Charlotte's Niece
by Pamela
Chapter 7
Getting out of bed the next morning, I remembered that I had slept in the pretty panties. Memories of the previous evening came flooding back. I went into the bathroom to pee. From where I stood I could see my reflection in the large mirror overlooking the counter. The panties were white with several rows of lace across the rear and around to the front. Periodically in the white lace was a small pink flower. The leg holes were surrounded by the same sort of lace. I took the panties off and inspected them to see if there was any obvious sign I had worn them. They were slightly wrinkled, but not that much more than they would be coming out of the dryer. To be safe I folded them extra carefully and smoothed them with my hands. I laid them ever so carefully back in the drawer, so I was sure that snoopy Ethel would not figure out that I had borrowed them.
Why had I borrowed them? Another of my acts of defiance? No, not really. It was after Charlotte had kissed me and I had cried. Still, I must have been hoping to hurt Charlotte for hurting me.
I couldn't wait for the evening, I had so much juicy gossip to tell the girls. And I could stay out a whole extra hour!
That afternoon while helping Ethel with dinner, I asked her why Charlotte and her friends hated men so much.
"They don't exactly hate men," she started to say, then hesitated, "but I can see how you'd get that impression."
"The way they talked last night scared me."
"I know, and we felt just awful about it! I hope we made that clear to you last night! Didn't we?"
"Yes, I guess so."
"You put a bunch of ladies together and before you know it, they're being a bit silly. They play off each other."
"Still, I think Charlotte prefers girls to boys."
"Why would you say that?"
"I think she's always liked Lei more than me!" I didn't know how I got the courage to say that, but I felt that Ethel could be trusted with the thought.
"No, no, Greg honey!"
"But she's always spent more time with Lei."
"Its only because she talks about girl things with her. You know, she finds a new style skirt or something at work and brings one for Lei. She only works with girl fashions, you know that."
"I know."
"Besides, she got you Mudd jeans and bought you panties. Given the chance she's as interested in you as Lei."
Ethel made it seem true. Maybe I had been overly sensitive.
"Even getting you panties, you made it so hard for Charlotte. Now she's a bit hesitant to mention fashion ideas she might have for you!"
"Like what else? I mean I am wearing the pink panties she bought me. To be honest I don't really know if its right that I should be. I'm afraid that somebody could find out! I think most people think of panties as just for girls." I started to blush. "I mean I can't see what else I could possibly wear."
"Don't you mind what other people think! Charlotte and I admire your good sense."
It occurred to me that if I really had good sense, I wouldn't be wearing panties at all.
"In a way its too bad that she can't bring you girls clothes, because you are, in some ways, closer in temperament to her "niece" as she calls her, than Lei is."
"What do you mean, closer? Closer than Lei?"
"Yeah, Lei is kind of a tough girl. You're softer."
"You mean I'm a wimp?" I remembered how I was crying outside the lingerie shop.
"I didn't say she thought of you as a wimp."
"But if she thinks I'm soft?"
"I didn't say soft. I said softer. Like kinder, less brash, more considerate. There is nothing unmasculine about being gentle!"
"You think Charlotte prefers me over Lei?"
"Not prefers, but my guess is that she sees you as more sympatico. I must say I am sure Lei would never sit still long enough to help make dinner like you do. And to tell you the truth, I have to help her with her room every day. She is a natural born... shall I say S-L-O-B."
I laughed merrily at the thought. So I wasn't crazy after all - Lei was a slob!
"Charlotte and I are both fond of both of you. You are precious to us."
The words made me feel very happy. Ethel was nice to talk to.
"Its nice that you'll be here all summer!"
"I like being here," I said, surprising myself.
"Its good for Charlotte. You're a lot like her imaginary niece - in a good way - and not in the sense that you're like a girl!" she hastened to add, "I'm sure if only Charlotte had access to boys clothes, she'd be bringing you presents just like she does Lei."
"And her niece!"
