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0.
They meet at a neighbourhood Greek Fest because Thor sees a bearded man running around in a skirt. The pleats of his white foustanella flounce up and down as he dances in circles with little kids or runs up to women and wraps an arm around their waists with his baggy white sleeves. While standing in line for an nondescript local restaurant, Thor watches him act like a fool in nothing more than the loose white skirt, matching white tights, and an ornate vest. The guy's fez falls off more than once while he declares Olympia Diner the best Greek restaurant in town.
The owner of the booth Thor is lining up for yells at him about stealing customers, but that doesn't stop the guy from approaching Thor, wrapping an arm around his shoulder, and asking Thor if he would like to accompany him to tastes so sweet it will make him feel like he's seen the Elysium fields. Thor isn't sure why he says yes but he does.
The guy yells, "Opa!" excitedly and drags Thor away with his warm hand clasped around Thor's. By the time they make it to the sad looking booth with a Greek flag and a banner with Olympia Diner handwritten on it, Thor knows that the guy's dressed up in order to promote the family business and that his name is Hercules. Their fingers are also entwined but both of them pretend not to notice.
"Nice skirt," Thor says.
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1.
But it's not just the foustanella. Hercules likes wearing short skirts and long dresses and shoes that come up to his thighs whenever he can. He jokes that it's easy access to his dick, but he also says that he likes the draft between his thighs and the thrill of his skirt lifting in the breeze like Marilyn Monroe. He doesn't shave and more often than not the thigh highs are all the more noticeable because of it, but Hercules wears it with proud, broad smile that he flashes at anybody who dares to look at him funny.
What boggles Herc's mind is that Thor watches him strap up his thigh high boots so intently but refuses to wear even the occasional miniskirt out in public. It's so obvious from the way his pupils blow up whenever he hears the straps of his thigh highs lock into place or watches his skirts bounce around in the breeze.
And it's not like Thor doesn't like to wear women's clothes. As much as the two of them like to knock back beers or happen to get into fist fights from their short tempers, the one thing they share is a fetish for wearing fishnets and corsets in bed. After taking Thor to the back of his parents' booth, Hercules had admitted that he'd always wanted to have sex while wearing his foustanella - or any skirt, really - and Thor had pressed close enough that Hercules was sure he was going to kiss him. But Thor didn't kiss him. Instead Thor whispered that he'd dreamed of fucking with bright red lipstick on his mouth and Hercules was into it the second he imagined Thor's lips smearing scarlet lip stains up and down his neck. It was the start of a relationship that involved lacy garters and platform high heels and getting pedicures together at the mall.
The thing is, Hercules knows Thor breathes a little heavier whenever they're at a restaurant and Hercules is wearing a skirt and sits with his thighs open. He sees the way Thor's eyes always follow the hem of his skirt like he can't focus on anything else. At first he thought Thor might be ashamed to be in public with Hercules dressed how he likes, but Thor had grabbed him by the waist and pulled him against his body and whispered into his ear with that deep voice that sends shivers up Herc's spine, "I like it."
It's so obvious to Hercules that he can't quite understand why Thor refuses to take the next step. Thor covers up his nylons by wearing slacks or baggy jeans. He wears sheer thigh highs with shorts long enough to cover the little peekaboo of lace at the top of the nylons even when he bends.
It's simple, really. If Thor likes to wear women's clothes, he should just wear them out in public. Hercules knows the initial shame of admitting the fondness of wearing women's clothing, but they're both beyond that. Thor has no problems taking his pants off when they get home and walking around with nothing more than his thigh highs and black briefs for the rest of the day. Wearing it out in public is a different matter, but Thor has a few loose sweaters he bought from the women's section that he likes to wear when it's chilly and a skirt that he wears only if he's wearing a hoodie long enough to cover the length. The part of their shared closet for women's clothes comes in two sections: the obviously feminine, bright, billowing skirts that belong to Hercules and the more gender neutral pieces that Thor matches with his slacks and blazers.
