Bad Faith

"Ever feel like you're not really you? Like you're just an actor pretending to be somebody?"

That's exactly what I am right now - an actress stepping into costume. The same costume I wear every day. Mascara, blush, mini-skirts, tights, sleeveless blouses. I wished I had said that, but I just muttered "uh-huh" as if I were just placating her.

Ever have someone say something that you've been thinking all your life but never told anyone? Andy seemed to have a knack for doing just that, as if some of my consciousness had spilled from my mind to hers. Every time it happened, I wanted to scream "Yes!" I wanted to tell her that I could have written a book on the subject by now and to let her hear every sentence that I would write. But every time it happened, I responded with something similar to that brusque "uh-huh."

I had class in fifteen minutes and make-up to put on. That was hardly the reason I stayed silent, though. When Andy said what she did, the hand that held my lipstick froze, leaving my bottom lip half-pink half-red. As usual, I was too taken by surprise to respond. By the time I had gathered my thoughts, Andy was always ready to move on to something else, as if she thought she had said nothing of any importance.

"Kinda weird, I guess. Whatever." She finished tying her shoe as I finished applying my lipstick. I turned to face her as she walked toward the door.

She stopped and looked me over. "Geez, Sophie, I've never seen such a girlie-looking philosophy major. Go get a beret and a black sweater or something."

"Yeah, well, you go put a big pink ribbon in your hair like a real girl..." She laughed at my comeback, so I pulled out my fallback insult. "Andrea."

She grumbled. "Whatever. Smell ya later." She stepped out the door. She hated being called by her full name.

I looked back in the mirror. My outfit was obnoxiously pink, even by my standards. That made it a prime target for Andy. She subsisted on good-natured ribbings, among other things. Growing up on daddy's farm meant that frilly dresses and nail polish were out of the question for her. She was always ready to jump on me for being what she called "one of those suburban girls with fingernails as manicured as their lawns."

-

When I get home from class, I pull out my drawer full of magazines. Elle, Vogue, Cosmo, the usual. I don't read them for the articles, honest. I just have a fashion compulsion. And I certainly don't want Andy to have any more ammunition by letting her see me read this stuff. She seems to have some kind of strange sense about me, though. I hate fashion magazines, I hate nail polish, I hate skirts, and I hate pink. And I think she has some suspicion that I hate these things.

Of course, that logically leads to the question of why I'm sitting at my desk looking at the pictures in the latest issue of Glamour when I want to torch all of my frilly blouses. Well, it's the same story of my first kiss. So let's turn the page back to that poorly written chapter of my life called high school.

It was senior year. I had never touched a boy, much less dated. I had given up on the hope that I would fill out anything more than the training bra my mother had given me in freshman year. And I had just gotten the worst haircut in my life.

I had decided that my long hair didn't fit my minimal-effort uniform of baggy tees and dockers. Hair needed to be shampooed and conditioned and brushed. So I cut it off. The first thing I heard the next day came from the seat behind me in homeroom: "I knew you were always a lesbian, Sophie." By lunchtime, my name had changed from Sophie to Lezzie. One girl walked up to me, stopped, pecked me on the cheek, then said, "Oops, sorry, I thought you were a guy." I couldn't deny it, though. When I looked in the mirror that day, I saw a twelve-year-old boy.

The Homecoming Dance was in a week and I cooked up the perfect plan to put an end to this crap. I got my hair styled, got fitted for an expensive dress, and let my mom go to town with the make-up. I almost felt bad because I had gotten her all excited and thinking that I had taken a sudden interest in school and boys. Anyway, I walked into the gym in my dress, which made my underdeveloped body look as good as it ever would, and made a spectacle of myself. I grabbed the first boy I saw and stuck my tongue down his throat. Then I promptly ran to the bathroom and hid in a stall until it was time for my mom to pick me up.

My scheme failed. I was still Lezzie and the poor boy became Mr. Lezzie. I didn't even know his name, but I hope he's forgotten about the whole incident. So that's where all the pink and frills come in. Maybe the more I emulated in-crowd fashion, the more I would be respected. I didn't want to fit in, I just didn't wanted to get by, to not be Lezzie. By winter break, I was old news. I liked to believe that my efforts in becoming a fashion plate had paid off, but I knew it was more likely that everyone had just gotten bored and moved on to fresher gossip.

