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“I bet you don’t know all the words to ‘Wonderwall,’” Stereotypical Ken says one night, at a party that has ended for everyone else but him and Rival Ken. They’re the last two people out on the beach, too caught up in their nonstop competitions to go home.
Rival Ken pulls a face at him. “Oh, come on. That’s, like, the douchiest song guitar players know.” He grabs a guitar out of nowhere; it’s covered in white glitter that shines rainbow in the moonlight, and it stands out against his sudden outfit change: now a dark purple collared shirt (unbuttoned all the way) and lavender shorts. “Of course I know ‘Wonderwall.’”
Ken grabs a guitar out of a different, separate nowhere, and throws his arm over it. He can see Rival Ken admire the design printed on it: a psychedelic swirl of blues and pinks, colours pulled directly from his own outfit change, now a sky blue collared shirt (unbuttoned most of the way) and pink shorts. “So do I,” he says. “I can play it so well you’ll cry.”
Rival Ken narrows his eyes. “I don’t even know what that means.”
Stereotypical Ken narrows his eyes more. “Guess you’ll have to see for yourself.”
And that’s how the two of them end up singing ‘Wonderwall’ to each other, aggressively strumming their guitars and singing louder and louder, each in an attempt to outdo the other Ken.
A couple songs in (because, yes, of course they do a full set), Stereotypical Ken realises that, from a distance, it might look like they’re serenading each other. They’re alone on the beach, lit by the moonlight, sitting closely, staring deeply into each other’s eyes as they play. Someone very far off might not be able to tell how much hostility there is in each one of those things.
In another time, that fear of someone misunderstanding might have made Stereotypical Ken want to stop playing, or even double down on his antagonism and somehow make it obvious this is not romantic. But Stereotypical Ken isn’t who he once was, and so, instead, he decides to lean into the idea. He angles himself closer and begins singing the harmony part to the song, letting Rival Ken sing the original tune.
Rival Ken’s eyes widen at the change, but he doesn’t stop to comment on it. He keeps singing, though much quieter— and since they aren’t straining to be heard anymore, Stereotypical Ken can finally hear how their voices sound together. Where Rival Ken’s is smooth and deep, Stereotypical Ken’s is husky and higher. They are perfect complements, and the sound they create together is more magical than any interdimensional portal.
Unfortunately, Rival Ken’s singing loses more and more of its spirit as the seconds pass, and then he stops altogether, hand stilling in front of his guitar before the song’s officially over. He stares at Stereotypical Ken in confusion. Ken stares back, unsure of how to continue now that the kenergy has changed.
It was easy, before, to hate the man sitting across from him, because they were competitors for Barbie’s attention. For her love. But they’re not competing for anyone anymore. They’ve officially broken their pattern. They’re getting along. Anything could happen now.
What does Ken want to happen now?
“Did you stop singing because I wowed you with my talents?” he asks, with none of the bite it would’ve had an hour earlier. It’s a joke, rather than a taunt. He hopes Rival Ken will pick up on the difference.
“You sang with me, not over me,” Rival Ken says, brow furrowing. “Why?”
“Maybe I thought it’d sound better if we worked together.”
“It did,” Rival Ken allows.
“Do you…do you want to do it again?”
“I…” Rival Ken starts. His eyes unfocus a little as he considers it. Stereotypical Ken can guess where his head’s going, the shock that’s come with being asked what he wants. Like his opinion matters, like whatever happens next is up to him, so long as he puts a voice to it. “Yeah,” he says. “Yes. I do. But I also…I also want to…”
Ken leans forward. Quietly, he asks, “Yeah?”
“I don’t know.” Rival Ken shakes his head. His shiny pompadour remains perfectly intact. “It’s weird. It’s hard to know what I want if the goal isn’t to get Barbie’s attention.”
“Woah,” Ken says, at a near whisper. His face is full of wonder. “How did you do that?”
“What?”
“It’s like—” Ken twirls his wrist, trying to figure out how to say it— “it’s like you crawled into my head and said exactly what I was feeling, but I didn’t even know what that was. How did you do that?”
“I don’t know, I just— I said what I was feeling.”
“Wow,” Ken says.
Rival Ken sets his guitar down on the plastic sand. “So you feel the same way?”
Stereotypical Ken pauses, weighing the likelihood that Rival Ken will tease him if he keeps telling the truth. They started the evening playing out their old roles, but even that hadn’t taken long to fall apart. They’re different now than they once were. A lot has changed.
Ken decides to trust him. “Yeah,” he says, setting his guitar down too. “I don’t know who I am on my own. I’ve never had to. It’s always been Barbie—” he raises his right palm— “and then Ken,” he says, holding his left one much lower down. “One can stand alone, but the other…” He puts his hands in his lap. “I’m the afterthought.”
“We have a lot to figure out, huh?”
“Mm,” Ken agrees. “Hey, why didn’t it work? Patriarchy. Here. My plan was so smart. I read theory. I understood it. Well, mostly— the interesting parts, anyway. But my masculinity should have made up for the rest of it. So why did it go so wrong so quickly?”
