Archive of Our Own

Drip.

Izumi winces and looks up, the little droplet sliding down his cheek. Another drop plinks against his forehead, and he frowns. The forecast said it would be sunny today—where the hell’s he supposed to get an umbrella now?

Drip. Drop. Drop.

And then a torrent of rain unleashes from the heavens and comes pounding down around him.

“Shit!” He tries to cover his head with his arm, but as he feared, it’s all in vain. He’s gotta get out of here—and fast, before the rain ruins his perfectly styled hair, before the rain soaks through his clothes, before he catches a damn cold.

His eyes dart around and land on the nearest building—that old dormitory no one uses anymore. Whatever, it works. And this way, no one will see him drenched and shivering.

So he positively books it across the pavement, not stopping until he’s ripped open the door and stormed inside. Little drops of rain plip plop off his fingers and to the floor, puddling around his feet, and he rolls his eyes.

“So annoying…” He leans his head back against the door and lets out a breath.

A sudden bang in the distance has him shooting up straight again.

“Hello…?” he calls into the empty hall. This area of the dorms is eerily quiet following the noise, and Izumi takes a shaky step forward.

Thinking about it logically, of course there’s bound to be someone else here taking shelter from the rain. He can’t possibly be the only one in ES caught unprepared by a shitty weather forecast. So it’s probably just another idol.

There’s a squeak—a thud. And Izumi’s heart pounds.

“Shut up,” he growls to his cardiovascular system. There’s no reason for such a stupid response.

But he’s sure he can hear some unintelligible muttering over the rhythmic drumming of the rain against the building. He can’t place the voice over the rumble of distant thunder, so he takes another step forward despite all his instincts telling him to run away. He’s never been good at listening to authority, anyway.

The muttering gets louder as he gets closer, and Izumi feels in his gut that he recognizes the voice. He tries narrowing it down, counting off names in his head, but—

The building shakes with the vibrations of a sudden peal of thunder, and Izumi’s thoughts spill out of his head like the droplets of rain trailing after him.

He turns a corner.

He blinks.

There’s a girl there, curled up against the wall with her knees to her chest. Her face is buried, short blonde hair falling over her legs in thick, tangled clumps.

Since when were girls allowed in the dorms?

“Uh, hello?” he asks, and if his voice sounds weird he doesn’t question it—just the rain, he tells himself.

The girl looks up, blue glasses askew on her face, choppy wet bangs clinging to her forehead. Her eyebrows are knitted together, her frown deep and confused.

And Izumi mirrors her expression because—because her clothes look almost exactly like—

“Yuu-kun?” he asks, and when his voice pitches up at the end it’s a shrill soprano.

“Huh?” the girl responds, pushing off the wall and onto her knees. Her white undershirt clings to her thin body, but the khaki button-up hangs loose from her chest, swaying a bit as she moves.

Izumi looks away.

“Uh, sorry,” he says, glancing back at her out of the corner of his eye. What an uncanny resemblance… “You just. You look like someone I know.”

The girl shakes her head—then pauses, a hand reaching up to her face and grabbing at the hair there, two fingers twirling the strands between them. She looks back at Izumi. “Izumi-san?”

Izumi jumps a little and clears his throat. “Uh, yeah? Are you a fan or something?”

“What? No—” The girl struggles to stand up, and when they come eye to eye, Izumi realizes she isn’t as short as he assumed she’d be. If anything, she’s even a bit taller than him. “Are you—are you Izumi-san?”

The girl takes a step forward, and Izumi takes a step back. “Of course I am, who did you think I—?”

He cuts off when he finally processes that weird quality in his voice, when he finally processes the weight that falls down his back, when he finally processes exactly why this girl looks so damn familiar.

He looks down at himself and wishes he hadn’t.

“Holy sh—!” He clamps a hand over his mouth when that soprano returns, and his arm flies over his chest, trying desperately to flatten the bulge that’s appeared there. In his panic, his hair tumbles over his shoulders—over his shoulders!—and into his line of vision, and he can see the full extent of the knotty, thick silver locks that twist together and wind down and down and down his frontside.

“Izumi-san, calm down!” the girl says, and Izumi refuses to call her by name because that would mean—that would mean—

“It’s me, Yuuki Makoto!” Makoto says, gripping Izumi’s shoulders so tightly and getting so close to him that in any other situation he’d be over the moon. “So just—calm down a bit!”

Any other situation, sure, but right now his mind is screaming, his panic rising, and he can’t think of anything else except for the mounds on his chest—the ridiculously long hair on his head—the high-pitched lilt in his voice—the—

“Y–Yuu-kun,” he dares to say even as Makoto guides him toward the wall and forces him to slide down to the floor. “What—what’s—?”

“You think I know?” Makoto says, sparing a glance down at himself then quickly, quickly returning it to Izumi’s face. “I–I was just taking shelter from the rain, and then—”

“And then?” Izumi cringes at the sound of his own voice.

Makoto gestures up and down at him. “And then you came around the corner looking like—like that!”

“You, too,” Izumi says, unable to even breathe as he takes in Makoto’s appearance, from the gentle slopes of his face to the short bob that frames it. “You look like that, too.”

“Y–yeah, I know.” He swallows visibly. “But this isn’t the time to freak out about that.”

Izumi gives him a look. “Then when, pray tell, is the right time to freak out? I’m pretty sure this is exactly when we’re supposed to do that!”

Makoto stares back. “Then you freak out enough for the both of us—not like you’re not already doing that. I’m going to try and figure out what to do about it.”

“What to do?!” Izumi shouts over the rain, his brain shutting off as soon as he tries considering that question. “What even is there to do? We’re—we’re girls, Yuu-kun—!”

“I get it!” Makoto clamps a tiny, slender hand over Izumi’s tiny, slender shoulder. “Be quiet a sec, I’m trying to think.”

Izumi forces his mouth closed—not that he enjoyed the sound of this voice in the first place.

After a few seconds that span an eternity, Makoto wrinkles up his nose and looks around. “Let’s… stay here for now. I’ll let the rest of Trickstar know I can’t come to practice, at least. And—it’s better no one sees us like this.”

All Izumi can do is nod. What Makoto says is right, logical. Don’t focus on the problem, focus on the solution. Right. Right.

“Izumi-san.” Makoto’s voice is gentle when he speaks, and in this new, strange, feminine voice of his, he almost sounds adoring, reverent. Izumi tries hard not to dwell on that. “Do you have anything going on with Knights today? Any jobs?”

“No,” he whispers, and he’s sure Makoto can’t hear him over the rain even with their proximity. So he shakes his head and pretends he can’t feel long hair rustling against his back, tickling his arm, with each motion. “No, we’re taking a break between jobs.”

Makoto sighs and pulls out his phone. “Good. I’ll just make something up, then. Do you wanna wait here while I go look around? There’s gotta be somewhere more comfortable for us to hang out.”

Makoto is already pushing himself up—Izumi panics and reaches out, grabbing onto his wrist. It’s small, unfamiliar, yet comfortable all the same. It’s still Makoto, after all. He’s not alone in this, and Makoto’s here for him.

“Izumi-san?”

“I’ll… I’m coming with you.” Don’t leave me alone is the unspoken plea that Makoto seems to pick up on—because of course he does. Because for all of Izumi’s nagging and all of Makoto’s protest, they still know each other the best.

So Makoto nods and helps him up, and Izumi takes those first shaky steps hand in hand with him.

When Izumi wakes up, his first thought is that he can’t remember going to sleep. But he must have, or that’d defeat the purpose of waking up. So he accepts that reality and focuses on other things instead. Like the soft breathing on the other side of the room.

He can’t quite place it, but it doesn’t sound like Kiryu or Isara. And come to think of it, the bed he’s in doesn’t feel like his bed.

He opens his eyes.

Ah, right. He’d hoped it had been a nightmare; he’d hoped all of it was some delusion or hallucination or something. He’d take mental illness over whatever the hell that was any day.

But no, it’s real, and he’s still in the dusty room Makoto had managed to discover unlocked in the old dorm. He’s still crammed in this tiny bunk without sheets or anything like some squatter. He’s still—

He looks down.

He flies upright, knocking his head against the top bunk with a bang that echoes off the walls. He grimaces and groans, fingers knotting into his hair to rub the forming bump, and jumps out of the bed despite the pain.

“Yuu-kun!” he shouts, launching himself across the room to the other bunk where Makoto is still sleeping. And god he looks so cute, so gentle and vulnerable in this peaceful state, but—but that’ll have to wait. “Yuu-kun!”

Makoto just barely opens his eyes into a squint when Izumi starts shaking him. “Wha…? Izumi-san…?”

Izumi wants to dwell on how soft his groggy voice is, but—“Yuu-kun, we’re back!”

To prove his point, or perhaps to indulge himself in a rare moment, he pushes his fingers through Makoto’s hair and lifts it up to show him how short it is. He pats at his own blissfully flat chest, heaving a sigh of relief.

“We’re back,” he repeats, staring down at Makoto’s boyish, handsome face.

Makoto looks up at Izumi, then down, then settles on himself before closing his eyes and letting out a breath. “Oh, thank god.”

Izumi bounces on the bed once, jostling Makoto around like some kind of ragdoll. “Yuu-kun! Come on, let’s get out of here!”

Makoto peeks an eye open, unimpressed, and tries to roll over. “Gimme like… five minutes to wake up.”

Izumi groans. “Absolutely not. First of all, this is no place for beauty sleep.” He tugs on Makoto’s arm and drags him across the bed, pulling him along as he climbs out of it and into the open air of the tiny room. Makoto comes with, reluctantly but unavoidably, and then crashes into a heap on the floor.

He groans and curls into a ball.

“Yuu-kun…” Izumi sighs and runs a hand through his hair, unable to stop the little flutter of elation that tickles his chest at everything being back to normal, at being alone with Makoto, at getting to take care of him like this. “Come on, it’s probably past eight already.”

Makoto groans louder.

Izumi rolls his eyes and steps over him to the sliding door at the far end of the room. There isn’t too much light out, but when he looks up he realizes it’s because of the dark clouds covering the sky. Tiny, spindly drops of rain pitter-patter against the window and trail down the glass, forming a little creek that runs along the pane.

“It’s drizzling,” he says. “But it’s light enough that we won’t get too wet.”

“Can’t we wait for it to let up, then?” Makoto complains from the floor.

Izumi shakes his head even though he knows Makoto isn’t looking. “It’s probably just going to get worse from here out; it’s the rainy season, after all. And I am so not letting myself get drenched again.”

“Fine.” Makoto lets out one final groan, something long and pitiful, and when Izumi glances over his shoulder he can see him stretching out and fumbling around for some kind of purchase to pull himself up. Izumi offers his hand, and they fit together too perfectly for him to simply ignore.

“I don’t care what you do after this,” he huffs as he hoists Makoto up, “but we at least have to get out of this place before someone finds us.”

“That’s true,” Makoto says between a yawn. He lifts his arms high above his head and stretches—up, left, right, out. His hair is disheveled and his shirt is wrinkled in every unflattering way possible, and yet Izumi’s traitorous heart still pounds in his chest when he takes him in.

He turns away to grab Makoto’s glasses—to hide the way heat creeps up to his cheeks. “Here. Let’s get going.”

“Thanks.” Makoto takes the glasses and fixes them on his face before reaching out to pull on Izumi’s still-outstretched arm. “C’mon, it’s probably too early for anyone to be wandering around—or at least anyone who would care enough.”

Izumi lets out a wordless noise of protest, but Makoto pays him no mind, not even bothering to look over his shoulder to make sure Izumi is following. And just where did he get that confidence from, anyway?

But… even so, he does. He lets Makoto pull him along without any further protest, and he only briefly wonders when they got so comfortable with this setup before the thought flies from his mind like little rain clouds rolling through. Besides, he reasons, from here he gets to look at Makoto all he wants; it’s not a bad position to be in at all.

So the door clicks shut behind them and they turn a corner, following the length of the hall until the door is in sight. Izumi listens for the sound of rain beating against the roof, and when it’s pleasantly quiet he figures they’re good to go. They’re going to get out of this mess and put it all behind them and next time he goes out, he’ll bring a damn umbrella with him.

Makoto’s steps falter, and then he comes to a halt, a hand feeling its way up his chest. “Ah…”

“Yuu-kun?” He grabs onto him and forces them to stand face-to-face, his eyes searching for something amiss.

“Uh, no, sorry.” Makoto waves Izumi’s hand away, but a frown set deep on his face remains. “I just—I feel a little funny.”

“Funny? Is it because we skipped dinner? Or—” He breaks off because he gets it. His heart pounds and there’s a weird pressure in his chest and his vision seems to waver and shift and he gets it and—

All at once, like a sneeze that sneaks up too suddenly, something bursts out of him, and when he blinks, he’s staring at that strangely familiar blonde girl again, her bob grazing against her too-slender shoulders and her glasses endearingly big for her face.

It inspires a fear inside Izumi that creeps up his chest and into his throat, slithering and thick and slimy, and he doesn’t dare look down—he knows.

“Izumi-san…” Makoto says in a too-high voice.

He tries to fight down the fear, tries to bite it back before it spills onto the floor around them. He clamps his jaw shut and shakes his head, his too-long hair whipping around him.

“We—we need to do something about this, Izumi-san,” Makoto says, and even his voice seems diluted and distant under the sea of anxiety drowning him. Makoto shakes him, the pressure of his fingers clenched around his arms both numbing and reassuring him. “Izumi-san!”

