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Image Credits: Title Picture purchased and licensed for publishing from

123rf.com. The model(s) in this image is in / and are no way connected with this story nor supports nor conveys the issues and situations brought up within the story. The model(s) use is solely used for the representation of looks of the main character(s) of this particular story. ~Sephrena

Divider licensed for use in publishing from Photoshopgraphics.com ~Sephrena.

Author's Note: This second edition of Camp Shoni replaces the 16 previously posted chapters at both Crystal's Story Site and a few other archive sites and is revised and with 5 new chapters. ~Pamela.

Historical Versions: Originally posted at Crystal's Storysite in 2004, and Fictionmania in 2011. ~Sephrena.

Legalities: Archiving and reposting of this story *unchanged* is permitted provided that: 1) You must have contacted the author, Pamela, and have asked permission first and received said permission to host this particular work. 2) No fee be charged, either directly or indirectly (this includes so-called "adult checks") or any form of barter or monetary transfers in order to access viewing this work *and* (3) PROVIDED that this disclaimer, all author notes, legalities and attribution to the original author are contained unchanged within the work. 4) The author of this work, Pamela, must be provided free account access at all times the work is hosted in order to modify or remove this work at her sole discretion.

The characters, situations, and places within this work are fictional. Any resemblance between actual people (living or dead), places, or situations is entirely coincidental.

This work is the copyrighted material of the respective author. ~Pamela.

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Chapter 7
 
Monday morning when Lorin met up with Kenny on his way to school, he could sense that something was different between them, and it did not take long until Kenny blurted out sarcastically, "thanks a lot Lorin!"

"Thanks for what?" Lorin said having a pretty good idea what Kenny was mad about.

"You know damn well. Some friend you are. You go sneaking off to Penny's party without letting me in on it."

"What could I do? It was Penny's party!"

"You could tell her to invite me. You would have if you were my friend."

"I am your friend. It's just, just..." Lorin did not know what to say. It was true he felt guilty about Kenny not being invited, but he also could not see how he had the right to ask Penny to invite him.

"Some friend," Kenny said and he started walking faster so Lorin had to run to keep up. "You don't have to walk with me," Kenny said.

"Kenny!" Lorin shouted, "I was afraid to ask her!" But it was to no avail. Kenny was mad and he kept walking at a ridiculous pace and Lorin finally slowed down and let him go.

It might take a little time, Lorin thought, but he knew Kenny well enough to know that after he calmed down, they would become buddies again. At least he hoped so.
 

 
Lorin got his first glimpse of Penny since the party at the beginning of Mr. Oster's class. She turned around to greet him when he came in. "I'm glad you could come to the party," she said.

Lorin said, "I had such a wonderful time."

"Me too," Penny said.

After class, Penny said, "do you want to have lunch?"

"I do," Lorin said, "but..." He stopped suddenly, afraid to tell Penny that he normally ate with Kenny.

"But?"

"Oh, nothing. I'd love to have lunch with you."

"I don't think you're telling me everything," Penny said looking at Lorin inquisitively.

"I'm sorry. It's just that I normally eat with Kenny."

"He can eat with us too. There's usually room."

"That's great, but..."

"Not another but, Lorin?"

"We had sort of a fight this morning."

"What about?"

"It's a misunderstanding. I need to straighten it out with him. I'm embarrassed to tell you."

Penny looked at him with a slight annoyance in her face and he quickly added, "but I'm going to anyway. You see, somehow Kenny heard about your party and that I was there. So he's mad at me for not getting him invited."

"I don't really know Kenny that well."

"I know. I know. It's OK. It's just that we're friends. It's not logical. He'll get over it."

Janice joined them and Lorin couldn't help but notice her smiling as if she had just heard something funny. It was about him, he was sure. "Hi" Lorin said.

"Hey Lorin," Janice said.

Lorin smiled at her and Janice let out a soft laugh.

"What's the joke?" he said.

"You're cute Lorin," Janice said and Penny laughed.

Lorin blushed and to Penny he said, "I'll go look for Kenny."

"Bye," Penny said.
 

 
Lorin found Kenny sitting far away from their usual table with some guys that Lorin barely knew.

"What do you want?" Kenny said.

"Kenny. Cut it out. You can eat with me and Penny." Lorin could see Kenny's eyes widen in surprise.

"Bullshit," Kenny said.

"It's no BS. Penny said you are welcome to eat with us." Lorin could see that Kenny was rattled, maybe even scared.

"Maybe tomorrow. I'm already sitting here."

Anxious to join up with Penny, Lorin said, "suit yourself. Don't say I didn't ask." He turned and walked over to the corner of the cafeteria where Penny was. As he approached he saw that a seat had been saved for him next to her and that he would be the only boy among seven girls. Boys usually sat with boys and girls with girls. He wished that Kenny had come with him. He felt overwhelmed by the boldness of his sitting among so many girls. He felt like the whole cafeteria was watching him as he sat down next to Penny and by so doing announce to everyone that he was her boy friend.

"Where's Kenny?" Penny asked.

"He said he'll come tomorrow. Right now he's with some guys."

Lorin knew all the girls at the table. Most of them had been at the party and were in his classes.

"Isn't it brave of Lorin to come sit with the girls," Janice said.

"Why is it brave?" Lorin asked.

"Most guys think they would turn into a girl if they sat with us - like being a girl is a disease."

"I don't think that," Lorin said. "I think being a girl must be a wonderful thing."

The girls stopped what they were doing and looked at him. The sudden attention alarmed him. He saw Penny looking at him also. "It's just that boys are no better than girls. That's all I meant. There's no way to assume one person is better than another."

"But most boys think girls are silly," Laura said. She was a tall girl that Lorin knew from math class.

"That's just because they base their judgment on things boys care about. If boys were judged by things that girls cared about then boys would look silly."

Lorin worried that he wasn't being manly enough by saying this.

"What do girls care about?" Penny said.

"Boys," Janice and Marilyn said at the exact same moment and the girls laughed. Marilyn was also in Lorin's English class.

"Janice!" Penny said and to Lorin she continued, "I want to know what you think girls want, that makes them different than boys."

Lorin strained his mind to come up with an answer. He realized that he had no clue what to say. He was definitely on the other side of the great divide. How could he know what girls wanted? But he had to know. He had to want the same things as girls if he was to fit in at Camp Shoni. Suddenly he said, "girls want to be pretty."

"Boys don't want to be pretty?" Janice said and laughed.

"I mean, don't girls care more about looking nice than guys?" Lorin asked.

"Only because society makes them." Janice said.

"Yeah, its cause of guys that we end up putting on make up and looking for clothes all the time," Marilyn said.

"I think it's more than that," Penny said. "I like just feeling good about myself, and being neat and clean is part of that."

Lorin thought of her coming out of the bathroom after her shower and having done her hair. She had been smiling and looked beautiful and neat like a brand new dollar bill. Crisp.

"Would you like Penny if she was covered with mud?" Janice asked Lorin, taking him from his reverie.

Lorin blushed at the public recognition of his status with Penny. "Sure," he said.

"Say she had ripped up clothes and she was a homeless person," Laura added.

"It wouldn't matter. Her inner beauty would shine through," Lorin said and he turned beet red when he saw Penny smiling at him.

"What a great answer," Penny said. "What else do girls want differently than guys? This is really interesting."

"I think that girls want harmony more than boys, they're less likely to fight over something."

"I wish that were true," Penny said, "but girls just fight differently. They do it with words, with snubs with little things that add up to be a big thing. Aren't I right?"

The other girls chimed in with agreement. "It's nice that boys just fight it out with their fists and get done with it," Laura said. "Girls are so back stabbing."

Lorin wanted to protest. He couldn't image that girls weren't anything but warm and understanding with each other. "Fist fights are not fun," Lorin said, remembering the time he had gotten into a fight with his classmate Steve. He had been scared of Steve for the longest time and when finally Steve had provoked him into a fight, he had found out that they had the same strength and the fight had been declared a draw. After that time, Steve never picked on him again.

"You haven't said the most important thing," Janice said with a smirk. "Girls, most girls, want babies."

"Boys want babies too," Lorin said.

"Do you want to have a baby?" Janice asked him.

Lorin glanced at Penny hoping for a sign as to how he ought to answer the question. He didn't see any and he said, "Sure, one day I would. Who wouldn't want one?"

He once had had a day dream about being a new mother. He had breasts that had swelled up to the size of Dolly Parton's and while he lay in a comfortable chair wearing a pretty robe, he had been holding a little baby and watching as it sucked on his breast.

"Let Lorin eat," Penny said and under the table Lorin felt her leg barely touch his.

He wondered if it was a signal: permission for him to push back against her leg. Everything about Penny was turning out to be a dream come true. But as much as he wanted to be happy about their relationship, he could not shake off the feeling that he was betraying her. In a few weeks, he would be a bunny at Camp Shoni and no doubt Penny would be shell shocked if she knew about it.

While Lorin took out his bag lunch, the girls talked about the party: the different guys they had danced with or met. Lorin gradually felt more comfortable and he looked around at the girls one by one noting what they were wearing and how they did up there hair. Janice and Marilyn began talking about their summer plans and it wasn't long until Penny asked Lorin what he was doing for the summer.

"I'm going away to camp," Lorin said and saw disappointment in her face. "I've been going there every summer for years, since I was a little kid."

"I'll be around part of the summer and then my family is going to the beach for a few weeks," she said.

"I guess we can write," Lorin said and then realized that his mail would be going to Camp Dan where they wouldn't know who he was. His parents would write and he'd never get their letters. The same with Penny and also Kenny if they were still friends. It was even more complicated than that. His name would be recognized at Camp Dan and a whole bunch of mail coming for him there would be bound to raise suspicion. If they connected the dots and realized that there was a Lauren Baxter at Camp Shoni, then Kaboom!, the jig would be up.

Lorin felt Penny's leg press against his even stronger and it was clear that it was something she was doing on purpose. He looked at her eyes and she looked at him. Her eyes had a warmth, even a twinkle about them. She was very pretty and his heart throbbed in his chest and he knew that maybe he was moving past the infatuation phase and heading toward real love for her. How could he not be in love with her?
 