"Yes, I suppose you could call those presents. Unopened, unappreciated presents." Ethel sounded sad.
Changing the subject, Ethel said, "Its kind of new to Charlotte having real live kids living with her. Its very good for her. She's been nervous about doing the right thing, believe it or not."
"She always seems so, so,... so self-assured," I said.
"Not because she is, but because she's nervous!"
I could understand that. Sometimes the more nervous I get, the more relaxed I look, mainly because I'm trying to force myself to look relaxed.
"I still think that there was an undertone of some sort of, I don't know, hatred, anger or something about men. Maybe its because of what you were saying about her not having a baby."
The sentence hung in the air for a minute since Ethel didn't respond immediately, though I did see her face contorting as if she were trying to make a decision. I started getting involved in my dinner jobs when abruptly Ethel said, "I think we have plenty time to finish making the dinner before Charlotte comes home. Sit down because I want to tell you some things that you must absolutely never share with anyone. Do you promise?"
Enthralled and fearful I agreed to the condition.
"That means Linda and her friends, and all your other friends?"
"Yes, I promise," I said. And I knew it was a promise I'd definitely keep.
"I've already told you about Charlotte expecting a baby and then having it aborted and not being able to have babies again." I nodded in agreement. "Well, what I didn't tell you was about how she got hurt and lost the child. In fact, let me start at the beginning."
Ethel was deep in thought and I saw her screw up her face thinking about how far back to begin the story.
"OK. A good place to begin is to mention where I met Charlotte. It was at FIT, the Fashion Institute of Technology. We were both students. She was tremendously popular. If you think she's beautiful now, she was absolutely knockdown gorgeous back then at 21 years old." Ethel started to giggle. "Back then was her leather phase. She only wore black leather. Skin tight black leather pants and halter tops. Tight leather skirts. Her nails were painted black and she wore a black choker with a silver lightening rod on the front. About as far as you can imagine from the pretty pink, lacy clothes she buys for her niece."
"Anyway, I was a little bit wilder myself back then. I didn't wear leather, but miniskirts hanging just a millimeter below my panties. Really tight tops and I used to get these killer bras that were real pointy. Charlotte and I made one hell of a team. You can't imagine what it did to our teachers. I've never seen so many middle aged men running behind their desks to hide their you know whats." Ethel laughed out loud at the memory. I blushed thinking of my own problems in that regard.
"I know what you're thinking Greg. Look at Charlotte and Ethel now, but you have to realize we were once young also, and we did care about things other than martinis and hospital corners on the beds. The reason why I'm mentioning this to you is that it was that time when Charlotte met the man who was later to become the father of her lost child. His name was Rick. He didn't go to FIT. Charlotte met him at a bar in the village. He had recently driven to Manhattan from LA on his Harley, where he had been raised. Whatever image that gives you, forget it. Rick had memorized every single one of Shakespeare's sonnets. Just tell him which number, or give him the opening words and he could quote the whole thing. He had studied them for years when he was teenager; it had kept him sane in the alcoholic family he grew up in. He was handsome, muscular and had even had some small parts in films."
"Rick was a sculptor, not just any kind of sculptor, but a sculptor in iron and steel. Dense, hundred pound hunks of metal twisted, welded and polished into unnerving shapes. There was something so masculine about his sculptures that I remember Charlotte and I almost had... you know, we got very excited seeing it. Rick was a powerful man. His biceps were as big as a persons head. He had to be strong to fabricate his art."
"They fell heavily in love with each other. She the perfect woman for him, he the perfect man for her. It was truly magical. They were inseparable, and the relationship lasted for years. The only dark side of it was that for some reason..." Here Ethel hesitated at some painful memory.
