People don’t take trips, trips take people - Antoine 24

Click, click, click! The sound of his tall stiletto heels, colliding with the pavement, filled Antoine’s ears as he quickly made his way through the streets of Paris. 

He didn’t know how long he had been walking for but with his legs and feet now numb to the pain, Antoine powered on knowing he was almost home.

Stopping for a moment to cross the street, he allowed himself to look around. It was a beautiful evening with the sun just starting to set in the distance but still strong enough to warm his exposed arms and nylon covered legs. He reached up to wipe a bead of sweat from his brow as he watched a young couple walking hand in hand on the other side of the road. He quickly dropped his head looking down at the clothes he had been forced to wear, longing for the day’s when he and Lily had walked together on pleasant Autumn evenings just like this one, he hadn't appreciated it at the time, but now he would give anything to just experience it one more time.

Crossing the road, Antoine heard the swish of his nylon clad thighs rubbing together and felt the pull of his pink restrictive skirt, decorated with green flowers, that wasn’t making his journey back home any easier. 

Stepping carefully on to the curb on the other side of the road, he once again spotted the couple who were now kissing in the distance, they looked so happy, he thought to himself, probably returning home from a date,  having had a much nicer time one than the awful, forced date he had just run away from.

(See image 44)

The day had started out quite well. Antoine on one of his days off from the store had sat around most of the day watching television and relaxing, well as much as possible with the knowledge he was going out that evening on a double date with Marianne. Of course, he had been on a date a few weeks ago, with Pedro, but that had been different, on that occasion, Lily had been there and with Pedro knowing his true identity it hadn't really been a date. The men tonight on the other hand were expecting Zara the model and Antoine didn’t like the thought of it one bit.

It was around four-thirty when Marianne appeared at his bedroom door wanting to help him get ready but Antoine now much more confident and proficient at applying his makeup and styling his hair, told her that he was fine and didn’t need her help. Marianne hadn’t seemed particularly happy at the announcement, but after making a compromise, where she would pick out his outfit for the evening, she had reluctantly agreed and left him in peace to get ready.

An hour later, fully dressed in the tight uncomfortable date night outfit Marianne had picked out, Antoine stepped out into the living room to find it empty. Hearing Marianne moving around in her room, still getting ready, he tottered over to the balcony, opening the door, and stepped out into the bright sunlight.

Antoine closed his eyes for a brief second and let all his worries wash away, for the briefest of moments, he was no longer a man dressed up as a blonde-haired fashionista, wearing a tight pink skirt and teetering on painfully tall stiletto heels, in that moment, with his eyes closed, he was his old self again, as he pictured himself dressed in one of his old favourite outfits, waiting for Lily to walk out through the doors behind him. His painted lips formed into a smile as he pictured her dressed up and looking beautiful, skipping out through the balcony door to wrap her arms around him and tell him she was ready to go out.

The sound of heeled shoes approaching, alerted Antoine to the presence of someone behind him as he spun around, knowing he was about to see Marianne, but still feeling disappointed as he opened his eyes to see her standing there in a tight red top and short black skirt.

After a taxi ride to a little restaurant on the north side of the city, Antoine and Marianne were greeted with a kiss on both cheeks by their dates for the evening, Pierre, and Denis before sitting down at a small table along the back wall.

The restaurant itself was looked very traditional and rustic, but not in a bad way, it was clean and nicely decorated, with the walls covered with pictures of what Antoine took to be were generations of family members as he concluded that the restaurant must have been a family-owned and handed down through the years. But even with the setting being so pleasant as Antoine was soon to find out, the date that evening was going to be anything but.

After some small talk where Antoine lied about his love of modelling and fashion, the appetizers arrived and they all tucked into what turned out to be some delicious food but sadly, it all went downhill from there.

Denis, Antoine's date for the evening, who as expected from the brief time Antoine had spent with him on the modelling shoot, turned out to be a nice friendly guy, rushed off to the bathroom and didn’t return for twenty minutes. In his absence, Pierre started paying less and less attention to Marianne turning to Antoine to ask him questions.

At first, Antoine thought he was just being nice, trying to involve him in the conversation with Denis out of the room, but as time passed, Pierre began to almost ignore Marianne completely, who was now, butting in and interrupting, trying to get some attention, Antoine started to realise Pierre’s true intentions.

Denis returned briefly, as things for a short while returned to how they were at the start of the evening, but that didn’t last long as within five minutes he was once again rushing back to the bathroom, leaving Antoine in a very awkward position.

It was clear by now, Pierre had eyes for Antoine and Marianne who was now shooting him daggers from across the table had noticed too. But with the alternative being to look at Pierre, who kept giving him complimenting and touching his arm and hand, Antoine tried to start up a conversation with Marianne, who just sat there pouting.

Pierre kept up his pestering as Antoine tried to discourage him by looking uninterested and giving him short one-worded answers, but this just seemed to encourage Pierre even more with things coming to a head, when Antoine, who was taking a sip of his red wine at the time, suddenly felt a hand, land on his nylon encased knee under the small table.

Wide-eyed and almost choking on his wine, Antoine froze, not knowing how to react. Antoine stared across the table, giving the smiling Frenchman, who was grouping him under the table, a look that said keep going and I’ll kill you, as the feeling of Pierre's fingers moving in a circular fashion massaging his kneecap was making him feel sick inside. Pierre didn’t seem to get the message, or he just didn’t care, as Antoine felt the hand slide up his inner thigh.

What happened next, caused quite a scene. Antoine quickly stood up, his chair flying backwards and making a loud awful screeching sound on the tiled floor. Angry and acting on autopilot, he tossed his wine in Pierre’s face, slammed the glass down on the table and called him a pig. He then stormed out of the restaurant, the only sound to be heard, the clicking of his heels echoing throughout the silent room, all conversations having briefly paused, with all heads now looking on, to try and find the origin of the sudden outburst, that had abruptly interrupted their evening.

It was dark by the time Antoine arrived back at his apartment, thoroughly exhausted and in dire need of a drink of water, he peeled off his cursed shoes and tossed them next to the door before plodding across the living room floor on his nylon cover feet, the feeling just starting as he reached the kitchen with a tingle in his toes.

Filling up a glass with water, he gulped it down in one before placing it back under the tap to refill it as he noticed the lipstick mark on the rim and shook his head in anger. He'd had enough, and he wanted out. Turning off the tab, he headed straight for Zara’s room, his plan to first get out of his uncomfortable feminine outfit, scrub his face clean of makeup and then find a pair of scissors to cut off all his girly blonde hair.

But pushing open the bedroom door, Antoine’s plans were interrupted as he saw Lily sitting on the bedside table with a certain sadness in her eyes, “Antoine, we need to talk”, she said looking up at him.

Antoine slowly nodded his head, lumbered his way over to the bed and sat down, crossing his legs mid-thigh, and resting his hands, palms down, neatly on top.

(See image 45)