Season of Terror
by Tigger
Copyright 2002, All Rights Reserved

Chapter 5: Recognition - Phase 1 

Morning sunlight shone bright and clear through the old glass windows of his Seasons House bedroom when Victor sat down at the little vanity table to 'dress' for breakfast. And it had been 'Victor' who sat there in those private, early-morning moments before Ms. Thompson or Marie came to enforce their feminine tyrannies on him.

Or at least, it always had been until this morning. 

Before when Victor Denato had looked at himself in that mirror, his mind's eye had seen what he'd wanted to see reflected there, regardless of how he was dressed or how he was made up by the women of this house.  This morning, however, even he had to admit the reality of the very feminine picture that stared back at him from those silvered depths.

He'd fallen into Ms. Thompson's trap so easily, he thought sadly.  Fallen, hell, he'd jumped at her so-very-carefully-worded challenge without a second thought, so cocksure that he could handle anything she might dish up to him - because *he* was a *man*!

Right. 

Memories, still painful and vivid, of the previous Friday's mall disaster brought his attention back fully to the reflected image before him. Whatever it was he saw gazing back at him from the other side of the mirror, it was NOT a man. 

With a critical eye for detail that had been beyond him as little as a week earlier, Victor examined the entire package presented before him. Now, he could see how the vividly blond hairs softly curled and curved about his face, in a sleekly feminine shape that no amount of brushing or slicking down could make appear in any way masculine. 

*Too bad I used the adult cosmetics in that last session on Thursday instead of the washable kid-stuff Ms. Thompson gave me for practice,* he mused ruefully. Although Marie had ensured that every speck of make-up that could be removed had been ruthlessly scoured away before going to bed each night, his face still appeared elegantly made up. Nothing he'd done in the last four days, including his just completed morning shower, had done anything to cleanse those resilient cosmetics from his face. In point of fact, if he were completely honest, what slight fading there had been in those dyes since last weekend served only to gentle their effect on his looks, making his face somehow subtly more girlish, more pretty.  Certainly, the fine, highly arched brows Marie had formed with her infernal tweezers did nothing for his masculine self-image.  Perhaps if he'd tried to fill them in using that eyebrow pencil, like he'd tried to do with his beard he mused, but then, he hadn't thought of that.  Besides, Jane would probably have called him on that as she had with the fake beard.

Idly, he brought up his hand to touch one plucked and sculpted brow, and froze.  He'd almost forgotten those damned nails Carolyn Beale and her witch-friend, Sandy, had stuck him with - literally.  Designed to be 'bite-proof', these artificial tips were an epoxy-based composite material - like the wings of the Stealth Fighter, only clear and natural looking.  And impossible to cut off.  Short of pulling his own out at the roots, the only way to remove these was with some special kind of solvent - something that was only available at the salon.  Even without the lacquers and polishes Jane made him apply and remove on almost a daily basis, the nails made his hands look, well, really sexy - like they belonged to one of those 'hand-models' he'd read about in the women's magazines that were now his only literary entertainment.

Taking his appearance as a whole, given his already small stature, then there was absolutely no way that anything other than what had gone down at that mall should have been expected. It was now so clear to him - as clear as the reflected image in his mirror.

He looked like a girl.  

Actually, he looked like a pretty damned pretty girl!

*Too bad you were too stupid and too blind to see that before last Friday,* he thought with a sigh, *but you were so damned sure, so damned tough. No way Jane Thompson was going to win that bet, was there?*

It should have been a 'done deal'. Apply himself to his lessons on Thursday, she'd take him on an outing as a male the next day. After all those weeks in Jane Thompson's Fortress of Satin, THAT alone should have been a welcome respite.  More important, however, had been the rest of the deal. If he carried himself as a male after 'giving his best effort to her lessons', then Jane would admit that he was too masculine to learn anything from her program and would release him to go home with no further threats of jail hanging over his head.

*A 'done-deal'? HAH! I should have known better,* he thought with a rueful smile. *Or at least, I should have looked harder for the gotcha.* 

Oh, he'd been 'got' all right - big time.  More than the Thompson woman realized, too, he reflected ruefully. *At least she doesn't know the worst of it. Twenty minutes hiding in the bathroom stall, afraid to come out because there were other guys in there with me using the urinals. She'd never let me live THAT down.  Thank God it wasn't any worse than it was.*

With a sigh that equal parts gratitude for small favors and resignation for large trials, Victoria Denato slipped into character and carefully selected a foundation makeup from the selection on her vanity. And for the first time, noticed something was missing. *Odd, all that adult stuff is gone, after I only got to use them the one time,* she mused. *Guess Ms. Jane figures I need more practice with the 'age-appropriate makeup'.  Am I supposed to regret failing that 'test', too?*  

Victoria considered that for a while, and then shrugged when no ready answer to that question came to her. *Actually, I am still wearing them, aren't I?  And that is something of a problem, too.* She sighed gustily. *Maybe if I can't wash away those grownup cosmetics, I can at least cover them up a little. Who knows? I might even get a few brownie points for effort.*

After all, Victor had given his word in making that deal with Jane Thompson.  It was up to Victoria to do her best to keep the bargain.