“Maybe masculinity isn’t enough, on its own,” Rival Ken says.
Ken gives him a disbelieving smile. “Ridiculous.”
“No, I’m serious! What if, to be manly, you have to…define yourself as a man by what you do, not who you want. Maybe patriarchy failed here because it’s not designed to work. Maybe- maybe a system built on tearing other people down eventually tears itself down, too. It gets torn down.”
Ken stares at him, mouth agape. Rival Ken has never been more appealing, which is startling, because Ken has never found anyone particularly appealing before tonight. All this time, he’s been guessing what it’s supposed to feel like.
“What?” Rival Ken says, like he hasn’t just said the most brilliant things Stereotypical Ken has ever heard.
“You sounded like a Barbie,” Ken says.
“Did I?”
“Uh-huh,” Ken says, nodding enthusiastically. “And not just any Barbie, one of the really, really smart ones who reads theory and understands it completely. On the first try, too.”
Rival Ken ducks his head. “I don’t know about that.”
Ken gets up on his knees, pointing a finger at Rival Ken as he says, “Shut your face. That was hot as hell.”
“What’s hell?”
“I don’t know. You want to kiss?”
“What?”
Ken rocks backward on his heels and sits again, so he’s no longer in Rival Ken’s space. He doesn’t want to press. He’s made that mistake before. “I want to kiss you, but I wanted to ask first. Barbie told me I should ask.”
“I—” Rival Ken’s dark eyelashes flutter. He’s flustered. It makes him look dainty, even when the rest of him tends toward compact muscle and broad, clean lines (which, now that Stereotypical Ken’s looking, are to be admired in their own right. Respectfully). “Yes,” he says, after a long moment. “Yes. We can kiss. But I don’t want to be another Barbie for you. I’m a Ken. I like that you’re a Ken. You’re…fantastic. Creative. Interesting. Powerful.”
“My plan failed, though,” Ken pouts.
Rival Ken reaches out and takes one of Stereotypical Ken’s hands. “But at least you had a plan. You went to the Real World. I can’t even imagine what that was like. And for a while, you really changed things here. But in a way, I’m glad it didn’t stay like that, or even go back to how it was before. I think you helped everyone see that what we had…it wasn’t working, either. There’s so much left to do, now that we know.” Rival Ken drops his gaze down to their hands. “I guess- I guess what I’m saying is: do you have room in your life for me right now?”
Ken takes a minute to think it over. He owes his existence to Barbie. He was created for her, to stand by her and help her achieve great things. He was never meant to achieve much, himself. His job isn’t even very specific. What is “Beach,” anyway? And what’s the point of any of it, if Barbie doesn’t want to be his girlfriend? They’re barely even friends.
But that’s okay, isn’t it? Isn’t it better that they aren’t very close, if it takes less effort for him to let her go? Isn’t it time for him to really find himself, figure out who he is without her?
He should probably do that alone, but he’s never truly been alone before. He’s always had the other Kens, at the end of the day. Even if his relationship with Rival Ken has been complicated, it’s always been a constant for him.
Maybe finding himself includes figuring out where that relationship leads. Already, it’s exciting that it could so easily become something more.
“I’ll always have room for you,” Ken says finally. “Besides, if we aren’t busy beaching each other off, we can beach other people off. Together.”
Rival Ken laughs, throwing his head back with the force of it. “You still want to do that?”
“Uh, hyeah I do,” Ken says. “I’m still a Ken, I like competition.”
“Even if it’s friendly?”
Ken smirks and tightens his grip on Rival Ken’s hand. “Maybe especially so.”
“I’d like that, then,” Rival Ken says. “All of it. Everything you said.” He raises an eyebrow, and his brown eyes take on a mischievous gleam. “You still want to kiss?”
“Yeah, but not if you’re a bad kisser.”
Rival Ken laughs again. “Oh yeah?” He turns his head away dramatically. “Well maybe I don’t want to kiss you if you’re bad at it.”
“Guess we’ll both have to be good, huh?”
“Guess there’s only one way to know.”
The kiss is softer than he expects it to be considering everything they’ve been to each other, and everything they’ve done in the name of patriarchy. Patriarchy demands that men can’t be soft.
Except… They’ve both been bold tonight. And being bold isn’t soft. It’s hard. They’re both harder than they’ve ever been before— and that, quite possibly, is the manliest state of all.
Ken likes it. He wonders why more men don’t do this, and then he wonders if all the men he saw in the Real World just did it secretly. That must be it. None of the men in the Real World could ever be this bold, this confident. They wish they could be him right now.
He breaks the kiss with Rival Ken, but only slightly, so he can say, “Do that again.”
Rival Ken smiles — he’s so handsome when he does — and says, “Okay,” and then they’re kissing again, only this time Rival Ken does this thing where he opens his mouth, and yeah, Stereotypical Ken wants to do much, much more of this. As often as Rival Ken wants.
Then he thinks maybe he should come up with another name other than “Rival.” But they have plenty of time to sort that out.