Oscar Night by Jennifer Brock David Fine, a bestselling novelist and Oscar-nominated screenwriter, was sticking up for an insult directed at his friend fashion designer Claude Marsh when he made a flippant comment to an annoying television personality agreeing to show up at the Academy Awards ceremony in a gown instead of a tuxedo. He was convinced that it would be far less embarrassing to attempt to appear as completely and fully female instead of just looking like a man in a dress. To that end, he's had some facial surgeries as well as a sizeable pair of breast implants. Dee, as she's been calling herself is under the tutelage of Kay Thomas, a feminine deportment coach Claude hired to give her a month-long crash course in how to be a woman. In this installment, Kay helps Dee try to figure out what kind of girl she is.

Part 15
Dee’s second day of voice lessons went much the same as the first. After breakfast she had to put together a casual outfit for herself. There was a bit of a chill in the air, so she started by picking a nice-looking fuchsia twinset with a camisole and cardigan in a soft knit. To go with it, she selected a denim skirt that turned out to be shorter than it looked on the hanger. It came to about eight inches above the knee, but she really didn’t feel like looking for a replacement so she kept it. For shoes, she went with a funky pair of wedge-heeled sandals with crisscrossing leather straps.

Kay had two comments about her wardrobe choices. First, she said that only much-younger girls could get away with the “visible bra strap” look, so if she was going to wear that camisole, she should switch to a strapless bra. Dee tried to protest that the cardigan would cover her straps, but Kay worried that as the day got warmer she might take it off, and then her fashion faux pas would be glaring.

When Dee had taken her top off, Kay noticed that it had a built-in shelf bra, so she wouldn’t need one. Dee had thought that internal elastic was just to make it fit better. Even though Kay assured her that it would provide enough support, her breasts felt much more loose and bouncy without a real bra.

Kay’s second complaint was that Dee hadn’t worn sandal-foot pantyhose. The visible reinforced toes of her nylons were unacceptable. Dee just hadn’t realized there was that much difference in hosiery. To make it worse, once she had the wrong hose off and Kay was looking at her feet, she decided that her toenails needed a new color, so Dee had to stop and give herself a pedicure. She did horribly on a few of the smaller toes and had to strip off the polish and start fresh. Of course, new polish on her toes needed new polish on her fingers to match, and Kay naturally made Dee do it all herself. It took a while, but she was satisfied with her new shiny nails. They were a cherry color that worked with her top without being too matchy.

Kay then led her through applying her makeup. For a casual daytime look, she had Dee use powder but not foundation, and mascara but not eyeliner. She chose a rose eye shadow and didn’t have her do all the complicated layering and blending that a nighttime look would need, and kept the color strictly to the upper eyelid. Kay made Dee pick out a lipstick color, and approved when she went with a soft pink that was the same shade as her nails, but paler and not quite as bold.

After thinking about hairstyles, Dee asked if she could try a simple ponytail. Kay helped her find a scrunchie that was almost the same color as her top, and showed her how to put it on. David had worn a ponytail many times, so there was a slight familiarity to it, but at the same time it was very different. Instead of gathering the hair at the nape of the neck, the feminine style was to gather from the middle of the back of the head, which gave the ponytail more bounce and character instead of just lying flat. Also, the hairdressers had put more body into her hair so it flared out from the gather much more than it had before, and better resembled the tail of an actual pony. But the most striking difference was in the hair that couldn’t be gathered. The bangs on her forehead and the delicate wisps that framed her face created a look that was undeniably female and, she’d have to admit, even cute.

She wanted to go with fun pieces of jewelry, and started with a pair of gold hoop earrings, and echoed them with a handful of gold bangles on each wrist, and a couple rings on each hand. She tried to go with a simple double-strand chain necklace, but Kay pointed out that the sharp angled line of a pendant would work better with her neckline than the soft curve of a chain. Dee looked through her jewelry box and picked a pretty gold butterfly that had crystals (or diamond chips?) on its wings. The line of its chain did work better with her top, but it also seemed to focus glittery attention right between her boobs. Kay told her that wasn’t a problem; Dee needed to learn to be proud of her “assets” anyway.

