People don’t take trips, trips take people - Antoine 17

As the morning sun shone down. warming the back of his freshly shaved legs, Antoine looked over at Marianne. camera in hand and breathed a heavy sigh. 

For the past week, he had worn nothing but dresses and skirts and the worrying thing was, it now felt somewhat normal.

With Monique returning to Avignon, Antoine had hoped things would have gone back to normal but with Marianne now occupying the guest bedroom, showing no signs of moving out, things were worse than ever, not only was he stuck living Zara’s life, but he was now also lying to Lily.

There were days like this one, where he considered telling Marianne to go to hell, but he would always chicken out, as the shame of her telling Monique the truth, and having Lily taken away from him was, was far scarier than having to live twenty-four seven in his torturous 6-inch Louboutin pumps.

He regretted not telling Lily the night Marianne discovered his secret, he should have talked to her, explained the situation, and made her promise not to let on to Marianne that she knew, but that ship had now sailed, he had been lying to her for almost a week, and he knew the one thing Lily hated and had made him promise never to do, was lie.

As a gentle gust of wind tickled the top of his exposed legs, under his yellow long-sleeved summer dress, he felt a mixture of guilt and embarrassment, thinking about all the things Marianne had forced him to say to Lily. 

When she had asked about his new skyscraper heels, he now exclusively wore, he had smiled and told her, he loved the feeling of walking on heels and wanted to take advantage of the situation while he could. 

Then there was the time, a few days ago, where he had approached Lily, sat around the apartment relaxing on her day off. With instructions from Marianne, he had nervously tottered into the living room in a little mini dress and his now standard Louboutins and asked her if they could go out shopping together as he wanted to buy some new clothes so he wouldn’t have to wear Zara’s stuff all the time.

Those were just two of the many instances, he had been forced to tell his girlfriend, he wanted to do something girly, each time feeling like he was falling deeper down the rabbit hole, and each time feeling deep shame and embarrassment, but the worst part of it all, to his utter shock and horror, each time his painted lips had somehow forced out the words, Lily seemed to accept what he was telling her, and on a few occasion she even sounded excited.

at least, one upside to the whole bizarre situation, was that their sex life was better than it had been in years, he was still living in Zara’s room, as Lily still believed they needed to keep up the pretence for Marianne sake, but whenever they had the apartment to themselves, Lily would pounce on him like a wild animal, in the last week, they had made love in every room in the house as he had to admit, sneaking around like a pair of teenagers, did give him a bit of a thrill.

“Zara, will you focus please”, Marianne said interrupting his thoughts, “I asked you to step forward, the light is perfect right now”.

Pushing himself forward from the railing of the apartment balcony, Antoine took a couple of tiny steps forward and turned towards the camera.

(See image 30)

The morning photoshoots were now commonplace, this was the fourth time this week, Antoine had dressed up in an outfit selected by Marianne before heading outside to the balcony to pose for her. 

Having asked on multiple occasions and receiving no answer, he still had no idea, what she wanted all the pictures for, perhaps it was just to torment him or perhaps she was collecting them as evidence to blackmail him down the line, but one thing was for sure, Antoine hated every minute of his morning photoshoots.

“Ok, Zara, looking hot girl”, Marianne announced after taking what seemed like hundreds of pictures, “go back inside and put on the dress with the gold sequins”.

Knowing that arguing would not change anything, Antoine didn't even bother to respond, he just clicked his way back into the apartment and headed for Zara’s room. He knew exactly which dress she meant as he remembered trying it on before, finding it to be almost indecently short, and making him feel half-naked and extremely exposed.

Back in the room, he slowly stripped off his loose yellow dress and tossed it to one side, looking over towards the clock on the wall and stopping in his tracks with a puzzled look on his face. it was 11 am, Marianne usually left for work around this time, so why was she asking him to put on another outfit? Had she lost track of the time?

Having lowered the flashy dress over his head and fastened the matching wide belt around his ever slimming waistline, Antoine let himself smile a little.  He was now convinced that Marianne was going to be late for work and after everything she had put him through lately, he had no intention of telling her.

Slipping his sore feet back into his tall designer pumps, he headed for the door, thinking about Marianne getting into trouble and perhaps even getting fired, after all, she had only just started her internships at Fifi, it would surely look bad to turn up late in the first week.

Stepping out into the living room, the smile on his face quickly disappeared as he saw Marianne waiting by the door, ready to leave the apartment, “come on, time to go”, she announced with a smile.

“What! Go where”? Antoine replied looking down at the way he was dressed and panicking.

“Never you mind”, came the reply, “I’ve put your keys and some essentials in here”, she added, handing him a small black purse, “love the dress, by the way, you’ve got some killer legs girl”.

With the click-clack sound of his heels echoing in his ears, Antoine once again found himself out in public, following along behind Marianne through what he knew to be the expensive part of the city, feeling self-conscious and nervous.

His mind was in overdrive, trying to work out where she was leading him and to for what purpose, becoming so caught up and preoccupied in his thoughts, he had little time to worry about the length of his tiny skirt or the numb feeling in his toes.

Stopping at a crossing, Marianne took the opportunity to quickly whip out her camera, “Smile, Zara”, she said cheerfully. Antoine looked over his right shoulder and glared at her.

“Oh, come on girl, that was terrible”, she announced looking over the camera, “let’s try again, ok back up a step or two, yeah that's better, now lift up your left leg and pretend you're readjusting your sunglasses”.

Antoine obeyed, not wanting to cause a scene in public, but as he stood wobbling on one leg, perched atop of his shiny designer pump, he saw something in the distance that made him feel sick to his stomach, as he suddenly realised where they were headed.

(See image 31)