"They don't make fun of me," Hercules says, remembering how a guy had highfived him and said, 'cool skirt bro!' earlier that day.
"I don't care what they think," Thor says with a low rumble of warning strumming in his voice, "I just don't want them to see me as a man in a skirt. I want them to see me for who I am."
Hercules takes another sip of his beer and lifts his skirt to scratch at his balls. He chalks it up to Thor being Complicated.
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2.
Hercules knocks on the bathroom door for the third time in twenty minutes. "Are you done yet?"
The blowdryer keeps whizzing and Hercules bellows his question again, this time getting an answer. "Five more minutes!"
Hercules gives Thor seven minutes before he barges in. He finds Thor bent over the sink with his stained tipped brushes and open eyeshadow palettes scattered all over the vanity. There are four different nude lipsticks lined along the wall and a matching gloss for each one. Thor smells like Acqua di Gio, Old Spice, and aftershave, which in Hercules' humble opinion doesn't conflict with the fruity leave in conditioner Thor rubs into his hair or the vanilla lotion he smears along his thighs and forearms.
Hercules doesn't mind it, not really. Sure, it was weird to find out that Thor liked to put on makeup every day and it wasn't just a sex thing, but it doesn't make a difference to him as long as Hercules can piss in the morning while watching The View on the can. If anything, Hercules preens at the fact his boyfriend takes such good care of his body because it means Thor always feels soft beneath his touch and smells pleasing. Thor is the only partner Hercules has ever been with who can knock out a guy with a single punch and have hands so smooth Hercules wouldn't believe those hands could knock a guy out if he hadn't seen it before.
But days like today when Thor takes over forty minutes fussing over how to best blend his concealer, Hercules can't help but wonder why Thor doesn't go all out like he knows Thor could. Hercules slides behind Thor and holds onto his hips, looking at Thor's reflection in the mirror pucker up for a baby pink lip gloss that looks pinker in the tube than it does on his bottom lip. Hercules thinks about how last night they had been in this same position, only it was Thor carefully running a scarlet red gloss on his lips and meeting Hercules' gaze in the mirror as Hercules rubbed his hard cock along Thor's bare ass. Today Thor's attention is on smacking his lips together enough to make his gloss go from kissably shiny to something more natural, like he'd just licked his lips.
Thor sets the gloss down and spins around in Hercules' arms, looking at him very intensely. It's not an insecure look. No, it's full of confidence. But there's something there, something that lately Hercules has thought to be a desire for validation. "How do I look?"
If Hercules didn't know what he was looking for, he might not notices that Thor's nails are glossy because of the topcoat he applies every Saturday afternoon. He might not notice how Thor's eyelashes always look longer or darker because of mascara or the bit of brown eyeliner he runs along his waterline. Thor is a pro, there's no doubt about it, but Hercules doesn't understand why Thor does this when he could just as easily add the little winged eyeliner or contour his cheekbones in the way that Hercules knows Thor loves best. "I do this for myself," Thor had told him once, not that Hercules really understands what Thor means by that.
"Beautiful," Hercules says, and he really means it because he loves the way Thor dolls himself up so the delicate, feminine features enhance his strong jaw or bushy eyebrows. He also loves the way Thor's face lights up when he leans in to smear his gloss all over his boyfriend's mouth.
Hercules doesn't care that Thor smiles wider when Hercules calls him beautiful or pretty rather than handsome or cool. He just guesses it's another one of those Complicated things.
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3.
Hercules walks into the bedroom to find Thor cupping his chest in front of their full length mirror. Thor doesn't notice him at first and squeezes his breasts together and pushes them up like a push up bra. He experiments with the pressure in a few positions while changing the angle of his body to assess how he looks in the mirror, all the while unaware of Hercules. Hercules takes this as an invitation and jumps on the bed as if he were canonballing into a pool.
