Dinah's Career

Dinah's Career

by

Kortpeel

___________________________________________________________________

The sudden shower had pushed the shopping crowd off the streets.

The coffee shop was crowded and the two young waitresses trying their best to keep all the customers happy were failing miserably. I was lucky to get an empty seat at a table for two tucked away in a corner.

"I hope you aren't in a hurry. I ordered fifteen minutes ago." The pleasant well-groomed, attractive woman across the table looked exactly the kind of well-paid business executive that I was trying to become. She was, I guessed, 27, about my own age.

I smiled. "Actually I have all day but I am dying for caffeine."

"How did the interview go?" she asked.

"Not good. However did you know?"

She smiled. "Brenda."

"Dinah." We shook hands. It seemed overly formal to me for women to shake hands like men do but from Brenda it came naturally.

"I saw you come out of the Baxter building. I happen to know they're interviewing today. You're all dressed up like for an interview so I took a chance."

That was another thing. Brenda and I were wearing similar clothes: navy business suit of jacket and slacks. On her they looked natural. On me I was dolled up for an interview. "Well guessed." I told her.

She shrugged. "Just lucky. You were going for the medical rep's job, I take it?"

"That's the one. It pays a heck of a lot more than nursing."

Brenda nodded. "Let me take another flyer: single parent, struggling to make ends meet on a low salary?"

"You've got to be a mind reader."

"Not really. I've been there too. Takes one to know one."

I'd been struggling with poverty for over a year now and hadn't been able to talk about it. Given this chance my feeling poured like water from a bursting dam. "I just can't come out on what I bring home. Every month I'm deeper in debt. The other night there wasn't anything in the house to eat. The last of the bread had gone mouldy." I'd have died rather than tell that to anyone I knew.

"Genteel grinding poverty." Brenda said, commiserating. "My husband died three years ago and left me with two young kids. I went back to work but they paid pocket money. I struggled like hell to keep up appearances but it was just too much. I lost the house and the car. We ended up for a while at the Salvation Army hostel."

"You didn't!" I could scarcely believe what she was telling me.

"It was either that or a cardboard box on the street."

"Heck! You really have been there."

"Respectability 's a wonderful thing, Dinah but it doesn't put food on the table. Or keep a roof over your head." Brenda's words, spoken with feeling, were in such contrast to her smart, successful appearance.

"Well, you're looking great now. Did you meet a guy?" I'd noticed she was wearing a wedding ring.

"I'm still Jake's widow." For just an instant her face softened and I realised she was in love with her late husband's memory. "I had this terrible guilty feeling of letting Jake down, through trying to maintain false values. In the end I took the best job I could get and it's paid off beautifully."

"Mine just ran off," I told her. "Didn't even say good-bye." Charlie had been a charming man but he was weak. He couldn't hold down a job. He'd been a child to my adult and when the baby came he'd been unable to pull his weight. He'd had just enough pride left to get out of my life. I told Brenda that.

Brenda nodded. "Some are bastards. Either way it makes life difficult. On the other hand, maybe it's good for your character or something to have to cope by your self. I didn't enjoy it but I'm a stronger person for it."

"Well you certainly look successful," I told her. "How did you do it?"

She smiled, a little shyly I thought. "I got a job at a massage parlour." She said it defiantly, as if expecting disapproval from me.

I was astonished.

She laughed at my reaction. "Like I said, respectability doesn't put food on the table."

She told me about it. She could earn more in a one-hour session than I earned in a day. The clients made an appointment, arrived, stripped, and showered if they wanted. Then they got a really good massage followed by a pelvic. "That means we bring 'em off by hand," Brenda explained. "Afterwards they pay up, get dressed and go. All in the hour."

"What are the guys like? I mean are they nice or horrible or what?"

"Most of the guys are very nice. They act like gentlemen even if they aren't. Remember that for them a session with us is a treat they're giving themselves. They want to enjoy it. There are very few assholes."

A thought occurred to Brenda. "I suppose you have to like guys generally, and accept them for the way they are. If you do then you can enjoy the work."

"Isn't it tiring? I'd have thought massaging was fairly strenuous."

"It is at first. But it keeps you fit and is good for the figure. After a while you get so fit you can do it all day when you need to."

I asked some more questions. The things I learnt were that actual sex is a no-no, discretion is very important and Brenda generally worked topless, often in just her panties. "That's entirely up to me of course but it is a help in building up a regular clientele."

About that point the waitress came to take my order. Brenda looked at her watch. "Gosh I talk too much. I have an appointment in ten minutes. I've got to go."

She stood up. The waitress, only too pleased to not have to bother, disappeared off to attend to other, less patient, customers.

"Why not come with me and see what it's like?" There was a kind of challenge in Brenda's voice.

Why not? I did have all day. The window of opportunity for caffeine had closed and the coffee shop was as full as ever. "Ok, I will."

