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Friends

by Vickie Tern

i.

It seemed to be the darkest day of my life, though now there's

no doubt I'm better off for it. Janice, she's my wife, she thinks

so, and her friend Melissa thinks so, and they both tell me so

often enough. Even my friend Ray thinks so, Melissa's husband,

though he always says whatever Melissa tells him, so who knows what

he really thinks? I guess it's true. We're all better off now,

I'm sure of it.

But it didn't seem so last November. You know November. The

trees bare and shivering, and it's gloomy even before you quit

work, and it's night by the time you get home. Your neighbor's

unraked leaves blow across your lawn. Ahead are months of icy

sidewalks on bad days and wet slush on good ones. People hunker

down, and everything looks bleak. And some of them decide it's

time to change their lives.

This particular day I was a little late getting home from the

office. An hour or so late. As usual -- I've got work, I do it. I

didn't bother to phone Janice I'd be late -- she'd only get mad and

hang up on me, and then I'd never get my work done. When we're OK

I hardly ever think about her. But Janice is my life, and when we

quarrel I can't think straight until we've made up. She knows I go

crazy, and sometimes she pushes me to see how far.

This time, when I got home all I found was a plate in the

micro, my dinner, and a note taped to the micro. No Janice. I

thought I already knew what the note said, same as all the others,

she was furious, she wouldn't put up with my thoughtlessness and

insensitivity any longer, and so on. The usual. So I waited to

read it till I sat down to my reheated dinner. Then I read it.

And then I couldn't eat. Not even swallow.

Because it wasn't the same as the others. Here's what it

said:

My dearest Bob, or not my dearest any more,

This is the saddest letter I have ever had to write, but

is also the happiest. We've had a good marriage, despite your

sometimes taking me for granted. But I won't mention that

again. I love you, so I really don't know how to say this.

That's why I'm writing it. When you read it I'll already be

gone.

I'm leaving you, because I've found someone I love more

than I love you. Much more.

I can't begin to tell to you how much more. So wonderful!

So gentle, considerate, and caring about things that really

matter most to me. Always aware of my feelings, and attentive

to my needs and desires. And an incredibly devoted lover --

I'm getting wet right now just thinking about some of

the things we do together. Lots of them things you've never

wanted to do, and some of them things you just can't do. You're

simply not able. I'm sorry, but that's how it is.

I intend to live with her, and I hope I can make her as

happy as she's made me.

I know this seems sudden, but I've been thinking about it

for a long time now, and there's no other way. You'll get over

it, dear. You'll find someone wonderful to love too, sooner

than you think, someone who'll make you feel as marvelous as I

do right now. I'm sure you will. I'll help if I can.

Still with lots of affection,

Janice

I sat there stunned. I reread the letter until the words made

no sense. But they'd made no sense in the first place! Janice had

run off. My wife had run off. With another ... with a woman? She

was doing ... things, with a woman?! Another woman had seduced her

to be a lesbian? She preferred being a lesbian to being married

to me? We had a good marriage, the two of us! At least I'd

thought so. And she'd just said so! I guess somehow I must have

overlooked something. I sat there a long time, and it got darker

and darker outside. Now it was night. What could I do?

I realized I was about to cry. Get hold of yourself, I told

me. You need help, I said to myself. Go talk to Ray and Melissa

about this. They'll know how I can get her back!

Ray and Melissa are our closest friends, and our closest

neighbors, right next door to us. Married seven years the same as

us, no kids yet the same as us. Inseparable, the same as us.

Until today. A sob lurched out of me. So I crossed through our

back yard into theirs, and knocked on their back door.

Ray answered. He was in the kitchen making something that

smelled delicious, and he didn't even pause to take off his apron,

one of Melissa's I guess from the frills all over it. He just took

one look at my face, and he led me to a chair in their living room,

and he sat me down, and he poured me a stiff one. And then one for

himself.

I handed him the letter and emptied my glass. He ran his eyes

down it and handed it back. I just sat there squeezing my hands,

unable to look at anything. Then he got up and poured me another

drink and sat down again.

I'd confided in Ray before, though mainly about business.

Guys don't usually talk about personal things. But his wife and

mine were always talking, on the phone, in and out of each other's

houses, planning shopping trips and checking out gallery openings,

and arranging lunches, and gossiping about everyone. So I hoped

maybe Melissa knew something even if Ray didn't. She had to know

something! Something to help me make sense of this craziness!

Something to help me get her back! I almost started crying again.

"Bob," Ray said slowly. He avoided looking at me. "I wish I

could help you. But women are a mystery to me too. I don't even

pretend to know how they're really thinking or feeling. Melissa

would be the first to tell you that. Married seven years and I

still don't understand why she does things the way she does them.

Her way. And insists on her way. I learned long ago, don't

question, just do what she says and wait for it to work out.

That's how she wants it. And you know, she's amazing. No matter

how impossible it looks to me, it always does work out.

I just looked at Ray mournfully. What could I say?

"There's her car pulling into the driveway now. Just sit

tight. I'm sure she'll think of something. Want another drink?"

I nodded, and he got me another double. I heard Melissa's

car door slam, and a moment later her key was scratching at the

latch. Ray leaped to his feet and threw the door open.

"I'm sorry, love," he said. "I was busy with Bob, here. He

has a problem."

She came in, both arms loaded high with packages, and glanced

in my direction. "I see," she said. Her gray eyes were barely

visible.

She looked at me more closely as she set down some packages.

Dress shop bags, department store boxes, mostly. Ray does the

household shopping, and Melissa buys pretty much whatever she

pleases. Ray once told me he isn't crazy about wandering up and

down supermarket aisles dodging women who look barely thrown

together and are quarreling with their kids. But he does it. His

time's been flexible since his company put their production

engineers on hold for re-tooling and then closed the plant. He

still gets severance pay, and when that runs out he'll get

unemployment. So he's in no hurry to find something else.

Meanwhile Melissa works long hours, and is much busier than he ever

was. She's a lawyer. So he takes care of the house. It makes

sense, if you think about it. But he did look odd in that frilly

apron -- Ray is all man, tall, handsome face, big shoulders, lean

waistline, muscles, works out sometimes, you know. Maybe that's

why he didn't even think about the apron.

"Hello, Robert!" Melissa always calls me "Robert" -- it's

part of her formality with everyone. Sometimes I call her "Lizzie"

in return, to give as good as I get. But not this time. Just a

subdued, "Hi, Melissa.". Still, even in my deep misery I couldn't

help but notice she looked stunning, a real knockout. Severely cut

gray suit nipped way in at the waist, and a white silk blouse with

a teeny bright red bow tie, high gray-clad legs under a tight mini

skirt, and propped up by high, high heels. Slash of red across her

mouth, and her eyes in deep shadow, almost black. Her 'power

outfit' she once called it, sexy and formidable.

She had a lot of them, and she always looked stunning. She

was a gorgeous woman. I could never figure why she married Ray, a

big good-looking guy I guess, but not at all assertive, at least

not when she was around. But they were a close couple. I guess

because she liked being in complete charge. He always seemed to me

completely under her thumb. As Ray once told me, she loved him

because he always did whatever she told him to do. "She looks

after my needs, and she knows I'll always help her with hers." An

odd basis for a marriage, it had always seemed to me. But now, I

realized, I should talk!

"How nice to see you here," Melissa went on. "It's been a

while, hasn't it? Had dinner yet? Ray, have you asked Robert to

stay for dinner?"

"Melissa, Bob's got a problem he thinks maybe you can help him

with. I can't. I don't think he's too hungry right now."

Melissa glanced at me over her shoulder again as she set down

the rest of her packages and her purse, and this time her bright

eyes stared into mine for a second, searching for something, her

red mouth impassive. "Obviously I know he has a problem, Ray, and

obviously I know what it is. I didn't tell you to check with

Janice and ask her too, did I? You should be more attentive.

Robert, stay and we'll talk. Ray, if it's ready, please bring

dinner to the table and we'll sit down."

Apparently Ray did all the cooking as well as the shopping

since he was laid off. He went into the kitchen to get whatever

he'd prepared. and I went into the dining room with his wife. She

settled herself at the head of the table and gestured for me to sit

to her right, where Ray usually sat, the privileged position. Ray

brought in an extra place setting for himself and a tureen of hot

soup, some kind of spicy chowder, and sat down to her left,

opposite me. He poured wine for the three of us.

"Now then," she said. "Let's see it." She held out her hand.

I was baffled. "The letter, the letter, of course! My but you

look unhappy, Robert!"

"How did you know?" I asked her. Tears started from my eyes,

and I started to choke up yet again. I handed her Janice's note.

She glanced at it and almost immediately handed it back to me.

"Here," she said. "You'll probably want to keep this as a

souvenir. And let me ask the questions, please, if you want my

help. I don't usually answer questions like 'How did you know?'

It wastes time. But this once I will. Janice saw me today and

told me she'd left you, and why. I advised her to take an

apartment now, and move in with someone else only gradually. She's

done just that. So your news isn't as new as you think. Nor is

your situation quite as drastic as this note implies. Not yet."

I swallowed, and just looked at her. What was it Ray had just

said? That she was amazing? "The soup is excellent," she told

Ray. "That touch of celantro is just perfect, just as I told you

it would be." Ray nodded, pleased.

"Now. Your wife has left you for another woman. So what's

the problem? Feeling deprived? Humiliated?"

"Some. It's as if I weren't man enough for her."

"No," Melissa said dryly. Her spoon paused just short of her

mouth, and she stared penetratingly at me, so as to miss nothing in

my reaction. "You seem to have missed the point altogether. It's

just the opposite. It's as if you weren't woman enough for her."

I stared back at her, my mouth a little agape, and said

nothing. Ray poured me some more wine, and I drank it. She was

right. So probably my situation was hopeless.

She set down her spoon. "Let me ask you one more time.

What's the problem? Exactly what is it you want?"

"I want her back!" I said, and my voice broke. "I want to

live with my wife again! I want things to be the way they were!"

Melissa resumed eating again, casually, now nearly indifferent

to the passion in my voice. "Well, obviously, you aren't going to

have that ever again. If things were the way they were, she'd

leave you again, wouldn't she? And consider. She's left you. So

even if she came back you'd always wonder if she was planning to

leave you again. That's obvious! What's also obvious is, you felt

too secure with her, and now, no matter what, you'll never feel

secure enough with her. That's how things are. No, if you're ever

to get her back in any real sense, it will be because things are

different. Not at all the way they were. Because you're

different."

"What do you mean?"

"Your soup is getting cold, Robert. Finish what's in front of

you, and then while Ray brings the next course I'll tell you what

I mean." She said it slowly, as if I were a child.

I ate in silence. When I finished I set down my spoon, and

Ray cleared the plate away. I waited.

"The operational phrase in Janice's letter is obvious. You

are too unlike her new lover, 'simply not able' to do the things

they do together. Your wife has left you for another woman, and

describes the kind of woman. You are not that kind of woman. Not

even a woman at all."

I waited. Melissa finished her soup, and turned toward me

again. Ray cleared away her plate.

"If you want her back, you are going to have to nurture in

yourself all those so-called feminine impulses and desires men

always suppress. If you have any. A desire to find fulfillment

for yourself by pleasing others. By being more gentle,

considerate, sensitive, weren't those her words? You will need to

be more of a woman. That's what she wants."

"Now, one simple question. Is that what you want?"

Ray brought in a platter, pasta covered with scallops,

portobello mushrooms and slivers of vegetables in a thick herbal

sauce. It smelled wonderful, delicate and spicy, strong yet

somehow refined. He must have been at it all afternoon.

