One of the books Lev read about how to ace grad school recommended setting aside Saturday nights for partying, in order to avoid resenting the rigor of the rest of your schedule. He follows the spirit of the advice, if not the letter; no matter how overworked he is, he keeps his Saturday nights sacred.
It takes a long time to shave all his body hair; he has hair on his chest and his stomach and his arms and all over his legs, and a week is enough time for it to grow back into stubble. But moving the razor over his skin is meditative. He likes it. It's a way of marking the difference between being Lev and being Leia.
Having smooth skin is decadent. Every time he marvels at how soft it is, how easy it is to run his hand along it; every time he feels the slide of sheets against his skin. This is the point in the night where he gets hard.
When he gets out of the shower he touches up his toenails; this week they're a light pink. He puts clear nail polish on his fingernails and carefully plucks his eyebrows. No one notices, but he can tell they're there, and it's comforting during the week.
He's not blind. He's seen girls, he's even had a girlfriend, he knows what they dress like: Old Navy shirts and faded denim, clothes that wouldn't really look out of place on a man. But he's not a girl. It's just a fetish. And he wants to be beautiful. He wants to be someone you could look at and desire.
And he's pudgy and broad-shouldered and flat-chested and unalterably square, he has a little bit of a belly and flab under his arms and most repulsive of all a penis, that disgustingly male body part, that he can't even tuck away out of sight because the process of getting dressed turns him on so much. No one would pause in what they're doing to look at him; no one would want him.
But he can at least dress like someone they would want.
So he wears high heels and fishnet stockings held up with suspenders, a frilly lacy tulle skirt and a sheer bra. He puts on the cosmetics even the names of which fill him with longing; foundation and concealer, eyeliner and mascara and three kinds of eyeshadow, lipstick and blush and bronzer.
It's not right. But if he looks in the mirror and squints he can imagine being beautiful.
His hair is shoulder-length now. He jokes about how he never had time to cut it.
He doesn't jerk off right away, even though his stupid penis is still hard and making his panties bulge out. Instead he takes out his books from his secret cache. If he were doing it right, it would be transformation fetish pornography. But he's a failure even as an autogynephile. He has Cognitive Psychology of Memory and Blackwell's Handbook of Perception, Advances in Behavioral Finance and Characterizing Human Psychological Adaptations, books from a dozen graduate seminars he's not brave enough to try to audit.
He reads for an hour or four, until it is time for him to go to bed; then he begins the most pathetic aspect of this whole sorry business. He scrolls through Facebook for pictures of Sasha where he's smiling, happy, at peace with himself and with the world. He imagines being Sasha's girlfriend, imagines Sasha's dick in her pussy and his mouth on hers and his hands in her hair, imagines walking down the street holding hands and a wedding where she's in a white dress and being called a good girl, his beautiful girl. And when he's horny enough that he can bear it he puts his hand on his dick and jerks off in the most efficient manner possible and finishes.
As always, on Saturday nights, it concludes in disgust. The sticky white stuff on his hands is bad enough. Worse, no longer aroused, he's repulsed at how pathetic he is, at his failed imitation of womanhood, at the awkward way he looks in clothing intended for someone more beautiful than him, at the entire concept of jerking off to someone's Facebook feed and of using a real person as a tool to validate his imaginary womanhood, even in his own mind. He strips naked in a businesslike way and scrubs himself red and raw. He hides his books and clothes and makeup, knowing through long experience that throwing them out in disgust now will only lead to embarrassing and expensive purchases on Friday night.
He doesn't cry.
On Sunday afternoon, he does the other thing that makes him not want to die, which is taking his volunteer shift at the math tutoring center.
It's the day Sasha is usually there.
He's here this week.
"Hi! Sorry, I know I say this every week, but this whole set of functions just doesn't make sense to me, can we —"
"Of course," he says. "Let me see how much of algebra I have to reteach you this time."
"Probably a lot, my memory hasn't improved."
"I'd say it was the teaching that was bad," he says, like he says every week.
"You always do," Sasha says, affectionate, and opens his textbook to the problem set he needs help with.
Lev asks him questions and eventually identifies the cause of the difficulty as a misunderstanding about how one finds the distance between a point and a line on the graph.
Sasha smiles at him maybe a slightly excessive amount as this is happening.
That's really great but Lev is busy with drawing right triangles and asking if Sasha has any ideas about how he'd use the Pythagorean theorem to figure out how far apart they are.
He only a little bit has ideas but he will volunteer his idea-scraps much more easily here than he ever would in class.
Lev smiles so much when he's on the right track.
That's motivating.
Being motivating does not actually give him the ability to do math but Lev is an excellent teacher and Sasha is definitely not going to stop smiling.
What about extremely patient explanations? Do extremely patient explanations give him the ability to do math?
They get him closer to one, anyway!
When their time is close to wrapped up, Lev says, "I'm sorry about your entire math education."
"I'm still pretty sure I just suck at math, actually, but thank you."
"Nobody 'just sucks at math.' Of course there are people who are better and worse at math, even with great math education there are lots of people who are never going to win a math contest, but-- the stuff you're learning is stuff everyone should be able to know. It's just that they quash your sense of mathematical beauty and your curiosity and replace it with anxiety and learned helplessness and-- of course it's hard to memorize rote procedures when you don't know why you're doing what you're doing and also you think you're an idiot. That has nothing to do with your abilities."
It is the longest speech he has ever said to Sasha.
".....we should talk more," Sasha says, and his face is very soft.
"Uh. If you want to."
"I do — sorry, do you not, I shouldn't have assumed —"
"No, I'd really like to. --We can hang out after the tutoring session, all I have to do tonight is grading and I'm happy to procrastinate that."
This is going to make Saturday nights significantly more pathetic.
"Awesome — my phone number, I should give it to you —" and he does that.
He bounces and then freezes mid-bounce which actually makes the bouncing process look significantly stupider.
"Here's mine."
Oh no that's adorable and heartbreaking. Sasha puts the number in his phone, names the contact "Lev <3".
He doesn't actually want to race through the rest of tutoring-- it's tutoring, it's basically the happiest time of his week-- but he's way less sad than usual when it ends.
"Hi!"
"Hey!"
He does not hug Lev because straight guys don't hug each other he's pretty sure.
That's totally okay.
"We probably shouldn't hang out if you're planning to take classes in the electrical engineering department but my guess is that that's not the case."
"I haven't decided what I'm doing but it's definitely going to be visual and not math."
"That's good. Electrical engineering is soul-crushingly boring."
"Why are you doing it, then?"
"Well, because it's soul-crushingly boring, people will pay you enormous amounts of money to do it."
Great. Four sentences in and he's already depressing. This is why he doesn't have friends.
"That's fair. I could not do it and not just because I am not good at learning math — don't tell me that isn't true I know it is — but it's fair."
"I will accept 'you do not spontaneously learn math without competent math instruction.'"
"My memory is also terrible, regardless of my teachers' competence," but there's no heat in it.
They should sit down on one of the library's couches.
Lev sits down near the edge of the couch so Sasha could sit closer to him if he wants to.
"And it's not for visual stuff?"
He does want to.
"With visual stuff I can coast on having strong opinions about how things should be designed, I don't have strong opinions about how math should work."
aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa
Lev attempts to say, as normally as possible, exactly like Sasha was not sitting right next to him on a library couch, "I wonder if you'd do better at math if you trained your mathematical intuition more so you don't have to rely on your memory as much. It's all about-- aesthetics and elegance, really, when it comes right down to it."
"I'm not sure how I'd go about training that but it sounds like something that would work."
"Ideally, that's the sort of thing math class would teach you but, uh."
Sasha's right next to her him and he's so pretty and aaaaaaa
He laughs. "Yeah. We have seen how well that went." He's not going to lean on Lev because straight guys don't do that.
Is he really sure that Lev is straight.
That is not a very heterosexual facial expression he's making.
"Part of me is trying to design a math curriculum right now."
.....okay, maybe he is going to lean on Lev very very cautiously. And only a little bit, so he can claim that wasn't what he was doing.
"That's adorable."
Lev makes a little tiny noise when she he is leaned on and then decides to ignore that that happened.
"I like teaching."
Maybe he will lean on him a little more, then. "You're good at it!"
"Thank you."
At some point it is probably important to explain to Sasha that Lev is straight to avoid leading him on. But that would probably mean less cuddles and she he feels warm and safe and happy and she he wants to enjoy it at least for a little bit.
"No, thank you."
He has the urge to wrap his arm around Sasha's shoulder and pull him close and play with his hair. He doesn't.
"So what do you do other than get confused by problem sets? --I'd answer for myself, but grad school is pretty all-consuming."
And also all of his hobbies are shameful.
"I read, I sew, I make gifsets out of movies I watch, I make jewelry sometimes but I don't have as much time for it as I had in high school."
"That sounds. Interesting."
Oh god he is so bad at social interaction someone shoot him.
That is not the face of someone who is interested.
"What did you do before grad school became so all consuming?"
"Uh. Studied, mostly."
"That's legit."
GAH why did he say that.
"So what would you be studying if you weren't going into electrical engineering?"
Psychology.
"I dunno, probably computer science."
Awesome! An interest! Lev still doesn't even a little bit look interested but Sasha can try!
"What do you like about computer science?"
"Programmers get to live in San Francisco," he says.
Fuck. How does he explain that?
"I don't think I've heard that answer before, what's in San Francisco?" Please please tell me a fact about yourself that doesn't make you make a face like you're in physical pain.
"It's on the other end of the country from my parents," he doesn't say.
"There are lots of crossdressers in San Francisco," he doesn't say.
"I like the weather," he says, "and I don't like driving."
That didn't work that didn't work at all. "I've never been, have you?"
Yes. He wore a skirt in public and was called 'she' and went home and jerked off three times in a row.
"The Academy of Sciences is really interesting."
Lev still looks pained but that's at least a topic he can latch onto.
"Cool! What's it like?"
Lev seems to relax when he's talking about the Academy of Science, a subject that has absolutely nothing to do with himself or his interests or his traits in any way.
Oh thank God maybe Lev doesn't hate him.
Sasha pays attention and asks lots of questions!
Now that he's no longer talking about himself, Lev is staring at Sasha and making a soft and warm and extremely heterosexual face.
Oh no he's so pretty.
Sasha notices himself moving closer and doesn't stop himself from doing that.
Lev also doesn't stop him.
He might wind up leaning against Lev again, their legs pressed together; he doesn't look away from Lev's face, keeps smiling, warm and soft, keeps listening.
Lev is staring at his lips a little bit.