"I thought you were getting dressed," he says as Thor drops his hands, face red as if he were just caught guilty of something. The only thing Thor is guilty of is being smoking hot, Hercules thinks.
"I am," Thor says, looking appreciatively at Hercules' stretched body. He always had a thing for whenever Hercules dressed up in traditional Greek clothing, especially his foustanella, ever since they fucked in Hercules' truck that first time they met. Hercules has to admit that teaching a traditional Greek dancing class at the community centre was one of the best decisions for their sex life, not to mention it being the perfect excuse to walk out without people asking why he's in a skirt. Traditional costume? Cool. Just a skirt? Not cool. Hercules had to admit that the social norm never made much sense to him. "What are you teaching them today?"
"Kalamatianos," he says, rolling onto his side. "I could fuck your pecs right now."
"Boobs," Thor says immediately, now watching his body in the mirror again and not the slightest bit distracted by his boyfriend.
It takes Hercules a second, partially because he's distracted by Thor's chest and partially because he doesn't know what to make of that. "What?"
"They're boobs," Thor says as he cups his chest again, with more care and gentleness than before. He rubs them and strums his thumbs over his nipples, blushing only when he pushes his chest together to really look like a woman's.
"You mean moo--"
"Don't say it," Thor cuts in, eyes sharpening into a glare. In the reflection Hercules holds both hands out to feign innocence. Thor nods and holds his hand out. "Hand me that bra."
Hercules grabs the bra by his head and shoots up into sitting position, thighs already spread. He assumed Thor had it out for later, but now is as good a time as any other. Hercules has been building up his stamina for a quickie like this, and Thor could not have picked a better time. Hercules in his skirt, Thor in his bra. For Hercules it's a dream come true.
"You look so fucking good," Hercules says deeply, palming his dick while Thor hooks his bra into place. The bra doesn't have a wire and it's not a pushup, but Hercules thinks he looks great in it all the same. It's the first time Thor will have worn a bra in public and fuck if that thought doesn't excite Hercules.
Thor's glare becomes stronger in the mirror as he rearranges his chest into the cups. "What are you doing?"
Hercules smiles like the most obvious truth in the universe just came into doubt. "Getting ready to fuck?"
Thor finishes adjusting himself and turns to face his boyfriend, eyebrows bent and eyes sharp. "I'm wearing this because it feels right."
Hercules nods encouragingly and waits for the rest. It doesn't come. "So...no sex?"
"Unbelievable," Thor mutters, stomping out of the room with his fists balled so tight that his knuckles turn white.
Hercules shouts out a growl of frustration loud enough that Thor can hear in the living room. Thor's Complicated is now Hercules' Complicated and Hercules really needs to do something about Complicated before he comes into contact with underage children.
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4.
It's 7 P.M. on a Tuesday when they finish making a yogurt and green tea avocado mask together. Hercules tried to use Oikos but Thor batted the strained yogurt away. Thor allowed the olive oil when Hercules insisted, so Hercules still thinks he won in the end. Thor was the one who mashed the avocado and mixed it with the yogurt and olive oil, and Hercules watched him with an idle smile as Thor showed that his muscles weren't just for show.
Thor masterfully lathers the green paste on Hercules' face like he does every week, careful to avoid smearing the mask into his beard. When he finishes he holds the bowl for Hercules to do the same for him. It's a weekly ritual they've done ever since they moved in together. They make a simple face mask together in the kitchen and spend more time nibbling at the ingredients than they do actually making it, and then Thor applies Hercules' mask before letting Hercules do the same for him.
Hercules smears the mask along Thor's jaw with his thumb and flicks some of the green paste on his cheek when Thor starts to smile too wide. His skin is soft and smooth beneath his touch, not even rough from five o' clock shadow, and still warm from the shower Thor took not long ago.
"You shaved again," Hercules muses as Thor hums and angles his cheek into Hercules' hand.
"Oh," Thor says, touching the part of his chin where Hercules hasn't covered yet. "Yeah."
