and in a moment I had to join her as I realized just how true my statement had been. Once again I had forgotten who, or what, I really was. Maybe I didn't even know. Steve looked at us in confusion, not understanding why something that sounded like an elegant insult provoked both of us to laughter.

Julie caught the confusion in his expression and choked out an explanation that set us both to laughing again, "Never mind, Steve, it's a girl thing. You just wouldn't understand."

Now he began to look a little embarrassed as he seemed to be interfering in something that only the two of us shared. I tried to reassure him by getting him back into the conversation.

"What are you and the team doing in our little town? Obviously we're all proud to have you, but it is a little out of the way."

"Not really," he disagreed. "Several of us have homes in the bay area. There were people here before Silicon Valley ever got started. It's a beautiful place to live. What do you two do?"

"Joy is a computer . . uh . . programmer, and I'm a real estate agent," offered Julie.

"However do you work on computers with those nails?" he asked.

"I don't know, yet," I admitted. "I just got them put on today. I still have to learn to work with them."

"Well, good luck," he offered. "I'd hate to think you couldn't keep them. They really look . . um . . nice."

I smiled again at him, looking from my hands that were the center of attention up to his rugged face. Those long lashes got in my way, again, and I seemed to peer at him with deliberate enticement. I could see his eyes widen a little as he thought I was coming on to him and I knew we needed to get out of there before things got even more confused. Julie caught a hint of my concern and, for once, offered to help out a little rather than make it worse.

"Joy, I need to go to the powder room. Would you like to come along?"

Not really, I thought, though the twinge of need her first suggestion had triggered had been building in me ever since. Still, it would get me away from a situation that was rapidly heading into dangerous territory. I nodded and stood up, provoking Steve to stand up in a gentlemanly reflex, one that even Jay had seldom bothered with. Julie led me from the booth and toward the facilities.

"Where did you find him?" she whispered.

"He sort of found me," I realized, "when I tried to follow you, he intercepted me."

"I told you that you were going to ace the course, but Steve Gage, the most eligible bachelor in America. You're incredible."

"It's all your doing. You chose the clothes and the makeup and the wig. All I'm doing is trying to be polite and stay out of trouble."

"Right," she scoffed. "I saw those looks you were giving him. You think he's a hunk, and you're right. And you're a babe. I may have put a little polish on the surface, but you're acting very sweet and ladylike. Plus, you have a gorgeous face. I told you you'd pass with just a little lipstick and you're a long ways beyond that. You're truly pretty. I wonder why I never noticed before."

"So," she continued, "are you having a good time?"

I admitted, "Yes, this is all so strange, but it's more exciting than I could imagine. I don't want it to end, but I really don't want it to end badly. What am I going to say to Steve?"

By this time we had reached the powder room and I followed Julie in without thinking. All of the sudden I realized where I was and looked desperately around for a place to hide. Julie caught my arm and steered me to a stall in a parody of the way Steve had earlier guided me, but with a great deal more force.

"Take care of business," she hissed in my ear, "and meet me back out here so we can touch up your makeup."

The prim, demure manner forced on me by the corset became an almost overpowering obstruction when I tried to get my underwear down. I couldn't see whether I had my skirt up all around nor whether my thong was adequately clear. I didn't dare try to relieve myself standing up, not just because my feet would be pointing the wrong way in the stall, but because I couldn't see over the bust formed by the corset to guide the stream. I sat down instead, finally getting a little blessed relief from the pressure that had built up. At least Julie had made me put the thong on over my garters and wear stockings instead of pantyhose. That kept the tangle to a minimum, especially when I tried to get myself back together. Those long nails didn't help anything but I finally had my secret hidden back away and my skirt draped down the little distance it covered my legs. I went out toward the mirrors to find Julie finishing her own touchup. She motioned for me to hand her my purse and then quickly selected out the items I'd need for my own repairs. It wasn't much, really. Lipstick of course, since I'd left a lot of mine on my wineglass, and a touch of powder where my nose had started to shine.

Julie picked up the conversation where we'd left off, but instead of answering me she only offered another question, "What do you want to do with Steve?"

"I don't know. I really don't know. Part of me wants to kick off these heels and run away just as fast I can. I really don't know what I'm doing here. I've never felt this way toward any man, that's for sure. But part of me . . well, part of me is wondering what it would be like to be held by those incredible arms. I'm really confused by this. What's happening to me?"

Instead of Steve's powerful embrace, I felt Julie gently cradle my shoulders in her own arms.

"Part of me is sorry I ever got you into this," she said softly, her parallel wording used to confirm the continuing strength of our relationship, "but part of me is thinking we should explore this further. I really do believe we'll be closer if you learn a little more about what it means to be a woman and explore your feminine side. You obviously can't tell him the whole truth or he'll kill you, but I think you should let this go at least a little further. Why don't we say we have to leave, and see if he asks for your phone number? Give him the private one that only I use so you can always answer in your Joy voice and then see what happens."

I felt myself nodding, too numb for argument. Julie tried to cheer me up by talking a little about the men that had hit on her that evening, all of whom it seemed were nerds, geeks, or sleazes. By the time we were back to Steve's table, I was at least smiling softly at her stories, a look I realized just confirmed the demure, delicate manner I had displayed to Steve all evening. It seemed the vamp persona I had used on the bouncer was not really my natural personality, whatever natural meant in this context.

Julie took the heat for our departure when she said, "I'm sorry, Steve, but we have to go. I have a couple of important closings in the morning and I told Joy she had to come with me. It's her first night in town and I feel like I have to watch out for my sister, at least until she gets better accustomed to life in the big . . well . . medium city."

I looked up at Steve with my confusion in my eyes, probably looking like disappointment to him, or was it disappointment in my eyes that looked like . . . disappointment? Anyway, he nodded acceptance of Julie's decision, ever the gentleman since that one crude remark.

"How long are you in town for?" he asked me.

"I don't know. A few weeks."

"Are you free this weekend? I have a nice sailboat and the weather is supposed to be nice."

He was asking me for a date! Right now! Not just a phone number that would allow me to think things over for a while. Then I realized he was just a little nervous, too. He had repeated himself, nice boat, nice weather. That gave me courage from some strange place and my out-of-control mouth was suddenly smiling at him, "Yes, I'd like that."

Julie interrupted, not really trying to get in the way, but still a bit concerned for me. "Sailing? At this time of the year? The bay will be like ice! Why don't you just come over for dinner or something."

He seized on her offer, "Well, I'd like that too, but my boat is big enough that we won't get too wet."

Now I had an all day date with him! Sailing, then dinner at our house. What was Julie getting me into? What was I getting myself into? She may have started this runaway train in motion, but I seemed to be adding fuel to the fire in the engine.

"Let me have your phone number and I'll call to talk over the details," he suggested.

I gave him our private number and stood in confusion, adrift in my thoughts more thoroughly than any sailboat that ever left its moorings. Julie urged me away with her hand on my elbow and we left Steve standing in his private booth, a beaming smile on his handsome face.

The confused feelings that were consuming me kept me from paying much attention as we returned home. I realized at some level that I was walking without effort in those incredible heels, buoyed up by the wild emotions within me so much that I didn't even notice how much my feet hurt. When we finally got back into our house and then our bedroom, I just stood uncertainly, not sure what to do next. I didn't want this phenomenal evening to end, but there didn't seem any reason, or any excuse, to stay dressed up so beautifully.

"Joy, dear, help me with my zipper, will you?" Julie gently interrupted my reverie.

I moved behind her with unconscious grace and had her zipper down before I even noticed the obstruction of my nails. Julie twirled her finger for me to turn around and in a moment my own skirt was slithering over my legs, my own blouse falling forward down my arms. I stepped out of the puddle of fabric and worked my arms out of the blouse, then let it fall to the floor as well.

"Never let your clothes just lay there," ordered Julie. "Fine fabrics can't stand the abuse you give your jeans and t-shirts."

By this time Julie had kicked off her pumps, but I made no move to get out of my own towering heels. It came to me that I'd have a hard time reaching my ankles while I wore my constricting corset anyway, so I squatted down and picked up my skirt and blouse, carefully hanging them in my part of the closet. When I came back out, Julie was looking at me with an air of considered assessment.

"Well, we'll sure have to get you some more clothes," she mused. "I only got you one outfit because I wasn't sure you'd really go through with this. I'm so glad you did, but that still leaves us with the problem of what you should wear next."

She knelt at my feet to remove my sandals and I felt a powerful mixture of regret and relief when my feet were once again flat to the floor. The regret increased when I looked around the room and realized I was back to a short person's view of the world. I liked being tall, even aside from the elegant beauty of the shoes. My stockings followed quickly, all too quickly to my lagging senses, then Julie twirled her finger at me again and I turned around so that she could loosen my laces. When the tension was relieved, but without undoing them completely, she urged me to turn around again with a gentle pressure on my shoulder, then started to undo the little hook and loop fasteners down the front. The relaxation of the crushing pressure on my waist, the chance to breathe deeply again, almost overwhelmed me with relief but I felt myself sag into a slouch I knew was unattractive as I lost the erect posture forced by the corset. Had I always been so sloppy looking?

Julie kept treating me like a full-sized Barbie doll as she undressed me without words, without requiring an actions on my part more strenuous or focused than lifting a foot or turning around. She led me to the vanity and carefully removed my wig. This clutched at my heart with real pain, real loss. A natural-born girl might have removed her clothes, but couldn't remove her hair. The loss of the wig moved me definitely, sadly, back into the world of men. Now I looked ludicrous, an artfully made up face, a delicate pink camisole, a man's haircut and body. Which parts were out of place?

Julie applied makeup remover creams to my face, then applied moisturizers and other night time preparations. She had started to talk while she did this, instructing me in the requirements for proper skin care and at some level I was listening, but the sorrow I felt at the reverse transformation threatened to burst out of control and all I wanted to do was bury my face in my hands and cry. Julie, precious Julie, picked up on my confusion, my sorrow, the razor-edge of control I was trying to walk, and carefully kept her tone neutral. No kidding, no commiseration, certainly no condemnation. She just talked through the technical details of the skin care as though only the importance kept if from being boring. If I had grown up with that regimen that might have been the right tone, but I couldn't believe any of this could ever be boring. Still, as I gradually got myself back under control, I recognized her calming tactics and was grateful. When she had finished caring for my face, she gently lifted the camisole off my shoulders and had me stand.

"Okay, time for your nightgown," she said as though that were a completely unremarkable statement.

"First, though, you need more reasonable panties. Mine will fit your hips just fine, though they might be a bit narrow in the crotch, but they'll do for tonight," she said as she handed me a powder blue pair of bikini panties, delicately edged with lace.

I stripped off my thong and took the panties, pulling them up over my deliciously-smooth legs, then looked up to see her handing me a long, satin gown in a matching powder blue. She slipped this over my head and it fell smoothly to my feet, the slight tightness at the waist only a gentle reminder of the special shape of the beautiful gown. The empty cups of the embedded bra were a sharp disappointment, though. Finally finished with dressing her Barbie doll, Julie put her arms around me and hugged me warmly.

"Darling, thank you for doing this for me tonight," she said, as though I had done her a favor rather than the other way around. "Let's go to sleep now, and we'll talk about where we go from here in the morning. Okay?"

I realized I hadn't said a word since we got home, too dazed to be more than the doll she had treated me like. Her direct question got my higher processors started again, though, and I moved from the automatic gentle pressure my arms had generated when I responded to her embrace into a fierce, desperate squeeze. I looked at her full lips, and merged them with mine, firmly, warmly, intensely.

"Oh, Julie, I love you so much," I said when I finally broke our kiss. "I never knew how much I'd like any of this. I've owed you for every joy in my life since I met you, but there's no way I could ever repay you for this evening, for helping me find Joy."

She grinned at me, sharing my happiness, but she also gave a tension-reducing giggle and said, "Oh, yes there is. Just be Joy again, and again, and . . ."

"That's a deal," I smiled at her, still too confused for real mirth, but beginning to recover from my stunned state.

She pushed me toward the bathroom to complete my preparations for bed. When I emerged, she had the covers turned back and I slid into bed, relishing the sensual feel of the satin nightgown while she made her own final preparations, turned out the light, and joined me. We fell asleep in each other's arms, closer than we had ever been, in more ways than the physical, more important ways.

The next morning Julie woke up first, as usual, and had finished her morning shower while I was still asleep. She came in with a cheery good morning and pulled the covers off my body, bringing the beautiful blue nightgown fully into sight.

"Up and at 'em, Joy," she called. "We've got to get you ready before I go to my first closing."

Even in my sleepy state, somehow the nightgown prevented me from assuming my normal grumpy attitude. Instead, I swung my legs out of bed in a graceful, toes-together-and-slightly-pointed motion and stood up. While I was moving to the bathroom, Julie reminded me to shave all over, though we wouldn't need to use the depilatory cream that morning. It took longer than usual as a result, but I was anxious to finish so I was back in our bedroom as soon as possible.

Julie had laid out one of her denim skirts, longer than the one I had worn the night before, but still short enough I knew it would be well above my knee. It was cut much more narrowly as well and it would fit snugly down my legs. She had selected a lightweight turtle-neck sweater for a top, the deep blue color a perfect match for her eyes, though a bit dark for mine. Still, if she let me wear the beautiful wig, I knew it would set it off very well. One of her wide red leather belts was also lying on the bed, next to the same towering red sandals I had worn the night before. So was that infernal, wonderful corset.

"I figured there was a good chance that you'd try the corset for at least a couple of days so I got a few pairs of stockings. I think you can wear one of my camisoles if we adjust the straps to make up for your . . bustline. But I only have one pair of shoes for you, sorry," she grinned, obviously not sorry at all. She had handed me the camisole even while she spoke and was making the adjustments as she finished.

"Hmm, not quite enough. Well, we'll just have to make do," mused Julie, again lost in play with her Barbie doll. She went to her own drawer and got a couple of pairs of pantyhose. She rolled these up and slipped them in to the top of the camisole, sized more for her C-cups than the A-cup camisole I had worn the night before. That was just a preliminary, though, as the main event was returning my waist to its tiny size with the powerful laces of the corset. Once again, after she bound me into rigidly upright posture she helped me with stockings (suntan this time), handed me a new thong, and then fastened the straps on my towering shoes. I tottered when I was back on those stilts, having forgotten most of the lessons from my previous practice it seemed, but when she motioned me to the vanity seat I made my way there without incident.

Julie worked her magic again, explaining what she was doing this time, though I'm sure I only absorbed about 10% of it. It still took over 20 minutes to get my face the way she wanted it, though she used more muted colors suitable for daytime. When she brought my softly flowing wig out, I finally roused from my passive state.

"Do we need to do anything to prepare my hair. . I mean . . the wig? You spend a fair amount of your time in rollers in the morning."

"Not yet," she laughed. "Since you didn't sleep in it, it's still okay. This is a pretty good wig, but to keep it looking right we'll probably have to take it over to Sally. Not for a while, though, it should last for several days with no more care than an occasional brushing."

She draped the long, golden tresses over my shoulders and carefully positioned the cap. A few finishing touches on the bangs and I was once again the beautiful Joy, though a bit underdressed in my tight corset and shimmery stockings. At her gesture of invitation, I went to the bed and pulled on the snug skirt, then she helped me to work the mock-collar turtleneck over my hair, zipping up the back zipper once it was in place. The red belt provided an acceptable balance for my red sandals, and I felt I was fully dressed.

"Hold still," I heard her say, then my earrings, necklace, and perfume were added. She handed me the same crystalline rings and I stood before the mirror in glorious living . . . life. I was having that same trouble breathing that had afflicted me the night before, not all, maybe not even mostly due to the corset.

"There, that should hold you until we can do a little more shopping," Julie said.