It was a short walk to Brenda's rooms. The rain had stopped but the sidewalks were still wet.

"What's your underwear like?" Brenda asked me on the way.

One makes economies in areas where it doesn't show. "I think I've just been knocked down by the bus my mother always warned me about."

She smiled, understanding. "Keep your slacks on then. Or go completely nude if you like. Robbie likes to look at women so he's certainly not going to mind."

Brenda's massage parlour consisted of three massage rooms, showers and a kitchen cum staff room where the girls could make food, sit and talk in between clients. It was all very clean and pleasant. Comfort and feel-at-home seemed to be the theme. Brenda remembered that I still hadn't had my caffeine fix and was kind enough to make coffee the moment we got there.

Brenda had been so matter of fact about it that the doorbell rang while I was still thinking about what clothes, if any, I ought to take off for this session.

"That must be our client." Brenda pressed the intercom button. "Hello?"

"Robbie," a man's voice sounded through the speaker. Brenda pressed another button and I heard the click at the front door.

"Come in Robbie."

There was a small reception area inside the front door. We met Robbie there. He was a tallish, well built guy, slightly overweight with the beginnings of a potbelly. I guessed he was early 50s. He was expensively dressed in dark grey suit and black shoes. I learnt later that the aura of power that I sensed from him was justified. He was looking jaded and tense, presumably from the pressure of his work.

Even so he seemed cheerful and happy to be there and I understood what Brenda had meant when she said that a visit to her is a treat that the clients give themselves. Robbie was looking forward to the next hour.

"Robbie this is Dinah who only started with us this morning. Would you mind if she joined us for the session?"

Robbie gave me an appraising look and a big smile. "Hello Dinah. I'd be delighted for you to come in on the session." I found myself liking this man.

In the massage room Brenda asked me to help Robbie with his clothes while she got him the cup of tea he liked at the start of a session. She handed me some coat hangers and left me there with Robbie. If he seemed a shade confused as to what should happen next it was nothing to my own confusion.

Well, his clothes had to come off, I guessed. So I made a start and unbuttoned his jacket. He took it off and handed it to me. I hung it nicely and then undressed him while he stood there enjoying it. I got him completely nude. I offered him a shower, which he didn't need but he accepted and went off with the towel I handed him.

So far so good. Was I doing it right? Just fine according to Brenda who came in with the tea.

"He didn't seem very excited," I remarked. His penis had remained very shrunken, almost buried in his pubic hair.

"Ah. You get that with a lot of our clients. We have ways of making them stand."

Robbie came back from his shower, completely nude and the three of us made polite conversation while we each drank our tea. I prefer coffee given a choice but tea is remarkably refreshing.

Brenda stripped to the black bikini briefs she was wearing and got Robbie onto the massage table on his front. I wasn't sure what I was supposed to do so in the end I did nothing and kept my clothes on.

"Now feel this guy's back," Brenda told me. "Can you feel how tense he is?"

I felt his back. I couldn't feel the knots she referred to but after she'd done his back I could feel a difference.

"Now we do his legs."

Brenda started at his feet and worked up. After she'd rubbed his thighs and buttocks she got him to turn over.

"Now I'd like you to help me with the next part."

Brenda got Robbie's legs so that they were bent at the knees, slightly apart with his feet on the table. She oiled up one thigh and got me to do the other one. Next step was to grip the thigh with both hands and rub firmly from above the knee toward the hip joint. We did this together with slow firm strokes. Robbie seemed to like it as we 'accidentally' lightly brushed his scrotum at the end of each stroke.

The most amazing thing happened. Robbie's erection grew with each stroke just as if we were pumping it up. About ten strokes like that and he was rock hard.

"Now here's a fine upstanding fellow," Brenda said, teasing as she held his penis and poured oil all over it. She rubbed the oil into his penis and scrotum. Robbie was quite obviously loving it.

Brenda made a very nice production of bringing him off. It didn't take long despite Robbie's best efforts to hold back. His ejaculate was yellowish and there was so much of it.

"Wow! Thank you ladies. That was beautiful," Robbie said while Brenda cleaned up his mess and wiped off all the oil she'd poured onto him.

When he'd dressed and was ready to leave Robbie paid Brenda for the session and gave us each a tip. The tip was more than I earn in a day. He looked ten years younger, relaxed and happy.

"That's a fairly typical session," Brenda told me after he'd left. "But you don't always get such a good tip. He's a wealthy man."

"And now he's a healthier man too," I replied. "It must have been good for him." I knew that orthodox medicine had nothing that could have benefited him like Brenda's treatment. I was most impressed.

On the way home I stopped off and spent most of Robbie's tip on underwear. I smiled remembering my mother's earnest admonition always to be decent under my dress. Say I got knocked down by a bus and the people at the hospital saw me in dirty undies? Whatever would they think?