"How creative! A kind of seafood primavera!" Melissa said.

"Very good, Ray! You've earned a treat, and I'll see that you get

it, this very evening, in fact even before we leave the table!"

Melissa served me, then gestured toward the salad Ray next

brought in, and I took some while she served the pasta to Ray and

finally herself. I noticed there were several kinds of lettuce,

with a hint of an aromatic vinaigrette, and that Ray had torn each

crisp lettuce leaf into small pieces by hand, not sliced them.

"It's taken Ray time to learn to do everything exactly the way

I like it." Melissa said. "But now I'm proud of him. Some women

in his cooking class were first class chefs,, but he took top

honors even so. A matter of motivation."

Ray smiled gratefully at her, and his eyes narrowed like a

puppy being stroked and preened.

"What do you mean, is that what I want?" I returned to the

question she'd put to me. I was beginning to sound stupid even to

me.

"Still asking questions when you already know the answers? I

asked you, do you want to become more the kind of woman Janice

wants? Now you ask me, what do I mean by that? Robert, you tell

me what you think I mean."

I reached out to find something to say. Melissa certainly

knew something. She and Janice were well tuned to each other.

"Well, I never cook, in our house, like Ray here."

"I don't either. Never! Ray is the cook here. But I'm not

any the less a woman, I think you'll agree. And I don't recall

Janice's letter mentioning that her new lover is a cook. You're

not eating, again."

"I go to the office and I come home. I watch television. Oh,

I see what you mean, I think. I don't much talk to her, share

things with her, tell her how I feel about things. Especially how

I feel about her. And about things that interest her. Share her

enthusiasms. Get excited with her about people we know." I had

twirled pasta onto my fork carelessly, and some sauce dripped onto

my chin.

"Wipe yourself," she said. "That's right. Yes. There are

feelings and opinions women usually want to share while men usually

don't. You aren't woman enough even to have noticed. Did Janice

ever ask you to share your feelings with her?"

"All the time," I said.

"And did you?"

"I guess not."

"What else didn't you do?"

"Well, it gets kind of personal, I'd rather not say."

"Then I'll say. She's told me. Your sex life with Janice is

dullness itself. You screw for your own relief, not to express or

create and share pleasurable feelings with her, and you never

improvise new variations. She asks for a little kissing and

hugging and cuddling now and then, but you're too tired to bother.

Am I wrong? She'd like oral sex now and then, to feel in the most

intimately physical way that you care for her pleasure regardless

of your own, and she's offered you that same kind of pleasure. But

you think that giving or getting head is distasteful. Sort of

dirty. Am I wrong? Now Janice has gone to enjoy those pleasures

with someone who'll provide them, pleasures that really matter to

her. You don't. Not any more. Am I wrong?"

This was all terribly embarrassing. Janice had obviously told

Melissa everything. Over how many days or months?

I set my knife and fork down and leaned forward. "Melissa,

what can I do? I want her back. I'll do whatever it takes to get

her back."

"Oh? Are you willing to do whatever I ask you to do to get

her back? No matter how bizarre it may seem to you? The way Ray

does?"

"Like what?" I asked, a little wary.

"More questions. Robert, I can assure you, you and Janice can

share your lives again. Not as before, but together. On her

terms. This can be done. I don't doubt it for a moment."

She set down her cutlery, folded her arms, leaned back, and

concentrated her gaze on me. "But you have much to learn. For

this to happen will require that you completely reconceive who and

what you are, and become someone else. You'll need to give

unquestioning obedience to my least suggestion for months, perhaps

three, perhaps more. You'll need to take a long vacation from your

office and concentrate altogether on this project. Or work at

home, or quit work altogether. At the end of that time, I will

bring you and Janice together again, and help you to re-negotiate

a new relationship I'm quite sure you'll both find satisfactory.

Even better than you've had. I can promise you that. I have no

doubt of it. But it requires unquestioning obedience."

"Now then. You can agree to my terms now or not at all. If

you hesitate now, you're not worth my time, and I doubt you'll see

your wife ever again."

I just stared at her! What was she proposing?

"I see you're finished eating. No, Ray, wait with the

dessert. I'll ask one more time only, Robert, and then you'll have

to take your problem somewhere else. Will you submit to learn from

me how to be your wife's kind of woman?"

A leap of faith was required. I still didn't understand her.

But Ray had said she knew how to accomplish miracles.

"Yes, Melissa, I will."

"You will," she said. Her voice was now lightly sardonic, and

she was still eying me steadily. "Perhaps and perhaps not. It

won't be that easy. No, Ray, don't get up just yet, not even to

clear the table. I want you here."

Ray had started to stand and reach for our dishes. He now sat

back down, looking at his wife expectantly, silent, waiting, a bit

wary. He knew she was full of surprises.

"All right, Robert. We'll see. Let's test whether you mean

what you've just said, that you'll do whatever I ask of you,

immediately and unconditionally."

She looked at me steadily. "Robert, I want you to get under

the table and give Ray a blow job, right now, before he brings us

whatever he's prepared for dessert!"

Did I hear her correctly? I had! I knew it! I looked at her

and half rose, more shocked than when I had read Janice's letter.

Outraged. I was speechless! I knew this time I'd heard her

correctly. Give Ray a blow job?! Was I a faggot?

"Good!" she said. "No indignant outcry this time, stalling

for time and hoping for a reprieve. You did hear me! You may be

capable of learning after all! I won't repeat myself. I assume

you're standing up in order to crawl under the table as I've

suggested."

"Notice how this little test respects your natural modesty,

though you'll lose it before long if you continue with me. For

now, no one will see what you're doing under the table, not even

Ray. I'll know because I'll know you wish to obey me without

question, and I'll know whether you're doing it well by watching

Ray's face. Your private feelings will remain your own, whatever

they may be. Until you come to feel that sucking cock whenever I

request it brings you such pleasure that you want others to share

in it by letting them see."

"Notice also, Robert, that I'm asking you to do no more than

any woman does for a man when asked. When Janice hears about it,

I'm sure she'll be impressed, especially that you're practicing

same-sex oral sex, just as she does. Are you woman enough? We're

waiting, Robert."

"Melissa, I need to go to the bathroom first."

Ray was speaking. Trying to get me off the hook, I suspect.

I noticed that he spoke quietly, as if merely to excuse himself

from the table for a moment, to stall things until I could recover

myself and get used to the idea, or could decide Janice wasn't

worth it, or until Melissa could change her mind. But I noticed he

didn't move. He just looked at her as he spoke. She didn't even

glance at him, but continued to gaze at me.

"All the better," she said. "There will be no male-bonded

conspiracies against my intentions here, my pet. What I have in

mind for Robert will take months even if Robert does everything I

ask him immediately and precisely, the way you always do. You two

will be together almost constantly, and he'll need to do whatever

I ask of him, day or night. This isn't even a beginning."

"Right now I've merely asked your friend to perform without

question or delay a common feminine sexual act, something every

high school girl learns to do early in her adolescence in order to

safeguard her virtue from worse. I don't doubt Janice did it to

boys when she was in high school. Any girl who didn't, didn't date

boys worth dating. You'll want to help him in this, Ray. Isn't

that so?"

Ray nodded.

"And didn't I promise you a treat before dinner ended?"

He nodded again. Was that a gleam in his eye?

"Now, since you say you have to go to the bathroom, Ray, let

me suggest that when Robert wraps his lips around your -- what is

it you men like to call it, your 'love-joint'? -- let me suggest

that you first relieve yourself directly into his mouth. I'm sure

Robert will accommodate you. If he won't, he won't, and this

little test of his dedication to his wife's return will have

ended."

She turned her attention back to me. "Robert, you'll swallow

everything Ray's cock offers you, gratefully, and you'll seem to

enjoy it. In time you really will enjoy it, the way Ray really

enjoys cooking these days. But if you don't want to provide your

friend here the relief he needs, the physical pleasure most women

provide most men, the loving mouth Janice was once willing to

provide you in exchange for yours, the mouth and tongue she now

provides her new lover, then you're not worth bothering with. Are

you willing? Don't answer me. Just do it or don't!"

She sat back and looked as if she was losing interest in this

whole affair. No more speeches. I was still half-risen,

half-crouched. I swallowed hard, bent, and without quite knowing

how I decided it, I slipped under the table.

It was snug down there. The table formed a low ceiling and

the carpet the floor, with the tablecloth draped around like the

walls of a Pasha's tent, and the light from the dining room

diffused. Close up were sights not ordinarily seen. Melissa's

knees close by, her legs curved gracefully down and crossed at the

ankles, her high-heeled pumps firm on the carpet. Her skirt half

way up her thighs, and those thighs like columns, and her legs clad

in smoky nylon, smooth, perfect, authoritative, female. There I

was on my knees in front of her, as if worshipful. As I looked she

opened her knees, ever so slightly. No doubt in the upper-world

she was amusedly watching for Ray's facial expressions to change.

I looked ahead of me and there were Ray's knees and pants

legs. His hands were nowhere in sight, maybe to keep things

uncomplicated for me. I crept over to him, swallowed, and rested

my chin on his knees. He didn't budge. Well, what was I here for?

I unzipped his fly, reached in and took out his penis, and held it

between the thumbs and fingers of both hands. Slack and soft and

smooth, about the same size as mine, also circumsized. The first

time in my life I had ever held a penis other than my own. From my

unique angle his purple cock head looked like a miniature Grecian

war helmet. I tried to think that's what it was, a helmet, though

its smooth pink-skinned shank intruded on my fantasy. It was

slowly elongating and thickening. He leaned back to give me more

room.

I tried to think of myself as a high school girl on a date,

crouched on the floor in the back seat of a car. That helped a

little. Very little. I needed more practice being a high school

girl, plainly. But there was nothing for it. Blotting out any

further thoughts I leaned forward and pushed the top of my head

into Ray's belly, then lowered my open mouth onto his member. Then

I pressed my lips tightly around it, closed my eyes, and waited for

whatever would happen.

It was still soft, like a warm, fat snake. After a moment I

felt a tangy liquid begin to enter my mouth, then more, and I

started swallowing it as fast as I could. On the exhale I could

tell that however fresh, it was piss. Though Ray was obviously

trying to help by drizzling into my mouth as slowly as possible, a

little fluid escaped the corners of my mouth and dribbled down my

chin onto his pants. He'd never tell Melissa how sloppy I'd been

while obeying her, I knew, but I worried nevertheless. I leaned

closer and wriggled my face more tightly into his crotch to make a

better seal, and began sucking ever so slightly. I drank and

drank, and he pissed and pissed as slowly as he dared, until

finally I had drained him.

While he was taking his leak I could breath only through my

nose, my mouth was so completely filled with his soft, smooth cock

and his salty urine. When he finished, and there was no more to

swallow, I could still smell his piss when I breathed out through

my nose. The aroma just wouldn't go away. Ray sat there, and my

face stayed buried in his pubic hair, his prick still in my mouth.

I wondered what his face conveyed to Melissa.

Then I began his blow job. I ran my lips all the way down to

the base of his cock and puckered them while licking the fat, soft

sausage that still filled my mouth full. Slowly it grew larger and

harder, but I noticed that it stayed as smooth as velvet or wet

satin. As it stretched out it began to provide me something to run

my lips up and down, and I moved my head and mouth onto him and

then pulled back, then down again. I kept tonguing and licking and

sliding my lips up and down and trying to press them together

around the base, but it got more difficult as his cock got harder

and longer. My mouth stretched as wide as it could open with my

teeth covered by my lips, and my jaw began to ache. But I kept

going.