"Hold me is right, this corset is murder," I groaned, though the smile dancing in my eyes made my pleasure obvious. Julie reached out and poked be in my armored waist.

"Just like a drum," she grinned. "But we'll do even better once your figure trains in a little."

"Really," I said, turning slightly sideways in the mirror to see my elegant hands sensually trace the swell from my padded bosom to my trim waist, flat tummy, and . . ."

"Uh, oh!" I grimaced, this time my concern was real. There was a suspicious, no a loudly declarative bulge in the front of the trim skirt.

"Oh!" Julie joined in my concern. "We'll have to do something about that."

"Well, if you're offering . ." I leered at her.

"Not now," she laughed. "I have to go. You'll have to take matters into your own hands, or just think pure thoughts."

"Right, dressed like this? Purity is not really applicable to me right now."

"Actually, except for that one little . . well, not so little detail, you really do look like a pure, innocent maiden. I can see why Steve was attracted to you. You're not only a real fox, you look sweet and virginal to boot. Everyone's fantasy blonde, of the girl next door type, not the bimbo type. Now, I have to go. Be good while I'm gone."

She was out the door in a rush and I walked to the kitchen for a morning cup of coffee and to arrange my thoughts. I couldn't see going out like this. I knew I had passed spectacularly well last night, but the bulge reminded me of the sharp risk I was taking and I wasn't ready for a solo adventure, especially not during the daylight. Since I really did have some work to do, I went to my study, my disarrayed cave, to get started.

At least I tried to get started. I couldn't even turn the silly computer on while wearing those magnificent nails. I wasn't ready to trust the nail itself and couldn't get my finger into the little recess where the on-off switch was on my power strip. A pencil solved that problem, but when I placed my hands on the keyboard, I literally couldn't get my fingers onto the keys. My nails, even if I carefully positioned them between the keys, bottomed out before my fingertips added any pressure to the actual typing surface. I also couldn't cramp my hands up enough to get my fingers onto the row closest to my wrist rest. I was about to give up, wondering if I could put off my project for long enough to complete this trial and get Julie to agree to long nails, when I happened to tap my nail tips lightly on a few of the keys in a distracted sort of way. The keys stroked and my nails didn't break. I was still leery of putting them to a continuing test, but I could at least try. A pad under my wrists to lift them a bit, and it was like I was tapping on a phantom keyboard an inch higher than the real one. Not completely, the angles of my fingers were wrong and I still used the ball of my thumb for the spacebar, but adequately.

It slowed me down and it was enough of a distraction that I couldn't really get a smooth flow going of the sort I need when I'm really living in cyberspace, but I had completed the difficult parts of the Spencer Industries penetration when I had worked through the night so this was just routine, methodical follow up. That reminded me of other logistics matters and I tapped into the driver's license bureau and added a record for Joy Connors, trimming a few years off my age. I used my digital camera to take a photo of Joy (was I really that pretty?) and then printed up my own driver's license on a blank plastic card (don't ask where I got them). It would even read out as valid if anyone ever checked the state computer. I got a valid Mastercard file the same way, though I wasn't set up to fake the card with its embedded hologram. I just added myself to Jay Connors account, though, so I could use my real card and claim I was authorized. That was even true. The morning flew by, especially once I got past the initial frustrations, and I was startled when our private phone rang.

"Yeah," I grunted into it, irritated by the distraction.

"You better not answer the phone that way when Steve calls," Julie's clear soprano teased me.

"Oops," I giggled, returning to the softer tones appropriate for my current persona.

"How's it going?" she continued.

"Not too bad. I finally got the hang of these fingernails. As of now I'm a real person in this state, or at least to the driver's license computer."

"Good. Well, I'm coming home early this afternoon. I wanted to make sure you'd be there after about 2:00."

"No problem. Where would I go?" I asked.

"Anywhere you want. Why else did you get your driver's license set up?"

I hadn't really thought about that. It just seemed like an ordinary preparation for a faked personality, of the sort I sometimes do when I'm developing a fairly involved penetration. My pause triggered another giggle from the other end of the phone at this further confirmation of my confused state, but Julie just said good-bye and hung up. Those thoughts triggered a plan in my mind for completing the Spencer assignment. They used a computer-controlled badge reader system for physical security. I decided I'd set up an identification within their system and walk in on their executives in some high-level, supposedly protected meeting. I could drop my results, the fake checks and things, on the table with a bit of showy flash, dramatically proving the effectiveness of my work.

By the time I got the preparations for that event underway it was 2:00 and I heard Julie's car in the driveway. She called out to me and I went walking to meet her, swinging in those terrible, beautiful heels like I'd been wearing them for all my life. I suppose you could say I had been, for all my life as Joy. Julie greeted me with a beaming smile she hadn't often shown lately and guilt at my self-centered selfishness resurrected itself a little. Surprisingly, there was absolutely no guilt at dressing like a woman, that was feeling more and more "right" all the time. Julie's smile turned a little condescending, though, when I got closer.

"Joy, you simply must take better care of your appearance. Now march into the bedroom and fix your face this instant!" she demanded in words that were preemptory but a tone that showed love.

I fled to the bedroom and looked at myself in the mirror, wondering what had gone wrong. At first, I couldn't see anything, my stranger's face still looked surpassingly beautiful. Then it came to me that the shine had gone off my ruby lips, and somehow moved to my nose and my forehead. There were also a few flecks of mascara under one of my eyes, and something told me I needed to touch up the blush on my cheeks as well. After a little more study I realized the color was no longer symmetric, I must have rested my cheek in my hand at some point while I was wrestling with my computer. Now that I knew what to work on, I thought it would be simple to fix.

It might have been simple, but it was still difficult. I struggled through, though, forcing myself to be patient as those long, glamorous nails poked my in my eye, my nose, my lips, and my cheeks, then got under the powder puff I was using to clean up the shine on my forehead. It seemed like it took me the same 20 minutes for these minor repairs that it had taken Julie to make up my face from scratch. When I finally turned from the mirror, Julie had laid out several new items on the bed.

"I've decided to take pity on you," she started with a grin that implied anything but pity. "For your big date tomorrow I'll let you wear deck shoes. I don't suppose it would be a good idea to wear spiked heels on his boat. You'll be back in them for supper, though, so don't think I'm letting you off too easy. More importantly, I got you a different corset. You need something that allows you to have distinct tits, not just a shelf. I also got you some artificial tits and something to add a little shape to your butt. Strip and we'll try them out."

She was pulling at the zipper of my turtleneck even as she spoke and I felt my own hands fumbling with the belt at my waist. By the time I had my skirt ready to drop, she was urging me to raise my arms so that she could help me get the sweater past my hair. My corset, shoes, and stockings soon followed and I stood there in my camisole and thong.

"Keep going," she ordered, "all the way."

Julie lifted the camisole over my shoulders, then I stripped the thong down my legs, a bit embarrassed now as my masculine equipment was displayed, so out of place on my smoothly-shaved body.

"Here, start with this," she said, handing me a flesh-colored garment sort of like the thong I had worn.

"What is it?" I asked.

"It's called a gaff," she explained. "It'll fix that bulge you were showing in the tight skirt." When I worked it up my legs, I realized it was a lot more confining than my skimpy underwear had been. By the time it was in place, I felt squeezed more tightly than the corset had ever done, in a much more intimate and sensitive place. It felt very uncomfortable and I just hoped I would get used to it, as I had with the corset's constriction.

"Next," she said, oblivious to my discomfort. She was holding a pair of tan shapes in her hands, shapes that jiggled in a most unusual manner.

"One of my clients is a doctor," she explained, "and he told me where to get mastectomy forms. These are the best there are. I chose C cups for you, just like me. I hope that's okay."

I was too shocked to argue, especially when she pushed me back to the bed and made me lie down. She spread something creamy on the underside of one of the forms and then placed it carefully on my chest. I could see it had a molded in nipple, perpetually erect. The edges of the form feathered out into near-invisible thinness and she carefully smoothed them into position. They appeared to merge perfectly into my skin, leaving no seam at all. The color was so close to perfect it was scary.

"I'm using a surgical glue the doctor gave me," explained Julie as she started on the other form. "They'll stay in place, even if you go swimming, until we use the release agent. The doctor said we'll have to remove them for at least 24 hours every week to let the skin underneath breathe properly, but we can handle that at night."

In a few minutes my other form was in place and Julie was urging me to stand before the mirror. Memories came flooding back from the night before when my reverse transformation was underway. At that time, I had felt a sharp pain at the incongruity of makeup and a camisole on a man's face and body. Now I stood there with my manhood hidden away behind the gaff thing that made it look like I had a woman's gentle mound instead. My breasts were full and shapely, accented by large dark nipples surrounded in deep rose. It was incredible. I looked completely feminine . . or did I? Something was still wrong, but I wasn't entirely sure what the problem was. Julie knew though.

"Now for the rest of our magic. Your new corset is shorter than the old one. It will allow you to wear a regular bra and it doesn't go quite so low on your hips."

The corset she was holding out was also a nude color, a little lighter than my skin tone but close enough it wouldn't show up with a revealing contrast if (when?) I wore a light blouse. It was just as tight as the old one, though, as I was soon to find out. She tugged at the laces until I felt my backbone rubbing on my navel, or at least that's what I thought was happening. It was indeed shorter, however, and I found I could bend over a little. Then Julie handed me a pair of suntan pantyhose and showed me how to pull them up my legs without snagging them. They rose up over the bottom of the corset, working to smooth out the boundary. She helped me into a delicately laced bra in a soft peach color and I felt the amazing transition of the weight of my . . breasts from my skin to the straps over my shoulders. At that point I thought I was done with underwear. I was wrong, though, Julie handed me the last foundation garment, a panty girdle. Or at least, that's what I thought it was, but it was padded and that didn't make sense, did it?

When I managed to get it up my legs, raising the wide waistband high up over the base of the corset, blending all edges smoothly into obscurity, I looked again in the mirror. Now I could see what had been missing. Unaided, my waist and hips were almost the same size. With the tight corset squeezing inches from my waist, and the padded girdle adding them back to my hips, I now had sensually curving shape that would definitely make a good hour glass, maybe an hour and a half.

Julie was pulling out other clothes as well. She had gotten me a pair of stretchy black stirrup pants that caressed my waist and hips, molding to every breathtaking meander when I smoothed them into position. She added a vibrant red sweater that seemed incredibly soft and fluffy at the cowl neck, but still managed to cling to my new bosom with dramatic emphasis. Thick fluffy socks in a matching red and lady's deck shoes, actually running shoes with bright accents and red laces, completed my outfit.

"So, what do you think?" she asked, though the grin on her face said she had her own opinion.

"Wow," I breathed softly. "I look even more like a woman in pants than I did in that skirt. I wouldn't have believed it."

"You'll be back in skirts soon enough," she threatened . . or promised. "This was just to make sure everything fit, and to check out the colors. I think red and black are definitely terrific on you, especially if you keep the black at your legs so that you don't look too pale. You can wear the new underwear for the rest of the day. I got two sets so you'll have clean things in the morning. Now, strip out of those shoes and pants, I have something else in case the day is warm."

While I was removing the black stretch pants, she handed me a pair of snowy white shorts. They were very tight and very short, just barely covering the legs of my padded panty. When I stood up to look in the mirror, my legs, shining in their shimmery covering of suntan pantyhose, looked like they ran up forever, longer than I could believe. At 5'9" I was no more than average for a man, but tall for a woman, and in those tiny shorts it looked like all that height was in my gleaming legs.

"Wow," I gasped again, unconsciously repeating my previous observation. Julie was a little quiet this time, too. The spectacular success of her hidden shapers, combined with the length of my revealed legs, was pretty impressive, and impressively pretty, if I do say so myself.

"Okay," she finally said, interrupting the stunned reverie that had gripped us both, "one last item, and then we're through for the day. Take off your shorts."

I pulled them down my legs with some reluctance, too pleased with the image to willingly give it up. She handed me a tight denim mini to take their place, though. When I raised it to my hips it fit like a second skin, so tight that a hint of the crease at the front of my legs showed, a crease that now had a perfect, feminine shape. It would have glued my legs together, as tight as it was, but it was so short that it just threatened to ride up to my navel instead.

"I can't wear this," I complained. "It's just too tight."

"Nonsense," she giggled. "You will have to be careful when you sit, though, even more than with that fuller skirt last night. It was about the same length but when you bend your legs, this one is going to ride up higher."

"Higher! It's exposing everything I've got already!"

Julie giggled again, "Not quite."

Even with all the clothes I'd tried on, there were still several unopened packages. When I asked about them Julie just said they were for later, except for a pair of sky-high white sandals that complemented the sweater. She also handed me a neutral gray purse and told me to put my things in it.

"Why? Where are we going?"

"Out, of course. You need to show off a little."

I gulped in shock, "In the daylight?"

"Certainly, you're going out in the daylight tomorrow, aren't you?" she asked like I was stupid. I guess I was. Somehow, the bright light shining in the windows seemed terribly revealing and I realized I had been mentally hiding in the shadows I had found at the nightclub, ignoring the upcoming outing. She grabbed my arm without further comment and I found myself carried along by her enthusiasm to a local mall. We shopped, and shopped, . . . and shopped. My feet were on fire when Julie finally let us sit down for a soft drink in the mall food court. She had been hurrying me along so much that I hadn't had time to think about the others around us. I also hadn't had time to sit down. When I did, that tight skirt rose up until I was sitting on my bare (well, pantyhose-clad) legs as much as on the inadequate denim material. The cool feel of the plastic of the seat shocked me back into awareness of the terrifying, thrilling, wonderful sense of being a beautiful woman. I looked around at the other mall patrons, first wary for ridicule, but then reveling in the appreciative glances, even stares, that were coming from others around us. The best thing, though, was the glare of absolute hatred I received from another pretty woman. Jealousy was rampant in her eyes, though she was drop-dead gorgeous herself. If she considered me even competitive, I was in rarefied company, but if her own self image made her second best, I was literally matchless within the crowd at the mall. I gave her a condescending smile, quite ladylike, quite deadly, and then grinned. She stood up in a huff and stormed out of the food court, a major victory for the home team. Wonderful!

Julie finally consented to let us go home, my crippled feet requiring me to walk in an even more delicate fashion than previously. They had recovered a little by the time we got home but she made me help in the kitchen while we prepared our salad supper and I didn't get to rest until the dishes were done. There was still some time before we planned to go to bed, so I went back into my computer cave to do a little more work. Before I got there, though, our phone started ringing. The private line. The one that only rang when at least one of us was out of the house. Until now.

Julie picked it up, I was too stunned to move, and she answered with a cheerful hello.

"Yes, she's right here," I heard her say, then offered the phone to me, at least partially. It was clear that she was going to listen in.

I took as deep a breath as the corset would allow before I took the phone, then let some of it out with a soft, "Hello?"

"Hello, Joy? This is Steve, Steve Gage."

"Hello, Steve, how nice of you to call."

"Are you still interested in a little sailing tomorrow?"

"Yes," I said quietly, losing my last chance to find some sanity in this unreal situation.

"Good. Very good. How about if I come pick you up at about, say 10:00?"

Julie shook her head in a quick negative. She whispered into my ear, "Don't let him know where we live, yet. He might snoop around and find out about us, the real us."

She had obviously forgotten her own invitation to dinner, but I went along, "I . . um . . need to run some errands in the morning. Could I just meet you somewhere?"

"Sure," he assented immediately. "Come to the office of the Bayview Marina about 10:30. I'll meet you there. Do you know the way?"

At this Julie nodded agreement. At least she knew the way.

"Yes," I softly answered, not a brilliant conversationalist that night.

"By the way," he asked, "can your sister come, too?"

Julie shook her head in another negative. "I'm afraid not," I replied.