 
That evening, Lorin received an instant message alert from Eileen, one of the girls who would be in his cabin at Camp Shoni, and in short order he found himself on line with several of the girls from the camp. At first Lorin responded cautiously, afraid that he would not appear to be sufficiently girlish, but after awhile, he felt more comfortable and found himself eagerly exchanging messages. He told the other girls that he was new to the camp, though he had had a "friend" who had gone to Camp Dan for many years. Most of the other girls were long time campers and they had a lot to say about the boys of Camp Dan. Joan had been there last summer and related how the younger boys had been popping balloons put up for decoration at the cotillion. She said that was why the 13 year old boys from Camp Dan would no longer be allowed to go to the dance.

All this because of a bunch of balloons, Lorin thought to himself. Then he entered the message, "I've got my cotillion dress already bought!"

"What's it look like?" Thalia wrote.

"It's sort of white with some light pink flowers in it. I fell in love with it the moment I first saw it." Lorin's heart was pumping with excitement.

"You're lucky," Thalia answered, "I haven't been able to find any dress pretty enough worthy of being a bunny."

"You're so funny," Eileen added.

"At least your mom is taking you shopping," Joan said.

"I can't wait to see Lauren's dress," Thalia said. The conversation went on like this talking about the cotillion dresses. One of the girls called it "Bunny talk" and they decided that that would be one of their "in" jokes this summer.

At one point Joan said, "I couldn't believe they want us to bring 6 bras. Why so many? I don't even have 6 bras."

"I feel the same way," Thalia said, "two bras are enough. You wear one a week and then wash it and switch to the other bra."

"Me too," Janet said who had just come on line. "I've only been wearing bras for six months and my mom just got me two. Its silly to buy new ones since I'll be a bigger cup size by the fall, at least that's what my mom says."

"What size are you?" Thalia said, "I just got my first A cup bra."

"I've been a 32AA, but I think my bras are just starting to get a little snug."

Lorin felt that he had to be part of the discussion and he said, "I've just started wearing bras. My mom bought me some Playtex bras."

"They have some padding?" Joan said.

Lorin hesitated afraid they would laugh at him. A message appeared from Thalia, "I wish my mom let me get padded bras. I might be an A cup forever."

"Yeah," Lorin said, "they make me look one cup size larger."

"Two cup sizes would be hysterical," Joan said.

"Wow," Janet wrote.

A little while later Ann, Susan and Judy signed on so all eight girls were present. The conversation had shifted to school and Eileen wrote, "I heard in health ed today that girls that live together start getting their period at the same time."

"I've heard that too," Thalia said.

"Me also," Joan said, "they get into sync with each other. I guess we're all having periods, aren't we?"

"I am," Eileen said followed by Janet, Thalia, Judy, Ann and Susan. Lorin was the only one who hadn't written. He stared at the screen in a panic.

"Lauren?" Joan wrote.

"I had to get a snack," Lorin lied, "I had my first period last month; I'm having my second now."

"Poor Lauren," Ann wrote, "I've been having my period for 2 years now, but at the start it was so erratic and really hurt."

"My older sister started late also," Lorin said, "I guess it runs in my family."

"What are you using?" Susan said.

Lorin wasn't sure what to write. He hadn't yet figured out what he should use. Something he put inside himself, or something on the outside? What would be normal? He remembered some of the guys joking about girls needing Kotex and he wrote, "coatex".

"That's a scream!!!!!!!" Susan said. "Coatex!!!"

"HAHAHAHAHAHA" Thalia wrote, followed by Ann, "Oh My God that's funny!"

Lorin couldn't figure out what the joke was. He wrote "it's the same as my sister uses."

"Bizarro!" Janet wrote, "Coatex? Where do you live? It's Kotex here."

"I was making a joke," Lorin said, "of course its Kotex!"

"Tampons or pads?" Janet said.

Lorin wondered if this was a trick question. Before he could answer he saw that Thalia had said, "I've always used Tampax Pearl regulars. My mom is really into tampons. If I'm bleeding heavily I also use Always pantyliners."

He was about to say he also used tampons, when Ann wrote, "I don't like tampons. They've always hurt me and I've been afraid they'd get stuck in me. I use Kotex pads."

"Me too," Eileen said.

Lorin figured that with pads, he could at least pretend to wear them. He had his doubts that he'd be able to find a place to stick a tampon inside himself. "I've started out with pads," Lorin said, "but I think I might try a tampon one day."

"The tampons are so necessary for swimming," Thalia said.

After a few more minutes of banter, a couple of the girls said they had to sign off since it was getting on towards ten o'clock.

"Before everyone leaves," Ann wrote, "we need to post pictures of ourselves. I'm dying to see what you all look like."

"Me too," Joan said. "By next week lets all have pictures of each other and let's also have a "Bunny Talk" once a week at this same time." This too was agreed upon and after a bunch of good bye's, Lorin signed off.

He lay down on his bed exhausted. It had been a great strain pretending to be a girl. Clearly he had a lot to learn. There were so many possible ways he could trip up. And now he had the problem of getting a picture of himself as "Lauren." Yet another headache.
 

 
The next afternoon, after school, Lorin paid a visit to his sister's bathroom and discovered that she had both a package of Tampax tampons and a package of Kotex pads. He took one of each and went back to his room. He popped the tampon out of its cardboard tube and examined it in detail. It had a little string which he realized would dangle from the girls so they could fetch it out when they wanted it. Too bad he didn't have his own vagina so he could experience first hand what it felt like. Did the little cord tickle? He had no way of knowing. The pad was another story. He fetched panties from his hiding place, put them on and then put the pad in them. He put on his pants and smiled with the realization that he could spend the rest of the day like that. His mom and dad would never know during dinner that he was wearing a pad. The thought made him feel a bit more connected with womankind.

He next located his dad's digital camera, and took it up to his bedroom to shoot a picture of himself as Lauren. By setting the timer, he took a picture of himself from his face down to his shoulders. When he looked at it in the viewing screen on the camera he was disappointed with what he saw: he looked more like a guy than a girl. He brushed his hair forward so that it hid part of his face and partially closed the blind on the window and tried again. This time the picture was much better, but still not ideal. The problem was that the camera was too close. He'd have to take a longer shot.

From its hiding place, he took out one of his new bras, a top and skirt and put them on. He took a picture from the waist up with his chest thrust out as much as possible. The picture seemed to show a somewhat shy, willowy girl. It will do for the time being he thought to himself. With his hair restyled it would be even better. He noted that his hands hung limply in a girlish gesture. He hadn't even been trying to do that. Clearly he was transforming himself subconsciously into being a girl and he was happy to have that one small victory.

He downloaded the picture to his computer and erased the images from the camera. He sent the picture to the camp girls. After supper, he got back a few messages thanking him for the picture. A couple of the girls mentioned how pretty "she" was. The pictures of the other girls came in one by one also, and he was impressed by how cute they all were. The whole cabin, with the certain exception of himself, would be filled with very attractive young ladies.
 

 
Lorin took stock of his camp clothes and made a list of what he was missing. During the next few weeks he made several trips after school to visit the free box behind the fire station and with some luck he was able to complete his wardrobe: a couple of pairs of jeans, a few skirts and tops. The last big thing on the list was makeup and pantyhose, and for this he took the last of his money, approximately 40 dollars and headed to the Fairfield mall on a Saturday morning.

With a list of what he needed in his hand, he walked through a large drug store at the mall gathering the various items into a basket: nail polish and remover, emery boards, a compact with a mirror, brushes and combs, a small box of Kotex pads, eyeliner, shampoo, conditioner and other things. He kept a running total of what the items cost and when this came to a couple of dollars less than what he had, he saw that he had everything except lipstick. A lipstick that he coveted - it had a perfect shade of red - was 8 dollars, money that he didn't have. He went through the things in his basket trying to see what he could get rid of to make room for the lipstick. The couple of things that he could spare only added up to a dollar or two.

He stood in front of the lipstick section for a few minutes thinking and then flipped the lipstick into his pant pocket certain that no one had seen him. He walked toward the front of the store and was relieved to see that there were two cashiers, one of which was busy with a customer. He went to the free one which was manned by a middle aged woman who looked utterly bored with her job. She rang up the stuff, seemingly oblivious to the fact that Lorin was a boy and everything he was buying was for girls. The total with tax came to $39.87 and after paying Lorin was given 13 cents change.

As Lorin stepped outside the store, a burly man with a shaved head came up to him and told him to come with him back into the store.

"What for?" Lorin said.

"Come with me," the man said. A man standing outside looked at Lorin with an open smirk.

"Why?" Lorin said.

"I have reason to believe that you stole something."

"But I paid for all this!"

"OK, then when I take you inside and you empty your pockets we won't find anything?"

"All right, all right," Lorin said and went back into the store.

The store guard led him to a back room and had him sit down at a desk. Lorin put the lipstick on the table.

"Lipstick?" the man said.

Lorin hung his head and began to cry. The guard opened up the bag and looked inside. "Kotex, makeup?"

"They're for my sister," Lorin half heartedly tried to lie through his tears.

"I need your parents to come get you."

Lorin imagined his parent's reaction to the call. Shoplifting lipstick, buying Kotex. Everything would unravel and he would be shamed. Lorin bawled hysterically. This would be the end of everything. Penny would find out, his life would be over.

"Your crying won't do you any good. The sooner you give me the number of someone, the sooner you'll get out of here."

"Can my older sister get me?" Lorin said. It was a sudden inspiration. He remembered how Beth, the saleslady who sold him his dress and bras had looked at him with concern and handed him her business card. She had offered to help him. It was the only hope he had.

"It's supposed to be your parents."

"They're off playing golf," Lorin lied. In fact, they were at home dealing with a house painter they had contracted to paint the exterior.

The guard stared at Lorin a minute while he tried to look as pathetic as possible in the hope he might get some sympathy. "All right," the man finally said, "how old is she?"

"She's a lot older than me, she's 24," Lorin said guessing Beth's age.

"Give me her number."

Lorin fished the card from his wallet. "It's her business card," he told the guard and read off the phone number that she had written on the back. The guard dialed the number and Lorin prayed that Beth would answer.

After a couple of rings, the guard said, "hello ma'am is this Beth?"

Lorin watched the guard as he listened.

"Good. I've got your brother..." He covered the phone and asked Lorin his name.

"Lorin Baxter," Lorin said.

"Lorin Baxter. I caught him shop... Lorin Baxter, is he you're younger brother?"