Then at last his hips began to thrust up at me -- finally Ray

was excited enough to want to face-fuck me. I tried to raise my

head well over his cock to take it into my throat, because that

soft helmet kept bumping into the back of my mouth. It slid part

way down, but there just wasn't enough head room for me to change

the angle and swallow all of his meat. So I sucked and licked and

tongued him, and even tried blowing him up like a balloon, once or

twice. He got larger, and humped at me even more vigorously.

Then suddenly he raised his hips high off his chair and pressed

tight into my face, and his hands came from nowhere to push my head

into his lap. Here it comes, I thought. For a moment he held

himself high up, crammed into my mouth, tense, utterly unmoving,

and my head was also immovable. Then that huge meat in my mouth

began to pulse, spurting and squirting out something a little

salty, like his piss, but this time slick and creamy, and a little

sweet too. It didn't taste at all bad! Four, five, six, seven

times he squirted into my mouth, then paused, then a few more

times. My mouth filled up and I swallowed, and it filled again.

I swallowed all of it. By the time he finished and had fallen back

onto his seat I was rolling my tongue round and around the body of

his cock and then its head, licking it clean.

When I'd squeezed the last few drops into the little slit on

top of his cock head, and then licked them up, I kissed the tip of

his prick and then tucked it back in his pants. Then I patted his

bulge affectionately, and zipped him up. I don't know why. I

suppose I was feeling rather intimate at that moment. Maybe I

wanted to assure him it hadn't really been as unpleasant as he

might have feared. Or that I was grateful for my first experience

as a bona fide cock sucker. Or that I was feeling pleased to have

brought him off, even feeling a little smug. Or that I liked

feeling sweetly feminine, his worshipful date sucking on his

manly cock. It was our little secret, in the dark, no one watching.

Am I a faggot, I�asked myself? My next cock would be no problem

at all. No, not a faggot. A girl. How did Melissa know?

I crawled out from under and sat down again in my chair. I

smoothed back my hair with both hands, and looked over at Melissa.

The taste of Ray's semen had completely replaced the taste of his

piss, I realized, now that I was breathing air not previously

filtered through his dank pubic hair. I licked my lips and waited,

worried that I might seem to be smirking.

"Well, Robert," she said, now highly amused. "Obviously you

do have talents you've repressed. The woman in you is far more

venturesome than the man. I must help you to liberate her. You

did something down there at the very end of your session that

surprised and pleased Ray even in the afterglow of his orgasm. I

won't ask what, because every loving couple should have their own

intimate little secrets. This one is yours."

Ray smiled at me affectionately. I felt a little

uncomfortable, but I tried to smile back. His cum was slick on my

lips. I tried to look at him the way a high school girl might look

at her date. Well built, really very handsome in a way. I enjoyed

pleasing him. He was still my old poker buddy. But now, well,

something else too.

"Yes, I'll train you. Who knows, maybe you'll become a superb

lover, and Janice will beg for you to take her on again. Maybe

you'll find you're altogether a woman, a heterosexual woman who

loves men and can't ever get enough cock into her to satisfy her.

We don't know yet, do we?"

I sensed she was mocking me. I wished she wouldn't. She'd

just seen how far I'd go to get Janice back.

"'Bobbie.' That's your name when you're being girlie-girlie.

And that's from now on. I don't expect ever to see 'Robert' again.

'Bob' we'll keep on hold. Maybe Janice will want to use that name

if you end up more a 'Bob' than a 'Bobbie'. Bobbie dear, you've

just had your dessert. You can go home now."

"Before you go to sleep tonight, I want you to shave off all

of your body hair, every last hair below the tops of your ears, and

then to sleep in one of Janice's prettiest nightgowns. To be a

woman, you will need to feel like one and look like one. Always.

I'm sure you can find a sexy nightgown in her drawers. In fact,

I'm sure she's left most of her clothes behind. They're all yours

now, those that fit you, for the time being. I think you're close

to her size. From now on you'll wear only women's clothes, until

you've really become the woman Janice seems to want. Tonight

you've earned the right."

I hadn't even thought to see if Janice emptied her closets

when she left me. But Melissa was too clever to misjudge something

like that.

"Come back tomorrow at six-thirty am, ready to live your first

full day as a woman. I'll do your nails the first time, bright

red, so from tomorrow morning on you won't feel the least bit

tempted to leave the house looking male. Come fully dressed and

made up, bra, panties, lipstick, hairdo or wig, everything. You'll

have lots of housework to do tomorrow, so pick out an ordinary

house dress, or a plain skirt and blouse, nothing high drag, and

some sensible shoes, no heels just yet. Janice will be charmed I'm

sure when she hears that you're trying to win her back by wearing

her clothes."

"Probably you'll make a mess of your face until we can get you

some adequate training in the use of cosmetics. Don't worry, you

have a promising face, and I can see you'll end up looking just

lovely. But I do want you to fix your own face from the beginning.

I want you to find for yourself your own kind of woman, to create

your own look, so you can begin to discover what kind of woman you

are. While you're doing it, just think that you're making yourself

as feminine and attractive as you can for your man. For Ray.

You're going to learn to be gentle, considerate, sensitive, caring,

and devoted to him. And sexy."

"He'll help. For part of each day I'll want you two to just

cuddle together, and be sweet, and feel tender, and share thoughts

about how you feel together. If you're pretty enough, and nice

enough, I'm sure Ray will want to kiss you, and kissing will lead

to other things, and then you'll feel just wonderful, and that'll

be your reward. Won't you, Ray?"

He nodded, entranced. How terrific was that blow job I'd

given him? Whatever, Melissa certainly sounded like she knew what

she was doing. I could only hope so.

"Now, I leave the house promptly at eight-thirty. I'll want

you to learn everything you need to know about housekeeping from

your intimate friend here, starting tomorrow, beginning with how to

fix a wife's breakfast and present it to her in bed. That happens

at seven. Ray knows lots of tricks Janice will want you to know

once you start housekeeping for her, if she ever lets you. I'll

come home early tomorrow afternoon, and I'll try to keep my daily

calendar open for a while, to give you whatever other attention you

need. Ray can help you feel like a woman, I'm sure, but he knows

very little about being one."

"That's all for now, dear sweet Bobbie. Oh, one more thing.

Always wear a dash of perfume. Choose one and stay with it. A

personal signature is very feminine. And like red nail polish,

it'll help keep you committed to what you wish to become. A

lovable woman. That's all, dear."

I stood up. I noticed that Ray wasn't looking me in the eye.

Did he now think of me as a faggot his wife had designated to be

his girlfriend, and now he was embarrassed he'd once been buddies

with me? With a cock sucker? That last kiss on the tip of his

prick might have been a bit much. Whatever possessed me?!

"Oh yes!" Melissa added. "Bobbie darling, probably you didn't

know it, but your friend Ray is bi-sexual. He's had the hots for

you for a long time now. I'm glad that the two of you have finally

gotten it together, and that now you're his femme. When he's

playing out his own femininity he gets pretty swishy, even for me.

But your job will be to make sure he always feels like a real man."

"Remember, no hanky-panky when I'm not here. Kissing and

hugging and cuddling, of course. You're now Ray's girl, and the

two of you should feel affectionate and loving toward each other.

That's part of learning how Janice wants you to feel. In fact, the

more affectionate you feel the better. But no fucking up the ass

except when I say so, not by either of you." "

"Bobbie dear, Ray's cock will provide your after-dinner

dessert every night until further notice. That's if you've been a

good girl all day. His cum will be your reward, and sometimes his

pee -- that'll be between you two. I know you won't either of you

disappoint me. Bobbie, I promise you, when I'm finished with you

Janice will be proud you're her girl friend."

With that she smiled at Ray, and Ray beamed back at her,

obviously admiring, devoted, and grateful. I suddenly realized he

had special reason to feel grateful. Melissa had just provided her

husband his own personal toilet slave and cock sucker for the

foreseeable future, guaranteed affectionate. His prick was going

to become as familiar to me as an after-dinner cigar. Satisfying

him sexually, learning to provide him with whatever a man wants

from a woman, was going to become my purpose in life. Should I

feel grateful? Was I being taken? But how else could I ever hope

to get my wife back? Did I have any choice?

I went back across our back yard to my own house, filled with

more hope than suspicion, pleased that Melissa had agreed to tutor

me, impressed by her judgment, and a little awed by what lay ahead.

I did indeed have a lot to learn.

ii.

A month later, I'd learned most of it and was practicing, and

after another month I was accustomed to it all and found I

preferred some of it to my former ways. I even loved some of it.

I found after some anguished embarrassment that I loved

wearing women's clothes. I looked forward to picking out a

different outfit to wear each morning, appropriate to whatever we

were planning that day, and then picking out matching accessories.

In no time I had a sure eye for mixing, matching, and coordinating.

Men's clothes seemed so monotonous in comparison! And the clothes

always felt sensuous, hugging, clinging, draping, floating over me

like feathers, some nubby and some silky smooth. Being a girl

could be lots of fun! When I forgot, Ray always reminded me.

I always slept at home. "This is my house and Ray's," Melissa

said, "Though you're free to invite Ray to visit with you and to

spend the night, any time. That's any grown girl's prerogative

with her boy friend. As I've told you, I want you to cuddle and

feel intimate with each other as a matter of course. Enjoy each

other's bodies. Love your enjoyment of each other. But as I've

told Ray, I don't want him tempted by your soft tush until you're

ready to make mature choices. So remember, Ray takes your

virginity only when I say so and with your consent, and you get

into Ray's pants only for blow jobs. From now on think of your own

prick as a clit, fit for fondling, not for insertion into

anything."

Whether Ray was in bed with me or not, early each morning I

rose, showered, depillated if necessary, perfumed myself lightly,

and dressed myself in Janice's underwear and clothes, or else my

own. Then as the sun rose I crossed the back lawn to Melissa's

house, to fix her breakfast and Ray's. I hoped none of the other

neighbors noticed. But if they did, I decided, they probably

thought I was Janice.

First thing, I brought Melissa her morning coffee and

newspaper, on a tray topped by a bright-colored single-stemmed

flower. After the first few days I woke Ray too with a tray loaded

with bacon and eggs, and toast, and waffles or pancakes, and

coffee, also topped with a single bright flower. Or I returned to

our house to awaken Ray that way. Within a few weeks we were

sleeping together at our house as a matter of course, spooned in

with each other. At first his arms around me felt imprisoning,

but within a week they felt protective. Hairless myself, I liked

tangling my fingers in the hair on his chest.

Melissa told me always to awaken him with a kiss. I felt

silly the first few times, but I did it, and after a while it

seemed natural, even kind of nice. When he was still asleep or

first waking up, his lips were soft, and gently responsive. "I'm

the head of this household," she told me. "But Ray is the man of

the house. Be glad he's there for you to practice on, so you can

learn more about a woman's concerns." I looked forward to a time

when I could awaken Melissa the same way, to practice eventually

awakening Janice the same way.

One day when it seemed respectful, and not at all an intrusive

question, I asked Melissa in a soft voice if I might kiss her awake

too. Just for practice on a girl. She glanced up as she unfolded

her newspaper. "When the time is right," she said, almost

automatically. Then she looked at me a bit more warmly and started

to sip her coffee. "You're feeling more affectionate in the

morning, aren't you. More girlish. That's nice. Suppose from now

on you awaken Ray with a kiss on his cock, whenever you find he's

sleeping in a position that allows you access. Then if you're both

in the mood, you have my permission to let nature take its course."

With that she concentrated her gaze on the paper, and I was

dismissed.