Then he shocked us by informing us it wasn't just a polite invitation, "That's too bad. One of my friends, Brad Jackson, you may know him? Anyway, when I described you two to him, he wondered if we could make it a double date."

Brad Jackson was the quarterback for the Montana Thunders. He wasn't nearly as big as Steve Gage, but he was tall, handsome, and considered the second best catch, for a lady that was, on the team. Julie gasped at the opportunity that was being dangled before her. She had already turned down the invitation to go sailing, but the yearning in her eyes that only I could see showed me a way to get her in a little over her head, too. Misery loves company, and I was miserably confused, right? Right?

Anyway, I made an offer without clearing it with her first, "I'm sure she'd like that, if she were available. Why don't your bring him along when you come to dinner, later tomorrow. She'll be here then."

Julie hissed at me in a vain attempt to stop me from the probably foolish course I had set us on, but I didn't care. All the embarrassment so far had been mine, all of the risk. It was time she got a chance to walk a tightrope with me for a change.

"Great!" Steve said. "I'm sure he'll want to come."

"Fine, I'll see you at the marina around 10:30, then both of you for dinner around, say, 7:00. How long do you think we'll be sailing?" I tried to wrap things up.

"As long as you want. Anywhere specific you'd like to go?" Steve tried to continue the conversation.

"Oh, no, just anywhere. I'll put myself in your capable hands," I said, not realizing the opportunity I was offering until the words were out of my mouth. I'd said that before, to others, and it had never seemed to have a sexual connotation. It sure did now, though, and Steve picked up on it.

"Promise?" he grinned. I swear, I could hear the grin right over the phone. But that stupid, out-of-control flirtation streak was rearing its ugly head, and I heard myself start to put a low, musical lilt into my soft voice, becoming more of a bedroom tone with every word.

"Would that be safe?," I cooed. Julie's eyes rolled so far I thought they'd disappear into her head, but there was a grin on her face, too.

"Nope," the grin was still in his voice.

"Ooh, that could be . . . interesting," I observed. "You've got such big . . . hands."

Julie had to stand away from the phone, strangling a giggle. She shook her finger at me in shame, but her eyes were dancing with mirth.

"The better to . . . help . . you with, my dear," he served another line.

"Now you sound like the big bad wolf," I returned his serve, then went to the net. "Promise?"

At this he paused for a second, at a loss for words. This wasn't quite the prim and proper, girl next door that he remembered from the nightclub. Over the phone, anyway, I was being quite forward. I realized that it had been after I seemed to be embarrassed at his crude comment that he began to take a real interest in me. Now, I wasn't continuing with that shy embarrassment he had found so fascinating. Maybe I was turning him off, maybe I was exciting him even more. In any event, I thought to myself, always keep them guessing.

That thought was almost my undoing. Always keep THEM guessing? Just who is US and who is THEM, here? What was happening to me? I was so shocked by the realization of what I had been doing, not just playing at words but actually beginning to think like a woman, that I almost missed his next words.

"Yes, Little Red Riding Hood, that's a promise," he answered in a much more serious tone, not angry, thoughtful perhaps, serious definitely. When I didn't say anything, he continued.

"Um . . Joy, who are you really?"

Shock! Panic! How could he tell? He was going to come kill me any second! I hadn't told him where we lived, but somehow he knew my secret and I remembered just how big . . and tough . . that man was.

"What do you mean?" I asked with a tremor in my voice that was entirely due to fear, but kept it soft and somehow inviting.

My panic eased as hard as it had begun, when he answered, "Well, you're the most gorgeous woman I've seen in a long time, you dress elegantly but sensually based on the single time I've seen you. Yet, you were quite ladylike and proper that night. Innocent somehow, as though you'd never been in a bar, never been offered a drink by a man, never . . . Then tonight, with just a few words you've got me so excited I can hardly breathe. Lady, sometimes you seem worldly and experienced, others innocent and sheltered. Who are you really?"

"A girl has to retain some mystery," I giggled, so relieved he hadn't figured out my real secret that I had to sit down.

"You have done that," he agreed. "What does it take to unlock your secrets?"

"You'll just have to guess," I challenged him.

"Will you tell me if I get it right?"

"Maybe," I offered airily, though of course I couldn't, not ever.

"I'm a pretty good guesser."

"Promise?" It slipped out before I thought.

He blitzed in behind the opening, "Do you want me to be?"

"Maybe," I tried to recover that earlier airiness, but I was getting out of my depth again. I looked at Julie for help, but the wicked grin was back in her eyes, telling me to get myself out of the hole I was digging. She chuckled just quietly enough that Steve couldn't hear over the phone, then left the room. Steve probed for my likes and dislikes. I had to build a fantasy background, not so different from my own that I couldn't sustain it (I hoped) but it couldn't be identical of course. He asked what I did and I answered with a free-lance programming story that was close enough to the truth to be safe. It turned out he was a bit of a computer aficionado himself, a talented amateur. Once we got off into the world of computers I was on safer ground. I could relax a little and get my heart quieted down so that I didn't think he'd hear it over the phone.

Julie called from the doorway, "Time for bed, Joy. You need to be fresh and alert tomorrow."

Steve heard her and said, "Oh, I'm sorry, we must have talked for an hour."

"No, that's alright," I blurted, not wanting the magical conversation to end.

"Really, I need to let you go," he said. "But you are an amazing woman. Not many go into computers."

"Oh, more than you might think," I said, responding to the comment about women in computers.

"Yes, there's definitely more to you than I might think," he said. Now that was an understatement.

"Tell your sister to take good care of you," he closed. "Bye."

"Bye," I replied softly, a little sadly, and hung up. I sat back with a start, looking at the clock to see it was already almost midnight.

"What got into me?" I gasped.

"If you're not careful, Steve'll be getting into you, or at least, trying awful hard. You might have crossed the line, there, sister. You went past simple flirting."

"Did I? You're probably right. I was out of control, a runaway train with no brakes. I don't know what's happening to me!"

"Well, you're certainly finding out what it means to be a woman," she said in a strange tone, not a sigh, not a triumph. She might have been as confused as I was. No, that's not possible.

With her help I was quickly back into a flowing nightgown (black this time, and my own!). She left my artificial breasts in place but she allowed me to sleep without the gaff, a relief that felt even better than the removal of the corset. Actually, I had gotten somewhat used to the diabolical little device that hid my manhood, at least enough to ignore the discomfort though it constantly reminded me of the need to act carefully, which was probably a good thing.

Julie was up first the next morning, as usual. After she finished in the bathroom she called to me with her usual irritatingly cheery smile. She's a morning person, I'm not. As awareness slowly seeped into my consciousness, the unfamiliar weight and life-like motion of my artificial breasts seemed first strange, then thrilling, then frightening as I realized just how far things had gone.

"Julie," I said quietly, a bit surprised to hear myself speaking in Joy's soft tones, "we need to talk."

She could tell from my expression that I was serious so she settled down beside me where I still sat on the bed and waited for me to begin.

"I'm really worried about all of this," I said. "I feel like I'm caught up in something I shouldn't be doing, but it excites me too much to just give it up. I'm feeling pretty guilty this morning. Steve seems like a nice guy and deserves a more honest relationship."

She replied firmly, confidently, "Look, if no one knows what's under your clothes but you and me, then the only opinions that matter are yours and mine. I love you. I trust you. A single experience, no matter what, won't change you from who you fundamentally are. If Steve is only interested in you for sex, then he's not a nice guy after all and whatever you do to him is only fair. If he is interested in you for your personality, for your looks, for everything that is Joy, then you owe him your most sparkling personality, your most beautiful looks, everything that Joy can be, but nothing that she can't be. That's as honest as you need to get. The only thing that will screw things up is if you let this guilt get in the way. Be honest with your own feelings. Do whatever feels good to you, as though society's rules didn't matter because they don't. Be the most feminine, sensual, wonderful woman you can be. Forget about Jay, at least for today. After tonight, we'll see if we had fun. If we did, maybe Joy will hang around for a while. If not, then we'll know."

"Wow, that's some lecture," I said, stalling while I absorbed what she said.

"Darling, I could tell you were troubled by this, so I thought it through while I was getting dressed. But it'll be fine. Trust me."

I smiled, fighting back happy tears, "Oh, Julie, you are solid gold." I hugged her, giggling a little as my new tits got in the way. She laughed, too, then flowed to her feet and pulled me to mine. As I headed to the bathroom she gave my fanny a pat through the elegant black nightgown and I wiggled my derriere at her with a flirtatious glance back over my shoulder. It still wasn't clear where we were headed, but I was through with guilt.

When I returned, she had my clothes laid out for me. The day was forecast to be clear, but cool, so I would wear the stretch pants rather than the shorts. The now familiar routine of the corset was inflicted on me, comforting somehow as it forced me to a more erect, proper posture. You had to stand proudly in it's embrace, and that posture drew my mental image up to a proud, confident state as well. Julie handed me a bra and I managed to get it fastened even with the obstruction of my beautiful nails, then rotate the clasp behind my back. I needed a little help from Julie to get it properly positioned around my full, round breasts, but soon my upper body was all in place. The gaff was just as uncomfortable as the day before, but now I knew I would eventually get used to it, at least enough to keep it from interfering with my pleasure in the day so I didn't worry about the awkwardness. I managed the pantyhose like a pro, the smoothly shaped nails actually less likely to snag something than my ragged short nails had been, if I kept their scarlet contours properly positioned.

The padded panty girdle that Julie handed me was longer than the one I had worn the day before. She explained that the long-leg design would allow my curves to blend out more naturally and when I pulled the tight pants up I saw that she was right. My legs looked luscious, long, smoothly curved, totally feminine. I put my deck shoes on, but before I put on the cowl-neck red sweater, Julie made me apply my makeup. I didn't get it all quite right, but I was pretty close, and Julie reminded me of the few things I needed to do differently.

"Now, I want you to remember," she instructed me, "that you need to find a chance to check it at least every couple of hours, all through the day. I don't want you looking less than your best."

"Yes, ma'am," I meekly consented, but I was just as determined to look my best as she was for me to do so.

Julie finally allowed me to put on the fluffy sweater, then made me sit down again while she added my golden wig. Instead of leaving it tumbling down over my shoulders, she gathered it up into a thick ponytail that could only be called perky. The band holding it together was covered in an enormous white bow and she motioned me to stand so that we could check me out in the mirror.

Joy was back, just as breathtaking as ever. She . . I . . demonstrated an intriguing image of teen-age innocence with the flippy ponytail and fluffy sweater combined with smoldering sensuality in my spectacular, thoroughly grown-up (and out) figure and sophisticate makeup. The slightly prim stance forced on me by the corset made it seem as though I were delicately balanced between offer and denial, needing, perhaps wanting the right man to provide the proper (or properly improper) push to help me find myself as a woman. If I had met that woman I'd have been so distracted that I wouldn't have been able to think straight. It was more than the sort of classic prettiness that shows up in a photograph. There was an enticing flavor to the total person I had become, as though I had recently emerged from a cocoon and was only now learning how to spread my wings into a spectacular new beauty. Maybe that wasn't so far from the truth.

My habit of sleeping late had left me without a lot of time before I had to go, just enough for a quick cup of coffee, then a return trip to the mirror to fix my lipstick. It probably wasn't a good idea to eat too much before we went sailing anyway since even though I had sailed before I wasn't sure just how good my sea legs would be if the bay were choppy. I grabbed my purse, a stylish shoulder bag by a famous designer, checked to see that my new driver's license was in place, and went to my 300ZX. This was the first time I'd driven as Joy and I found myself holding my aggressiveness down from my previous rocket launch style. It didn't seem right, somehow, for a lady to drive that way. Following Julie's directions carefully, I found myself at the Bayview Marina just about 10:30.

The harbormaster's office was obvious as I pulled into the parking lot, but just before I got out of the car I saw Steve walking toward the door. I ducked down a little, suddenly short on confidence, but he walked briskly in and I heard him call a greeting to someone inside. I needed a deep breath to calm myself, but there was that corset again, always there when I didn't need it (as well as when I did). So I just got myself out of the car and walked to the door. As I approached, I could see that Steve had seated himself inside a cubicle in the office. His long legs were visible draped over a tilted-back chair but his shaggy head was hidden behind the wall. Before I opened the door I ducked to the side for a second and unrolled the fluffy red cowl neck to my sweater, then carefully worked it up and over my ponytail so that it formed a sort of a hood, a little too short to cover my whole head, but at least it reached to the top and covered the big white bow.

Then I walked through the door. The harbormaster, seated behind his desk and facing the counter, looked up with a slightly quizzical expression at the strange way I had arranged my sweater, but also with an appreciative gleam in his eyes. He stood up before I reached the counter, prompting Steve to begin to tilt his chair back to the floor. He clearly anticipated that it might be me.

Before either of them could speak, however, I called out to the harbormaster in a high, little-girl-squeaky, obviously fake falsetto voice, "Would you tell the Big Bad Wolf that Little Red Riding Hood is here?"

For the first time I saw a hint of what made Steve Gage the best linebacker in the world (besides being as big and hard as a wall). His chair hit the floor in an instant, but almost before the sound reached me he was standing at the counter, passing the grinning harbormaster like he was standing still. He looked at my tight sweater that revealed more than concealed my beautiful bosom and tiny waist, then his eyes flowed down over the just-as-revealing tight stretch pants that highlighted my gently flared hips and smooth legs. A pleased, somehow possessive, smile lit his face and he gave a long, low, blatantly appreciative wolf whistle.

"Rrowrr!!" he followed up the wolf whistle with another wonderfully sexist, equally wordless growl of appreciation, then said, "Right here, Joy Of My Life."

Once I had played the part of Red Riding Hood, I lowered my cowl off my head and rolled it back into place, tossing the long blonde ponytail around to make sure that everyone's, at least every man's eyes were fixed on me (like there was any doubt).

As he came around the corner of the counter he offered me his hand and I had to tease him a little, even as I saw my own hand reach out toward his, "My, Wolfie, what a big . . . hand . . you have."

A fit of coughing seized the harbormaster, though the grin never left his face. I barely noticed though, because a jolt like an electric shock had passed into me when Steve had taken my hand. Before, he had only touched me in a very proper, almost asexual way, gently guiding my elbow. The bouncer at the nightclub had kissed my hand and sent a thrilling shiver up my arm, but this touch from Steve was not much more than a handshake, was it?

Somehow we ended up outside without losing contact in our hands. My own was so swallowed up in his that it was only the elegant nails, shining like rubies in the bright sunshine, that revealed themselves at all. Our fingers intertwined as naturally as though they had done it many times before and we made our way to his "sailboat". What we found when we got there was sailing yacht at least 60 feet long. Two towering masts (ketch rigged) and a proud bowsprit made it seem even larger, built on the same scale as my massive escort. He led me to the side of the boat and stepped ahead to open the hinged section of rail, still without letting go of my hand.

"Welcome aboard," he said formally as I stepped from the dock.

"Thank you, Captain Wolfie," I grinned.

His responding grin had enough of a leer to it to definitely confirm the wolfish nature of his interest, though this was one girl he wouldn't be able to eat . . . unfortunately. I knew I had resolved not to feel guilty about looking and acting like a girl, and I didn't, but my emotions now threatened to swing too far to the other side. I felt myself yearning to be a real woman, with a real woman's plumbing. I also felt a tiny twinge of regret at being married, a commitment that seemed for the first time to be an impediment to my happiness rather than the source of it. Oh, well, being without guilt had been nice for a while, but I certainly had an abundant supply to replenish any I could shed.

Steve caught my momentarily pensive expression, "Anything wrong?"

"No, not at all. This is the most impressive boat I've ever seen. How big of a crew does it take?"