“Okay!” he exclaims, bursting out of the deep waters for air. “But what?! What can we even do about this?”

Makoto looks off into the distance as he thinks. “Maybe we should tell someone—”

“No.”

“Huh?”

Izumi stands his ground, folding his arms across his chest—then deciding better of it. His fingers fumble with the hem of his shirt instead. “No. Absolutely not. I don’t want anyone seeing me—seeing us—like this. No.”

Makoto scoffs. “But—”

“No,” he repeats. “No one can know about this. It’s too—too—”

“I get it,” Makoto says, and his touch is warm and comforting, melting little shavings of ice from Izumi’s resolution. “But there’s no way we can handle this on our own. For one, Trickstar has a live coming up. I can’t just not go to practice. I can’t just not perform. What if this happens again?”

“It won’t—”

Makoto stares hard at him. Izumi shuts up.

“We need someone else helping us, Izumi-san.” Makoto squeezes his arm again, and Izumi crumbles beneath the pressure. “Even if it’s just someone to cover for us until things get back to—to normal, or something.”

“Sena Izumi.”

Izumi nods.

“And Yuuki Makoto.”

Beside him, Makoto mimics the motion.

Tenshouin hums and taps his fingers together.

“Well, I’m sure weirder things have happened,” Aoba tries, the calm smile on his lips not even coming close to matching the atmosphere around him.

“Is that supposed to be a joke?” Izumi deadpans. Makoto tugs on his sleeve, as if to try and keep him from launching across the table at them. Izumi settles back in his chair with a begrudging sigh and slams his foot into the leg of the table, grimacing when his too-small foot slides around inside the shoe.

“Now, now.” Tenshouin smiles a little too brightly and rests his chin on his hands. “There’s no reason to get worked up, Sena-kun. Or perhaps I should call you Sena-chan?”

“Try it and we’ll see how long you survive,” Izumi spits. He tosses his hair back over his shoulder and glares daggers at Tenshouin.

Makoto groans. “Can you calm down, Izumi-san? We want them to help us, remember?”

“It’s exactly as Yuuki-kun says.” Tenshouin smirks, the sparkle in his eye never waning. “And I can’t say I feel like being helpful right now.”

Izumi growls.

“Please ignore him, Tenshouin-senpai!” Makoto pushes himself up in his seat, hair flying into his mouth as he bursts forward. “He’s just pissed off because of—well, this whole thing.”

He gestures at his own body, the gentle curves and ill-fitting clothes and long hair and tiny everything. A certain anger wells up in Izumi’s chest and he wants nothing more than to get up and shield Makoto from Aoba’s and Tenshouin’s prying eyes, their passive, predaceous gazes—But he’s in the same situation as Makoto right now. He can’t do anything.

Makoto clamps down on Izumi’s shoulder and squeezes. A warning, a quiet plea. “You guys are our direct line of contact with the higher-ups at ES, so if you can help cover for us if… this ever happens again, we’d appreciate it. It’s not like we can do this ourselves, so—!”

Aoba’s smile is gentle, pitying. Izumi frowns. “It’s fine, Yuuki-kun. We can help you out. Right, Eichi-kun?”

“Hm?” Tenshouin blinks owlishly and looks over them both, a calculating look in his eye. “Can is quite different from will, Tsumugi.”

Rage explodes in Izumi’s chest; Izumi explodes in his seat. He lunges across the table, his arms just short enough that he can’t reach all the way across it and throttle Tenshouin to death. “Excuse me—?!”

“Izumi-san!” Two arms wrap around his waist, a chest pressed against his back. Makoto pulls at him, but even though Izumi falters and loses balance, he doesn’t let up.

Aoba flounders too, his mouth falling open. “Eichi-kun, wait! Don’t you want to help them?”

“I don’t see any particular advantages to it,” Tenshouin says with a flippant wave of his hand, as if Izumi isn’t trying to kill him in this very moment. “It isn’t as if I have all the free time in the world to hide two women on ES grounds, after all. And think: If either of us got caught doing so, the press would be in an uproar. No one is going to believe the truth about this.”

Aoba’s face falls. “That’s true, but…”

“Helping them comes with a great risk to ourselves. Bear in mind that our reputations are our very lives. I already walk too fine a line between life and death to willingly push myself off that tightrope.”

Makoto jerks Izumi back again, and they both tumble backwards into Izumi’s seat.

Izumi looks down at them, at their position, at the way their clothes are too big for them and the way he can still see every part of Makoto’s body—and his own, as he sits firmly on Makoto’s lap.

Heat springs to his cheeks, and he looks away.

Tenshouin chuckles. “My, Sena-kun, I must say I’m quite jealous of you right now.”

Makoto squeaks and leans back behind Izumi to avoid the daring quirk of Tenshouin’s lips, the knowing slant of his eyes.

“Can it, Tenshouin,” Izumi manages to squeeze out through his teeth. He ignores the way Makoto clings to him and the way every part of him is so different from usual and the way he feels so vulnerable under Tenshouin’s scrutinizing gaze. “Leave Yuu-kun alone.”

Tenshouin hums. “I was under the impression that you wanted me to help you.”

Makoto peeks out over Izumi’s shoulder. “We do, but…”

“Are you afraid of me, Yuuki-kun?” Tenshouin’s smile widens just a hair. “There’s no need for that. Come, let’s talk this out man to man.”

Izumi scowls. “You’re doing that on purpose.”

“I can’t deny that.” His lips curl back into a quick, toothy grin, and then it falls again into a thin, serious line, as if it had never existed at all. “In any case, I have a proposal for you two.”

“A proposal?” Aoba says, flipping through some documents before him. “I don’t remember anything about that.”

“I’ve just thought of it,” is his explanation. “Yuuki-kun, Sena-kun. You understand the risk we take by sheltering you, yes?”

Makoto nods into Izumi’s shoulder. “Yeah. I know this is a whole lot to ask, but there’s no one else we can turn to here. Our entire lives come to a halt if we—if we look like this. We’re idols; we are the product. We can’t work like this.”

“Mm, yes, that is true.” Tenshouin gazes at them again, as if he were picking them apart with his eyes. “You can’t perform as Yuuki Makoto and Sena Izumi when you clearly don’t look like either of them.”

Izumi narrows his eyes. “What’re you trying to get at here…?”

“I’m saying,” Tenshouin says, sitting back in his chair as if it were already a done deal, “that I’ll scratch your back, but only if you scratch mine.”

Izumi’s lips curl up as he fights off that mental image. “Thanks, but no thanks. I don’t want my manicure anywhere near your back.”

“A pity,” Tenshouin says. “Yuuki-kun, then. Will you hear me out?”

“Umm…” He looks up at Izumi with big doe-eyes, as if seeking help. But the moment passes and he shakes his head. “What do you want us to do?”

Tenshouin’s eyes flicker toward Izumi. “So you speak for Sena-kun now? Interesting. But anyway, I’d like to propose a deal. Tsumugi and I will do everything in our power to accommodate you as girls—scheduling, rebooking, lodging, clothing, anything you will need to live comfortably.”

This is too good to be true, Izumi realizes one second too late. And then Tenshouin continues, and Izumi can’t butt in anymore.

“And in return, you two will work for me. As idols.”

Izumi freezes.

“I already work for you, though,” Makoto says slowly, as if testing the waters. “Are you suggesting Knights sign on with StarPro, too?”

Tenshouin shakes his head. “No. You won’t work as Trickstar or as Knights. Rather, you’ll sign on with StarPro as an idol unit—a female idol unit.”

There’s a beat of silence, and then in the quietest, softest voice, Makoto whispers, “Huh?”

Izumi is much louder. “You cannot be serious, Tenshouin.”

Tenshouin blinks. “Oh no, I am very much serious. I expect to get just as much out of this deal as you two get. Besides, ES doesn’t have any use for idols who don’t produce results. If you want to stay as idols, you’ll need to work for it.”

“But as girls?!”

“I don’t see how you expect to perform as men when you look like that,” Tenshouin says calmly. “Or did you have some other idea?”

Izumi sputters, his face hot and skin prickling. “You—!”

“He’s right, Izumi-san,” Makoto says, but his voice sounds distant. “Everything he says makes sense.”

“But!” Izumi tries. “But there’s no way we can just—!”

Makoto looks up at him. “I don’t necessarily like it either, but he’s right. We can’t just expect him to help us without giving something back in return.”

Aoba leans over the table as he scribbles something on a blank piece of paper. “I think you two would make a really cute duo unit, anyway! You’d get all sorts of attention right from the moment you debut. Especially from male fans, with your looks.”

Izumi sees red. “Is that supposed to be a compliment?!”

Tsumugi jumps. “Of course! You two are both very attractive as girls, and—”

“Argh!” It comes out shrill, and he clears his throat and shouts out again, deliberately pitching his voice much lower this time. “You’re both so annoying!”

Tenshouin’s smile is unfazed. When he speaks, he looks directly at Makoto. “So? Do we have a deal?”

“No way, no way am I gonna work with y—!”

“Yes,” Makoto says loud enough to drown out Izumi’s protests. “It’s not like we have any better options. We’ll work for you, Tenshouin-senpai.”

Izumi digs into his scalp and pulls on the too-long clumps of hair there and wishes, prays that if he just tugs hard enough, it’ll all come out and go back to his normal, beautiful head of hair and he’ll be normal again and everything won’t be a head-splitting nightmare.

It stays firmly attached to his head.

He falls forward and knocks his forehead into the table, and when Makoto leans over him to shake Eichi’s hand, he mumbles a pathetic, muffled groan into the wood.

“They said we could take the dorm,” Izumi says as he kicks open the door, “but are they seriously not even going to bother cleaning it for us?”

“It’s not like it was that dirty to begin with,” Makoto says, sliding through the opening Izumi made, and the bulge of the box in his arms causes them to brush against each other just slightly. “I’m just grateful there’s internet.”

“It’s not like they’re barbarians,” Izumi says. “If they’re going to force us to live in the old dorm, they’d better at least give us modern conveniences.”

“It’s a nice enough place,” Makoto says, dropping his box on the bed as he looks around. “Big enough for four.”

Izumi scoffs. “There had better not be another two people in this situation.”

“I doubt it,” Makoto says through a hearty laugh. He joins the box on the bed and runs his hand through his—thankfully short—hair. “I’d feel pretty bad for anyone who got caught up in this.”

“What, but you don’t feel bad for me?” Izumi scowls over his own box. “I got caught up in this too, you know.”

“But you’re different.” He doesn’t elaborate. “In any case, this is a good solution. It’s not like we can really be in our dorms when we’re girls half the time. Otogari-kun might take it in stride, but Morisawa-senpai would probably have a heart attack if he saw me like that.”

Izumi hums as he puts his box down and starts rummaging through it. “That guy never shuts up about wanting a girlfriend, but put a girl in front of him and he can barely breathe, let alone flirt.”

“It’s not like we have many opportunities to talk to girls other than Anzu-chan.” Makoto’s face twists in thought as he pulls out a few video game controllers and sets them aside.

Izumi stops himself right before he blurts out what about me?

Nope. Absolutely not. He’s going to live in denial as much as he possibly can. And besides, he’s a guy right now anyway. He’s not going to make this weird.

“It’s fine, though; it’s not like we’re living here full-time,” Makoto says, pulling out a laptop next. Of course. “It’s just while we’re, you know.”

“Girls,” Izumi finishes, the word rolling off his tongue like slime.

Makoto nods. “Sneaking out of the dorms is gonna be rough, though. But it’s not like we can just… disappear for however long, right? People would start getting suspicious.”

“Correction: you can’t disappear. I can.” Izumi crosses his arms over his chest. “I already told the rest of Knights I had more modeling work in Florence, so I wouldn’t be around that much.”

Makoto lifts an eyebrow. “And if they see you around?”

“I–I’ll just make something up.” Izumi grimaces.

Weirdly enough, Makoto just laughs. “Sure, all right. It’s good you can use Italy as an excuse, Izumi-san. I’ve been really stressed about this.”

“Can’t imagine why,” Izumi grumbles into his box as he pulls out his own belongings: a brush, a pillow to hug, a potted plant, and—He holds the shirt up to the weak midday light streaming through the balcony door and realizes he won’t be needing this.

He throws it back into the box with more force than intended.

“A shirt?” Makoto asks, but it’s less prodding and more revelatory. “Wait, why don’t you just move into this dorm for now? It’d be way less of a hassle, right?”

Izumi bristles and shoves the shirt down deeper into the box. “This place is filthy, that’s why.”

“It’s literally not,” Makoto says with a hum. Izumi’s shoulders tense, waiting for him to poke and prod him for the real reason. But Makoto doesn’t pry, he doesn’t open Izumi up and expose him; he just tosses a spare pair of glasses onto his nightstand and continues his work. “If it’s because you don’t wanna be alone though, I get it. It’d be pretty lonely here at night without anyone around, right?”

That’s not it at all, but he nods anyway.

“I guess that’d happen anyway if one of us changed and the other didn’t…” Makoto trails off. “Can that even happen?”

“Why are you asking me?” Izumi says, throwing an incredulous look over his shoulder.

Makoto shrugs and stares out the window, a charging cord limp in his hand. “I don’t know, haven’t you thought about it at all?”

“I try not to.”

Makoto spares a curt glance and a half-quirked smile at him. “I guess it has only been a couple days. But it’s a pretty important question: Why is this happening? What started it? What triggers it?”

