by BrettJ © 2011
No one she went to high school with would have recognized Frankie. She looked different, she acted different and her burning anger at the injustices of the world had disappeared. She didn't go looking for trouble; she was in control of her actions and had held a steady job for over 5 years. It wasn't some Joe-job either; Frankie worked at a prestigious law firm and was planning to attend Law School herself as soon as she had saved up enough money. She had a bright future and she smiled all the time.
As she walked around the school campus, she noticed that the trees were a bit bigger, the grounds immaculate and graffiti no longer covered the walls. The school had been part of a reclamation program, Frankie's mother had told her last month. The local citizenry had taken on the job and put a lot of effort into getting the 100-year old school back in tip-top shape. A fund-raising drive had raised money for a computer lab. Frankie herself had chipped in a thousand dollars now that she could afford to.
To someone who knew Frankie back then, it might have seemed odd. A lot of her memories of school were generally not happy ones. She was incredibly smart and funny and talented and tall. She was also possessed of a 34DD-24-34 figure and gorgeous blonde hair and a smart-ass personality that could be off-putting. A lot of the guys in school followed her around and those who weren't too intimidated tried to get dates with Frankie, but she wasn't interested in them. After a while, rumors of her being a hard-core dyke began circulating. It broke Frankie's heart, because she yearned to have friends and be popular. She just wasn't willing to play the role of blonde bimbo to do it. Frankie wasn't hiding her light under a bushel for anyone and she wasn't spreading her legs for just any guy.
Frankie found acceptance in the dark world of the Goth crowd. She cut her long blonde hair, dyed it black and began hanging around with that crowd. She made friends who accepted her for being smart, even if they were moody at times. Her best friend Alison set Frankie up on a number of dates and one of the guys finally took Frankie's virginity.
After a few disappointing lays, something began to occur to Frankie. She made her confession to Alison and asked her to keep her secret.
Frankie had figured it out for herself a few months earlier. The nasty rumors that had circulated some time back had actually turned out to be true. Frankie was attracted to other girls, she was a lesbian or at the very least, bi-sexual.
Alison was cool with it. She hugged a crying Frankie and told her they'd always be friends. She continued to be cool by offering to introduce Frankie discreetly to some hot, lesbian friends of hers. Frankie's stomach was doing flip-flops, but she agreed to the meetings.
The first woman was Juliette and she was a gorgeous blonde of about 25. She looked a bit like Frankie had before her transformation into the dark, mysterious beauty she thought herself to be. After an incredible, mind-numbing night of lesbian sex with Juliette, Frankie's assumptions of her own sexuality were confirmed. She loved being with women and had lost count of just how many orgasms had surged throughout her body.
Frankie started to see Juliette on a regular basis, but monogamy wasn't Juliette's strong suit. Frankie realized that left her free to pursue other women as well and she went for it with a vengeance.
She dated a few younger girls, a black girl, and sexy Asian with one of the longest tongues that had ever lapped at her cunt and she even discovered one of her mother's closest friends was a closet lesbian. She and her mom's stepsister, her Aunt Gretchen began meeting regularly. Frankie thought it was very cute that the well-respected, 40-year old brunette who worked for Wal-Mart also owned a motorcycle, wore leather miniskirts and "fuck me" boots whenever her salesman husband was out of town. Gretchen was one of Frankie's best teachers, the slinky brunette knew her way around a woman's body.
The Goth look faded into the past, but Frankie continued to maintain an aloof, tough-girl attitude. She still kept her hair dyed jet-black and wore pants and almost always was the partner in control. She told her mother about her lesbianism and Carole told her daughter she had figured it out for herself a year or two ago. Carole hugged her daughter, told her she loved her anyway and that unless her father figured it out, there was no sense in telling him. Frankie knew her father would support his only child but he would struggle with his emotions, coming from a traditional background.
Frankie graduated university with good marks, then continued to drift through life. She became slightly promiscuous and drank a bit too much. When she was at a party and offered cocaine, she teetered on the brink. That incident shocked her into reality. She was sliding down a slippery slope and she had no intention of reaching the bottom. She left the party and got herself together. She started taking courses and got her job at the Law Firm. She dressed a bit more professionally at work and became a little less surly in her personal life. She was determined not to be another burn-out statistic.
