Changes to be made

The next morning, Bill Powell woke up early and clambered away from the still-slumbering form of Lucy. He almost made it to the outhouse out back before the memories of the night before came back to him. When they did… he suddenly found himself struggling to even drain the lizard amongst the heart faltering turmoil of it all. Still, the sun seemed a little brighter today… and when he headed back into the bar to check the hiding place he'd stuffed their earnings, they were all still there. It was done with and they were better off. That was all he needed think about. He got to work making breakfast and waited for the others to emerge.

Perhaps three hours later, and with said breakfast now gone decidedly cold… they finally did so. He heard the commotion coming down the stairs, apparently midway through an intense discussion.

“Well, I suppose, but I still feel like you've pressured the poor boy into this… and did you have to cut both of them quite so short?!”

That was Lucy’s voice, but it was Jane's legs that first came to Mr Powell's attention. They were near completely exposed! His rambunctious young daughter appeared to have taken a pair of scissors to her own skirt and left almost all of it behind. A lump formed in Bill’s throat as he realised just how foolish had been the hope that everything might just go back to normal from here on out. Sure the girl had always been something of a tease and a flirt, but this was…!

And then he saw the third figure sandwiched between his wife and the exhibitionist, hooked on an elbow of each. Sam was also wearing a massacred skirt, along with a frilly blouse that definitely belonged to his sister. Even from here, Bill could see that his only son had been shaved from head to toe and his hair plaited carefully into pigtails. The boy's face had been powdered and rouged and his lips painted red as red wine. If before his features could have been mistaken for effeminate in the right light… now there was no mistaking them at all. Nothing was left that could be considered an 18 year old man, waiting to woo some local filly and start a family of his own. Mr Powell had been secretly hoping that a little country air and rugged living might be all it took to leave that mess with the pastor behind. Yet another monkeypaw dream to come circling back to haunt him.

“W-what… have you done to my boy?!” He wailed, plaintive and desolate.

“He ain't a boy no more… She's a pretty, little cockswallowing whore!” Replied Jane, proudly and boisterously. Clearly revelling in her father's reaction to half a morning of hard work upon the subject.

“Now Bill, I think we all realised there was gonna have to be some changes after last night…” Lucy's calming voice cut across the pair of them.

“We might finally have found a way to make this business work, just like you always wanted… Shouldn't that make you happy, my love?”

Mr Powell gawked at his wife, his jaw hanging loose with disbelief. He noticed now that she too had propped up her ‘assets’ to be rather more on show and had a bare leg poking out from a long slit up the side of her dress. Had his whole family really just unanimously decided to dive headlong into this madness?! He had to sit down for second before he fell down with the horror of it all. Could this really be happening? Were they really so ready to just sell off their bodies for his own dream-turned-nightmare?

It was in that very moment, that who should swagger through the saloon door? …but the lead stranger from the day before.

“Mornin’ folks…” He offered cheerfully. “Ah just thought ah'd best return these. Somehow they ended up in ma’ pocket when I left, can't think how…?”

In his hand he held the pair of bloomers that Mrs Powell had been wearing the day before. In the light behind him several other shadows emerged, more than last time. Bill took his head in his hands as he realised how foolish his earlier hopes had been. Nothing was over and done with… this was just the beginning.