"You always shave it off while it's still stubble," Hercules goes on. "You'd look good with a beard. Like a true viking."
Thor smiles at the thought but shrugs. He has a towel wrapped around his hair and he begins to twist it so hard that it droops beneath the weight of the knot, which Hercules knows means Thor is bothered.
"You'll mess up your mud mask," Hercules says as he finishes covering Thor's other cheek. Thor stops fussing and sighs irritably. Hercules thumbs the mask along Thor's cheekbone when he thinks aloud, "You wax everything. Your chest, your legs..."
Thor glares. "What's your point?"
"Don't you want to see what it's like with hair?" Hercules grins, running his hand along Thor's jaw and masking it in avocado as he does so. "You'd look so manly."
Thor's face scrunches up like he ate tzatziki with too much lemon in it. "Is that all it takes?"
Hercules runs the mask up Thor's nose and across his forehead, eyebrows bent in incomprehension.
"What is masculinity anyway," Thor asks, sounding more like he's asking himself than Hercules.
Thor pulls away the second Hercules finishes applying the mask and retreats to the living room couch. Hercules follows him and finds Thor brooding while he flips through the Netflix titles. He settles for Legally Blonde by the time Hercules takes a seat next to him and slithers his arm around Thor's waist.
Hercules kisses him and Thor's mask catches on Hercules' beard. Thor tells him to stop but he's laughing and Hercules kisses Thor until he has half of Thor's mask matted into his facial hair. Thor tries to ignore Hercules making faces at him and it lasts for seven minutes before he sinks against Hercules's body and snuggles in the crook of his arm.
It's thirty minutes of watching Elle Woods challenge stereotypical perceptions others project onto her when Hercules really starts to think about it. Thor definitely has a streak of effeminacy, but it doesn't make him less of a man. It was still the same Thor who preferred to make his furniture and told Hercules to step aside whenever they needed to fix their leaky kitchen faucet. Thor was probably the manliest person Hercules knew, unafraid to step in a bar squabble if some guy was harassing a girl and benching more than two guys combined at the gym. Thor pulls out his wallet when it comes time to pay the bills and specialises in ten minute radiator replacements for his father's mechanic company and barbecues on the grill whenever the weather permits, and if none of that screamed manly, Hercules didn't know what did.
He looks at Thor with his hair wrapped in a towel and his face covered in avocado paste and Hercules thinks about how his face is covered in the same green chunks and his dick is threatening to peek out of the miniskirt he's wearing. They have their kinks but Hercules doesn't feel like his masculinity is threatened at all. He's confident in who he is. Thor... Thor is Complicated.
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5.
"Don't introduce me as your boyfriend anymore."
Hercules drops the fork he unfolded from his napkincloth. "You're breaking up with me?"
"What? No, I just-" Thor points to Hercules' sister as she struts to the back of the restaurant to give their orders to Hercules' father, the chef of the family business.
"I know Athena can be a pain in the ass, but I thought we both wanted to be out," Hercules says, although it's a bit hard to concentrate when his stomach is flip flopping and his forearms feel like ice. "We talked about this."
"Hercules. I'm not breaking up with you. And I do want to be out," Thor reassures, reaching over the table for Hercules' hand and squeezing it. "That's...why I want you to stop calling me boyfriend."
"But-" Thor squeezes Hercules' hand hard enough to stop him from saying anything further.
It takes Thor long enough to fumble for the right words until Athena returns with their drink order and sets them down. Hercules takes the tensest, most awkwardly long drink, gulping down an entire glass of water while Thor continues to begin and abandon explanations.
"I don't like boyfriend," Thor says abruptly. "I don't know how to put it... It doesn't feel right anymore."