"No, let me back up a second. I mean to say that Charlotte became pregnant and of course, Rick wanted to marry her. It was maybe a year or two earlier than they were thinking about, but it was OK with them. Well what happened was that Charlotte was having a fairly stressful pregnancy which required a lot of sonograms, and she ended up finding out that the baby was to be a girl. When she told Rick, without hesitating he said that of course she'd abort the baby since their first child had to definitely be a boy. Charlotte thought he was joking, but it was no joke. It turned out that the only way Rick had justified having the baby was that he was going to get a son. He had no time for girls. Maybe in a few years when his creative moods would be different he could entertain the idea. Right now, a daughter would ruin his sculpting. Well you can imagine the fights that then ensued. Charlotte though he was full of you know what. She was carrying a daughter and a daughter it was going to be. Rick would have to love it."
"Perhaps partly in spite, partly because of a deep inner need, Charlotte decorated the room they had set aside in their apartment for the nursery in the brightest and girlish pink lacy everything she could find. You can imagine the contrast with her black leather attire! She also bought girly baby supplies, pink frilly diaper covers, even a supply of pink diapers. As these preparations progressed, Charlotte's fights with Rick escalated. Finally, he told her that their relationship was quits. She could raise the girl herself. He was clearing out. Charlotte made it clear how much he would pay, which was everything he had, including all his sculptures."
Here Ethel stopped once again. After a few moments in a much more subdued voice she said, "and then they had the fateful fight." I could see tears misting over her eyes, and I felt a great urge to cry, though I held back. She continued, "somehow, in a rage, he punched her hard in the belly, then stormed out. She felt a great pain inside her and later that night she called me to come over. I ran over as fast as I could and after taking one look at her, I called in the emergency. An ambulance took her to the hospital where she aborted the baby." Ethel was crying openly now and I joined in. We held each other and I felt my tears running onto her shoulder and making her dress wet. My chest was still heaving with sobs when I sensed she had regained her composure. She held me tightly and let me get to the end of my crying spell.
Ethel said with a tremendous struggle: "the terrible terrible irony was that the baby turned out to be a boy!" This completely did me in and I had to run to the bathroom to get tissues. My nose was running as much as my eyes. No wonder, I thought to myself, why Charlotte hates men! What a truly evil man Rick had been.
When I came back to the kitchen, Ethel was busily working on the dinner again. I said, "what happened when Rick heard that it was a boy?"
"He desperately tried to apologize to Charlotte. She let him give his speech just once. She didn't say anything to him, and despite many many phone calls and visits to her apartment, she never ever said one word to him again. Its been over ten years and she has never talked to him. Its been about 9 years since he stopped trying to communicate with her. I suppose he was lucky that Charlotte did not press murder charges against him.
I joined in helping with the dinner. There was an awful lot to think about and as I worked making the salad and setting the table, I replayed the story over and over again in my head. I wondered how the doctors could have made such a stupid mistake, but it really wasn't anywhere as stupid as Rick. Poor Charlotte, and I felt like crying again, but stopped myself. Later that night, when I went to bed, I'd have myself a great big cry!
Shortly before Charlotte was due back, I said to Ethel, "there is something I was meaning to ask you."
"What dear?"
"Well, you know that I went to Linda's on Tuesday night."
"The lovely girl who lives upstairs?"
"Yes, well, somehow I ended up telling her and her friends about the decorations in my bedroom and about Charlotte's niece and her clothes. Anyway, they sort of asked me if they could come down and take a look. Just out of curiosity."
"I don't think Charlotte...."
"Really it was just the fancy clothes they are most curious about," I said cutting her off. I could guess what she was about to say. "They thought that maybe I could show them some of the clothes, if Charlotte didn't mind. I could take a few things up to Linda's apartment, so the girls could see them."
"Honey, if it were up to me, I'd have no problem with it, but you know how much the clothes mean to Charlotte. I'm not sure she'd allow that. But no matter what, you really have to check with her!"
"Can't you just give me permission?"
"Greg, there's no harm in asking Charlotte when she comes home."
"It doesn't really matter," I said.
"Greg, don't be shy. You should ask her when she gets back. Anyway, maybe I could help you pick out a few things that she might not care so much about. Lets take a look."
