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Jade would have never considered himself insecure about his eel form. No, such a well-designed and practical form would never be something to be ashamed of. Yet, when his boyfriend all but begged to see it, he… just… couldn’t bring himself to say yes. The very idea shocked him to his core. Him, ashamed of anything? It just didn’t seem possible. So, he did what he usually did when it came to things he didn’t understand about himself. He went to his brother and then argued about what he heard.
Floyd leaned off the end of his bed, looking up at Jade, who sat respectfully in the desk chair in his brother’s room. “Why wouldn’tcha? You and Sea Turtle have been (annoyingly) in love for like six months now! That’s forever by your standards!”
“I suppose… Though if it were that simple, would I not have just done so?”
“Yeah, but that’s whatcha do. You’re like super weird about things that I don’t understand.” He sighed, uncharacteristically, “But, I s’ppose, we could always just take a picture of it.”
“Oh? Whatever do you mean?”
“Just what I said, dummy. Were you not paying attention? Let’s get down to the pools, I’ll take a picture of it, then ya send it to Sea Turtle and problem solved!”
“It is a reasonable plan.” Jade thought, “There appears to be just one problem: there’s nothing for scale…”
“Well, I guess I gotta idea for that too. Coach Lobster won’t be happy though…”
This was how Jade ended up in the Octavinelle pool, trying to line the end of his tail up with a standardized flying broom. If this had been the bottom of the pool, where he didn’t have to worry about keeping himself as close to the surface as possible, the whole ordeal would’ve been no problem. But staying afloat meant having to move his tail. Which, unfortunately, appeared to result in blurry or inaccurate pictures. Floyd wasn’t the biggest fan of the whole broom idea to begin with. However, once they… retrieved the item from Professor Vargas’ supply closet, his brother was suddenly all-in on the idea. All in, and growing increasingly frustrated with the concept of taking a single photo.
“Sevens, could ya at least try to work with me?” Floyd yelled from on top of the lifeguard stand, shifting the camera angle on Jade’s phone slightly. “You gotta get closer to the edge of the pool! That, or I gotta move the broom to your face.”
“Whatever you think would look best, dear brother.”
“Ugh! This is so boring!” He grumbled, climbing down to move the broom before climbing back up. “Alright, just stay there! Aren’tcha gonna at least try to pose or somethin’? This is for ya beloved Sea Turtle.”
“How would you recommend I do so?”
“I dunno. If it were me, I would’ve BROUGHT HIM TO THE POOL! Now, pick a pretty pose or something so I can take this photo and go hangout with Sea Snake.”
“Ah, I see.” Jade smiled, aware of his brother’s crush on the Scarabian vice-housewarden. Though he was unsure if Floyd himself was aware of it, since his brother was the kind to act the moment he became aware of something. “Does this look alright?” He lit up his scales and opened his mouth to allow his gills to puff up slightly. Overall, it seemed like it would turn out to be a pretty appealing picture.
Floyd took the picture. “Whore.”
“Excuse me?”
“Openin’ your mouth for the picture. I can’t believe you.” He sighed, climbing down from the tower, “I can’t believe I took this for you!”
Jade tried to hide his flush at the statement, failing as his face turned an embarrassing shade of teal. “Well, regardless of your belief in me or the picture, does it look alright?”
Floyd shrugged, “Yeah, it looks fine. I sent it to Sea Turtle for ya.”
“You did what now?”
“You’ll be fine, he was the one wantin’ to see it so badly.” Floyd sighed, placing the phone on a bench against the wall. “I’m gonna go see Sea Snake now. We’re playin’ Mancala tonight, and I’m already late.”
Jade, surprisingly able to keep his nervousness at his brother’s reckless choice under control until said brother left, began the transformation back to a human body as quickly as possible. Perhaps he had just gotten used to the feeling, or maybe the anxiety he felt surrounding the whole situation took his mind off of it, but the normal pain of splitting his tail wasn’t nearly as prominent. The same followed with the reshaping of his gills and the shedding of his eel skin. Once the transformation was done, he shot out of the water, leaving the excess skin and a small pool of blood in his place. He had ignored the concepts of professionalism and courtesy in this moment, caring much more about how the picture was to be received. Perhaps this went against his usual values, but so did most of his actions when it came to Trey.
Trey-San <3 is typing…
Perhaps he was more insecure about his merform than he expected. With someone like Azul, who was ashamed of his body before even coming to the surface, it made sense. But, he wasn’t like that at all. He didn’t even particularly like his human body in favor of his mer one. Most of the interesting features he had still brought over with him, with the mortal body having fins for ears, the pharyngeal jaw, and the bioluminescence. It was practically the same thing, just shorter and able to walk on land, so why was he so worried? And why was Trey taking so long to type? This whole thing was unreasonably frustrating; he should never have listened to his brother. The sound of a notification rang through the room.
From: Trey-San <3
You look stunning
From: Trey-San <3
Are you free now?
At this, Jade blushed, the human body he currently occupied turning a rather unflattering shade of pink. It was honestly more shock than anything else. Of all the reactions to have, he was not expecting Trey to have that one. However, the text that he received afterwards made him laugh out loud; it was a cackle that echoed across the pool room. How very Trey-like. That was slightly closer to what he was expecting, yet it made him blush in fondness all the same.
From: Trey-San <3
I need to know if my math is right and you have better grades than me. That is a standard flying broom, right?
From: Trey-San <3
You don’t own one of those… Did you steal it?
From: Trey-San <3
I’m coming to you, we’re returning it before Vargas notices
To: Trey-San <3
Of course, it’s a date :)