I realise then that my mother had strived for respectability as I'd been doing. She'd succeeded better than I. Her husband had been a better man than mine.

I kept thinking of the session with Robbie all the rest of the day. It had been of real benefit to him. That one fact appealed to the nurse in me. Although what Brenda did was considered to be bordering on prostitution it was nevertheless real therapy. I'd seen it with my own eyes.

I thought about the way we'd 'pumped' up his erection. Probably his femoral arteries were obstructed which was the cause of his erectile dysfunction. The strokes we'd applied to his thighs redirected the blood flow into his penis which was, at that stage, ready to receive it. There been so much ejaculate because he hadn't had a release for a while, since his last session probably, and it was yellowish because it had aged inside him.

I wondered if Robbie was married. Guys like him usually were. Somewhere there was a dumb cow of a wife neglecting her husband and pushing him toward the Brendas of this world. How could any woman be so stupid? It would take so little effort to keep a man like Robbie satisfied.

Next day I was on morning shift in the operating theatre. The mail drop that came just as I was leaving was full of bills that I didn't have money to pay. That decided me. I phoned Brenda from work and told her that I wanted to join her.

Six months later I found myself the boss. Brenda had entered into a permanent relationship with Robbie and handed the whole thing over to me, lock stock and barrel as a going concern. She didn't even want any payment. "Just keep up the good work," was all she asked from me.

There were two other girls there. Jane was a very shapely and attractive 42 year old brunette. She didn't need the money. She and her husband were both qualified accountants. Her husband was actually a partner in an accounting firm. Jane could have become a partner but she didn't like the work. She much preferred dealing with naked guys on her massage table. "They're so much nicer without their suits." Didn't her husband mind her doing this kind of work? "None of his business and what he doesn't know won't hurt him." I thought it best not to pursue that line of enquiry.

Sally had just turned 21. She was a slender blue eyed blonde, the single mother of a four year old. Her boyfriend had disappeared from her young life the moment he'd learnt she was pregnant. She'd nervously and tentatively answered my discretely worded ad for extra girls. I'd had my doubts about her; she seemed too nervous and shy for this work. I gave her a chance, more out pity than expectation but as it turned out, she'd taken to the work and blossomed.

With Sally, as with me, it was poverty that was so undermining. There is a threshold of income at which you can meet your needs. At or above that threshold life is pleasant and worth living. Below it life is hardship and misery.

For us life was pleasant. We had a nice and growing core of regular clients, a steady trickle of new business and we were all coping beautifully. As the owner I had the extra work of dealing with the landlord, keeping the place up to standard and making sure the bills all got paid. Jane, Sue and I paid a levy per client toward the costs and we shared out any excess at quarterly intervals.

Most importantly we enjoyed the work. Hell but it is nice dealing with naked guys on their best behaviour. And in such variety.

This arrangement could have lasted indefinitely, Going by Jane we were good for another twenty years at least, but one day I had the oddest phone call.

"Sister Allaway?"

In this business it was strictly first names only. I don't think anyone knew my surname and certainly I'd never used my nursing title. I smelt a rat. It could be anything from Vice or blackmail to protection or, as happened from time to time, the press wanting to do an exposé.

I was guarded. "Who wants to know?"

"My name is Meg Richter. I need your help."

"And how can I help, Meg?"

"I need to see you. I can't talk over the phone."

Occasionally a woman would book a massage as a treat for some guy in her life. Perhaps this would be something along those lines. Those women were often embarrassed. She mentioned that I'd helped Albert recently. For a moment I was puzzled. Then I remembered. Albert, a client about 60 something, had had a stroke when he came for an appointment. I gave him first aid and I'd had to tell him I was a nursing sister in order to give him the injection that may have saved his life. Certainly it minimised the damage from the stroke. The ambulance took him away and that was the last of it. Except now apparently it wasn't. Albert was doing well, I learnt..

Mrs. Richter was Albert's daughter in law. She told me that she needed to see me to discuss a problem I might be able to help her with. She was adamant and there was an underlying concern in her voice. I had the impression that she was struggling to maintain her self-control. Because she didn't seem like she was going to make trouble and because she sounded so desperate I allowed myself to be talked into booking a one-hour session for her. Maybe Albert had done a selling job on her on the benefits of massage and she thought we could help her lose weight or something. I wasn't too keen. Despite the real benefits of massage we saw ourselves primarily as sex workers.

Discretion is important in our line of work and there was no danger of her meeting our normal clients. Even so I was shocked when she turned up with her daughter. Averil must have been about eleven or so.

Meg Richter was of average height and slim. Her light brown hair framed her face. She was well groomed, well dressed and was attractive even though she looked worried.

The daughter was going to be a beauty one day. She had her mother's lovely big blue eyes that made her look so innocent and vulnerable. Her lustrous long hair was several shades lighter than her mother's. At this stage though she still had the slender unformed body of a child. She jumped up onto the massage table and sat there demurely, hands folded in her lap, no doubt taking everything in as little girls are wont to do.