There was a pause and then the guard said, "yeah, he shoplifted lipstick."

"Yeah, he says he was buying it for you. Anyway, we don't tolerate this shit here. You'll have to come get him, or I'll call the police and press charges. He'll be banned from the store for twelve months regardless."

Lorin heard the guard give the address of the store and then hung up. "She'll be here in 15 minutes. You're lucky. I've had many kids where the parents tell me to go to hell and don't come. The police put them in juvenile detention over night."

"I've never stolen anything in my life," Lorin said, "it's just I ran out of money and I had to get the lipstick." He began crying again. The guard looked at him and shook his head.
 

 
Lorin rode in silence with Beth back toward her place. Finally he said, "I'll pay you the eight dollars as soon as I get my next allowance." By the time he had gotten to the end of the sentence he was whimpering.

"I don't know what makes me more upset," Beth said, "your shoplifting or your buying lipstick, and Kotex. What in the world are you going to do with Kotex and all that other girl stuff?"

"I'm not a terrible person," Lorin said.

"I know that Lorin," Beth said and then after a minute, "but you owe me an explanation. I saved your neck. Now you're going to let me in on what you're doing." Beth looked at him and said, "there is some Kleenex in my purse. Take one and fix yourself up."

"Are you going to tell anybody about this?" Lorin said.

"It depends on if you tell me the whole truth, and also that you promise to never shoplift again."

"I won't, I promise," Lorin said as he gingerly opened up her purse and felt around for tissues. There were many vials of makeup and other unfamiliar things in the purse. It must nice to have one's own purse. He would have to get one also, and learn how to use it.

"I'll tell you everything. You've been way too nice to me already. I just hope that you don't get mad when I tell you."

"Mad about what?"

Lorin hesitated and Beth said, "we're almost home. Let's get comfortable and you can tell me what it is you're doing. Do you drink coffee? or tea?"

"No."

"Hot chocolate?"

"Sure, thanks."

They parked in front of a small apartment building and Lorin followed her to a top floor apartment that overlooked the street and had a small balcony. Beth ushered Lorin outside to sit in one of two reclining chairs as she fetched the drinks. In a few minutes she came back and said, "OK. I'm all ears."

Lorin stared at her. She was wearing jeans and a tee shirt and it was a bit strange to see her so informal compared to the dresses she wore at the store. "What do you want to know?"

"Tell me everything. Start at the beginning. Why buy a prom dress?"

"I'm scared to say. You're going to laugh at me and tell me I'm sick. I know I'm sick. I just don't know what to do about it, except what I'm doing."

"What is it you're doing," Beth said. "Tell me right now."

"I'm going to be a girl this summer. At camp. At a girl's camp."

Lorin watched as Beth shook her head back and forth in disbelief. "You're going to be a girl this summer? At a girl's camp? Just like that? You won't get caught? Are you crazy?"

"It's the sister camp to the one I've always gone to," and Lorin told her the story of the change in the upper camp and how he had gotten himself accepted to Camp Shoni. "So I've been buying clothes and things to get ready."

"So you think that a camp full of girls and women won't have any clue that you're actually a boy. All you have to do is dress like a girl and then you're magically a girl?"

Hurt and frightened Lorin said, "I know it's not easy, but I've been studying lots of things about girls. I think I can talk like a girl and I think that I look like a girl, well except for my hair style and I have a plan to change that on my way to camp. I'm also trying to think like a girl."

"I'm sorry to disappoint you Lorin, but there's too much about you that's boyish for you to pass as a girl."

Lorin started to cry.

"Don't cry," Beth said and Lorin cried harder. "That's one thing you do like a girl," Beth said with irony and got up and gave the whole box of tissues to Lorin. She stood over him, "I didn't mean to make you cry. I like you Lorin or I wouldn't have helped you today. It's just that I wouldn't be doing you any good if I didn't say what I think is the truth."

"I'm evil," Lorin said.

"Don't be harsh on yourself. I don't think you're anything more than a young kid who's got a lot to work out for himself. You can't expect to have all the answers so soon. Actually, I think you're very brave for trying to do what you're doing, though I have to admit that I think that you were not hard enough on yourself thinking about whether or not the risk was worth the benefit. I mean you're walking a tightrope. You have to have known that. One slip and there are victims - besides yourself, they would be your mom and dad, the people at the camp. It's not just about your desires and needs."

Lorin blew his nose and then blew it again. "What should I do? I have to be in a camp this summer or else my mom and dad can't take their big trip to Asia."

"Can you tell them the truth?"

"If I tell them what I've been doing, isn't that just as bad as if I had gone to Camp Shoni and then been discovered?"

Beth sat down again, crossed her legs, closed her eyes and put her hand up to her forehead as if she were thinking deeply. Lorin waited for her to answer his question. Finally she said, "look, you do have a point. A guaranteed hurt to your parents vs. a possible hurt to your parents. Which is worse?"

"I don't know," Lorin said.

"The answer to this question lies in whether or not it's possible that you can have a greater than zero chance of being a convincing girl at camp. If you can, then I can see that you need to take the risk. On the other hand, if you can't pull it off, then you shouldn't even try."

"But you said that I have no chance."

"Right now, yes. But maybe I could help you be a girl. Teach you some things. Get you just to the point where it may be OK. I don't know if it's possible. You've got so many years of being a boy that you would have to unlearn. It would take a lot of practice and hard work."

Lorin started sobbing and got up and threw himself on Beth and hugged her. "Would you do that for me? Would you help me be a girl?"

"I think I could get in big trouble for doing this. You're a minor you know. But nothing we're going to do will be sexual. I'll merely critique you and give you advice and things to do to, but it's totally in the role of supplying information. It will be as if we were coin collectors and I told you about how to find and evaluate coins."

"Of course," Lorin said moving back away from her. "I understand about that. I will never even say I know who you are."

Beth laughed. "Don't be dramatic. I trust you Lorin. It's as simple as that."

"And I trust you," Lorin said.

"Do you want some more hot chocolate?" Beth asked.

"Sure," Lorin said. "Can we begin now?"

"OK. Give me a minute to think about what to do. I've never done this kind of thing before." Beth went to the kitchen and Lorin blew his nose again. When Beth came back she gave him the drink and said, "we'll have to work on your appearance, your make up and clothes, your movements like how you walk, run, get dressed and how you talk, what you say and how you say it. I 'm sure there are things I'm forgetting. What do you want to start with?"

"I don't know."

"Let me look at you walk across the room and sit on the sofa."

Lorin got up and did as she said. "No," Beth said, "your walk is too hurried and you sit without hesitation. It's hard to describe how girls walk and sit, but it's more tentative shall I say. More conscious of being graceful. Keep your thighs closer together, girls walk more protectively of their private area. When you sit, imagine that you're getting your butt perfectly aligned over the seat and you sit slowly, bending your legs. Imagine you have a skirt or dress on and your instinct is to make sure the skirt is folded neatly under you."

Lorin tried it again. "Better. A big problem is your hands. They need to be soft and fluid. Delicate. Imagine you have long pretty finger nails that you don't want to break at any cost. It makes your hands sort of float delicately and when they touch something it's slowly and caressingly."

Lorin tried walking and sitting several more times. Beth watched him carefully, then went to her bedroom and came back with a large blue skirt with an elastic waist band. "Put this on, over your pants" she said and when Lorin reached to take it she quickly added, "and reach for it like a girl. Put it on like a girl. There's no rush. Think that it will make you feel pretty, that should help."

Lorin practiced walking and sitting with the skirt. Beth showed him how to gently make sure with his hands that the skirt was even when he sat. "How am I doing?" Lorin asked.

"You have some talent, but you have much more unlearning to do of boy type movements. I have an idea," Beth said and took a large picture book down from a shelf and sat down next to Lorin. The book consisted of sharp color pictures of ballerinas in exquisite costumes. "Here, look at Amanda McKerrow in Giselle." Lorin gazed upon a beautiful dancer en pointe in a wonderful full skirt. "And here is Susan Farrell in Swan Lake. Look at the delicacy and softness of her posture and the certainty of her own femininity. You have to feel that prettiness inside. See how the skirt of the tutu is an extension of her femaleness."

"She seems so frail and weak," Lorin said, "how can I ever be like that?"

"But she's not really," Beth said, "she's a powerful athlete, but she doesn't use it like a man - hit you over the head with it. Do you sort of get the picture, what I'm trying to express?"

"I think so," Lorin said. "I have to use my strength to help me appear weak."

"That's a pretty good way of saying it. You see it rules out being a sissy, you know like a caricature of a girl, where you flap your hands like you're ever so precious."

"It seems impossible to get this all right," Lorin said dejectedly.

"That's what I told you before. But you have made a bit of progress even in this hour, so I think that anything is possible. It's going to depend on how driven you are."

"I can't thank you enough for all you have done for me today."

"It's actually kind of fun. I feel a bit like Professor Higgins and you're Eliza Doolittle. Anyway, its getting late and you ought to be going. Practice everything I mentioned and come again next week."

"Could you show me how to put on pantyhose and a bra the way a girl would? And also a dress. I don't even know how to put on my cotillion dress."

"You'll have to bring them here."

"I'll try and do that," Lorin said and gathered up his things and said goodbye.
 

 
Over the next few weeks, Lorin ice skated with Penny at the town rink, went to a couple of movies with her, held her hand and even "made out" with her in the back of the movie theatre. He wondered the whole time if it would be appropriate to place his hand on her breast. To feel a breast in his bare hand, to feel it lying inside her bra, to feel Penny's warm bra as it nestled across her chest. He desperately wanted to do it, but was frozen in fear lest he go too far.

Interspersed with his times with Penny were several trips to Beth where she taught him techniques for putting on a bra and pantyhose. She showed him how to put on lipstick and eyeliner and eye shadow and rouge. Under her guidance he learned to brush his hair like a girl would, and set it up with rollers or barrettes. He learnt how slips go on and when a slip was necessary or not. Beth made him know what to look for when he looked in a mirror. She taught him how to be patient and to plan his movements.

She was an excellent teacher and he felt that he was becoming almost like a girl friend of hers as he absorbed more and more of what she taught him. The more he learned, the more feminine he felt and the better he learned, so his progress accelerated dramatically over the few weeks. He especially loved the freedom her small apartment gave him to just let down his hair so to speak and be a girl, or try to be a girl. From the moment he would enter he would slow his steps reach for things gently and carefully. His voice would soften and shift octave to more of a girls tone.

