Packed tightly into the box was what looked like a period costume, a girl's period costume.
Soon after we had all managed to separate out the silky bloomers from the many layers of cloth and draw them up our legs, we were startled to hear Dr Owen address us again. It seemed that whilst we were busy getting dressed, she had re-entered the room silently. As she spoke, we all continued to, more than a little reluctantly, get dressed.
"What you are looking at gentlemen," she said, "is an exact replica of the very first uniforms, worn at this actual school. As you are no doubt aware, this school was founded in 1883. Of course, at that time it was called "The Lake Point Academy for Young Women", and was of course a girls only school. But even then it was somewhat of a trend setter. It was the first in the state to incorporate African-American girls, had a faculty comprised of mostly women, including the principle, and offered full scholarships to worthy, disadvantaged girls."
A few of the boys had elected to forego the corset in their pile and began to don their dresses. The men tasked with overseeing our dressing put a stop to that and had us all slip into what we would accept as "our corsets" for the duration, after we had laced our boots.
Once in place, some of the overseers helped with the lacing, whilst some of the guys teamed up and through trial and error began tighten the laces of each other. All the while, Dr Owens looked on, with little to no expression.
It was while Trevor was yanking hard on my laces, trying it seemed to squeeze the life out of me, that I recognized where I had seen Dr Owen before, it had been at Karen's house. She must be Karen's Aunt Sue!
Once we were all suitably squished and struggling for breath, laces tied off, the dresses were pulled over our heads, dozens of tiny buttons done up, a broad emerald green ribbon sash at our newly feminized waists was tied in a "pretty bow".
From the shoulders down, we looked like a class of young women near the end of the 19th century, however, above those shoulders, we were a dozen unhappy looking guys, with red faces and a lot of confusion.
Things worsened when the girls returned from their dressing. The first reaction from them was shock, followed by laughter and a few remarks along the lines of how we were all so suited to our new uniforms.
When everyone had started to settle down again, Dr Owen addressed us all again.
"Ladies!" she began, seemingly referring to us all, "please take your seats. We still have quite a bit to get through before the Morning break. You will notice that I addressed you all as 'Ladies', this was intentional, as for the duration of this course, that is how you will all be expected to behave. As such, you will be courteous and you will be respectful. Along the way, you will be taught how to be genteel, elegant and demure. By the time we are done, you will all understand and no doubt, greater appreciate what it means to be not just female, but also feminine."
"With that in mind, we will NOT tolerate and wilfulness, aggression, rough housing, manliness or negative comments about this program. Anyone engaging in such behaviour will discover just how much latitude we have in enforcing your contracts. Trust me, 'girls' when I say this, it will not be pleasant, and you will without fail regret it. So, I expect best behaviour from you all, end of story.
So far, everything had happened quite quickly and we were all seeming to just go with the flow. Then, two things happened almost simultaneously. The first, Moose had apparently reached his tolerance threshold and began tearing at his clothes whilst screaming about how no one was going to turn him into some sissy bitch. The second, more personal, was that I began to feel terribly light headed and nauseated.
I was only partly aware of Moose screaming in pain and dropping to the floor in spasms, because at the same time, my light headedness became severe dizziness and I too was heading to the floor, only without the screams.
