Takes Guts

Mid-morning light filtered through the high warehouse windows, bleaching the concrete floor into long pale bands. Forklifts hummed in steady loops. Pallets thudded into place. The air smelled faintly of cardboard dust and machine oil, the familiar perfume of routine.

Steel-toed boots anchored him to the floor. Thick sports socks cushioned each step. Yesterday's jeans rode low on his hips, stiff from a second wear. Everything beneath the denim, however, told a different story.

Red lace hugged his body, soft, deliberate, impossible to mistake. The fit was precise in a way that felt intentional. Every shift of his weight pressed lace against skin, a quiet reminder threaded through muscle memory. No bunching. No slipping. Just presence.

Above the waistband, compromise turned into spectacle.

The baby-tee clung shamelessly. Cotton stretched across his chest and tapered inward at the waist, stopping just short of modesty. A bright red heart sat squarely over his sternum, bold and symmetrical, as though stamped there by a marketing department with no sense of irony. A swath of midriff showed, the hem riding high enough to expose pale skin, contrasting against steel shelving and industrial greys.

And no one had said a word.

Morning briefing had unfolded as usual. Inventory sheets passed around. Coffee cups balanced on shrink-wrapped pallets. The big shipment from Vancouver had arrived late, which meant the entire crew had spent two solid hours unloading, sorting, and stacking. Boxes moved hand to hand in practised rhythm. Someone cracked a joke about the Canucks. Laughter rippled and faded.

Work absorbed attention the way it always did. Lift. Turn. Stack. Repeat. For long stretches, the body functioned without commentary. Focus dulled sensation. Muscles burned in ordinary ways. Sweat gathered at the back of his neck. The red heart on his chest became just another patch of colour in a busy room.

Accomplishment carried its own kind of relief. A row of pallets lined up clean and square felt like order imposed on chaos. Shared effort hummed through the team; that easy, unspoken understanding built from months of repetition. For a while, clothing became incidental.

But not forever.

A reach for the top rack stretched cotton tight across his torso. Cool metal brushed exposed skin when the hem rode up as he leaned into the shelf. The lace beneath his jeans shifted with a slow, silken glide that refused to be ignored. Attention, once returned, could not be unlearned.

Another attempt on the bus that morning had gone nowhere. Eyes closed against the rumble of transit, exhaustion pressing hard behind the temples, he had willed himself toward that strange, warm expanse where Eros waited. No drifting threshold. No golden horizon. Only the hiss of brakes and the murmur of commuters.

The entire ride, humiliation from the night before ran through his memories.

Lamplight spilling into the hallway. Frank's half-awake squint. "Nice pajamas."

Back in his bedroom, door closed, the quiet had felt heavier than before.

The shopping bags were still sitting on the dresser where he had dropped them before bed. Craig's attempt at reclaiming normalcy. Eight pairs of boxer briefs, straight off the rack. He grabbed one bag, hoping to find something to wear that didn't involve his utter humiliation.

Instead of bags of men's underwear, he found two neatly boxed lingerie sets rested — tissue paper folded precisely, lace visible through clear plastic windows. Deep red. Black trimmed in something delicate and floral. The gum he had picked up at the till remained beside them, bright and ordinary, as though anchoring the scene in reality.

Confusion had turned methodical.

Drawers opened one by one.

Sock drawer: unchanged.

Underwear drawer: exactly as it had been the night before, an impossible collection of femininity that had already defied explanation.

Then the T-shirts.

The first colour visible was pink.

Fingers had closed around the fabric and drawn it out slowly. Not a T-shirt. A tiny crop top, cut high and narrow, sleeves barely substantial. Soft cotton. Fitted.

Another pull. A baby-tee, smaller than any shirt he remembered owning.

Another. Thinner fabric. A scooped neckline. Shorter hem.

Each piece grew more unmistakably feminine than the last, colours brightening, cuts softening, silhouettes narrowing.

The closet door had creaked when he opened it.

Inside, blouses hung in careful rows: chiffon, satin, lightweight knits. Floral patterns. Pastels. Cream and lavender and blush. Sleeves gathered at the wrist. Buttons small and pearlescent. Not a single flannel. Not one oversized graphic tee. No plaid. No faded band logos. No masculine shirts anywhere.

Another entire section of his wardrobe simply... gone.

Reality had not shattered. No thunderclap. No shimmer of divine light. Just quiet rearrangement, as though the world had edited him while he slept.

Back in the present, a pallet jack squealed nearby, snapping focus to the warehouse again.

"Hey, Craig."

The voice belonged to Mendez. Six-foot-four, shoulders like a brick wall, shaved head perpetually shining under fluorescent lights. Arms roped with muscle strained against a sleeveless high-vis vest. Loved busting the chops of new staff, calling them sissies if they couldn't keep up.

Mendez jerked his chin toward Craig's chest. "That shirt's sick."

Air stalled in Craig's lungs.

A grin spread across Mendez's face, easy and unselfconscious. "The heart. Bold choice, man. I like it. Takes guts."

For a second, the warehouse seemed to tilt.

"Uh. Thanks," Craig managed.

"No problem." Mendez adjusted a pallet with one boot.

Conversation ended there. No smirk. No sideways glance. Just a genuine nod before turning back to work.

Guts.

The word settled differently than humiliation had. Not mocking. Not accusatory. Something closer to admiration. As though the baby-tee were an act of intention rather than enchantment.

Soft lace moved with him. Cotton clung. The red heart remained bright and unapologetic against the industrial backdrop.

Business as usual.

Only the awareness had changed, sharpened now by the memory of pink fabric in his hands, of blouses replacing flannel, of lingerie where boxer briefs should have been. Craig didn't understand the rules of his new life, but whatever they were, he wanted out.