He had brought his cotillion dress, a bra, panties, a slip and some pantyhose to Beth's apartment and she didn't mind if he stored them there. Each time he came he would rush into her bedroom and don his "costume" as Beth described it. Undoubtedly, the mere act of wearing the pretty dress made him feel more feminine and so his lessons went better. On more than one occasion while on a date with Penny, he would think of himself in his dress and then feel terribly guilty. But inevitably, he would also wish that he could be Penny's girl friend, if that were possible. Would she mind if her boy friend was a girl?

With just two weeks before he would leave for camp, Beth said to Lorin, "your progress is really quite extraordinary. I think you might be passable, just passable as a girl. Or enough of a girl to suppress suspicion. A lot will depend on your hairstyle. Your movements have become feminine without being overly done and your voice, though a bit husky, is kind of girlish. You've gotten the hang of make up. Of course we haven't touched upon things like swimming like a girl, or catching a ball like a girl and I don't what you'll do at the dances. Do you know how to dance like a girl?"

"No," Lorin said with worry.

"Let's make this the last thing I teach you. I'll lead and you follow." Beth put on some slow music and came up to Lorin and held him firmly as if she were a boy leading him in a dance. It was the first time Beth had touched him and he delighted in the sensation. He had become very fond of her, not in the same was as with Penny, but nevertheless he was undoubtedly in love with her. In a future life maybe he would be her girl friend, or little sister. He hoped there would be some roles that they could play in each others lives in the future.

They danced together and Beth softly whispered instructions in his ear on how to follow her directions communicated through slight guiding movements of her arms. "I daresay that the boys you'll be dancing with won't be very good, so anything you do will probably be OK."

"Thanks, Beth, you've been so wonderful to me. I can never repay you." A few tears started coming down his cheek.

"I must admit its been a fun experience for me. You're a very special person Lorin. But I'm going to be very worried about you this summer. I want to believe that you're going to make it, but I don't honestly know. It's a very difficult thing not to have a slip up."

"Had I not had these lessons, I would have had no chance. I see that now. I can't believe how naive I was that I didn't see that before."

Beth gave Lorin a hug and told him he better go. "I'll be away for parts of the summer myself. I'm going to Europe for a few weeks. You will really be totally on your own at Camp Shoni."

Lorin could see some tears forming in Beth's eyes.

"And regardless of what happens at the camp, you're going to have to deal with yourself in the fall," Beth said.

"I know," Lorin said. It was, in fact, something he had thought about a lot. If he blossomed as Lauren this summer, how would he ever become Lorin again in the fall? How would he ever just resume his relationship with Penny?

Lorin took off his dress and underwear and put back on his jeans and shirt. He put his things in his backpack and said a last farewell to Beth and started back for home. He felt like his one life line to someone who would not condemn him was severed and he fought hard not to cry. By the time he got home, he felt more confident. Beth thought he could pass as a girl and she wouldn't say that if she didn't believe it. Two weeks to go to blast off and he decided that he was as ready as he ever was going to be.
 
 
Chapter 8
 
It would not be an exaggeration to say that Lorin went through the last weeks before he was to leave for camp in "auto-pilot" with his body accomplishing everything it had to, but his mind being a million miles away worrying, agonizing and dreading the upcoming plunge into the unknown. At odd moments throughout the day, regardless of where he was, or whom he was with he would find himself in a state of abject horror at the reality of what was about to unfold. Perhaps it was like a performer about to walk out on stage in front of 50,000 people. Only in his case, he would get onto a bus to Poughkeepsie, change to the camp bus and end up smack in the middle of hundreds of girls at Camp Shoni. It seemed absolutely impossible that not one girl among so many would be suspicious about who he was. Beth had had the right instinct. He couldn't help but make the comparison to Camp Dan in the situation that a girl tried to infiltrate pretending she was a boy. It would probably take just two seconds for the guys to figure out the deception. It must be the same for girls and even more so. Like a condemned man facing the gallows, Lorin would be caught, humiliated and then roasted alive by his parents.

Unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately, there was no alternative except to going ahead with the plan. Confessing to his parents and taking whatever consequence ensued would be a worse thing to do, since, like he had said to Beth, he might end up being lucky. People did win the lottery after all, didn't they? Whether he got caught now or later his life as he knew it would be just as much over. He had to take the path that had a tiny hope of success in it as against the path with no hope at all. He would stay the course.

Lorin and Kenny had made up to the point where Kenny had gotten an intro into Penny's circle of friends. Kenny had confided to Lorin that he had set his sights on a couple of the girls and might even try calling them up that summer. Lorin hoped he would succeed. A particularly onerous task during Lorin's final week before camp was shopping with his mom for the camp things that she thought he would need but Lorin knew he would not need. She asked his opinion on everything and with great effort he attempted to sound appreciative and excited. The money being spent on his behalf only fed into his guilt. The events during this week that grabbed his full attention were the times that he was with Penny. He saw her for a part of every day and it was clear to both of them that they were getting ever closer emotionally and physically.

Despite the distraction of his worry and paranoia, Lorin carefully went over and over his detailed preparations - his "war plan" for the big day. His mom had already gotten him his bus ticket. He had insisted that she get him one for an early bus even though it meant an extra hour layover in Poughkeepsie until the camp bus came. It had not been easy convincing her. She had thought him crazy, but he said he didn't want to cut it too close in case his bus was late. "But two hours instead of one hour?" his mom has said with exasperation. Luckily she had caved in to his wishes and he had gotten the bus he wanted.

It was a key to his plan. He would have two hours to take care of the one thing he couldn't do before he left: restyle his hair into a girl's hairdo. In fact, through an endless sequence of improvised blunders he had successfully avoided getting his typical pre-camp haircut. Every day closer and closer it had gotten to camp, the more his mom and then both his mom and dad had tried to get him to get his hair cut. His hair was now easily a girl's length, longer than it had ever been before. Kenny had begun joking to him that he was looking like a girl and even Penny had asked him if he ever was going to get his hair cut again.

Lorin lied to his parents that Penny preferred him in long hair and he lied to Penny that he would get a very short haircut the day before he left. His mom left him money to go to the barber and Lorin purposefully left it on the table and pretended he had forgotten to take it. On other occasions he had made up lies wherein Penny needed his help or Kenny's family wanted to take him bowling or other crazy reasons. When there was only one more possible time left to get his hair cut - the morning of the day before his departure - Lorin's dad ordered him into the car and said that he was personally taking him to get a haircut. Not only would it be cut, his dad insisted, it would be short enough to last the entire summer. Lorin fought back tears the entire way into town, but when they arrived at the barber shop there was a sign in the window saying: "Closed on Account of a Death in the Family. Will Reopen Tomorrow." Lorin's dad had stood staring at the door a good five minutes cursing under his breath, while Lorin quietly looked up at the sky and thanked God a hundred times for his kindness.

"Dad. Like I've been saying. There's a barber that comes to the camp every week. It's no big deal. He'll cut my hair."

His dad stared at him and pronounced that they would go to the beauty parlor where his mom usually went. When they arrived there, however, the hairstylist said that the only opening was late in the afternoon.

"We can't go back," his dad said, "can't you do it now?"

"I'm sorry. We're just booked solid."

Fuming, his dad stormed out of the shop and they drove home. Icily, his dad said, "So help me God Lorin! You're going to get the first haircut at camp. I'm going to call to make sure you get it!!"

"Don't worry dad, I'll get it done!" Lorin said with both inward joy and a quaking fear. Would his dad really call from China to find out if he had had his hair cut? It was possible, but it was a darn sight less of a problem than the one he would have if he showed up at Camp Shoni in short hair!

When they got back home, Lorin's mom volunteered to find a shop somewhere that would cut his hair that afternoon, but his dad reminded her that there simply was no time. Besides, Lorin was going to get it cut at camp, come hell or high water!

"I'm disappointed in you Lorin," his mom said.

"I'm sorry mom, I really did forget to get it done."

"I'm not sure I trust you on that. I think you've got some other motive here. I just don't know what it is. To tell you the truth, there are a lot of sort of strange things going on with you."

"You know, I never dated a girl..."

"Things that can't be explained by you dating Penny!"

"I'm sorry mom. There is nothing going on at all!"

"I think it dates from the day you found out you wouldn't be in the upper camp. I hope you don't do anything at camp that would embarrass the family!"

"Of course not!"

"You haven't gotten a false ID card to prove you're 14?"

Lorin forced himself to laugh. "How could I get them to change my age! That's ridiculous. Look Mom, there is no reason not to fully trust me. I've resigned myself to having a good time at Camp Dan and I will obey all the rules and you have nothing to worry about. I promise you on a stack of bibles!"

His mom looked at him a minute and then gave him a hug. "Teenagers. They are the most incomprehensible species on the planet. But I do love them anyway!"
 

 
Lorin had used the web to get the names of hair salons in Poughkeepsie, especially ones near the bus terminal. Certainly one of these must be willing to "turn him into a girl" he figured, it was just a matter of finding out which one. Using a pay phone and pile of quarters that he had saved, Lorin called one named "Maria's Hair Salon" to see what would happen if he were to ask them directly if they had a problem cutting a boys hair to look like a girls.

A woman answered and Lorin said, "I need to get my hair styled, but actually I sort of need to have it turned into a girls style."

There was total silence on the end of the line until finally the woman said, "is this a prank?"

"No, no, no," Lorin said, "I just want to know if you have any problem doing that."

"Yes, I do," the woman said. "We're a family business here.

"Can you tell me who would?"

The woman hung up on him. Lorin tried another place and when a man answered the phone Lorin hung up. He tried yet another and this time a woman with a thick Asian accent answered. Lorin had a hard time communicating with her but finally he got the idea that she thought he needed a unisex salon. Examining the list of stores Lorin saw that one of them had the name "Samantha's Unisex Salon" and it looked to be in easy walking distance of the bus station.

A woman answered the phone saying, "Samantha."

Lorin said, "Hi, I need to get my hair cut."

"When?"

"Oh, this Saturday at 11 in the morning?" That would be a half hour after his bus was due to arrive.

"I can do you at 4."

"Oh no, it has to be no later than 12. I catch a bus at 1."