Mrs. Richter was having some trouble getting to the point of her visit. She talked about the stroke Albert had had. He was a widower as it turned out. She was very grateful to me for saving his life. He was doing well and should make a good recovery. As she'd booked the whole hour and had paid me in cash up front I was quite happy for her to talk. I guessed she'd get to the point eventually.

She asked me about my nursing career and I told her. She wanted to know what I was doing in this line of work and I told her that too. She seemed to understand. The salaries that nurses are paid are so low that to be a nurse you have to depend on your husband's income to live. "If you don't have a husband you can't afford to be a nurse."

"I asked around about you before I called you. Word is that you were- are, a brilliant theatre nurse."

I had the feeling that Mrs. Richter had decided she could trust me with whatever it was she wanted. I looked at her, forcing her to continue.

"I need your help Sister Allaway."

I continued to gaze at her with what I hoped was an encouraging look.

"It's Averil," she said. I was damned if I could see what my set of skills could do for the child. She looked perfectly ok to me. And if she wasn't ok there was nothing I could do. I just nodded.

Whatever it was, Mrs. Richter was having trouble verbalising it. She looked at her daughter "Averil get undressed darling. I want Sister Allaway to see the problem."

Averil was wearing the uniform of an expensive private school: royal blue blazer with a heraldic badge, grey knee length skirt, white blouse and a necktie like boys wear. That school also has a straw boater as part of its uniform but Averil had already removed it. She looked a little shy but obeyed her mother. She stood with her back to us, neatly folding her clothes and putting them on the massage table as she removed them.

Everything became clear when Averil turned around and I saw she had a boy's penis and testicles. She was a boy in fact.

"Averil is transgendered," Mrs. Richter said. "A female mind in a male body. It's a recipe for an unhappy life and I want to pre-empt that."

"How can I help you?"

"Remove the testicles."

Mrs. Richter anticipated my next question even before I'd thought of it. She produced a file of letters from the document case she was carrying. They were from psychiatrists that had seen Averil. I knew the local ones by reputation. Some I'd never heard of. Basically they all said they'd examined Averil, confirmed that she was transgendered and recommended that she be raised as a girl until such time as the appropriate surgery could be contemplated.

"Surely on this basis any reputable surgeon …?"

"They won't touch it. Not until Averil is eighteen. By then it will be too late"

"Too late?"

Meg Richter nodded. "We've thought it through. What happens to a boy's body between twelve and eighteen?"

I knew what she meant. He grows tall, gets muscles, big hands and feet and broad shoulders. His voice breaks and he gets an Adam's apple. His skin gets a masculine texture. He gets a man's face. He grows a beard."

"Would you want that for your daughter?"

To gain time I told Averil to get dressed.

"All the men in our family are big strapping guys and Averil would be too."

"Yes. I see the logic in what you say, Mrs. Richter. In fact I agree with you completely. If you leave the letters with me I'd like to speak to some surgeons I know and see if I can get them to do the procedure."

"Wouldn't you do it?"

"I'm not a surgeon."

"But you're a theatre sister. You've seen the procedure surely? You must know what to do."

As a theatre sister I'd made incisions, tied and cut and closed up. On routine cases such as appendectomies I'd done so many that I was certainly more competent than many of the GPs who occasionally elected to wield a scalpel. However I'd always done it under the direct, personal supervision of a doctor or surgeon. They have to be there. If anything were to go wrong the case immediately became non-routine and then the advanced expertise of the specialist was needed. It was rare for a case to go wrong but it did happen.

"With any surgery there is always some risk. That's why you need a proper surgeon. Supposing something did go wrong? Something that I couldn't handle. Would you take the chance of Averil becoming a vegetable?"

Reluctantly Meg Richter saw the logic of my argument. She handed me the papers and I promised to do the best I could for her.

Sally had seen my unusual clients and I told her about them. She was extremely sympathetic for Averil. "I do hope you find a surgeon. Imagine how awful it would be to become a man when you aren't."

Until Sally said that, I had never given much thought to how important it is that the body should match the brain.

I telephoned some of the psychiatrists who had seen Averil. Dr. Jean Weathers who I knew fairly well confided that at first she'd been concerned that this was a case of a mother who'd wanted a daughter and who had unduly influenced an otherwise normal boy. However she'd satisfied herself that Averil really did have a girl's mind and would one day have a woman's mind. To confirm it she'd had some e.m.r. checks on the brain. This proved beyond any shadow of doubt that it was a female brain in there, even though she had XY chromosomes in her body.

"In fact, I think Meg Richter is an enlightened and understanding mother who is facing up to a real problem with her child" was her conclusion. "She deserves all the support she can get."

I asked her about the castration that Mrs. Richter wanted for Averil.

