"Laura, darling... I ought to have told you before, but I like to dress in women's clothes..."  By Petal France

I tried my speech for the twentieth time in the hope that eventually I would get it right. "Laura, my darling... I have something to tell you... I... I'm a transvestite."

I grimaced at my reflection in the mirror. It was wrong - entirely wrong. No matter how I phrased the speech, it still sounded wrong. Perhaps I could scrap the word transvestite.

"Laura, darling... I ought to have told you before, but I like to dress in women's clothes..."

I imagined Laura's face freezing into a mask of horror. More likely, it would crumple- as a prelude to tears. With an effort, I could just picture her melting into my womanly arms - but only as part of an unconvincing romantic novel. Maybe I could lead up to my bomb shell gradually.

"Laura... you enjoy wearing beautiful things, don't you?"

It wasn't the first time I'd faced this problem. Seemingly in another lifetime, I should have told Margaret before our wedding. I'd thought of it, but had lacked the courage. As a supposedly easier alternative, I had thrown away my feminine clothes and resolved to make an end to my transvestism.

At the start of our marriage, Margaret had only half of me - the better, feminine part remaining buried. Later, wearing Margaret's clothes was almost a physical necessity. My ugly masculine garments felt like a prison. The first time I slipped into my wife's things was akin to homecoming after years in exile.

There was no dramatic scene in which Margaret discovered me dressed, although she once came close to it. I was putting her clothes away when she returned two or three hours earlier than expected. I hastened to place the underwear out of sight. When she entered the bedroom, I was hanging her dress in the wardrobe.

"It'd come off its hanger," I explained. "I was just tidying up."

This was not, I assured myself, a lie. The dress had come off its hanger, and I was tidying up. The question of how it had come off the hanger, and why, was another matter. If not a lie, it was certainly deception.