“I don’t know, I don’t know, and I don’t know,” Izumi responds with a huff. The more they talk about it, the more irritated he gets. Not even looking at Makoto’s beautiful, handsome face is enough to calm him down at this point; there’s an itch that crawls like a million ants under his skin, and when he looks down to scratch it his vision swims with memories of thin wrists and short arms and ill-fitting shirts.

He’s shaken from the memory by a light pitter-patter, and he barely has time to register it himself before Makoto speaks up again. “Oh, it’s raining again.”

Izumi grimaces. “Again?”

“It’s been raining so much lately,” Makoto says. “I guess it’s good our schedules were cleared today for moving in. I forgot an umbrella.”

Izumi looks out the door. It’s still light, but even still the daylight has become foggy and vague as it struggles to keep the room illuminated even as it drips with a murky gray haze that can’t quite be called darkness. The clouds pitch the world below in blotchy shadow as rain trails like a lazy river down the glass panes, pooling at the sill.

Whatever, he thinks. This is fine. He doesn’t have anywhere to be, and neither does Makoto. Which means he has him all to himself.

The thought makes him a little giddy, and he has to force himself to keep unpacking his box, keep focusing on setting his things up on the nightstand, keep his vision trained on the little potted plant as he turns it approximately forty-five degrees for a tasteful, natural look.

Makoto, on the other hand, tosses yet another controller onto the floor to join the others in the heap at the end of his bed.

“When are you even going to use those?” Izumi asks, looking down his nose at them.

“What else am I supposed to do when we’re locked up in this room?” And Izumi has to admit, Makoto has a point. Maybe he should have brought some kind of entertainment with him, too.

He’ll find something later.

“Oh.”

“Hm?” Izumi looks up to see a furrow in Makoto’s brow.

“I think it’s—”

Ah. “It’s happening.”

The pressure builds in his chest like a sneeze, and when it lets out, Izumi’s hair, pooled in his lap, is the first thing he sees.

And he doesn’t want to see that, so he looks back up at a much better view—that is to say, anything that isn’t himself.

His eyes land on Makoto, because of course they do. And they take in the short, choppy bob and the gentle slopes of his torso and the way he immediately tenses up and curls in on himself.

And as the clouds cover the last of the natural light in the room and bathe them in overcast shadow, Izumi finally gets it. “It’s the rain.”

“The what?” Makoto asks, reaching up to twist the ends of his hair between his fingers.

When he speaks again, it’s small, uncertain, even as the sinking in his gut tells him he’s right—it makes sense. “We change when it rains.”

“It’s the rain?!”

Izumi barely has a mind to nod as he stares at himself in the window, the mess of waves spilling over his shoulders distorted and kinked by the trails of rainfall that spill down the glass. It’s the rain, he repeats only to himself because he can’t bear the sound of his own voice. It’s the only explanation.

“I hate that guy.”

“Who?” Makoto asks, swinging an umbrella at his side. “Tenshouin-senpai?”

“Duh,” Izumi says, gesturing vaguely in front of him. “He waits for us to change, and then he springs this crap on us? Does he get off on this?”

Makoto giggles a little into his hand, and it sounds like a babbling brook, like something out of a fairy tale: light, airy, girlish.

Izumi shakes his head.

“He’s just thinking about it logically. It would look weird doing this as guys, right? And it’s easier to find stuff that would fit us this way.”

Izumi rolls his eyes and flips through a few shirts, the heavy chink of metal hanger on metal rack grating against his ears. “Didn’t Aoba and Tenshouin say they were gonna set us up with everything we’d need?”

Makoto hums and picks out a shirt, holding it up to himself first, and then Izumi. The way Makoto scrutinizes him makes him feel far too exposed, far too visible, and Izumi squirms a bit under his gaze. “It’s probably better this way. Do you really want either of them picking out our entire wardrobe?”

“Ugh, pass.” Izumi wrinkles his nose. “The stuff they already stuck us in is bad enough.” He gestures down at the navy blue A-line skirt with a grimace. It’s far too short for his liking, and yet he can’t seem to find anything longer anywhere in this store.

“See? We have more control this way.” Makoto pulls out a tank top. It’s dark green and thick, a little frumpy, and way too big for Makoto’s frame.

“Are you seriously considering that?” Before Makoto can respond, Izumi plucks it out of his hand and shoves it back onto the rack. He rummages through the selection a bit before producing something much more suitable and shoves it into Makoto’s arms. “Look: white is a good color for summer, and the sheer fabric will help you stay cool. It’s loose and flowy so it’ll catch the breeze, and it pairs well with a huge variety of bottoms. This is the kind of stuff you should be looking for.”

Makoto stares down at the blouse, then up at Izumi. “I didn’t think you knew so much about women’s fashion, Izumi-san.”

“I’m a model, Yuu-kun.” And out of something that can’t quite be called habit, he tosses his hair over his shoulder. “And besides, Naru-kun never shuts up about fashion trends. I can’t exactly avoid it.”

Makoto nods and runs his fingers over the fabric. “It feels weird, you know? I still feel like a guy, but here I am, shopping at a women’s boutique—for myself. If I had it my way, I’d just be wearing a T-shirt and jeans.”

“Eugh, you should at least put the bare minimum effort into your appearance.” To illustrate his point, he yanks several more blouses off the rack and tosses them into Makoto’s arms.

Makoto staggers under the weight, a whiny grunt emitting from somewhere within the mound. “You say that, but you don’t exactly look comfortable in that outfit Tenshouin-senpai got for you.”

Izumi is again made hyperaware of how short the skirt is, how low the collar of his sheer blouse is, how bare his arms and legs are. He clears his throat and curls his fingers around the hem of his skirt. “It—it’s not about being comfortable, you know. We’re idols.”

Makoto hums, as if to ask who Izumi’s really trying to convince. “This should be enough shirts though, right? I wanna get some pants, too.”

“Just pants?” Izumi says on impulse, and then immediately regrets opening his damn mouth.

Makoto somehow manages to peek around the pile in his arms. “Should I get some shorts too? Or…?”

He regrets it. He regrets speaking, opening his mouth, even thinking. Even more, he regrets that he can’t deny that he’d love to see Makoto in a skirt. He clears his throat. “Never mind.”

Makoto lifts an eyebrow and frowns. “I guess shorts are a good option too, actually. It is really hot out, and it does feel nice without all that fabric clinging to my legs.”

He shifts from one side to the other, and Izumi’s eyes are drawn against his will down to Makoto’s very bare legs. It’s not a skirt, but the green shorts Tenshouin had forced on him still look good on him—Izumi has nothing to complain about. They go well with the chiffon button-up Tenshouin had paired with it and the strappy sandals Aoba had suggested.

It turns Izumi’s stomach over. No matter how much he tells himself this is his Yuu-kun, it’s still weird. It’s his Yuu-kun, he knows that, but… with the way blonde hair frames his face and his glasses are too big and keep sliding down his nose—the way the clingy fabric of his blouse reveals a thin, shapely figure underneath and his bare legs are clean shaven—

“Izumi-san?”

Oh, but it’s still Yuu-kun. He can’t deny it, not even when he speaks in gentle falsetto, not even when he looks like a familiar stranger.

He wants to go back to normal.

“Uh, nothing,” he says. “I want out of this skirt, too. Let’s go find something.”

Makoto nods. “Right. But you know, Izumi-san, I think you look pretty cute in it.”

Izumi flushes deep and hot, and he nearly knocks into the clothes racks behind him in his attempt to hide it. “Wh–what?!”

Makoto’s eyes widen, as if he’s just realized what he said. “I mean, you just—you make a very pretty girl… is all.”

Izumi damn near chokes, and he really can’t say whether that’s a good reaction or not. A pretty girl? Yeah, well—well sure, he’d look good no matter what. He’s beautiful, and tits on his chest and hair down to his ass aren’t going to change that simple fact of life. So of course he makes a pretty girl.

He kind of wishes Makoto would say that to him as a guy, though.

Makoto looks away, almost hiding behind the mountain of clothes in his arms. “Sorry, Izumi-san. That was weird.”

“Um.” Izumi clears his throat. “No, it’s… I mean. You’re—”

Makoto peeks out from behind the mess of fabric just enough for Izumi to see his raised eyebrow.

Izumi takes a breath. “Of course I make a pretty girl.”

Nailed it.

Makoto snorts out a little laugh. “Uh-huh.”

Izumi splutters, almost losing his grip on the clothes tenuously draped over his arm. “What? Why are you laughing?!”

Makoto buries his head into his own pile to muffle his giggles, and his hair splays out across it like winding rivers running down a mountain. “Nothing, nothing. You’re just… No, it’s nothing.”

“Ugh, fine.” Izumi huffs and, with a roll of his eyes, turns away. “Let’s just keep shopping.”

“Mhm,” Makoto says, pulling his head out of the clothes. “I’m counting on you, Izumi-san!”

Izumi squeezes his eyes shut. God fucking dammit.

Why did Makoto get to have the short hair? he asks himself as his arm snags in a knot and pulls his head down sharply. Why did he get stuck with the long as shit hair?

Can he even cut it? Is that allowed? Would it just grow back next time it rains?

“Izumi-san?” Makoto asks warily, staring at him out of the corner of his eye. “Are you okay?”

“I’m—” he yanks his hand and the pen out of the tangle with a noise that sounds kind of like a grunt and kind of like a pathetic whine, “I’m fine.”

Tenshouin raises an eyebrow but nods once, moving on without so much as acknowledging that. “In any case, I just need you to sign here. The contract stands so long as you keep going through this transformation, and is null and void with no further effort on your part as soon as the phenomenon ceases.”

“You’ll be able to conduct business as usual while you’re guys,” Aoba continues, flipping a few pages back and pointing at a massive chunk of a paragraph. “The contract still applies no matter what form you’re in, but you won’t need to do anything special until you actually transform. It’s just a precaution and a safeguard. For both of us, really.”

Makoto nods along, a deep frown on his face as he glances over the tiny font. “And when we’re girls?”

“You’ll be expected to carry out much the same duties you have while you’re male idols,” Tenshouin explains. “Regular practice and rehearsal—or as regular as possible, rather—maintaining a strict, healthy diet and appearance as dictated by management, and basic upkeep of a spotless image and reputation.”

“That last one probably won’t matter too much,” Aoba cuts in with a little shrug, “since you’re not living as girls. There won’t be as many opportunities to ruin your reputation.”

Tenshouin hums. “Exactly. And on top of that, your freedoms will be restricted while in your female forms.”

“Excuse me?” Izumi asks, hand clenching around his pen.

“We can’t risk you being discovered,” Tenshouin explains with a little wave of his hand. “If one of our other idols or the media pieces everything together, it could be disastrous. We’ll keep you under constant surveillance to minimize that risk, and you won’t be able to act as you please.”

“It… makes sense,” Makoto says with a grimace.

“It’s not that bad,” Aoba assures him with a small, sympathetic smile. “We just don’t want you spending excessive amounts of time in common areas where your friends might see and recognize you.”

“That obviously wouldn’t happen!” Izumi shouts, leaning over the table. Makoto grips at his arm, hard, as if in preparation for him launching himself across the table. Again.

Tenshouin frowns. “You two recognized each other almost instantly.”

Izumi instantly deflates.

“I simply want to avoid the same thing happening with anyone else.”

“I get it,” Makoto says. “Izumi-san and I will stay out of common areas and avoid people while we’re girls. I mean, I don’t really want to talk to anyone when I’m like that, anyway.”

Izumi rolls his eyes. “Fine. I’ll do what you want.”

“That’s a good girl,” Eichi coos, and Makoto’s grip on Izumi tightens in anticipation.

Izumi grits his teeth.

“Oh!” Aoba claps his hands together and flips a few more pages back. “I almost forgot: We’ve decided on your unit name and theme.”

“You didn’t even consult us about it,” Izumi says, glaring daggers into Tenshouin’s blue eyes.

“Oh? I wasn’t aware you wanted to sit around for hours and discuss your feminine charms and potential sex appeal in intimate detail, Sena-kun.” Tenshouin cocks his head to the side, innocent and aggravating all at once. “I’ll keep that in mind for next time, though.”

Izumi growls. “Never mind.”

Tenshouin smiles at the favorable answer. “I thought so.”

“We’re naming the unit Raindrop2,” Aoba proclaims proudly, puffing out his chest as he settles his index finger over a stylized unit logo. It’s bright and cheery like a sunshower, with vibrant shades of yellow set against a cutesy, cartoonish cloud and some stylized raindrops. It has a summery vibe to it, almost childlike with the puffy lettering and carefree curves.

Izumi stares at it for a moment. “Raindrop2? Like 2wink?”

“Not exactly!” Aoba protests. “See? The number is at the end of the name. Anyway, it’ll be a fresh unit overflowing with this feeling of youthfulness, intended to lift spirits and energize people of all ages.”

“Like 2wink?” Makoto is the one to ask this time. He exchanges a look with Izumi while Aoba bristles.

“No, it’s different!” he insists. “It’s sunnier, with summery themes.”

“Right.” Izumi stares down at the paper. “This doesn’t feel like me at all.”

“Because it’s not you,” Tenshouin says, a note of exasperation in his voice. “You are not performing as Sena Izumi anymore.”

“Then who am I?” Izumi challenges.

“You’ll have stage names,” Aoba says with a smile, “much like CosPro’s HiMERU. Sena-kun, you’ll be called Shizuku. And Yuuki-kun, you’re Haru. Look here: the names use the kanji for ‘drop’ and ‘clear weather.’ It fits the theme!”