My makeup gradually improved, and it began to be fun, doing as

instructed on each lesson of the videocassettes Melissa brought

home while using the different items of makeup she brought home.

Now when I looked at a woman's magazine, it was for ideas how to

improve my eye make-up, or hair style, or coordinated matching of

blouses and skirts, or finally, of evening gowns and eye-shadows,

if ever I would be permitted to attend a formal wearing a formal.

Janice had several I tried on sometimes, and a white sequinned one

was simply exquisite. I longed for an occasion when I could wear

it.

In very little time I understood why generations of women have

complained that they have nothing to wear, even though their

closets are bulging. The requirements for women's costumes are

daunting. Nothing may be worn tastelessly or twice, certainly not

for the same kind of occasion, and everything must blend. A woman

nicely turned out is a work of art. I learned to become an artist.

It seems silly now, but I felt paralyzed at first when Melissa

wanted me to leave the house dressed feminine. I just couldn't.

Despite her assurances and my mirror's, I was convinced everyone

would know at a glance that I was male, and a peculiarly perverse

and degenerate male. I couldn't be persuaded otherwise.

So Melissa cleverly designed a way for me to learn I was

passable beyond doubt. As she left for her office one morning, she

called over her shoulder, "Bobbie, I'll be sending some legal

papers home later today. Be sure to sign for them when they

arrive. It's important."

If Melissa said it was important, I had to do it. As she

certainly knew I would, I spent the morning in a fever of anxiety.

Could I hide behind the door when the messenger came, and just pass

my hand around it to receive Melissa's papers? Would I look to him

like a woman, or like a man wearing women's things? What kind of

voice should I use. Should I smile at him or look aloof? Should

I curtsy? The silliest ideas passed through my head. What if he

made a pass at me? I decided that I had to be so convincing a

woman there'd be no doubt of it, so I took a whole hour on my face,

and then fixing and re-fixing my hair. I practiced on a closet

door, opening it, leaning slinky against the opening, and saying in

a sultry voice, "You have something for me?"

When the front door chimed I had just about decided I was too

formally dressed for the morning, in a dark silk, high styled suit.

But now there was no time to change again! With my heart in my

throat I opened the door and stood to one side.

There stood not a male messenger but a nicely dressed girl in

her late teens. "Hi," she said. "I'm Andrea. I work in Melissa's

office. She told me to have you sign for these."

She handed me a fat package of papers, then unfolded a receipt

and handed it to me with a pen. I leaned the paper on the package

and signed.

"Thanks," she said as she took it back. "Love your perfume.

And that suit's scrumptious! Going to a wedding, or special

luncheon, or something?"

I nodded. I wasn't sure I could say anything.

"Thought so. Well..." she looked at my scrawled signature.

"Well, Barbara, you're gonna hate my telling you this, but you have

a run in your pantyhose -- I'm afraid you're going to have to

change them."

I looked down, but didn't dare bend down to see. Without even

thinking, I said, "Oh, dear!" in a natural-sounding, high-pitched

voice. "Thank you!" I was so nervous I couldn't not use a

high-pitched voice. Then I remembered politeness. "Thank you,

Andrea."

"No problem, Ma'am. See you again!"

And she was off. I closed the door, and within a few minutes

my heart had slowed to where I could breathe again. Then I smiled,

and I smiled all that afternoon. My first encounter with anyone

other than Melissa or Ray, and it never occurred to her I wasn't a

woman just like her! I could do this thing! Janice might be

willing to give me a second chance after all!

It then occurred to me that Andrea might have been a setup in

some way, instructed to address me as a lady no matter what my

appearance. Melissa was capable of such tricks. But a few days

later, the same thing again, only this time unintended and without

prior warning. And this time, a uniformed Fed-Ex messenger. I

felt comfortable, though I was only wearing a high-necked blouse

and skirt-not-quite-to-the-knee, and very little makeup, with my

hair pinned up. It was one of those days when I was practicing

walking in heels. I knew I had nice legs.

I smiled as I signed the messenger's delivery pad, and he

smiled back, holding my gaze longer than necessary, signalling an

interest in an invitation for something more. I felt this somehow,

and lowered my eyes, and said, "Thank you," and smiled again, and

slowly closed the door. At the last moment, he smiled back, and

said, "Thank *you*, Ma'am," and tucked his pencil in his cap, and

turned away. When Melissa got home and I gave her the package, she

looked at it, genuinely surprised. "This should have come to the

office, not here," she said. Then she looked at me sideways. "Are

you all right? Were there any problems?"

"None," I replied. And I told her about the messenger's

extended attempt at eye contact.

"Yes," she said. "Men do that all the time. He must have

found you attractive. Well, just remember that you're a married

woman. And that you're spoken for."

"That's easy," I replied. "Ray is the most attractive man

I've ever known!" It just slipped out!

Melissa smiled broadly. "Yes, isn't he." And mercifully, she

left the implications alone. She just said, "You'll soon be ready

for a trip to the beauty parlor, and to shop a few boutiques,

Bobbie. You are certainly getting there."

An occasion came sooner than either of us realized it would.

A few weeks after my training began, Melissa had a period, and

mentioned that she was having cramps. She asked Ray to come rub

her shoulders and back, and Ray took his arm from around my

shoulders, went over to where she sat, and obliged. She did look

tired. "When you're finished with her, Ray, I'll be waiting," I

said, maybe sounding a little catty. She stared at me and said

nothing. They were married, after all.

The next day she came home with a package, and after she had

disappeared into the bathroom for twenty minutes she called me to

join her. When I arrived she said, "Bobbie, sit on the edge of the

tub and just listen for a moment. I want this lesson to be

unforgettable."

I sat there and looked up at her. Ray was Melissa's cook, but

that day he was teaching me to be Janice's, and I had a roast in

the oven, and wanted to get down to baste it, and there were still

vegetables to prepare.

"You aren't sympathetic enough that women have periods and

feel bloated and cramped, so from now on you'll share mine. Maybe

later, Janice's. This is an high colonic enema and a specially

valved plug. The plug will restrict discharge of whatever I put

into you, so if you feel cramped, you can't eliminate it until

permitted. Not even to pass gas, poor dear, until this valve is

turned. Now, I'm going to fill your lower intestine with fluid,

the way a woman's uterus bloats monthly when it sheds its lining,

and you'll retain most of it except at certain intervals tonight

and tomorrow, when I'll allow release of some of it. The fluid is

a vaginal douche, a mild laxative, some female hormones to create

special mood swings as they're absorbed, and some mild soapsuds.

Oh yes, and red dye, so your napkins and tampons will remind you

what time of the month it is, and accidents will be as embarrassing

for you as for any other woman. Bend over."

I hoisted my skirt and dropped my panties, and Melissa

inserted the nozzle. Ten minutes later I was cramped and swollen,

and had to go the worst way.

"Back to the kitchen, darling," she said. " And finish

preparing our dinner. But slip this pad into your panties first,

in case there's an accident. Every two hours you can have 30

seconds to discharge your menstrual fluids. Other than that,

you'll retain them, or absorb them, or leak them. Next month, the

same thing. Or if Janice should take you back and want you to

share her monthlies with her, the same thing. Maybe with some

shots to give you PMS as well. So don't think of this induced

menstrual period as temporary training, or as a punishment. Think

of it as a fact of your life monthly from now until your

menopause."

I could barely straighten up. Two hours later I was near

tears when she released the valve and gave me my thirty seconds to

relieve the pressure. And two hours later still, the same. Two

hours after that I was in bed with Ray, sobbing. "I hurt," I cried

out to him. "I don't deserve this."

Ray was hugging me and trying to console me when Melissa came

into our room. "Well, the hormones seem to have melted all that

male stoicism," she said. "That's nice, Bobbie dear. I suspect

more of them might speed your progress in other ways too. Now you

can have a bit more relief, and I'll remove the plug, and you can

switch to a tampon. Remember to change it in the morning. You'll

have a few more small cramps during the day, leftovers. Then

tomorrow evening we'll do it all again. Aren't you glad that Ray's

here to console you? Even though men don't really understand, do

they? Well, Ray does, because I gave him this treatment a few

years ago, just once, and Ray is a dear, so once was enough."

Four days later the ordeal was over. Once or twice I cried

from the sheer discomfort, when the cramps wouldn't let up even

briefly. Once I had to excuse myself from dinner and go to the

guest room to lie down. Once "to cheer me up" Melissa said, she

took me to a beauty parlor just after filling me with fluid, and

had them give me a permanent, curls my hair had grown long enough

to sustain, and I had to act as if I were at peace with the world

when in fact I was in agony. I was so concerned not to double over

and become a spectacle that I hardly paid attention to where I was,

a beauty salon for the first time, and what they were doing to me.

I recall sitting in a chair while my hair was being wound up tight,

and different plastic bottles were squirting on me, and I was

sitting under a dryer hood with my clothes completely covered, so

women passing by scarcely bothered to glance at me -- I seemed so

much just one of them. I tried to read a copy of Vogue from a

table alongside, to distract me from waves of discomfort that swept

over me periodically. But I could pay little attention. I

remember they did my nails, and it was then that my ear lobes were

pierced. All while I was too distracted to feel frightened by

these commitments to femininity. Afterward Melissa questioned me

how I had felt, and she seemed pleased when I answered, "Like any

other woman who goes to the beauty parlor while she's having her

period, I suppose. Terrible!"

It was only a day or two later that I realized what I had

said. Any "other" woman. My identity was changing. Also, my

nipples became sore from the hormones in my menstrual fluid. As my

period ended, Melissa handed me some large pills. "Here," she

said. "You'll take these daily from now on, like any other woman

without her own ovaries."

It all seems perfectly easy now, so it's hard to remember that

at the time each teeny step toward femininity seemed a dangerous

leap over an enormous gulf. I was frequently terrified as Melissa

raised the ante and required more of me. One time, maybe because

she had just doubled my hormone intake, I burst out into tears and

then couldn't stop crying. No real reason. I just felt

overwhelmed suddenly. We were getting ready to go out to dinner,

the three of us, and I'd chosen a rather tight, flippy mini to

wear, I thought in good taste, and Melissa had sent me back for a

calf-length dress. "We're not dining in a whorehouse tonight,

dear," she commented. "You really need to control your sluttish

tendencies."

I realized she wasn't wrong. I liked feeling provocative.

But I came apart. I suppose I'd been trying too hard, going as

girly as possible, so no one would dream that I was a man in

women's clothes. But when I started sobbing, for once Melissa

didn't turn aloof. Instead she hugged me, and kissed me gently,

and when I had calmed down a little she quietly reminded me that

half the human race had already walked where I feared to tread, and

that it was nothing, really. Perhaps I felt anxious about seeming

to be a girl because in some way deep in my psyche, I desired it?

"Let go being a man," she coaxed me. "Ray does that so much better

than you do. Be the woman he'd love you to be, the woman your wife

desires! Just a woman in the normal, everyday course of things,

because that's what you are and it therefore requires no further

thought."

Another time toward the end of my training I was buying panties to

replace those that were sometimes stained beyond recovery whenever

Ray and I ... well, never mind. I was wearing a nice skirt of

course, not even pants, and I know my hair and face were

persuasive. But I suppose I forgot to move carefully, to walk with

my thighs close together and my shoulders held back, or I forgot to

keep my wrists loose, or perhaps some other movement betrayed me,

because the saleslady asked with a strange smirk, "Shall I wrap

these, sir?" Earlier I would have felt embarrassment wash over me

and drown me utterly, and I would have fled from the store confused

and ashamed, then and there. Instead I felt indignation. "Well,

I'm certainly not going to wear them all now, young woman," I

snapped at her in my best high dowager voice, and she completed the

transaction rapidly, with her own shoulders sunk down in shame.