"Let me see. What do you need done?"

"Just a haircut. Actually, it's a bit more complicated than that. I need to change my hair style. You do that don't you?"

Samantha laughed and said, "I like to think we can. I mean we are a hair salon, not a butcher shop."

"Sorry," Lorin said, "it's actually that I need to get a haircut so I can look like a girl." Saying that, Lorin felt the air rush out of his lungs and his heart pounded intensely in his chest.

"Why in the world would you be doing that?"

"Its way complicated. It's for a part in a play," Lorin lied, "I mean I'm going to audition for it."

"Okay, okay. No problem. You be here at noon and I'll do it during lunch. What's the name?"

"Lorin."

"Phone?"

Lorin looked at the number in the phone booth and gave it to her.

"Where's that?"

"I'm moving to Poughkeepsie for the summer, I don't have a number there just yet. I promise I'll be there and I'll give a really big tip."

Samantha laughed. "Okay. Bye. You're too much."

Lorin caught his breath. This was all going better than he should expect. Surely something was going to go wrong. He had to be really on his toes.

After he had hung up, Lorin thought about Samantha's voice. She sounded like his mom and guessed that she would be kindly toward him. Perhaps like Beth if he was really lucky. It was a big relief that this was all set. He would arrive in Poughkeepsie, check his luggage at the bus station at a location in the terminal which he found on the station website and then find his way to Samantha's. Thus all was now in place except for the "big switcheroo" which is how Lorin referred to the time when he would switch all his boys' clothes with his girls' clothes. He had a mental picture of how it would unfold. His trunk, which his mom had already placed in his bedroom, was steadily filling up with his boy clothes as his mom went systematically through the camp list. A few things would wait until the last minute and then she would have him close the lid and he and his Dad would carry the trunk downstairs and out the door and into the car.

A big danger was that he would get interrupted in the few minutes he would have to do the switching before his mom told his dad it was time to carry the trunk to the car. More likely, however, was the possibility that his mom would have forgotten something and would need to open the trunk again after he had locked it. To defend against the latter, he would keep some boys clothes on the shelf that fit into the top of the trunk. Until the trunk was safely stowed in the cargo bay of the bus to Poughkeepsie, he would be a nervous wreck.

The last bit of his plan was the one that gave him the most excitement and happiness. He would have with him his small back pack containing his first ever outfit as Lauren. There would be a bra, panties, his girl's shorts and the pink Camp Shoni tee shirt. He had given a lot of thought as to which bra he would wear and had decided it would be one of the new padded bras. Like superman he would rush to find a private place, perhaps the bathroom at the bus terminal to switch his clothes. He wondered what would be worse: leaving the boys bathroom dressed like a girl, or entering the girls bathroom as a boy. Neither one seemed like a good idea. Maybe he would find an alley somewhere. But after it was done, wherever that happened, he would be Lauren. The next step, of climbing on board the bus bound for Camp Shoni, was beyond his imagination to conceive.
 

 
The hardest part of going was saying good bye to Penny. Their friendship had grown to the point where he was no longer worried about saying the right thing or presenting himself in the best possible light at all times. She liked him. She liked being with him. It was easy being together. They had fun, they laughed, they played and they touched each other. Of course, there was a big part of Lorin she knew nothing about, nor could he confide in her about it. Had he known Penny before he had enacted his plan to go to Camp Shoni then he surely would never have done it. On the other hand, the part of him that wanted to be Lauren was powerful, it was not simply going to go away because he loved Penny. Ultimately it was probably best that now that he had discovered Penny, he would have an equal chance to discover Lauren. By the end of the summer, he would then know which way he would want to go for the rest of his life.

The day before he was to leave, he saw Penny for the last time. It was after his dad had returned in frustration from trying to get Lorin's hair cut. Penny and he walked together hand in hand to the park and then to a spot near the top of a beautiful sloping meadow that Penny knew about. They lay down in the grass next to each other and Lorin looked out into the distance across to a forest that began at the bottom of the hillside and ran up to the top of an adjacent hill. They kissed each other and held each other and they told each other how much they loved each other. Yes, the "L" word had come out a few weeks earlier. Penny had said it first and Lorin had rushed to say it also. It had been so obvious it was more of an after thought than a necessity to say it, but it had felt wonderful to Lorin's and Penny's ears. It's nice to hear someone say that they love you. For Lorin it was the ultimate validation of his self worth.

Looking at Lorin, Penny had said, "your hair is so long. I think I may be starting to like it like this."

"Really?"

"I think so, but you know it does start making you look a little girlish."

Lorin glanced at her suddenly.

"I hope I'm not hurting your feelings."

"No. Of course not. I'm going to get it cut. I don't know why, but I just didn't feel like doing it. Maybe because it's the hair I had when I started seeing you."

Penny laughed and Lorin joined her. "That's so beyond ridiculous," she said, "but probably why I love you."

Lorin blushed. "I don't intend to look girlish. I guess I better get it cut the first thing at camp. Some of the guys can be pretty tough, especially if they think a guy is the slightest bit you know - like a fruitcake."

"I'm not surprised," Penny said. "The guys I used to go out with before you were always making jokes about fags. To be honest, I didn't know that any boys didn't think that way."

"You're not concerned that I'm not tough enough?"

"There's tough and there's tough. I don't think I would like swishy in a guy, but not being a caveman? No problem, in fact, I think it's great, it brings us closer together. Let's face it, I've dated a guy who was a freshman on the high school football team. All he wanted to do was make out and he had nothing to say."

They embraced and lay facing each other looking into each others eyes. Wisps of Penny's hair fell across her eye blown from a breeze of hot air running up the slope past them and Lorin gently pushed it aside. It was perfect. It was too perfect. Would they be together in the fall? And if they weren't would it be because of what he was about to do at Camp Shoni?

Lorin thought about what Penny had said. She didn't want a caveman and she didn't want swishy, but he wasn't at all swishy. Girls weren't swishy. The guilt he felt at what he was about to do felt like a hot poker inside himself. Perhaps looking for a release he said, "I worry sometimes that I want to emulate girls."

Penny's face scrunched up slightly and then relaxed. "Emulate them how? Having a baby?"

Lorin laughed. "I never thought of that, but that would be cool. No, I mean, it's hard to say. I mean if I like a certain guy, like Bob Dylan for example and I then tried to imitate him that would be OK I guess. But I like you for example, so logically it seems like I should want to emulate you also."

"I see what you're saying. You could want to have qualities of a certain girl, let's say she never lied or anything, or was a good student. But if you imitated Bob Dylan by wearing his kind of boots, then I don't think that kind of imitation would also make sense if the person you emulated was a girl. Like do you want to dress like Joan Baez or something? Do you want to wear my clothes?"

Lorin let out a gasp of air and recoiled in fear until he heard Penny laughing uproariously. "Oh, you're so funny. Man did you jump! I must have really hit a nerve!"

Lorin playfully climbed on top of Penny in a mock wrestling match. "As I always say, love the girl, love her clothes."

Penny laughed. "I'm going to miss you terribly this summer. Let's switch shirts so we have something to remember each other by."

"Really?" Lorin said.

"Yes! I think my blouse will fit you and your shirt will fit me."

Lorin impulsively took off his shirt, a red tee shirt with the logo of a country western night club that his parents often went to, it was one of his favorites. Penny's blouse was a kind of salmon color with a collar and a few buttons that ended just at the top of her cleavage. "You can't take your shirt off!" Lorin said, "we're outside."

Penny looked around quickly. There were a couple of guys playing Frisbee near the bottom of the meadow. "They're not looking," Penny said, and while lying on the grass she pulled her top off revealing her bra. They exchanged shirts and Lorin watched Penny put his tee shirt on. When the show was over, he put her blouse on over his head and pulled it down. It fit him well enough though it was just the slightest bit tight.

They admired the way each other looked. "You look beautiful in my shirt," Lorin said. The image of her white bra against her pale skin and her young breasts swelling inside was emblazoned in his memory forever.

"And you look so pretty," Penny laughed.

It was a magical moment Lorin thought. He sensed Penny's essence in the blouse, the slight dampness of her sweat and a kind of faint feminine smell. "Do I look like a girl in this shirt?" Lorin asked.

"I'll say," Penny said. "You're my girlfriend and I'm your boy friend!"

Lorin looked at her trying to see if there might be any truth whatsoever to what she was saying. Was it all a joke? Or just maybe she liked the idea of their switching roles. He was tempted to go further, to say something like: "but you're wearing the bra," but he didn't. It seemed like an enormous risk. It could backfire. Instead he hugged her and lay on her again and they took a long soulful kiss.

When the sun seemed like it was beginning to head down, they walked back to Penny's house where his mom was expecting them for dinner. Lorin already had permission from his mom to stay. Penny's mom laughed good-naturedly when she saw that they had switched shirts, and said "how romantic you two are." Lorin enjoyed eating with Penny's family - her parent's weren't quite as serious or formal as his own. When it was over Lorin and Penny spent another hour in her room mostly kissing and saying their goodbyes and making promises to each other such as that they would write every week without fail.

Lorin's dad picked him up at 8:30 and on the drive back Lorin couldn't stop himself from crying.

"You've done a lot of growing up this spring, Lorin," his dad said. "I'm proud of you."

"Thanks dad. It's so hard to see how I can get through two months without seeing Penny."

"True. A lot can happen in two months. But the way I always think about these things is that if they are meant to be they will happen."

"But she'll probably meet other guys this summer and she'll have all day everyday to hang out with them."

"True, but if she forms a better couple with you than she does with the others, then she'll know it and you'll get back together."

"But she might meet someone better than me."

"That's always the risk, but if she does, then it was never meant for you two to be together more than you have been. That's exactly my point."

"I think I see what you're saying."

"When you're older it will make even more sense to you."

When they got home, his mom quizzed him about the shirt that his father hadn't even noticed. He told her the truth and, while his mom didn't seem enthusiastic about the trade, she didn't criticize him for it either.
 

 
The next morning was the big day, the day Lorin had been both dreading and hoping for since he first hatched his plan. It was a gray day, with a slight drizzle and unseasonably cold. An auspicious start to his final countdown. Memories of Penny flooded his mind and he felt his heart ache with longing for her. He had her shirt and he would wear it often during the summer.