"It's an excellent idea and a darn shame that it can't be done."

"Why not?"

"Totally illegal. Besides no surgeon would castrate a young male like that. Would ruin his career. It's against Medical Association advice."

"Even though this girl will grow into a big huge guy?"

"We could try chemicals: drugs that suppress testosterone production. Not really recommended in a youngster though. Nasty side effects. Could cause permanent damage." Dr. Weathers was thinking aloud for my benefit. "No I'm sorry Sister Allaway. Averil will just have to wait until she's eighteen. Then she can go the whole transgender route. I'd certainly be pleased to give her every support at that stage."

It was much the same with the surgeons I spoke to. They were sympathetic but they wouldn't touch the case. "Come back at 18," they all said. In response to the point that instead of a beautiful young woman, Averil would be a hulking great fellow at 18 they just shrugged.

Sally had heard some of my conversations with surgeons. "Could you actually do it? I mean would you know what to do if you had to do it?"

I supposed I did know what to do. I'd seen bilateral orchiectomies on cancer patients. It's similar to a hernia op and actually simpler to do.

Looking back I think it was Meg Richter's reaction when I gave her an update that decided me. I realised that all I'd done was cover the same ground that she had and had hit the same brick wall. Being a medical insider had merely let me access patient confidential information. Mrs. Richter thanked me very politely for my efforts.

There was a sort of sad resignation about her. It actually worried me. "What will you do now?"

"We're making enquiries overseas."

"You are resolved to go ahead with this?"

"Oh yes. Wouldn't you?"

Yes certainly I would in her position. "Mrs. Richter, would you still like me to attempt the procedure?"

"Of course I would. And I would certainly make it worth your while."

"No. I want no personal gain from this. I think it's the right thing to do."

Mrs. Richter looked astonished. In her world one paid for everything.

"There will be costs though. Materials, equipment, anaesthetics. I will charge you for all expenses incurred."

We spoke about it. We agreed.

I had a one on one session with Averil. She was a bright kid and understood endocrinology as it affected her. She desperately wanted her testicles removed before they started masculinising her.

I told her what the procedure would be, that it would be under a local anaesthetic, that she would have to keep very still. Some of it would be scary and it would be sore for a while afterwards. I emphasised that the locals would block the pain of the actual cuts. She was apprehensive but still wanted the procedure.

I was impressed with her quiet courage. After talking to Averil I felt reassured that I would be doing the right thing for her.

After a long talk with Mrs. Richter, during which I almost scared her to death with stories of What Might Go Wrong, I got her to sign an indemnity. Finally I asked her to make an appointment for Averil with a cardiologist of my acquaintance.

"What on earth for? There's nothing wrong with her heart."

"Just to be sure." I explained that her heart sounded fine to my ears but even so I wanted her to be checked by a specialist. I'd known cases where a cardiologist picked up heart defects missed by non-specialist doctors, and to my surprise, by me as well.

"But what shall I say?"

"Tell him you've heard that her biological father has recently died from a heart condition which runs in his family. That'll be enough and he'll be discreet enough not to ask any more questions."

A Cardiologist lives in a world where people fall down dead every day from heart failure. Many more have heart attacks and can be saved. Every day he listens to sick hearts. He didn't query Mrs Richter's request for him to examine her daughter. He thought it was a perfectly normal, sensible precaution. He was delighted to pronounce her heart to be perfectly fit and healthy.

Sally had shown such interest in the Richters' case that I granted her request to be present. In return she helped me prepare the room. We were going to use the massage table for the procedure.

I used my contacts to acquire all the equipment and stuff that I was going to need: surgical needles and thread, scalpel, syringe and anaesthetics, rubber gloves, masks and dressings.

Because the patient was transgendered it was important not to inflict any damage to the scrotum. This would become part of a vagina one day. Without testosterone the prepubescent penis would shrink and become even tinier. It might even pass as a clitoris. From the research I'd been able to carry out I thought that Averil would have every chance of growing into the beautiful woman I thought she'd become when I first met her.

Averil was nervous when she got naked on to the table. Prepping had been a tranquilliser and a wipe of surgical alcohol on the hairless genital area. I had restraints but decided it would be better to use them only if necessary. I injected the anaesthetic and waited. Sally was standing up well so far. The test for her was coming. Would she be ok when I made the first incision?

She was brilliant. Barely flinched. I worked the first testicle up to the incision quite easily. It came out and hung on its cord. Simple to tie it off and snip.

The second testicle came off too and I sewed up the incisions. For stitching I used tiny, fine stitches to minimise the scarring. This girl would be able to wear a tanga one day. Or even not wear one if that's what she wanted.

I put a dressing over the wounds and Sally helped me put Averil to bed. I gave her a sleeping pill. It worked well. There was just time for mom and daughter to have a few words before daughter dropped off to sleep.