Tenshouin leans in. “Tsumugi is quite proud of this; just let him have it.”

Makoto nods slowly. “Sure, I’m fine with it. I’ll do what I need to. Izumi-san? Are you good with all of this?”

Izumi scowls down at the name, the logo, the colors. He has a million arguments on his lips—

But he looks over at Makoto. His eyes are big and green, the same jewel-like shimmer he’s always thought was the most beautiful sight in the world. The face around those eyes is different, but the eyes are the same.

And he realizes with startling clarity that this sight is for him only, for as long as they’re like this. That this Yuu-kun is his alone, and he is Yuu-kun’s all the same. And even if it comes at the cost of Tenshouin and Aoba manhandling them like Barbie dolls, maybe it’s not that bad. Or—no, it’s definitely that bad, but…

“Fine,” he says with a huff. “Where do we sign?”

Tenshouin’s smile reaches his eyes as Tsumugi shuffles through the contract again. “Excellent. Yuuki-kun, you’ll be the leader of this unit. Please sign here on this line.” He taps a finger near the bottom of the page.

“Yuu-kun?” Izumi questions, but even as he does it feels right, somehow.

Makoto just shrugs and leans over to sign.

“Sena-kun, this line please.” He taps the line underneath.

Izumi feels like he’s making a deal with the devil. Well he is, almost literally, but now that Makoto’s already handed his soul over, he can’t very well back out. He presses his pen into the paper as his chest presses into the table and his hair presses into his back.

And then it’s a done deal, and there’s a sour taste in Izumi’s mouth.

This is stupid, Izumi decides fervently, with passion. It’s stupid and he feels stupid and he’s pretty sure he looks stupid, too.

But Makoto’s a natural at this. When his arm swings backwards and lands on his butt, he doesn’t even flinch—he just keeps going, entirely unfazed by every humiliating step that’s somehow worst than the last. He pops his butt out, rests a hand on his thigh where the hem of a skirt would be, keeps his chest teasingly visible but never too within grasp, and he does all of it with bright, sparkling eyes and an aura of confidence.

And worst of all, he looks like he’s having fun.

Makoto slows his movements and then stops completely when he notices Izumi staring. And that’s when Izumi notices he’s staring too. He looks away quickly, as if that could possibly save his ass.

“Izumi-san?” Makoto asks. “Are you having trouble with the choreo?”

He’s not even sure how to answer that question, if he’s being quite honest. “I’m fine. It’s just…”

“Just what?” Makoto cocks his head to the side. Then his hair falls down over his face and he sputters, furiously brushing it away. “Man, I just keep forgetting.”

“How do you forget something like this?” He gestures at himself, twisting his fingers in between strands of his own long hair and tugging lightly. “It’s not exactly out of sight, out of mind.”

Makoto shrugs. “I don’t know, maybe I’m getting used to it? It’s been almost a week now, after all, and we’ve been changing every day.”

“Don’t remind me.” Izumi drags his hand down his face, and he can feel every difference in bone structure under his fingers.

Makoto shakes his head with a little good-natured huff. “It’s gonna be fine, Izumi-san. It’s not like we’re doing anything different than usual, right? We’re still idols, and we’re both pros at that.”

Still idols, he says. But everything else is different. Everything else is—

His thoughts cut off when he feels warm fingers wrap around his arm and tug lightly. Izumi goes ramrod straight and jerks his head around to see Makoto there, right behind him, his chest pressing into his back. Izumi yelps; he can’t help it.

“Calm down, Izumi-san,” Makoto says without missing a beat. He pulls Izumi through a few motions, positions his arms with gentle precision and then slowly drops his hands lower until they wrap around his waist and pivot his hips around. “These dance moves are different from what male idols would normally do, but it’s still dancing. It’s kinda fun when you get the hang of it, too.”

“Uh-huh.” Izumi hears the words, but he sure as hell isn’t listening. He’s laser-focused on Makoto’s hand on his waist, trailing over his stomach as he moves him around like some kind of puppetmaster.

“I’m pretty sure the choreo is focused on showing off our bodies as much as possible,” Makoto explains, his voice tickling Izumi’s ear. “But it’s relatively modest, all things considered. Tenshouin-senpai didn’t want us to be too sexualized.”

Izumi doesn’t respond at all this time, just lets Makoto push him into place, pull his arms into the next position. The heat from Makoto’s body seeps through his T-shirt and hugs his skin, and it takes every ounce of concentration and willpower he has to keep his feet underneath him.

“See?” Makoto says, moving them both to the left. His head knocks into Izumi’s, their cheeks grazing against each other, and where he touches it leaves a trail of fire on Izumi’s skin. “It’ll be fine. You’re a great dancer, Izumi-san. Way better than me. You’ve just gotta get into the mindset, I think.”

Izumi nods, wooden and jerky. “Right. Yeah.”

“Izumi-san?” Makoto turns his head, and when his lips brush against Izumi’s jaw, it sends a jolt through Izumi that shocks him awake like a cold bucket of water to the face. “Are you okay?”

Izumi jumps back, out of Makoto’s embrace. “I–I’m fine! Everything’s fine!”

Makoto stands there, arms still poised as if Izumi had never left them, a funny little look on his face. “Are you sure? Your face is all red… Maybe we should take a break?”

Izumi starts to refuse, shaking his head—Then he remembers the way Makoto was shaking his ass and spinning around and he changes his answer to a decisive “Yeah, I think that’s a good idea.”

Makoto’s brow furrows, but he drops his arms to his side and shuffles to the corner of the practice room where their bags are. He crouches down and rummages through one, then the other, and as he spins on his heel he tosses a water bottle to Izumi and tips back the other with his head all in one smooth motion.

Izumi fumbles the catch and drops to the floor a moment later, phantom heat wrapping in bands around his waist as he replays the last few minutes over and over and over in his mind. He has half a mind to insist it wasn’t real, it didn’t happen, because there’s no way—

But Makoto looks over at him from across the room and smiles a little bit, and Izumi tries, tries, tries to think of what he ever did to deserve that.

He comes up blank.

Makoto waves his arm from side to side, watching in awe as the puffy white sleeve billows in the air. It’s made for this kind of movement, and it looks almost like a rolling tide as it sways, a captivating sea of fabric that draws the eye. Perfect for dancing.

Izumi tugs on the skirt, desperately trying to get it to reach his knees. It doesn’t work.

“They really are beautiful stage costumes,” Makoto tries, but hesitation colors the edges of his words. “Tenshouin-senpai didn’t cut any corners.”

“He’s just playing dress-up with us,” Izumi grumbles, tugging on the skirt again. It stays firmly in place, the scratchy tulle swishing around his mid-thigh.

Makoto adjusts the yellow vinyl belt around his waist. Izumi wants to point out that it’s just there for decoration, but he can’t muster up the motivation for it. “It’s not all that bad, Izumi-san. Tenshouin-senpai and Aoba-senpai went all out designing the costumes with Anzu-chan, and even you have to admit Anzu-chan’s work is second to none.”

Izumi puts his hands on his hips, and the fabric of the full skirt envelops them completely. “They gave me a boob window.”

“W–well,” Makoto says, trying to avoid looking at said boob window, “it’s not distasteful.”

Izumi pulls at the loose fabric of the bodice, trying to close the window—or at least hide it. The bow hanging around his neck does little to cover it, but maybe if he sets it just right…

“Oh, right. Come here, Izumi-san.” Makoto doesn’t actually wait for Izumi to move; he comes to him. “Your hairbow got messed up.”

Makoto’s fingers are smaller than he’s used to when he threads them into Izumi’s hair, but the way they move is familiar all the same. And just that small touch, that small affection he’s afforded is enough to ease his jitters. Makoto is close now, his tongue poking out through his lips and his nose scrunching up as he works the bow back into its original spot, pulling and playing with his hair gently, so as not to hurt him.

It’s a soft, friendly gesture, full of empathy and knowing, and it’s all directed at Izumi. Not Trickstar, Izumi. Because right now, he’s Makoto’s partner.

A traitorous thought passes through his mind, but he stamps it out before it can even take shape.

Makoto steps back to scrutinize his work, and the gentle waves that frame his face look a little more familiar now. This feminine version of Makoto still can’t hold a candle to the beauty of his true self, but there’s an almost irresistible charm in this awkward girl standing before him, tiny fingers pressed against glossed lips and big, emerald eyes framed in bold stage makeup that glitters under the fluorescent lights of the dressing room.

“It looks fine now,” Makoto says with a short nod. “Do I look okay?”

Okay is an understatement. He’s never much cared about feminine beauty, but he’s not blind. And Makoto understands intimately, subconsciously, how to hold himself to show off his maximum appeal. It’s something he shares with Izumi, something that ties them together in their past and in their present.

The yellow ribbons hanging off of Makoto’s skirt flutter around his legs, drawing just enough attention to tease something fans can never have—but can most certainly fantasize about. It’s complemented by another ribbon tied around his Peter Pan collar, a much more modest contrast to Izumi’s exposed chest.

Izumi tugs on his shirt again. “You look fine.” And it comes out breathier than he intended, his eyes trailing up and down Makoto from his T-strap pumps to the frilly, puffy bow hanging off the side of his head.

No, he’s never much cared about feminine beauty, but this is Makoto. It’s different.

Makoto lets out a breath. “Good. It’s still… It feels weird. I’ve never worn anything like this, even when I was still modeling.”

“Well, it’s not like you used to be a girl,” Izumi counters with a roll of his eyes. “Obviously you never would have worn this kind of thing.”

“Yeah…” Makoto trails off, looks down at himself, looks back at Izumi. “You look good too, you know.”

Izumi bites out a laugh. “I feel stupid.”

“You don’t look it, though,” Makoto insists. “You look like an idol.”

Izumi ignores the skip in his heartbeat—He’s not supposed to care about any of this. No matter what Makoto says, it’s not like this is him. It’s not like this is real. So why should he care?

“You’re really pretty, Izumi-san.”

God fucking dammit.

“I guess,” is all he manages to grit out from between clenched teeth. He tugs on his skirt again—to no avail. Maybe it’s just the principle of the thing. “I still think all of this is stupid.”

“But Tenshouin-senpai’s been helping us a lot,” Makoto says. “This is the least we can do in return. It’s not like anything he said was illogical or even particularly malicious. We are idols, after all.”

“That doesn’t mean I have to like this.” It comes out a little whiny, and he slumps forward onto Makoto’s shoulder, allowing himself this moment of selfish comfort.

“I don’t like it either, Izumi-san.” Makoto, to Izumi’s surprise, reaches up and strokes his hair in one long, smooth motion down his back. And again to Izumi’s surprise, it feels nice, the gentle tug of hair that shouldn’t be his as Makoto’s fingers entangle themselves within the strands. “But unless we can find a way to fix this whole… thing, there’s not much else we can do.”

The traitorous thoughts return to cloud his rationality, whispering promises of something he’s wanted for too long if only they would stay like this forever.

It’s harder to chase away the thoughts with the scent of Makoto’s flowery perfume reeling him in closer and closer.

“Is there even a way to fix this?” Izumi’s voice is small, and he grimaces into Makoto’s shoulder at how girlish he sounds.

Makoto is quiet for a moment, but with those thoughts floating in his head it’s not as damning as it should be. “Well, it only happens when it rains, right? So maybe after the rainy season…”

“Then what?” It takes monumental effort to tear himself away from Makoto. “Then we live in fear for the next time it rains for the rest of our lives? What is this, Yuu-kun?”

“I—” Makoto shakes his head, and the frilly hairpiece flops around. “I don’t know! It’s not like you’ve had any ideas, Izumi-san.”

Izumi’s breath hitches. He can’t voice his ideas; he can’t let those thoughts become any more real than a ghost whispering terrible desire in his ears. “It’s just—”

“No, I’m sorry.” Makoto sighs. “You wouldn’t know what to do any more than I do. But… at least we’re not alone in this, right?”

Not alone. His thoughts catch in his throat and steal his breath.

“I don’t know what I’d do if I had to deal with this all by myself.” Makoto gestures at himself, at the black and white frilled dress designed to tease, at the long, exposed legs that tremble awkwardly in heels, at the wavy bob that keeps sticking to his lip gloss whenever he turns his head. “So I guess… I’m happy you’re here with me.”

With him. Here, with him. The words are intoxicating, and Izumi almost loses his own balance, even though he’s not even the one wearing heels.

Makoto looks at him expectantly. Izumi can’t possibly speak right now, not when his every thought is consumed by those dreadful whispers.

“Right, yeah,” he forces out despite it all. “Me… too.”

Makoto smiles at him, and his lip gloss glistens under the fluorescents.

Izumi hates himself.

“Oh, they’re so cute!” Arashi gushes, shoving her phone in Ritsu’s face. “Tenshouin-senpai was completely right about signing on female idols; they’re gonna be a total hit!”

“Mhm,” Ritsu mumbles, then turns his head over on his arms so that he’s facing away from her. “They’re sooo cute…”

Arashi scoffs and pulls her phone back to her chest. “Fine, I see how it is. Izumi-chan!”

Izumi freezes, water bottle smushed against his lips.

“Look at the new StarPro idols!” she continues, pushing herself off the floor and prancing over to where Izumi is. “They just debuted, what, like a few days ago? I haven’t even seen them around until they were all over social media, and honestly I’m kinda offended. They could totally use a cute onee-chan to show them the ropes, don’t you think?”