His parents would be taking him to the bus station at 10:00 AM to catch the 10:15 bus. It was now 7:00 AM. The trunk filled with his boy's clothes awaited the big switcheroo. For safety sake he wouldn't switch the clothes until 9:30 or even a bit later. He went downstairs for breakfast where he encountered both his Mom and Dad and Stephanie. They had a very big day themselves, since their plane to Japan left that evening.

"I'm doing one last wash before you go. Anything to go in?" his mom said.

"No, I already put everything in the hamper."

"You're not taking Penny's blouse with you, are you?"

"I can't? Why not? That's why she gave it to me?"

"You're not going to wear a girls' blouse at camp, are you?"

"Well, I won't wear it, but it's sort of a way to remember her."

"It's all right," Lorin's dad intervened. "It's easy for us to forget how emotional young love can be."

"Shall I wash it then?" his mom asked.

Washing would take out Penny's scent and Lorin said, "no, it's fine. It doesn't need washing."

Lorin's mom looked at him as if she would say something and then thought the better of it. After breakfast, Lorin closed the door to his room. It was time to enact the first part of his plan. Since it would be too time consuming to shuttle clothes back and forth between the hiding place in the bathroom and the trunk in his bedroom, he had decided he would stage all his girls' things under his bed so the switch could be made that much more rapidly. He could also select the bra, panties and other clothes that he needed to switch into after his haircut in Poughkeepsie.

He went into the bathroom, opened the panel and took out his precious clothes and put them under the bed. There was a bag of his bras and one of his panties, another for his swim suits and shorts and tops and one holding his crinoline. And then the most important bag of all was his dress. He prayed that it wouldn't be ruined lying at the bottom of his trunk. The other girls probably would bring their dresses in garment bags, and he worried what they would think about the way he had packed his dress.

When he was done with his preparation, he showered and then put the last of his boy things in the trunk that his mother expected to find there and then went downstairs to see how the laundry was coming. As soon as his clothes were dried and folded, he'd be there to carry them up and do the switch.

The clothes had completed their wash and his mother was in the act of putting them into the dryer when he appeared. "Excited about camp?" his mom asked.

"Yeah, but I guess I'm still more thinking about not seeing Penny."

"I know, your dad told me you were crying last night. That's so touching. She must be a very special person."

"She is. We have so much fun together. I feel like I can be myself with her."

His mom smiled at him. "I'm sure everything will work out in the fall. It's hard to meet a nice person and that should mean a lot for keeping it going in the future."

"I sure hope so," Lorin said.

Among the items in the laundry were Camp Dan tee shirts from past years and as his mom put them into the drier she said, "I've been wondering why you never got a Camp Dan tee shirt in the mail. Every year they always send one. Did it come and you didn't tell me?"

"No, mom. I was wondering the same thing," he lied. His mom would definitely not want to see the pretty pink tee shirt he got from Camp Shoni.

"I want you to complain about that when you arrive. They should give you a free shirt."

"OK, mom, I'll ask for one."

"Don't forget."

"I won't."

An hour later, it was 9:30 and the wash was done. Lorin anxiously sat in his bedroom. When his mom came in with the pile of laundry he rushed to take it from her. "I'll put it in the trunk," he said.

"We've got to go. I'll get your dad to help you carry the trunk downstairs."

Oh shit! Lorin thought to himself. This is going way too fast! The moment his mom left he raised the lid of the trunk, lifted out the top shelf in it, and madly grabbed the boys' clothes and ran them into the bathroom where he stacked them up behind the door. The door to his room was partly ajar and he noticed his sister staring in at him. "I think I forgot something" Lorin yelled at her and she shook her head and kept on walking. Lorin prayed she couldn't figure out what he was up to.

When the trunk was empty he placed his dress on the bottom and rapidly threw in his girls' clothes taking them out of their bags since he figured it would look silly to have all his clothes bagged up when he got to camp. He could faintly hear the sound of his father downstairs and then he heard his father call up to him. "Ready Lorin?"

"NOT QUITE!" he screamed. He could hear his dad ascending the stairs and Lorin frantically completed tossing his stuff into the trunk and then just as his dad entered the room, in desperation, Lorin grabbed the top trunk shelf that was filled with small items such as soap, shampoo, and socks and flung it on top of the girls' clothes piled underneath.

"ALL DONE!" Lorin yelled.

"You don't have to scream," his father said, "and it wouldn't hurt to be gentle with the trunk. My goodness, you can't slam it around like that."

"Sorry, dad!" Lorin said with a weird smile on his face.

"My God you look tense Lorin!"

Lorin let out a strange laughing sound.

"Are you ready to lock it up?"

"Hunh, yup!" Out of the corner of his eye Lorin noticed that at least part of the clothes he had piled in the bathroom were visible from his bedroom. "But I've to go first!" he said, pointed to his stomach and ran into the bathroom slamming the door behind him.

"Are you sick?" his dad said through the door.

"No! I'll feel better in a minute," Lorin said. As quietly as possible, he unscrewed the trap door and shoved his boys' clothes inside.

"What are all these bags?" his dad said.

"Oh nothing," Lorin said. "I was just cleaning out my room."

"Are you sure you have everything for your trunk?"

"Yeah!" Lorin said. The lid was open. If his dad looked underneath the top shelf he'd probably see a few bras and a panty or two.

There was so much boys stuff, Lorin was having trouble squeezing it into the opening. He finally had to take some clothes back out, push what was in there further in and then resume filling it. Lorin heard his father yell "what?" and then, after a minute, he said to Lorin, "you're mother wants me to check if you have your one good pair of corduroy pants."

"They're in the trunk, I'M SURE OF IT!"

"How far down?"

Lorin was almost done. He put the plate back on the opening and began frantically turning the screws. He flushed the toilet and ran out just as his dad was about to lift the top shelf off. Lorin lurched across the room in a frenzy, acting as if he had lost his balance. He screamed, made an Indian war whoop-like cry and headed right toward his dad, who jumped aside just as Lorin grabbed the lid of the trunk and slammed it shut with such velocity that the sound echoed throughout the room and downstairs like a gunshot. His mother yelled in alarm, "WHAT IN THE WORLD?"

"JESUS! LORIN! You almost chopped my hand off!" his dad yelled.

"I'm sorry dad, I stumbled, I lost my balance it was the only thing I could take hold of."

His dad looked at him with utter confusion and disbelief. "I don't know Lorin, you seem to be really losing it."

"I'm really sorry."

"Look Lorin. Are you..."

"Am I?"

"You know, high?"

"Dad! How can you say such a thing?"

"I've had some experience. Your behavior is fitting that profile."

"I promise you dad. You can trust me. I definitely have never taken drugs and I don't intend to start. I'm just excited and clumsy."

"OK. We don't have much time. Just calm down, way down. OK?"

"I will."

"I hope you didn't lock the keys inside."

"No, I've got them right here and Lorin produced a key chain with two identical keys on them.

"Alright, lock it up let's carry this down to the car."

They each grabbed an end and brought it downstairs to the car. On their way back into the house Lorin's mom saw them and said, "It sounded like a gun when off upstairs."

"Your son just about decapitated my hand. He fell on the trunk lid while leaping across the room. I guess we don't have to worry about him joining the ballet."

Lorin's mom chuckled and said, "I found one more shirt to go in the trunk."

"I'll just put it in my backpack," Lorin said and took the shirt from his mom and went back upstairs.

"We're ready to go," his dad called after him, "and throw out your trash."

"What trash?" his mom said.

"He's got a pile of empty bags up there. I just don't know about him."

Lorin crumpled the bags into a ball and put them into the trash can. He carefully filled his backpack with his girls' outfit and put the shirt his mom had given him and other stuff on top of it. He took one long look around the room, checked under the bed and made sure there was no evidence of what he was about to do.

In the bathroom, he saw that he had missed one sock and he picked it up and put it in his dresser. He tightened the screws on the bathroom panel as tightly as he could and hid the screwdriver in his desk. He was all set here. When he came back in two months he'd have to deal with whatever he would have to deal with. One thing would obviously be to switch his girls' clothes back to his boys' clothes and to somehow get his boys clothes to look like they had been at camp. That wouldn't be easy, but why worry about it now? He had a hundred other things to worry about.
 

 
The trip to the bus terminal was uneventful. A few minutes after they arrived, the bus to Poughkeepsie showed up and Lorin watched as the driver loaded the trunk into the underneath compartment. Lorin's mom and dad and sister who had come along also, hugged him and Lorin found himself holding back tears. His family would be thousands and thousands of miles away from him and he'd be all alone in Camp Shoni masquerading as Lauren. It felt like a huge boulder was crushing him to the ground. There was still time to call it off; he just had to say the word.

The driver called for everyone to board the bus and Lorin climbed in and took a window seat near the back and waved to his mom and dad. The bus backed out and then he was off down the road toward the highway. Lorin looked up at the sky and saw that the cloud cover had parted and the early summer sun shone down in full force. Lorin smiled and then he felt his heart rise up in happiness and excitement. He opened up his backpack, reached in and felt around in it for his padded bra. It was nice. In a couple of hours he'd be wearing it. He'd be a girl. He'd have a pretty pink Camp Shoni bunny tee shirt on and he'd be entering a world that held such wonders as he could never fully imagine. Just a few more hours.

He sat back and relaxed. Months ago this moment seemed impossible to attain, yet here he was. Someone in heaven was looking out for him and maybe they would also do so while he was in Camp Shoni. He would soon find out.
 
 
Chapter 9
 
As Lorin rode on the bus to Poughkeepsie, for the first time since he had cooked up his plan months ago, he felt free of the immediate danger that his subterfuge would be discovered by his parents. He sank back into his seat and relaxed and felt giddy with happiness. He had done the impossible and it must mean that he could continue to do the impossible. He would act the part of a teenage girl that summer at Camp Shoni so perfectly that no suspicion would ever be raised.

Lorin watched the scenery slide by. Each road or house or town that the bus passed meant he was that much closer to realizing his dream and he felt happy and content. It wasn't long, however, before he found himself wondering if he were happier now than he had been in the meadow with Penny the day before. It was a big and important question and he honestly did not know the answer. Maybe by the end of the summer he would know. Whatever way it came out was likely to affect the whole future course of his life.

