RANSVESTIA

Once again, it was an initiation night. I remembered the last time. four years before, when the course of my life had been altered so strangely - and so pleasantly. But this time, it was the initiation into the sorority which I pledged in college. The initiation was popularly known as "Hell Week" - a name which it deserved. Oh - I really shouldn't condemn it like that; after it was all over, you could look back with enjoyment. The name was part of the whole process, you to give the newcomer a certain apprehension and afterward, a certain sense of "belonging."

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As before, I had a "big sister." The simple difference this time was the fact that she thought I was a real girl. Maybe I should put that differently. A real female - as far as I was concerned, I was a girl. I lived among them, undetected, by using a little care and foresight - for example, the communal shower in a girls' dormitory (if one is willing to get up an hour earlier than anyone else - and so on). Also, I regularly wore a bikini panty of latex that compressed the only visible signs of my maleness quite effectively.

The main night of the initiation, we were all (those of us who were pledges) to sleep on the floor at the foot of our "big sister's bed, with only one blanket over our thin pajamas. The floor was hard, but I found the real source of discomfort was the cold. My "big sister" had opened a window that let in the cold February air. Several times she would ask, calling out in the darkness, "Are you comfortable, lit- tle sister?" And I would answer (as I was required, "Yes, thank you. I do so enjoy this." But of course, as the hours passed, I grew more and more miserable, and when, for perhaps the fourth or fifth time, she asked again, I couldn't answer but was suddenly sobbing, silently. She must have heard me, because I could hear her get out of bed, close the window, then come back, and say, "Hey, the idea is to make you a little uncomfortable - not turn you into an icicle. Now come on, quit trying to set an endurance record and get in bed and warm up."

I didn't need another invitation; I nearly leaped into bed, almost crying out for the sheer luxury of the warmth. My "big sister" walked around to the other side and crawled in, too. I was shivering so badly, my teeth were literally chattering (they really did, you know). "You'll be lucky not to catch pneumonia."

And if I did, whose fault would it be, I asked silently. She put her hand out and laid it on my shoulder. "You're absolutely as cold as ice," she said in surprise. "I'm sorry, I didn't realize it or I would have

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