“I’m sure they’re fine,” Izumi says around the bottle, then lifts it up to take a swig.

Arashi rolls her eyes and pushes her phone in his face. “Just look at them! A cute little duo with like, this weather theme I guess?”

“It’s summery. That’s their theme.”

“Huh?” Arashi tilts her head, then looks down at her phone, zooming in on the pictures. “Wait, you know them? Why didn’t you say anything? This is huge news!”

“What’s the big deal?” Izumi caps the bottle and all but throws it back into his bag. “It’s just another idol group.”

“They’re girls, Izumi-chan,” Arashi says slowly, as if she were explaining it to a child. “It’s the first time ES is producing female idols. If anything, it’s huge for the industry as a whole. But if you ask me, what I’m more interested in is their cute costumes! Look at the bows in their hair, Izumi-chan! Ohh, maybe Knights should incorporate some of their style into our next live.”

“Hard pass.” And then Izumi plucks the phone out of her hands and clicks the screen off.

“Hey!”

“Social media rots your brain, you know,” comes Izumi’s simple reply. He ignores the pout on Arashi’s lip and the slight tremble in his own hands as he hands the phone back to her. “Who cares about some dumb idol group from StarPro, Naru-kun? You should be way more concerned about this live you said was oh-so important.”

Arashi rolls her eyes and shoves the phone in her pocket. “I still think the bows would be cute. I’ll ask Anzu-chan about them.”

It’s all Izumi can do to keep from groaning audibly. If that damn producer forces him into even more bows and frills, no one in the ES top brass is gonna hear the end of it.

“Whatever,” he says instead. “We’re supposed to be practicing, remember? Focus on that. Where’s Leo-kun and Kasa-kun, anyway—?”

As if by design, a shriek comes barreling down the hall and slams through the door to the practice room just moments before the door, itself, slams open, all but smashing against the wall. It shakes the whole room, and even Ritsu picks his head up to see Leo race inside the room, a frazzled Tsukasa hot on his trail.

“Leo-kun?” Arashi cries, but her voice is nearly drowned out by Leo’s guffaws, by Tsukasa’s shouts, as they chase each other around the room.

“Leo-san, calm down!” Tsukasa orders, waving a stack of papers around furiously. “Please, just—Leo-san!”

“Wahaha!” Leo dodges Tsukasa’s attempt to grab onto him and slides to the left, his hair freed from its ponytail and whipping in heavy chunks across his face and through the air like some kind of blazing corona.

A few drip-drops of water land on Izumi’s face. Izumi is not pleased.

“Leo-san, please stop ru—augh?!”

And Tsukasa goes down hard, his legs sliding out from under him as he splashes through a puddle on the practice room floor that wasn’t there just moments before. He lands on his ass, then on his back, a loud groan echoing throughout the room as he stares unseeing at the ceiling.

Leo finally stops running only to spin around and laugh at Tsukasa’s misery. “That’s a great idea, Suo! I feel the inspiration leaking out of my brain!”

“No, that’s the rainwater,” Izumi says with a roll of his eyes.

Wait—

“Leo-san,” Tsukasa practically begs, “I told you to stop running or someone would get hurt.”

Wait, wait, wait—

“Here, Tsukasa-chan.” Arashi offers a hand to him, wincing in time with Tsukasa as she hauls him to his feet.

“I—” Izumi starts, the words catching in his throat.

Ritsu looks over at him, followed by three other pairs of eyes. Everything is quiet for a moment, and Izumi can finally hear the rain pounding against the roof of the ES building.

“I have to go,” he squeaks. “I have to—”

“Sena?” Leo asks, reaching out to him. His face contorts into something that half-resembles worry, but Izumi is already turning away before he can see its further evolution.

“I’ve gotta get out of here,” he says, unable to hide the panic in his voice.

He doesn’t even bother to grab his things. One of them will bring it back to his room eventually. Or they won’t. He doesn’t have the luxury of caring about that right now.

He runs to the door, splashing in the puddles Leo left behind. He puts his hand on the doorframe and hesitates as that familiar something builds up in his chest. His eyes widen—

“Secchan?” Ritsu’s voice is quiet, so unlike him. “Wait a—”

Izumi runs out of the room. He doesn’t stop running even after he changes.

Izumi is sure he’s still being followed, and that scares the absolute shit out of him.

So he keeps running, rounding whatever corner he sees first in his attempt to escape. He doesn’t dare look back to see who it is; he’d rather live in ignorance. So he takes another right, keeps running, takes a left, keeps running, keeps—

“Augh!”

He falls to the floor, his sweats swallowing him whole as the fabric pools around him. His heart clenches; fear claws its way up his chest and he throws his hands over his face in some desperate attempt to hide himself.

“Izumi-san!”

He lets out a sigh of relief and unthaws instantly, unable to stop himself from pulling Makoto into a tight, clingy embrace when he realizes it’s someone safe. The only person who could be safe. “Yuu-kun!”

“Ahaha, I guess the rain was unexpected for the both of us.” Makoto grins sheepishly and rubs the back of his neck, his hair waving softly as it rubs against his arm. His glasses sink down his nose, and he looks a little worse for wear himself, drowning in fabric the same as Izumi. But it’s cute, Izumi thinks, especially with that awkward smile lighting up his face and making his cheeks all rosy. “I was—oh!”

Makoto scrambles to stand up, but his foot catches on his pants leg and he falls forward with a shout—but Izumi catches him, just barely, careful to avoid putting his hands anywhere he would never live down.

He tries not to look.

“Argh, sorry Izumi-san!” Makoto says, gathering his bearings and pulling himself up. He looks around frantically. “I’m just—”

“Makoto!”

“That!” Makoto squeaks, somehow both shrill and quiet at the same time. “C’mon!”

Makoto doesn’t give Izumi a chance to protest; he bends down and grabs his arm and pulls him along, not caring how he fumbles with his own pants legs or how he haphazardly throws his jacket across his chest or how he’s already out of breath from shaking off whoever the hell was chasing him down.

“Isara-kun followed me out!” Makoto hisses out, the sibilance harsh on Izumi’s ears—but still so sweet. “I tried to shake him off, but he’s really persistent when he’s worried.”

Izumi wants to say something about how annoyingly chummy Trickstar is, but he can’t quite form the words on his lips when he hears off in the distance a quiet, lazy “Secchaaaan…”

“Kuma-kun,” Izumi says, spitting it out like a slur. “Of all people to follow me.”

“Ritsu-kun too?!” Makoto says, and suddenly he’s moving faster. “We can’t let them see us like this… They’ll recognize us for sure.”

“We’re girls, though,” Izumi says. “That’s impossible.”

Makoto spares a doubtful glance over his shoulder as he tugs on Izumi’s arm to keep him stumbling forward. “Not impossible enough.”

Izumi sighs. He’s right, of course.

Another tug on his arm comes with more purpose and is followed by the click of a latch bolt. “Izumi-san, in here!”

Makoto pushes the door open to reveal a small, dark closet. Nothing so dirty as to offend Izumi’s sensibilities, but out of the way enough for Izumi to feel like he’s doing something that’ll come back to bite him in the ass.

Still they tumble into the room, and still Makoto shuts the door with another resolute click. And then Makoto pulls Izumi close and holds him there, one cheek pressed to the door, the other pressed against the crown of Izumi’s head. His arms snake around Izumi like a knot, like a noose.

Izumi swallows.

“Stay quiet,” Makoto commands, breathing hot and heavy. Izumi can feel each rise of his chest, can hear each beat of his heart, and Izumi couldn’t speak if he wanted to. His mouth is dry and his heart is pounding in his throat and his tongue is swollen and cottony and so he just nods, his face brushing so shamelessly against Makoto’s breasts with each choppy motion.

Makoto doesn’t even react to it.

They stay like that for a few beats of Makoto’s heart, the thump-thump-thumping keeping Izumi’s thoughts from wandering, keeping Izumi’s head on his chest as he leans so bodily against Makoto, crushed so tenderly in his arms. The sweat beading along his hair line, in the small of his back, between his thighs tell him this isn’t right, he’s making a mistake here, that he should get far, far away from Makoto—

Still, he stays. He lets himself have this small moment, crammed in this small closet. And so instead he weaves his arms around Makoto’s waist, tests his luck to see just how much he can possibly get away with before Makoto pulls away and the moment ends forever.

When his fingers slip under Makoto’s T-shirt and find skin, it’s slick with sweat.

Izumi jumps and tears his hands away. That’s—? He lifts his head from the cushion of Makoto’s breasts to look, to search his face for anything at all, but Makoto is singularly focused on the world outside the two of them. His nose is scrunched up as he listens for footsteps, and Izumi looks back down at Makoto’s body.

Once again, he realizes he’s so stupid.

Then Makoto hums softly, inquisitively, and peels his face from the door to look at him. “I think they’re gone.”

And all at once he collapses, taking Izumi with him down to the floor. They land in a heap with a sigh and a giggle, light and breathy in Izumi’s ear.

“Ahaha, I really thought they were gonna get us,” Makoto says, not able to keep the laughter out of his voice. It sounds like a masterpiece Leo would write.

“They’re gone?” Izumi asks far too late, his mind only now catching up as he struggles to process every sensation that so oppressively assaults him: the warmth of Makoto’s arms around him, the airy quality of his voice, the unfamiliar but still comfortable proportions pushing against every part of his own distorted body, his own hand clammy on Makoto’s thin, shapely waist.

His fingers graze against smooth, bare skin.

He drops his hand to the ice-cold tile of the floor and hisses at the contrast.

Makoto scrunches up his face again as he listens. “Yeah, I can’t hear anything anymore,” Makoto says, and then he drops his head onto Izumi’s shoulder and sighs loudly. “I’m glad we both got away.”

“Me too,” Izumi replies woodenly, entirely preoccupied with the way Makoto’s hair tickles his nose, with the way the fabric of Makoto’s pants tickles his wrist. “Yeah.”

Makoto’s head lolls to the side so he can peek at him out of the corner of his eye. “Izumi-san? Are you okay?”

Izumi clears his throat and squeezes his eyes shut. “Yep, just peachy.”

“Mm, good,” Makoto says. He reaches up and brushes his fingers across Izumi’s cheek, catching the stray hairs there and tucking them behind his ear. Izumi’s skin prickles with heat, and he can’t breathe.

Izumi’s arm threatens to give out, threatens to send him straight down onto Makoto perched so delicately underneath him. It shakes under his weight, under his haywire emotions, and if Makoto weren’t there to steady him, surely he would have broken down completely already.

But Makoto’s finger lingers a little too long on his skin as it falls along his jawline and down his neck and across his collarbone, and it’s only as the featherlight touch sears his skin and grips his chest that Izumi realizes—

Izumi rolls over onto his side, and with the movement his breasts shift awkwardly downward. It’s an uncomfortable feeling, and an unwelcome one—He grimaces.

“Yuu-kun,” he says. Quietly, just in case Makoto is already asleep. His voice is soft and light in the darkness, as if carried on rain clouds above their beds, and it settles into the night like mist wrapping around them both.

The bed on the other side of the room creaks and moans, and there comes the shuffle of fabric against skin. Makoto groans ever so slightly, a sleepy grumble that’s barely audible and yet so deliciously sweet. The sheets pull against Makoto’s skin once more, and then: “Yes, Izumi-san?”

Izumi’s heart pounds with an anxiety he isn’t prepared for, and no matter how hard he fights it down it keeps springing back up into his throat, coating his tongue with slippery, clumsy syllables. “O–oh, it’s just, um—I–I mean—”

They drip off his lips in little plips and plops, and he’s grateful for the cover of night to protect him from whatever Makoto’s reaction might be to his complete incompetence.

The sheets shift again, and Izumi can make out Makoto’s dark, huddled form as he turns over onto his side. Facing him.

“Is something wrong?” Makoto’s whisper is gentle and coaxing, and against Izumi’s better judgment he leans into it, rolling over once more so that his face is buried in the pillow and his breasts press uncomfortably into his chest.

He mumbles into the pillow, garbled words muffled by the thick stuffing.

“Izumi-san?”

Izumi turns his head. “I like you, Yuu-kun.”

There’s a moment of silence filled only by the steady beating of raindrops on their window, a gentle rumble that wraps around them and pushes, as if to bring them closer.

They stay firmly in their beds, several feet apart.

“I…” Makoto trails off, and then the rain falls down on both of them for several more moments.

Izumi holds his breath.

Makoto sighs, and there’s a muffled thump from the bed as the shapeless lump of Makoto’s body throws itself onto his back. “I know that, Izumi-san.”

Something painful pierces Izumi’s heart, and he chews on his lip as if to dull the pain—or at least to distract from it. “No, Yuu-kun,” he says slowly, his face burning with humid summer heat. “It’s—I love you.”

“Ah.”

Makoto doesn’t continue, and Izumi squirms in place, embarrassment and humiliation twisting his legs together and clenching his stomach. “Y–you could at least say something, y’know.”

Makoto lets out a tiny, high-pitched yelp. “Oh, right, sorry. I was just… thinking. About it.”

Izumi wants to be swallowed up by the rain, completely dissolved into the clouds hanging low in the midnight sky. “And?”

Makoto hums, and it’s cute and girlish and not quite like his Yuu-kun but still so, so familiar by now. “I… guess I knew that, too.”

“You knew?!” Izumi’s voice breaks at the end, all shame tossed into the storm.

“Yeah, probably.” The mass of pitch-black blankets bob up and down, and Izumi guesses maybe that was supposed to be a shrug. “Sorry I took advantage of that.”