"Well, I wouldn't want to take it out to sea without a few experienced sailors, and it sleeps a dozen comfortably, but we can manage by ourselves for just a little cruise around the bay. If you'll help, that is."

"Um," I hesitated and wiggled my beautiful but fragile fingernails, "okay, but I . . um . . well . . sure, whatever I can do."

"Don't worry," he laughed, "I wouldn't do anything to damage your nails. They're too sexy for words. They're terrific, on you at least."

I smiled my gratitude at him and we moved to the cockpit area. He started the auxilliary and then went to take in the lines. The boat rubbed gently against its rubber fenders in the slight current within the marina until he returned to put the motor in gear and back us out of the slip. In a few minutes we were heading forward down the channel to the entrance to the open bay.

"Here," he said when we cleared the breakwater. He was pointing toward the classic spoked wooden wheel.

I moved to stand behind it and then found his massive arms around me as he held the wheel from behind me. He didn't rub up against me, in fact his huge arms were so big and his shoulders so wide that he could easily grasp the wheel without touching me at all. I was so disappointed I wanted to cry.

"Steer toward that point out there, a heading of about 340," he commanded. "I'll go get some sails up."

"Good," I said, then tried to use some gentle teasing to hide my wistful hope that I'd feel those arms around me a bit closer. Much closer. "I didn't agree to come driving. You promised we'd sail."

"I always keep my promises," he grinned, then went forward.

I watched as he went to hoist the mainsail, hardly needing the winch until he had the sail well up. Finally he took a couple of turns about an appropriate winch, pulled the halyard snug, and cleated it off. He left the mainsheet loose enough that the sail wouldn't catch the wind and it began to boom and snap in the breeze that had picked up significantly once we left the marina. The auxilliary motor was pushing us along making part of the relative wind, but it was clear it would be a brisk, fun day.

The mizzen soon followed, his hoisting station just forward of the wheel so I could see his incredible muscles rippling under his thin t-shirt while he hauled. It was enough of a distraction that I consciously had to force my attention back to steering the assigned course. In a few minutes, however he had that halyard cleated off as well and both sails were booming in two-toned counterpoint. Once both sails were up he went back to the mainsheet and cleated it off at the position for a close-hauled tack. When I saw he was ready I let her head fall off a little until the sail caught the wind with a dramatic, powerful explosion of energy. The yacht immediately heeled over about 10 degrees, which seems like a lot if you weren't used to it, but it also stabilized a little with the natural rhythm of a soaring bird.

"You already know how to sail," he accused, though the admiration in his eyes was greater than ever.

I blushed a little and gave a quick nod.

"Joy Of My Life, will you never cease to amaze me?"

"You haven't begun to find out how amazing I am," I grinned. Always hide the truth within the most audacious-sounding lies, if you have to lie.

Steve hauled in the mizzen sheet until that sail was also drawing well and then checked to make sure everything was shipshape. He shut down the auxilliary and looked at me.

"You think you can manage a tack?" he asked.

"Ready about," I said quietly, nearly making a desperate mistake as I almost called it out in my normal carrying voice. My masculine voice.

"Helm alee," I completed the command, then twirled the wheel to bring her head across the wind. Like the thoroughbred she so clearly was, the boat pivoted neatly and settled on the opposite tack, now headed about 050.

He teased me gently, though there was ever-increasing respect in his eyes, "You'll need to call out louder than that, if you're going to command a ship this size."

Shaking an automatic negative, I tried to find a plausible reason for sticking with my soft, almost voiceless tones.

"Then I won't command," I replied, smiling to show that I wasn't disappointed in giving up a career at sea. "My mother croaks like an old crone, and when I raise my voice, it gets as shrill as a fishwife. I can't even stand the sounds I make, let alone others. I decided a long time ago that I'd keep my voice soft and pleasant."

"Such a pretty voice, shrill? I don't believe it," he snickered.

"Believe it," I said with finality, changing my smile to show continuing pleasure, but unbreakable resolve as well.

He sighed, then grinned again. "Do you think we should put up the jibs?"

"You're the captain, Captain Wolfie," I teased. "I don't even know where we're going."

"Does it matter?" he asked, suddenly a hint of seriousness in his eyes. Testing me.

"No," I smiled. "I'm in your hands, today."

He chuckled, then explained, "Promises, promises. We're just running across this arm of the bay to where we'll eat lunch. I think I'll sit here and admire the scenery and let you do the work."

When he mentioned the scenery he was staring right at me, letting me know what sight he considered most pleasing to the eye within the horizons visible to us. I blushed again, but gave him a quick lip pucker, a pretend kiss, for his compliment. It brought a visible response from him, a widening of the eyes and an unbelievable tightening in the front of his dockers. For just a moment I thought he was going to come over to stand by me, but then he just settled his massive bulk onto the weather rail and looked, obviously, blatantly, appreciatively at me. My disappointment must have shown in some way because the tent pole in his pants got even tighter, threatening the structural integrity of the material.

"What do you call this ocean liner, anyway?" I asked, trying to get back on safer ground . . er . . into safer waters.

"She's the Starlit Night. A naval architect friend of mine and I designed her."

I was surprised at the beautiful name. "Not the Quarterback Sack, or the Blitzed Out?"

"There's more to me than football."

"Yes," a simple affirmative, but it said that I accepted the truth of his statement without qualification. I wished I could be that true with him.

If you've never sailed you can't believe how a dozen knots in a stiff breeze feels so much faster in a sailboat than in a powerboat. The wind kicked up a light spray, the boat alternately leaped and swayed through the waves. It was exhilarating and it brought a happy smile to my lips, a bright rose to my cheeks, and pure pleasure to my heart. After a while he directed another tack, a simple thing without raised jibs. He passed behind me on his path to the new weather rail but I wasn't paying much attention to him, instead concentrating on setting a course that would fill the sail properly. After a moment I noticed he hadn't appeared from behind me yet.

I looked back to find him leaning on the mizzen boom only a few feet from where I stood. There was a smile on his lips that spoke silent volumes. Respect was there, apprecation for a range of skills he hadn't expected me to possess. My combinations of innocence and sophistication, demure femininity and practical knowledge, quiet poise and glorious beauty were uncommon, and he was intrigued by them. There was more in that smile, though. There was something beyond respect, beyond appreciation for a pretty girl, beyond gentle teasing. I felt myself respond to the softer emotions he was showing with a softening of my own resolve to be safe, distant, proper. He caught that softening in whatever way it showed and moved to surround me with his arms again, reaching for the wheel even as I turned toward him.

He was infinitely gentle. His massive hands gripped the spokes of the wheel but his arms swung in to squeeze my arms that stole around his waist. I found myself staring at his strongly formed chin, then letting my eyes drift up to his firm lips, his deep brown eyes. I found those eyes plunging into mine, those lips lowering to the shining ruby ones I raised to him. Just as they were about to meet his, a thundering clap hammered the sails as we luffed up into the wind. The boat staggered into the trough of a wave and I fell against him, still as solid as a wall. We both jerked back in surprise and his eyes went back to the sails and the wind as he put us back on course.

The moment was lost, however, and by the time he had us sailing correctly again I had sagged into the seat, trying to get my racing heart under control. I looked at him with frustration in my eyes to see a combination of frustration and pain in his, pain I was only too familiar with. It struck me as funny, the whole situation, two adults so confused about who they were, what they wanted. I had to giggle.

"Gee, Cap'n Wolfie, you let yourself get distracted. A good helmsman wouldn't do that."

"Some distractions are sufficient justification."

We sailed along in quiet companionship for a while after that, now my turn to study him as he stood to the wheel. He was the most impressive man I had ever seen and I was beginning to realize his tremendous size was just the visible tip of an athletic iceberg. His muscles flowed beneath tautly shining skin. His legs provided a rock-steady balance even when the boat tossed on an occasional rogue wave. The pressure of the unbalanced sails in a rig designed to have jibs in use had kept me struggling to maintain course. His huge hands seemed powerful enough to exert the required force with no more than their own weight, lightly poised on the rungs of the wheel. I was considering standing up and giving it another try when he preempted my plan by pointing again to the wheel.

"Take over," clearly a captain's order. "We need to get ready to enter the harbor."

I took the wheel, holding her head to the course he had set until he had the auxilliary running again. At his command, I luffed up into the wind, deliberately this time, and he quickly lowered the mizzen, then the main. Bungees were used to band the sails to the booms, then the booms were placed in their crutches and we were a powerboat again. He came back to take the helm and in a few minutes had maneuvered us up to a gentle nudge against the fenders on a dock adjacent to a cheerful open-air restaurant. Attendants at the dock caught the lines he threw to them and tied us fast, then I was once again looking at my hand reaching out to Steve's massive maw as he helped me to the dock.

Again our hands seemed to get tangled together, stuck fast as we walked along. He smiled at friends he knew with a pride I realized was due to my presence as much as his own reputation. The smiling hostess seated us at a sunlit table (I was pleased to see an appraising then respectful look on her face toward me) and we considered our menus.

I put mine down immediately and smiled at Steve, "I'm in your hands, Cap'n Wolfie. Will you order for me?"

"What sort of things do you like?" he asked.

"Oh, lots of things." My eyes were only for him and I let him know that I wasn't talking about food.

My handsome hunk shifted uncomfortably in his seat and I knew his pants were too tight again, at least in one area. The humor of the "intimate" knowledge I had of his predicament showed in my smile, but he thought it was for my effect on him. Come to think of it, maybe that was the same thing. He ordered for us both, remembering my preference for a mild zinfandel from the earlier night, and I excused myself to visit the powder room. When I had set out for the day I was worried about using the lady's room. If Julie was along, there was at least some chance of a diversion or something if there was a problem, but all by myself I could get in big, big trouble. Somewhere along the way, though, I had passed by concern for that. Perhaps it was the massive power my escort had, along with a reputation for willingness to use violent, though controlled force. If he ever found out my secret, I was dead, quickly, efficiently, easily. Getting arrested might have been the least of my problems.

I had to spend a long time in there. My morning coffee had percolated through and I had to work my way through pants, girdle, and pantyhose to take care of business. I wasn't sure whether I was relieved or disappointed that the design of the gaff allowed me to do my duty (while seated) without being removed. On the one hand, a few minutes relaxation of the pressure would have been heavenly, on the other, I might not have been able to force myself to put it back on. Anyway, duty done I moved to the mirrored area to consider my makeup. A few moments and I was back to the sophistication Julie had defined for me. My lipstick wasn't even smeared. Damn.

Steve was waiting patiently, always a gentleman. Fans had discovered his presence and were asking for autographs, or talking about some of his great plays. That gave me an idea for later that evening that put a wicked little grin on my face when I got back to the table. The crowd dispersed when I approached. My swollen ego got even a little bigger when I heard the comments they made as they left.

"Did you see that fox with him? Where can I find one?

"If you were Super Bowl MVP and made 12 million dollars a year, you wouldn't have any problems."

"Fat chance. I've never even seen a woman as gorgeous as that. You got to find them before you can worry about catching them."

"I'll bet she found him."

"Not that babe. She doesn't have to chase anyone. She probably keeps a big stick around to beat them off."

Steve stood up to hold my chair with an embarrassed grin as the comments drifted away.

"I'm sorry. For some reason people around me seem to forget their manners. It's as though they expect football players to be wild animals or something, crude and lewd."

I just smiled at him as I thought about some of the plays he had made. Why would they think someone who made a regular practice of hitting people so hard their helmets flew off should be a wild animal?

My timing was pretty good, actually. I hardly sat down when the first course arrived, a delightful house salad. I sipped at my wine and listened to Steve talk about times he had been accosted by fans. My eyes never left his, so whenever he looked up at me he saw the amusement shining in them and the attention I had focused on him. After a while it began to embarrass him, and his stories trailed away.

"You're staring at me," he accused.

"Yes," I admitted without the faintest hint of remorse.

"Why?"

"Why not?" I didn't really answer, sparking a bit of amusement in his eyes to match that beaming from mine.

"Have I got a spot of salad dressing on my nose?" he teased.

"No. Drool on the chin maybe, but no salad dressing on the nose. Or is that my chin that has the drool?"

His eyes widened at this hint, no, a statement, of hunger on my part. I decided to shift things into higher gear and slowly, sensually, licked my red-hot lips.

"No, no drool on my lips, is there?" I asked.

His eyes burned into my flaming red lips with an intensity that said he was about to make a close, personal inspection of my mouth, when the next course arrived, a fish in a delicate sauce. It was delicious, but that diabolical corset forced its will on me yet again and my compressed stomach was already full from the salad. I picked at the fish, just enough to know and regret what I was missing, and continued to stare at my huge hunk of a date.

He needed a lot of food to fuel the fires that ran that enormous body so he made quick work of his own plate. When he was nearly done it finally soaked in to him that I wasn't eating much.

"Don't you like it?"

"It's the best food I've ever tasted, but I filled up too much on the salad."

"You didn't eat enough to keep a bird alive."

"I guess I'll just need to find another source of nourishment."

"Like what?"

"I don't know, make a suggestion," I suggested, suggestively.

He paused for a very long moment, making it abundantly clear what sort of suggestion he'd like to make, then embarked on a list of favorite restaurants as though my request had been as simple as the surface conversation had indicated. I countered with favorite places of my own, including a few I made up to try and match the sophistication of his background. A single out-of-character summer in my youth had been spent wandering through Europe and so I could convincingly describe little out of the way places that were plausible, but safely beyond the risk of conflicting with legitimate knowledge he possessed.

My wine glass never seemed to get empty, though I sipped at it through our conversation. The service was excellent and I'm sure they must have refilled it at least once, but I couldn't tell for sure since they never let it get empty, or even half empty, while I kept my crystal blue eyes locked on his deep brown ones. That infernal, wonderful corset had compressed my stomach too much for a cushion of real food to occupy the alcohol and by the time we were ready to leave it was having an effect. It was a good thing I wasn't wearing heels when I stood up, or I'd have tumbled off them when a wave of dizziness hit.

"Are you okay?" Steve was instantly concerned.

"Fine," I answered. "I'm just not used to drinking so much."

"Much? You only had a little wine."

"A little goes a long way when you're not used to it, and when you don't have three or four tons of meat to spread it through."

He led me back to the Starlit Night and opened the hinged part of the rail. Instead of trusting me to make the transition from dock to deck, he put his huge hands around my tiny waist, surrounding it so completely that his fingers overlapped and his thumbs touched. He lifted me into the boat with casual ease, holding me over the deck with my feet lightly touching until he knew I had my balance.

"Do you always wear that armor?" he asked.

I sighed in mock sorrow, "You wouldn't believe what a girl has to go through to look good for you."

"You don't have to do things like that for me."

"You might not say that if you saw me without my little helpers," I grinned.

"Why don't you let me be the judge of that?" an unambiguous increase in the level of intensity in our flirting.

That I declined. "Sorry, not yet."

He let a pout form on his lips for a moment, but I could see a sense of satisfaction in his eyes as though I had passed some sort of test. Was it because I was still being a good girl? Or because I had said, "not yet" and offered the potential for further hope?

I sauntered back to the seats in the cockpit, not nearly as drunk now that I was prepared for the sensations, but letting him think I was at least tipsy. The attendants helped him cast off and we were soon on our way again. The fresh bay breeze helped clear my head even further, but I was deliciously dreamy as I sat there on the luxurious upholstery.

"Do you want to put the sails back up?" he asked.

"I am in your hands, Cap'n Wolfie," I said, but I stretched languidly on the cushions, pulling my artificially enhanced figure into sharp focus. "Or, at least I'm willing to be."