He told himself he wasn't gonna do this what if his parents find out somehow they're still in the library he shouldn't —
He waits for Lev to find a natural stopping point and then kisses him, quick and gentle.
Lev kisses him back.
!!!!
Good, that's good, Sasha's good at this, he can keep doing this —
He should tell Sasha he's straight. He should tell Sasha he's straight, because Sasha wants to have sex with someone who's into him and not someone who's using him as a prop for a fetishistic sexual fantasy--
"Do you want to go back to my room?"
Fuck.
"I'd love to." He kisses Lev again, quicker this time, and then grabs his bag.
This is a bad idea!
This is such a bad idea!
That is his internal narrative on literally the entire walk to his room.
Once they're there Sasha can kiss him again, deeper than before.
He pulls away in the middle of the kiss and says, "I'm straight."
".........are you sure?"
"Yes."
"....okay," he says, deeply skeptical.
"Do you like when I kiss you?"
"Yes."
"That's okay, then."
He sits down on the bed and pulls Lev towards him and kisses him again.
Lev feels like he totally failed to convey what was actually going on in this situation but on the other hand Sasha is in his bed and kissing him and it is every one of his sexual fantasies for the past two months come true, except for the part where his pants are tight and he doesn't have any breasts and he's not wearing lipstick.
He is in Lev's bed and kissing him and he's wanted to do this for months and it's so good. Does Lev like when Sasha touches his hair.
She He likes it a lot!
That's excellent.
Sasha takes one of Lev's hands and puts it on the back of his head and pulls just a little on Lev's hair and keeps right on kissing him.
Having her his hair pulled makes her him hiss.
(Good girl-- slutty girl, fucking some guy you don't even know-- hot slutty girl, he wants you, he wants to use you, your mouth and your ass and your pussy--)
"You make the best sounds," he breathes against Lev's mouth, and pulls his hair again.
Oh--
That gets Sasha a soft broken whimper.
He does it again. "And you have the prettiest smile, and I love your voice, and I love how you talk to me, and —"
That's right. Sasha does love his voice, because Sasha is gay and Lev is a man. Right. Fuck.
He wants to go take a shower but instead he kisses Sasha so he doesn't have to talk.
He kisses him back and then looks at his face, at his body language.
"Are you okay?"
"I'm fine."
Lev kisses him again and starts to undo his pants. If Lev sucks him off then he'll finish and the sex will be done.
"— you obviously aren't," Sasha says, and pushes his hands away.
That's not what's supposed to happen.
"Let me suck you off, it's fine--"
"Who have you been having sex with and do I have to kill them."
"Uh, well, nobody really for the past couple years."
"Okay. Can I hug you?"
"Yeah."
Apparently he gets to escape having sex without having to give anyone oral sex this time, which is nice.
Sasha hugs him tight.
He makes a soft happy noise and rests his head on Sasha's shoulder.
Well, he just about fucked up everything.
That's really sweet and also kind of sad and Sasha cradles him, puts his hand on the back of Lev's head. "I've got you," very quiet.
Maybe he can kiss Sasha again.
It's wrong but-- probably he does this sort of thing all the time, probably it doesn't mean anything, it's not like they're dating--
He doesn't do this all the time but kissing Lev is nice. He's careful not to take it further than kissing, careful to let Lev be the one to initiate.
Lev kisses him and puts his hands in Sasha's hair and pulls Sasha on top of him.
(If you were a girl, he thinks, you could do this sort of thing all the time-- have meaningless sex with a guy just because he's pretty and he wants you)
He whimpers at the hands in his hair and goes where he's pulled and — he's missed doing this so much —
She kisses Sasha's face and bites his ear and touches him.
(His-- his slut, his girl-- so good for him)
He gasps and moans and whispers "Please" when he's bitten, arches his back into Lev's touch.
That's good. It's nice to make him feel good.
She keeps biting his ear and puts her hands up under his shirt, touches his back.
That's good that's good that's so so good — Lev is so good —
She kisses him and rolls him over onto his side and starts to take off his pants.
(Best sounds-- prettiest smile-- pretty girl-- pretty little cocksucker--)
He kisses him back and goes where he's pushed.
"You're gorgeous."
Full-body shudder.
Leia is not bad at all at handjobs. (Getting off a stranger-- who thinks you're gorgeous-- gorgeous cockhungry little slut--)
Then it won't take long for Sasha to come over Lev's hand and kiss him again.
"Mm. I love your cock."
"You're so good."
"Thank you."
She kisses Sasha and undoes her pants and starts to-- take care of things.
"Do you want me to —?"
No.
"If you want."
That is not the face or the body language of someone who wants to say yes. Sasha kisses him but doesn't touch him anywhere below the shoulders.
He finishes quickly and then has his usual disgust.
What the fuck did he just do.
Sasha kisses him one more time. "Are you all right?"
"I'm fine."
He's not fine! Why did he have sex with a guy! Why did that seem like a good decision! He should never let his fucking dick make choices!
He doesn't seem fine but that isn't something Sasha can do anything about right now so he just hugs him.
"You should maybe... go away now? Sorry."
"— okay. I'm sorry." He gets up and does up his pants and puts his shoes back on and goes.
(Great! Awesome! The cute smart guy he's had a crush on for months probably hates him now! Good job!)
Lev sets a timer for twenty minutes, curls up in a ball on the bed, and quietly wants to die.
When the timer goes off, he sits up and starts grading.
He gets back to his dorm and pulls out his thread and puts it away and opens his computer and starts looking up clips of The Royal Tenenbaums to make gifs of, because apparently this is what he does when he's stressed.
So. Probably Lev does not hate him, he reminds himself, that would be really weird. Probably what just happened was a closeted guy freaking out that he just had sex with another guy. Probably they're going to see each other again next Sunday and it's going to be awkward but totally fine. Probably.
Lev is in fact there next Sunday!
He doesn't know if he wants Sasha to skip.
Sasha does not skip.
He does show up wearing a shirt that was visibly bought in the women's section of the store, and a jacket with a rose embroidered on the front.
Lev turns bright red and drops a thousand-page math textbook on his foot.
..........cute.
Sasha asks him for help again, just like he does every week.
Lev is less helpful than he is most weeks!
He keeps blushing and staring and losing his train of thought.
That's really really cute and Sasha's going to wear clothes like this every week from now on.
He doesn't smile at Lev any less.
He's going to get significantly less helpful tutoring if he does!
Lev is also smiling a lot, but it's less correlated than usual with whether Sasha is on the right track, and more correlated with whether his hand is accidentally brushing against Lev's.
Bold of you to assume Sasha is ever accidentally touching Lev's hand.
When he's done helping Sasha with his homework, he says, conspicuously staring at a potted plant, "I was doing some reading about ways to teach you math that don't rely on memory so much."
"That sounds like it'd be useful to learn."
"Maybe not, if I can get you a B in this class and then you don't take any more math ever."
"...I don't know that taking more math classes would be a good idea but I would like to ever be able to learn a thing about math?"
And he bends over the paper
"I was wondering what would happen if I gave you a real math problem, not one of the fake ones you have in class-- something visual--" and he's sketching out a picture and trying to explain what's going on.
He looks happy.
It doesn't really feel like solving a math problem; it feels like solving a puzzle.
It's fun.
For the first time, he's smiling about the problem in front of him rather than smiling about Lev.
"...This is what real math is, by the way," he says.
"As opposed to what I'd been doing before which is social studies in a weird hat, or?"
"As opposed to what you were doing the whole time, which is to real math the way paint-by-numbers kits are to art."
He does not say "I love you."
He sure is thinking it, though.
Lev is going to explain the concept of a proof!
Lev is going to do this by giving Sasha a square piece of paper, asking him to fold it into a triangle that's half the size of the original square, and then refusing to be convinced that the triangle is really half the size of the original square.
He's smiling a lot.
He's laughing by the time he gets to "Okay, look, I can unfold the paper and then you can see the triangles and see that they're the same size, c'mon —"
"How do you know they're the same size, it could be an optical illusion--"
"Because when I fold the paper you can see that they're one on top of the other with no overflow!"
"All right, I'm convinced. But another problem--"
They might accidentally keep doing this until the math center is closed.
That wouldn't be so awful.
Sasha hesitates, and then hugs Lev goodbye.
Lev hugs him back and puts his face in Sasha's hair.
Oh, that's nice.
He doesn't really want to let go, but after a minute or so he'll have to. "That was fun, thank you. See you next week."
"Uh," he says, "I'm probably supposed to help other people and not just you? On Sundays? So maybe we could, uh."
!!!! okay keep it cool he freaked out last time.
"Yeah, that makes sense, sorry. We could meet again on Tuesday at the library?"
"That would be great."
"I'll see you Tuesday, then!"
He goes back to the dorm and flops onto his bed and presses his hands into his face and can't stop smiling.
He goes back into his room and jerks off and quietly hates himself.
He has enough free time on Tuesday mornings that by Tuesday afternoon the skirt he was sewing is finished and he can wear it to the library. He's.... maybe a little bit visibly nervous about that.
Lev is bright red and staring and makes a little 'eep' noise.
That's adorable. Lev is adorable.
"Hi." His shoulders are curled inward; he has one hand on the back of his neck.
What is English. Sasha is wearing a skirt, Lev can't speak English.
He's adorable. Sasha takes his hand. "We should probably find a table."
Sasha spoke to him. He should probably make some sort of answer.
"Uh. Yeah."
It feels like electricity is dancing under his skin where Sasha touches him.
Sasha will find them a table, then! Lev continues to be adorable.
"You look really nice."
Fuck. Did he just say that.
"Thank you."
Lev is going to do math now and not think about kneeling on the floor and hiking up Sasha's skirt and Sasha's hand on the back of his head and wrapping his lips around Sasha's cock and getting his face fucked and oh goddammit
Sasha will also do math, mostly oblivious to this thought process.
He eventually manages to concentrate on showing Sasha why the formulas for calculating the areas of various shapes are the way they are and not on thinking about whether, if he pulled up Sasha's skirt, his legs would be silky-smooth.
That's so much more useful than a list of formulas to memorize. Sasha asks questions, leans forward, pays attention.
(He might have noticed, if he was looking while they were standing up, that the answer is yes, they would be.)
Later. He can think about that later.
(He can already feel the sick churn of self-hatred in his stomach.)
They probably shouldn't continue until the library closes again but he wants to.
Lev's not going to stop unless he wants to stop!
He rests his knee against Sasha's knee and pretends not to notice.
He presses their legs together and asks another question about circles.
When the library closes, he says, "there's a diner that's pretty good. --I can cover it, I know college students are broke."
"I'd love to go with you."
"Thanks," Lev says, his hands in his pockets. "I don't know that I've done math for that many hours straight since high school."