The rest of Dee’s morning entailed going through a speech lesson off the DVD, as Kay pointed out mistakes she’d made, offering suggestions on how to do better. Her voice still had a long way to go, but she was close to getting the right pitch. Dee wanted to keep working at it, but Kay warned her that pushing too fast could strain her vocal chords and ruin the whole thing. They took a short lunch break, and even though Dee was the one making the meal it almost felt like a break, since the crockpot had been cooking their soup since the day before, and even though she baked fresh sourdough breadsticks to go with it, they were fun to make.

After lunch, Kay had Dee work on her penmanship. She had to practice writing “D. Fine” in as feminine a manner as possible, over and over again until her wrist ached. When she got to the point where she could consistently make the flourished curlicues on the capital letters and always dot her I with a little circle (Kay thought a heart would be too much), she got to sign the back of the credit card for “D. Fine” that had arrived in the mail.

Then it was time for another scary venture out in public. Dee put her clutch wallet, with her new credit card in it, into the shoulder bag that worked the best with her ensemble. She tried to claim that the weather called for a jacket, but Kay could tell that she was just trying to find a way to hide her chest and said no. She even suggested that it might be a nice enough day that she’d be taking off her cardigan and walking around in just the cami. Kay made Dee drive this time and she was glad she’d chosen wedges that day instead of spike heels.

They went over to the Galleria in Glendale, and Kay explained that the theme for the day was “Persona.” Dee’s mission for the day was to work on what kind of image as a woman she wanted to project to the world. Who was Dee? To that end, they were starting at the fragrance counter in Nordstrom’s. Every woman has a scent; what would Dee choose for hers, and what would that say about her personality?

She was nervous, but Kay did most of the talking, and the salesgirl was very helpful. They sniffed several samples. At first, Dee was tempted to choose Maritza’s favorite, Jean Paul Gaultier Classique, in order to have a reminder of her at all times, plus it came in the world’s sexiest bottle. But Kay had done her homework and declared that one off limits.

For a while she was leaning toward the epitome of glamour, Chanel No. 5, but it just seemed like too boring a decision. In her best soft voice she asked the girl to suggest something exotic, and ended up becoming captivated by Ralph Lauren’s Notorious, a spicy fragrance with a hint of musk. Kay thought it was a bold choice, but it did seem to work well with Dee’s body chemistry. The salesgirl talked her into adding a matching lotion, and didn’t blink or ask for ID when Dee used her credit card. She smiled and wished them a nice day as she handed Dee the fancy shopping bag.

Kay had come prepared. They stopped off in the ladies’ room and she pulled some cleansing wipes out of her purse to remove all the extra sample scents from Dee’s arm, and then she had her apply her new perfume properly, with a few strategic spritzes and then a walk into a cloud. Dee liked her new scent; it really helped her feel feminine. She didn’t even think to worry about being in the ladies’ room until they’d already left.

They browsed for a while, so Dee could get the feel for the female shopping experience, where you do a lot of looking but no actual buying. It involved a lot of walking around, stopping every so often to look at a particular article of clothing, feeling the fabric, and even pulling out a hanger to hold up a garment in front of you, even when you have no intention of purchasing it. It was more exercise than Dee had had in a long time.

She was grateful when Kay then took her through the mall to the food court. They got a couple skinny cappuccinos and sat at a table where they could watch the shoppers going by. It turned out to be another lesson.

“You’ve been using your walks interchangeably,” Kay began, “switching them at random. That’s not the way to do it.”

Dee got defensive. “It hasn’t been arbitrary or anything. When we were shopping I was doing the sashay in the stores when we saw something interesting because that’s the slowest, and doing the strut between stores because it’s fastest, and using the glide inside the store between departments because it’s faster but not too fast.”

“That’s where you’re making the mistake. The difference in the walks isn’t speed, but attitude.”

Dee gave a confused look. “I’m not sure I understand what you mean.”

“Maybe an example will help. See that blonde in the pink capris down by Fredericks? Watch how she’s moving. You automatically form an impression about her personality, that she’s the kind of girl who doesn’t take crap from anyone, and that’s all just in the way she walks. If you look carefully, you’ll see that she’s doing a variation on your basic catwalk strut. She’s not in a hurry so she’s going slower than when you do it, but the deliberate stride is still there, as well as the cocky angle in her hips.”

“Wow. I didn’t realize.”