The speed that made him famous showed again as an autopilot was engaged in an instant and he was pulling me to my feet in another. I found my arms around his neck while his own arms were lifting my waist, holding my feet off the cockpit sole. I found his lips with my own and was consumed in the heat of his passion, surrounded by the unbreakable power of his gentle embrace. The teasing that had inflamed his need had finally broken through his commitment to be a gentleman and I had another success as a woman, a success I still wasn't sure was a good idea, but one I wanted as desperately as he did.

My first kiss as a woman, and what a kiss! I have no idea how long it lasted, but while it did I was totally female, totally a woman. In his enormous embrace I was small and dainty, sheltered and controlled. His size was greater than my large-for-a-woman body by more than my average-for-a-man body exceeded an average woman's. For the first time I understood what it was like to surrender to overpowering strength, what a woman's greatest fear and greatest need were all about. Julie was right about my learning to understand her better by being a woman for a while. Now I just hoped I could make the journey back to being a man. I did hope that. Really I did. Didn't I?

At some point I realized he had lifted his head and was checking our course. I knew I had tried to follow his retreating lips with my own, but couldn't reach far enough. Instead I had laid my head on his shoulder and just held on for a while, oblivious to the fact that my feet were still dancing in mid air. It seemed appropriate somehow, and certainly not something that needed fixing.

"Joy Of My Life, I thought you wanted to sail."

"Oh," startled return to awareness of where we were. "Oh!" recognition of what we were doing instead of sailing. "Oh," disappointment.

The disappointment won out in my tone, but I knew I needed a little time to get my racing emotions back under control, "Aye, aye, Cap'n Wolfie."

Taking my place at the wheel, I disengaged the autopilot and watched as he repeated the motions of the morning, first raising the sails, then sheeting them home. This time, without trying to call back a comment over the whistle through the rigging, he went forward and raised a great billowing genoa jib, even larger in area than the mainsail. It cracked and boomed as it fluttered in the wind until he started hauling on the jibsheet. I eased her bow up into the wind a little to let him get close, then let her fall of until the main was drawing well so that he could properly judge how to set the sail. This time, with that massive foresail, he needed to use the winch to get it taut, but even then he tailed it himself, using one hand on the sheet and one on the winch crank.

Hauling in on that jibsheet was like stepping on an accelerator. The Starlit Night surged forward, driven by the powerful sail like a wild horse threatening to run away at any instant, or to buck without mercy. I had never been in a sailboat nearly as large as this one, let alone at the helm, nor on so large a body of water as the open bay, and I was struggling to control the wheel as differing combinations of wind and wave changed the balance of forces on the sails and hull. My eyes were lifted to the sails and to the tell tale at the masthead and I didn't notice Steve make his way back to me until his arms reached around me to take up the spokes of the wheel. I sagged back into the embrace of his arms, gratefully surrendering control of the ship. My own arms rested on his and I was in a comforting cradle more secure than any that NASA could devise.

Once the responsibility for controlling the boat was given over to Steve I could relax and just enjoy the sensations. We leaped and pounded through the waves, surged and shimmied to the touch of the wind, alive with power under control, not fighting it but taking our energy from it, in a harmony that powerboats could never understand. Steve understood, though, and helped me to see that harmony in his own grin of pleasure, his own deep breaths as though he absorbed more than mere air.

I couldn't match those breaths of course, but I could enjoy them vicariously, and enjoy the feeling of security within the circle of his arms. I couldn't lean my head back against his shoulder because the boat was leaping with too much energy for me to keep still. Steve was still, of course, doing a matchless imitation of a wall. That might have been part of the problem, if his body had responded to the inertia of the surging boat like mine did, we might have stayed in sync a little better.

Despite the motion that made it impractical to keep my head on his shoulder, I could lean my body back against his, the softness cushioning our relative motion. In a little while, I realized that softness was mostly on my side, as our relative motion provoked a hardness I could feel even through the taut girdle. Don't hate me because I'm sensual, but I let myself rub just a little more vigorously than the weather demanded, just a little more erotically as I enjoyed the naughty power I had over this powerful man. He took it for a long while, the strength of his self-control on the same scale as the strength of his body, but finally he had to do something, anything.

"Let's tack," he ordered, "take the wheel."

I took a firm hold on the spokes and he moved away, to his relief perhaps, but my disappointment. When he was ready at the cleat, I called with my soft voice knowing that he wouldn't hear me but knowing also that my standard words would be easy to read on my bright lips.

"Helm alee!"

He let go that sheet and moved to the other gunwale as Starlit Night's graceful bowsprit moved across the wind. With the skill of long practice and strength that was matchless he hauled in on the opposite sheet so quickly that he had it cleated into position before the wind even caught it. This time the sail took the wind with an explosive boom and we leaped back into our gallop through the waves like a starting thoroughbred at the Derby. In a moment, he was back at the wheel, granting me at least as much relief as he had experienced when he moved away from my teasing.

It's probably a measure of my distraction that I hadn't realized the wind had backed around while we were eating. The pride I normally take in my awareness of what's going on around me was shown to be hollow as that most basic of sailing factors went unnoticed. Even though we were once again sailing close-hauled on alternate tacks instead of running downwind, we weren't too far from reaching our home marina. The wind dropped signficantly as we passed an out thrust cliff and Steve once again pointed for me to take the wheel. When he was ready I luffed up into the wind to let him release the jib, then let her fall off to glide with a much-reduced motion until he was ready to lower the mizzen. By this time we were close enough to the marina to start the auxilliary and the transition to powerboat went smoothly and efficiently and all too quickly.

Steve took the helm and showed a practiced seaman's eye as we moved easily into our slip. His slip, really, my time on this beautiful boat with this wonderful man was drawing to a close. As before, he handled everything himself, shutting down the motor and fastening the mooring lines without any help from me. As before, he held out his massive hand for mine and my fingers were gently supported as I stepped back onto the dock.

"Thank you, Steve, I've had a wonderful time," I murmured, truly sad to go.

"What, no Cap'n Wolfie?" he teased.

"It seems that's about over," I replied.

"Only if you want it to be."

"Oh, Steve, I need to go get myself together for tonight, but I'll cherish this day forever in my dearest memories, regardless of what happens."

He was a little confused by my pessimistic words, "What might happen? Except maybe that we get to do it again, get to know each other a little better."

I couldn't meet his eyes. I couldn't really answer, of course. I just stared ahead and walked with him to the marina gate.

"I'll see you tonight," I smiled after I had a little time to get my emotions under control.

He sensed by confusion, my emotional turmoil, and tried to lift me out of it with a light tone and a grin, "Not if you don't tell me how to get to your place."

"Oops!" I smiled gently, not quite ready for a genuine grin. I gave him the address and directions and then got into my pocket rocket.

"Nice car," he said appreciatively.

"Thanks," I smiled up at him with a little pride, a little more humor. "It gets me around."

Looking up at him was a mistake, or maybe the best thing I could have done, for when our eyes met I saw a warmth in his expression that opened my heart from the worries that were consuming me. He saw an answering warmth and bent down to my lips through the open convertible top. We kissed again, not quite as overwhelming as the first kiss had been, but much, much more dangerous, powered by deep emotions and not just lust.

When he lifted his head I found my lips lifting to pursue his, reluctant to let things end. He smiled gently at me and then stood back. Without words I nodded at his decision and started the car. In a few minutes I was away from the lot, looking back one last time to see him still watching me, still smiling.

Julie's car was in the driveway when I got home and that reminded me to take just a minute to look at my makeup in my rear view mirror. My lipstick was most definitely smeared, a condition I wasn't sure I was ready to explain, nor even new how to explain. I fixed it before I went inside, to find her with her hair in curlers and wearing a bathrobe.

"How'd your date go?" she asked with a much-too-casual tone that didn't go at all with the sparkle in her eyes.

"Oh, just fine," my reply was equally nonchalant.

Our eyes met and we both broke out in giggles as we fell into each other's arms.

She pulled back and asked, "What did you do, really?"

"Well, we sailed to a nice little restaurant at a marina, had lunch, then sailed back," I offered, this time I could feel the sparkle in my eyes.

"Is that all?" she asked in disbelief.

"Nope," I grinned.

"Joy, if you don't quite teasing me, I'll slap you!" a threat made hollow by the grin that beamed from her face.

"He was very much the gentleman until I teased him a little too much, then he kissed me," I giggled with a conspiratorial hug.

"He kissed you! Did you kiss him back?"

"Just as well as I could," I admitted without a shred of guilt.

Julie was little pensive at this concept, "So you enjoyed it?"

"Yes. He's so big, and when he took me in his arms, I felt sheltered and safe and dainty and helpless and a whole bunch of other things I've never felt before, things that I never could feel except with such a giant of a man. Oh, Julie, you were so right! I understand what it means to be a woman so much better now. It's not just clothes, it's a whole way of life, using the most sublime form of judo imaginable to turn a man's strength to your advantage, which is the best thing for him as well."

She just smiled as I babbled on, but she nodded when I tried to express what I'd learned in words, inadequate though they were. Finally she interrupted my bubbling excitement with a kiss of her own. I responded with all the love I had for her, with all the pride and protection I felt as her husband, with all the tenderness that only two women can share. I truly was more of a person now than I had been and I gave all that to my wife in our kiss.

"Whew!" she said as she broke our embrace. "You really did learn something. You may be teaching me about what it means to be a woman before long."

That comment started a cascade of thoughts rolling around in the back of my mind that wouldn't come to fruition for a while, thoughts I didn't even understand myself until later that evening. In the meantime, Julie started pushing me toward the bathroom, helping me get the sweater past my hair. For the first time I noticed that her fingernails were extended with glorious, glamorous scarlet wands, a couple of shades darker than my own, but just as long and elegant.

"You got your nails done!" I exclaimed with joy.

Her pride was evident in her smile, "Yes, you convinced me, at least to give it a try. I went by Sally's this afternoon and told her to do the same for me that she had for you, except we picked a darker color to go with my hair."

"Now, hurry up, we have to get ready!" she warned.

"But we have over 3 hours until they're due," I protested.

"Exactly!" she said, like that explained anything.

She made me clean all of the makeup off my face while she was helping me out of my clothes, undoing my corset and my bra, taking the big white bow from my hair. When I was stripped down, she herded me into the shower where she smoothed the depilatory foam over my body again.

"It won't take as long this time," she promised. "After 10 minutes, shower it all off. Wash your hair and then use this conditioner."

"Wash my hair? I thought we needed to keep it dry to keep it set."

"The wind and water from your sail has made it wilt. Once you get it washed and conditioned, take your wig off and I'll set it while you take your bath."

This confused me, a situation that was becoming more and more common, "But you said to take a shower."

"Right," she said, once again as though nothing else deserved comment.

She disappeared into the bedroom while I stood there, looking down at my pink-covered skin and waiting for the itching to start. It did, right on time, but not nearly so bad this time. Either I was getting used to it or the little amount of hair left after my morning all-over shave wasn't reacting as strongly. The soothing spray of the shower still felt heavenly, though, then I started in on "my" hair. That wonderful mass of honeyed shine grew heavier, and I swear longer, with every drop of water, every bubble of shampoo. By the time I got it all lathered, I was sure it was down to my knees and weighed 50 pounds. Rinsing it took even longer and my arms were tired well before I started in on the conditioner but I was determined to draw every shred of experience I could from the fascinating adventure that had captured me and I didn't even think of removing my wig while I worked on it.

When I was finally done, I called to Julie and stepped out of the shower. The first thing she did was take my beautiful hair (well, all right, so it was wet and stringy) and drape it over a form. I would be an understatment of classic magnitude to say I felt strangely naked. Not only was I bereft of my flowing blonde hair, but I was possessed of full, shapely breasts. Which was more inappropriate? I wished I knew, but the loss of my hair was what captured my heart. Julie pointed to a steaming bubble bath and told me to get in.

"But I just finished washing," I complained.

"I know, but the bath oil will soften your skin, in case anyone wants to caress it tonight."

I lowered myself down into the bath, grumping inside at the waste of time when she was concerned about the time, grumping about how hot the water was, grumping internally at the loss of my beautiful hair, just grumpy. For about two seconds. Then the hot water started to feel even more heavenly than washing off the depilatory itch had been, the bath oil started to make my skin feel soft and smooth, the bubbles started to make me feel pampered and special, and I started to feel a lot better about just about everything in the world. I might still be there, except Julie came back in and ordered me out.

The clock had stopped, no, had jumped. That's what it was. Instead of 10 minutes in that bath the lying clock said I had soaked for almost 45. Julie helped towel me dry, a funny feeling to see her fondling my shapely bosom in the fluffy terrycloth, and then powdered me with her delicately scented bath powder. My own short hair was toweled dry enough that I didn't need to worry about it and then Julie handed me that infernal gaff and motioned me out into the bedroom.

"Okay," she warned, "you're going to have to do without a camisole tonight. We're both going strapless. Grab onto the bedpost."

She brought out a shimmering corset in black satin, trimmed with red (my colors) and proceeded to lace me into it. The design had half cups that lifted and cradled my breasts but left the perpetually excited nipples free. The cunning contours squeezed my bosom into a spectacular cleavage without obscuring any sensual curve. That same design incorporated some equally cunning stays that forced my waist in to an impossibly tiny size yet made the curves leading to it seem natural and smooth. Two garters edged in delicate lace supported each of the sheer stockings in black silk, those stockings accented with thin seams that Julie took careful pains to make sure were arrow straight. Black lace panties, disguising my gaff so completely I could have posed as a lingerie model, were snugged up my hips and into position.

She removed her bathrobe and I notcied that she had donned a corset of her own, in a deep lustrous blue satin that perfectly matched her eyes. It wasn't laced, yet, or at least not tightly, and to my surprise as soon as she had tied off my own confining garment, she turned to grasp the bedpost herself.

"My turn, now. Watch your nails, we won't have time to fix any real problems."

Now there was an offer I had wanted for a long time. She was fulfilling a fantasy that had led to this incredible situation in the first place when I had found it so compelling I had nagged her about wearing one. I had honed that desire with every gasping, shallow breath I took when that same fantasy was inflicted on me, not by me. Guilt warred with satisfaction in my heart as I struggled to lace her as tightly as she had laced me. Satisfaction won, and I was sure my efforts had shown her the error, or the glory, of her ways.

Julie had already pulled on her own stockings and done her face with dramatic, sophisticated skill. The curlers were out of her hair and she displayed an elegant, dramatic style with her hair upswept into a pure white ribbon then tumbling in sausage curls gracefully down her back and sweeping her bare shoulders. Blue satin sandals with heels almost as high as those that she inflicted on me, probably equivalent when the shorter length of her foot was considered, graced her feet, that complicated strap design holding them in position even as they accented the slimness of her ankles.

I noticed my blonde wig on its form, drying with rollers in a carefully laid out pattern. If it had been my choice, I would have reached for it immediately. I still felt so naked without my hair, so improper somehow. Julie motioned me to sit down instead and after fastening black satin sandals to my feet, started in on my makeup. I had expected that she would merely repeat the design from my first night out and certainly it started that way, with careful application of those flesh-toned or seemingly colorless cosmetics. However, when she finally moved to the colored tones it was clear that my face would end up as dramatic and as beautiful as her own, though subtly tailored for my fairer complexion and crystal blue eyes. It became clear that I was not going to be the girl next door that night, at least not in appearance. After that afternoon with Steve, it seemed my actions would no longer be demure, either.

When she had finished my face, I would have passed in any situation as a beautiful woman though my short hair would seem gracelessly inappropriate. After testing the dryness of my wig, Julie pronounced it close enough for me to put on and then helped me to position it carefully. I wouldn't have gotten it right, the shape was so altered when it was pulled up into the rollers that it didn't look anything like I expected, but she knew what to do and in a few moments I was more appropriately coiffed.

For some reason I caught a glance at us in the mirror and had to laugh, "Are you thinking about a little modeling money, on the side?"