It’s okay, Izumi wants to say, he’d be fine with anything if only Yuu-kun would be there by his side. But that makes him sound pathetic, as much as that instinct must be the truth. He holds his tongue.

“Or, well, sorry I took advantage of you.” Makoto speaks quietly into the night, his soprano just barely loud enough to float over the rain. And Izumi finds himself leaning in again, even though there’s nowhere left to go but toward Makoto. And he—no, he can’t do that.

So he stays in his bed and turns his face back into the pillow and pushes out a low, hot groan.

“Izumi-san?” His voice prods Izumi, as if it were a thorny vine so hesitantly and carefully and gracefully winding around his neck.

Izumi shifts, frees his mouth from its cottony prison. “I really, really love you, Yuu-kun.”

“I know, Izumi-san,” and it sounds like an apology, and it sounds like a eulogy. “I know.”

He doesn’t change back.

When the wind blows the rain clouds away and the late summer sun casts a warm glow across ES once again, Izumi doesn’t change back.

He sits on the edge of his bed, his hair trapped haphazardly under his ass and pulling at his skull, as Makoto examines him.

Makoto, tall and wide and masculine. A guy.

Makoto changed back. Izumi didn’t.

“Wh–why not?!” Izumi asks, too scared to even recoil at how shrill his voice comes out. “Why am I still—?!”

Makoto’s brow furrows, and he leans in, almost engulfing Izumi in his size. It’s the first time Izumi has ever been so aware of how tall he is, how big he is, and it’s only exaggerated by how small Izumi feels right now.

How small Izumi is right now.

He shrinks back almost involuntarily, scooting back in the bed and catching even more hair under his ass. His heels hook under the edge of the bed frame, and his legs squeeze together without conscious thought.

Makoto doesn’t seem to notice any of that. Instead he reaches for Izumi’s hair, and Izumi’s idiot heart pounds as his large hand brushes against his cheek. Makoto takes a silvery lock between his fingers and runs them down its length, pulling it forward to him until they reach the tips of his hair and the lock falls in a flourish against the mounds still stuck to his chest.

Izumi stares enviously at Makoto’s smooth, flat chest.

“You really didn’t change back,” Makoto whispers.

Izumi scoffs. “Yeah, no shit.”

Makoto raises an eyebrow at him, unamused.

“I mean—” Izumi looks away, anywhere other than at his face. He ends up staring straight ahead, at Makoto’s legs. At Makoto’s… never mind. “What happened? Why didn’t I?!”

Makoto clamps his hands around Izumi’s shoulders, and they’re warm and he feels impossibly small within that firm grasp. “Calm down, Izumi-san. I’m sure there’s a perfectly rational explanation.”

“As if this whole thing was ever rational to begin with?!”

Makoto falters, then shakes his head. “Let’s just try and think. What happened last night that might have triggered something like this?”

It’s hard to think with Makoto so close to him, if he can be quite honest. With emerald eyes staring open and vulnerable at him, with massive hands rubbing gentle, easy circles into his skin, with a stature that towers over him and makes him feel not only small, but safe—

“I–I don’t know,” Izumi says. “How should I know? I was asleep!”

“What about before that?” Makoto asks. “What did we do before we went to bed?”

Izumi takes a deep breath to center himself, but it’s shaky, just like his resolve. “We came back from practice, took showers, and… I don’t know, then we went to bed.”

Makoto stares hard at him.

And it’s not like Izumi doesn’t remember. Of course he does. But right now, the thought of adding the vulnerability of admitting that to the existing vulnerability of their situation—their positions—makes him squirm.

He clears his throat. “Never mind. It doesn’t matter.”

Makoto tilts his head. “It doesn’t? But Izumi-san…”

“It doesn’t matter,” he repeats. He can’t take this. He can’t take this even more than he can’t take the fact that he’s still a girl. “Why should I care, anyway? It—It doesn’t change what happened. It doesn’t change that I’m—”

Two hands squeeze into Izumi’s shoulders, and he instantly melts into the touch. It’s comforting, and he wants more, craves more, and it’s hard to deny himself that desire when the events of last night are hanging, unspoken but omnipresent, between them.

But the hands leave his shoulders, and Izumi has to bite back a whimper when a cool draft replaces Makoto’s touch. He clenches his fists into the blankets to keep himself from reaching out—

Except maybe Makoto could tell anyway, or maybe it was part of his plan from the beginning, because he sits down next to him instead, and it feels like they’re closer than they’ve ever been before, thighs touching and arms pressed up against each other.

When Izumi looks down, he can see the difference between them. Everything about Izumi is smaller now in a way he’s never quite had to reckon with before. Before, Makoto was a girl too. Before, Makoto was the same small size as he was. But now he’s big, he’s tall, he’s wide, and every subtle difference between them prickles against Izumi’s skin like those same thorns Makoto had used to strangle him last night.

And when he looks up, he can feel the difference between them. Because he looks up, and up further still. Izumi is short; everything about him is a far cry from the magnificent stature that he used to have, that he’s supposed to have. And Makoto dwarfs him in comparison now, a development he doesn’t even seem to notice, let alone acknowledge.

“Yuu-kun,” he whispers, and there’s no rain to drown out his sickening dulcet tones now.

“Izumi-san?” There’s care and concern in his voice, and when he looks down he almost seems startled, himself. As if he’s not used to this. As if he’s finally facing the reality of it all.

“I hate this,” Izumi says. “I don’t want this,” he says. “I’m… I’m scared,” he says.

And Makoto stares at him, searching for something on his face. And then, perhaps having found what he was looking for, he throws his arm around Izumi without a word and pulls him in until their bodies lay flush against each other, Izumi’s head pressed into Makoto’s shoulder like a warm, inviting pillow.

“Yuu-kun.”

“Yes, Izumi-san?” Makoto holds onto him even as the distance between them seems to grow. He rubs his hand up and down Izumi’s arm methodically, a small comfort Izumi clings to as if it’s the only thing keeping them tied together.

“I just want to go back to normal.”

“I know, Izumi-san.”

Izumi lets himself relax into Makoto’s touch, lets Makoto massage away his thoughts, lets Makoto’s whole being engulf him if only just for the moment.

And as he sits there in Makoto’s arms, closer than he’s ever been but still so far away, he’s no longer so sure what “normal” he wants back.

He goes to bed alone that night in the room they were supposed to share. Even when the midnight downpour starts, he doesn’t hear from Makoto.

And when he wakes up alone in the morning in the room they were supposed to share, reality sinks deep into his bones. He’s stuck like this. Makoto is free from whatever curse was placed on them, and he’s stuck.

So much for that Raindrop2 nonsense. Solo units may be “a thing,” but that’ll never work now. It’s not like he cares anyway; he was just humoring Tenshouin for a while.

That said, what’s going to happen to him? He can’t work as an idol like this, and Tenshouin won’t keep him around if he can’t pull his weight. So what, is that it? Is his idol career over? Is he going to be dropped by the wayside because he’s not useful anymore?

He reaches up and tugs at his hair, hard enough to elicit a little whine from deep in his throat. The hair doesn’t come out, obviously. He totally didn’t think it would. Like that would even fix this shithole he’s in.

(Besides, he’s already tried that before.)

With a huff, he grabs his phone and clicks a button to light it up. There are several notifications obnoxiously cover up the picture he’d snuck of Makoto while they were out shopping. He frowns down at it.

It’s the only reminder he has of Makoto when he was a girl.

Well, that and the innumerable other photos he’d taken, and the live footage he’d saved to his camera roll.

He has half a mind to throw his phone, but then he actually bothers to look at the notifications on the screen. Most of them are from Hallhands, and most of those are from either Tenshouin or Aoba. He scrolls through them without unlocking his phone because he has absolutely no intention of gracing them with his attention quite yet, especially considering they’re obviously just calling to say he’s fired.

But at the top, sandwiched between a photo of Arashi’s breakfast sent to the Knights group chat and some longwinded message from Tenshouin, is a surprise that makes his traitorous heart jump. Fear? Excitement? Maybe there’s not all that much of a difference between the two in the first place.

He sits up, unlocks his phone and subsequently opens Hallhands, biting his lip when he sees the little notification dot next to Makoto’s name. It’s recent, only from about half an hour ago.

They haven’t spoken since yesterday afternoon.

Izumi hesitates. Should he open it? No, that’s a stupid question—of course he should open it. It’s from Makoto, from Yuu-kun! But still his finger hesitates over the message, and all he can see before the preview trails off is “hey izumi-san, just wanted to…”

He sets his phone down next to him, then sets his face gingerly into his hands and groans.

Then a few knocks echo throughout the room, and his face slips out of his hands and he falls backwards on his bed, hair splaying out around him as a little shout is knocked from his lungs.

The door pushes open, but it’s slow and careful.

“Izumi-san?”

It’s Makoto.

“Are you decent?”

For some reason, tears prickle at his eyes, but he squeezes them shut and wills them away as he pushes himself back up, tangling his arms in his hair during the process. “Yuu-kun?”

The door pushes open more and Makoto pokes his head in. His head falls as he lets out a sigh. “Oh, thank god. I was worried I was going to barge in on you, and. Well.”

Izumi sucks in a breath. “And well what?”

When Makoto’s head perks back up, his face is beet red. “Um! It’s just because, well. You’re a, you know… a girl, and I don’t want to, uh—”

“Right.” He clenches his fist around the hair that’s there. “Why are you here, Yuu-kun?”

Makoto’s eyes widen, and he lets go of the door to fumble with his hands, allowing it to swing wide open. “Oh, yeah! I just—Did you get my text?”

The phone sits untouched next to him. He shakes his head.

“I wanted to check up on you,” Makoto says, still hovering in the doorway as if he’s not sure what to do or where to go or even how to talk. “You were so upset yesterday, and so I thought it over and… I wanted to see if there was anything I could do to help.”

You could turn back into a girl, Izumi’s mind supplies. He absolutely does not say that.

“No, Yuu-kun, I’m fine,” he answers instead. “How did you even think you could help me, anyway? Are you stupid?”

Makoto’s face falls, and a pang of guilt kicks against Izumi’s chest. “I know I can’t change anything. We barely even know what’s going on, so anything I do could barely even be called help. But still…”

Still…?

“I wanted to cheer you up somehow.”

Izumi finally registers how Makoto looks. He’s wearing a nice button-up and slacks, and surprisingly they actually match the canvas sneakers on his feet. There’s a sleek watch on one wrist, his hair is slicked back with a product that doesn’t make it look greasy, and if Izumi looks hard enough, he can even see light makeup on his face.

“What are you doing?” Izumi asks with a raised eyebrow.

Makoto pulls his other arm from behind his back. There’s a single pink rose clenched a little too tightly in his fist, but he holds it out for Izumi without hesitation. “I want to get your mind off things, so I thought I could… I dunno, take you out. Or something.”

T–take him—?

“On a—?” Izumi swallows the rest.

Makoto’s eyes widen and his jaw drops open and he looks scared out of his damn mind, but then he responds: “I guess. If you want it to be a date, then it is. It’s all about you today, Izumi-san. Because I want you to feel better.”

Izumi pinches himself. Hard.

“Izumi-san?!”

Then he stands up in a rush that has his head spinning. “Yes. I’ll—Yes.”

He snatches the rose out of Makoto’s hand and squeezes it in his own, so tightly that his nails dig into his palms.

Makoto chuckles nervously and steps back. “Okay! Awesome! Then I’ll, um, let you get ready. I’ll be… in the hall. Out there.”

He doesn’t give Izumi a chance to respond or even to think about the implications of the statement before the door closes, separating them.

But not for long. Because Yuu-kun said this was a date. Because Yuu-kun is waiting for him. Because despite the shithole he’s in right now, Yuu-kun is doing all of this for him.

He puts the rose to his face and breathes in, his lips grazing against its soft petals when he smiles.

Izumi teeters on the highest heels he can stand to wear just because it makes him feel taller, and it more or less works to close the gap between him and Makoto. If he ignores the short, ruffled A-line skirt he’s wearing and the ponytail that swishes back and forth with every step, he can almost imagine that things are back to normal as he walks down Saison Avenue, arm in arm with Makoto.

A nice summer breeze brushes through his bare legs, and his illusions are shattered.

Maybe he should have gone with a less conspicuous outfit, he wonders. Maybe he should have dressed down, or at least put on something more boyish or handsome. The eyes he feels on him as he walks down the street make him feel a little too small and vulnerable, even with Makoto’s warmth combatting the chill of fear he feels whenever he catches yet another random man leering at him.

Still, when he’d checked himself out in the mirror, he couldn’t deny that he looked hot. He knows fashion; he knows what makes a body gorgeous. And he pulled out all the stops for this one, every fold of fabric perfectly accentuating his figure in a way that draws the eye and keeps it there. To put it simply, he’s a total knock-out.

Based on the way Makoto keeps sneaking glances at him, he thinks so too.

And that’s all that matters, probably.

He grips Makoto’s arm tighter.

Makoto clears his throat, and out of the corner of his eye, Izumi catches him staring again. “Um, Izumi-san, you look really nice today.”

“I know,” he says, all the while beating himself up for it. I know? He’s an idiot. But—maybe he can salvage it. “I did it for you.”

“For me?!” There’s a stutter in Makoto’s step that causes Izumi to almost lose balance, but somehow they keep going without any injury.

Izumi almost gets embarrassed by it all—Makoto’s gaze on him, his outfit, the amount of effort he put in just to get Makoto’s attention.

