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I remember the year the spring sunlight danced across the sidewalks, when the wind seemed to carry perfume and secrets and laughter in equal measure, and when my best friend and I, two half-grown boys, learned how to swirl in frilly skirts under stage lights that felt as warm and all-seeing as the sun.

We were thirteen and living inside each other's shadows — Simon and I — as boys often do at that age when the world still breathes in wide, bright colors and secrets are things you taste, not speak.

It started, as many grand misadventures do, with older sisters and a twist of fate.

Both our siblings studied at Ridgewick Dance Academy, that grand old studio at the edge of town where the windows were always fogged with effort and dreams. That year's annual music hall performance was to be their triumph — a sold-out affair, months in the making, tickets vanishing faster than snowflakes on a griddle.

Then destiny played its inexorable card.

The girls had won awards from the Girl Guides — proper honors, interstate and all — and the jamboree was scheduled for the exact night of the performance. The choice was cruel: a lifetime opportunity or the stage. They wanted the jamboree, of course. Who wouldn't? But Ridgewick Academy needed bodies, dancers, someone to fill their shoes — literally.

That someone, it turned out, was us.

Simon and I, proud bearers of a few modest dance medals ourselves, suddenly became the focus of a plan concocted by two very determined mothers. Our fathers — gentle tyrants of discipline and barbecue — grunted their assent, but it was the mothers who carried the plan forward, like generals leading troops into battle.

We didn't know what we were getting into. Not really. Not until we were standing in the Ridgewick changing room, staring down at two cherry-red dresses folded with reverence on a wooden bench. Next to them, tap shoes — girls' tap shoes — and hair ties — and...

We blinked.

I remember Simon turning to me, his lips pale and slightly open, as if some small sound had just escaped. "What's going on?"

Our mothers smiled, not unkindly. "You'll be standing in for your sisters."

"But... the dresses?"

They didn't blink. "You'll look perfect. And if you don't want trouble with your fathers, you'll change. Now."

And so we changed.

There was something oddly sacred in the way my mother helped me into that dress. The fabric felt alien against my skin — cold, whisper-soft — and the shoes made my feet feel like they belonged to someone else. I couldn't meet my own eyes in the mirror. I looked like a ghost pretending to be a girl, like someone playing dress-up in a dream they'd later forget.

Mrs. Adams, supple as a lioness, appeared like a magician at curtain rise. The Dance Mistress gave us one long, appraising look and smiled a slow, thoughtful smile.

"I'm sure," she said, her voice syrupy and sure, "no one will even suspect."

The training began that very day — sharp turns, graceful steps, back straight, wrists delicate, head high. She made us dance like girls. No, not like girls — like ballerinas, like theatre queens, like performers who carried the weight of applause on their shoulders. We learned the sway of hips and how to step in rhythm with a dozen other feet. We learned how to hold our breath and our skirts.

We learned how to become someone else.

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The following days blurred into mornings of chiffon and afternoons of sweat. There were bras — which we wore against all logic — because 'all girls in the show wear them.' There were leotards, high-kick rehearsals, and vocal lessons until our voices, still unbroken, rang out in shimmering harmonies.
The song we were assigned?

I Enjoy Being a Girl

A rather cruel joke, I thought at first. I had prayed — prayed! — that my voice might crack just in time. But no; the notes came pure and clear, and under Mrs. Adams' watchful eye, Simon and I sang like nightingales in borrowed plumage.

Strangely, the fear faded. The embarrassment curled up somewhere and went to sleep. The girls in the troupe welcomed us — some with shy giggles, others with teasing that felt more like blessing. Only one girl  — lead danseuse Emily Hunter — eyed us with something colder than curiosity. But even she would soften in time.

The rehearsals wore on. Costumes came and went — pink dresses with ankle socks, swirling 1950s skirts with petticoats that rustled like secrets, bright yellow numbers that puffed and glittered in the lights. Then, the final number: the legendary cancan.

The night of the show arrived like a cathedral bell, booming in our chests.

Backstage, everything shimmered. Costumes glowed. Makeup shimmered like constellations. My hands trembled as I adjusted my garters. Simon looked pale but resolute. We were dressed to thrill — frilly knickers, black suspender hose, high heels that clicked like typewriters across the dressing room floor.

And then — the stage.