Julie looked up as well and giggled, "Well, we could certainly make some money at it."

Our outfits of nipple-exposing, tightly-laced corsets, seamed stockings and sky-high heels, and dramatic but sophisticated makeup would define the standard for any lingerie marketer in the country. Not to mention sell an awful lot of clothes. She giggled again and poked me in my armored ribs, pointing at the clothes on the bed.

"We need to hurry, they'll be here in less than an hour and we need to set the table yet. Put on your dress. I'll help you with your zipper if you'll help me with mine."

"Deal," I grinned, then reached for the wisp of black silk that was clearly intended for me. Julie had obviously planned that we would dress as sisters that evening, but when I stepped into the clingy silk dress, it became clear that our style was chosen to be very dressy as well, though almost shamelessly sensuous. The tiny skirt barely covered the tops of our stockings as we stood there and wouldn't have a chance whenever we sat, or bent over, or anything.

"Don't you think the guys will be dressed more casually than this?" I asked.

"Of course, dear, that's why we're dressing up. Men like to be casual for themselves, but they like to see their women looking like ladies. Besides, it shows we consider the evening important enough to go all out."

All out was right. The sensual underwear was a constant reminder of the demands of maximum femininity, maximum attractiveness. I had gotten used to the long nails, but they still extracted their price in care and attention. Our high heels lifted our legs into towers of smooth silk, but balance would take a lot of thought, especially if we were to make it look thoughtlessly easy. It was as though we had adapted a technique used since ancient Rome, where a slave would whisper in a conqueror's ear as he enjoyed his triumphal parade, "Remember, you are mortal." Except in our case, it would be sensations in our body that would whisper, "Remember, you are sensuous!"

That impression was pretty apparent even through our clothes, not only because the style Julie had chosen celebrated our spectacular figures with ruthless precision, but because the bare-nipple design of our corsets showed clearly through the thin material. In my case, the artificial nipples protruded constantly, clearly, blatantly. Well, if things went well, the men would be making an equally blatant show through their pants. The dresses, mine in black, hers in deep royal blue, weren't really strapless. Thin spaghetti straps highlighted the bareness of our shoulders, more accent than support. Julie covered a potential problem in my not-quite-correct Adam's Apple by adding a further accent at our necks in the form of wide silk ribbon chokers that matched the ones for our hair (red for me, white for her), complete with dangling gold pendants. She had picked up earrings to match the pendants on the necklaces, earrings that dangled down and tugged at our earlobes with every motion.

"Let's see, what else?" she mused to herself. I poked at the rollers in my hair, but she shook her head. A smile broke out on her face as she remembered and went to her jewelry box. She shared out a glittering tennis bracelet each, blue sapphires for her, brilliant rubies for me. I had always thought her jewelry choices were a little redundant, multiple items in the same style being common, differing only in colors, but that night it worked our wonderfully as she found a cocktail ring with a large sapphire surrounded with diamonds for her, and a matching ruby one for me. It barely fit on my finger and I knew I'd have trouble getting it off, but that was a problem for later. A bit of perfume for each of us and she was finally motioning me to sit so she could take down my hair.

The smooth silky blonde tresses were now wound into bouncing curls hanging from the back of my head, highlighted and lifted by a softly gleaming red ribbon. A few tendrils were pulled down to frame my cheekbones, my bangs were draped over one eyebrow and led to the side, hairspray set everything without stiffening it into rigidity and I was ready. My mentor had set up our camera on a tripod and she proceeded to pose me in several positions ranging from innocent (in that getup, clearly a pose) to erotic (extremely, though without being a bit risqué). Julie even set the timer and we took a few couple poses, in one of which we were in each others arms and kissing. That one would rate the men's slick magazines, if we chose to sell it. She helped me to repair my lipstick and we tapped quickly to the kitchen to finish our preparations for dinner.

I was just lighting the candles on the table when the doorbell rang. My hand froze, my breathing froze, my heart froze as the last chance to run and hide clamored in my mind for attention. Julie's eyes grinned with that wicked delight that seemed her only alternative to gloating triumph and nodded her head at me to get the door. The delightful, diabolical corset kept me from gulping the air I needed to get my breath started again, but I managed to get the candle going and went slowly to the door. Partway there I realized my hips were swaying sensuously in the motion made necessary by my towering heels. The skirt of that lovely silk dress was lighter than any I had worn and it flipped with flamboyant energy with each provocative swish. I had arrived, not just in the sort of looks that show in a still photo, but in all the motions and gestures of a lady, a woman. It gave me confidence, or returned to me the confidence I had felt that afternoon. I had been so caught up in our hurried preparations that I hadn't had time to get into my role. Those few steps toward the door were enough, though. When I reached it, I was Joy, a sensual, beautiful girl. No one else existed within me.

Our house had a double wide entryway with sidelights flanking the door itself. That whole doorway was filled, wall-to-wall and floor-to-ceiling by the two enormous hunks that stood waiting when I opened it. Steve was just too big for my mind to absorb. My memories of his massive size always turned out to be less than the actuality whenever I saw him for real again. His companion was not nearly as large, only as big as two of me. Brad Jackson was about 6'3" and weighed a mere 220 pounds if my memory for the statistics was correct. Right then my overwhelmed mind wasn't promising to be accurate, but it hardly mattered. He would have dominated any room that didn't include my Steve. I was stunned at the mountain of beefcake that decorated my doorstep and just stood and stared for a moment.

"May we come in?" Steve asked with a beaming grin.

"Oh, yes, please do," flames of embarrassment lit my cheeks, but I managed to step back. The handsome men were both wearing casual slacks and sport coats, but they each had bottles of wine and an armful of flowers, My saturated thinking processes finally got back on track and I started to be a better hostess.

"Please, make yourself comfortable," then I called out (at the limits of my soft voice), "Julie, our guests are here."

She swept gracefully into the room, making a grand entrance that I envied even as I wished I'd have thought to do it myself. I gave her an appreciative grin that held a promise to get even, a promise that had been building in my mind ever since she said she might start taking lessons in femininity from me.

"Steve, you remember my sister Julie," I began the introductions.

He nodded, "I could hardly forget her. This is Brad Jackson. Brad, this is Julie Connors, and her sister Joy."

"Pleased to meet you, ma'am," Brad said to Julie with the twang of his Oklahoma origins.

Julie's eyes sparkled with pleasure at his politeness, but also with the opportunity for an immediate bit of fun to start the evening. She reached out and took the flowers from his hand, then snaked her arm through his as she led him into the house.

"Now suh, If yoah gonna call me ma'am, Ah'll tun you outa the house raht now," she drawled in a gentle tease robbed of all insult by her bright smile and shining eyes.

Brad ducked his head with a little flush of his own, charming in such a famous man, but he nodded at the fairness of her barb. "Okay, Julie, no more ma'ams.

I had followed her lead and took my own flowers from Steve. We escorted them to the living room and suggested they put the wine on the table while we put the flowers in water. Their offerings were a dozen roses each, mine in a passionate ruby red, Julie's in an innocent pure white. If Jay had been around, he'd have wanted Julie to remain true to that innocence, but Joy had other plans for her sister.

Julie had taken charge of a lot of our lives in the past few days and she had managed the dinner mostly on her own while I was out sailing. Since she knew we wouldn't be able eat much while locked into our tight corsets, she had chosen a meal that would allow us to eat small portions without making the larger portions of the guys seem inappropriate. The main course was a deeply layered lasagna based on a recipe that we had developed together. There was enough of it to make sure our men didn't have to go hungry, and it was done well enough to make sure they wouldn't want to go hungry. Garlic bread and a light salad with Italian dressing completed the simple meal, along with the wine our guests had brought.

Dinner was so warm and light-hearted you'd think we had been friends since childhood. Julie's gentle teasing about Brad's excessive formality had broken any barriers between them and there was no way I could be distant from Steve after our kiss that afternoon. With Julie showing me subtle tricks of ladylike interest, we tried to draw them out about themselves. It fell to each of the men to talk about the other. Brad told us how much of a leader Steve was within the team, then Steve told us how tough Brad was, recounting tales of playing with concussion, broken fingers, and worse. It was obvious that each respected the other greatly, with a deep masculine strength that was as foreign to us women as women's giggling intimacy would have been to these handsome men.

Dinner was over too soon, though we sat there for well over an hour. I suggested they move into the living room while Julie and I cleared away what little was left of the meal. They had barely moved out of earshot when Julie was sending me after them, promising to take care of the residuals herself. Now was the time for the first of the little bits of fun I had planned for the evening, this one triggered in my mind when the fans had been going on about Steve's great plays at our lunch. There had been a bloopers film put out about the Super Bowl champion Montana Thunders. Some of the bloopers were made by the champions themselves, and our giant dates filled us in on the background with hilariously exaggerated tales of dumb linemen and blind officials. Some of the bloopers were from teams that had played the Thunders, forced by the expertise of the world's best team. Once again it fell to each to talk about the other, Steve explaining how Brad's exquisite timing had forced an error on a defender that looked silly but wasn't really. Brad pointed out that Steve's matchless sense for the ball had put him right where he needed to be to recover a fumble or make an interception. It seemed our men were gentlemen as well, not given to bragging about themselves. I resolved to see just how gentlemanly they were.

The video tape finally ran to the end, to the relief of both our rugged hunks. Julie put a slow CD in the player and before I knew what was happening, I was caught up in Steve's massive embrace and we were swaying gently together. My arms lifted about his neck and his arms cradled my waist. As I tightened up a little, so did he, and I was lifted up until my toes were only occasionally, needlessly, touching the floor. Brad and Julie formed their own dance couple, not quite as closely, yet. At one point our men had moved so they were back to back and I caught Julie's eye over her date's shoulder. I made a kissing motion with my lips, and raised an eyebrow to see if she approved. Her eyes widened first in surprise, but then the wicked grin returned and she gave an almost-imperceptible nod of assent.

My own head raised up off of Steve's shoulder and looked demurely at his strong lips. My arms tightened a little around his neck and one hand stole delicately into the shaggy locks at the nape of his neck. A gentle pressure and his head, those lips, were descending to meet the glossy rubies I offered to him. Our kiss was like and unlike that first wild union on his sailboat. We were unhurried, untroubled, undistracted by any world beyond each other and I surrendered to his power willingly, as fully as our tight embrace would allow. His tongue tickled a gentle request on my lips and they opened almost of their own accord to allow his entry. My own tongue waited just inside to greet our special guest, showing a warmly delicate welcome. That delicacy began to give way to building passion and I started to suck on his tongue, trying to draw him into the only orifice I had to offer. We might have stayed that way forever, entwined in a hidden embrace to match our visible closeness, but the CD ran out and the next one in the changer was a lot more strident. It forced its way into our awareness and Steve lifted his lips once again beyond my reach. My head found its way back to his shoulder to see Julie's eyes once again looking at me, her lipstick smeared in a way I knew must be mirrored on my own face.

"Gee, Cap'n Wolfie, you certainly do know how to make a girl feel . . . appreciated," I teased.

"Cap'n Wolfie?" Brad and Julie asked in such perfect unison it sounded practiced.

With the gentlest of squirms, I let Steve know I needed to be let back onto my own feet, though I was floating so lightly they didn't even hurt. There was no hurry in my motions, but I disengaged from his embrace and moved toward the kitchen.

"Steve can tell you about it, Brad. Julie, will you come help me get a little dessert ready?" I asked. She moved away from her own dance partner to follow me toward the doorway.

"Maybe you guys could get a fire started," I offered. "There's firewood already in place, and more just outside the patio door."

While they were busy at the chore, I pulled Julie after me into the kitchen. "We each need to fix our faces," I grinned. Her hand flew to her own mouth, not thinking that her closeness with Brad had left a record. We pulled out the necessary magical components and were soon back to the visions of femininity that Julie had created. Our dessert was a simple fruit dish that we had started cooling down before supper, so preparing it didn't take much attention. I focused our mental power on another topic as I prepared for the other bit of fun (I prayed it really would be fun) that I had planned for the evening.

"Julie, did you mean what you said about our relationship being strong enough to make it through anything we might do tonight, assuming Steve doesn't discover my secret and kill me?"

Her response was a grinning nod that transformed itself into an introspective smile that was itself transformed into her wicked grin, full of confidence.

I pushed on that confidence and asked, "Will you trust me to take the lead from here, and play along with what I say?"

"What are you going to do?"

"Do you trust me?" I asked again. "If you do then you know I wouldn't suggest anything I thought you wouldn't like, anything you haven't already suggested yourself."

Julie's eyes widened at the blank check I was asking for and that introspective look came back as she tried to remember all the crazy things we had discussed. But in a moment, she was nodding again.

"Yes, I trust you. Whatever you say, I'll back you up."

We gathered up the dishes of fruit and swayed back into the living room. The guys had the fire started and had settled back onto the couch to watch it, taking opposite ends. There was really only room for one more on the couch and I motioned Julie to take that place as we passed out the dishes. I took a place at Steve's feet and leaned against his leg, resting my head on his knee as we watched the fire.

When the soft ringing of spoons on crystal died out, I started talking on a deceptively casual topic while still staring at the fire, though my heart was pounding madly within my constraining corset.

"Do either of you guys have a brother?" I asked.

Steve was silent but Brad nodded and said, "Yes, actually I have two, both younger than me."

"Did you ever make a pact with one of your brothers?" I continued softly, almost dreamily as I considered the flames.

"What do you mean?"

"A promise to do something, or not to do something. A promise that you would each help the other to keep."

Julie was wondering what I was getting at. She knew I didn't have any siblings, male or female, so all of this was irrelevant to me, wasn't it?

"No, not really," Brad answered my earlier question, not the one rampant in Julie's eyes.

At this I turned around and looked up at Julie, then at Steve. "Well, Julie and I made a pact. We agreed that only the one we marry would ever bring us to physical fulfillment, to sexual climax."

There were three shocked faces looking at me now, Julie's surprise safely out of sight from the other eyes focused on me. She and I had made that pact, in the time before we got married. We were really old-fashioned in a lot of ways, though it would have been crazy to try and prove it, dressed the way I was, entertaining two men in our house. I had been a virgin on our wedding night, and to the best of my knowledge, so had Julie. She realized the sister I was talking about, the types of promises I was discussing, were between her and me, her sister for the evening. My statement was blatantly, explicitly sexual, but it was a denial, not an offer. What was I talking about?

"However, we also made an agreement, that if the circumstances were right, we might . . um . . try and . . um . . learn a little something about how to . . please . . men, so that we wouldn't be a disappointment on our wedding night."

Now that was an offer, of some sort, just as confusing but an opening that demanded further explanation. My eyes had been fixed on Steve while I spoke, though a transcript would have suggested my conversation was with Brad. My giant date responded with a surprisingly gentle tone but the hard rod within his slacks was visibly pulsing.

"Just what do you mean, Joy Of My Life?"

I stammered out my response, partly acting, partly real, for though I knew the words to use, there was still a voice crying deep within me that this was crazy, that I should stop this out-of-control madness.

"Would you . .um . . could we . . try to . . um . . give you . . . blowjobs?"

There, it was out. Julie's gasp would have given us away, except it was constrained by her corset to a tiny sip of air and totally drowned out by the huge gulps downed by our massive studs.

"Right now?" Steve gasped in surprise.

"Well, yes," I replied. "I mean, you guys have seen each other in the locker room and all, and I don't feel like we should go to the bedrooms or anything. Not that I don't trust you, I know you're a gentleman, both of you are gentlemen, but I don't trust myself. Without my big sister here to keep me under control, I might go back on my promise. Part of me, a lot of me, wants to so badly I almost can't help myself. Anyway, if that makes you too uncomfortable, just forget it. It was a silly idea anyway."

