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Metal boots clicked against the walkway as the two passengers and their denizen moved forward onto the next car, rested, and in seemingly higher spirits than they were the previous day. Ryan turned back towards Min-Gi as he walked. “I dunno, I kind of liked the cold pizzeria car, even if it’s not the pizza we’re used to. Pizza is still pizza, man.” Min-Gi rolled his eyes. “Whatever you say Ryan, although I still think cold pizza is just wrong, it’s just not a good texture.” He shivered a little bit, thinking of the aforementioned texture and the resulting sensation, but quickly shook it off as they approached the next car. Ryan ran ahead and opened the door, tempted to continue defending cold pizza but quickly changed his tune when he saw the next car. “Min, Kez, look! A dressing room car! Oh man I wonder if we’re gonna get to play another gig already, we can definitely manage to help you overcome your stage fright this time, right Min?”
Min-Gi cautiously rubbed the back of his neck and averted Ryan’s gaze. “Maybe...?” Kez smiled at him, attempting to be reassuring. “Hey man, it’s gonna like, work out. Don’t sweat it too much.” Min-Gi and Kez casually followed a much more eager Ryan into the apparent dressing room car. As Ryan and Kez began to look around and Min-Gi cautiously scanned the car for anything dangerous, a figure stepped out of the shadows. With a tall blonde bouffant that made her appear all the more intimidating at over seven feet tall, Sashay struck a pose and whistled to get the group’s attention. As the three of them turned to look at her, she grinned and began to explain the rules of the car.
“Welcome to Sashay’s runway fairway darlings! I’m Sashay and I’ll be your drag mother for tonight! You two have thirty minutes to come up with looks that’ll slay and blow the judges away! Don’t forget to hit the exit runway pronto when your done with your looks!” Sashay posed once more, this time with her hands on her hips and strutted off, back to the stage, leaving the three of them to process her instructions. Min-Gi looked like a deer in the headlights as she left, clearly panicking both internally and a little bit externally. Meanwhile Ryan had stars in his eyes and was clearly brimming with excitement. “Yes! I can definitely rock this car!” He pumped his fist and ran to the rolling clothes rack to start picking out his outfit.
Kez however, stayed back to see if Min-Gi was okay, even she, with her often oblivious nature, could tell that something was bothering him about this car. “You okay man? You look a little pale, kinda like somebody drained all the color out of your body so you look like one of those weird ghost mannequins from a few cars ago.” Min-Gi put a hand to his forehead and looked at the ground trying to calm himself. “I can’t do this, there’s an audience out there! Everyone’s gonna see me-“ he cut himself off as he slumped down to the floor feeling both panicked and frozen. “How is Ryan so comfortable with all this!? Everyone out there is gonna think I like doing this stuff or that I’m...” Kez raised an eyebrow. “That you what? Like to dress in fun outfits or perform or something?” Min-Gi looked up at her with worried eyes that were on the verge of tearing. “It’s more complicated than that Kez, my whole life I’ve avoided stuff like this for a reason, I didn’t want anyone to think- to figure out-“ The words seemed to catch in his throat as he tried to rationalize to Kez why he couldn’t do this. It wasn’t just the performing, it more than that, Kez just couldn’t understand it, maybe nobody could.
While Kez was trying to think of think of some way to calm Min-Gi down and convince him to try out the car’s challenge, Ryan had paused his search through the clothes rack when he noticed Min-Gi wasn’t by his side. Looking back by the door he saw Min-Gi sitting on the floor and realized Min-Gi was gonna need more than a pep talk from Kez to get through this car. Ryan wondered for a moment if maybe the train actually had helped him grow a little bit, a few weeks ago his first instinct might not have been to take the initiative and try to talk to Min-Gi about something like this, but now he knew that the worst possible thing to do here would be to leave Min alone when he was this upset. Strolling over, he sat on the floor next to him and tried to figure out what it was Min-Gi was upset about. “You okay man? Is this like another stage fright thing?” Ryan ended up coming off a little less sensitively than he had hoped but tried to continue. “I know that performing isn’t your favorite thing in the world but-“
Min-Gi snapped at Ryan, he hadn’t meant to but it just happened that way. “Don’t you get anything Ryan!? It’s not really about the performing! Everyone out there is gonna see me in clothes like that and think- know- that I’m...” Yet again the last word got caught in Min-Gi’s throat. Min-Gi put his head down while Ryan tried to figure out what exactly he had been talking about. It took him a moment and then it hit Ryan like a train. Min-Gi was queer too and he was afraid for anyone to know it. With this realization Ryan tried his best to chose his words carefully. “Min, I know this is a little weird and maybe... uncomfortable for you, but we’ve done a ton of other weird stuff on the train, this isn’t that big of a deal, man.” Min-Gi fiddled with the zipper on his jacket and sighed as he quietly responded. “Yeah but you don’t get it, this is different from all of the other weird things we’ve done on here. Nothing remotely like most of those things exist in our world. None of that was stuff we’ve been told we should be ashamed of liking or wanting anything to do with our whole lives.”
The sympathy in Ryan’s eyes was evident. He had processed the very same feelings before. Only now, he had to be there for Min-Gi in a way that nobody had been there for him during his own reckoning with his queerness. “Well Min, I used to feel kind of like that too, I never understood why people wanted to hate me and hurt me so much just because I was different. But when I went out on my own, I met people like me, people like us. And I decided that I wanted to live on my own terms and that it was more important for me to feel comfortable than try to change myself to make others happy.” Though he was far more focused on comforting Min-Gi, Ryan could hear the sound of his number dropping in the background. “Min, I can’t make you decide to do anything one way or the other, but I just want you to be able to live the life that makes you happiest...” Min-Gi looked back up at Ryan. “Yeah but... what about everyone out there? If I do this they’re all gonna know that I’m-“ He paused, not yet ready to say it aloud.