I couldn't let go of my post-makeover Ally Sheedy look, though. It made me feel safe, like an actress in costume. I'm not a girlie-girl, I just play one in real life. When I got to college, it went from being a safety blanket to a point of pride. Look, I can think and wear pink! I wish I could be comfortable in torn jeans and a dusty t-shirt like Andy, though. It would make mornings so much easier.

Just thinking about all this crap gets me wound up, though. My clothes and magazines are like a scar that remind me of why I am what I am. No one can know the story behind a scar unless you tell them.

I threw Vogue back into the drawer and picked up Cosmo. When the pictures brought back too many memories, it was time to distract myself by breaking into the articles. Almost all of them were sex advice columns. Good for a laugh. Sometimes, though, I really wondered if girls were dressing up as French maids, tying their boyfriends to the bed, and tickling their penises with feather dusters to "spice up their sex lives." I didn't know any more about sex than Cosmo did.

The articles were making me even more depressed, so I fell back to my favorite distraction. I tucked Cosmo away, undressed, and slipped under the covers of my bed. The feeling of being naked, the soft sheets caressing me, was enough to make me aroused. I ran my hands down my body until they tickled my lips. Moistness began to build. I sighed as one hand slipped its fingers inside and the other played with my clit. I rocked back and forth to get that wonderful feeling from the bedding. The sheet pulled firm against my erect nipples. The comforter drooped over my toes and fluttered against the soles of my feet.

Masturbation is divine. It is cleansing. The fact that I have a little stretch of skin that I can rub to give myself pure pleasure gives me some hope that there is a god. The simple act of fingering myself can obliterate a shitty day as well as the nagging memories of other shitty days. It's almost a bit strange to me that the act is considered sexual. I never fantasize about anything when I do it; I just let the sensations wash over me.

The old juices were flowing now and I was getting closer to orgasm. Everything that wasn't bliss would be pushed out of my body. I writhed under the sheets and jerked my hips. I let myself vocalize a little bit. It wasn't necessary, but it made my orgasm feel even stronger if I pretended to lose control of my vocal cords along with the rest of my body.

"Ah!" I squeaked as the door flew open. I had completely lost track of time.

"Hey, it's not bedtime yet," said Andy.

I nestled under the sheets. "Uh, no, just trying to take a nap."

"Oh." She looked down at the pile of clothes I had left on the floor. "You like to sleep au naturel?"

I laughed nervously. "Yeah, I guess."

"Okay, then. Sorry if I woke you up. I have a bio test to study for anyway, so I won't make any noise."

Of course, I didn't care. I was on the verge of orgasm. My thoughts were just a continuous loop repeating "Please go away." Andy walked over to her desk and cracked open a book. Shit. I was hoping she would take that to the library. I pulled the covers over my head, letting myself simmer in arousal out of sight. My hand slid back toward my pussy.

I could get myself off real quick. It would feel weird to do that with Andy sitting a few feet away, though. I didn't know how to handle the situation. It was still not even halfway through my freshman year, so I had managed to avoid situations like this so far. But Andy was a junior and a dorm veteran. She told me how her last roommate had screwed guys in the top bunk while she tried to sleep. Surely a silent little orgasm from me wasn't a punishable offense.

I resumed fingering myself, getting right back onto the edge. Out of nowhere, the image of Andy walking over to my bed, tearing the covers off, and yelling "Gotcha!" while I convulsed in orgasm popped into my head. And that did it. I curled up into a little ball and climaxed. Unlike most of the time, however, I came so hard that my cries of "Ah, ah!" were involuntary.

I was still shaking when I heard Andy's voice. "Are you okay? You're not sick, are you?"

"No, fine, just a headache. Nap time." Now I did actually want to sleep. I couldn't imagine what Andy would think if she knew her roommate had just gotten off fantasizing about her a few feet over. Did that make me a pervert?

I really hadn't felt any sexual attraction toward men or women. But I couldn't be asexual if I liked masturbating so much. I was a girl who wanted to dress like a boy but dressed even more like a girl instead. What the hell was I? A semi-sexual double-crossdresser? Was there such a thing?

At that point, I let myself drift to sleep.

-

It was dark when I woke up. Andy was gone. I was tense again. I had just killed off half the day, I had work to do, and I knew I wasn't going to get to sleep at a normal hour tonight because of that nap. Screw it. I stuffed my head into my pillow and reached for my pussy again.