I turned around to look at the fire again, my cheeks flaming with embarrassment that was real, shock at what I had said (once it was out and too late) that showed me I wasn't as fully Joy that night as I had thought.

Steve reached down to caress my head and turn it back to look at him, to see an enormous smile, "No, that's all right. If it's that important to you, I think we can manage our end of the . . lesson. Right, Brad?"

"If it's all right with Julie," Brad agreed.

Now I looked at her, challenging her with my eyes. That first night I had gone out as Joy, she had told me that I either needed to suck a man's cock or forever quit bugging her about oral sex with me. Well, I had just called her bluff. She either needed to agree to the outrageous offer I had made, or admit that I had won forever the reasonableness label for myself. Right. Like the offer I had just made had anything to do with reasonable. I almost snorted in a decidedly unladylike way as that thought went through my mind, but I managed to keep still while I waited for her to make her decision.

Her reply was to push herself to her feet, then sink to her knees beside Brad's legs in a posture similar to the one I was in near Steve.

"You guys understand," she explained, building on my spectacular lie as though it were our most intimate truth, "we've never done this before. We probably won't be very good. I guess that's why we're so afraid we need practice."

"We'll . . um . . make allowances," Brad grinned. He had only known Julie for a few hours and wasn't really emotionally attached to her. For him, with all the groupies that threw themselves at him, this probably wasn't that unusual an offer. Well, maybe parallel blowjobs by sisters was a little unusual, but not the part of the offer that would matter to him. He just grinned his pleasure at the opportunity and slid his hips a little closer to the edge of the couch.

I could see an interesting series of emotions chasing themselves through the depths of Steve's dark eyes, though. The corsets Julie and I wore had kept us in a prim and demure posture all night. The kisses we had shared had been warm, then hot, then consuming with passion, but were after all only kisses, nothing of real physical intimacy. Here we were going from a simple kiss to cock-sucking all in one giant step. There was a bit of hurt in his eyes as the pedestal he had built for me as a pure and innocent lady, possibly even someone to get serious about, crumbled. But that was probably for the best since we couldn't really get serious. Besides, he was a man and so he was controlled by his little head at least as much as by the one that was supposed to contain brains. He had responded in the affirmative before thoughts of my false pedestal even occurred to him. This was definitely a case where he wouldn't respect me in the morning as much as he might have when he arrived at our house, but Julie's respect was the only one I cared about.

Her respect was certainly increased by my willingness to follow through on the course she had laid out for me, to follow through in a way beyond any she had imagined. Julie might just have been thinking I had let myself be manipulated too easily. That was certainly gone. I had now manipulated her into a situation where she was going to have to try out another of my fantasies, even if on another man, and left me with the decision on whether it was "reasonable". Further, I had cleared everything in advance with her, making sure that she wouldn't think less of me for my own experiment with this activity. At least, not if she were as honest with me, and with herself, as I believed her to be. I flicked one of my long nails quietly, just enough to get her attention, then took an ostentatious breath that the guys thought was an attempt to psyche myself up for the blowjob. That was a part of it, of course, but the real message was to Julie, to remind her of the nails and corset that she had already decided were worthwhile. Her eyes tightened a little at the smile of triumph that I knew was lurking behind my long lashes, but then she grinned as she acknowledged that I had won that point. A bit more respect grew in her smile as she realized maybe, just maybe, I had been right all along. Being a woman could take a lot of effort, but the rewards might just be worth it.

Steve had slid his own hips to the edge of the couch, then leaned back. He smiled at Brad in a sort of a dare before looking back at my blonde head, crouched by his knees. My eyes had been drawn back from Julie to the bulge in my date's pants, a bulge that was now throbbing with an unusually slow pulse, at least from the standard of my own racing heart. The audience behind my eyes (was that Jay? or still Joy?) watched as my ruby spears reached out and started to fumble with his belt. His hands caught mine gently and then he undid the buckle himself. I waved my elegant, graceful, clumsy nails over his zipper and he chuckled as he pulled that down, too.

Unlike a woman's hips, his trim butt wasn't much if any larger than his waist and it was no problem to pull his pants down to his ankles. I captured his underwear at the same time, simple cotton underpants like I used to wear, in another lifetime. The pulsing rod that had been bumping against me for most of the day burst forth with magnificent pride, strong, vibrant . . . huge! His cock was built on the same scale as the rest of his incredible body, so much larger than the one I hid away that it seemed to belong to a different species, something more animal, more physical than humans had evolved to be. Not that this matchless specimen of manhood with all his equipment was something less than a man, instead it was as though he were more than a man, or at least more than the conventional image of a modern man.

Out of the corner of my eye I saw Brad's cock jump into freedom, tasting the air of the room. It was more conventionally sized, still a bit larger than my average body came equipped with, and I was glad that Julie would only taste it. I wouldn't want her to get spoiled. My own problem was so much greater than hers that I knew she would never again complain that I didn't know what it meant to suck a man's cock, not if I managed to survive this encounter.

The audience that still lurked behind my eyes watched as my shapely hand, enhanced so beautifully by the elegant nails, reached out to wrap around Steve's monstrous tool. Or at least as far around it as I could reach. When I realized just how big around that thing was, I wondered if I could encircle it with two hands, let alone one. For an instant I had a crazy image of Steve's hands around my corseted waist and wondered if the overlap in his fingers as he surrounded me was greater or less than the overlap that would result if I tried to wrap my hands around his towering sword. Even with my nails, it seemed like his cock was larger in proportion to my hands than my waist was in proportion to Steve's massive fists.

I had never examined a cock before, especially not so close up. I'd never touched one except my own. The view was . . . different . . from where I knelt between his legs. The veins stood out like thick ropes behind the surprisingly soft head, a head decorated with a drop of gleaming fluid on the very tip. It was almost like a reflex, but my tongue darted out to taste that drop, as though to catch it before it could drip away. Steve jerked with the flickering sensation, unprepared for such a rapid assault on such a sensitized surface.

The drop was . . interesting. Salty, for sure. A bit tangy in some musky way that wasn't too bad, really. Deliciously masculine. A lot of taste is really tied up in smell and the scent of his arousal was so tremendously healthy in a powerful way that it triggered some sort of desire, as though I were considering his potential as a mate, as an eventual protector for my children. It wasn't what I understood to be erotic love, just some conditioned appraisal reflex, more similar to some deeply buried judgment about the suitability of a cave for shelter than a modern love story. At some level I had started to use Steve as a tool to move closer in my relationship to Julie. I knew with a sudden clarity that I wasn't gay, that I wouldn't come to want male companionship more than female, regardless of how I was dressed. Now I wanted to suck this massive cock so that I could understand Julie better, her feelings, her needs. I loved her more at the moment I put a man's cock in my mouth than at any time in our lives before.

And I did put it in my mouth, at least the tip. I spread my ruby lips as wide as I could and carefully moved them over the head of Steve's sword. It was incredibly huge. At the widest my mouth would stretch, I still felt me teeth graze on the ridge at the base of his cap when I tried to get them by. It felt like I had crammed a baseball in my mouth and it filled me up completely almost as soon as I passed that wide ridge. Since I couldn't take any more in my mouth, at least not right then, I used my tongue to explore the shape and texture of the sword in my lipstick-rimmed sheath. It was amazingly soft at the surface, though rock hard just under the skin, somehow my tongue was more sensitive to that than my hands were. Another drop had formed and I licked it off eagerly, savoring the complicated taste. My eyes closed of their own accord and I let the world recede except for the treasure I was exploring.

I knew what he wanted of course, but delivering was another matter. Rising up a little higher on to my knees, I managed to change the angle at which his massive tool was invading my full lips and get a little more of it into my mouth before I felt the first twinges of a throat reflex that tried to reject the intruder. With my eyes still closed I couldn't tell how much I had consumed of the towering shaft. I knew I would have looked silly and cross-eyed anyway if I tried to see, but I had my hands and I placed the other one around his cock above the first hold I had secured. Both still fit around it, though I had surrounded at least another hand's length with my lips.

Steve was wonderfully patient, letting me explore these sensations on my own without pressure or comment. He sat perfectly still, making sure I knew he wouldn't suddenly start to rape my mouth with unwanted force. At some level my awareness had realized that Julie was making at least similar progress, but then this wasn't her first time for the simple things I had done so far and her target wasn't nearly so immense. After a few seconds to accustom my throat to the sensation, I pushed forward a little further, just enough to feel my throat start to stretch to try and accommodate the wide head of Steve's manhood. I wasn't going to be able to get it any further down my throat without figuring out how to unhinge my jaws like a snake, so I drew back instead, leaving an interesting lipstick taste on the part my lips had caressed.

Julie's technique a few inches away showed me, or at least taught me since my eyes were closed, another thing to work on as I heard a slurping sound start. That reminded me of the value of suction pressure and instead of just sliding my mouth back down on his shaft, I tried to pull his sword into my moist sheath by the power of my lungs. It didn't work of course, I couldn't have pulled Steven's enormous body with both hands and my spike-heeled feet, but the image helped me to start to get into Steve's sensations and not just my own. A bit of a slurpy sound escaped my own mouth as the moist seal alternately formed and broke when I moved my lips over a thick vein. I started to pull a little harder, move a little faster. When my mouth was back far enough I would flick my tongue all around the head that I never let escape from my lips. When my lips had engulfed more of his shaft I let my tongue vibrate along the bottom-side skin I knew from my own experience was wonderfully sensitive. Steve remained still with a greater self-control than I might have had in his place, but his breathing had become more strident as I built to a greater rhythm.

I let my eyes open to see his face and found his own eyes rolled back in his head, the eyelids almost closed and showing only a narrow slit of white. Without breaking my rhythm I glanced to the side to see Julie servicing her stud as industriously as I was working on mine. Brad's eyes were also closed, but the smile on his face showed both more contentment and less pressure than I saw on Steve. Of course, Brad hadn't had a woman rubbing up against him on a pounding sailboat for a good part of the day. A part of my mind absorbed the pace Julie was setting and I realized she was gradually accelerating. I tried to match that acceleration with my own efforts, beginning for the first time to feel pangs of tired, overstretched muscles in my straining jaw.

It probably wasn't necessary to worry about that. Steve was so close to detonation that I could have coasted to a completion, rather than trying to become even more compelling. I had an inkling that that might happen when I saw his rolled-back eyes, but the explosion that came a few seconds later was still a surprise . . a huge surprise. Pulse after jetting pulse of thick cream filled my mouth, and overfilled it. My head was so far forward over his lap that it was Steve's pants that caught the overflow, not my beautiful dress. Julie's unknowing wisdom had resulted in a hairstyle that kept free of my mouth as well, so I just rode out the storm, trying my best to choke down as much as I could and letting what got out take care of itself. A lot of it dribbled down my chin, but the elegant turn back up to my throat was too much for the viscous cream and it formed a large, sluttish drop at the lowest point.

Steve was so far gone at that point that I didn't think he'd notice if I widened my focus a little. I glanced around as I milked the last drops from him and spotted a napkin we had brought in with the fruit cups. I let go of his cock with one hand and snared the napkin with a long nail, bringing it to my chin to blot off the excess man-milk. By the time I had it reasonably cleaned up, he was shuddering with aftershocks but not actively pumping any longer. His eyes drifted open and I looked up at him, a grin in my eyes since my mouth was too stretched for any shape but round.

I gave him one last tongue flick, which provoked a lightning-fast sit-up as the sensation was too intense for the impulse-saturated tip. He managed to turn his grimace into a smile, but his giant hands were gently urging me to sit back and let him recover. Just then Julie received her own reward and Brad arched his back with a wordless grunt. She started to pull back but at some level she knew that I had swallowed Steve's present, at least as much as I could, so she started to take down Brad's cream instead of letting it free. She actually did a better job than I did, letting only a little past her dark-red lips. Or perhaps the quantity of Brad's release was scaled to the size of his tool, in which case I hadn't done so badly after all.

Certainly Steve didn't think I had done badly. His smile of contentment was almost comical, the huge man looking as happy as a young child. He lounged back on the couch, clearly in no hurry to move beyond such fundamental tasks as breathing.

I rocked back onto my towering heels and said, "If you gentlemen will excuse us, we need to go clean up. Steve, you might want to dab a little cold water on your pants. There's a bathroom at the first door on the right down the hall."

With that I grabbed Julie's hand and pulled her with me to our master bathroom. We were no sooner out of sight from the depleted studs than Julie wrapped her arms around me and hugged me tightly. Her mouth lunged for mine and her tongue, still full of the taste of Brad's cream, probed almost desperately for my tongue, for my taste.

"You did it!" she exulted after a rapid excursion into my mouth. "I can't believe you did it!"

"So did you," I said, not sure whether she was pleased with me or somehow gloating at a personal triumph.

"Right! We did it! Oh, Joy, I am so proud of you, of us. You're the very best husband any woman ever had."

"Shhh!" I urged in panic. "If they hear you I'll be dead so fast it won't matter how good I was."

Julie grinned and ducked her head in embarrassment, but by this time were into our bathroom and reasonably secure. She was beaming at me with more pleasure than I had helped her to find in a long time, maybe more than we had ever shared, and I decided it didn't matter exactly why she was so happy. I had done little enough in our life together just to please her and I was satisfied with the results whatever the cause.

She just kept beaming as she helped me to remove my smudged makeup and start over, at least on the lower part of my face. Thankfully my eyes and cheeks were fine, at least through the area that had blush applied. She worked to shape the contours of my jaw back into a more feminine softness and then reapplied my lipstick from scratch. In a few minutes I was as good as new, better actually since there was a special glow about me, pride I expect.

Julie fixed her face up as well. It took a lot less time than mine since she hadn't gotten a mess all over the lower half of it. She just had to redo her lipstick and we were ready to go back out to our men.

They had cleaned themselves up as well, a slightly darker spot on Steve's dark slacks the only giveaway that anything unusual had happened. Our dates had taken advantage of the time to find some fresh wine glasses and open up the other bottle of wine they had brought, a fine champagne it turned out. The wine bubbled gently in their glasses, and in another pair that sat waiting for us on the end table.

I picked one up and took a careful swallow, not wanting to seem unladylike even in sipping champagne, though my status as a lady had probably disappeared in their eyes, however much they now believed me to be a woman. That was probably an acceptable change in their perception of me.

"Hmm, tangy, a bit sweet, delightful effervescence. Overall, not bad," I grinned.

"The champagne is good, too," Julie giggled.

That broke us all up into laughter. It took most of the self-control I still possessed to keep my hilarity down to a feminine giggle instead of the belly-laugh that Jay would have enjoyed.

"So, boys, did we do okay? Do we need another lesson?" I teased.

They chorused with the same perfect timing that Brad and Julie had shown before, "Definitely!"

Julie joined in "To which question? Okay? Or need another lesson?"

"Both!" they sounded again, not quite a perfectly timed but close enough to infect us all with another case of uncontrollable laughter.

Steve moved to me and gathered me up in his arms, not asking permission, just taking a deeply passionate kiss as a natural part of our new relationship, a relationship I would have to figure out how to work my way out of . . . someday. Brad had Julie in his arms almost as quickly and while I knew they would never be more than good friends, even if Julie hadn't already been married, still it was nice to see that they would indeed be friends. Even without discussing it with Julie, I knew that Joy would be around for some time to come.

We finished the champagne and the guys got ready to go. At the door, we shared another set of hot, deep kisses. Steve still gathered me into a totally surrounding embrace, reminding me once again of the wonderful difference between men and women, of the power that comes from surrender to an even more powerful man. And then he reminded me twice again, and then thrice. If Brad hadn't pulled him by the back of his collar to go through the door, we might still be at it. With a final grin and a squeeze that made me grateful for the armor of the corset, Steve followed his friend and we closed the door on our unbelievable adventure.

