The door slid quietly shut as Eugene made his way out of the top-floor apartment. With a slight smirk playing upon his rubbery lips, he stepped onto the footpath and headed towards the train station. He looked quizzically at the passers-by. They didn't even notice him and he enjoyed the anonymity. He chuckled, pleased with himself. If they'd seen him playing around in front of the mirror half an hour ago they would certainly look twice.
What a contrast to now, dressed in his navy King Gee work shirt and shorts, black steel-capped boots. Walking along, feeling the breeze in his curls, his mind slipped into a familiar reminiscence, as he pictured his alter ego in a black satin corset, the one with the red lace trim, the whalebone inserts digging pleasurably into his ribs. Running his hands over his rubber falsies he felt a wave of femininity wash over him as he sighed. Black patent leather boots, long up to the thigh, pointed toes and spiked heels. He felt like Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman. They fit like a glove and so they should after all the money he'd spent on them. Shipped from Berlin! He recalled the day they arrived. Running to the door like an excited child, scrambling at the box as if it were Christmas. He spent that entire day wearing them in around the house. Happy days.
Eugene took a seat on the station platform away from the other commuters and began humming an old favourite of his - some old showtune he couldn't remember the name of. It reminded him of those glory days, living in East's Beach caravan park down south. He'd fitted his old pop-top out as an 18th century style French bordello. Red velvet drapes, lashings of feathers and lace and a makeshift chaise lounge.
Eugene bumbled passed the faceless commuters onto his train bound for Town Hall, the closest station to B.D.M. a business college for foreign students where Eugene cleaned toilets. The college was made up of generally young 20s Asians from affluent homes preparing study at an Australian university. Eugene preferred to think of them as “rich little nips”. He didn’t get on so well with the students, mainly because of his dislike of Asians. They left a bad taste in his mouth and he felt he could never relate to them and their filthy foreign customs. Eugene resented the fact that he was the one who had to clean up after them. He’d been cleaning toilets twice a day for 25 years. It was 25 years ago that Eugene arrived in Australia as a Russian immigrant. His first toilet of the day was always the ground floor ladies.
“Excuse me sir, I want to ladies,” whined a meek Asian girl. Eugene could never tell them apart. Chinese, Japanese, Thai, Taiwanese? It was all Greek to him. He noticed her small childish frame topped off by her full breasts that were bursting out of her lilac crop top as she shuffled nervously past him into the toilet cubicle. It was the kind of body he craved, but not to have sex with. It was the kind of body Eugene wished he had.
Eugene was a solid man, legs like worn tree trunks and his chest was quite filled out with a light fuzz of hair. Over the years he had grown to love his body and felt comfortable in his own skin. But the sight of this little Asian woman sparked something else in Eugene. It excited him. The sight of this girl stirred a desire within him that he longed suppressed. Of course, on occasion, Eugene had toyed with the idea of a sex change but the thought of surgery put him off. Instead, he vowed to live as a woman at all times outside of work to see what it really felt like to live as his female persona “Genie”.
“Genie”, it had quite a magical quality, and it certainly made him feel magical. A far cry from his daytime persona - Eugene the toilet cleaner. He would fantasise that Genie led a life of luxury, sipping expensive champagne in the glorious afternoon sun on her moored yacht down at Woolloomooloo overlooking Susan Renouf’s apartment. Genie would be waiting for her husband, a powerful and well-respected entrepreneur to chaperone her to dinner at the Summit.
At times, Eugene would feel confusion when at work. He felt it ironic that he spent his day alternating between the men’s and women’s toilets – just like his life really! During breaks at work he often went to a quiet park close to the college. This was his special place. A place where he could escape into his own thoughts, his fantasies, reflecting on the past and envisaging his future. His was often transported to his days back in Russia, where he felt suffocated by the conservative society. He remembered with a coy smile playing on his lips, his first days in Australia and his first taste of emancipation. He remembered when he first discovered a discreet cross-dressing club frequented by “men” just like him. A warming feeling of coming home. A sharing. At the time he could barely speak any English, a few words here and there, yet the other girls understood him and he was ever so grateful. They even had a name for him - “Eastern Bloc Cock”. Eugene found this endearing and all those horny little trannies were more than willing to pleasure him. Not that Eugene was gay, just that Genie was a heterosexual woman.
