30-SCHOOLING IN SKIRTS

more comfortable they felt. It was certainly a different feeling walking down the halls with a single piece of fabric around both thighs, and it took some getting used to seeing my smooth legs in front of me when I sat down. My hair had gotten longer, too: It now fell past my shoulders, almost down to my bra strap. (The only problem with long hair was that the dangling earrings I'd taken to wearing sometimes got tangled in it.)

A few guys eventually got up the courage to ask me out, but I was way too scared to try dating as Danni, so I always found a way to turn them down without hurting their feelings. Chris, on the other hand, had become neurotic about her lack of a boyfriend, and although most people referred to the two of us and Susan as the "Three Musketeers", I didn't feel like I was living up to the responsibilities of being Chris' friend. I was making no progress in convincing her that the entire male half of the human race was not a worthless bunch of jerks. I almost told her about my fulltime masquerade a couple of times, but given how much she trusted me as a girl, I didn't want to risk losing her as a friend.

Anyway, between getting used to the clothes and trying to be a good girlfriend, the end result was that by the time mid-December arrived, I'd practically forgotten what it was like to be a boy. It seemed impossible that I had once walked, talked, and dressed so differently than I did now: All of the feminine mannerisms and body language had become automatic. Sometimes I would realize that the way my hips moved when I walked was a tremendous contrast to the way they had when I was growing up. And my breasts? Well, they had pretty much kept their shape because of my wearing a bra most of the time. The only thing that really surprised me was how good I had become at picking things up now that my nails had grown out some. I guess it was because I'd had to deal with them as they had gotten longer. I'd even won a major battle, having gotten Kathy to stop calling me "Danielle" after I showed her how I was spelling Danni on my school papers.

I talked with my sister's psychologist at least twice a week, not only to try to help bring Kathy back to reality, but

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CONTEMPORARY TV FICTION 31

because Robin (she encouraged her patients to call her by her first name, and I was extended the same privilege) was also helping me cope with living my life as a girl. She'd had a patient in the past, she told me, who had gone through a sex role reversal a few years back. That piece of information caused me a great deal of worry, until Robin reassured me that she wasn't trying to steer me in the same direction ... only to make me feel more comfortable while I had to take on a female identity. I had to admit, I don't think I could have gone on with the masquerade without her help... but I still couldn't wait for it to end so that I could go back to being a boy.

At least I didn't have an overblown social life to complicate matters. Susan came over after school a couple of times a week, Chris and I went to the movies most Friday nights, and the three of us cruised the mall on Saturday afternoons. We never bought anything, but we were constantly digging through the racks and occasionally trying things on. (To tell the truth, it was kind of fun modeling dresses, skirts, and stuff in front of my friends... although I was scared that someone might come into the dressing room at the wrong moment and discover just how non-female I really was!)

Once in a while Susan would make a crack about something I was modeling making me "look like a boy", which sent us both into a giggling fit. Then Chris would usually look at us like we were from another planet... but eventually we convinced her that I had told Susan about the joke I'd made in the ladies' room at the theater. That seemed to satisfy her, and after that she laughed along with us.

This particular Saturday afternoon, though, all Susan wanted to talk about was the upcoming pre-Christmas holiday dance. Apparently her boyfriend had decided to take her out to dinner before the dance, and she was driving the salesclerks crazy trying to find "the perfect dress". Eventually, Chris and I gave up on her and went down to the food court to grab a hot dog.

"So, Danni, are you going?" she asked between bites.