What is he even doing?

But when he looks up through his lashes and sees a flush on Makoto’s face, a barely-contained smile twisting his mouth into all sorts of weird, unnatural curves—

Well, maybe it was worth it. This is what he’s been doing his whole life, anyway. This is all he’s ever wanted. To be with Yuu-kun, to be as beautiful as he can possibly be for Yuu-kun. Just because he looks a little different doesn’t mean his heart has changed.

“You’re cute, Izumi-san.”

His heart exploding isn’t out of the picture, though.

Izumi stutters a few half-syllables before Makoto tugs on his arm. “C’mon, we’re here!”

“Here” is apparently a little café squeezed between two boutiques. It’s crammed in so tight that only a single table can fit outside, and even that stretches over the invisible boundary line and onto one of the boutique’s properties.

A bell jingles above the door when Makoto pushes it open and holds it so Izumi can walk in first—Izumi can’t help but wonder if he’s doing it because he’s Izumi, or because he’s a girl.

Does it even matter? Is there even a difference at this point?

Izumi walks through the threshold, leaving the thoughts outside.

The air conditioning blows his hair back and runs across his clean-shaven legs, and a chill runs down his back only to disappear under the warm spot on the small of his back where Makoto’s hand goads him forward. Izumi complies, heels clicking on the hardwood floor as he approaches the display case full of cakes and sweet breads and all kinds of pastries.

He frowns. “Yuu-kun—”

“I know, I know,” Makoto says, coming up right behind him. His voice echoes in Izumi’s right ear, his mouth so close he can feel his breath tickle his cheek. “They have stuff for you here, too. But I thought…”

Izumi glances to the side just to see a little blush dusting over Makoto’s nose.

“Well, I was thinking, since you’re going through a rough time right now that you’d let me spoil you a bit.”

Izumi’s heart nearly stops, his chest seizing with an unexpectedly good sort of pain. He spins around just to put some distance between them and wobbles back on his heel, teetering back toward the display case as the good sort of pain gives way to a sudden panic—

“Whoa, there!” But Makoto catches him, as if prepared for something so embarrassing to happen. His hand wraps around Izumi’s upper arm and pulls him back upright. “You okay, Izumi-san?”

Izumi looks down at the ground and clears his throat before nodding just barely enough to be called a response.

Makoto sighs audibly. “Be careful with those heels, okay? I was fine ‘cause I had to learn how to dance in them, but you’re not as used to walking around like that.”

Izumi’s face burns, and he doesn’t look up. That was so uncool of him—what is he, some idiot high school girl on a date with her first crush?

He guesses he can’t say that’s a hundred percent false, but still. He’s supposed to have it all together, but the more time he spends in this ridiculous situation, the more he feels like he’s just being tossed around by everyone else around him. Including Makoto, he admits to himself even as he can’t figure out if that annoys him or not. If he wants that or not.

But Makoto seems entirely unaware of his inner thoughts and just turns back to the rows and rows of heart attacks waiting to happen. “Anyway, like I said, they’ve got plenty of stuff you’d usually eat, like salads and whatever, but Otogari-kun recommended this place to me, saying they had really good sweets too. And y’know, I just thought…”

Izumi looks up through his bangs.

“Well, they say chocolate can cure anything, right?” Makoto shrugs.

“I’m like, ninety-nine percent sure that’s not true,” Izumi says with a huff. But, well…

He looks back at the cakes and grimaces.

“Fine. What do you recommend?”

Makoto lights up with a brilliant sparkle, and Izumi wonders if that’s natural or if it’s a byproduct of being around that orange head all the time. “Um! Well I dunno, it’s my first time here too. We could split something?”

Izumi’s heart beats a little faster and he nods—It’s practical, he tells himself firmly. This way he won’t be eating so much. “The tiramisu.”

Small, simple, elegant. It’s perfect, he reasons.

And Makoto beams down at him and takes a step to the counter to repeat the order before Izumi can do it himself. Izumi’s shoulders slump forward in something of a pout as he watches the clerk pull out a tiramisu from the case and hand it over to Makoto.

Makoto pays and returns and scans the café for a moment before pointing to a tiny table and two empty chairs crammed to the side. “Let’s sit there,” he says, and then he walks off without giving Izumi a chance to put his two cents in.

Not like he had any in the first place, really.

So he follows Makoto to the table, careful to put one foot in front of the other so as not to embarrass himself again, and when they go to sit Makoto pulls the chair out for him like he’s some chivalric knight in shining armor.

That’s supposed to be his thing, Izumi thinks, but the way his heart flutters and the way Makoto just keeps smiling that damn smile at him kills any protest he might have had before it can reach his tongue. He sits down quietly and mumbles a thanks he’s not sure he wants Makoto to hear.

Makoto pushes the tiramisu toward him. “Try it.”

“I haven’t had something this sugary in months,” Izumi says. It’s not a rejection, but… He looks down at the cake and scrunches his face up.

Makoto raises an eyebrow and smirks knowingly at him. “C’mon, just one bite. If you really hate it, I’ll finish it for you.”

Izumi picks up his fork. “Fine.”

He sinks it into the cake, pries out a small chunk and puts it to his lips. Immediately he can taste the rich, bittersweet flavor as the crumbs spill into his mouth, and the only thing on his mind as Makoto stares expectantly at him is how much he’ll need to work out to burn this off.

“Yuuki-kun?!”

Izumi coughs and drops his fork, the barely-touched bite of tiramisu spilling in pieces onto the table. Makoto’s eyes are wide, the smile wiped completely off his face, and Izumi whips around to—

Arashi’s hand is in the air waving at them as she makes her way over. Without even so much as asking, she hurries across the café floor to where they sit, her eyes sparkling as she looks between them.

“Omigosh, I had no idea you were dating anyone!” she gushes, pressing her hands to her cheeks with a simple joy Izumi has come to expect from her when it comes to topics like these.

His face twists up as he goes to confront her, to shoo her away so they can get some privacy. Then he remembers he’s not supposed to have any idea who Arashi is, and he swallows the sarcastic retort biting into his tongue. Instead he draws in on himself and looks down, hoping his hair will cover his face, hoping she’s just here to pass by and nothing more. Like get a clue, Naru-kun; you can’t just disturb people when they’re on a date.

Makoto just laughs, a note of panic in his voice. “Hey, Narukami-kun. It’s, uh… yeah, well—um—”

Arashi bats at his arm playfully. “No need to be shy! But wow, I can’t believe you of all people would be dating anyone! Just be careful you don’t get caught in a scandal—Remember what happened with Hakaze-senpai that one time?”

Makoto squeaks out an embarrassing little noise that Izumi finds utterly endearing.

“Soooo, introduce me!” Arashi gushes, finally turning toward Izumi. And then she gasps, a hand flying to her lips. “Wait, you’re—!”

Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck—

“Aren’t you that Shizuku girl? From Raindrop2?”

Izumi’s heart stops in his chest. And then he remembers how fixated Arashi had been on Raindrop2, how she literally wouldn’t shut up about them. Fuck, of course she’d recognize him, one way or another.

He looks up, but not so much that he might risk revealing his actual identity. He opens his mouth and realizes he has no idea what Shizuku would say, how Shizuku would act, what a girl is even supposed to be like. The closest thing he has is Arashi, and well—

Tryhard isn’t exactly the ideal he’s going for here.

There’s Anzu too, but… Yeah, never mind. Guess he’ll be winging it. He opens his mouth again.

“Shh, Narukami-kun!” Makoto says, eyes wide and flustered. “Don’t say that so loud! Shizuku-chan is way more at risk for a scandal than I am, since she just debuted recently.”

Arashi sucks in a breath, but a little squeal ekes out from between her lips. “No way, this is so exciting!”

Makoto grabs Izumi’s hand and squeezes—less a show of affection and more an attempt to reassure him. “She’s really shy; she’s not used to being in the limelight yet.”

Arashi jumps up and down on the balls of her feet.

“But I do think you got things a little mixed up,” Makoto says, voice pitched low. “We aren’t actually dating. She’s my kouhai at StarPro, so she wanted some advice. I thought we could talk over brunch.”

Arashi sinks back down, disappointment palpable. “Oh, is that all…?”

Makoto frowns. “Yeah. Sorry I caused some confusion, but this is just a business relationship. Right, Shizuku-chan?”

Izumi’s heart pulses with fear, and he nods with an awkward fervor. “Um… yes.”

He doesn’t want to admit that even though Makoto is just acting, he’s still twisting a knife in his heart. He keeps repeating to himself it is a date, it is a date, it is a date—

“See?” Makoto says, squeezing Izumi’s hand again, like a silent you did great.

Izumi clings to that.

“Yeah,” Arashi says, and there’s an obvious pout in her voice. “I guess I got a little worked up there, didn’t I? Sorry, Yuuki-kun, Shizuku-chan. But really, it’s so nice to meet you. I’ve been watching you both like a hawk since you debuted!”

“Thank you,” Izumi says in the girliest voice he can muster. It sickens him. “I appreciate your support.”

“I hope ES keeps bringing on female idols!” Arashi continues. “You girls are total trendsetters! And you have such a cute look, I’ve been trying to get Tsukasa-chan to take some inspiration from you! But he’s so stubborn, you know?”

Izumi rolls his eyes. That’s an understatement.

Arashi gasps. “Oh! I probably shouldn’t badmouth my unit members in public. You never know who’s listening.”

As if Izumi would care about something like that anyway. But he’s not Izumi right now. “Right…”

“Sorry about the mixup, Narukami-kun,” Makoto says, as if stepping in to save him. Izumi feels like he can breathe a little better now. “But that’s really all it is. I just wanted to help out my kouhai.”

Arashi hums and teeters back and forth on her feet. “Is that really all it is?”

Makoto coughs, yanking his hand back and holding it to his chest like he just got burnt.

But her voice is warm when she speaks again, and Izumi is sure if he looked up there would be a radiant smile on her face. “Well, anyway. If this is how you act as a senpai, I almost wish I were your kouhai, too. You’re so lucky to have Yuuki-kun doting on you like that, Shizuku-chan.”

Izumi swallows thickly and tenses up too suddenly. He doesn’t know what to say to that—He doesn’t know if he could speak even if he found the words.

Makoto sputters a few broken syllables before regaining some sense of composure, wringing his hand out next to him. “Th–thanks for stopping by, Narukami-kun! It was good seeing you! Let’s catch up later, okay?!”

Makoto sounds breathless, much the same way Izumi feels.

Arashi just giggles. “I see, I see. Well all right, I’ll catch you both later then. It was good meeting you, Shizuku-chan. If you ever need some more feminine energy to combat that sausage fest called ES, just give me a call, okay?”

Izumi forces himself to nod. “Thank you, Naru-k—Narukami… senpai.”

Eugh, gag him with a spoon.

And then Arashi leaves them alone with Makoto’s beet-red face and Izumi’s pounding heart, and as soon as she’s out of sight they both fall forward with a sigh of relief, their heads landing onto the table at the same time.

A few months after they first started changing and a few days after Makoto stopped, they’re both in the old dormitory just… sitting around, really. It’s not like Izumi can actually go anywhere after The Arashi Incident. Still—

“Why are you still here?” Izumi asks, perhaps more demanding than he’d intended it to sound.

Makoto looks up from his game, his fingers finding the pause button by muscle memory alone. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, why are you here?” Izumi asks, gesturing at the room around them.

“Oh.” Makoto looks at the TV screen, then back at Izumi. “Well… I felt weird just leaving you all alone.”

Whatever heat might have fueled him before fizzles out. “Why?” he asks, softly.

“We started this whole thing together,” Makoto begins, chewing on his words thoughtfully, “so I thought we should end it together too. Or something?”

“You’re not even stuck like this anymore.” Izumi’s voice is quiet. “You can go back to normal.”

“But you’re not,” Makoto says, as if that explains everything. Izumi isn’t sure how far to read into that.

“So you’re just gonna sit around and play games all day?”

Makoto raises an eyebrow. “Would you rather be left alone, Izumi-san?”

Izumi shuts his mouth.

No, he doesn’t, but—but it still doesn’t make any sense. Why would Yuu-kun hole himself up like this when he doesn’t have to? Wouldn’t his roommates worry about him? Doesn’t he have work? Doesn’t he have anything better to—?

“I don’t want you to go through all of this alone, that’s all.” Makoto puts his controller down and pushes himself up, crossing the small room in just a few strides. The bed bounces when Makoto settles himself on it next to him, and Izumi tries to ignore the blissful warmth he radiates. “I can’t sleep here with you anymore, but I can at least hang out with you while you’re basically on house arrest.”

Izumi bites his lip. “So you’re just going to give up your whole life for me?”

“That’s a little dramatic,” Makoto says, bumping his shoulder into Izumi’s. “Am I not allowed to sympathize with you?”

“Oh, so you pity me.” Izumi stares straight ahead. None of this is coming out right at all, and he’s perfectly aware of this. But still he can’t stop it, can’t stop the caustic tone that aims for all of Makoto’s weak points and drips acid on them in some desperately idiotic attempt to get under his skin.

But Makoto just sighs. “No, Izumi-san, you’re misunderstanding me. Is it really so bad to want to keep you company?”

Izumi clenches his hands into fists. “That’s—”

“You don’t have to suffer alone,” Makoto says. “Just because something happened and I’m not turning into a girl anymore, doesn’t mean I’m going to abandon you.”