Lorin couldn't help but appreciate the irony that if he did get caught at Camp Shoni then he would not have to answer the big question himself: it would be answered for him by his parents and maybe even the police. In a strange, sadistic way, there was some comfort in that scenario since it gave him a way to relax and just let life wash over himself without having to think.

Thinking, that was his worst enemy, since it had got him to where he was at that moment. He was too clever for his own good and it had made him think up this crazy plan and now he had no way to pull it off as perfectly as he would want. Lorin felt his spirits sag and his anxiety rise. The all too familiar image came back to him that he had been trying to put out of his mind all that spring: the image of himself slipping and sliding down a steep hill into an abyss. At the bottom would be his parents, sister, other relatives and friends yelling at him and crying. Only Beth would be the exception, and he hoped Penny would also, but he did not know for sure. He wished the bus would speed up and up and up and get him to Poughkeepsie so fast that he wouldn't have the time to think any more about all these things

Lorin distracted himself by counting highway signs and his anxiety passed. A minute later he thought that maybe he had just two hours left as Lorin if even that. Would he miss his boy self? Would his boy self actually be missing? Would his girl self long to be his boy self? The thoughts swirled in his head.

Lorin looked around the bus to see if anyone else might be going to camp. There were a couple of boys his age sitting next to each other a few rows ahead of him but there was nothing obvious about them to suggest why they were going to camp. Lorin saw a girl up front near the driver. From what he could tell she did not seem to be too attractive. Lorin caught a man looking at him who then looked away when Lorin returned the gaze. Lorin wondered if the man could tell he was a guy, or had he wondered for even a second that maybe Lorin was a girl. He hoped so, since it would make his task that much simpler.

Finally Lorin took a book out of his backpack and became absorbed in reading, and then before he knew it the bus pulled into the station at Poughkeepsie. Trembling, Lorin put his backpack on and got off the bus. In a few minutes his trunk was unloaded and Lorin sucked in his stomach and forced himself to be brave. This is it, the games begin! He looked around the terminal to where he expected the luggage check to be and sure enough he could see it a hundred yards away across the terminal. His trunk was heavy but it slid rather easily on the hard surface of the terminal floor and Lorin did not have too much trouble pushing it across the room. A clerk gave him a numbered receipt and Lorin walked to the main entrance to the terminal and out onto the street.

Samantha's. He would now have to find the hair salon.

Lorin pulled out a hand drawn map he had made from his backpack showing him the way to Samantha's and headed off looking at the street signs. He walked slowly having time to kill. A pizza place was at the end of the first block and Lorin debated whether he should have a slice or not. He decided he was too nervous to eat; in fact he had no appetite.

Shortly before noon he found himself standing outside Samantha's Unisex Salon. Through the large picture window he saw several people inside. There appeared to be a woman hairdresser who was middle aged and a younger male hairdresser. A couple of women were in barber chairs having their hair styled.

The presence of the man was disconcerting and Lorin hoped he wouldn't be listening in on his conversation with Samantha. While he was looking through the window, the woman stylist saw him and Lorin had no choice but to enter the shop. When he came in the woman called out to him, "Are you Lorin?"

"Yeah," Lorin said nervously.

"Have a seat, I'll be with you soon."

Lorin couldn't tell if she was friendly or not. The woman was preoccupied with a conversation she was having with the woman whose hair she was styling. Lorin sat down and picked up a magazine and looked at the cover. It was a trade magazine for the hairstyle industry and Lorin skimmed through it looking at women's hairstyles. It was Greek to him and the more he looked the more confused he became as to what sort of hairstyle he should adopt. He hoped that Samantha would be able to tell him what he should do.

After ten minutes, Lorin could see that it was noon, but Samantha didn't seem to be close to finishing with her customer. The bus for Camp Shoni was to leave at 1 and Lorin didn't see how he could get his hair styled and get back to the station in much less than an hour. Maybe a 5 or 10 minute delay would be OK, but then he'd be really pressing it. Not only was the terminal several blocks away, but he would have to switch to being Lauren before he got there. This was not looking good. Samantha and the woman chatted casually and every so often Samantha stopped working and just talked.

At 12:10, the male stylist finished with his customer and she paid him and left. The stylist said something to Samantha and vanished into a back room. Just as it came to 12:15 Lorin put down the magazine, stood up and began pacing back and forth and staring hard at Samantha hoping she would see him.

After a minute, she glanced at him and said, "I'm sorry, I'll be done soon."

"I'm sorry but I have to catch a bus, remember?"

"I think I said I would try and fit you in, and I will."

"Oh, OK," Lorin said. A wave of depression descended over him. It was 12:20, in another minute or two it would be impossible to make the bus as Lauren. What would he do? Did the camp have any provision for late campers? There had been a warning in the camp documents in capital letters about the importance of arriving at the bus before one since it would leave promptly.

Lorin slumped down in the chair and fought back tears that seemed to be coming on. He had worked so hard for so long to get to Camp Shoni, and now the plan was unraveling by a few minutes. He felt Samantha staring at him, but he couldn't look up. He put his hands up to his face to hide behind them. The futility of his situation was overwhelming. A great weight descended on his shoulders pushing him down and he felt sorry for himself. He didn't want to feel sorry for himself, but the burden had become too large and he just couldn't take it any longer.

After a minute or two, he felt the presence of someone near him and he opened his eyes and saw Samantha standing over him.

"You look like you're going to die."

"I was hoping I could get changed, you know, like I said on the phone, before the bus leaves at 1. I'll never make it now."

"I'm almost done."

Lorin looked up at the clock it was 12:26. He feebly pointed to it. Samantha looked back at the woman in the chair. She wasn't close to being done. "I feel terrible. Maybe Gus could do it."

"Gus?"

"He was just here, the other stylist."

"A man?" Lorin said. Lorin had never planned for the possibility that a man would be the one to turn his appearance into that of a girl. His transformation had always seemed like a girl thing to him. It only involved girls and not guys. Guys would never understand his wanting to be a girl, but girls would. They would be able to understand his hunger for all that they had.

"Is that a problem for you?"

"It's just that, you know what I need done?"

"Make you look like a girl, right?"

"Yeah," Lorin said. Her voice was loud enough for her customer to hear and Lorin winced in embarrassment.

With an effort he added, "you don't think he would laugh at me?" Lorin wasn't sure that laugh was the right word, but it seemed to explain in his own mind why it was that he didn't think a man should be the one to turn him into a girl.

"Why do you think I wouldn't laugh at you?" Samantha said, amused by Lorin's remark.

This almost brought on his tears and Samantha quickly added, "I'll see if Gus can cut your hair, and if he can I'll make sure he won't laugh at you."

Lorin nodded his head and Samantha went to the back room and a minute later she returned. "He says no problem. Give him a minute to finish his lunch."

"OK, thanks," Lorin said in a tiny voice. It was his only option and he would have to take it despite whatever embarrassment he might feel.

"Go ahead and sit in his chair, he'll be right with you. He's very good."

Lorin did what she said and in a minute Gus appeared. "What's the deal? Samantha says you want a girl's style, is that it? For a play or something?"

"I can't thank you enough," Lorin said, and in mid sentence something came over him and he desperately wanted to talk as if he were Lauren. In his best girl's voice like he had practiced with Beth, he continued, "I've got to look like a girl. Yes it's for a part sort of, as you can see I've been practicing it a lot. But I've got so little time now. My bus leaves at one promptly, do you think we have enough time?"

"Oh sure, yeah no problem."

"That's so kind of you."

"So what kind of girl's style do you want?"

"Whatever makes me most look like one, can you do that?"

The elderly woman being attended to by Samantha turned around to stare at Lorin.

"I don't see why not. I better shampoo you first."

"Is there time?" Lorin asked.

"There had better be, because I can't do what you want with a dry cut. Trust me it'll be all right."

"I've been growing my hair long to make it look more girl like."

"I can see that," Gus said. He led Lorin to a back area of the shop where he washed Lorin's hair and then brought him back to his styling chair.

"Your hair is medium length, between your shoulders and chin. So, I'd guess something like bangs across the front, a part over the middle of your head and your hair sweeping around the sides of your face just over the outer corner of your eyes and the outer parts of your cheeks and angling to just below your chin. Your face will look soft and feminine, any male angularity will be behind your hair."

"That sounds so fantastic!"

"Well let's see how it turns out first."

Lorin glanced at the clock and Gus said, "I know. Relax. I'll have you done in no time."

As much as he wanted to believe Gus, he felt extreme anxiety deep in his loins. It was a hot intense feeling that seemed to encompass the entire midsection of his body. He watched Gus select a scissor and with confident hands gather the strands of his hair together and snip them across the front. The immediate transformation in the mirror was striking. Using a brush, Gus organized the part at the top of his head and when it was aligned he cut the hair so it would fall like he had suggested over his face.

Like a wizard Gus conjured up the girl in Lorin and as Lorin watched in growing amazement he saw Lauren appearing more and more clearly. Later he would reflect many times over on when had been the exact moment in the mirror when the balance tipped away from Lorin to Lauren. It was a subtle thing, but there was a certain point after which anyone looking at Lorin's face would think they were looking at a girl. Not just any girl, but a young feminine girl, with a rather pretty face peering out from behind her bangs and long strands of delicate, straight hair converging toward her chin.

Lorin felt his eyes tearing up and then a drop fell down along his cheek. He was now Lauren. That was it. It was done. He was a she. He would now think of himself only as a she. The girl whose image he saw in the mirror had been Lorin and now she was Lauren. That girl, she was Lauren. Lorin was Lauren.

The self-image of Lorin, the boy who had planned this summer at Camp Shoni, receded from Lauren's mind at blindingly fast speed until all that Lauren knew with sure knowledge was that she was a girl. She was a she. She was Lauren.

Gus noticed the tear coming down Lauren's cheek and gently wiped it away with his hand.

"It's a tear of joy," Lauren said.

"I know," Gus said smiling. "I won't probe any further, but just answer me one question."

"Sure," Lauren said in the voice Beth had taught Lorin weeks earlier, "I owe it to you. I owe you a lot."

"Why this shop, this day, in Poughkeepsie?"

Lauren smiled. "I'm on my way to camp. It's the camp bus I have to make. Oh, and it's not a coed camp."

Gus stared at Lauren shaking his head, "A gutsy thing if I ever heard one. My goodness!"

Samantha had finished with her customer and she came over to see the transformation. "He comes in a boy and leaves as a girl. You're a magician Gus."