Hercules doesn't know how he manages not to drop the glass, but apparently he slams it on the table loud enough for some of the other patrons to stare. He doesn't notice it, not really. He feels light headed and outside of himself. Thor is breaking up with him. The longest relationship he's ever had is coming to a close. The man he's lived with for over a year in their too small apartment, the man who has talked about moving to the suburbs and starting a family with him, the man who he'd fallen in love with at first sight, that same man is dumping him.
"You want to us to be friends with benefits," Hercules says.
"No!" Thor thunders back and Thor has to bite his bottom lip to stop him from shouting all their personal drama to the entire restaurant. "No, I want to be with you! Hercules, I just told you I'm not breaking up with you."
"Then why are you saying-"
"This isn't the right place for this," Thor says, more sharply this time and looking around. Some of the greedy eyes watching them dart away when Thor glares at them. "Or time."
"Fuck it. We're talking about this right now," Hercules says, voice cracking and willing himself not to cry.
"I want... Fuck, Hercules I don't know what I want. I want you to call me something other than boyfriend. Partner? Lover? It's complicated."
Thor tries to explain it. It sounds to Hercules more like Complicated with a capital C.
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+1.
"I don't feel like a man," Thor says late at night when Hercules is spooning him and they can't sleep.
Herc's chest rumbles against Thor's back as he laughs. "I saw how much of a man you are an hour ago."
And Hercules isn't sure what he said that makes Thor mad, but he can feel his frown without having to see it. "I mean I don't feel like I'm a man."
"So... You're... What? Are you going to become a woman?" Hercules asks, nosing at Thor's ear. He feels Thor shake his head.
"No. I don't feel like a woman either," Thor says in a strained tone.
"Then what are you?"
Thor's voice cracks and his body goes as tense as his tone. "I don't know."
Hercules takes a few moments just to breathe. Process. He wraps his arms tight around Thor and squeezes him. "What does that mean? You don't want to be called a man anymore?"
"Yeah," Thor breathes, still frozen in Hercules' arms. "That's a start."
Hercules breathes in slowly and deeply and exhales against Thor's neck. "Okay."
Thor tilts his head to the side, barely enough to peek over his shoulder. "You're okay with it?"
"Yeah," Hercules says, nuzzling his face and beard against Thor's hair. He may not understand it, but the bottom line is that Thor is Thor. "You're still you, psihi mou."
-
+2
Hercules' orange miniskirt flutters up as he takes a seat next to Thor. He elbows at his boy-- er, not-boyfriend until Thor takes his attention away from the book he's reading and Hercules grins wide. "There's a word for it."
"A word for what?" Thor asks in a tone that is clearly just humouring his boyfriend.
"For what you are."
Thor makes a motion with his head for more elaboration. "Which is...?"
Hercules puffs out his chest proudly and chirps, "Queer."
Thor levels him with an unimpressed look until Hercules insists there's more to it.
"Genderqueer. Or...non...non... Shit, what was it again?" Hercules whips out his phone and pulls up the last page he was reading. "Non-binary! See? There's a whole bunch of them. This is what you were telling me last night, right?"
Thor peeks over at Hercules' phone and scans the list of labels that supposedly define him. Agender, bigender, gender neutral, gender nonconforming, genderfluid... He can only guess at what most of them mean and none of them really call out to him, but seeing how long the list is reassures him just to know he's not the only one who feels like there's more than just being a man or a woman. "Maybe."
"This one sounds like fun," Hercules says, tapping on the word genderfuck. Thor shoves at him with a cheeky smirk.
Hercules shows Thor some of the other links he's found, from pronouns he's not sure how to pronounce to guides on androgynous fashion for MAAB people - which Hercules informs Thor means male assigned at birth. He squeezes Thor's shoulder and assures him that they'll figure this out together.
"You're a really good boyfriend," Thor says, slightly choked up, after he and Hercules finish browsing through all the links.
Hercules kisses his cheek and leans his forehead against Thor's. "And you are a really good girlboyfriend."
Thor laughs and headbutts him, snatching away the phone to go through the list of alternative relationship titles again.