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Ice cream with the boys lasts about twenty minutes before Riz has to sneak into the bathroom at Basrar’s and call Kristen. She picks up on the second ring. “Heyyy girlie.”
“Kristen,” he says. “You’re gay.”
“Oi, wot mate, I’m as straight as— no, yeah, definitely, I’m like gay-gay.”
“Do you know about… ?” He’s in too deep. This is wrong to ask about. It’s invasive and it’s also just weird if he’s wrong, or hell, even if he’s right! This is… ? He shouldn’t be talking to Kristen about this but also. Gorgug and Fabian don’t seem like they’re going to talk about it. Sometimes his perceptiveness is a curse instead of a blessing. “Do you know about, like… transgender… stuff?”
“The Ball, are you exploring your gender?”
“No! I’m not— there’s, it’s. I’m… ugh.” Sometimes being nosy is how you show your love! “I’m seeing something, there’s like. A vibe. With Gorgug and Fabian. That’s just… really…”
“Transgender?”
“I guess?” Riz says, crystal clutched in his claws. “It’s like. Coming back from college for spring break and playing a version of yourself that everybody expects. Also, I don’t know, Gorgug grew his hair out and when Fabian commented on it he got really freaked out for a second.”
“Oh my God, he’s scared Fabian wants to take his hair.”
“I don’t… I don’t think that’s…”
“No, you’re right.” She hums on the other end of the line, and he can picture her fidgeting with the pens and Post-Its in Fig’s recording studio office. Kristen’s been spending her gap year in hell, doing odd jobs for the Archdevil of Rebellion and figuring out the best verbiage to spread the gospel of her pantheon. “Gorgug’s already bi for pride month, maybe he’s transfem for college.”
“What?”
“I should ask Cassandra about this,” Kristen muses. “They just got top surgery.”
It’s always a treat calling Kristen for clarity and winding up even more soup-brained with complications. “Your god got top surgery?”
“Yeah, isn’t that cool? I’m thinking about going half-and-half to support them.”
Riz tries and fails not to picture that. “Okay, well, I just. I feel mean if I’m, like, clocking them.”
“Yeah, you can’t tell an egg they’re an egg, that violates the Prime Directive,” Kristen muses. “Best you can do is give them a safe space to come out if they’re ready. Make sure they know that you’re all about protecting the dolls. Oh! You should take, like, a paladin oath of protecting the dolls. Wait, no, you should tell them you’re trans.”
“Well, this has been a great talk, Kristen.”
“Wait!” she squawks. “Riz. You definitely knew I was gay before I did, right?”
He thinks about Kristen in freshman year, heart on her sleeve and Bible in her hand, so kind and accepting to everybody but herself.
“I mean. Yeah,” he admits. “Sorry.”
“No, don’t apologize, I was so fucking gay,” she says. “But it’s not a bad thing, I don’t think. If you recognize things in other people before they’re ready to say it out loud. I mean, you’re a detective, man, that’s kind of your thing.”
“I don’t want to, like, transvestigate them.”
“You’re not! You’re just giving them a, like, soft landing pad,” Kristen says. “For when they're ready to jump.”
“Okay,” Riz says. “Okay. I can do that, probably. Thanks, Kristen.”
“Happy to help!”
Riz ends the call and rubs the scrunched-up spot between his eyes. He’s a good friend! He’s better at social interaction now than he’s ever been before in his life! He loves those guys!
Or not guys.
He loves his friends.
Back at the table, Gorgug is stirring his cookie dough ice cream into a soup while Fabian picks at his fingernails. Riz hops up into booth beside Fabian.
“Jesus, the Ball, you were in there forever,” Fabian comments.
“Oh,” Riz says, trying to think of a lie. “Uh. I’m lactose-intolerant now.”
“For real?” Gorgug says.
“Yeah, it's wild,” Riz goes on. “But, like, sometimes that happens as you get older and go to college, sometimes you discover new things about yourself and it makes it easier for you to know who you are and be true to yourself.”
Gorgug stares at him. “You’re being true to yourself by eating ice cream? Even though your body can’t handle it?”
“Ummm. Yes.”
“I understand what he's saying,” Fabian says. “It’s like, I just started learning ballroom dancing. And I go back and forth between leading and following, because I like to do both the male and the female parts.” And then he looks down meaningfully at them both, eye flicking from Riz to Gorgug.
Gorgug gapes. “And that’s the same as being lactose-intolerant and eating ice cream anyway?”
“Yes!” Fabian says.
This is going about as well as Riz could have expected it to go.
What else can he do? How else can he communicate that he’s an ally and that whatever else his friends figured out about themselves while they were away, they don’t have to leave it behind just because they’re back in their hometown.
“Hey,” he says, “you know who I think is a really cool lady? Sam Nightingale.”
Nailed it.
“Yeah,” Gorgug says. “Sam’s great.”
“The Ball, do you have a crush on Sam Nightingale?” Fabian asks.
“What? No,” Riz says. “I don’t have a crush on anybody.” Oh. Oh, fuck. Could it be that easy? “And I don’t… think… I’m going to,” Riz says, face heating as he stares down at his own melting ice cream sundae. “Ever.” And then he says the thing that he hasn’t even said aloud to his own mirror. (Of course he hasn’t. The mirror’s always listening.) “I’m ace. I’m asexual.”
“Oh, that’s cool,” Gorgug says, giving him a thumbs-up.
“Yeah, thanks for telling us,” Fabian says, nudging him companionably. “Is there any sort of, ah, LGBTQ+ union at rogue school? Like the one at Aguefort?”
Riz doesn’t fucking know! He just admitted it for the first time right now. Does asexual even count as LGBTQ+? Is that what the plus is for? He doesn’t know!
“Riz, it’s okay,” Gorgug says, noticing him bouncing his leg faster and faster. “I mean it, I’m really glad you told me. And, hey, I’m learning how to get more ambitious with the designs for my artificer gadgets. I can do, like, pride flags and little insignias! I’ll make you an ace pride flag Medal of Wit or something.”
“That’s… really fucking nice, dude,” Riz says, feeling increasingly embarrassed at himself for coming out like this— not after the shit Baron put him through in the Nightmare Forest, not at any of the numerous sleepovers he’s had with his friends over the years, but in an attempt to get his friends to come out to him, too.
Like he’s playing a game of chicken.
Is something wrong with him? No, right?
“Okay, if the Ball’s going to be brave, then I’ll put my cards on the table, too,” Fabian sighs. “I’ve… been experimenting with my gender. At school. I’ve been, ah, trying out… all pronouns. He and him, you know, the classics, but also she/her and they/them. Ze/zir. E/eir. There’s a whole wealth of pronouns out there.”
“Wait, that’s so sick,” Riz says. “Thank you for telling me!”
“You got it, man,” Fabian says, smiling a little bashful smile. “Spring break, I believe in you.”
“I believe in you!”
“I’ve been experimenting too,” Gorgug says. “I can make grenades now. Also I might be a girl. If that’s okay.”
“Yes, girlie,” Fabian cheers, reaching across the table to clap Gorgug on the shoulder. “Spring break!”
“Spring break,” Riz agrees, going for another bite of his ice cream.