“I know. That’s why we’re here. It’s easier to show you than to tell you what I mean. Now since you’re on an abbreviated timeline, we didn’t do all twelve walks. But the three you’ve got cover the most important archetypes.” She looked over to make sure Dee was still following her. “Have you heard of the ‘Madonna/Whore Theory?’”

Dee nodded. “Freud, wasn’t it? It had something to do with men not wanting to fall in love with women they have sex with, and vice versa. Are you saying if I walk one way I can make a man fall in love with me, and if I walk another way I can make a man want to have sex with me? Well, that’s only two walks. What’s the other walk for?”

“Hey, you’re stealing my speech! I keep forgetting that I’ve read your books and can tell you’ve studied almost as much about human nature as I have, and you have much less of a typical clueless male mind than my usual clients. Yeah, you’ve got the gist. But I open up the picture wider than Freud. It’s not just men that you project a persona toward; it’s everyone. When you sashay, it announces that you are The Whore. Your defining characteristic is sensuality. It says to a man, ‘Play your cards right and I’m yours.’ It says to a woman, ‘I am comfortable in my body, and I know what makes it feel good — want me or want to be me, and keep your man on a short leash.’ You really should save that walk for when you want to make a statement to bring out lust or jealousy in someone. Unless you decide that the persona you want to project most of the time is all about sex.”

“I see. I never really thought about what the way I walked said about me.”

“Now on the other side of the coin is the glide. That’s for when you want to be The Madonna. Here, the defining characteristic is grace. It’s for when you want to appear to move effortlessly, and in a full ballgown you can even seem not to touch the ground. You can evoke beauty without seeming sexual. It’s like how a ballerina can wear a tiny skin-tight leotard but her performance is not as grounded in animal physicality as a dancer in a basketball halftime show. You can transcend earthly things and carry yourself as an angel or goddess. It says to men, ‘Aspire to deserve me.’ To women, it’s more ‘Aspire to become me.’ I could see that as working well as your usual walk. It would fit well with that whole June Cleaver / Donna Reed thing you’ve got going on at home.”

Dee wrinkled her nose. “What thing is that?”

“The sort of natural way you easily fall into the role of hostess or housewife. You want to make all who come into your home welcome and contented. I meant it as a compliment, really.”

“Well then, I suppose I should thank you for your kind words.” Dee smiled and fluttered her eyelashes a bit. “So if the sashay is for whores and the glide is for madonnas, who is the strut for? I don’t think Freud had a third category.”

“That’s what makes my worldview more complete than deal old Siggy’s. When you use the strut, it says to the world that you are The Bitch. You’re all about confidence and independence. It says to men, ‘You will need to work hard to earn a chance with me, so don’t waste my time with tired lines and worn-out moves.’ It says to women, ‘I am better than you, and you know it.’ And basically it just says to everyone that you really don’t care what they think about you. If you want to project a strong persona, you could use that as your default walk. So take some time to think about who you are, or actually more who you want the world to think you are. And make sure to keep that in mind when you’re planning your big debut on national television.”

“Well, based on all that I can tell you I’ll be doing a strut when I walk down the red carpet past that annoying Jane Waters.” Dee laughed. “I’ll have to think some more on who I want to be in general.”

“Good idea. But remember that it’s not about who you are on the inside as much as it’s about how you’re perceived.”

Dee leaned in and shifted to more hushed tone. “Of course. I mean, after all who I am on the inside isn’t really female.”

Kay replied with a conspiratorially whisper of her own. “Are you so sure? Although you should be thinking not in biology terms of male vs. female, but rather in psychology terms of masculine vs. feminine. And as I’ve gotten to know you there are many strong feminine aspects of your personality, and personality is in that space between identity, how you see yourself, and persona, how you let others see you. But if things are getting into an uncomfortable realm for you, psyche-wise, it might help if you treat this whole thing like some of my acting clients do. Take your strong sense of self, your core identity, including how you view your roles and attitudes with respect to gender, who David is, and push that down inside. Sublimate the actor.” She made a fist with her left hand. “Then on top of that, you create the identity of the character.” She covered her fist with her right hand. “What is Dee’s identity, as a female, including all her gender roles and attitudes? You may be more comfortable compartmentalizing that way. Then when you have a firm grasp of your character, there’s another layer.” She pulled her fist out from under her hand, and then waved her left hand in the air above her right one. “And that’s persona: who does Dee let the world see her as? Now 90% of what we work on, how you walk and talk and dress and do your hair and makeup is in this space here, but you need to keep in mind what’s underneath, to make sure that this persona is believable and consistent and appears grounded in something.”