"I definitely haven't. — that was fun."
"Math is fun!!!!! --I did math contests in high school, it was great."
"That sounds exactly like the kind of thing you'd love," he says, affectionate.
"Well, it was better than anything else I was doing to beef up my resume, anyway."
He wants to introduce Lev to actual hobbies that you do purely because they are fun right now immediately, but probably it isn't the time.
"I bet! I didn't do very much to beef up mine, mostly I dabbled in a lot of crafts, but the clubs I was in pretty much inevitably sucked. — except cereal club but that one was founded as a joke so it doesn't count."
"What's cereal club?"
"So in my high school all you needed to form a club was five students who wanted to join and a teacher who would let you use their classroom, so one guy founded the Cereal Club, which is where you all meet on Fridays at lunch and hang out and eat cereal. I guess now that I'm thinking about it cosplay club wasn't bad either, it just fell apart after three meetings because it had been founded by five freshmen and me."
"I bet your costumes would look great."
"Thank you! I made the skirt myself, actually."
"Oh, wow, that's amazing!" Now he has an excuse to look.
"You should make me a skirt," he doesn't say.
"You should twirl," he does.
The skirt is the kind that twirls!
His heart aches with jealousy.
"You're really talented."
"I've had a lot of practice!"
"I haven't ever had much time for things like that."
"Like sewing in particular or crafts in general or things that don't boost your resume in even more general or —?"
"The last thing." His hands are in his pockets. "My parents came here from Russia and we didn't have a lot of money growing up. So I kind of had to spend my whole life convincing someone to give me money for a scholarship so I could go to a good college so I could get a good job so I could stop living in an apartment with rats in it."
Great. Here he is, being depressing again.
"That makes sense.
I can teach you some of my weird crafty things, if you want to learn them. And if you have time."
"Doing finicky things with a sewing needle is at least a change from doing finicky things with circuits."
"And this finicky thing produces a product you can touch. — I also do other finicky things that do not involve sewing needles but I have no idea if you would like beading any better."
"You can touch a circuit! It's not necessarily a good idea but you can!"
"But do you generally get to use the things you make, I'm guessing probably you don't."
"Well, probably when I have a real job I'll get to use the things I make. As will millions of people."
"That's fair, but in the meantime — it matters to me to be able to have physical objects that I made, it's like — I don't know what it's like, I don't know why I set that up to need a comparison."
"Probably to help me understand it."
They enter the diner. The only other customers are a bunch of obnoxious theater kids in makeup, rambunctious after a show.
He looks a little bit wistfully at the theater kids. "Probably. Are the milkshakes here good?"
"Pretty good. --You do theater?"
"I used to. Stopped after junior year."
"That sucks. I think they have community theater here? I see signs for it sometimes."
The waitress stops by and Lev orders a veggie burger, french fries, and a soy milk.
Sasha orders a regular burger, french fries, and a strawberry milkshake.
"...I don't know if it'd be the best idea. And I'm not sure I have time, and there was — community stuff that wouldn't exist here."
"I guess," he says. It's not like he can argue that you should do things because you want to do them without being a massive hypocrite.
Probably he shouldn't comment on the being vegan.
"I quit when my parents found out I was queer."
WHY DID HE SAY THAT.
"What happened?"
"A lot of threats. Not a lot else. I stopped wearing makeup and stopped doing theater and broke up with the guy and mostly spent time around girls for a while."
SEE, THIS IS WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU BLURT OUT STUPID THINGS.
"Can I hug you."
"Yes," Sasha says, and hugs him.
"You should get to wear makeup and do theater and date guys if you want to. Fuck your parents," Lev says, hypocritically.
"Observe me going out to dinner with a cute guy while wearing a skirt," he doesn't say.
"Yeah. And I have been wearing makeup more since I got here. But," he says.
"Yeah."
Lev thinks about the possibility that his parents found out about his sexual orientation and shudders.
...right. Closeted guy. Sasha's just going to keep hugging him.
"I am glad my parents didn't find out about. My thing."
Okay he spat it out it's okay.
"Yeah. Parents are a nightmare, I'm sorry."
The burgers arrive.
Lev is going to eat it and hope that Sasha asks because he is not going to be able to say it to a person unprompted.
Sasha eats his burger and drinks his milkshake. "So what's your thing?"
"I uh. I kink on the idea of being a woman."
See. Was that so hard to say?
(Yes.)
"Yeah, I can see why you wouldn't want your parents finding out about that." This milkshake is really good.
"That's what I meant when I said I was straight, it's-- I'm not really attracted to you, I'm not really attracted to men, it's just that my brain thinks on some level that having sex with men is a thing that women do so it's hot because of that. Sorry."
.......uh.
What..... do you say to that.
"Well, you like when I kiss you and I like when you kiss me, you wouldn't be the first straight guy I've slept with."
What the fuck, mouth.
"You don't... mind?"
I do not even a little bit believe you that you aren't attracted to me.
"Should I?"
He pokes his burger with a fork.
"I don't know. I haven't slept with guys very much."
"Most of the people I've slept with haven't! I have faith in us."
"You're really sweet."
"Thank you." He takes Lev's hand and squeezes. "So are you."
!!!!!!!!!
"I can. Answer questions about my thing. If you want. It's a weird thing."
"I'm not sure I can think of anything to ask. Do you have clothes and stuff, or —?"
He snorts without humor and does not say that he's spent more money on his fetish than on food.
"Clothes and makeup and nail polish, yeah."
"Good. Do you want me to make you something or is that weird."
Why did that sentence make him hard. (Because he has a fetish.)
"I'd really like that."
"Alright. — at some point I should find out measurements and what colors and styles you like but that doesn't have to be right now."
"Maybe when we're done eating I can show you what I have?"
"That sounds good."
"My taste in women's clothes can be described as 'slutty.'"
"....you're cute."
"Thank you."
For the love of God they are having a normal conversation it is not the time to get aroused.
So cute.
"I can definitely do slutty but even so there are, like, flavors of slutty, you know?"
He doesn't know.
"Yeah."
"Sorry, I can wait until we're in private to talk about this."
"It's fine. I don't think the theater kids care."
"That's true. — even if you just break it down by 80s teen movie subculture, cheerleader slutty and goth slutty and frilly pink slutty are totally different looks, and you can get a lot more finely divided than that."
"I don't know much about clothes."
"That's alright! You don't have to, I just wanted to explain what the hell I was talking about."
Lev pays the check.
"Want to see my stuff?"
"Sure!"
Lev takes his hand for the walk back.
"It's called an erotic target location error. My thing."
"I have no idea what that means."
"It means-- my sexual orientation is towards women, but something got screwed up so instead of being sexually oriented towards women I'm sexually oriented towards the idea of myself as a woman."
That sounds very much like the sentiment of a gay guy who has come up with some very elaborate justifications.
"Huh," Sasha says instead of that.
"It's weird."
Maybe he can put his head on Sasha's shoulder.
"That is so not the weirdest kink I've ever heard of." He puts his hand on Lev's hair.
"I guess." He sighs. "I'm not sure whether I'm going to decide to get a vaginoplasty once I'm earning enough to be able to afford one. Probably depends on whether I've given up on finding love."
(He says this as if he were discussing the pros and cons of two different majors.)
Sasha hugs him.
He hugs Sasha back.
"I probably will. Dating is hard."
"And it's not like there aren't any girls who would like that."
"Women aren't going to be interested in a guy with an open wound between his legs."
"— um, just thinking about the people I know personally, Mackenzie has vaginismus and would be thrilled to date someone who is definitely not going to want penetrative sex, Nat doesn't give a flying fuck what's between your legs, and Gwen would go "great, how do you feel about me fucking you with a strap on shaped like a tentacle" because she's just like that as a person."
"You know different girls than I do."
"Maybe I should introduce you to some of the girls I know."
"Maybe. --I dated Melissa for eighteen months and it was okay at first because I was trying to stop having my fetish. But then she noticed that I, like, wasn't very interested in sex, and when I was I had a hard time keeping it up, and I was spending a lot of time away from her and giving vague reasons about why, and then she snooped and found a bunch of, uh, porn of the sort that people with my fetish look at. And she added one and one together and got three and told me I was a porn addict who had escalated to more and more extreme stuff and she would leave me unless I got clean." He shrugs. "I tried."
"I mean, yeah, there are people who'd be grossed out about my kinks too, that doesn't mean there aren't also people who would enjoy having them with me. And I think trying to not have your fetish is just — not going to work."
"Yeah. I've figured that out. It's why I don't really date."
"....the temptation to introduce you to Gwen sometime is not going away."
"If you think she'd be-- tolerant of it."
"I wouldn't want to introduce you if I didn't think she'd actively like it."
"Women don't really-- have paraphilias the way men do."
"— um."
"Except masochism," he corrects himself. "Women are sometimes masochists."
"....Nat is a sadist and Gwen kinks on monsters and hypno and on tying people up and I'm not sure I want to know what all is going on with Legion but there's a whole lot more than just masochism."
"That's... weird. --There have been studies, women who have non-masochism paraphilias basically don't exist, and there's a lot of circumstantial evidence that it's not just social desirability bias, women almost never die from autoerotic asphyxiation, they're almost never arrested for being exhibitionists or child molesters or grinding on people on subways--"
"Well, of the four girls I happen to be close friends with, one is a sadist, and one has a TF kink and a monster kink and a hypno kink and both ends of a bondage kink, and one is into things I don't actually know the names for, and one is a sub but I wouldn't call her particularly masochistic. And I find it very unlikely that I happened to become close friends with the only three girls with paraphilias in my city."
"Clinically, 'masochism' includes being interested in humiliation or degradation or taking orders or being tied up as well. --That's weird. I'm confused."
"It's possible these studies were conducted in the 1980s, or maybe paraphilia is being defined in a way that leaves out for instance omegaverse fic, or maybe researchers find what they expect to find as people studying gender are wont to do, or maybe something weirder is happening. But kinky women definitely exist and not all of them are subs with no kinks except submission."
"What is an omegaverse."
"It's an extremely common fanfic trope, generally written by girls, where in addition to man and women there are alphas and betas and omegas and omegas go into heat and can get pregnant and alphas have weird dicks and go kind of nuts from pheromones when they're around omegas in heat. It's very loosely based on bad science about wolf packs, I think it comes from the Teen Wolf fandom but don't quote me on that last one."
"What."
"That is generally people's reactions, yes!"
"...You know, I have ever pretended to be a girl with weird sexual fantasies on the Internet."
"There's a lot of people writing and it would be really weird if they were all pretending."
"I guess."
They're back at Lev's dorm room!