When I told Melissa about this encounter, she pointed out that its

importance wasn't that I had been "read" because of a moment's

lapse, but that I instinctively felt insulted to be thought a man.

I smiled at that. So I was!

With each step from that first morning, I found, there was no

going back. Melissa saw to that. Over the next few months she

insisted that I accept body hair removal, painted nails, pierced

ears, a feminine hair style, then later beard electrolysis, hormone

treatments, and voice training. And she insisted I wear only

women's clothing, always wear make-up, and when I appeared on the

streets to appear only as a woman, always to seem like one. To

persuade myself that I have always been a woman at heart, a woman

who mistakenly thought herself a man. My willingness became the

way Melissa measured the strength of my commitment to convince my

wife to return to me. She reminded me of this whenever I balked.

During the third month of this feminizing discipline I became

increasingly impatient to show Janice what a dear girlfriend I'd

become, how loving we could be when she returned. I practiced on

Ray all the time.

iii.

I was glad when my first period ended and I could put away my

napkins and tampons for another few weeks. At least mine were

predictable, not likely to begin embarrassingly when I was out

shopping or at a business meeting, where I'd need to excuse myself,

or worry whether I'd stained my skirt or slacks before I'd noticed.

But one evening two weeks later Melissa came home with a special

gleam in her eye.

"I think tonight we'll try to make you pregnant," she said.

"What!?" I replied, stifling a note of inquiry even as I

uttered the word, Melissa did not respond well to questions.

"That should be interesting!" I finished lamely, with hollow

enthusiasm. What could she have in mind?

"I don't mean you'll get pregnant," Melissa said. "But about

now is when you would be ovulating. I think we should try. You

need to know how a woman feels when she contains a man, and then

can feel his seed deep inside her, and can imagine how at that

moment his seed may be bonding with a part of her own body to form

a new life."

"Melissa, I don't have a vagina. Or the rest of it."

She looked at me with contempt. "Are you such a virgin you

can't even imagine what I'm talking about, Bobbie? I thought you

had a feminine imagination! Don't you want to know how women feel

about everything women do? Don't you want to understand being a

woman?"

I realized what she was proposing, and heard the implied

threat, swallowed hard, and said "Yes, Melissa, I do. I want to

experience everything." This was going to complete my journey into

faggotry for sure. True, it would provide some sense how Janice

felt when I fucked her, so some day I could fuck her with greater

consideration, the way a woman would I suppose. The way some woman

was doing her with a dildo, maybe at this very moment. I swallowed

again. "Melissa, I don't want to be a virgin any more," I added.

"Good!" she said. "You'll find a pretty nightgown on the bed

in the guest room upstairs. I selected it for you a few days ago,

when I realized you're just about ready. Change, make yourself

pretty with whatever makeup is in your purse, and wait for me.

I'll be a few minutes. Oh yes, you'll find a large box of prepared

douches in the bathroom. Give yourself two now, so your insides

will be sweet and fresh. Then you may want to douche again later,

perhaps. Perhaps not."

I did as she asked. Then I sat on the bed, waiting. This was

some kind of watershed moment, I was thinking, but I have to go

through it to get to the other side.

When Melissa came in, I was shocked. Her hair was bound back

severely, as it sometimes was days when she meant to intimidate

opposing attorneys, but for the first time she wasn't impeccably

dressed. In fact she was wearing a black chemise that covered her

breasts and ended at her navel, and below that, nothing. Well, not

quite nothing. She was naked from the waist down, but strapped to

her mound, in the appropriate position if she had been a man, was

an enormous erect penis. It looked to be maybe nine or ten inches

long, and it would have frightened me except that it wasn't that

thick. Maybe only an inch. *Only* an inch, I said to myself, when

nothing thicker than the enema nozzle or once, Melissa's probing

finger, had ever been in there.

"Here you are, Bobbie dear. This will change you from a girl

into a woman. Let it know how it feels in your mouth."

She stepped close, and sitting on the edge of the bed, I bent

slightly and licked the tip. It was a soft rubber or plastic, but

rigid enough. Habit took over, and though it was much thinner and

longer than Ray's cock I quickly fell into the same rhythm, licking

and sucking and running my lips up and down it, even deep-throating

it once of twice. Melissa took my head between her two hands and

guided my movement up and down her cock a few times. It was soon

slick with saliva.

"Now, sweetie, on your back, spread wide, and pull your knees

up as high as they'll go."

I did that. I felt terribly vulnerable. My asshole utterly

exposed, about to be invaded.

"Now close your eyes, and keep them closed until I tell you

otherwise. Grasp the bars at the head of the bed, and don't let go

until I tell you."

I reached over my head behind me, found them, and held on. It

felt good, having something to brace myself with.

"There. You're ready. Now, Bobbie, tell me what you want."

"I want you to fuck me, Melissa. Put your prick into me."

"My, how romantic! Ask me again. Beg me. Persuade me you're

eager for me, overwhelmed with desire!"

"Please, Melissa," I said. "I'm ready! I want you! Please,

please, make love to me! Now, please!" As I said it, I was

thinking first, let's get this over with. Then I was thinking,

let's make a beginning, so I can see what it's like. How Janice

feels when I fuck her. Then I was thinking, I wonder if it will

feel as good as Janice sometimes seems to feel when I take my time

with her. Maybe I'll learn to love it?

Before I could think further, Melissa touched her cock's head

to my puckered anus, thrust it in an inch and stretched me nearly

painfully, and paused. I took a deep breath, and held it, feeling

a peculiar sensation, a little like passing a turd. The feeling

changed from full to snug to comfortable. Then in a single

spasmodic thrust of her hips she buried it into me. I felt her

loins squeezing tight against my thighs, then she began to slide it

out again. Then in, all the way in, but slowly, the nine or ten

inches this time making a gradual progress into my ass and deep

into my guts. Almost majestic. Then out again."

"Do you love me for doing this to you?"

"Yes, Melissa." I thought I sounded too dutiful. "Oh, yes,

oh, yes!" By the second "yes," I was thinking, this is strangely

pleasant! Rather wonderful, in a way. Feeling so full of her. Of

her dildo, anyway. When she was fully into me yet again, I said,

"Yes, I love it!" By then I did!

She did me slowly, in and out, for another few minutes, now

and then lubricating herself with something I could feel but not

see.

Then she stopped and withdrew all the way. "Just a moment,"

she said. "I want to change to something thicker. You'll

appreciate it more. Eyes tight shut."

I gripped the bars and waited.

Then slowly something warm and fat pushed against my anus and

then slid in. Warmer and fatter and smoother. What was she using

now? It stretched me to the utmost. But it was all the way in me

much sooner, and then just held there while her hip bones pressed

against my thighs.

"Wrap your legs around your lover," she said. "Dig your heels

into the small of his back."

I did. The prick snuggled into me more tightly, then pulled

almost out, then pushed in, and I began to seek it when it wasn't

filling me up. I began to lunge down toward it so it could

re-enter me sooner. I tightened my legs around his back, and

pushed myself at it.

His back. Why did I say that? I realized that the pleasure

of feeling a fat cock moving in me had monopolized my other

sensations. The waist my legs were embracing wasn't Melissa's,

smooth and narrow, but thicker. And a little hairy. I almost

opened my eyes to see what was happening, but the body pushing at

me suddenly changed rhythm and began a feverish pounding. I

winced, closing my eyes even tighter. Then I grabbed the bars

behind me hard, and thrust back hard.

"Now, Bobbie, now you can throw your arms around your lover's

neck and cover him with kisses, and open your eyes."

I did. I felt the friction of a beard on my lips. I opened

my eyes. Of course. It was Ray, eyes shut, frowning in

concentration, pounding his meat into me as hard as he could,

faster and faster. An erotic sensation began to move through my

loins, and I wondered whether his belly was masturbating my cock.

No matter. I felt repelled for only a moment. I was being fucked

in the ass by a man. But now that was irrelevant. More and more,

it felt glorious as he worked his cock through me, in and out. I

hugged him as hard as I could with my arms and legs, and we began

to move to his rhythm as if we were one body, until he stiffened

and pushed himself mightily into my asshole, deep, deep, and I

could feel his fat prick spasm. Did I imagine now that I could

feel his hot seed spraying deep into my guts? That I was now

keeping his precious cum safe inside me? That now, as Melissa

said, we were lovers?

I locked my lips to his and kissed him deeply, as he held his

body tight against mine in the spasm of cumming, and in spasms of

my own I felt myself cum on my belly, and his too. I realized I

had been holding my breath! Now as I disengaged my face I began to

breath again, deeply, through my mouth. Ray kissed me, and I

kissed him back, just a peck this time. He pulled his cock out of

my ass, and I felt empty. I didn't want him to go. Reluctantly I

unwrapped my legs and just lay there with my eyes closed, savoring

the afterglow. So many new feelings down there.

"Now," Melissa's voice said, this time from the bedside chair

at the head of the bed. "Now, Bobbie, you're no longer a girl.

Are you a woman or a faggot? Do you love Ray's cock in you as a

woman would love it, or as a man?"

"I don't know," I said. I honestly didn't. But I realized I

had just confessed to her that I loved Ray's cock in me. I

considered the matter some more. No way did I feel like a man. "I

feel like a woman, I think," I added uncertainly.

"Well, there'll be lots more times for you to find out. From

now on. Never mind your douche this time. Now you want to know

that your man's semen is inside you, that you're absorbing his

essence and making it your own. Here's a tampon, meanwhile. Slip

it into you so you don't leak, and get dressed. We're going to

celebrate the loss of your virginity by going out to dinner.

Nothing fancy, but be sure you look pretty. You have a lovely glow

in your cheeks, a well-fucked look, and I'm sure you'll want

everyone who looks at you to think, 'there's a woman who looks

well-fucked,' not 'that's a man'."

Our excursion to a small local restaurant seemed so

anti-climactic after what I had just been through, what I had done,

that it didn't occur to me the world might doubt, when they glanced

at me, that I was what I seemed. I felt like what I seemed. I

wore a skirt and a short blazer open to show a loose purple silk

blouse hung with a long gold chain. My hair was a mess, but I

primped it here and there with my fingertips until it recovered the

curls from the permanent wave I'd gotten during my period, and it

passed well enough. I changed my tampon in the ladies' room, and

as I walked back to the table I thought to myself, I've just had a

man inside me. I'm desirable. His cum is still deep in my body.

I felt proud, and very feminine. My hips were swishing as I

approached my chair, and Melissa looked at me smiling. She knew

why.

Thereafter, Melissa didn't require that I suck Ray's cock

nightly before dessert, or instead of dessert. "From now on, you

two can go upstairs to the guest room or over to Bobbie's house for

an hour or two after dinner," she said. "You can watch TV if you

wish, but there are better things for lovers to do. What you do is

your affair, not mine. Just be sure that they're the kinds of

things that men do with women. Just be sure you're exploring your

femininity with Ray, Bobbie. That's what Janice would want,

wouldn't she?"

After a while I began to dress and make myself up to look as

nice as I could for dinner, because I knew I'd always have a date

afterward, and I wanted to look my very best for Ray. Whether I

then cock sucked or fucked him, I knew he appreciated my trying to

look my prettiest. When Melissa suggested that I take my hormones

by injection instead of pills, I agreed, to help speed the process

of feeling and looking more feminine, for Ray for now, though of

course eventually for Janice.

iv.