"Did he," Gus started to say and stopped after seeing Lauren give him a sharp glance. "I mean, did she tell you why she needed this?"

"She?" Samantha looked momentarily surprised and then said, "he/she/it, whatever, said it's for a play, isn't that true?"

"Tell her," Gus said to Lauren.

"I'm going to a girl's camp this summer."

"A girl's camp? You're going to be among girls, pretending you're a girl? That wasn't truthful of you," Samantha said though she did not sound upset.

"I feel terrible having deceived you, but I had no choice. Everything depended on this and it's turned out so much better than I ever could have imagined. I am forever grateful to you."

"You've left us vulnerable," Samantha said. "If you get caught I imagine we'll be blamed."

"But there's no law about giving a boy a girl's haircut, is there?" Lauren said.

"Maybe not, but I do feel like the shop has aided and abetted the delinquency of a minor."

Gus laughed, "Chill, Samantha. It's only hair. We didn't give him a boob job."

Lauren glanced at the clock and saw that she had barely ten minutes left.

"I truly am sorry, but I've got to go. I can't thank you enough, really. It's so much better than I ever imagined."

"You're hair is damp."

"I know, but there isn't any time."

Lauren got up, reached in her knapsack and took out her money. "What do I owe you?"

"It's just fifteen for the cut."

"That's all?" Lauren gave Gus twenty five dollars. "Can I use your bathroom for a minute?"

"Sure," Gus said indicating where it was.
 

 
Lauren hurried to the bathroom and closed the door behind her. She took off all of Lorin's clothes and from the backpack she took out panties and put them on, followed by a pair of thin pink socks. She next took out the bra that Lorin had placed in the backpack and with extreme delight she expertly put it on. It was padded and exquisitely pretty and Lauren said out loud, "how did I ever manage without a bra before." She looked approvingly at herself in the small mirror and then hurriedly put the pink bunny tee shirt on. The last two articles of clothing were her shorts and a pair of girls' sneakers and then she was done.

There wasn't much time to admire herself in the bathroom mirror, but she couldn't resist the temptation to take in the whole new look of herself. She was cute, even without make up or anything and she loved the way her hair looked. It was nice to be wearing a bra and feeling so feminine. There was something utterly fulfilling about the feeling of having breasts. It was like she was complete now. Most wonderful of all was that she felt that her longing had ended. Yes, she could sense that there was still some longing in her, perhaps to not have a penis, or to have a narrower waist but these were subsidiary to a primal desire inside herself to project the image of a womanly figure to the world. It was breasts that seemed most important and now she could look forward to many days ahead, one after the other drawn from a rich mother lode of days, like taking withdrawals from a bank vault filled with riches, where she would be wearing a bra and experiencing all that society gives to those who are female, or at least have the appearance of being female.

Lauren stepped out of the bathroom holding Lorin's clothes in a neat pile. The clock said it was almost one. "I've got to run! I don't need these clothes where I'm going. Can I just leave them here?" she asked.

Samantha took the clothes from Lauren and said, "Hurry up. You're never going to make it!"

"I'll drive you," Gus said, "my car is out front."

"Would you!" Lauren said.

"C'mon!" Gus said and they rushed out to his car.

As they waited at a traffic light with the terminal in sight, Lauren said, "Actually, I may be coming through here in two months and I might need my hair changed back."

"Really?"

"Even if I don't, I may stop by then to say hello and I hope you'll be there."

"I hope you do. I really want to find out how it all turns out for you."

The car started moving and when they got to the terminal, Lauren saw several girls wearing pink tee shirts. "Whew, the bus must not have left, there are bunch of other bunnies."

Before Lauren left the car she turned to Gus and said. "You saved my life and I'll never be able to thank you enough."

"The pleasure is all mine," Gus said.

Impulsively, Lauren leaned toward him and gave him a little kiss on his cheek and then left the car. She waved to Gus as he drove off and then hurried to pick up her trunk.

When a camp counselor saw Lauren trying to drag the trunk across the floor she said, "let me help you with that!"

"Thank you," Lauren said, "it's awfully heavy!"

"What's your name?"

"Lauren Baxter."

"Small world! I'm Marilyn, your counselor for the bunnies of cabin 4!"

As they struggled with the trunk, Lauren said, "It's my first year at Camp Shoni."

"We've got a great group of girls this year. I'm sure you're going to have loads of fun."

"I've been so excited about camp, it's hard to believe it's actually going to start."

"I know exactly what you mean."

They brought the trunk close enough to the bus and then let it down. Marilyn went off to help another girl and Lauren looked around at the kids in the bus station. She saw that some of the girls were wearing blue tee shirts that identified them as Wolves at Camp Shoni. Nearby there was a bus for Camp Dan that was close to being fully boarded. Through the window Lauren saw a few faces that she recognized. She didn't see her friend Owen, but figured his parents drove him up to camp anyway. One thing that was certain was that the Camp Shoni bus wasn't leaving promptly at one. Her hysteria over the last hour had been pointless.

Glancing around at the girls in pink tee shirts Lauren saw a familiar face and then realized it must be Joan, or someone who looked exactly like the picture that Joan had sent. The girl had dark hair and was much more well developed than Lauren. "Hi Joan!" Lauren exclaimed.

Joan turned around and eyed Lauren quizzically. "You're Joan in Cabin 4, aren't you?" Lauren said.

"Yes! Lauren? Is that you? You've totally changed your hairstyle. You look so much different. I love that hairstyle it's so adorable."

Lauren didn't know if she was supposed to hug Joan, but she did so anyway and Joan hugged her back.

"I thought I'd try something new that my hairdresser suggested. I'm so glad you like it."

"It's cute," Joan said. "I haven't seen any of the other girls; I suppose they're not coming by bus. It's just you and me."

"It's my first time at Camp Shoni," Lauren said.

"You'll love it. I do. I've been going for three years already. This year we get to go to the dances and the big cotillion at the end. It's so neat."

"I know, I was reading about the cotillion. It sounds so wonderful."

"It is. A lot of the girls from the lower camp help with the decorations and I've been able to watch when the boys start arriving. They wear ties and jackets."

"It must be magical."

"Yes, magical, only this year I, I mean we, won't have to watch from the sidelines."

"I can't wait."

"It's funny that way. We all can't wait for the cotillion, but the cotillion means the end of the summer, and we'll all be crying that the good times are over."

"Bittersweet."

"Exactly."

Joan recognized one of the boys on the bus and pointed him out to Lauren. It was a guy that Lauren also knew, Frank, one of the older campers from last year. He had a reputation as being a great athlete and was very popular. "I remember him from last year when he used to come to some of the dances," Joan said. "You have to watch yourself with him. He's slick."

"What would an older guy like that want with us?"

"You'd be surprised. They like to take advantage of our innocence."

Lauren was glad that Joan was so helpful. "To be honest, I haven't had too much experience with boys. My parents are pretty strict about dating."

Joan smiled, "we're the bunnies, remember? I think the girls who want to be bunnies haven't dated much. You'll see that the wolves all act like they're such experts and so experienced."

Lauren noticed that Joan had a large stuffed Orca resting on top of her suitcase.

"I'm sure I'm going to have so much fun this summer as a cabin 4 bunny," Lauren said.

"If the other girls are as nice as you, I'm sure we'll get along wonderfully," Joan said.

The bus was beginning to load and Lauren said, "I better freshen up."

"Don't go to the terminal bathroom. There's a nicer one across the street in the Wendy's."

"Thanks," Lauren said, "I'll be right back. Don't let them leave without me!"
 

 
At the Wendy's, Lauren saw the adjacent bathrooms for men and women and for the first time in her life was able to go into the ladies room. It seemed like a magical experience, going through that portal to a world that had been forever the province of her mom and sister and other girls. Now the ladies room belonged to her also. It was where ladies went and she was a young lady now.

With great attention to detail, Lauren peed like a girl. She sat, she dabbed at her pretend vagina with tissue paper. She quickly went through her purse and put a slight bit of makeup on her face and a dab of very light pink shaded lipstick on her lips. She made a brief try at combing her hair. Luckily it was a style that did not need a lot of attention. She had noticed since she had left Samantha's that she often found herself sweeping the hair off of her face and she concentrated on making the gesture as natural and feminine as possible.

Lauren and Joan sat together on the bus. Joan was next to the window which gave Lauren an opportunity to look at her while pretending to be looking at the scenery as the bus made its way toward the mountains and Camp Shoni. Lauren compared herself to Joan: their hair, their skin, their arms, their facial features, their legs and feet. Lauren decided that her own hair was as girlish as Joan's and her arms were perhaps even a bit thinner than hers. Her feet were definitely a bit bigger and it was hard to tell about their skin. Lauren wondered if Joan's was softer but she couldn't just go ahead and touch her. One big difference was their finger nails. Joan's had a kind of light blue polish with some sparkles in it, while Lauren's were bare.

As they rode along bouncing as the bus negotiated the small roads, Lauren said, "One thing I really need to do is get my nails polished. My mom doesn't believe in makeup."

"Believe me, it'll be one of the biggest activities in our cabin. Trying out nail polish and talking about boys, they go hand and hand."

"Great!" Lauren said and even giggled slightly.

"What color?" Joan asked.

"Probably pink. It's my favorite color. I've always loved pink."

"Me too, but for some reason I love blue nail polish."

They rode on in silence. Lauren watched as the bumping of the bus caused Joan's breasts to slightly bounce and jostle. She looked down at her own breasts as defined by the foam cups of her bra and they were clearly not moving. Lauren felt envious, even more so than normal, since she felt that in some ways she had a right to have real breasts now. It was unfair that she didn't. And when she thought about the fact that she had a penis, she felt a wave of hopelessness. Surely she had demonstrated to the world during the past half hour that she was now a girl. In fact, it was clear to her that being a girl was not about having a penis or not, so God might as well just give her the right anatomy and just be done with it!

In another hour the bus pulled through the gates of Camp Shoni and Lauren gazed with excitement at the wooden buildings, the sports facilities and the beautiful Lake Navajo that would be her home for the next two months. Regardless of anything, she would make the best of the situation, and not spend the summer praying for miracles. Just getting to Camp Shoni as Lauren was really a miracle all by itself.
 
 

End Part III
 
 
To Be Continued...