Sasha isn't really sure what he's expecting to see.
Lev pulls out a plastic box from under his bed.
There's kind of a lot of clothes: stockings and miniskirts, dresses and knee-high lace-up boots, even a French maid outfit. It would be misleading to say that there were no common themes. The person who purchased this clothing clearly believes that, whenever possible, clothing should be sheer and see-through, or alternately made of leather or PVC, or alternately bright pink, or alternately so tight you can see every part of their body. They clearly desperately want to wear florals and bright colors, and yet have no idea which florals and bright colors look nice and which ones are blinding or something your grandma would wear or look like you made lingerie out of a carpet. There are multiple dresses with holes cut out where the breasts should be. Nevertheless, despite these commonalities and the amount of clothing, it's difficult to imagine how you'd assemble a single non-clashing and aesthetically pleasing outfit.
He has foundation that's the wrong shade for his skin and eyeshadow that looks like it comes from the 1980s and lipstick of a garish color that doesn't really belong on human lips. The nail polish is nice. There are three sets of breast forms, in sizes normal, large, and cartoonish.
Incongruously, there is also a stack of academic books, mostly about psychology.
......some of the dresses he can probably cut up for scrap fabric? He's going to need to get him foundation that suits him but he can probably use the rest of Sasha's makeup, but none of the clothes Sasha owns are likely to fit —
"That's — a lot."
"I told you it's-- basically the only thing I get off on."
"That makes sense.
.....you can use my lipstick and eye makeup probably but my foundation isn't going to be the right shade for you either, we might have to go to the drugstore."
"I'd get off on it."
"The sharing or the going to the drugstore? I can help you hide it if it's the drugstore but I can't buy you foundation without you there or you'll just get something totally the wrong color again —"
"I mean. It's not okay to do things in public if I'd get off on them, other people don't consent to be part of my fetish."
"....okay, but going to the drugstore to buy makeup for yourself isn't other people being part of your fetish."
"There would be a clerk and there might be other people in the store and I shouldn't involve them."
"By that argument nobody would be allowed to buy sex toys."
"People don't get turned on by the process of buying sex toys but I get turned on by the idea of doing things I associate with womanhood. Like buying makeup. And even if they do have a fetish for buying sex toys I think sex-toy store clerks opted in for that and the guy at CVS didn't."
".....you could go in with me so I can try out the samples on you and then leave while I buy them and not interact with the clerk while we're there?"
"Maybe at a weird time so there's no one in the store?"
"Of course," Sasha says, and kisses Lev's cheek. "....the clothes might not be salvageable but that is kind of my entire specialty."
He curls in on himself. "Sorry."
"— no, it's okay, I'm trying to help you find things that look good on you. Most of this is — it looks good on models and basically nobody else, lots of women's clothes are like that, figuring out what looks good on you is experience you don't have and you don't have to apologize for not having."
"I'm not sure there are things that look good on me."
"Everyone has things that look good on them."
"I mean. Men's clothes. Because I'm a man."
"I guarantee you we will be able to find or make women's clothes that look good on you."
"Really?"
"Yeah. Even if we can't find anything, I sew my own clothes."
"I mean. I'm kind of ugly and I wouldn't ever pass."
"I don't think you're ugly." And of course you don't think you'd pass, you've been wearing Halloween costumes and clown makeup, he doesn't say.
"Really?"
"I meant what I said, you have the prettiest smile."
Sasha gets to see the prettiest smile again!
Sasha kisses him.
!!!!!!!
Sasha found out about it and he doesn't hate him and still wants to kiss him.
"I haven't told anyone before."
"I'm honored you trust me that much."
"Well, I probably shouldn't sleep with people without telling them. It doesn't really... work."
"That makes sense." He touches Lev's hair. "Still honored, though."
"I'm glad you don't think I'm gross."
(Probably. Lev has not missed Sasha's slightly judgmental facial expressions.)
"I think you're adorable."
Bounce bounce bounce.
"I think that's kind of a weird reaction to my gross fetish but I'm not objecting!"
"You kink on buying makeup! It's adorable!"
Bounce bounce bounce.
"On buying makeup and wearing frilly underwear and having breasts and getting called a pretty girl and getting pregnant."
Sasha pulls him onto the bed and curls up in his lap. "Adorable."
Lev smiles up at him. "You're adorable. --I picked out a name. For when I'm dressed as a girl."
"What is it?"
"Leia. But spelled like the character from Star Wars."
"Pretty name." He kisses Lev's — Leia's? — forehead. "...pretty name for a pretty girl."
He she moans.
He kisses her again.
"Good girl. My gorgeous girl."
She shudders.
"Thank you."
He plays with her hair, very gentle. "You're lovely."
He doesn't believe Sasha.
But it's-- easy to pretend. She has a lot of practice.
"You should pin me down and fuck me."
"Okay," very soft, and he pins her wrists to the bed and kisses her and starts undressing her with his free hand.
She has three days' growth of stubble on her chest and her stomach.
"Probably," she says dreamily, "after I come I'm going to freak out and feel disgusted and hate myself and want to curl up in a ball and sob."
".....after you come I can stay with you and pet your hair and tell you you aren't disgusting, because you aren't." Another kiss on the forehead.
"That sounds nice." She snuggles up to Sasha. "Do you mind just-- taking your clothes off and holding me?"
"Of course not," he says, and does that. He shaves everywhere, Leia might notice.
"Your legs are so soft," she says, with wonder, and then wraps her legs around his.
"One of these days I'm going to get lasered. — do you want me to help you shave or do you prefer doing it on your own?"
"Getting you to help would be hot."
She seems... relaxed. There's muscle tension she's usually carrying that she isn't anymore. Her shoulders aren't up around her ears.
"I can do that then," he says, and keeps holding her. "....it's nice seeing you relaxed."
"I feel-- better," he says. "When I'm dressed as a girl. Things-- hurt less."
.....it is suddenly very, very obvious that this is more than just a fetish.
"I'm sorry things hurt so much." He pets her hair.
"It's fine. I mean, it's not fine, but."
(She's not making the stressed tight smile.)
"I'm still sorry." He kisses her forehead, pets her hair, holds her.
"On Saturday nights I get dressed up and read books about psychology."
".....you're adorable." And now he knows what Leia is actually interested in, or at least, can guess.
She puts her hands to her chest in a mock-struck position. "Me? Really?"
"Yes. You, really." Her face needs kissing.
Leia's face absolutely does need kissing. She agrees.
That's good because he doesn't plan on stopping.
"You're so hot. Have I told you that? You are really incredibly hot."
"Thank you."
"This whole afternoon I kept getting distracted thinking about how much I wanted to suck your cock."
"Maybe you should do that sometime."
"Maybe 'sometime' should be 'in the next ten minutes.'"
"That sounds like it would involve not cuddling you, though."
He doesn't want you, you're not pretty--
"Okay," he says.
He feels her tense up under him. "Are you okay?"
"I'm fine."
He's getting soft.
....given the timing it's probably that he turned her down but he actually does not particularly want to have sex at the moment and not just because that would probably also wind up making her sad.
"Okay." He snuggles her. ".....my good girl."
"Oh," she breathes. "Sorry. I thought you might not-- like me."
"I like you a lot. I just — am not particularly in the mood and also last time we tried it wound up making you sad."
"Sorry. I don't want you to have sex when you're not in the mood, I'm just-- oversensitive."
"I don't mind." His hands are very gentle on her hair. "I've got you."
"I feel like I've been doing all the talking." She rubs circles on Sasha's back.
"I'm not sure what to talk about." He relaxes into her hands.
"I don't know. Sewing. Theater. Your friends. Your parents. ---I want to know everything about you."
'I love you too,' he doesn't say.
He talks more about Nat and Gwen and Mackenzie, talks about early elementary school when he'd been the only boy the girls would let into the clubhouse, talks about spending Halloweens at Gwen's house and making their costumes together and watching Fourth of July fireworks on Natalie's roof.
Leia is--
sickly jealous of being the only boy in the girl's clubhouse, of being girly enough that that would happen
less sick but still jealous of having friends
acutely aware of how much younger Sasha is than he is and concerned he is a pervert
turned on by the idea of having a female friend who sews costumes with you
self-hate-y about being turned on by having friends, what the fuck
happy.
"You're so good."
"Thank you! --Stay with me tonight?"
"Sure." He reaches out and takes her hand and squeezes it. "....just out of curiosity what colors do you like?"
"I like bright colors. I don't really have a preference between red and green and blue as long as they're bright. And I like pink."
"I'll keep an eye out for fabric, then."
"You're the best friend ever."
"I love you too."
"I... can't. I'm sorry."
"....can't what?"
"You're great, you're wonderful, it's nothing about you but. I can't. Love you."
"Why not?" He pets her hair, gentle, gentle.
"Because I'm not actually into guys. I'm into-- pretending to be into guys as a validation of my imaginary womanhood."
....oh, honey.
"Does it help if I tell you I say 'I love you' to platonic friends? Because I do that."
"Okay. As long as you don't think it can be-- romantic." He kisses Sasha's cheek. "I love you."
"I won't be upset about not getting chocolate on Valentine's Day, I promise." He kisses her cheek and puts his head on her shoulder. "I love you."
"Pretty sure you should be the one getting me chocolate on Valentine's Day."
"No, the trick is that you get your chocolate the day after Valentine's Day and then it lasts you until Easter."
"But I want a real Valentine's Day. With roses and chocolates and sexy underwear. --We can celebrate it the day after," she says maganimously.
Definitely not a romantic relationship, huh. "We can always do both."
"That sounds amazing."
"Sexy underwear and heart shaped chocolate and — flowers, anyway, I don't know about roses — on Valentine's, and giant bags of discount candy and movies the day after."
"I love you."
Plans!!!! For the future!!!!! That means Sasha is going to want to hang out with her again!!!!!
"I love you too."
They should go to sleep snuggling.
Yes. Yes, they should.
In the morning he kisses Leia goodbye before he heads back to his dorm for a change of clothes and he's definitely late for class.
She he is relaxed and feels like he's floating on air. His teaching is as always flawless but he doesn't get any work done on his research; he looks for a website where people save pictures of clothing, discovers Pinterest, and spends the afternoon alternating between pinning dresses and skirts and tops he likes to show Sasha and researching math pedagogy.
(She doesn't jerk off. If she jerks off it will be over.)
He spends kind of a lot of time looking up patterns and going through Pinterest and browsing online fabric stores and their meeting on Thursday can't possibly come fast enough.
She hugs him.
"Hi Sasha."
He hugs her. (He's wearing boys' clothes this time.) "Hey, Leia," very quietly into her shoulder.