Ethel put down a dish she was holding and led me to my bedroom. She sat on the bed, leaned over and opened the lower dresser drawer. The pile of panties and bras was arranged as I had left them that morning. "My, my, she's got some lovely things here," Ethel said.
"Yeah, I saw them when I first moved in."
She picked up the top pair of panties and opened them up to show off the lace on the front and rear. "Gosh, aren't these pretty!"
"Uh, hunh," I said, feeling just like I had that morning when looking at myself in the mirror. The lace and the occasional pink flower were very pretty.
"Oh my word," I heard her say, and she brought the panty closer to her eyes to look at more carefully. "Oh my word!"
"What is it?" I said with alarm.
"These look like they've been worn!"
"How could that be?" I said.
I watched nervously as Ethel screwed up her face in thought. "I'm sure these have never been worn before. Greg, honey," she said, turning toward me, "did you already sneak these out to show the girls!"
"No," I said.
Ethel thought about my answer for a second, and said, "Greg, tell me the whole story. I think you know who wore these panties!"
"It was me, Ethel, I'm sorry, I didn't know it was so important! I tried them on the other day. I was curious about the difference between them and the ones Charlotte got me. She said that panties are better for me, so I wanted to see why."
"I know she said that Greg, but they're not your panties. Charlotte bought them for her niece and her niece only. I'll have to tell her about it."
"No, please don't. I don't want her to be mad at me. Please Ethel. I didn't know that it was a big deal. I mean they're right in my room and everything!"
"What else did you try on? A bra? A slip? A dress?" Ethel started to get up as if to go to the closet to look.
"Nothing!"
"Do you swear it."
"Yes!"
Ethel regarded me sternly and finally said, "I'm going to believe you, Greg, because I think you're an honest boy."
"Thank you Ethel. Then you won't tell Charlotte?"
"I can't promise that, but I'll think about it. Does this mean that you want to get prettier panties? You know, there isn't any reason to wear Charlotte's niece's panties. I'm sure Charlotte would be happy to get you your own pretty panties."
"It's not that I want prettier panties! I mean I don't want panties. I was just playing around!"
"What a funny way to play!"
"Its not what you think. Charlotte told me that pretty panties make girls feel pretty. I wanted to see if that happened to me. If they made me feel pretty!" For some reason I felt it important to inject some logic into the conversation.
Ethel laughed, "you misunderstood Charlotte's meaning. Yes, pretty panties make girls feel pretty, but only girls that want to feel pretty. A girl puts on pretty panties because they make her feel the way she wants to feel. Like if a girl sees some pretty panties like these, she might be thinking 'I would love to wear them so I could feel as pretty as I want to feel.' Is that what you were thinking? That you wanted to feel pretty?"
"I didn't want to feel pretty," I said. 'I don't know, Ethel. I thought I was trying to find out if they made me feel pretty."
"Why did you have to find that out?"
"I don't know."
"What did you find out?"
"About what?"
"Did you feel pretty?"
"No, I don't think so, well maybe a little bit." Ethel was staring hard at me and I was afraid she'd say I was lying.
"I would think that boys can't feel pretty. Can they?"
"I don't know Ethel. I just did it once to see what was so special about them. They made me feel kind of girlish. That was what I was afraid of at the bra shop."
"That pretty panties would make you feel girlish and pretty? Really? I'm having a hard time with the idea that pretty panties MAKE someone feel pretty. I think you must have wanted to feel pretty."
"I didn't want to feel like that! I was just curious."
"But why curious?"
Ethel seemed like a lawyer to me. "I could be curious for many reasons!" I said.
"Like what?"
"I don't know. Are you going to tell my mom?"
"Greg!"
"You are!"
"Of course not, Greg, honey. This is between you and me. I've trusted you with some secrets and you can trust me with your secrets!"
"I'm sorry Ethel."