That image of Andy tearing the covers off me kept returning. Maybe it was loneliness. I loved the solitary pleasure of masturbation, but I often wondered what it would be like to share with someone. How powerful would that feeling be if someone else gave it to me? How nice would it feel to be held after it passed? After I came for the second time that day, I wanted answers to those questions more than ever.

Now I just wished I had someone to hold me and reassure me, make me feel like a normal person just by gracing me with his or her presence. I say his or her because I didn't care who or what. Boy, girl, animal, vegetable, mineral. Just someone who cared for me. Maybe I should move back home. Mom and Dad couldn't do that for me, but at least they'd try.

When Andy came back and asked if I wanted to catch dinner, everything felt tranquil again. My odd little mood swing seemed rather silly. There was nothing wrong with me. I was eating a quesadilla and laughing with Andy like I should have been.

-

It was Friday night, so that meant Andy was going out and I would have to entertain myself. That usually meant a movie or a book. Recently, though, I had discovered that other people stayed in on the weekends, too. Namely the engineering nerds in the boys' wing of the dorm. They had started constructing a miniature trebuchet and they seemed pretty confused when I showed up and started helping them chop the balsa wood.

It was an interesting diversion but it seemed to be creating the same situation I had found myself in during senior year of high school. Short, petite, no curves. Though once I refined my look, I received the first instances of male attention in my life. Being the only girl on the trebuchet construction crew was beginning to remind me of last year. These guys were a little more subtle about it, though. Instead of "Hey there, good looking," I got whispers of "Look at that guy, can't even cut wood straight. Here, I'll show you how to do it right."

Well, it was better than watching whatever Hugh Grant flick was on TV and nodding off before my weekday bedtime. I decided I might as well check on the trebuchet when Andy stepped back from her closet mirror. "Hey, Sophie. I know you'll never let me live this down, but do you think you could help me out?"

"What do you mean?"

"Um, like a makeover. I wanna look really amazing for this party tonight."

"What's wrong with that?" I gestured toward her clothes. She had on a camo t-shirt that couldn't decide whether or not to bare her midriff and a gnarled denim mini-skirt. Hardly a work of art, but it didn't matter. Andy looked good in anything. Dirty blonde hair, big tits, long legs, worn down clothes - she had the farmer's daughter thing going on.

"I want something different." A girl who wants to look "really amazing" for a house party really wants one thing: To get laid. Since Andy had no problem divulging all the details of her life, I knew she hadn't gotten boned in quite a while.

"All right, then." I figured I'd help her out. And I could always take pictures to hold up whenever she teased me about dressing like a girl.

"Yay!" She smiled as she pulled off her shirt and unzipped her skirt. "Now dress me."

I got a strange thrill out of handling Andy in her underwear, helping her dress and undress. I wrote it off as just not being used to doing something like this. Half an hour later, she was squealing at herself in the mirror. My ruffled skirt came to the shins, but went just barely above the knees on Andy. My halter top was loose fitting on me, but hardly contained her boobs. I had given her a ponytail that tied at the nape of the neck and a low-key make-up job.

She swung around to face me. I stood at cleavage level and her boobs jiggled right in my face. Oh yeah, she was getting laid tonight. "Okay, let's head out."

"Let's?"

"Yeah, come on. Come with me for once."

"I did."

"You mean the time you went to the frats, had one Jell-o shot, then left? Come on, let's go together."

"But the trebuchet..."

"The trebuchet can wait. It'll be there when you get back."

-

That's how I ended up in this seedy basement, my shoes sticking to the floor and my ears getting blown in by top forty rap. Andy pulled me into the writhing mass on the dance floor. She held my hands and forced me to wiggle around with her. Almost instantaneously, some guy came up to her and started dancing. He put his arms around her waist. Her hands unclasped from mine. It seemed as if he was pulling her away. I was lost now, no Andy to guide me, so I jerked around in the hopes that it resembled rhythmic movement. Another guy came up behind me and tapped me on the shoulder. In seconds, his hands were on my hips and his crotch was slamming into my ass. I hadn't even had a chance to tell him to fuck off.

I pulled away from him and walked away from the mass. He didn't seem to care. I looked around and spotted a vat. If I was going to go down, I was going to go down drunk. I took a cup and dipped it into the red liquid. It was some kind of fruit punch concoction. I turned back to the dance floor and saw Andy rubbing herself against the guy. Time for a healthy dose - I chugged whatever low-grade filth was in my little plastic cup. Then I repeated the process.