"Hey. Do you want to go makeup shopping?"
"I do! Foundation in your color, lipstick and eyeshadow that look like they were not portaled from the 1980s, possibly eyeliner, anything else?"
"You know more about makeup than I do!"
Yeah. He does. Probably trying a department store first is a good idea, more than one brand in the same place means more shades to look at even if each individual display is smaller.
Leia is flushed red and biting her lip and she keeps forgetting to breathe.
"You're so cute. — how much sparkle is enough sparkle."
"I want all the sparkle! --But I also want to look nice."
"Good answer," he says, and picks up a sample container of gold eyeshadow. "Close your eyes."
She does.
Feeling Sasha put makeup on her eyelids is just about the hottest thing that has ever happened to her, and she can't stop a little noise from escaping.
That's adorable.
He tries gold on one eye and warm bronzy green on the other and has her open her eyes and makes a sound and wipes them off and tries different shades of gold and green and copper until he finds a green that works.
Leia thought the first colors looked fine but this entire situation is so hot that she isn't really intellectually capable of objecting.
"Cool. So do you like light lipstick or dark, is there any particular texture you can't stand...."
"I keep licking my lips so I need a lipstick that stays on anyway. I think I like dark lipstick?"
He can look for brands that are likely to stay!
He tries warm colors, browns and bronzes, with varying amounts of sparkle. Leia doesn't have to close her eyes for this bit.
Then she can see Sasha getting close to her face to put makeup on it, which really really makes her want to kiss him.
Maybe she can do that.
Maybe not while they're trying lipstick on but between colors he will totally kiss her.
!!!!!
"I look pretty."
"You do look pretty."
Foundation, if Leia wants it, involves putting streaks of makeup on her cheek, and very specifically not on the underside of her wrist.
Leia is not really sure if this is the recommended way to do foundation or just Sasha making an excuse to touch her face but either way it makes her hiss.
No, it is the right way to do foundation, the underside of your wrist is the palest part of your body, it should be the same shade as your face. But the touching her and the hissing are nice too.
"I love you."
"I love you too. This looks like the right color — mascara and eyeliner can just be black, we don't need to test out those —"
Leia would object that she already owns both of those but she always kind of needs more makeup. (This is horny logic.)
"Anything else?"
"Not unless you think you need it! Honestly you don't really need more eyeliner either but I know that brand of mascara and it clumps like whoa — do you have real brushes or do you just use the ones that come with the thing —"
"Why would the brushes come with the thing if they weren't fine?"
"They work but you get better results with real ones. Do you want to wait outside while I find a brush set and pay or would you rather stay with me?"
Part of him is thinking about how he's a boundary-violating narcissist autogynephilie, but that part seems not very important right now.
"I'll stay with you."
"Alright." He holds Leia's hand and finds the brush set he uses and doesn't let go of Leia's hand until he gets up to the counter and needs his hands, doesn't make Leia do any of the talking.
And Leia pays for her makeup and throws in a bag of candy and goes to her car and says, "When we get home, either you have to fuck me or I'm going to have to jerk off."
"I can fuck you when we get home."
"Awesome. --Probably not the hottest thing that happened to me in my life, but definitely up there."
"That's adorable and you're adorable and I want to kiss you but I can't because you're driving."
Leia can hold his hand and drive at the same time.
Sasha shouldn't distract her by kissing her hand but he wants to.
It's only a little bit distracting!
He's still not going to do it until they're in Leia's room, and at that point he might as well just kiss her properly.
Leia moans into his mouth and puts her hands into his hair.
Good.
Maybe they should be on the bed.
Maybe they-- should--
But first Leia strips off all her guy clothes as quickly as possible. Her skin is all shaved smooth, and she's wearing black lacy panties and fishnet stockings.
"You're beautiful." Her thighs look kissable and Sasha is going to kiss them.
"Oh-- you're beautiful."
"Gorgeous — my gorgeous girl — what do you like —"
"I like sucking people off and getting fucked-- I like being hot and slutty and cockhungry and wanted-- I don't like it when people touch me, uh, you know--"
"I can do that — do you have lube —"
"Yeah." She produces a bottle.
Sasha has condoms, what's the best way to do this so he doesn't wind up touching her dick by accident — he takes her shoulder and kisses it and rolls her over.
She whimpers at being turned over.
It occurs to her that Sasha would probably like it if she said out loud the narration that's always running in her head when she has sex.
"Yours-- your pretty girl--"
"Yeah," and he kisses her shoulder again, puts a pillow under her hips and slicks up her thighs and kisses down her back. "My pretty girl, mine, my beautiful girl, gorgeous —"
She's grinding into the pillow.
"Gonna make you feel so good-- gonna come around your cock--"
"Yeah — yeah you are — my good girl my sweet girl — keep your thighs together, there you go, just like that —"
Leia is slightly confused about what's happening!
"You okay?" very soft, against the back of her neck.
"You're... not fucking my ass?"
"Not all sex is anal," and he kisses the back of her shoulder. "I don't actually like anal that much? It's fine but it's a lot of effort for not a whole lot of payoff and your thighs are really nice."
"Anal is pretty much the only way I can come during sex, because. You know."
"Do you want me to take the pillow away or is that fine?"
"The pillow is good," she says.
"Okay." He kisses her neck again. ".....you might be surprised but if you can't finish from this I'll finger you. That okay?"
"Or I can just deal with it afterwards."
"If you'd rather, but it isn't a problem, really."
"Okay," Leia says, and pushes her thighs together.
"Ah — good girl my sweet girl just like that there you go —"
His hands are on her hips, running up her sides.
Oh, oh--
Her ass feels empty but Sasha is on top of her and praising her and calling her good, she's grinding into the pillow and it doesn't feel like something is touching her dick, it feels like--
"My sweet thing my good girl my — ah — pretty girl, gorgeous, so beautiful for me, I —"
"Hurt me-- please--"
She's breathless.
He bites down hard on her shoulder, presses his fingers into her hips.
Oh, oh-- it feels so good, it's hard to think, she wants a cock in her ass splitting her apart, she wants Sasha's come all over her body, she wants--
He bites down over and over on her shoulders and the back of her neck and presses her hips down into the pillow and moves hard and fast and — starts to lose his rhythm —
That's-- that's very good--
She's a girl, she's a girl and she has a pussy and she's grinding her clit into a pillow while her boyfriend gets himself off between her thighs, he's biting her shoulders and pressing her down because he's stronger than her and can move her however he likes, she's so pretty and he likes the way she looks and he wants her and he loves her, and it feels this good because it's her clit, she can feel the silky slide of the panties against her skin, she's rubbing her clit against the pillow--
She comes.
And Sasha gasps and moans and comes between her thighs and collapses on top of her and kisses her neck.
"Good?"
Leia is floaty and happy and snuggly. "Yeah."
So is he. He rolls off her, moves her so they're facing each other, tosses the pillow aside to be dealt with later.
"Good."
And he realizes that he is in bed with a guy, wearing fishnet stockings and come-stained panties, and he just wore fishnets and panties under his clothes in public and bought makeup where anybody could see and put it on his fucking credit card and he told the guy he loved him and, and--
"Fuck."
He holds her tighter. "Are you okay — do you need anything —"
"I am regretting many of the decisions I made in the past few days!"
"Is there anything I can do?"
"This is why I only let myself be her on Saturday nights and in San Francisco!"
.....oh honey.
"Hey, I've got you — do you want me to stay —"
"I do. I'm not sure if I should but I do."
"Then I'm staying. — let's go to the bathroom, get you cleaned up?"
"Okay," he says, and stands up. "If I were a good person I wouldn't ever see you again."
He helps her to the bathroom, helps her get the fishnets off, gets a washcloth wet and starts wiping the cum and lube off her thighs.
".....why not?"
"Because I want to pretend to date you because it's my fetish and that's not fair to you at all."
Ohhhh boy.
"You told me that right out and I decided to do this with my eyes open.
Also you're kind of my only friend and I really like talking to you and I don't want to stop."
"You talked about your other friends."
"I went to a different college than they did. We text but — you're the only person I can hug and that matters, you know?"
And I'm pretty sure I'm the only person you can hug and that matters too.
"You're great. I'm sure you can meet new people." Better people.
"....or I could stay friends with the sweet adorable person who can get me to enjoy doing math and who gives excellent hugs?"
She's he's smiling a little bit.
"When I finished I was thinking about-- about what if I was a girl and we were dating and you loved me--" He starts to sniffle.
He holds her and pets her hair. "I do love you. And I could love you that way, it would be really, really easy, you asked me not to —"
"I want that more than anything in the world, but--"
"But what?"
"But I can't. Because I'm straight."
".....I have heard it said that if you're always going 'I wish I could be bi, because if I were bi I could kiss guys, but I'm straight so I can't kiss guys and that's terrible,' then probably you aren't actually very straight. And honestly, even if you are straight, you care about me and I care about you and I am okay with dating a straight guy, this isn't something I don't know I'm getting into."
"I can definitely kiss guys and be straight. I have tested this extensively."
"'I wish I could be gay so I could date guys, but I can't date guys because I'm straight and that's terrible' is also not a very straight thing to say."
"Fetishes are just weird."
"....honestly, 'I'm dating a straight guy and he loves me very much' is fine with me. I care about you and you care about me and I want to date you and if you're only attracted to me for weird fetish reasons then whatever, I don't care."
"Does that mean I have a boyfriend now?"
"It does."
"This feels sort of weird."
"I love you." He tucks a lock of hair behind Lev's ear. "What kind of weird?"
"I started dating somebody and I... don't want to throw up? Even a little bit?"
......honey, you have never been attracted to girls at all, he doesn't say. He pets Lev's hair and says "I'm glad you don't want to throw up" and kisses her cheek.
"No vague free-floating dread! I'm just happy!"
"I love you very much."
"I love you."
Kissing?
Yes. Definitely kissing.
"I used to-- scroll down the pictures on your Facebook page and jerk off to the ones where you looked happy."
........oh my god.
"I love you! I love you so much!"
"I don't know why this is getting that reaction! It's kind of creepy!"
"There is something very cute about specifically using the pictures where I looked happy, and also it's not like I haven't had a crush on you for a month and a half."
Bounce bounce bounce.
"You did?"
"I understand 'my cute math tutor' is a very traditional choice of person to acquire a crush on."
"I'm cute?!"
"I think I have made my opinions of how cute you are very clear!"
He kisses Lev's forehead and her nose and her mouth.
"I have no idea why you'd think I'm cute!"