Ryan put a hand on Min-Gi’s shoulder. “When I first left, I was terrified of people knowing too, but then when I started playing shows at gay clubs and meeting other people like us, I just wasn’t as afraid anymore. I tried out drag and I met the queens and you know what I loved it! It was just like being on stage at any other gig except the people there actually understood me!” Min-Gi was on the verge of tearing up. “Yeah but didn’t you worry that people would judge you for- or think you were-“ Since Min-Gi still apparently couldn’t say it Ryan did for him. “What? Queer? No, I wasn’t worried because practically everyone else there was queer, just like me! And everyone here clearly came for a drag show so they’re not gonna care either!” Min-Gi took Ryan’s hand and stood up as he continued. “The train is just just like those gigs I did on the road, nobody here is going to judge us or even think twice about the fact that we’re queer.”
Ryan led Min-Gi to the makeup chair and continued. “Besides everyone out there is excited for the show and I’m sure they’ll love whatever we end up doing. When I was on the road I learned that as long as you’re having fun the audience is having fun. I think we’ve just gotta give it a try, man.” Min-Gi took a deep breath. “Fine, if it means getting out of this car I’ll do it... maybe it won’t be as bad as I think.” He added quietly, under his breath. “That’s the spirit, corpses!” Kez chimed in, finally breaking her uncharacteristically long silence. Ryan grabbed a palette and started doing a makeup look for Min-Gi, who winced as the blush brush touched his face. Ryan’s hand quickly pulled back, noticing Min-Gi’s discomfort. “Hey, I know your still getting used to this but we have to at least try, but y’know what? For now we’ll just skip the makeup, c’mon, let’s go pick out our wigs.
Any relief Min-Gi felt from leaving the makeup station immediately evaporated as he and Ryan began to look over the variety of wigs displayed on styling heads. “Ooh I’m definitely gonna go with this one!” Ryan exclaimed as he picked up a long and wavy fruit punch pink wig. Feeling unsure of himself Min-Gi scanned through the wigs until a short teal wig with a vintage vibe and a large circular black fascinator attached to it caught his eye. “Okay I have to admit, this wig is pretty cool.” Ryan grinned. “See, I knew you’d get into the swing of it! We probably only have a few more minutes to get on the exit runway!” The three of them quickly ran over to the clothes rack and Ryan immediately went for a floor length black ball gown and a pair of boots. Min-Gi raised an eyebrow at his choice. “You do realize nobody’s gonna even be able to see those boots if you pick that right? The fabric is too thick.” Ryan shrugged and grinned mischievously. “Let’s just say this isn’t my first rodeo at a drag show.”
Min-Gi turned to Kez as Ryan skipped off towards the changing rooms. “Wait, do they actually have rodeos at drag shows?” Kez shrugged her sparkles. “I dunno.” Clearing the question from his mind, Min-Gi eventually settled on blue suit with dramatic shoulder pads and flared pants. He still wasn’t ready to go completely out of his comfort zone but this seemed like a nice happy medium that would at least get him through the exit runway. A few minutes later he was standing just outside the curtain with Ryan and Kez, as ready as he felt he was going to be to face an eager crowd, dressed in a way that he never dreamed he might be allowed to. Before being called out onto the stage Ryan took Min-Gi’s hands in his own. “We can do this Min, we’ve got this, you’ve got this.”
He turned to the stage as Sashay announced the next contestant. “Everyone get ready to rock with Ryan Akagi!” Ryan happy strutted out onto the stage looking like he was having the time of his life. He posed, twirled and to Min-Gi’s surprise threw off the tulle overskirt of the ballgown to reveal that the bodice of the gown was actually a mini dress and that he had gone with the thigh high leather boots under the mini dress. To Min-Gi’s relief the ‘risk’ paid off and the crowd went wild. Sashay turned to the judges, who each held up a card with a ten on it. Sashay dramatically wiped away a nonexistent tear as she continued. “All tens! Fantastic job, this clearly wasn’t your first ballgame!” Min-Gi and Kez spent the next few seconds trying to hype themselves up, knowing it was their turn next. “Don’t say OM-G until you’ve seen our next contestant, it’s Min-Gi!” Although he wasn’t sure he could top Ryan’s performance, he stepped out on the runway with Kez on his shoulder, determined to do his best. Once he stepped out the experience seemed to fly by, just a pose, a twirl and another pose and already the judges were giving him his final score. “All nines and looking fine! You may all exit!” Sashay gave him a thumbs up as he walked towards the exit, actually enjoying the attention from the audience in his new look.
Min-Gi grinned as he and Kez ran past the red velvet rope to hug Ryan. “I actually did it! I can’t believe I actually did it! My parents would kill me if they ever found out, but it was so much fun! Is this what it feels like on stage all the time for you?” Ryan nodded. “Yeah! That’s exactly it! I’m so glad we could do this together Min, I always knew we could go out there and perform have fun like this.” Min-Gi nodded. “I’m actually really glad I did this too, I don’t know if I ever would have gotten a chance to explore this side of myself off the train or if I would have even let myself do something like this if I had gotten the chance.” Ryan grabbed Min-Gi’s had as they stood there. “Well I guess we better get ready for the next car.” Min-Gi smiled back. “Yeah I guess we better.” Somehow, although neither of them could bring themselves to say it quite yet, Min-Gi and Ryan felt like they understood each other a little bit better after that car.