It’d be easier if he did, Izumi thinks. It’d be easier if he left like everyone else he pushed away and hurt so that he wouldn’t have to keep thinking, wouldn’t have to keep looking at him. But of course that would never happen; if there were ever any chance of Makoto leaving him, he’d have done so long ago.

But Makoto doesn’t move from his place next to Izumi, and Izumi doesn’t want him to go.

Words form on his mouth and dissolve before they can take tangible shape, and in the end he sits there quietly listening to Makoto breathe. It’s steady and rhythmic and maybe he’s grateful that Makoto is there, even if he doesn’t deserve it, even if it just makes everything worse.

He plucks at his skirt—one of the ones he’d bought specifically with Makoto in mind. It’s not so uncomfortable wearing them anymore, not when it’s the majority of his wardrobe and not when he’s been wearing them nearly every day for so long. He still feels exposed when Makoto glances over at him, but it’s not unpleasant. It’s not unwelcome.

“Izumi-san—”

“It hurts, Yuu-kun,” Izumi blurts out, knowing he’ll regret it—but he’s said a lot of things he regrets, so he stupidly keeps going and just throws it onto the ever-growing pile, “to want something you shouldn’t.”

Makoto shrinks back and considers that for a moment. “What do you want, then?”

And how is he supposed to answer that? He shouldn’t have said anything in the first place. The regret sinks in immediately, but despite the slurry of shame and longing he knows he has to come up with something.

But he can’t say what he wants. He can’t say he wants to go back to normal, because “normal” now is so far from normal-normal. “Normal” now is a fantasy he can’t have, shouldn’t have, isn’t supposed to have. “Normal” now is a stupid, idiotic dream born of stupid, idiotic whispers in his ear and a stupid, idiotic situation they were never supposed to experience. He can’t tell his Yuu-kun, whose handsome face is his best asset, whose body is his entire career, what he so selfishly wants.

He can’t say he wants them to be girls again—both of them.

Because that’s stupid. It’s something only an idiot would want. It’s stupid, it’s idiotic, it’s—it’s—

It’s a promise of Makoto, of Izumi being Makoto’s partner, of Izumi being the most important person in Makoto’s life. It’s a shared understanding of who they are and who they once were and who they’ve become. It’s solidarity and care and the knowledge that no matter what, they’re in this together. It’s the comfort that Makoto can’t, won’t, leave and go somewhere Izumi can’t follow.

He’s so stupid.

“Izumi-san?”

“I just want you, Yuu-kun,” he says, picking the option he’ll regret the least.

“I already told you,” Makoto hedges, “I’m gonna stick around as long as this whole thing keeps up so—”

“Not what I meant.” Izumi buries his head in his hands.

“Oh.” And now he has nothing to fall back on, so he falls silent instead.

So Izumi sits there in that silence, thigh pressed against thigh, arm pressed against arm, shoulder pressed against shoulder. There’s barely any distance between them, and yet it feels insurmountable. Because Makoto is still a guy, and he is still a girl. It shouldn’t make any difference, he knows that. It doesn’t matter in the end; they’re still Sena Izumi and Yuuki Makoto, and they’re together right now, and Makoto isn’t going anywhere.

He knows that. He knows all of that.

But there’s nothing holding them together anymore, and the more he fumbles for Makoto’s hand the more he slips through his grasp, falling further and further away.

Makoto will eventually go back to his old life. He has that option. He can stop showing up one day and leave Izumi all alone, and there’s nothing Izumi could do to change that.

He wants Makoto. He’s always wanted Makoto.

“Can I kiss you?” he asks into the oppressive quiet, into his hands.

Makoto squeaks. “Huh?”

Izumi lifts his head and asks again. “Can I kiss you?”

He turns to look at Makoto and finds him red in the face, slack-jawed, wide-eyed with surprise, or maybe shock. “I—I—”

“Yuu-kun,” and it comes out like a plea, and it comes out like a prayer.

Makoto swallows. “Okay.”

The single word wraps around his heart and squeezes, and he leans in with a hunger that’s never quite been sated, resting his hands around Makoto’s shoulder as he draws closer. Makoto’s eyes flutter shut, and the closer Izumi gets the better he can feel the heat radiating off his face, off both of their faces.

Their breaths mingle for just a moment before Izumi seals their lips together, and the first thought he has is that Makoto’s lips are soft.

The second is that he’s an idiot. A stupid idiot who shouldn’t be doing this, who’s taking advantage of someone he loves, who’s going to end up regretting even the thing he wants most in the world.

He goes to pull away. This was a mistake. He shouldn’t have even asked.

But when he does, Makoto’s hand flies up and tangles itself in Izumi’s complete mess of hair, holding him firmly in place. Izumi panics for a moment when he realizes he can’t break free, but Makoto pulls him closer, deepens the kiss—and Izumi relents, lets himself sink into Makoto’s touch, lets his hands fall to his side and accepts it, somehow.

Makoto’s other hand tucks under Izumi’s chin and caresses his face, and again he feels so small compared to Makoto. Again he feels so different.

But his thoughts are drowned out as passion overtakes fear. He moans and it comes out in a sweet soprano; Makoto’s hand trails down and cups his breast. It’s weird and unnatural and yet even so it feels right, somehow, and he wants more. He doesn’t want it to stop, and he wishes Makoto’s hands would touch every part of his body, natural or not, just as long as it keeps going and never stops.

His skirt hikes up and Makoto’s hand finds his ass, fingers curling around his panties almost with a sort of desperation. And with that same desperation Makoto pulls on his hair until Izumi falls backwards, and with that same desperation Makoto follows and keeps going and, thankfully, never stops.

And when he pulls away to catch his breath Izumi whispers a breathy “I love you” and Makoto whispers a breathy “Me too” back and something seems to shift into place that makes all of Izumi’s earlier worries feel so stupid now.

He really is an idiot.

“You really are so pretty, Izumi-san,” Makoto says against his skin, and Izumi wants, more than anything else, for this to last forever.

It doesn’t. When he wakes up with Makoto’s arms tangled around him, he realizes with an almost pitiful sinking in his stomach that nothing lasts forever.

He changed back.

It’s a foreign sensation, somehow. He feels almost too big now, too empty and too full in all the wrong places. It’s his body, the most beautiful one in the world, but right now, at least, it doesn’t feel like it.

He groans, and Makoto shifts around him, holds him close in a fleshy prison Izumi wouldn’t dare escape from. And then fear grips his heart—he lies perfectly still. Because if this moment is shattered, if Makoto wakes up, then it’s all over. If he could just stop time, he could stay here forever, warm and loved in a way he’s never known.

But he can’t stop time. He’s only human, and the world isn’t so kind to people like him.

When he turns his head, his hair doesn’t spill onto his face or catch under his back. When Makoto shifts just slightly, his arm runs over a smooth, flat chest. When Makoto groans sleepily in his ear, his dick responds almost immediately.

He’s a guy. He changed back.

This isn’t what he wanted.

“Izumi-san…?” comes Makoto’s groggy voice, hot and wet against Izumi’s cheek. Izumi’s whole body chills; it’s only a matter of time now.

He doesn’t say anything. If he does, the illusion will be shattered. He doesn’t want to hear it, doesn’t want Makoto to hear it.

He wonders briefly if he could fake it, and then discards the thought.

Makoto’s hand runs up Izumi’s torso until it reaches his collarbone. There’s no real energy in the way he lazily draws light patterns there with his finger, but it’s soft and gentle and Izumi clings to it. “Good morning.”

Izumi nods, not daring to make a sound. He hasn’t realized yet, and Izumi doesn’t want to be the reason he does. If he could just stretch this moment out, make it last for as long as possible—

“You okay, Izumi-san?”

Izumi nods again. He doesn’t move.

Makoto does; he pushes himself up and pulls away from Izumi, leaving behind a frigid draft in the empty space that replaces him. He looks down at Izumi, scans his face for something, and Izumi braces himself for impact.

“What’s wrong?” Makoto says. His hand leaves his collarbone and goes to his face, fingers pressing against his cheek. They feel so much smaller than they did last night.

Izumi waits and waits, but it never comes. Makoto doesn’t cringe away, doesn’t shout out, doesn’t contort his face into a grimace. No, he just stares down at him, hands all over him even though the only things on him right now is a too-tight baby blue pleated skirt and a lacey bra he’d bought, perhaps ambitiously, with Makoto in mind.

Izumi’s face burns with shame.

“Are you feeling sick?” Makoto continues. And then his eyes widen and he pulls away. “Oh—or is this about last night…? Oh my god, I’m sorry Izumi-san, I just—”

“What.” His voice cracks when he finally dares to speak. He pushes himself up onto his elbows and stares at Makoto, hopelessly confused. “What the hell are you talking about…?”

“I went too far, didn’t I?” Makoto says, throwing his hands up to his face. “So now you’re mad at me, aren’t you?”

Why would he—? “No, I’m not—I’m not mad at you, I’m—?!”

He reaches out one of his hands and pries Makoto’s away from his face.

“I’m—! I mean!” Izumi kind of wishes Makoto weren’t looking at this sorry display right now, but, well, just another regret in the pile. “I changed back, Yuu-kun. So—”

“Yeah,” Makoto says. “And you didn’t even react. So I thought…”

“What?” Izumi asks, desperate. “I was waiting for you to react!”

Makoto twists his mouth up into a funny little smile. “Why would I react? I mean, I’m happy for you and all, but this isn’t… I already changed back.”

Izumi groans and falls back onto the bed. “Not what I meant.”

“Then…?”

And how is he supposed to explain? How is he supposed to swallow his pride and explain that he was waiting for Makoto to recoil in disgust, jump away like he’d touched fire, leave as soon as he possibly could?

“Izumi-san… are you okay?” Makoto asks, and his voice is quiet, soothing. “This is what you wanted, isn’t it?”

No. It’s not. He doesn’t want this. This isn’t the normal he wanted anymore, not when Makoto touched him like that, not when Makoto kissed him like that.

Not when Makoto thinks he makes a pretty girl.

He covers his face with his arm and groans again, long and miserable. He can’t explain this; he can’t explain any of this.

Makoto hums, and then the mattress bounces up and down as he crawls across it. Warm, steady hands grab Izumi’s arm and pull it away so he doesn’t even have a way to hide anymore.

But the way he looks down at Izumi is soft, an expression swimming with concern and something else. “Izumi-san, what do you want?”

Izumi gives a fruitless tug on his arm and then relinquishes control of it to Makoto’s hands and the gentle, calming way his nails scratch against his skin. “I told you that already. Or did you already forget?”

Makoto shakes his head. “No, I didn’t. I just wanted to make sure. What do you want?”

“I want—” to go back to normal—“you, Yuu-kun.”

The one thing he can’t have, and the one thing that only gets farther from him with every development that happens in his shithole life.

“I know, Izumi-san,” and this time, somehow, it sounds like a promise, and it sounds like a hallelujah. “Me too.”

Izumi blinks, and his thoughts come to a halt. He sits up. “What?”

“Me too,” he repeats. “Or did you not get that from all the… you know…”

No. That’s not—“That’s not possible,” he says, because it isn’t. “You said—”

Makoto cocks his head to the side, innocently.

“You said I’m a pretty girl.” It sounds so pathetic when he says it out loud, though.

Makoto furrows his brow. “Yeah? I mean, you do. Or did. Actually, is this whole thing even over? I guess we’ll have to wait until it rains…?”

Izumi shakes his head, and it feels light and empty without all that hair swishing around and catching and pulling. “But—!”

“But?”

“I thought,” Izumi says with a shaky, uncertain voice, ashamed of himself and scared of whatever answer he might get, “you preferred me… like that.”

It sounds so pathetic when he says it out loud.

“And that was the only way we could—the only way I could be with you,” and Izumi knows he’s rambling at this point, and he’s just building up his pile of regrets with every embarrassing and pathetic word he lets fall from his lips, but he can’t stop himself, doesn’t stop himself. “If we were both—If we just stayed like that, then you would have—”

“I would have what?” Makoto asks with a frown. “Stayed in a unit with you? Dated you? Loved you?”

Izumi nods miserably. It doesn’t matter which question he’s answering; it’s all the same.

“Izumi-san.” Makoto’s voice is quiet, almost unsure of himself in a way Izumi hasn’t heard in so long, probably well before this whole thing even began. He dares to look at him, dares to study his face as his eyes dart around, all over Izumi’s body from his legs to his arms to his face to the too-tight skirt.

“Yeah?” He responds in kind, his voice barely above a whisper.

“Can I kiss you?”

Oh, Izumi thinks. So that’s how it is.

Makoto leans in before Izumi can say anything, because they both know what the answer is. Makoto puts one hand on Izumi’s face, and the other snakes around his torso and feels up his back until his fingers fumble with the clasps of that perhaps ambitious bra until it falls open and drops down Izumi’s shoulders, leaving his chest bare and smooth and masculine.

Izumi is slow to understand, but he knows, at least, that he doesn’t want this to stop. That if he could control time, he would make this moment last forever. Makoto’s breath is hot on his face and when his hand finds its way up his skirt again and finds nothing girlish about him he doesn’t stop, and when Izumi moans it’s deep and husky.

And when the rain starts drip-dropping on the balcony door and slides down the window to pool along the sill, Izumi stays the same, and so does Makoto. The rain punctuates their jagged breaths and beats along the rhythm of their hearts and pulls them closer together until they melt into each other.

And with a deep, contented sigh, Izumi thinks that this is the normal he’d wanted after all.