I kept her there all the next day. She got up to use the toilet. It was sore and hurt her to move but that was normal. The day after that I checked the wounds, which were healing nicely, no trace of infection, and declared she could go home.

Mrs Richter paid me for the expenses incurred and offered a thick wad of bills over and above that. I turned it down. Later it would occur to me that I was able to act so honourably simply because I could afford to. In my nursing days I’d have been unable to refuse her money.

Averil healed perfectly over the next couple of weeks. I was on edge, knowing I'd probably infringed several statutes and was nervous every time the phone rang. That is not good for business.

It was about six weeks after that. We'd all settled back to normal and business was running along nicely when I got a phone call from Dr. Weathers, the psychiatrist. Brief pleasantries and she came to the point. "Remember that patient Averil Richter? I see that she managed to get her testicles removed. Very nice job too."

I resisted the temptation to say "Thank you." It was a nice compliment but discretion is everything.

She continued. "I've put her on to an endocrinologist and she'll be starting with oestrogen soon."

"That's nice. She's happy then?"

"Oh yes. Perfectly normal little girl. It's working out well."

"I'm so pleased for her."

"So am I. Thing is Dinah, I have a similar case."

"There seems to be more and more of them." I was trying to side-track her. "What's causing it do you think?"

"Oh, I'd say it's no more than there ever was. Just that people are no longer afraid to come out. Good thing too. How would you like to spend your life pretending you were male? Even if you looked like one?"

"I couldn't."

"Neither can transgendered guys. Sooner or later they crack under the strain. Often with tragic results."

"So it's better to come out?"

"Course it is. It's a waste to live a lie all your life. The interesting thing is that we're beginning to see it now with younger people. Averil Richter is going to be a real success story."

"That's good to hear."

"And so is Drew Bellamy."

"Drew Bellamy?"

"A case like Averil. Twelve years old, just on the verge of puberty. An urgent case for castration. Will you see her?"

"What can I do, Dr. Weathers?"

"Sister Allaway, medicine and psychiatry are moving with the times. The Medical Association is about to create a new category of nursing licentiate. You'll have specialised nurses in this area, like today midwifery is a nursing speciality."

"Dr Weathers I'm not with you."

"I'm talking about castrations like Averil Richter and Drew Bellamy. I've been authorised by the State Medical Association to investigate this area with a view to licensing qualified nurses to perform castrations."

"Oh."

"It's all legal and above board. I can give you a temporary licence for development of the scheme."

It was obvious that Dr. Weathers knew perfectly well that it was me who had removed Averil's testicles. She carefully avoided saying so which was tactful of her. However she was offering me a chance to do it legally from here on.

Dr. Weathers had come with an offer that I was finding hard to refuse. I did truly love nursing and I was missing it. I knew also that there were Averil's in this world who needed the empathic understanding and practical help that I could give. I could legitimately charge a fee for the service too.

"S'funny how this is the one area that those surgeons can't handle," Jean Weathers was speaking as a woman rather than a psychiatrist. "Those surgeons will whip out your ovaries at the drop of a hat and they'll even do circumcisions on babies for a fee. What they can't seem to handle is cutting off another man's testicles."

"So that's how come they're willing to delegate it to nurses?" I replied.

"You've got it in one, honey." There was a pause then she added "The time will come when being transgendered will be routinely dealt with the same as any other birth defect, like a hare lip or cleft palate."

"Amen to that" I replied and after some more discussion I became a legally licensed castratrix, albeit only temporarily licensed.

I had the licensed framed and put it on the wall of my massage room. The massage clients who read it always reacted and wanted to know more. I usually told them about the transgendered youngsters and pre-op cases.

Over a period there was an ever-growing trickle of such cases and Sally, as my assistant, and I became extremely proficient.

Not all of my castration patients were youngsters. Some guys acknowledged their transgendered status quite late in life so we had a good proportion of adult patients to castrate as well.

Sally had kept all the testicles that we'd removed and had them bronzed. When she had enough she threaded them and put them on display in her massage room. She loved the way it scared the hell out her clients when she told them what that funny decoration actually was.

Sally maintained that her regulars got a kick from knowing that those hands that brought them so much pleasure could just as easily take out their testes. "They just love it so much when I gently squeeze their balls after I've told them," she would remark. I suspect that Sally got quite a kick out of it as well.

Some of Sally's regulars made casual queries about the procedure, what it cost, what it entailed and what happened afterwards. She didn't encourage them. Mainly she didn't want to lose her regulars but also neither of us knew much about what happened afterwards. All our clients up to that point were people who wanted to become female and were into hormone treatment.

It was my other partner, Jane, who broke the pattern. I suspected that all was not sweetness and light in her marriage. Several times she'd worn dark glasses all day and had worked with her clothes on. I suspected that her husband, Grahame, was a wife beater. On a very few occasions she had even failed to turn up at all.

