Rent or Forfeit 02

Chapter 2: Smoothly Does It

Backed into a corner after his pleas for more time to find the rent money fell on deaf ears, Tommy, with absolutely no intention of wearing makeup, reluctantly chose the second option. No sooner had he uttered the words, and before his groggy brain had fully grasped what he was agreeing to, Tommy was pulled from the sofa and ushered up the stairs by his smiling older sisters. He was practically dragged into the bathroom, handed a pink packet of razors and told to strip.

"Now lather up your body and take long, smooth strokes," Sarah instructed with a stern tone. "You don’t want to cut yourself, do you?"

"Sarah! You're not really going to make me do this, are you?" Tommy groaned, the thought seeming to cause him physical pain. "How is shaving my body hair going to help me find a job?"

"It's going to inspire you to take action and do something other than sit around playing games and getting drunk all day. Start with your beard, so you don’t dull all the blades on your legs," Sarah replied, her comment eliciting a playful giggle from Monica.

"What!? No way! You want me to shave my beard too? It took me forever to grow it!" Tommy cried out in horror.

"Of course! Didn’t you read the forfeit? Every single hair below your eyebrows must go. And trust me, we're doing you a favour here, Tom. You look like a homeless bum! Oh, and that reminds me. Use the shampoo in the pink bottle and the conditioner next to it. Your hair is disgusting."

Tommy looked at Sarah and then Monica, his expression dumbfounded, searching their faces for any hint of a joke. Finding only cold, unyielding gazes, he bowed his head in defeat, the pounding in his temples growing. Gritting his teeth, he undressed and stepped into the bathtub.

After a monotonous hour of shaving - having failed Sarah's inspection three times - Tommy emerged from the tub, his skin as smooth as a newborn babe. Monica was there to offer him a fluffy white robe, which he gratefully accepted to shield his hairless frame from his sisters’ scrutinizing eyes.

“Good job, Tom,” Monica called out cheerfully, as Sarah smiled beside her. “Let me help you dry your hair.”

Tommy, longing for an end to his nightmare and peculiar without his usual fuzzy coat, let Monica - who was now being nice to him again - work her magic. Over the next five minutes, as the blow-dryer’s loud hum resonated in his hungover skull, Tommy gazed glumly at the reflection of his exposed cheeks and chin. By the time Monica pronounced him done, his formerly shoulder-length, grungy rocker hair had been transformed. It now shone, flicking outward at the shoulders, mocking him from the mirror.

Seizing his chance to escape, Tommy darted past his sisters toward the refuge of his bedroom. He slammed the door behind him, eager to put some real clothes on. The sight of his smooth, pink ankles protruding from the bottom of the robe - far too delicate and girly for his taste – was making him feel nauseous.

Charging towards the chest of draws, Tommy wrenched open the top drawer expecting to find his trusty jeans. Instead, his heart sank at the sight before him. His beloved jeans - along with all his other long-legged clothing - had been replaced by neat piles of vibrantly coloured material. As Tommy unfolded one, his upper lip curled in disgust. It was full of shorts! Desperately examining each pair, which had been 'kindly' donated by his sisters, he hunted for something acceptable to wear. However, after a brief and fruitless search, he discovered every pair to be extremely short and designed in a distinctly feminine style.

Reflecting on the words from the small piece of paper he had unfolded earlier, Tommy suddenly realized the literal and serious nature of the game his sisters had thrust him into. Backed into a corner, Tommy reluctantly chose the least feminine pair of shorts he could find and pulled the tight denim material up over a clean pair of boxers. The underwear bunched up uncomfortably underneath, but that feeling paled in comparison to the cringe-inducing sight of having his hairless legs on full display for the world to see. Not wanting to dwell on the strange, unfamiliar sensations he was experiencing, Tommy quickly threw on a dark T-shirt and slipped his feet into his trusty Converse. Once dressed, he took a few tentative steps across the room before coming face to face with the full-length mirror on the far wall.

(See image 02)

Slowly shaking his head, Tommy's eyes widened as he took in his new look. It was truly shocking how something as seemingly insignificant as a lack of body hair could change his appearance so dramatically. Without his beard and with his neatly styled long hair, scented with lavender from the shampoo, he looked younger and more androgynous. At that moment, as he glared at his altered reflection, he vowed to do whatever it took to avoid another forfeit the following week, fearing what other punishments lay in wait on those little folded pieces of paper.

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For the next few days, Tommy scoured the internet for job opportunities. He detested the feeling of having smooth, hairless skin and found the daily task of shaving his entire body tiresome. However, as the week progressed, Tommy slowly reverted to his old habits - lazily lounging around while indulging in hours of computer gaming. His urgency to find a job had dwindled as he deemed all available positions beneath him.

By midweek, with nowhere to go and no one to impress, Tommy had grown accustomed to life in shorts with hairless legs. As his sisters grew tired of poking fun at him, his feelings of embarrassment gradually shifted to accepting his new normal. It was at this point, he reasoned that his sisters were simply trying to bluff him into becoming their cash cow. Having pranked each other throughout their teenage years, he was confident he could outlast them. He believed they would eventually give up on their silly game, allowing him to return to enjoying his life as before.

When Friday night descended upon the house, Tommy was in the thick of an intense online FIFA match with his friend Henry. He was on the brink of scoring the winning goal when Sarah and Monica burst into the living room. "It's that time of the week, Tommy boy," Sarah exclaimed with excitement, "do you have our rent money?"

Tommy ignored her question, not even bothering to acknowledge her presence. Clearly irked by his lack of response, Sarah tensed her body, marched across the room, and yanked the TV plug from the socket.

"Hey! What the hell?" Tommy yelled, his voice tinged with anger. "I was about to win!"

"I don’t give a shit about your stupid game," Sarah snapped, looming over her younger brother with her arms crossed. "Do you have any rent money for us?"

"Nope," Tommy replied nonchalantly, shrugging. "I've been looking for jobs all week, but there’s just nothing out there right now."

From across the room, Monica watched as Sarah's fingers clenched into a fist. However, before her sister could react, she stepped forward to intervene. "Really? I just checked online, and I found a few places you could have applied.”

“What? Wait tables or deliver flyers?” Tommy scoffed. “No thanks.”

"Well, I guess you’re doing another forfeit," Monica shot back, producing the purple hat from behind her back.

Tommy rolled his eyes. "Come on, Mon. Are we really doing this again? You’ve made your point. I’ll get a job as soon as something decent comes along. I Promise. So why don't you put the hat away, and we can all go back to enjoying our evening, okay?" he stated defiantly.

Sarah, now calmer, stared down at her self-confident little brother. "This isn't a game, Tommy! This is your life now! And it ends one of three ways: You get a job and pay your own way. You move out. Or you become our little sister. Your choice!" She declared, snatching the hat from Monica and shoving it in Tommy's face.

"Whatever," Tommy scoffed, reaching into the hat. His bravado faded quickly as he unfolded the two slips of paper he'd drawn. He regretted his earlier stubbornness as he read his choices: ‘Paint your fingers and toes with nail polish and maintain them properly’ or, equally daunting, ‘Wear tights or stockings at all times’.