"Its OK, Greg. I just want you to not feel threatened. Neither Charlotte or I would ever want to hurt your feelings. Its just that its a fairly serious thing - you wearing Charlotte's niece's panties and I think you should not be afraid to ask yourself why you did it."
"Maybe I just did it so I could understand girls better?"
"Are you asking me or telling me?" Ethel said. I saw her eyes contract a bit as she added, "is that why you tried on your mom's bra too?"
"I didn't wear my mom's bra! Who told you that!"
"When you left the bra shop in such agitation, Lei and your mom were very worried and they mentioned that you had worn your mom's bra. They were trying to figure out why you had gotten so upset about the panties."
"They don't have any proof!"
"Are you sure? Lei was adamant that you had, and your mom pretty much agreed with her. They were certain that you must have tried on one of her bras that she had left in the bathroom after bathing."
"I accidentally knocked it down and couldn't remember which hook it had been on!"
"OK, but your mom says that the shoulder straps were off from their normal position. That couldn't have happened just by falling to the ground! Somebody must have tried it on."
"I don't know what you mean by the shoulder strap positions."
"Here, Greg," Ethel said, and she put back the panty and took out the top bra in the pile. The bra matched the panties. It was made of a delicate, white, satiny, almost transparent material, with a sparse pattern of pink flowers intertwined in white lace. She held it up by the shoulder straps and pointed to the adjustable buckles. "See these buckles? You can adjust the size of the straps to fit any particular girl. Normally, they stay in one position and never change, and the strap gets a permanent crease at that spot. Your mom says that she noticed that both buckles had moved."
"So?"
"So somebody other than your mom would have had to been wearing the bra for that to happen."
"All right!" I growled. "So I tried her bra on! It was just there and I wanted to see what it felt like to wear a bra! Do you think I'm sick?"
"Sick? I don't know where you get that from."
"So you don't think I'm sick?"
"Of course not!"
"But its wrong, isn't it?"
"Well, you really shouldn't wear your mom's bras or Charlotte's niece's panties. Would you want someone wearing your underwear?"
"No!"
"If you want to wear bras as well as panties, then I think it must be more than just wanting to feel pretty or even wanting to see what it feels like to be dressed as a girl."
"What do you mean?"
"How pretty was your mom's bra that you tried on?"
"I don't remember it too well."
"Was it as lacy as the panties?"
"No."
"Well, then putting on the bra couldn't be to feel pretty, could it?"
"I guess not."
"Maybe what's important is that it was your mother's bra. It could be that you want to be like your mom. To emulate her, follow in her foot steps, so to speak. Dressing like her helps you to get to be more like her. Your mom is such a fine woman, I think anybody could envy her."
"I don't want to be my mom!"
"I mean subconsciously. You might want to grow up to be like her. Wearing her bra could be a way of pretending you're her. And the panties also. You get to experience being your mom."
I did like my mom, but I wanted to be a scientist. If anything, my dad's job seemed a lot more exciting. "I dunno," I said, dejectedly.
"What do you feel like when you're wearing a bra?"
"I don't know, Ethel. I don't think I'm going to do it again."
"So that's the full extent of your dressing up?"
"Yeah," I said half heartedly. "but I did once try on Lei's bra. It was the day after we went bra shopping. I saw her new bra and I just put it on for a little while. I remember wanting to see how I looked in it!"
"Well it was a very pretty bra. Anyone would look good in it! But I'm sure Lei would be very upset thinking of you wearing her underwear."
I felt miserable, and fought back tears. I sensed Ethel taking pity on me. "Greg, honey, I realize that we share some deep secrets now."
"Unh, huh," I said.
"I don't want to hurt your feelings, but I think there is a pattern here, but I'm not going to tell anyone. Just like I know you won't tell anyone about what I told you about Charlotte, right?"
"Yes, Ethel."
"Good. Let's put the bra back," and she folded up the bra and placed it neatly back in the drawer and closed it. "So you're not going to experiment with any more of her niece's things?"
"No!"