"That's because when you talk about math you're too focused on the math to realize you're being cute, whereas for most of my life I was constitutionally unable to focus on math for more than five minutes at a time and so it was very obvious how cute you were about it. And you don't see your own smile, and you don't see yourself bounce."
"My boyfriend thinks I'm cute when I talk about math!"
"Your boyfriend has both the experience of having heard you talk about math and functioning eyes." He kisses his boyfriend (girlfriend? that'll be weird to explain to Nat but it's whatever).
"Mostly people are like 'that's boring, Lev', 'just tell me what I need to memorize to pass the test, Lev.'"
"That's because most people are wrong."
"No, you're just great."
Possibly they shouldn't be in the bathroom. Possibly they should be cuddling on the bed.
They should definitely be cuddling on the bed. "Maybe I'm great and most people are wrong."
"Maybe! If they were right they would be as great as you are." He snuggles Sasha and says, "I have weird fetishistic attraction to you in two different ways."
He snuggles Lev and says, "Oh?"
"I like men in dresses because my brain is just really fundamentally confused about the difference between being attracted to someone and wanting to be them."
"I'll have to wear more dresses, then."
"Well. I'm not picky. Dresses, skirts, women's clothing, makeup--" He strokes Sasha's leg. "Your legs are so soft."
"I have strong preferences about textures, it's a thing." He leans into the touch.
"I like feeling your legs against mine when they're both smooth."
"Me too." He rubs their legs together. "I can help you shave if you want."
"Am I doing a bad job at it or--"
"No, it just seems like the sort of thing you'd enjoy doing together."
"I would. --I have a boyfriend!"
"You have a boyfriend! And I have a you!"
He laughs. "That's cute."
"You're cute. Also I couldn't decide whether you were my boyfriend or my girlfriend so instead I have a you."
He wiggles.
"I'd-- like to be your girlfriend. At least in private."
!!!! She wiggles!!!!!
"My girlfriend, then. — I've never had a girlfriend before."
"Well, I'm not very much like a girl, really."
"Still. I would expect it to be pretty different from the boyfriends I've had." He kisses Lev's cheek, and then his mouth.
"How?"
"For one thing you seem.... more willing to talk about your feelings? And you like it when I call you pretty instead of getting all 'guys aren't pretty' about it, and you know basically what it is that you like and are willing to tell me."
"You really think so?"
She he looks so hopeful.
"I wouldn't say it if I didn't."
"You know how they say real trans people have a woman's mind trapped inside a man's body? I have a man's mind trapped inside a man's body."
"....I'm not sure I believe in men's minds and women's minds being that obviously categorically different. Just — people trapped in bodies they don't want to be in."
"There are differences. On any individual trait, the differences are pretty small, but if you look at a bunch of traits together you can classify people accurately more than ninety percent of the time. And if you do that for me I'd wind up classified as a male." He sighs. "You might be classified as a female."
Sasha pets his hair. "It seems really silly to classify me as a woman and you as a man, but alright."
"Why would it be silly to classify me as a man? I have, like, a dick. I produce sperm. I went through male puberty. I was socialized as a man. I have male-typical personality traits."
"I also have a dick and produced sperm and went through a male puberty and was socialized as a man insofar as I believe in 'socialized as a man' as a coherent category, and I am okay with being a man and you aren't and if someone is going to call one of us a woman it really seems like it should be you?"
"You can't just decide you're in a different category because you're unhappy about it. I am unhappy about not being John von Neumann and that doesn't make me him."
"Then why am I in a different category?"
"If we were going to decide that people with women's minds in men's bodies should be considered women, you'd have a much better claim for it than I would." He shrugs. "I don't know if we should. Not my circus, not my monkeys."
"....that still seems silly but they aren't my monkeys either." He curls around Lev.
"I love you. Stay with me?"
"Of course. I love you too."
"They're sort of your monkeys."
"....how are they sort of my monkeys."
"Even if you don't want to be a girl, you're-- on the spectrum with the people who do. Feminine gay men and straight transsexual women have the same underlying brain thing, and if you were in a different situation you might wind up having a sex change."
".....I guess maybe? But I'm not in a different situation and — there is something really weird to me about calling me an authority on something I don't know very much about and that doesn't actually affect me."
"I mean, neither of us really is, but you're more of one than I am. I'm just a fetishist."
He isn't sure what to say, so instead he keeps quiet and rubs Lev's back.
Lev snuggles up to him and eventually drops off to sleep.
Lev is so good and Sasha loves him so much and he's missed sleeping curled around someone and it doesnt take long for him to follow.
In the morning, Lev kisses his forehead and says, "Good morning, I love you."
"...mmmmmmmmloveyou."
"You should probably get ready to go to class. Unless you want to stay here all morning and cuddle which, strictly speaking, I'm not supposed to encourage."
"I want to stay here and cuddle you and not move. The not moving is very important."
"Should I encourage you to get to class, seriously."
"I can miss a day, I don't skip habitually and I don't actually learn very much in class anyway."
"Okay." He nuzzles Sasha. "Why don't you?"
Mmmm snuggling is good they should be snugglier.
"Can't concentrate when I'm in class, can't pick up the information, don't retain what I do pick up."
"Have you gotten screened for ADHD?"
"— I'm not, like, fidgety or anything. I just wind up staring off into space thinking about something else."
"You might have the predominantly inattentive type. Not all people with ADHD fidget. --If you unsnuggle me I can pull out my copy of the DSM-V."
Sasha unsnuggles him but wishes it to be known that he is less than happy about doing this.
Then Lev will present him with:
A. A persistent pattern of inattention and/or hyperactivity-impulsivity that interferes with functioning
or development, as characterized by (1) and/or (2):1. Inattention: Six (or more) of the following symptoms have persisted for at least 6 months to a degree
that is inconsistent with developmental level and that negatively impacts directly on social and
academic/occupational activities:Note: The symptoms are not solely a manifestation of oppositional behavior, defiance, hostility, or failure to
understand tasks or instructions. For older adolescents and adults (age 17 and older), at least five symptoms
are required.a. Often fails to give close attention to details or makes careless mistakes in schoolwork,
at work, or during other activities (e.g., overlooks or misses details, work is inaccurate).
b. Often has difficulty sustaining attention in tasks or play activities (e.g., has difficulty remaining
focused during lectures, conversations, or lengthy reading).
c. Often does not seem to listen when spoken to directly (e.g., mind seems elsewhere, even in
the absence of any obvious distraction).
d. Often does not follow through on instructions and fails to finish schoolwork, chores, or duties
in the workplace (e.g., starts tasks but quickly loses focus and is easily sidetracked).
e. Often has difficulty organizing tasks and activities (e.g., difficulty managing sequential tasks;
difficulty keeping materials and belongings in order; messy, disorganized work; has poor time
management; fails to meet deadlines).
f. Often avoids, dislikes, or is reluctant to engage in tasks that require sustained mental
effort (e.g., schoolwork or homework; for older adolescents and adults, preparing reports,
completing forms, reviewing lengthy papers).
g. Often loses things necessary for tasks or activities (e.g., school materials, pencils, books, tools,
wallets, keys, paperwork, eyeglasses, mobile telephones).
h. Is often easily distracted by extraneous stimuli (for older adolescents and adults, may include
unrelated thoughts).
i. Is often forgetful in daily activities (e.g., doing chores, running errands; for older adolescents
and adults, returning calls, paying bills, keeping appointments)...B. Several inattentive or hyperactive-impulsive symptoms were present prior to age 12 years.
C. Several inattentive or hyperactive-impulsive symptoms are present in two or more settings (e.g., at
home, school, or work; with friends or relatives; in other activities).D. There is clear evidence that the symptoms interfere with, or reduce the quality of, social, academic, or
occupational functioning.
"....oh.
Yeah. That — all sounds like me."
"You should maybe go to the health center and try to get a prescription for stimulants? --I'd suggest therapy also but I don't know how good your insurance is and the student health services suck."
"I'll look into it, anyway." He's very cuddly.
Lev is really unusually wiggly.
"You seem happy."
"I want to tell you all about the neuroscience of ADHD but probably that would be really boring."
"That would not even a little bit be boring."
Lev is a pretty good teacher when he's telling you about something he likes well enough but isn't particularly interested in.
He's an amazing teacher when he's talking about something he's interested in.
His shoulders are relaxed and his muscles aren't tense and he looks like he did when Sasha called him a good girl.
He's beautiful.
Sasha listens, asks questions, watches how his whole face is lit up.
After a few minutes he says, "sorry, we can talk about something you're interested in."
"I'm interested in this, I like listening to you. You're really good at teaching."
"Teaching is the best part of my job."
"I'm glad you like it so much. And not just because it let me meet you." He kisses Lev's cheek.
Then he can hear more about ADHD neuroscience!
(Bounce bounce bounce.)
It is really obvious that Lev loves psychology.
He's adorable.
"Have you ever thought about doing psych instead of engineering?"
"When I was in undergrad I used to take all the engineering classes and then audit a full courseload of psych classes. At least one professor was genuinely confused when I didn't ask her for a recommendation letter for psych grad school."
"I ask because you said electrical engineering was incredibly boring, and I don't think I've ever seen you as happy as you were just now."
"I love psychology. But I don't really love the idea of being an adjunct professor for the rest of my life."
"....it didn't sound like you love the idea of being an engineer either."
"If I'm going to be unhappy either way I might as well be unhappy in the way that makes me a vaguely worthwhile human being?"
"— a vaguely worthwhile human being."
"Yes?"
What the fuck — holy hell, poor Lev —
"I'm not going to be an engineer, am I not a worthwhile human being."
"Of course you are. You're perfect."
That's extremely sweet but it is also kind of terrifying!
"Then why do you have to be an engineer in order to be worthwhile?"
"I don't have to be an engineer, I just have to be successful, and all the other kinds of successful are things I would be worse at or find more unpleasant."
"— I still don't get why you have to be successful to be worthwhile but I don't."
"Because I don't care about whether you're a failure at everything, I would love you regardless, but I really really care whether I am a failure at everything."
Okay. That's — that's a lot, but. Okay.
"I would love you regardless. And you're an incredible teacher, if you taught I don't think you'd be a failure."
Flop.
"Tell my parents that."
".....yeah. That's fair. But — I don't think you should have a career that makes you miserable just to please your parents."
"I'm not miserable."
"I've seen your face when you talk about being an engineer and I've seen your face when you talk about psychology."
"I'm not miserable! I feel basically the way I have for my entire life."
Sasha hugs him.
"I'm so sorry about your entire life."
"I'm kind of a failure either way. I mean, I'm not going to get married or have kids."
"....probably neither am I, though."
"Yeah."
He draws his legs up into his chest.
Sasha holds him and kisses his forehead.
