My Femboy System

The dressing room smelled like stale perfume and panic.

Gilt mirrors framed in tarnished brass reflected my own bloodless face back at me from three angles. A row of dusty wigs lined the far wall, each more moth-eaten than the last, and there was a singular, suspicious stain across the chaise lounge that I refused to identify. I sat cross-legged before a cracked vanity, brushing flecks of ash from my coat as a harried young man burst through the curtain.

"Sir! The script!"

He handed it to me like it might bite him. Thin paper. Clumsy ink. The title scrawled across the front with all the flair of a teenage tragedy: Ma mort nous fait taire.

My heart fluttered.

"Oh," I breathed, "I know this one."

The boy blinked. "You do?"

"Darling," I said, flipping through the pages, "I studied this play when I was still using fake names and fucking philosophy students for rent money. It’s a classic. A decadent descent into desperation, betrayal, madness, and death."

He hovered awkwardly, unsure whether to bow or back away.

I tossed the script back at him with a wink. "No need. I’ve got it memorized."

The boy caught it with both hands, jaw slightly agape. "But it’s—it’s in three acts—"