Royal Frills

A Pink Heart

I will be honest; all the recent coverage that the boys at the school were being hypnotised to believe that we were sissy boys seemed a bit far-fetched to me. I do not recall that I had to stare at a swinging pocket watch. The media were writing that we were being fed subliminal messages all the time. I even had to Google what this meant. "Subliminal messages are words or images presented below our conscious awareness." For a 10-year-old like me, this sounded like something from a Star Trek film. So my first thoughts were that this was some rumour spread by people who hated the institute. As I thought about it, the adults in my life loved me, and they knew what was best for me. They would never rewire my brain to believe that I was a sissy boy.

Then I remembered that my sister and grandmother told me that they heard whispering voices in the bedroom. I never heard these voices. What if these voices were subliminal messages? As the days went by, I started to think that maybe these rumours had some merit. I did not want to be a sissy before I came here. I always thought that I accepted being a sissy because of the threat of punishment or because the other boys here were also sissies. That does not explain why I was happy to be a sissy boy now and why I felt like one. What if we were being brainwashed by subliminal messages? Surely that would be against the law. It would also be a form of child abuse. If all these rumours were true, I would feel as if I were being tricked.

Niki did not believe any of this. The way that Niki saw the petticoat treatment here, they simply found a part of us that was hidden somewhere in us. The institute was there to support boys like us, and we had to trust them. There was a lot of debate in the media, and the parliament was even debating a new law about places like the Victorian Virtue Institute. Niki had the theory that these rumours were propaganda that was meant to influence the politicians. One thing that Niki was sure about was that many people did not understand sissy boys. People thought we were either freaks or being forced by our parents and the institute to be something we shouldn't be.

I was happy that I could chat with Emma on Discord. The only thing that she said about all this was, How does the institute know that we have gender identity problems? And why do all the boys that come here discover that they are transgender? Emma did not like the word "sissy," so she always used the word "transgender." Besides this, Emma and I talked about normal things. The more that we talked, the more we found that we had the same interests. We liked the same music and the same films. Emma even liked doing art. The only difference between us was that Emma liked studying and doing homework. Chatting with Emma every day on Discord was something that I looked forward to. It was nice that I could talk about normal things with someone.

Niki chatted with Blake every day. One day, Niki even told me that he was in love with Blake and did not know how to tell Blake this. Niki knew that he always liked boys but did not know if Blake also liked boys, even special boys like Niki. I could see that Niki's love for Blake bothered Niki, as Niki did not know what to do. I tried to help Niki as much as I could, but how could I? After all, I am only 10. I told Niki that he was only 10 as well, so there was lots of time for things like love. After all, we knew nothing about love. Niki agreed with this and said he would not say anything to Blake. Niki wants to be at least a teenager until he gets a boyfriend. I couldn't help but tease Niki and ask if he would not be Blake's girlfriend.

As for the school, classes and life continued as usual. We were now doing what they call domestic lessons. This meant that we had to learn how to clean and cook. This may not seem difficult or like it should have been a big problem, but it was a big problem for me. As a prince, I always had a maid or cook do things for me. So I never knew how to clean or work. The other boys complained, especially about how perfect a bed had to be when we made our beds. It was not the same for me; I quite enjoyed cleaning, especially vacuuming. I did not like anything to do with the toilets, for obvious reasons. It was entertaining to see the other boys complain about domestic class. I, on the other hand, thought it was better than doing math.