Of course I never said anything. That was her business. I knew she had two teen-age sons on whom she doted and was committed enough to keep the home together for their sakes.

She'd not been her normal self for the past few days and I suspected that Grahame was giving her a hard time. Then one day she didn't come at all; nor the next day.

On the third day, without hearing from her, Sally and I were really concerned. We'd been calling her house and got no reply; not even from an answering machine. I took it upon myself to call the hospitals and eventually found that the City Hospital had a patient by that name. That was all I could learn. I could get no details over the phone.

I visited her. She'd looked like she really had been knocked down by a truck which was what she tried to tell me had happened. She had a broken arm, fractured ribs and her face was a mess with a broken nose and extensive bruising.

She doggedly stuck to the truck story until I asked her about her boys. Then it all came out. Grahame had been beating her for years. "He would have these violent spells and then be contrite and apologetic afterwards." He would also intimidate the boys with threats of violence.

At the last scene he had started on her and her younger son went to her help. Grahame had hit him so hard it knocked him unconscious. The older boy came in, saw his brother on the ground and Grahame hitting his mother. He was sixteen going on seventeen and he called his old man out.

"What frightened me the most," Jane said, "was the anger I saw in Tim's eyes. He hated his father. It was raw naked hatred. I was so scared that one of them would be killed."

They'd fought and in the end it was Tim's stamina that prevailed. Grahame collapsed. "I thought he'd had a heart attack."

Tim had bruises and some broken bones in his right hand. Grahame was battered but he was fine apart from a few bruises after a night's sleep. The younger son had a broken jaw and was in the same hospital.

"Trouble is I don't know what to do. I just lie here in this bed worrying myself sick about it."

I knew Jane's bruises and bones would heal. It was the scars in her mind that worried me. Jane was worried that the violence in her husband had been passed on to her sons. She had seen it in that look on Tim's face.

Grahame had been to see her, was all penitent and apologetic as usual, swearing that he'd never do it again and would make it up to her.

"He's got a mental disorder," I told Jane. "He needs treatment."

I spoke to Dr. Weathers about it. She was concerned for the sons and suggested they make appointments with her.

Jane got her sons to see Dr. Weathers. Apparently they were fine. Tim had behaved quite rationally under the extreme circumstance of seeing his father violently attacking his mother. "He did what he thought he had to do," Dr. Weathers told me. There was a hint even of admiration in her voice. She made a point of telling Jane this to set her mind at rest.

We all had our favourite regulars. One of Jane's was a guy called Arthur. It happened that Jane came in to see us while she was convalescing and still a shade frail about six weeks after her beating. She was divorcing Grahame and thought she would be ready to resume work in another two weeks.

I wondered if she would be up to it after all that had happened. It seemed to me that she'd got it in her mind that if all men were at least capable of violence, which may well be true, then all men were dangerous. I sensed a fear and uncertainty in her regarding men that would make her unsuitable for our kind of work. Maybe she'd be better off going back to accountancy?

We were talking in our kitchen cum staff room when Sally came in and said that there was someone who wanted to see Jane. We all trooped into Sally's room and there was Arthur, nude, sitting on the massage table. Sally had been looking after Arthur in Jane's absence.

Jane and Arthur greeted each other like old friends. "So are you back to work now?" he asked Jane.

After some chit-chat Arthur talked Jane into giving him his massage. It wasn't too difficult. She wanted to massage him.

"Well as long as you understand that I'm out of practice and not very fit, I don't mind to try."

"Agreed."

"Tell you what," Jane said, "Just this once I'll do it for free. But if you ever tell anyone yours will join those on the wall there." Jane was referring to Sally's display of removed testicles."

Arthur hadn't realised until then just what that display actually was. He recovered quickly. "Promises, promises," he joked.

Coming back to work proved to be the best possible therapy for Jane. She was her old normal happy self and she loved the chaff and banter with her nude guys as she worked on them on her massage table. She recovered all her old self-confidence and was better than ever without having Grahame to hold her back.

Sally had a favourite too. There was a guy called Mike, late twenties or early thirties who would visit about three times a fortnight. Sally thought him 'gorgeous' and would have been, in this one case, happy to give him more than just a massage and pelvic. " I asked him once and he said he didn't want to be unfaithful to his wife." Sally said in a staff room chat. "But he comes here 'cos his wife won't give him any." I think it was the fact that Sally couldn't figure him out that made him so attractive to her.

Then Dr. Weathers called one day. After the divorce from Jane became final Grahame had got into another relationship and started his nonsense. The woman laid charges and Grahame for a "first" offence got a suspended sentence subject to therapy. Dr. Weathers was his therapist.

He was currently in a contrite phase and rather than risk jail had suggested to his psychiatrist that castration might be an option. Jean Weathers was of the opinion that in Grahame's case this would be a splendid course of action, one that was covered by my licence and would serve the bastard right. Would I be willing to do it if it came to that? I got the impression that Jean Weathers' attitude to Grahame wasn't entirely professional.

