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Like many things in Ken’s life, it started off as a dare.
The three of them were at Timothy’s house, since his parents are never home. They decided to bake some cookies, and after eating half of the dough they were finally in the oven. They decided they would hang out in Timothy’s room while the cookies baked.
“Hey, why do you have one of my bras?” Jolie asks as she rummages around in Timothy’s closet. “Because you two always leave your clothes over here. It’s not like I took it unlike someone else,” he nudges Ken, who splutters. “I only stole her tops! And shut up.” Ken pushes Timothy into the bed. Timothy pushes back and Jolie has to mediate to make sure a pillow fight doesn’t break out.
“I dare Ken to try it on.” Timothy says, and Ken gasps. “You can’t do that!” “Why, are you chicken?” Jolie chuckles. After a bit of back and forth he realms. “Shut up, I’ll do it.” He snatches the article of clothing and goes to the bathroom to change.
When he puts it on, he stares into the mirror. It…doesn’t look bad. Should it? Should he look wrong in this?
Usually he spends a lot of time looking at himself in the mirror. Not in a narcissistic way, more of a ‘just making sure’ way. Yeah. He just likes to make sure he’s still himself.
Sometimes when he looks into the mirror, he doesn’t see himself. He sees pieces of himself. Like, he knows that’s his hair and his face. But sometimes his shoulders are too wide and he hates the way his arms look in a specific shirt and he just looks too-
Masculine. Too much like a boy in girls clothes.
There’s a knock on the bathroom door. “Hey, are you alright?” Timothy asks, leaning against the door. Ken sighs. “Yeah. I just need a minute.” “Okay. For a second I thought you got sick from eating too much cookie dough.” Ken chuckles. Leave it to his best friends to lighten the mood.
The rest of the night goes by like normal and they all pile into Timothy’s (frankly humongous for his tiny friends proportions) bed. They figured out pretty early on that the three of them enjoyed being close to each other at night.
But Ken can’t help but wonder in the back of his head about his thoughts earlier. About being ‘masculine,’ whatever that means. Is he having one of those crises Timothy told him about? It doesn’t feel good. Kind of feels like he needs to run and throw up at the same time while bashing all the reflective surfaces in his house in.
He knew he needed to talk to someone about this. But he had to be suave about it.
~~~~~~
“How did you know you were a boy?” He blurts out the next morning. Timothy huffs and turns the coffee maker on. “The fuck happened to good morning?” Ken thumps his head on the kitchen counter.
“Hi, good morning, I’m having a huge crisis.” He restarts as he picks his head up. “About what?” Timothy questions as he rummages around in the cabinets. Ken takes a deep breath. He can do this.
“You know how you’re trans or whatever?” Ken gestures to him. “I am aware, yes.” Timothy tells him. “How did you…know? Was it like a gradual thing or did you just have some great epiphany? Or maybe you just got sent a letter that said ‘hey, sorry, we had a factory error, you’re actually a boy?’” He couldn’t help but go for a joke at the end.
“Oh. That kind of crisis.” Timothy had that weird tone when he said it, and Ken knows what a weird tone is. “What kind of crisis did you think I was having?” He presses. “I don’t know, I thought it was about- Nevermind, let’s focus on this. So what, you want to be a girl?” Timothy finally fishes out the poptarts from the cabinets and faces him.
Here’s the thing: he doesn’t want to be a girl entirely. Sure, the shiny-pink allure of femininity does entrance him every so often. Yes, sometimes he wishes he were a girl so he could steal Jolie’s cute skirt and wear it to school. Yes, that one time his sister smeared makeup all over him when they were little and the grocery store cashier said ‘what cute daughters you have!’ Did give him a good feeling.
In the end, He just wanted to be himself, even if he’s not exactly a ‘he.’ If that makes sense.
Ken doesn’t answer Timothy’s question directly. Instead he asks “you still have your old dresses, right?” To which Timothy nods. He seems to get whatever message he was laying down because the two of them head upstairs, poptart abandoned.
“Jeez, you two are loud.” Jolie says as she finishes up her hair. “Sorry, we’re turning Ken into a girl.” Timothy tells her. His casual tone made Ken feel a bit lighter. “Valid reason. Makeover time!” Jolie claps her hands together.
Timothy immediately hops over to his closet. Jolie begins rummaging around in her makeup box. “Alright, option number one-“ he holds up a pure white dress very befitting of a flower girl. Ken shakes his head. “Fair. Option number two-“ he holds up a yellow dress with embellishments over it. It looked like it would wash him out. He shakes his head again. “And behind door number three is-“ Timothy makes a drumroll noise before pulling out a black dress. It had a V-neckline and looked like it belonged to a vampire, or an evil siren like that one woman from that mermaid movie. Perfect. Ken nods his head. “Knew it. Go put it on and Jo and I will help tie up the back.” He explains as he hands Ken the dress.
Ken manages to put it on, and the other two spend a few minutes tying all the ends up. He stands up and takes a good look at himself in the mirror. “Stop gawking and let me fix your face,” Jolie grabs him by the cheek and starts putting stuff on his face. Somehow his hair gets straightened and primped in all of the chaos.
“So…what do you think?” Jolie questions as she brings her back to the mirror. A breath. “I think I look like a girl.” She breathes out. It was like what was in her head finally matched her appearance. It felt amazing.“Is that a good thing?” Timothy asks tentatively. “Yes. Totally.” Ken touched her face, like she couldn’t believe her eyes.
“Oh! We should all paint our nails!” Jolie squeals. “It will totally match your dress.” She adds. “Yeah, and then we should eat the rest of the cookies while we do it.” Timothy says. Ken sighs. They really did get her. “I love you guys so much.”
