RANSVESTIA

The next thing I know, I was standing on the sidewalk outside, holding a bleeding little Jimmy in my arms. Little Debbie was crying loudly and hanging on to the skirt of my pinafore. It is amazing how quickly a crowd can congregate. It seemed that all the neighbors were there within a minute. I did not think at first about the fact that here I was in the street in my feminine pinafore, yet, exposed to practically everybody in the street. I had attention only for Jimmy, whom I tried to calm and comfort. Someone must have called the police because within a very short time, a screaming police car drove up, just as Jimmy was getting calm enough to tell me where it hurt.

"Who are you, miss? What happened here?"

I told him the details and only when I automatically gave him my name as Christine, did the horrible truth dawn on me. Not only was I standing in the middle of a crowd, dressed as a girl in a domestic white apron, but I had myself without thinking given my new name, Christine.

I stood there, my face as pale as Jimmy's, still the center of atten- tion. I looked around for help, but heard someone say, "I went to tell their mother, and she has fainted."

Someone else asked, "Who's the pretty girl... is she his sister?"

Jimmy opened his eyes then and I forgot all about my predica- ment as he said: "Christine ... it hurts."

"You better take him to the hospital, miss, for a check-up," the policeman said, leading me to his car. I had no choice of course but to carry Jimmy in my arms to the hospital. There I had to register him at the emergency room and again had to give my name as Christine. It was becoming a habit already. I noticed some blood- stains on my pure white pinafore and was annoyed that I even cared about that. We attracted plenty of attention of course and was I ever getting nervous. On the treatment table Jimmy insisted I kept holding his hand and, trying to console him, I forgot again about being in skirts in full view in a public place. Jimmy would not let go of my hand, no matter what the doctors said. The nurses were very nice to me, treating me as one of them and they all liked me ... as a girl.