Cinderella

Cinderella had two older brothers. Their names were Bill and Bob. They did a lot of sports and Cinderella washed their kit as well as doing the housework. She didn’t complain, this is just what girls did.

But one day Bill and Bob decided to be girls too. Instead of shorts and sweatshirts Cinderella found herself washing dresses and frilly things.

“But surely,” said Cinderella to Bill and Bob, “if you want to be girls you should do your own washing. In fact, you should do all the household washing. Now that you are girls.”

Bill and Bob laughed in her face and busied themselves with their makeup and hair.

They became obsessed. Nothing could tear them away from their own image in the mirror.

Their costumes and makeup became ever more outrageous.

They carried brightly colored flags wherever they went.

“We’re announcing ourselves,” they explained.

“It’s not very feminine to announce yourselves,” said Cinderella. “Real women wait until they are asked.”

“Tosh!” said the brothers and laughed in their sister’s face.

Cinderella went on with the housework and washed her “sisters’” clothes.

“I think you need some lessons,” she said to her brothers. “You need lessons in how to be a woman.”

The brothers laughed in her face.

But Cinderella went on.

“These clothes you give me to wash are ridiculous. They won’t last, they’re badly made, they shrink and the colors run. What you need is some nice polyester dresses from a chain store. They would be able to go in the washing machine and I wouldn’t have to do all this work.”

The brothers stayed fixed to their dressing table stools (which they overflowed) and laughed at their sister.

“I think you have the wrong idea about us,” said Bob.

“You seem to think we want to be ordinary women,” said Bill.

“That’s the last thing we want,” said Bob. “We don’t want to be ordinary. Why would we?”

“Our reason for wanting to be female,” said Bill, “is that we want to be extraordinary. We want to be noticed. Nobody notices us when we are male and we’re not even very good at rugby.”

“Can’t you see,” said Bob. “Everything we do is staged. We are on stage even now.”

“Everything we do, everything we say,” said Bill, “is an act.”

Cinderella was shocked. “But that can’t be true,” she said. “You can’t live like that. There must be some authenticity somewhere.”

“What do you think of this plum color?” said Bob and spread the color all over his lips.

“Not good,” said Bill. “This magenta is far better. More luscious.”

“Don’t you ever talk about anything real?” said Cinderella.

“Real!” said the boys laughing in her face. “Real indeed!”

“Yes, real,” said Cinderella.

“Like what?” said Bill. “What’s real?”

“Yeah,” said Bob, “Tell us then Clever Clogs, what is real? Are you real? Is this dump real?”

“Yes, I am real,” said Cinderella, “and yes this dump is real and it needs cleaning and I’m sick and tired of being the only one to do any housework!”

But the boys took no notice.

They had become drag queens, they wore clothes that were more fancy and more revealing than any real queen would ever have worn.

They wore them into town where they paraded with other men dressed as women, dancing and prancing on floats and waving multi-colored flags while innocent and stupid young women cavorted madly and cheered them on and men in black masks threatened any dissenters in the enormous crowds.  

“Whatever do you do that for!” Cinderella asked.

“It shows our identity,” said the brothers.

“You mean your identity lies in what you wear and what flag you wave?” said Cinderella. “You mean you really don’t know who you are?”

“Of course we know who we are,” said the brothers. “We are affirmed wherever we go. It’s like being famous.”

“But you don’t do anything,” said Cinderella. “Your identity can’t only be in what you wear.”

The brothers thought about this and came up with a plan.

They went to the local library and told the librarian they wanted to entertain little children.

The librarian was very excited that drag queens had come to her backwater of a municipal library. She invited them to come whenever they liked and entertain the little children.

The brothers didn’t know much about entertaining and even less about little children. All they had to do, they thought, was to show off. They would show off their clothes and their absurd makeup and that would make the children happy. Perhaps they would even drop their frilly knickers and let the children see their bottoms! That would make the children giggle and that would prove that they were happy. And that would prove that the brothers were popular and successful.

The brothers became so popular they got invited to grand parties and balls. And they even got invited to the Prince’s ball at the palace.

Cinderella watched them dress, changing their clothes a hundred times, weeping when they didn’t feel right, laughing when they did.

Eventually they left for the palace and Cinderella breathed in the silence and peace, then collapsed exhausted by all the hysterical tension caused by the titillation of fabricating a sex change.

She must have fallen asleep and found when she woke up that she had company. An old woman was standing beside her saying, “Why aren’t you at the ball?”

“I wasn’t invited,” said Cinderella. “And anyway I don’t have anything to wear. And I hate clothes!”

“We’ll soon see about that!” said the old woman and waved her magic wand. Instantly Cinderella was scrubbed clean and dressed in a magnificent outfit which included glass slippers of all things!

It didn’t seem right to get a bus to the palace while dressed so magnificently. So the old woman waved her magic wand and transformed a pumpkin into a golden carriage with four white horses to pull it and Cinderella got in and was taken to the palace.

I’m sure you know the rest. In the midst of the excitement and frenzy the prince noticed Cinderella. She was pretty and good and quiet and very feminine, the opposite in fact of Bill and Bob. She spent the evening dancing with the prince and when the clock struck midnight, she ran off and jumped into the carriage just in time for it to get her home before it turned back into a pumpkin.

She went back to her scrubbing and washing and cleaning and her brothers didn’t even notice anything different about her.

But then there was a knock on the door. Cinderella went to open it as she always did but her “sisters” got there first. They had been watching out of the window and had seen the prince arrive with his retinue, carrying a glass slipper.

Cinderella went back to the kitchen. And didn’t see the prince until she was summoned by the aggrieved and offended “sisters” to escort the upstart royal off the premises. The prince was disgusted by the self-aggrandisement of the two drag queens who each had claimed to be the owner of the glass slipper. They had fought each other like rugby players in a tackle and had even cut slices from their feet to try to squeeze them into the delicate footwear.

Cinderella saw the prince to the door. She looked a mess but so what? She was still delightful, still naturally beautiful, still the apple of the prince’s eye. And the prince recognized her, not only as the girl he had danced with the night before, but as his destiny, his partner for life.

And so they got married and lived happily ever after.

But what became of the ugly “sisters” I do not know. I hope they made their peace with Reality.