~~~~~~
“Wait, what did you think I was having a crisis about earlier?” Ken asks as she lays down on the bed. “Also, did you clean that needle?” Timothy assures him that he did, and Ken lets him continue.
After her makeover, he had re-pierced his nose and gotten a new hoop for it. Jolie had decided she had to get a belly button piercing to go with it. It helped that she found matching jewelry on their mall trip before this.
Jolie and Timothy give each other a look, like they don’t know if they should say it. Ken huffs. “Just spit it out. Please.”
“We thought it was about your crush on Brenda,” Jolie offers. Ken bolts upright. “My- my what?” She stutters, trying to contain composure. “I don’t have a crush on her! That would be absolutely insane of me, and I know what’s insane.” “Doesn’t mean it isn’t true,” Timothy mutters and Jolie elbows him.
He flops back down. “Just do it,” he grabs a pillow to scream into. You’d think after three separate piercings her pain tolerance would be higher now. Timothy shrugs and Jolie holds her arms down. Ken feels the needle pierce through and two minutes later she has a belly button piercing.
“So what if I have a crush on her? It’s not like she likes me back.” He crosses his arms. “She does.” The two of them state at the same time. “Well, she wouldn’t like me like this,” she gestures to herself. This time, Timothy speaks up. “Ken. Brenda definitely likes girls. And she definitely likes whatever you have going on.” He swears. “Actually, I think you could start breathing fire and she would be into it.” Surprisingly, Ken sees Jolie agreeing with him. Was everyone aware of this but him? Signs point to yes.
“So what now?” She asks. “Well you have the dress, and the perfect face. Now all you need is the right date.” Jolie says. Timothy nods. “We should make a plan.” She squeals. “I’ll grab the markers.”
As Ken pokes his fresh piercing (something he shouldn’t really be doing), she wonders how Brenda would feel about it. Probably say it’s pretty. That makes her feel ecstatic.
She imagines being Brenda’s girlfriend, and she has to grab the pillow again to scream into it.
~~~~~~
Turns out the three of them didn’t get to execute their plan.
They were at the cafe, after it closed. The three of them had a deal that if they helped clean up they could eat the leftover pastries. All of the chairs were stacked up except for three of them, where they sat eating the last of the coffee cake.
Ken was in another dress, this one a deep red with a rose pattern on it. She had on one of her jackets as well to complete the look. Normally he would care but no one was around besides him, his friends, and Jolie’s mom, who didn’t seem to care as long as they got their cleaning done.
Suddenly, the bell above the door chimed. Ken turned to see who it was, and Brenda looked right back at her. She shut the door behind her and ran her fingers through her hair. She was like an angel who came here simply to bless Ken with her presence.
She turns back around and finds Jolie and Timothy have disappeared. She takes a deep breath and stands up from her seat, trying to act normal.
Brenda walks over to her. “Hi.” “Hi.” “I like your dress.” She gestures to her. Ken looks down.“Oh, this? Yeah, I’m trying something new. That whole ‘being a girl’ thing. Do you like it?” She brushes her hands off on her dress. Brenda looks her up and down. “It’s definitely interesting…but the more I look at you the more I like it.”
“You’re a girl, right?” She asks.
“Yep. I mean, today I am. It kind of changes but- I’m a girl now.” Ken tells her.
“Alright. I just wanted to come here and ask if the really pretty girl I saw in class wants to go on a date with me?”
Ken swears her brain stopped working for a moment. She cleared her throat when she realized she hadn’t said anything to Brenda. “Yes! I would love that.” Brenda smiles. “Cool. I’ll call you tomorrow, alright?” “Okay.” Brenda waves goodbye before leaving the cafe, leaving Ken lovestruck as always.
He turns around and sees Jolie and Timothy hiding under a table. Typical.
“You two suck.” She whines. “Hey, we just wanted to witness our very best friend get with the girl she’s been pining over. Is that such a crime?” Timothy asks. Ken sticks his tongue out at him. They fall into their usual banter after that.
She spends the rest of the night with the aftertaste of coffee in her mouth and the thought of her and Brenda going on the best date ever.
~~~~~~
Brenda takes her to a beach. A bit odd since it’s only February, but luckily Ken likes odd.
They’re alone. The wind blows around them, and Ken’s grateful she gave Brenda her jacket before this. It also helps that whenever Brenda looks at her it warms her from the inside out.
The two of them have been not-so-subtly holding hands for the past five minutes. Ken has to resist the urge to squeal from excitement. She just can’t believe this is actually happening. Maybe she’ll pinch herself and this will end with her waking up in her bed with a red face.
She pinches herself. “Ow,” she mutters, but is happy to find this isn’t a dream. She hears Brenda giggle next to her. “What?” She asks. “Nothing! I just think you’re funny.” “Just funny?” Ken teases. “Don’t make me list them all out.” Her own cheeks are red now. Ken kisses her hand for it.
“I’m having a really good time.” Brenda says. “Yeah, me too.” Ken agrees. “You don’t mind this, do you?” “Mind what?” She quirks an eyebrow. “The whole ‘I’m a girl now but might still be a boy some days’ thing? You don’t think that’s weird?” Ken gestures to himself.
Brenda takes a breath. “I know I am attracted to you, no matter how you want to present or who you want to be. I didn’t just fall for you just for your looks, you know.” That makes Ken giggle. “I know this is new, but I think as long as we talk we can make it work?” “Yeah. I agree.” Ken finally stutters out.
“I really want to kiss you now.” Brenda exhales.
“Is that so?”
“Yes. So are you going to listen to your girlfriend, Ken?” She leans in closer.
Of course she will. She’d be a very stupid woman not too.