A month later it was February, with a hint of Spring in the

air. As my appearance changed I realized I'd never be returning to

my former self or my old job, so I resigned, and at Melissa's

suggestion took a short course in cosmetology. The other girls

were mostly teenagers, but I fit in. I loved learning little

tricks for looking romantic or mysteriously beautiful, and what

those girls told each other about how to control their boy friends

was a revelation!

By now I was habituated to feeling like a woman. I dressed in

women's clothing all the time, enlarging Janice's collection with

many items of my own, less cute, more my style, conservative but

with a kicky flair, more like the kind of woman I had become. More

me. Sometimes I shopped with Ray and asked his opinion of things,

and it was disappointing that he was as uninterested in dress

styles and colors as I had once been. I had a regular weekly

appointment at the beauty salon for a wash, set, and manicure, and

Melissa had me take a few collagen shots to improve my appearance,

to give my lips a more pouty expression "more attractive to women

as well as men," she pointed out, "because we women enjoy imagining

full lips sucking our slits the way men love to imagine them

wrapped around their meat. I'm sure Ray will love it."

That reminded me. I was looking and feeling more and more

like a woman every day, but I still had no idea how women really

make love with each other. I wanted to be as attractive to Janice

as I could be, in every way, when she returned to me. I mentioned

this to Melissa, and she just said, "You're doing just fine, honey.

Just look how Ray can't wait to be with you each day. You're a

lovely girl, and you'll be lovelier before we're through. Janice

will adore the new you."

She had expected to schedule me for breast implants, but they

weren't necessary. I responded very quickly to my accelerated

hormone regimen. It smoothed and rounded my body, and my breasts

grew to fill a B Cup with my nipples still swollen, still

deliciously sensitive, more growth expected. She was pleased to

see how gently I cradled Ray whenever he sucked on them. I took

voice training, and now whenever I answered the phone, no one ever

confused my voice with a man's. All this, I told myself, was to

show my commitment to my marriage, so Janice could see how much I

cared for her.

But I have to admit it, uppermost in my mind when I was

dressing and primping for dinner each evening was looking beautiful

for Ray, so he'd feel tempted to nurse on me, or push his beautiful

cock into me night after night. That felt so delicious that even

the anticipation filled my whole body with longing every afternoon,

and when he gently slid into me I'd feel fulfilled almost all at

once, then begin building toward more voluptuous tensions, then the

exquisite feelings of peak and release I realized were female

orgasms.

To know that you're desired! Sometimes it sent me to shops

far outside of town, where for example I could buy handcrafted

earrings that were just perfect for a new hairdo I was trying out.

To feel pretty for my man! Even though he never seems to notice!

That certainly is how women feel, I realized! Previously I'd

thought it silly. Now I understood.

One night after dinner Melissa disappeared upstairs, and Ray

and I went into the living room together, feeling especially

affectionate. An hour later I was so filled with his semen, the

dear man, so brimming over that I needed to change a tampon yet

again, and thought I might even need a pad. No spares in my purse.

I went upstairs to borrow something of Melissa's.

"Aaahhhh! Oh! OOOhhh!" Loud moaning came from Melissa's

bedroom. I paused outside her door. They weren't really cries of

ecstasy or sexual gratification, more like cries of relief, like a

parched throat swallowing quarts of water after a long drought.

They didn't sound like Melissa, either. I peered in where her door

was still open a crack.

I could see Melissa facing the door, slouched back on the bed,

leaning back on piles of pillows, her arms draped apart like a

mid-eastern potentate, her thighs and knees spread wide, her legs

hanging off the bed. What seemed from behind to be another woman

was kneeling in front of her with her face buried in Melissa's

crotch. She was really working away at it. I'd never seen anyone

so hungry -- it was almost like feeding time at the zoo. She was

slurping, and sucking, and licking, and writhing as if trying to

push her whole head all the way into Melissa's slit, and moaning

because she couldn't. As I listened, her outcries sounded more and

more like squeals of delight, the kind I'd just been making with

Ray.

So Melissa likes being eaten by another woman, I thought!

Well! She always did seem a little dykey to me, I thought. I

wonder what Ray knows about this.

But as I looked, I couldn't tell if Melissa was enjoying it or

not. Her face was calm, impassive. I suddenly realized she wasn't

concentrating on her feelings, but was instead looking straight at

me through the same crack in the door, straight into my eyes,

unruffled and untroubled, as if she were merely nursing an infant,

or had momentarily looked up from a book in her lap, not from that

frantic head still rutting into her. Then she smiled at me and

looked down, where her hand affectionately stroked the other

woman's head.

Who was she? Where had she come from? What was happening?

When had Melissa taken a lover? How had I never noticed before?

Did Ray know? I went back downstairs and was about to tell Ray

what I'd seen, but he was uninterested -- he pulled me down on top

of him and began trying to paw my bra open again, obviously ready

for yet another go. The dear man! So, ten minutes later I was on

Melissa's living room couch again, plastered around my darling Ray

with my arms tight around his neck and my legs clamped around his

waist, and he was creaming me with swift, deep thrusts into my

asshole. Oh, God! He was so wonderful!

"Ohhh, uhhh, ahhh, uhh!" I kept calling out. "Uhh, uhh, ohhh!

Deeper! Ohh, ahhh, ahhh!" Then again as I felt him spurt deep

inside my bowels, I came too!

"Oh, dear, God, your prick is so heavenly," I said, still

thrusting toward it as it softened. I couldn't wait for him to

climb forward as he always did, and drop it into my open mouth for

licking and cleaning. But right now I wanted him to remain in my

ass forever.

"Melissa was right," I heard a familiar woman's voice say just

over my shoulder. "You do make a wonderful woman. You and Ray are

the most passionate couple I've ever seen. Didn't I tell you you'd

soon find someone who would help you feel the way I feel about

Melissa? And didn't you?"

That voice! Janice! Janice's voice, from the easy chair just

beyond my head! My wife's voice! I squirmed, trying to turn

around to look! How long had she been there? Had she seen and

heard this whole show? Should I feel ashamed? Proud?

Just then Ray disengaged his cock from inside me, crept

forward, and straddled my head with his knees so I couldn't move.

His balls and prick dangled over my mouth, and he lowered them as

he always did, so I could lift my head slightly and choose which I

wished to lick clean first. I tried again to look behind me.

"Janice?!" I tried to say. Ray's softened prick filled my mouth

full. I had to suck and lick the cum off it, and then off his

balls, before I could turn to confirm who had spoken. My mouth

began licking reflexively. "Thanith?" I asked between slurps.

"Yes, that's who. Melissa thought it was time I saw how happy

you are now that you're fully feminized, how much you've changed.

So I'd agree to the way she changed our original plan."

"Thanith?"

"Just lick your lover clean, dear. Yes, Janice. Your own

dear wife. My! When Melissa and I first hit it off, I guess

nearly two years ago now, and we talked about what to do with you,

she told me you'd make a marvelous cock sucker, properly motivated.

Well, I wanted you to love licking pussy, not sucking cocks. My

pussy! Now look at you! A cock sucker is certainly what you've

become. And to judge by what I just saw and heard while Ray was

reaming you, that isn't the half of it! You seem now to be the

most passionate and devoted woman a man could wish for, at both

ends!"

I gave Ray a customary last lick on his balls and kiss on the

tip of his prick, his signal that we were finished. He then

dismounted from my head and knelt beside me, kissing both my

eyelids. Even though I was still struggling to turn to look at

Janice, I closed my eyes to receive this now familiar post-fuck

affection, and without thinking I lifted my mouth and kissed his

gratefully, with a soft peck, as I always did.

"That's just beautiful, Bob," Janice said. "Or Bobbie, I

suppose, now. Don't let me hurry you! Enjoy your man!"

I felt a sudden, terrible twist of shame. "Janice!" I cried

out! "This was for you! I did all this for you! I've became a

woman so you'd come back to me! So I'd know how you feel! So

you'd want to live with me instead of the woman you'd gone off to

live with!"

It struck me like a club! My high, flute like voice got so

high that it squeaked. It does that when I'm excited -- Melissa

and Ray think it's cute. "Good heavens, Janice! Was Melissa the

woman you went off to live with? Melissa? But how?"

"Oh?" Janice said. She ignored my question. "You became a

woman for me?" I wished she looked less amused. "And now that

you're a woman, do you prefer me to Ray? When Ray was sliding into

you just now and you were moaning like a bitch in heat, and when he

started pounding you, well, even I had to come see who was making

all that noise. You never made those sounds with me, my dear, and

certainly you never brought them out of me! For taking pleasure

from a man, you're more of a woman than I am!"

I sat up and tried to straighten my clothes. I could feel

Ray's cum begin to leak out of me again. I hoped it wouldn't stain

my dress, a favorite of mine and also of Ray's, a slightly formal

black satin, off-the shoulder and decollete. I tucked in some

kleenex and I pulled up my panties and I looked at Janice,

bewildered. I had become a woman. What more did she want? There

was something wrong.

Janice looked down for a moment, looking for the right way to

say something. Then she looked up, and her expression was now more

kindly than amused. She began slowly. "Bobbie -- I guess that's

who you are now -- Bobbie dear, I do appreciate your efforts. I

can't imagine anything more considerate. You're a dear love.

Always have been. But I'm afraid you're the wrong kind of woman."

I listened, my eyes wide on her.

"I take pleasure from women. You know that now. I began in

college, in between boy friends. It was nice. Then during the

past few years, when you've been working late at the office, or

sitting in front of the tube being a bore, and I wanted to get out

of the house, and I didn't want to violate our marriage by taking

up with some man, I'd go out sometimes to one of the few places a

lone woman can go and feel safe. There aren't many such places.

Movies, maybe. Then I started stopping in at our local lesbian

bar, you know it, "Tops 'n Bottoms"? The one in that shopping

plaza just down from the mall? Just to chat? Mostly just to chat,

but after a while, sometimes to do other things. And arrange to do

other things with other women, in various places, sometimes at

their places and sometimes home afternoons and evenings when you

were tied up at the office."

"Then one evening a dear friend introduced me to the most

wonderful woman she knew, strong-willed, clever, a woman she said

could get anyone to do anything. She said she'd change my life,

that I just had to meet her, and one night I did. Can you imagine

my surprise? Melissa! It was Melissa! Can you imagine Melissa's

surprise?"

"Well, the long and the short of it is, Melissa and I have

been lovers ever since! Passionate, deeply devoted lovers. Nearly

two years, and even with her living right next door I couldn't ever

get enough of her! When I'm licking her pussy, or she nuzzles

mine, it's just bliss. Sheer bliss! When we caress each other,

rapture! When we sip each other's breasts it's utter ecstasy! I

can't keep my hands off her. That's why I'm here right now. We

arranged for me to stay away for three months, travelling around

the country, until she'd finished changing you. But here I am,

back a little early. I missed her so. I had to come back!"

"Last summer it was, when we decided finally what to do about

you. I thought, finally. It came about like this."

"I told Melissa one day that I wanted to leave you for good

and live with her. The same sort of thing I put into my letter to

you. But she said no, it wasn't possible. For one thing, she'd

put so much work into training Ray, that now he's a perfect

housekeeper and cook, and her sexual slave in lots of ways, when

she wants one. He does anything she asks, she told me, and he

loves and worships her. She couldn't abandon him for me, he'd be

devastated. And he couldn't come with us either. It wouldn't be

fair to take him away from his friends, because they're all he has

most of the time, when she's wrapped up in her lovers. He never

has sex with her any more. 'He's already given up too much for

me,' she said."