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The lights dimmed. The orchestra struck a bold chord that rippled like lightning across the stage. The velvet curtain, heavy with years of dreams and powdery dust, shivered once and lifted — and there we were.
Eight girls.

Or what the world thought were girls.

Our feathers fluttered. Our skirts fanned out like blooming roses. We stood in two neat rows, the breath trembling in our throats. I could hear Simon beside me, exhaling slowly through his nose like we'd practiced backstage, as if he could calm his hammering heart by willing it into rhythm.

Then came the music — bold, brassy, impossible to ignore — and we danced.

At first, I moved like a marionette, stiff and too aware of everything: the sway of my hips, the tickle of stockings against skin, the cool whisper of petticoats brushing my thighs. The real horror, the thing I had dreaded, came with the first high kick — when, in perfect time, we threw our legs skyward and lifted our skirts in choreographed abandon.

For a moment, I couldn't breathe.

There it was — exposed to the world, under the dazzle of footlights and the curious, countless eyes of the crowd: soft lace, satin bows, the pale shimmer of stockings climbing my legs like ivy. I felt naked. I felt foolish. I felt thirteen and not enough of anything. I wanted to vanish behind the velvet folds of the curtain, or slip between the boards like a ghost unsure of the script.

But the music didn't care.

It thundered forward, pulling us with it — and something in me shifted.

The kick came again. I lifted higher, the skirt arced like a flame around me, and I caught a glimpse — not of myself, not of fear — but of motion, of rhythm, of flight. The crowd clapped, and the sound washed over me like warm rain. A woman in the front row was laughing — not cruelly, but with joy — her hands clapping to the beat, her face lit up like she hadn't felt that alive in years.

And suddenly, so was I.

Each kick now was a celebration. Each twirl, a dizzy prayer. I wasn't a boy in borrowed clothes anymore. I was a dancer, a comet in a spinning red sky, part of something too big and golden to name.

The fear? Gone. The shame? Melted like frost under the footlights. In its place: exhilaration, like diving off a cliff and finding you can fly.

I was enjoying this.

Every second. Every kick. Every note.

And beneath the rouge and the ribbons and the stockings, I was still me — just... more. More alive. More bold. More true than I had ever imagined I could be.

The spotlight was hot as the sun. The music rose again, fast and bold, and we swept about the stage like firecrackers. Skirts lifted. Legs kicked. The crowd howled its approval. Sweeping to the edge of the stage, I flipped my petticoats over my head, offering the room a breathtaking view of my ripe, pantied bottom. Simon — and each of the girls — joined me at the brink, jostling their satin bottomtops before the rapturous mob. I felt a garter snap against my straining haunch but barely noticed. A wild sense of exaltation careened through my bloodstream, blotting out all other emotions.

Simon — Simone — wheeled past me, skirt flaring out from her waist; knickers and thighs and black suspender stockings on open exhibition. We danced like girls. No — we danced like stars, like something luminous, ephemeral, like boys who had walked through fire and come out wearing sequins.

We reached the crescendo — skirts held high, legs flashing in rhythm, and then the splits, each of us falling to the boards in perfect precision, a human firework in motion. The applause that followed felt like the world had cracked open and light was pouring in. As I sat there, breathless, my legs trembling and my chest heaving, a smile pulled at the corners of my painted lips.

Applause.
Encore.
More applause.

Somewhere between the curtain rising and the curtain falling, something had changed in me. Not just the clothes or the voice or the makeup — but something deeper. Some hidden part of myself had stepped forward, blinking in the light.

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After the third encore, we were radiant and breathless and soaked with joy. Strangers hugged us. Girls kissed our cheeks. I felt like a comet streaking across a boyhood sky. Backstage, Emily  — the girl with the frosty visage — silently entered my field of vision. Her eyes were soft now, her smile something I hadn't expected.

"You were amazing," she whispered. "If you ever want... I've got some spare cheerleader dresses."

I didn't know what to say, so I said I'd think about it.

Simon and I walked home still dressed — red lips, curled hair, heels clicking on pavement that had never felt so alive. Our sisters cheered in triumphant return. Our mothers cried. Our fathers nodded once, solemn and proud.

Later, when I lay in bed and peeled down to my frilly lace panties, I stared at the ceiling and wondered who I had been on that stage.

Maybe not a girl.
Maybe not just a boy.
Maybe just... someone who could dance.

As I'd learnt all too well — boys can cancan.

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