Dee nodded. “That makes sense. I’ve done something similar when developing characters in my writing, but it feels more intense when it’s not just in the abstract. I’m glad you’re here to keep me on track. I seem to be creeping close to a meltdown every so often.”

“That’s okay. A lot of my clients go through crises of identity; it’s not unusual.”

Dee reached out and touched the side of Kay’s hand. “I know you’re being paid for this, but you’re a great comfort, and a good friend. Thank you.”

Kay pulled her into a hug. “You’re welcome. That’s very sweet of you, and definitely what the Madonna would say.” She smiled at her student.

They sat around people-watching for a little while longer, and Dee had to identify elements of her walks in women passing by and show how the movements related to their attitudes. Kay said she did a good job, and deserved to be rewarded. However, her “reward” was to go shoe shopping, that quintessentially female activity. Kay said that she needed more experience feeling like a woman in public, and nothing else could do that as well as trying on pretty shoes.

Dee said she was nervous and afraid of being found out, but Kay just made her take her cardigan off and put it in the shopping bag with her perfume. With her impressive chest on display, it would announce her womanhood to the universe for her. She felt very vulnerable, but as a woman, so in a weird way that worked.

A creepy guy in Bakers who seemed to enjoy touching her foot a little too much, measured her and said she took a 10  ½ medium, which meant she had to try on both a 10 and 11 in every style. And for each pair of shoes, he’d kneel down and help her get them on, trying to sneak a peek up her skirt when he wasn’t focused on her reaction to the air conditioning.

Dee was growing weary of pretending to be excited about shoes when she tried on a pair of burgundy faux-alligator peeptoe slingbacks that she actually liked. They were fun, and about as comfortable as a shoe with a three-inch heel can get, and she really thought they made her legs look sexy. She told Kay those were the shoes she wanted, and Kay agreed that they were fabulous, but she had the guy but them back anyway and they left the store.

Dee was confused. What was the point in spending all that time looking for something you weren’t going to buy? Kay had to explain the intricacies of shopping to her. You only pay full retail price for a pair of shoes if you have a special occasion that urgently needs them. Since you’ve already picked them out ahead of time, you’re ready to snatch them up if the store has a sale, and you can get them faster than someone else who has to wait for the assistant so she can try them on first. You are allowed to go back to the store every so often and try them on again, and if the need to own them becomes so great that you can’t wait for a sale, you just need to invent an urgent reason. But as there were plenty of high-end designer shoes at home in Dee’s closet that she hadn’t even worn yet, these would be remaining in the store. If she did exceptionally well on a future lesson, they might come back to let her buy them.

When they got home, Dee got her first free moments alone all day. She had to check her implants and massage her breasts with the lotion that was supposed to prevent stretch marks. She still wasn’t used to the strange feeling of getting to second base with herself, and she was glad the anti-libido tea was keeping all this fondling from turning her on. She smiled as she wondered what thirteen-year-old David would say if someone told him some day he’d be able to touch boobs any time he wanted to. He probably wouldn’t even care if you said they’d be attached to him; boobs are boobs.

She wanted a little more support than the shelf bra had provided, so she wrestled her puppies into a sexy black bra and then called down to Kay to see if it was okay for her to change. She agreed but turned it into another exercise, and told her to put together a professional look, as though she’d been working in an office all day. Dee sighed and went to the closet.

A half hour later, a smartly dressed businesswoman came down the stairs. She wore a light periwinkle blue silk blouse under a charcoal grey jacket that matched her knee-length pencil skirt. Just a hint of white lace peeked from under her hem as she crossed the room. Legs sheathed in off-white pantyhose ended in sensible black pumps with a chunky heel. Her hair was pulled back into a bun secured by a pair of decorative black lacquer chopsticks. Shiny black discs hung from her earlobes and a string of matching discs was around her neck. Her makeup was expertly done: flawless foundation, just a dab of blush on the apples of her cheeks, a smooth blending of natural tone eye shadows, a thin tracing of eyeliner, a generous brushing of black mascara highlighted her features perfectly. But the eye was immediately drawn to the strong maroon color on her lips, which perfectly matched the shiny new coat of polish on her nails.