So we worked out another plan. We'd all stay right here. But

you'd be changed into a different kind of person. I'd leave you

the way I did, and you'd feel distressed the way you did, so you'd

do whatever Melissa asked you. Melissa would then make you into a

substitute for herself, for when I couldn't be with her. You'd

become more like a woman in your lovemaking. More considerate, and

sensitive. I didn't mind your remaining a man, but I did mention

one day that it would be nice if you were more like a woman

whenever you were caressing my nipples, or licking my pussy. If

you had a delicate touch. If you had breasts I could kiss."

"Well, Melissa saw no problem with that. 'You go away and

enjoy yourself,' she said. 'And when you get back, I assure you

your Robert will look and behave like a woman.'"

"And what do I find, now I'm back? My husband looks and

behaves like a woman, all right. And he thinks and feels like a

woman, apparently. But not my kind of woman. Not a woman's woman.

I told Melissa I didn't care whether you finished butch or a femme,

I can go either way. But you're neither. You're a man's woman.

Dear, you aren't my woman now, you're Ray's woman. Can you deny

it? Let's face it, I came home to find that my husband has become

a cock-starved slut who loves to fuck other men! At least one

other man, anyhow."

"I did tell Melissa I didn't want to come back and find I was

married to a faggot, and she assured me I wouldn't. And I guess

you're not. You're not a man who likes men. You aren't gay or

queer. In your own mind you're straight. In your own mind you're

a woman who likes men. Aren't you? Well, that wasn't supposed to

happen. I think Melissa may have done this deliberately. She can

be so sly, that darling! But you're not who I wanted you to be."

I swallowed hard. I loved being what I was. Should I plead

with Melissa to make me over again, this time into a lesbian? The

remembered feel of Ray's cock swelling in my mouth silenced me.

"I'm sorry, darling. We can still have some kind of

relationship, I'm sure. But as what? Not as husband and wife.

For heterosexual loving you prefer Ray to me, now, don't you. And

you never were much of a natural lover of women at best. I suppose

Melissa's had something in mind all this time, and we'll just have

to find out what."

"And you know something else? Even if you were now what I

asked for, a lesbian lover for when I'm not with Melissa, I'm not

sure I'd want you that way any more. I've been with a lot of women

in the last three months. A lot. No men, I've been faithful to

you, just as I know you've been faithful to me. But now I know

your limitations. You don't have a pussy, that delicious fragrant

slit women like Melissa have between their legs. You have nothing

for me to lick but that oversized clit, nothing like Melissa's

tender little button. I see you do have breasts now, and they look

just lovely. But I suspect you grew them for Ray, not for me, and

you think of them as attractive to men, not as a means for pleasing

other women. Isn't that so? Well, Melissa's breasts are

altogether for women like me, and I just love them. And mine are

hers."

I could feel my wife slipping away even as she sat there. As

if from a distance, I called out "Janice! Please come back!" She

just looked at me. She knew I meant something else.

"Janice darling!" Suddenly there was Melissa's voice.

We both looked up. Unnoticed, Melissa had come down. She was

now leaning over the back of Janice's chair, listening. She began

to caress Janice's hair, and then her hands slipped down past

Janice's shoulders and began to tease Janice's nipples through her

thin sweater. I noticed that Janice had no bra on underneath, and

that she was relaxing into Melissa's hands, surrendering her

breasts into them.

All the while Melissa looked steadily into my eyes with a

slight superior smile that told me the only way I'd ever live with

Janice again would be on Melissa's terms. She'd won. And I didn't

even know yet what game she'd been playing.

"Janice honey, come to bed," Melissa said. "Ray, would you

take Bobbie over to her own house, and spend the night there with

her? She needs some special loving tonight, I'm sure, the poor

confused dear. I have some things I need to explain to Janice.

Then tomorrow we'll all have cocktails and dinner here, and talk

some more, and if Janice and I agree that what I've done is for the

best, we'll explain everything to Bobbie, and I'm sure Bobbie will

understand everything. And agree to everything. Bobbie honey, I

told you that you and your Janice will be together again. Don't

worry your pretty little head about it. You will be."

She leaned over Janice and kissed her. Janice lifted her head

to kiss her back, and then reached one hand way up to pull

Melissa's head closer. Their kiss became grew in intensity, and

became almost ferocious. Then she stood up, and without another

word to me the two of them made their way upstairs, wrapped up in

each other.

Ray came over and sat down next to me. He took my hands and

clasped them in his. They were much larger and stronger. "Bobbie,

remember how I told you once that my wife does things in strange

ways, but they always work out for the best? Tomorrow you'll

understand. This isn't what you or Janice expected, exactly. But

it's been the only way all along. You'll see."

He leaned over and kissed me, full on the mouth. My cock

stirred ever so slightly in my panties, and he reached up to caress

my nipples. I started to melt, yet again.

"Lets get over to your place," he said. "We don't need to be

wearing all of this clothing any more tonight."

v.

Ray left me soon after breakfast, to begin preparing what he

called "our first dinner together as lovers," whatever that meant.

I took Melissa her breakfast as usual, and took up a second

identical tray for Janice, not knowing how I'd feel when I saw them

together, or even if they were sharing the same bed. They were.

They were sitting up chatting animatedly, and I interrupted them

with my knock. As I came forward to set the trays down and arrange

them on each of their bed-tables, Melissa watched me with the same

superior smile as last night. This time Janice had some of the

same. "Oh, lovely, Bobbie," she said. "How very sweet. Just set

it here, and we'll call you when it's time to take it away. Love

your hair. And I didn't tell you yesterday, your figure looks so

much nicer now."

"Thank you, Ma'am," I replied without thinking, as I

straightened the flower on her tray. My own wife! 'Ma'am' I

called her! The two women resumed their private conversation as if

I were no longer in the room. I turned and left.

I spent the morning house cleaning -- now that Janice was

back, and somehow might be living in this house with me again,

everything had to be spotless. I separated out our dresses and

lingerie in our drawers and closets, in case she wanted to reclaim

hers. I now had plenty of my own. At midday I shaved off the few

fine hairs that were to be found on my body -- hormones and

electrolysis had seen to the rest -- and then I soaked in a

perfumed bubble bath until my skin felt like satin all over.

Then I spent three hours in the beauty parlor getting a

makeover with all the trimmings. I wanted to be stunning,

ravishing. For whom wasn't clear -- Janice would drift into my

mind's eye, admiring my new femininity, perhaps taking me into her

arms, and then Ray's face would smile at me. And sometimes my own

face, pleased that I was looking my very best. I must say, I

emerged from my beauty treatment absolutely gorgeous! This is what

I should have been doing all along, I decided! I studied my face

a moment, then took my purse, tipped the operators, and tripped out

feeling more self-assured than ever before in my life. As a man,

it was already clear, I had been cruelly tricked into gender

confusion and what I once would have thought were perverse

practices with Ray. But I was no longer a man. As a woman, I had

Ray as my lover and some further relationship, yet to emerge and be

explained, with my wife. So as the woman I now looked like, the

woman I felt myself to be, I couldn't lose!

Needless to day, I dressed carefully in my most stunning

outfit, a constructed purple cocktail dress, beaded, with a form

fit bodice and a darling flared skirt, and I came over to Melissa's

at about 5:30, the cocktail hour. Ray was in the kitchen putting

sprigs of parsley on a dish of canapes. His eyes sparkled when he

saw me, and he reached over to grasp my breasts with both hands.

I allowed him a moment, then slapped his hand away gently and

smiled, and told him not to be vulgar, and asked how I could help.

He nipped briefly at my neck, handed me the dish, and told me to

carry it in to "the other girls" in the living room, and he'd be

along with the drinks in just a moment.

There they were, seated together on the couch and looking just

beautiful -- each had also had her hair done, and had put on her

best dress, and made up carefully. They were in the middle of an

animated conversation, with lots of giggling. Whatever the

misunderstanding over me, obviously they had made it up. I

wondered what they'd decided.

"Bobbie dear, there you are," said Janice, looking up at me

with a radiant smile. "Just set those down for now, until Ray

comes along with our drinks. We were just talking about George

Fontana, Joanie's ex, you remember Joanie? She divorced him and

later married that lovely ship's captain, the one who's away from

home months at a time, and she doesn't seem to mind? Well, George

was always propositioning other women, promising them anything,

getting into their panties, and then on to the next conquest. At

the office, at home, at parties, anywhere. He must have hit on you

too, one time or another. No, of course not, not then. But did

you know him?"

I knew him. We'd been nodding and drinking companions at the

golf club. But you couldn't carry on a conversation with him.

He'd break off whenever any woman came into the room, so he could

put his moves on her. No one ever accused him of sincerity.

"Well, George tried getting each of us into bed with him, of

course, but of course we weren't either of us interested. We each

love the man we're married to, for better or for worse, past,

present, and future. And we love each other too, of course."

Janice paused and looked me over more closely, appraisingly, as if

for the first time. "Why, you know, Bobbie, you really are just

lovely now! The hormones softened your face just a bit, didn't

they, and your lips look good enough to eat, Your hair worn up is

so flattering! And fuschia is your color, no question of it.

George would have loved to meet you looking the way you do now!"

She smiled slightly and added, "You might have loved to meet

him too, you know why? It seems that George's success with the

ladies' can be attributed to charm, but also to a huge cock, over

ten inches I've been told by someone who has reason to know, and

unbelievably thick. That explains why he thought he was God's gift

to women. Because obviously, he was! But once he was in and out

of a woman, he never looked back."

I set the canapes down, and settled carefully alongside the

other women. Ray came in with a tray of drinks, and handed each of

us what he knew we'd want. "You ladies gossiping about old

Meat-on-the-Hoof?" he inquired. "Old George? Who's he done now?"

Melissa replied, "Be a good boy and go back to the kitchen,

dear. This is girl talk." He did.

"Now wait till you hear this!" Janice leaned toward me and

put her hand on my knee confidentially. Then she looked up, again

distracted. "That's Nuit d'Amour you're wearing, isn't it, Bobbie?

It's very nice. I've often wondered if it would do for really

formal occasions, you know, evening gown affairs? Is it heavy

enough? And would it hold up through hours of dancing, and who

knows what else?"

"It's fine," I answered. "It goes on a little musky, so it

should be just right for making a grand entrance, and then it stays

deliciously flowery all evening. Through all kinds of activities,

I've found. All kinds!"

She slapped my knee lightly and said, "Naughty!" and then

continued. "Well, George remarried, a rich woman out West it

seems, who tried out his cock and wanted it all for herself. She

believed his promises, and didn't know that George's thing was

always on loan elsewhere. Well, she was busy running the cattle

ranch she'd inherited, so it was a while before she found out. She

used up three private detective firms, and they finally implicated

half the women in the county."

"So one night George was coming out of a shower, when she came

up on him from behind and reached for his equipment. Of course he

let her. But she'd hidden in her hand a remarkable instrument. A

rubber ring with little steel razors inside, and spring loaded

clamps. They'd just invented it for castrating bulls any time with

no fuss, just slip it on, and when the bull has wandered somewhere

else and has his mind elsewhere, on some heifer maybe, trigger it.

No fuss, no bleeding, and remove it a few days later when the wound

has closed and begun to heal. She had this one modified to trigger

with a remote."

"Before he even knew, she'd fastened it around his things, you

know, just where they hung down below that cock of his, and locked

it on. So now any time she wanted, even while he was sleeping, she

could click on the remote and unman him without the least mess.

Convert him into a steer, she told him, for bulls to use when they

ran out of cows."

I wondered if this story had a point. Were they thinking of

fixing me?

Janice noticed my expression. "Oh my poor dear," she said.

