Sandra

Chapter 3: the change

With slow steps I walked over to Deirdre's full-length mirror.

Oh, shit, I looked like a girl and, and dare I say it, even a pretty girl. I turned my tortured face towards my mother. She was unrelenting, "You will stay as a girl until after the wedding. You have a lot to make up for and you have a lot to learn. You can skip the last two weeks of school term - I'll homeschool you - and then have the two weeks holidays in which to do your learning. Come on, let's show you to Pearl."

"Everyone, this is Sandra, formerly James, and Pearl, she will be taking Deirdre's place as your bridesmaid."

"Oh my God, really. Is this really my little brother . . .? He looks so . . . "

"Now, listen," continued Mum, "she is going to be living with us as a full-time girl, as Sandra - supposably a distant cousin - and she is going to need a lot of training: how to act as a girl, walk, sit, talk, gesture, etc. Audrey, you will have to help."

My second eldest sister, the elegant Audrey, was doing a beauty and fashion course, and she worked in an upmarket boutique. "Of course," she responded immediately.

Audrey came over to me and started to examine me critically, "Stand up straight, Sandra, young ladies do not slouch. Put your feet closer together . . ."

And so it began and seemed to go on with hardly a respite.

By the end of the first week, I had pierced ears, a girl's hairstyle, a drawerful of my own panties, some of my own female clothes and all sorts of other bits and whatevers. I even had a pair of small, stick-on fake boobs. I have to admit the boobs were quite extraordinary, without close examination you simply couldn't tell them from the real thing.

I cooperated completely with my 'training'. I'd made a decision. I would do what I had to do to get back into the good graces of my family. I decided that I would simply treat these four weeks as a joke, have as much fun as I could and then erase them from my memory.