52-SCHOOLING IN SKIRTS

The first night, when I changed for bed, Chris took one look at me and asked, "Danni, are you wearing your bra under your nightshirt?"

"No..." I looked down at my breasts. They DID seem a little more swollen than usual. The twin points of my breast's nipples had become big and prominent and showed clearly. "I always look like this now. I guess it's because I wear a bra all the time ... they never get a chance to flatten out.'

"I don't know... they seem a little big for a boy who's just masquerading as a girl. Are you SURE you're not taking any drugs to make your breasts bigger?"

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"I'm sure... the only thing I'm taking is a prescription to deal with 'stress-induced nausea' that's what my psychologist calls it, anyway." I reached for my purse and rummaged around inside for the bottle, handing it to my girlfriend. "See?"

She read the label. "These are female hormones!" she exclaimed. "Your breasts ARE growing!"

I grabbed the bottle away from her, horrified. "How can you tell?" I asked.

"When my older sister came home from college, I noticed that she was taking the same prescription. She said they're for birth-control, although it's also given to men who are going to have operations and become women." Her eyes opened wide as she realized what she had just said. "You're not going to REALLY become a girl, are you, Danni?"

"I HOPE not," I replied. Although I had suddenly realized that the M.D. Robin had referred me to was undoubtedly the doctor who had helped her sex change patient. I sat there for a long time, silently contemplating the implications of what Chris had just discovered about my "tranquilizers". Could it be that my sister's psychologist was in this plot with her... that they were working together to really make me into a replacement for my twin sister? How could I have believed that the swelling was simply vestiges of baby fat pushed up by wearing a bra.

CONTEMPORARY TV FICTION --53

I was faced to acknowledge my sweet new breasts and it added more confusion to my becoming a woman. I was going through the changes that girls go through. No, I wasn't going to bleed on a monthly basis, but I was going through the physical and emotional indoctrination of coping with being a female person. I was becoming a woman in a world where women are treated much differently than men. These small pyramids on my chest had changed my outlook on life.

My girlfriend broke the silence. "You know, Danni, there is ONE advantage to your taking hormones ... at least you won't grow facial hair. I'd HATE having a boyfriend with a mustache that tickled me when I kissed him!"

"Just as long as I keep being your BOYfriend... I hope my sister and her doctor don't have other ideas."

I didn't have to worry about what Chris believed. That night, we celebrated my birthday in away only two eighteenyear-olds could. For once, I was able to be naked without being ashamed of my feminized male body. In fact, we discovered that my breasts were much more sensitive as a result of the medication I'd been taking. In a way, my having become Danni had helped me cope with that adolescent problem of "coming of age". I just never thought I'd turn out so ... different! At boy at eighteen, treated like a young girl all my waking hours. The last months had even confused me about my own gender. In front of Chris, I felt feminine. Being around her even seemed to accent my femininity. I was extremely aware of little things: the lace of my slip tickling my nipples, my skirt caressing my thighs, my long curled hair brushing around my shoulders.

Chris no longer had to encourage my femininity. I walked with a dainty girlish sway because I felt girlish.

CHAPTER TEN

The next morning, as I showered in Chris' bathroom, I couldn't help but marvel at my hormone-induced breasts as I lathered soap over my hairless body with my girlish hands,