"Sorry. I should try to be. Fun. Not a mess."
"There's no should, love.
What do you actually want? Separately from what would make you not a failure?"
He's quiet for a while and then he says:
"I want to be a girl and I want to get married-- to a guy or a girl, I don't really care-- and I want to have lots of kids and homeschool them and-- do you know who Judith Rich Harris is?"
"I don't."
"She was a stay-at-home mom who was bored when her kids got older and wound up researching behavioral genetics and concluding that parenting doesn't have an effect on kids. She published a book about it and it won a Pulitzer prize and she spoke at conferences and stuff. That would be wonderful."
....he's never really thought about having kids before and he's not sure how he feels about the idea but that is a different feeling to examine at another time. "I love you. And I hope you get to do all of that."
"I'm going to get my PhD and move to the other side of the country away from my parents and get a neovagina and get fucked a lot by men who are willing to call me a woman. And that's-- okay. That's fine."
"....your shoulders went all tense again when you said that. You were relaxed before."
"I think I'm supposed to object to this but I'm just really happy you're paying attention to me."
"I love you. Also it's sort of hard to not notice how tense your shoulders are because I'm on top of them."
"You'd be surprised at how unobservant people who are on top of me can be!"
He kisses Lev's cheek and his shoulder and his neck. "I love you very much."
"Love you too."
"I should take a closer look at your clothes, some of it might go together if I try really hard and some of the dresses might have nice colors or patterns."
"Is my taste in clothes really that bad?"
"The clothes you wear in public are fine, but — I think the actual thing is that you're optimizing for sexy and don't have any practice or outside input in terms of choosing women's clothes that look good on you."
"I mean, I do really really want to be sexy."
"Right, but optimizing for sexy with no sense of what looks good in practice rather than seeming hot in theory tends to look like you raided the slutty whatever section of a costume shop."
"I always sort of thought that the problem was that they were designed for girls and I am-- not."
"Nope. The problem is that you have a French maid outfit in with your day-glo lingerie and dresses with holes cut out of the boobs. It has nothing at all to do with what you look like, nobody looks good in those unless they're a model."
"Or a French maid."
"I think most maids in France just wear normal clothes, actually."
"You're ruining all my dreams."
"Love you too."
"We can look at my clothes and see if there's anything that's, uh, salvageable."
"Yeah." He kisses Lev's head and then drags himself out of bed.
Lev bounces a bit. It is exciting to maybe get to wear sexy clothes in front of his boyfriend (his boyfriend!!!!).
Alright.
So there was a leather miniskirt, is there anything else vaguely punk and/or goth in this box?
There are fishnets, and a black mesh top, and a black and red underbust corset.
Fishnets and a leather miniskirt and a mesh top, that works fine — how about colorful tights, does he have those?
He does not have any colorful tights!
Eh, it'll work.
"This would look better if you had a long-sleeved shirt under the mesh and colorful tights under the fishnets, but it'll work fine," Sasha says, and hands Lev what he's got.
"Should I have a bra?"
"A tank top is fine."
She grabs a pair of panties and a tank top, strips down, and puts on the clothes Sasha gave her.
"Do I look okay?"
"It's cute. If we weren't going to try other, less goth-looking things I'd add heavy eyeliner."
She bounces. "Take a picture!"
He does, and shows it to her.
She's adorable and smiley and happy.
"I look okay!"
"You look gorgeous."
"I'm not sure I would go that far. --Can I try on something else?"
"Well, I would." Is there anything else that seems like a likely pair.
Some of the pink and floral things aren't godawful.
"This is.... less of a match but it's a shot, anyway."
"I know it's silly but I like the flowers. They make me feel pretty."
Oh no that's adorable. "I can find you flowers."
Bounce bounce bounce.
"Flowers I'll look okay in?"
"Flowers that don't look like they're a carpet print even a little bit," Sasha says, and kisses her.
"Flowers and sparkly things and lace and bright colors and pink."
"Yes. All of that. You're so cute and I love you so much."
"You should kiss me."
Sasha kisses her.
He's gentle about it, his hands soft in her hair; he doesn't bite.
"You shouldn't dress me up," Leia says, "I like it too much."
She's very clearly hard.
"That sounds like an invitation to dress you up more." He kisses her again. "And I think you're enjoying it the perfect amount."
"I'm going to suggest something and then you should talk me into it."
"Yeah?"
"Paint my fingernails a color."
"Absolutely — it'll be pretty and you'll look down at your hands and be happy about it all week —"
"But I can't, because my parents will find out and get mad at me, and it's not professional, and it's a fetish thing and it's wrong to walk around all day with polish on my fingernails when I know I'm going to go home that night and jerk off about how hot it was to get to be feminine even a little bit."
"Your parents won't find out unless you see them or you tell them, and it isn't unprofessional to wear nail polish although it's a little bit unprofessional to have chipped nail polish, and walking around with nail polish on isn't hurting anybody and nobody is getting involved in your fetish and nobody knows it even is your fetish."
"Except you and you think it's hot."
"Yes. Except me and I think it's hot."
Her leg is shaking.
"I'm nervous. --Maybe do black? Black is a guy color."
He hugs her.
"I can do black. I can also do green, if you'd rather."
"I'd rather red, but I'm kind of terrified!"
"Green is a guy color too, and it'll be colorful, you love color —"
"Okay."
Her legs are both shaking.
He sits her down and kisses her before he takes out the nail polish and starts.
She makes quiet little whimpery noises while he paints her nails.
She's so good he loves her so much —
"Now I have to hold still while they dry," she complains. "This is awful."
"I could read to you?"
"That sounds good." She sighs. "I was going to be like 'or you could eat me out' but then I remembered."
"I'm sorry about — everything." He looks up a fanfic he'd liked and that soesnt require much context and reads out loud.
She closes her eyes and lies back and lets the words float over her.
He finishes the story and starts a stream of my good girl my sweet girl my beautiful thing I love you I've got you —
Do you want Leia to start writhing around and moaning without even being touched? Because that is how you get Leia writing around and moaning without even being touched,
(She's careful with her fingernails.)
That wasn't the intent but now that that's happening he certainly isn't going to stop.
Leia does not know what Sasha expected from putting her in a leather miniskirt and a mesh top, painting her nails, and calling her a good girl.
That's fair — good girl sweet girl pretty girl his beautiful thing —
Her breath hitches and she bites her lip.
Gorgeous.
Maybe he should be kissing her.
He should. He should definitely be kissing her.
"Mmmmmmmmmlove-- oh god--love-- oh---"
"I love you too," he murmurs against her neck, kisses down her throat.
Gosh. Sasha has a thigh. She can grind up against it.
She sure can. He won't stop kissing her while she does that; he will move his thigh so she can get a better angle.
Grinding up against Sasha's thigh makes her feel like a horny little slut, which makes her want to grind up on his thigh more. It's a good system.
"My good girl my precious thing my pretty slutty girl — I love you — I've got you —"
Her hands find Sasha's hair and she pulls.
The praise stops abruptly, replaced with a long, drawn-out moan.
That totally works.
"I think I'd like being a domme," she says, "as long as I get to wear the totally impractical boots."
"Who'd stop you, the sub?"
"I mean you could be like 'I don't know, Le-- Leia, ridiculous thigh-high boots with high heels actually really turn me off. They are so impractical."
"I am not particularly turned on or off by high-heeled boots but you might want to practice walking in them, it's harder than it looks."
"I dunno, I think if I were wearing them I'd have a Sasha to fetch me things."
She pulls his hair again.
He tries to say 'You might still want to be able to stand up,' but what he actually says is "Ah — Leia —"
"You're nice to hurt." Biting!
A series of short whimpery noises. His head falls back.
She keeps pulling her hair, keeps biting, whispers, "I love you, you're mine."
"I love you, I love you, I'm yours, all yours."
"Maybe I also like it without the boots."
"I'm glad," and he ducks his head and presses into her hand.
Well then she can keep pulling his hair, can't she.
Yeah — yeah she can —
Leia is going to keep kissing him and pulling his hair and thrusting up against his thigh until he comes up with a better plan.
That sounds like a perfectly good plan.
Then they can keep doing it!
Yeah. Yeah, they can.
This was a great way to spend the morning.
It was.
But eventually Leia has to put on men's clothes and go to class.
Sasha kisses her goodbye and then goes home.
She can't stop staring at her fingernails as she takes notes.
She keeps waiting for someone to comment. There are a few odd glances but no one says anything.
Thrift shopping without Leia there would be way harder logistically than he wants to figure out but he isn't going to stop browsing fabric stores anytime soon. (It's been much too long since he had a real project — God he misses doing theater — that train of thought won't lead him anywhere he wants to go.)
Leia finishes her class and studies and grades and doesn't message Sasha even though her hand keeps reaching to her phone.
(Don't be clingy, don't be pathetic-- he has things in his life that aren't you even if you don't have anything in your life that isn't him--)
He does his best to do his homework for a few hours and doesn't get very far and then texts Leia.
hey
He makes a very undignified happy noise.
hey!
how was class 💚
A heart!!!!
He texts back:
I kept getting distracted and staring at my nails.
He pauses and thinks about it and then very quickly types before he can think better of it:
<3
<3!
I love you lots
how was your class and stuff
it was fine I guess
I did an entire english homework. in geo when I was supposed to be taking notes but it's whatever
oh well
need help?
with English? nah
I can have opinions about books just fine it's the sitting down and getting stuff done I have a hard time with
Okay. He doesn't want to hang out with you right now. That's-- fine. It's fine. It's not like you're his only source of happiness in the world.
I would tell you to schedule an appointment at student health services but maybe it would work better if I scheduled the appointment and then took you to the appointment at the correct time
thatd be sweet of you <3
unrelatedly do you want to do a thing. watch a movie or go thrift shopping or something
He buries his face into his hands and eventually manages to type:
yes
always
yay!!
thrift shopping is fun and I bet you've never had a chance to do the fun version and I want to show you
Bounce bounce bounce.
we can watch a movie
not everything has to be about my fetish
bold of you to assume I wouldn't be getting stuff for myself too
but yeah movie sounds good
what kinds of movies do you like. how do I not know this
I mean we can go shopping if you want to we just don't have to
uh
promise you won't laugh at me
babe I like donnie darko and disney descendants I have no right to laugh at anyone
I don't know what that second thing is
I like children's movies mostly. and really bad horror
disney channel movie. the plot and setting are a hot mess but the characters are endearing and the relationships are [kisses fingers to the wind like an Italian chef]
kids movies are g11 and bad horror is always fun
my taste in fiction is usually pretty bad
I am aware but I can't stop myself
oh good that'll be a nice change
(gwen's taste runs toward the unbearably pretentious. dead poet's society is a good movie but I do not want to watch it every sleepover)
I'm not pretentious! I am the opposite of pretentious! I like it when blood spurts everywhere and when the priest waves a crucifix at the monster and then the monster eats their hand
HELLA
oh no you're encouraging me
tbc when we actually watch horror movies they're mostly going to be horror movies I've.... heard of
which means like 95% Stephen King adaptations
aw okay
I can't convince you to watch some of my favorite obscure ones
I said mostly!!!!!!