"You know what, Joy?"

"What?" I asked.

"Those studs got their rocks off tonight, but neither of us has."

I giggled at her, "You're right. So, woman of my life, have you learned anything new since the last time we made love?"

Julie's silver giggle answered my own, "Oh, maybe a thing or two."

That night we made love as two women might. We stripped out of our fragile silk dresses and the dainty lace panties. Julie helped me to remove that magical gaff and then to reattach my stockings to my garters. With my single unbelievable exception that was framed by the straps and dark stockings, we were two gorgeous babes, ready for intimacy that men would envy but couldn't share. Except for a special man that was both a man and a woman, masculine and feminine, stud and sister. Me. Who'd have ever thought we'd end up like this when Julie got mad at me for nagging her?

Then Julie demonstrated the spectacular effectiveness of her new technique, a technique that lost a bit of its rhythm since unlike our huge studs, I didn't leave her alone while she worked. Julie arranged herself with her legs near the head of the bed, and waved her elegant hand gracefully over the bed in invitation. I took my obvious place, nestling my head between her dark silk stockings even as I felt her creamy lips capture my now-excited tool. I realized at that point that I hadn't been erect while I was sucking Steve's cock, another confirmation that I was still interested in women. That adventure had been more like a scientific experiment to be approached dispassionately than an act of love. This sharing with my wife was what I loved, what I needed, what consumed me with desire. I had definitely enjoyed kissing Steve, my Joy persona complete enough to arouse me mentally, but deep down where my hormones flowed, it was still women that interested me.

Julie's talented lips demonstrated their newly-developed skills with magical success. Her acceleration technique worked as well on me as it had on Brad. Maybe better since I was struggling to hold back a part of my consciousness to maintain my nibbling at her nubbin and as a result, my release was even more intense when she pulled it from me, seemingly with the irresistible force of her suction. Still, I managed to fulfill my part in our pleasure. With my willing help she climbed her own mountain at the same time (two or three times, but who's counting?). When we were both done, we just lay there a while, too spent for aggressive motion even if the confining corsets had allowed us to recover our vanished breath. Finally, we started to move and rolled off the bed. Julie moved me to the vanity and had me sit while she stripped all my smeared makeup off of me and helped me out of the corset. I did the same for her and was looking for my nightgown when she interrupted me.

"Sorry, Joy, you have to leave for a while. Jay needs to shed those tits for at least a day and you might as well sleep in men's clothes, just to remind you what they're like."

She brought out the release agent for the surgical glue and soon my strangely empty chest was back to the way it had been for most of my life. Yet it was nonetheless strange, not just because it was different from what I had lived with the last few days, but because it was wrong for me in some way that I didn't understand. My wig followed my tits and except for a hairless body and long scarlet nails I was back to being a man. The ordinary t-shirt and cotton underpants seemed distressingly rough on my sensitized skin and I wasn't sure I'd be able to sleep at all, but the stress and excitement of the day pulled me under almost before my head hit the pillow.

In the morning Julie woke up first, but before she got out of bed she prodded me until I first gave out with a typical grump, then finally woke enough for a rational conversation.

"Jay, we need to decide where we're going with this," she began. "You've convinced me. You've shown me by incredible example that the things you've asked me to do for you are not only reasonable, but fun, exciting, wonderful. I'd do anything you suggested now, if I could figure out how. You don't need to ever be Joy again, unless you want to."

My disappointment at that last comment must have been written on my face in flaming neon letters. Never be Joy again! Please, don't stop me from the fulfillment we had just found! But I controlled my panic at least enough to ask before I leaped to any conclusions (and wasn't that a change from the way I had been?).

"Don't you want me to be Joy?"

"More than ever, more than even in my fantasies, but I want you to know you don't have anything further to prove to me, and that you shouldn't need to prove anything to yourself. Be Joy only if you want to be Joy."

"Oh, I do. More than ever," I mimicked her phrase. "I was so disappointed when you made me take off my tits last night that I knew what a lady with breast cancer must feel like. A vital part of what made me who I am was ripped away from me. I don't know what the future will bring. Maybe someday I'll tire of it, when the newness, the naughtiness wears off, but right now I want nothing more than to get my bosom back, my hair back, and even my corset back and return to being Joy."

Julie just hugged me even tighter, happy tears in her eyes that prompted a matching shine in my own.

"I'm sorry, Jay, you need to stay dressed as a man, except for your nails, for at least a day to let your skin breathe. The doctor said it would be better to leave even your corset off so your muscles don't become dependent on it, and I know it would feel better without your shoes. Why don't you just work on your project today and we'll start over in the morning?"

She was probably right, thought I spent the day feeling something was terribly wrong. I realized that I had adapted to dressing as Joy, that first time out, more easily than I was returning to being Jay. The sensations that jarred me with incongruity were things like seeing the world from my shorter stature, finding myself slouched instead of primly erect, reaching to brush my hair from my face to find it short and already clear. There were many more times that day that I looked in a mirror and was shocked at my missing makeup and hair than times I was bothered by, or even noticed, my long nails.

There were a couple of amusing problems to be solved that day as well. About mid-morning a delivery man rang our bell, and I was actually reaching for the doorknob with my gleaming ruby wands when I realized they would be difficult to explain. I ducked out of sight and called for Julie instead. When she opened the door, the delivery man had two enormous bouquets, one for each of us. As Julie signed for us both, I wondered what I would have done if I had been alone. If I signed as Jay, for Joy, with my long nails, my secret would have been compromised. The delivery man would have known who the flowers were from and might have used that information against Steve, which would have been very, very bad for me. If I had signed as Joy, while obviously a man except for my nails, it would have been even worse. Oh, well, a problem that didn't happen wasn't the most important thing to think about.

Another problem was with my masculine clothes. By the time the afternoon rolled around my skin felt like it had been rubbed raw. I finally went in and took another bath, soaking in luxuriant bath oil beads until my skin felt soft and smooth again. I used the time to remove the stubble of chest hair that had grown under the breast forms, so it wasn't all wasted. After another long soak, I got out and put on my satin nightgown instead of my rough jeans and t-shirt. Julie smiled from the easy chair where she was watching TV, but said nothing, accepting my compromise.

"While you were in the tub, Steve called," she informed me.

"Oh? What did he want?"

"He's invited us to go sailing next weekend with Brad. I agreed for both of us."

"Good, you'll like the boat."

Julie teased me a little, "Should we invite them back here afterward?"

"Not unless you want to," I said easily, refusing to be embarrassed.

She grinned at my confirmation of her expectations, "No, I carefully didn't invite them over, so after a little beating around the bush, Steve invited us out to dinner for that night. We'll need to get new dresses, but I think we can get by with a few kisses. Disappointed?"

"I don't need anyone but you," I declared. "The boys can be fun, but nothing serious."

Since I was dressed in my nightgown, I lowered myself into her lap, draping my legs over the arm of the chair. She laughed and wrapped her arms around me, taking the man's role for a change. We snuggled and kissed for a few minutes, but even my slender form was a little much for my beautiful wife so I got up fairly quickly.

Wrapping up the penetration for Spencer Industries consumed the rest of the day. I had decided that I (actually Joy) would show up at one of their meetings with my results, uncleared and unannounced. To make that happen I had to convince their computer that Joy was cleared, a simple thing once I was loose behind their inadequate defenses. I wrote myself checks totalling a million dollars, including one that was for over $100,000 and shouldn't have been written without Spencer general manager Richard Bancroft's, personal signature. I also authorized myself to travel to Hawaii at Spencer's expense, first class. Too bad I wouldn't actually be enjoying these little presents.

Dressing intermittently as a man or a woman became the new pattern for our lives, or at least Joy's life. Julie would insist (and I knew she was right) that every two or three days I spend at least one dressed as a man, except for the beautiful nails that been the first step on this incredible adventure. I might sometimes spend more than one day as Jay, if I were deeply into a project. That wasn't because of the inconvenience or discomfort of Joy's clothes. They quickly became so natural to me that I was actually more uncomfortable dressed in rough men's fabrics. I just sometimes couldn't spare the time for the transformation to elegance. In that way, at least, Julie was right. The things I had nagged her about were inconvenient, at least in the amount of time they took, but they were worth it if I there was any way I could spare the time. Julie agreed, now, of course, but for the same reasons that applied to me, she would take a break from her corset and her shoes whenever I did. As a result, we were a well-matched pair. When Jay was around, Julie was casual in everything but hair and makeup, once again the Julie from before our little test. When Joy was around, Julie was equally elegant, and equally thrilled to be so spectacularly feminine, so intensely sensuous.

When the time came to conclude the Spencer project, I called up Bancroft personally, using my Jay voice, "Mr. Bancroft, I'm ready to present my results."

"So, you're giving up, huh?" he gloated.

"Not exactly. I have managed to find a few problems," my grin must have been apparent in my voice, because the Spencer top boss got testy.

"I don't believe it. I have our people monitoring everything and you haven't done a thing. I'll be sure and tell the board not to pay your outrageous fees."

That made me mad and I decided to up the ante, "Would you like to put your money where your mouth is, Mr. Bancroft?"

"What do you mean?" he asked, suddenly suspicious, with better justification than he knew.

"I'll tell you what. I'll show up at your Monday staff meeting with my results. You tell your people not to let me in. If I make it to your meeting, you owe me double. If I don't, I still help you fix the problems I found, but no charge. Deal?"

"Deal," he agreed. "I'll make sure that no man from outside Spencer gets anywhere near that meeting."

"Try your best," I offered, strangling the giggle that was bubbling in my throat. No man from outside would get anywhere near his meeting. No man was going to try, but Joy would be there.

That did give me a little more incentive to wrap up loose ends. I browsed through the Spencer personnel records (a supposedly protected file) and found an executive secretary with long blonde hair. Her boss would be one of those who attended the meeting and I would use their internal mail system as my passport for entry.

On the appointed day I strolled to the main Spencer entrance in a crowd of secretaries and office workers. I had dressed in a smart women's business suit, dark charcoal gray with a bright red blouse that matched my nails. By this time I had my makeup and mannerisms down pat so I was noticeable only for my striking beauty and my unusually tall heels. The Spencer electronic access system was based on a combination of a badge plus a personal code number that also had to be used for additional protection in case a badge was lost or stolen. My fake badge didn't impress the reader very much, but the special code number I had set up let me through without incident. I used the same sequence to get to the region of the plant where the meeting was held.

There was a uniformed guard outside the entrance to the conference room, scanning each man who passed closely, and the women even more closely, though with an obviously different interest. Finding an empty cubicle where I could watch the entrance to the conference room, I took off the jacket to my suit and opened my briefcase to take out my results and a small laptop computer. When my target executive had entered the room, recognizable from his picture in the personnel file, I called his office to get his blonde secretary.

"Hello, this is Joy Dresser. Is Mr. Stanfield in?" I asked.

"No, he's gone to a staff meeting," she replied with the answer I expected.

I played my part by becoming distressed, "Oh, dear, I've just sent him some information he needed for the meeting through our company e-mail. Could you see that he gets it immediately?"

"Well, they have some sort of special security thing going on. No one is allowed in the room," she offered the expected problem. Everything was going according to plan. I had sent a file, of course, and it would be arriving at her computer any second now.

"Could you call him and ask if he wants the file? It's pretty important," I pleaded.

"Let me see," she mused, "it's coming through now. Oh, new budget numbers for his department. Yes, I'll call. Please hold."

I listened in on the second line through another of my little tricks and heard her ask her boss, Stanfield, if he wanted the numbers. I had previously sent him a fake message from the relevant people letting him know they were being revised, promising to get them there in time for the meeting. He had probably been irritated that they were late and was primed to expect them. Stanfield told his secretary to bring them down as soon as they were printed out, and that he would take care of the guard. Bingo!

Stanfield stepped from the conference room after they broke their connection and I was barely able to hear his comments, "My secretary will be bringing some important papers in a few minutes. She's a good-looking blonde. Let her in, but no one else."

Stanfield's secretary was simultaneously informing me that she would take care of things, but I wasn't really listening. Her part in this drama was already complete. It was at least a five minute job to print the report, and another five minutes to walk from her office to the conference room. In much less than that time, 7 minutes by my slim lady's watch, I walked up to the guard with my reports in my elegantly manicured hands. Those slim, sky-high heels put a delightful wiggle in my walk, at least based on the pleased smile on the guard's face. As I approached I could see him already starting to open the door for me.

"Go right in, Miss, they're expecting you."

Not really, I thought to myself, but they should have been.

Once I was in the room, instead of walking demurely to Stanfield's side, I walked confidently to the head of the table, right next to Bancroft. Of course, in that slim skirt, with those towering heels, even a confident walk was pretty interesting. Before anyone else said anything, I dropped my stack of faked documents in front of the Spencer general manager, carefully arranged so that the $100,000 check was on top.

"Mr. Bancroft, I'm Joy Connors. I believe you owe me twice my normal fee." Goodness it was fun to say that! Of course I used my soft, feminine voice. I was Joy, after all.

"But . . but. . . you're a girl!" he stammered.

"My, my, my, Mr. Bancroft. That could be construed to be a sexist remark," I teased. "Would you have called an adult male a boy? I think it would be more politically correct to have said I was a woman."

"But . . Jay Connors is a man!"

My grin was decidedly wicked, though still elegantly beautiful, "Right, and Joy Connors is a woman. I have found it convenient to establish alternate identities. For occasions just like this one."

"Which one is the real you?" he asked, sagging in his chair in shock. It obviously didn't really matter, but his saturated mind was trying to get a handle on something, anything, in order to get reorganized.

"Whichever one is present," is all I offered, then I let a little harder tone into my soft voice, and a bit of a threat, "Unless you intend to get really sexist and require a strip search, you better consider me Joy. Of course, you'd also better be right in which gender you choose to conduct the strip search. Choose wrong and I'll cry rape."

He was helpless at that point, completely overwhelmed. His executives were just as shocked. I expect Bancroft had made a big joke of the computer hacker who said he could get into their meeting. Now the joke was on him, on all of them. I finally relented, though, and began a professional presentation of my results. I showed him the checks I had written, and how to fix that problem. I showed him the fake travel authorization, and how to fix that problem. Finally I showed him the holes in his physical security. Fixing that problem was probably most important and would require human guards in a few more places, guards who did a little better job. I don't suppose anyone trusts computers less than hackers like me that make our living outwitting them.

I concluded my presentation with a gently feminine smile, provocative when displayed on my full, ruby lips, "So, Mr. Bancroft, may I take your interest to indicate you found my work satisfactory?"

Somewhere along the way he had forgotten his arrogant confidence. Moreover, he truly was a good executive, for all of his blind spots, and he knew I had delivered a valuable service.

"Yes, Miss Connors, this is most impressive. I'll make sure to include a bonus even above the special fee you earned."

"Thank you, sir, gentlemen. Let me know if I can be of assistance in the future," I said as I gathered my things to leave.

"Please, . . um . . Miss . . um . . Ms. Connors. I am really consumed by curiosity. Are you a man or a woman?" Bancroft asked.

"Yes," was all I said, though I blew him a kiss as I left.

Am I a man or a woman? Yes is the only correct answer. I am certainly more than the man I had been when Julie manipulated me into discovering my feminine side. I am also more than a woman . . and less. My world has become much richer, much more interesting since Julie showed me how to find the Joy in my life.

Well, we have to go. The boys are taking us sailing. I think this time we'll let them give us another lesson in how to please a man. It's a sunny day and we're wearing shorts, and we found some wedge-heeled deck shoes that lift our legs into long, shiny pillars of tanned flesh. We're looking mighty fine and I think they'll be primed for us, especially if I get a chance to rub my fanny up against Steve's massive rod again. Wish me luck!