I used the bathroom and then cycled around the house a bit, pretending to mingle, killing some time. When I went downstairs, I figured Andy might be kind enough to remember that she had brought me here. But she and that same guy were making out now, right against the wall, surrounded by dozens of grinding bodies.

A feeling of jealousy washed over me. That was my Andy he was making out with. But what the hell was I getting worked up over? Did I expect her to become celibate and build a shrine to me in her closet? Nevertheless, I still felt left out.

"Hey, baby, whatcha doin' here alone, all by yourself?" An arm slid around my waist. I despised this maneuver. It wasn't sexual enough to be inappropriate, but when it was performed in a venue such as this one, the guy might as well have walked up to me and said, "Hello, I'm going to make a pathetic attempt to get into your pants."

"Nothin'," I said.

"Well, we could do something instead of nothing." His hand dropped down to my ass.

"Fuck off." I nonchalantly dumped the remainder of my drink onto his shirt. Yes, I do love parties. I went back to the vat to refill my cup. Andy was still going at it. By now, my jealousy had dissipated into wondering. Wondering which couch in the lounge I could get some decent sleep on. I downed some more alcohol. Dizziness overcame me. I rushed toward the bathroom, pushing people out of the way. In seconds, the drink I had just downed was spinning in the toilet.

-

I woke up in my bed with a pounding headache. Andy was sitting on her bed watching TV. "What the hell happened?" I groaned.

"Someone had a little too much last night."

"Ugh. What happened to that guy from the party?"

"That guy? I was worried about you making it home. Why would I care about that guy?"

"Just...whatever." My voice didn't betray the fact that I wanted to run over and hug her for getting me out of that house last night. Then I realized that I was wearing my long night shirt. That meant Andy had changed me out of my party clothes, which also meant she had seen almost all of my body. I imagined her disrobing my unconscious body, running her hands over my bare skin, her fingers brushing my bare breasts. She held up my figure, clad only in panties, to slip the nightshirt on. Then she gave me a goodnight kiss, right on the lips. I shivered in pleasure at the though.

-

"Say, do you think you could, you know, do me up again?" Andy asked.

"Going for a second try tonight?"

"Huh?"

"I'm just saying, you're horny, ain't ya?"

She laughed sheepishly. "You got me."

"All right. But I think I'll pass tonight. Gotta get a head start on staking out a couch."

"Oh. Don't- I'll try not to do it in the room if it happens."

"If? I think you mean when." I traced the neckline of her tank-top for emphasis. At first, it had been a mere gesture, but then I took a good look down her shirt. Her cleavage was impressive. I almost wanted to grab her breasts to find out what a good pair felt like.

"No, really, I don't want you to sleep on the couch."

"It's okay. I'm sure one of the engineers will give me a room."

-

My prediction had turned out to be correct. Not only that, but the guy insisted I sleep in the bed while he took the floor. I couldn't argue.

He had hit the lights when I decided to take a trip to the bathroom. As I walked into the hallway, I looked down at the entrance to the girls' wing. I knew what was going on just a few doors down in my room, but some strange sense of curiosity overtook me. I stepped up to the door that said "Sophie/Andrea" on it. The letters "rea" were crossed out in marker and replaced with a "y."

Rustling and grunting was coming from behind the door. Andy's voice was getting louder until her "oohs" and "ahs" hit a crescendo. My mind wandered inside the room. It didn't put me in the place of the voyeur, watching the two screw. And it didn't put me in the place of Andy, getting fucked by some studly beefcake. It put me in the beefcake's place, because that was the form that would allow me to pleasure Andy. I saw myself with a penis, sliding in and out of Andy. I was going to make her orgasm - I wanted to see the face that went along with the "oohs" and "ahs" I heard.

"Oh shit. Make me cum like that again," came Andy's voice. Her moans started up again. I looked at the door, with our names on it. In my mind, I blacked out the "-phie" in my name, leaving just "So-." Letters above the cross-out formed: "-me guy."

-

The door swung open. "Hiya, roomie," I said as I flicked a switch on the trebuchet. The thing was finally complete so I had borrowed it for the day to prank Andy. It launched the water balloon ammo at near point blank range.