Frankie had finally saved enough money after her first year at her job to be able to afford a nice loft-style apartment. It was at that apartment that her life began to change.
In her 3rd week living there, she met her downstairs neighbor. Frankie was positively smitten with the younger woman, an Asian lovely named Julianna. Julianna was very atypical for an Asian female. For one thing, she was tall at 5'9". She also had a set of boobs nearly as big as Frankie's own, Julianna sported a 36D chest and often dressed to display it. She was friendly and graceful and outgoing and funny and Frankie wanted to be her friend right away. It took a bit of coaxing, but eventually she managed to convince Julianna to come upstairs for coffee. It became a regular thing for them both after work.
Frankie got a vibe from Julianna, she sensed her new friend was a lesbian like herself or at the very least, bi-sexual. She was falling for Julianna and falling hard and for the first time ever, she didn't know what to do about it. Her normally assertive personality seemed to fail her around Julianna. She couldn't be glib or do all the things she normally would have done to get a woman into bed, everything failed her. Finally, she decided that the next time they got together, she would just ask Julianna outright. She was fairly certain Julianna knew she was a lesbian, even if she hadn't said it outright.
Frankie was correct, Julianna had known and when she asked about Julianna's sexuality, the girl was very forthcoming. "I'm bi," Julianna told her. "Don't think that I'm not flattered or totally uninterested ... you're my friend and I think you're beautiful, but there is something holding me back."
Frankie looked at the young woman she desired so much and asked "Oh? What might that be?"
"It's you. I'm sorry if this hurts you Frankie, but you seem so angry at the world. You dress almost constantly in black and you're very aggressive. I can see from your eyebrows and body hair that you're a natural blonde, but you dye your hair jet-black. Why? You wear clothes that hide your beauty and I don't know why you want to. You should let the world see how lovely you are. There's nothing wrong with being a lesbian and being feminine at the same time." Julianna told her. She thanked Frankie for the coffee and went to her own apartment, leaving Frankie with a lot to think about.
No one had ever challenged Frankie's choices before. At 27, she had always lived her life by her own rules and she thought she was okay with that. But as she let Julianna's words sink in, she realized that she wasn't okay. She was lonely and it was time to let go of the old hurts and resentments. Why DID she hide her beauty and her femininity? Because it kept the world away, but it also kept romance and love away as well.
Possibly it went back to her school days or perhaps the way she had felt when she and Juliette had their falling out. All she knew is that everything Julianna had told her made sense. She wanted to change and hoped that if she made those changes, it wouldn't be too late for her and Julianna. If not, the new Frankie would have other options.
It took time to effect the changes. She didn't want to shock everyone at work or have them talk about her on a constant basis, Frankie knew that.
She had a fair amount of money saved, so she went on the shopping spree to end all shopping sprees. She kept some of her nicer pants and tailored suits, but everything else was donated to charity. Frankie bought skirts and lingerie and heels and vibrant colors. She met with a fashion consultant to pick the colors that best suited her. She went out and bought bikinis and then went to a salon and talked with the staff there. They told her it would take them a bit of work to strip the black from her hair, but if she was willing to be patient, they thought they could achieve that goal. Frankie let them work their magic and by the end of that day, she was blonde again. She hadn't seen herself look like this in over a decade.
She didn't meet with Julianna that day; she wanted to surprise her friend. At work the next day, she still wore pants, but she proudly displayed her new look and the feminine blouse she wore under her jacket. She let a bit of cleavage show and she saw some admiring glances coming her way, even from some of the female employees she knew were bi or bi-curious. It felt very nice to be looked at with admiration. She hoped Julianna would look at her the same way, because as much as she knew she had to make these changes for herself, it was still Julianna she wanted to impress.
That night, when Julianna came up for coffee, her eyes practically bugged out. She smiled at the newly-blonde Frankie and kept shooting admiring glances her way. "See?" Julianna told her. "I told you that you were beautiful."