Kay applauded and made her do a catwalk turn to show off the full effect. David had spent so much time immersed in the fashion realm that as a woman she had very good taste and excellent skill at putting an ensemble together. Kay was having a much easier time with this client. Dee looked a little too good to just stay in for the night, so Kay went up to room and got dressed up herself, and they went out to a three-star restaurant like two glamorous executives having a dinner meeting. (Kay couldn’t find a vacancy at a four-star.)

Kay called a cab and told Dee that Claude had bankrolled an expense account for her, so she didn’t need to worry about paying for their meal. Dee was worried, but more about being discovered than about money. They had a little time, so she reviewed the morning’s voice lesson. She still didn’t sound completely authentic, but she had a breathy whisper that was passable.

To continue the theme of the day, Kay made Dee adopt a persona for the evening to see how well it fit. Unfortunately, her decision was that Dee’s partial voice would work best as a sultry temptress, so her assignment was to employ her sexy sashay as a flirt and a tease. Kay would be there to make sure none of her targets went too far, so she told her to try to have fun with it. She undid the top two buttons of Dee’s blouse and said she could start by playing with the taxi driver.

However, their cabbie turned out to be an elderly African-American gentleman who just chuckled when Dee tried to smile and flutter her eyelashes at him. She even tried leaning forward to give him a better view, but it was a dud. When they got to the restaurant, Kay gave her credit for trying but told her to try again with the waiter if they got one.

Even though they were on time, their table wasn’t ready yet, so the hostess had them wait in the bar. Dee tried making eyes at the bartender, as she told him they’d been working all day on a project and she was ready to cut wild. He smiled back and said she was mashing her expressions together; she could either go wild or cut loose. Dee made her best attempt to giggle cutely. The only real satisfaction was when she knew his eyes were glued to her swaying behind when the hostess came to lead them to a table.

Dee tried a few double entendres with the waiter when ordering her appetizer, but he didn’t seem to be noticing no matter how obvious she made her comments about wanting something juicy in her mouth. Kay was struggling to keep from laughing, though. When he had gone, she expressed the opinion that he was just a little too flouncy to be straight. But she said that meant Dee had done an even better job. She was so convincingly female that her oral teases were ineffective on a gay man, and they usually have pretty good trannydar.

Maybe that relaxed her enough, or maybe it was the bottle of Chardonnay they were splitting, but she did get flirty enough to noticeably inhale when the busboy came by to fill their water glasses. It was cute when he spilled a little because his eyes were watching something other than the pitcher. Dee had so much fun she made sure she needed a couple refills.

To go with her dessert, she mistakenly ordered a fancy coffee off the cocktail menu instead of a regular one, and left the restaurant fairly tipsy. This time their cab driver was a buff young Latino, and he chivalrously gave her a hand getting out of the car and walked her up the front steps. She thanked him with a big, wet kiss on the lips and nearly tried inviting him in before Kay stepped in, paid the man, and apologized for her friend.

Later that night, Dee learned that California fusion cuisine does not look nearly as fancy after being partially digested. Despite Kay’s best efforts at preventive remedies, Dee still woke up the next day with a monster headache and a queasy yet hungry stomach. After a very bland breakfast she still wasn’t in the right state of mind for the morning’s lesson, so Kay blended up a special herbal tea for her and sent her to soak in the tub for a couple hours.

By lunchtime the throbbing in her skull had faded, but vague memories came flooding in that filled her with mortifying embarrassment. She told Kay that a flirty, sexy persona was not for her, and she’d want to try a different one the next time. On the plus side, the involuntary washing of her throat in stomach acid seemed to help improve her awareness, and she was finally able to find a feminine pitch. But for the same reason, Kay thought she should take it easy and didn’t have her repeat the day’s voice lesson like she usually had her do.

To keep busy for the rest of the day, Kay gave her some instruction on body language, particularly the language of flirting. She protested that she wasn’t planning on doing a lot of flirting, so this lesson wasn’t really necessary. But Kay insisted that it was an essential part of being female; she needed those elements in her vocabulary of gestures if only to get out of a speeding ticket. Kay led Dee through learning three different ways of crossing her legs, five ways to play with her hair, six things to do with her hands, and four different cute smiles and coquettish ways to move her eyes and look at someone without looking like you’re looking.