I love you
best boyfriend ever
...
wait I have a boyfriend does that mean I'm queer now???? I feel like this is a somewhat complicated situation??????
I think even if you are Technically Straight, you're a kinky crossdresser dating a gay guy and that makes you an Honorary Queer
I mean, I definitely don't want to explain to everyone who might ask "actually, I'm straight, I have a boyfriend for complicated reasons related to my gross paraphilia and also because he's sweet and funny and awesome"
but I don't want to... appropriate? queerness? since I am technically straight?
this was a lot easier when I was just getting guys to fuck me in the ass
possible answers if it comes up include "it's complicated," "my boyfriend says I'm an honorary queer," "I'm queering the queer/not-queer binary," and "what are you, a cop"
okay
love you <3
love you <33333
I'd come over but I don't actually know where your room is
Sasha texts him his address and six green hearts.
Eeeeeeeee!
He puts on silky panties and the pants and shirt that make him want to die the least and comes over.
Is Sasha's roommate there?
He is not!
Sasha's side of the room is colorful; his sheets are bright green and there's a sewing kit and a half-finished embroidery project on his desk.
Bounce bounce bounce.
"I like your room."
There is subtext. Probably Sasha can pick up on it.
He sure can. "I like it too! My old room was this dark forest green but you can't really paint the walls here, I miss it." He and Lev should be kissing.
This is a good decision on Sasha's part.
Perhaps they should be on the bed and kissing.
They definitely should be.
"Disadvantages of being a grad student: I can't paint the walls at my place either."
"Oh no." Lev is here! And on his bed! And snuggleable! "What color would they be if you could?"
"Depends on whether I'd end up showing them to anybody who isn't you."
"Pink, then?"
"I am very predictable."
"You are. I love you." A kiss on the tip of his nose.
"Probably if I actually had some pink things I would have less of a drive for everything to be pink."
"Probably. But it's also just a pretty color. — we should find you, like, posters of sunrises or something, so you can have some color without worrying about what it looks like to people."
"I mean, I legitimately do like colors but-- I think I mostly like them because they're girly and feminine? And so if it doesn't look girly and feminine at all it wouldn't feel nice in the same way."
"A calendar with flowers might still help but that makes sense."
"That would be really great."
He kisses her. "I love you. And I love the face you make when I say things like that, you go all soft and happy."
She wiggles.
"I like that you approve of me."
"I'm genuinely not sure why I wouldn't!" Hugs? Hugs. "And also I love when you wiggle. Getting to see you happy is very good."
"The only other person I dated who did was Faye!"
Leia needs snuggling. "What was Faye like?"
"Well, we had a really great relationship for about two months, and then we had sex where I ate her out a bunch until she had a ton of orgasms and she didn't touch me at all, and she was like 'that was really nice!', and then a week later she told me that she'd realized she was a lesbian."
"....I'm glad you got to have that."
"I was sort of expecting you to go 'gah!'"
"You don't like being touched, and she didn't try to touch you, and you said the relationship was great, and I'm glad you got to have that? I am a little bit going gah but mostly it's that that's the best relationship you had, not that you had a relationship that looked like that."
"Well, now this is!"
"I am happy to be the best relationship you've ever had even if I am concerned about where that bar is set!"
"I'm just bad at people."
"Seems like people are also pretty bad at you. I think you're wonderful at people, or at least you're wonderful at me."
"You're easy to be wonderful to! --What about you?"
"What about me?"
"People you've dated, I guess."
He thinks about it.
"One of the years I did theater I was Mercutio and I was dating the guy who played Tybalt, he was sweet and really good at choreographed swordfights. There was the guy I broke up with because I couldn't stand his Shakespeare opinions, there was the guy I broke up with because he had dated a multi orgasmic girl and thought everyone could and should come three times a session, there was the guy who broke up with me when my parents caught us, there were a couple others."
"...If he had a dick surely he was aware of the concept of refractory periods."
"My hypothesis is that he had previously been one of those straight guys who makes 'good in bed' a bragging point and forgets to consider that different people want different things, plus he was convinced that if I only wanted one orgasm it was because I hadn't enjoyed myself the first time and just didn't want to hurt his feelings, and this combined disastrously. But I dont know for sure because I dumped him after the second time had sex."
"That sounds like a good decision."
"I thought so too." He pets Leia's hair.
She says with very careful casualness, "are you sleeping with anybody else now?"
"Nope. Just you."
She's not relieved! Relieved is a thing she is not.
(Why is she so bad at lying to herself?)
"Why? It's really easy to sleep with guys."
"....because if I wanted to have sex with someone really urgently you're right there? Also because dating two people sounds like a lot of time investment and also also because you're the first person I've slept with since my parents found out about the thing."
Sasha needs a hug.
"Want to talk about it?"
"The things that actually hurt were not doing theater and the threats, I still had my friends."
Leia hugs him.
"None of that should have happened."
"I love you." He presses his forehead into her shoulder.
"Were they like 'probably it's the theater that made you gay' or something?"
"No, they just suddenly got really invested in me being more gender conforming."
"You should be allowed to be as gender-non-conforming as you want."
"Thank you."
Leia kisses him.
Sasha kisses her.
"I've slept with a lot of guys."
"Okay." The way he's holding her doesn't change. "— oh, is that what the San Francisco thing is about."
"Yep. Can't accidentally run into someone I know if I'm halfway across the country."
"Makes sense," he says, and puts his head on her shoulder.
"It was nice. I could put a picture of myself in a skirt on Grindr and line up four guys and get fucked all day."
Nuzzle. "I'm glad you liked it."
Nuzzle. "I like you better. Is that weird?"
"Nope. Lots of people prefer sex with people they know."
"When I was sleeping with guys before it was hot because they were calling me a girl but I didn't... really... like the sex itself that much? Because they were men? But I actually do like having sex with you. It's kind of confusing."
He pets her, very gentle. "Maybe it's that I'm just really girly, or maybe it's that you don't like sex with people you aren't dating and thought that was not liking sex with men, or maybe something weird is happening."
She thinks about it.
"I... think it's probably the second thing?"
"I'm glad you have me, then," he says, and snuggles her.
"I... guess I'm actually bi?"
"It sounds like it," he agrees.
"Did you know and you were humoring me."
"...yeah, kinda, the faces you made at me did not seem particularly heterosexual but directly arguing seemed like it wasn't going to help."
He looks a little bit like he is going to throw up.
"...I don't want to believe false things about myself."
"I'm sorry. If something comes up again I can argue with you about it."
"It's fine. It's my job to have accurate beliefs about myself, not yours."
....it clearly isn't fine but Sasha doesn't know how to argue about this.
"--I mean I'm upset but mostly I'm upset at myself? Because I should have noticed before I actually did, since you noticed."
"That makes sense." He kisses her shoulder. "I love you."
"I-- want to believe true things and not false things, that is like the most important fact about me, and the most important thing to be right about is myself."
"That makes sense," he says again, because he can't think of anything else to say.
"Are you okay? Sorry."
"I'm fine, I'm just not sure what to say so I'm repeating the same vaguely affirming phrase over and over."
Lev kisses him. "It's fine. I'm a bi dude now, I guess."
"Yeah." Kissing Lev is really nice.
"--Fuck. I'm going to have to tell my parents."
"— is there some reason you can't not tell them?"
"Well, if I tell them, then they won't ever be proud of me and I get to stop trying?"
.......................you know what okay sure.
"That makes a surprising amount of sense," Sasha says, and kisses Lev. "I'm sorry about everything."
"Maybe not yet. But. I really like you. And if I am still dating you six months from now and I still like you as much as I do right now, I wouldn't want to lie to my parents and claim that you're not important to me."
"You're a sweetheart and I love you and — I was going to say I hope it goes better for you than it did for me but you're over eighteen, they literally can't threaten to send you to ex-gay camp —"
"They did that?!"
"They didn't actually wind up sending me anywhere but the threat was made."
"I want to keep you safe."
"...I love you." He squeezes Lev's hand. "And I'm an adult, they can't send me anywhere and I don't have to be around them often and pretending doesn't hurt much."
He doesn't say, "if I drop out I can probably pay for you to go to school."
He says, "I'm glad."
He doesn't know what to say so he snuggles up to Lev instead.
"Movie?"
"Yeah. Movie. — what do you want to watch, I think I'm currently more in the mood for kids movies than horror —"
Lev is going to list off movies until he gets to one he's mortally offended that Sasha hasn't seen.
Then they can watch The Princess and the Frog while cuddling on Sasha's bed.
His boyfriend is SO GOOD.
He is moderately concerned that there might be some preconditions for being gay. Maybe there is required reading. Does he have to own a rainbow flag. Or go to meetings. Or be proud of himself.
Sasha can come up with required reading if he wants it but it'll be like ninety percent poetry.
"There should be a conversion process where a rabbi of gayness says 'no' to you three times."
"That's adorable but there definitely should not."
"It seems weird that I get to be bi just by saying so!"
"You get to be bi by loving me! By any sane standard that's enough!"
"I should email Faye and tell her I'm bi now. She'd be so excited."
"Cute."
But right now they are going to snuggle.
Yes. Right now they are going to snuggle and maybe they should have fewer clothes on.
That is an excellent idea.
(Leia keeps her panties on.)
She's so good and he loves her so much and — she didn't mind the pillow, probably if they just grind against each other that'll be fine —
That's--
(--Sasha is rubbing his dick against her clit, she's rubbing her vulva up against him, his dick could slip down and then push inside her vagina and then he'd be inside her--)
--more than fine.
Good.
"Talk to me?"
Yeah — he can do that —
"My good girl, my beautiful girl, you're so warm, you're so good, so pretty all mine I love you so much," and he presses his face into Leia's shoulder and kisses her neck.
She's too turned on to self-censor--
"Talk about my pussy?"
Howwwwwww does he do that. "It's so good — you're so hot and so wet for me, my good girl, my slutty girl, I love fucking you, I love feeling you —"
She bites her lip and finishes and stares up at Sasha like he's the most wonderful person in the world.
"I love you," and he bites down on her shoulder when he comes, and then he goes limp against her chest.