"Bobbie precious! Don't worry one bit! What's yours is yours, and

we all of us love you just the way you are. You are the most

faithful husband imaginable! Just look at you! No, this is about

a man who didn't keep his promises at all. Just listen!"

"So there's George, with this band around his balls, and no

way to get it off without tripping the spring and then 'Zip!'. His

wife told him he'd wear it one full year, and during that year he'd

have to fuck whoever and whatever she told him to fuck, when she

told him, or else. Naturally, he agreed. It didn't sound like too

bad a deal."

"Well, then she took him out to the barn where her horses are

stabled, and she told him, 'Back East they say you're hung like a

horse. Well, they don't know horses back East. Tonight you'll

service those mares over there, all eight of them. We'll see if

they even notice. Cum into each of them, or it doesn't count.

Then when you get the hang of it, do the stallions. They won't

mind getting laid by a queer. All six of them.'"

"'From now on you fuck all fourteen horses at least once each

week. More often if you feel like it. Then in between, you'll

work on the nine hundred head of cattle we keep in the corral and

in the next valley. During the next year I want you to work your

way through the whole herd. Figure out how many a day that is,

besides the horses, and pace yourself.'"

"'I don't think you're going to have much time or energy or

hankering left for any of our local ladies. But if you do, you let

me know, and I'll get you some more mares to service.'"

"She set two men to watching him, guarding him really, to make

sure he did what he was told, what he'd agreed to do. They were

told to use the remote if he rebelled, or fell too far behind, or

tried to escape. So that's what our George has been doing all year

now. Ploughing his way through the ranch. Cows and horses, five

or six a day I guess, with that huge dong of his, all so he can

keep the parts that hang down below it. Melissa says she hears

he's gotten to like it. They say he gets a hard on now whenever he

passes a Burger King! And you know what? Tell Bobbie, Melissa."

Ray came through with refills, and smiled at me when he handed

me mine. My heart warmed immediately, and I beamed back at him, so

very pleased! Melissa glanced at me, sipped at her drink, and

leaned back.

"Well, there isn't much left to tell. Last week a number of

women in town got an engraved invitation to a week-long celebration

at that ranch, dances, barbecues, white water rafting nearby,

helicopter skiing nearby. It seems that George's new wife promised

him a horse of his own when his year was up, a stallion that's been

fixed, to remind him of his own year under the gun so to speak, so

he'll behave in the future. And his year's about up. Most of his

former girlfriends from around here plan to attend. They want to

find out what the invitation really means. You see, it reads 'You

are cordially invited to help us celebrate George Fontana's

gelding, the reward he richly deserves after his year of caring for

all the animals on our ranch the same way he cared for their

predecessors. He will receive it on the first day of the week's

festivities.'"

"It does seem she means to remove the instrument as she'd

promised, but not the way George expects. A woman after my own

heart. I should think the incidence of adultery in that county as

well as this town has dropped by 90% since those invitations went

out."

"Poor George," Janice said. "He'll still be able to perform,

I hear, but his wife will call the shots, so to speak, since that's

what he'll need to remain interested in sex. I wonder if she means

to have her stallions return the favor to him through next year."

"Oh, Janice," said Melissa. "What an imagination! Let's go

to dinner."

It seemed to me the story was saying that men who offend their

women are at grave risk. Ray certainly took no chances, but even

so, he would have felt uneasy to hear the three of us giggling

about George's prospects. I found I could be just as amused at

poor George's situation as the two other women, who resented a

libertine however well-endowed, and themselves had no testicles to

feel threatened by the very thought of anyone losing them. Could

it be mine no longer mattered to me, that I'd found something

better to cherish?. Someone else's?

Ray's dinner was superb. We sat in our customary places, with

Janice opposite Melissa at either end of the table as the hosts in

charge, as it were, and Ray and I seated opposite each other on

either side as usual. I wondered if Melissa would ask me to drink

Ray before dessert, as so frequently during the past few months, to

show Janice how well she had trained me. But instead we sat over

coffee and cognac, and talked.

"Melissa," Janice said. "Lets review what I'd expected from

you, and what you did, and then you can tell us your reasons, so

we'll all four of us know."

"I wanted to live with you full time, but you weren't ready

for a commitment. You wanted to see other women too. And our

husbands, whom we each love, made for complications. So I decided

to settle for second best, a husband who'd do with me the things I

do with you. I went away to provide him with a reason to want to

change, and to give you time to change him."

"You were supposed to teach him selfless devotion to my

pleasure. So he'd lick my pussy for hours, and fuck me for hours

the way your dildo does, without climaxing himself until I'd

finished using him. So he'd caress me the way a woman does,

slowly, languishingly, deliciously, perhaps even believing himself

to be a woman while doing it. In brief, to do everything I do with

you, and love it the way I love doing it with you."

"Now what happened instead? You didn't train him to be my

lesbian lover. You trained him to be your husband's cunt. Now he

sucks on your husband's cock for hours, I hear, and your husband

fucks him for his own pleasure, though I don't deny Bobbie loves

it. I don't think he's been near a woman since I left him, much

less learned anything about how to satisfy a woman. Except for

some of his anatomy, he's become a woman himself. A heterosexual

woman. Maybe he doesn't care at all for real women any more, not

even for me. That's not what we agreed would happen."

Janice was finished. She sipped her cognac and waited,

"Janice dear," Melissa said. She got up and moved behind

Janice's chair, and bent over. They began to take soft kisses from

each other's mouths, one after another, and again Melissa began

rotating her fingertips across each of Janice's nipples. Again

Janice began to yearn and melt toward Melissa even before Melissa

spoke.

"My lovely Janice, the moment you went away I realized our

plan was deeply flawed. I'd been wrong about my feelings. I love

you and want you. I didn't want your husband ever to fill in for

me. Or ever to desire you sexually. I didn't want to share you

with anyone."

"But we are each of us bound to our husbands. We couldn't

either of us abandon them. Loyal, faithful men who love us and

serve us, yours now if not then. Ray long ago gave me his absolute

trust. I own him. I could never desert him. I thought in fact

that I should be rewarding him!"

"Then again, for me to turn Bob into your second best lover

after me might be to create my own potential competitor. Suppose

some day you wanted to break off with me for his sake? I wanted to

arrange so you'd remain with me for his sake, if it came to that."

"So I trained Bobbie to be the ideal girl for Ray that you are

for me. I'm not sure he loves Ray the way you love me, but now

he's willing to do whatever pleasures Ray, and to take his pleasure

from Ray, and to do it for as long as Ray wants, the way you do

such things for me. The way we do such things for each other.

That sounds to me like love. And it's a wonderful bond between all

of us."

"I should say, "she's" willing to do whatever pleasures Ray.

As you've seen for yourself, Bobbie is now for all purposes a

woman. She's one of us. At each stage I asked your husband to

choose, and at each stage he chose to be a woman. Now she is a

woman. Ray's woman, as you point out. And Ray is her man."

But look what you now have. Your husband is now your dearest

girlfriend, or sister, or whoever you wish her to be. From now on

the two of you will have so much in common as women you'll never

run out of things you're eager to talk about together. You can

tell each other anything, even about the things you each do to

please Ray or me, or that the two of us do to please you two. And

you'll each understand each other and feel delighted, and that will

double your pleasure. And ours."

"Just think of all the things you can now do together you'd

never do as husband and wife. The two of you can go shopping any

time and both love everything about it. For yourselves or for each

other, or for Ray and me, enjoying yourselves as women do. Bobbie

will appreciate whatever lovely things you buy because now she has

the same fine eye for women's clothing."

"You can even use the same hairdressers, and compare notes on

styles. You already share the same wardrobe. I don't think any

marriage anywhere is more solidly bound up by common concerns and

understandings and affections than yours and Bobbie's. You each

even have loving same-sex relationships you can talk about with

each other. They just don't happen to be with the same sex."

"Because of what I did, the four of us are now beautifully

bound together, in honest mutual affection. This is a much better

arrangement. We can each trust that each of us will want us all

together always, and know that we will never alienate each others'

affections. Even if you two were to sleep together, which doesn't

seem probable, even if you were to make love, Ray and I would know

it's to understand more profoundly what you each do with each of

us, to learn to be better lovers to us. In effect, you two are now

the intermediaries of my marriage to Ray. Because you each make

love to each of us, we don't need to with each other. And we're

the intermediaries of your marriage. Bobbie will wish to do with

Ray whatever I may wish to do with you, or you with me. It's a

four-way relationship in which we each remain perfectly faithful to

our spouses, and to our lovers, and neither couple ever cheats on

the other."

"Of course we'll live together. That's what I promised

Bobbie, and that's what will happen. We'll live together, but we

won't usually sleep together. We'll sleep with our lovers. From

now on I'll sleep with Janice and Ray will sleep with Bobbie. Our

husbands will wife-swap, that is, they'll swap their wives for each

other. Each will be the loving partner of each other's loving

partner. And all will seem respectable to the outer world -- not

even our closest friends will ever notice. Our marriages will grow

closer and happier than ever!"

By now Janice was in a musing trance, her head lolling back

and her lips parted, her eyes closed, while Melissa continued to

fondle her nipples. Then Melissa lifted her eyes toward me. "You

see, Bobbie. Its just as I said. Things aren't as they were. Now

that you're a woman, your wife is willing to share your life again.

We'll all four of us visit each other often, across the back yard,

and share recipes as well as spouses, and shop the same dress sales

together. You have your wife again, as the dearest of girlfriends.

And meanwhile, you know that Ray loves you. There's no question of

that. He's giving me that look again even now, asking me to finish

talking so you two can go home together, and get to bed and enjoy

each other. The way Janice and I have enjoyed each other for years

now."

"I always felt sorry for Ray, whenever I was with Janice and

he was banished to the front room, or I had to send him over to

your house to play Gin Rummy with you. This more than makes up for

those nights now, doesn't it, Ray?"

"Now, Bobbie, you and Ray will keep house for the two of us,

unless you're yourselves working. It's only fair. I know you had

to leave your job so we could arrive together at this lovely

moment, and that you can't return to it now as your old self. So

do come work for me. I need a secretary who's pretty, well

groomed, and can do intricate database processing when necessary.

You'll blend right in. And you can still serve Janice and me our

breakfasts. I look forward to years of them."

Now Melissa's speech was over too, and she kissed Janice once

more, then sat down.

I'm sure Janice was no longer paying attention. She was

looking at Melissa with adoration. This arrangement was so very

much more desirable than any she'd ever imagined! Without a word

she suddenly stood, then crouched and slipped under the table.

Melissa moved her pelvis to the edge of her chair and smiled, then

spread her legs. A moment later Melissa closed her eyes, and her

smile ascended to heaven as Janice's face apparently found her

crotch.

She did first glance at Ray, and my eyes followed hers. Ray

was just sitting there looking at me, also smiling. His pelvis

also seemed to tilt toward me. I too slipped off my chair and sank

to my knees, and crept over to him, and threw my arms around his

thighs. Tears were streaming down my cheeks as I buried my face in

his crotch. I glanced over and saw that Janice had pulled

Melissa's panties way to one side, and was nursing hungrily on

Melissa's clit. I unzipped Ray to take him in hand for the

hundredth time, then to put him in my mouth.

I knew that for the rest of my life there was no way Janice

would ever want to leave me again. We were bound together by our

common submission, devotion and love. We four friends are closer

than ever, I thought as I carefully lifted Ray's cock out of his

pants. I loved it, that Janice loved it that Ray and I loved each

other, and that Melissa loved it too. Then as I started to suck on

Ray's cock, for the first time I loved it that Janice and Melissa

loved each other.

END

(c) 1996 by Vickie Tern