I said I'd get back to her and discussed it with Jane.

As I put it to Jane and she realised what I was getting at her face slowly lit up in a dawning smile of happy realisation. "Yes, if that's what he wants. Who am I to stand in his way?"

Dr. Weathers had got Grahame to sign the authorisations and waiver while he was in one of his post-violence contrite phases.

When Sally and I got to the City Hospital for the occasion he'd had second thoughts and was strongly against the procedure. So strongly that he'd gone into another violent phase. The two psychiatric orderlies, lovely big strapping guys, were having trouble getting him onto the table. "How about a sedative," one of them suggested.

"Dr. Weathers shook her head. "This is part of his therapy.

Those orderlies were used to violent patients and any discomfort that Grahame caused them they returned with interest. Eventually he had enough sense to stop trying to hit them. "We do live and learn" Dr. Weathers murmured as she observed this. The orderlies applied the restraints to Grahame.

"You fucking bitches can leave my balls alone," Grahame snarled.

"Now then Mr. Toller, mind your language. Dr. Weathers, all very professional, told him. "There are ladies present."

In fact Sally, Jean Weathers and I were the only ones there. It was lovely to be in proper operating theatre again with all its facilities and resources. I hadn't realised how much I'd missed it. I was also getting a kick out of being the surgeon in charge, a status to which as a nurse I'd never even aspired.

I knew from experience that a local anaesthetic is better than a general for a minor procedure such as a castration. The only reason that castration is such a big deal for a man is psychological and that was Dr. Weathers' department.

Grahame kept on shouting curses at us and in the end we gagged him to shut him up. I injected the local anaesthetic and stood back to give it time to work.

Dr. Weathers was at last able to reason with him. "Mr. Toller, you know you are a violent man. You've been convicted of assault and causing actual bodily harm and you have a suspended prison sentence hanging over you. You are lucky that you didn't kill Jane or your two sons."

"Basically you are not a responsible enough person to have testosterone in your blood stream. If you carry on as you've been doing you really are going to kill someone."

"You know this was your idea in the first place and it was a good one. Without testosterone you won't have those violent outbursts. You'll calm down and you'll be able to get on with your life. Perhaps some achievement of yours in the future will make up for the harm you've done in the past."

"It really is for your own good."

Grahame couldn't say anything but he isn't a stupid man and I could see from the look in his eyes that Dr. Weathers' words had struck a chord. He accepted the inevitable and his body visibly relaxed.

I had an idea. Normally we'd use sticking plaster but something made me say to Dr. Weathers "Would you mind holding his penis out of the way while we work."

She did so and gladly. I'd had a feeling that Dr. Weathers would be into penises. She held it like the expert I'd sensed she was. No hesitation or girlish shyness there; this woman knew a prick when she saw one. Almost as a reflex she began stroking it as it hardened in her hand. I noticed Sally give an approving smile beneath her surgical mask.

Because Grahame was not transgendered he wouldn't need his scrotum any more. That was to come off too. Two simple incisions and off it came leaving his testicles dangling in the air. I tied them off and was ready for the cuts on the testicular cords. Dr. Weathers was going full tilt on Grahame's penis. Any second now and- . Gobs of ejaculate shot out of his penis and landed on his stomach. She expertly got all of it and I made the cuts as the last drop emerged.

I sewed him up, checked that all was as well as it could be and a porter wheeled him back to his bed in the psychiatric ward.

Sally and I cleaned up and we joined Jean Weathers for a coffee and post op chat.

"I'm sorry if that was unprofessional of me in there," Jean said. "But I couldn't resist it. He'd have been a nice guy if he hadn't been violent."

"Was all that true? What you told Grahame about the effects of castration?" I asked her.

"Well there's a lot we don't know about castration. Its effect seems to vary from one individual to another. Generally a man's behaviour is controlled by the brain but the presence of testosterone and other steroids in the blood can aggravate effects and transform mild irritation into extreme violence. As in Grahame's case."

"Hence I would say that castration will solve his temper problem. Provided he doesn't take replacement hormone it will keep him out of jail."

"It won't affect his ability to think or do his job. It may even help. There's some reason to believe it improves a man's concentration - probably because he stops thinking about sex all the time."

I prefer guys with their balls," Sally said.

That remark of Sally's turned out to be significant. Next day a woman called Anna rang up. After a lot of beating about the bush I got out of her that she wanted us to castrate her husband. She'd heard that we did that, legally. She was adamant that this was what they both wanted. She collected the waiver forms and brought them back signed the next day. The one unusual thing was that they wanted the procedure done on their own premises. That way Anna could keep an eye on her husband post-op.

"I think we may have discovered a new market," was Sally's comment as we set out for Mike and Anna's house.

End