Ethel regarded me a minute and said, "you are allowed to want to feel pretty, or to be like your mom, or even to just be curious as to what it feels like to be a girl."
The tears were really starting to come now, and she continued, "do you know that?"
With my voice choking, I said, "yes," and then I felt tears running down my cheek.
"What am I going to do with you!" Ethel said. "You poor boy! Now dry your eyes." She got a Kleenex and dabbed at my eyes.
When I could talk again, I said, "Ethel?"
"Yes, Greg?"
"I also wore Lei's first bra. I found it in the bottom of my mom's dresser. There was a photo of her wearing it, and..."
"And, what?"
"I think I feel jealous of her. My mom never bought me a first bra. I know it sounds ridiculous."
"Well how about I buy you your first bra?"
I couldn't believe I was hearing her utter those words. Then in a state of panic I said, "no! Ethel, I don't want a bra!"
"Its OK. Come with me to the kitchen. Charlotte will be home in just a minute."
After Charlotte had come home and I had put her shoes away and gotten her a martini, she invited me to sit down with her and Ethel in the living room. We were waiting for dinner to finish cooking.
I could see Ethel signaling me to ask Charlotte my question, but I knew that I couldn't do it. To my chagrin, Ethel said, "Greg has a question for you. I told him I couldn't answer it myself, it was really for you."
"Not a minute past eleven, Greg. That's my final answer!"
"No, Charlotte," Ethel laughed. "He wasn't asking about his curfew. Now go ahead, Greg."
Charlotte was staring at me, "go ahead, Greg, I've had a long day, don't be coy."
"Its just that, you know the girls upstairs, Linda and her friends, I'm going to see them later?"
"Yes?"
"Well..."
"Well what, Greg?"
Charlotte took a long sip from her martini. I couldn't find any sign of warmth in her face.
"The girls were curious about the clothes in my room."
"What clothes?"
"You know, your niece's clothes."
"How would they ever know about her clothes?"
"I told them."
"Why would you be talking about her clothes? Greg, is that what you're interested in?"
"I was telling them about the pretty decorations, and then about the pretty clothes."
"Offhand I don't think it is any of their business what kind of clothes my niece wears. I don't see how it could interest them in the slightest."
"It was how pretty they are. The lace and ribbons and bows and the pink colors. I guess I made it seem pretty exotic."
"Well don't worry about it any more. My niece doesn't want her clothes carried about, or worn by anyone else."
"Sure, I understand," I said, relieved that at last the matter would be dropped.
"So you've been looking at her clothes?"
"I saw them the first day I was here."
"You haven't touched them?"
Looking at Ethel and then back at Charlotte, I said, "well one time I looked at the lower dresser drawer."
"Looked?"
Ethel intervened, "I was showing Greg some of the panties and bras. We had been talking about the differences between his panties and your nieces panties. He was curious about why girls wear pretty panties and I was helping him understand. I even let him try on one of the panties so he could see how pretty he'd look." Ethel winked at me.
Charlotte laughed. "Why were you afraid to tell me that, Greg?"
"I thought you'd be mad at me!"
"As long as you don't go exploring by yourself, then there's no cause to be mad! But you really shouldn't be wearing my niece's underwear."
"You have me to blame for that, Charlotte," Ethel said, "but if you'd seen how excited Greg was to wear the panties, you probably would have let him also."
"I wasn't excited."
"Ethel and I would be happy to get you pretty panties to play dress up with," Charlotte said.
"I didn't say I wanted to play dress up. I don't want my own girls underwear, I mean more than the ones I have now. I was just curious about it. Since the panties you bought me are plain."
"In the bra shop you insisted on the plainest panties we could find."
"I know. But that's all I want. Just the plain panties." With relief I could hear the buzzer going off signaling that dinner was ready. Trying on the panties last night was the stupidest thing I had ever done. Luckily, I'd be out of the room in a couple of days, so the opportunity and the temptation would be gone.
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