By Ddoskocil
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I look at my reflection. It doesn't look like me. I look like a man; the man others know only as "Blank." I sigh as I slump down against the wall. It has been this way for seven years. Every day I look in the mirror, but nothing has changed. Every day for seven years all I've seen is Blank. I have not always been Blank, though. It has been too long since I have seen that person.
"Yo, Blank! Ya ready yet?" a voice calls from the hall outside my room, startling me from my thoughts. The door starts to open, but I leap at it before it can be fully opened, slamming it back in my friend's face. I push hard against it and flip the lock into place. There is banging as the guy tries to get in.
"Blank? What's going on? Are ya ready or not?" he asks, still banging on the door. I sigh and lean against it.
"I'm not dressed yet." It's not really a lie. I did have to bind myself. Thank God it never took long; small was good.
"Um...does it really matter? I mean, we're both guys." I smile at that remark. It's an argument that we have been through many times.
"I know you just want to see me naked, Zidane," I chuckle. "Why not admit it?" I chuckle again at the shocked silence.
"I knew it."
"Hey! That's not funny, Blank. I'll see ya in a couple of minutes, all right?"
"Yeah," I comment as I hear him walk away. I sigh. If you only knew. Would you be so unwanting?
I shake my head. It's no use to dwell on it. He won't find out. I am determined that no one on this ship will find out. Last time that happened...no, I will not think about that. That will never happen to me again.
"Blank!" I hear Zidane outside my room again. "We're waiting on you. God, you take forever to get ready. Hurry up."
I grab a shirt off of the back of a chair and throw it over my wrapped chest. Then I open the down and lean against the frame. I try to hide my smile as Zidane losses his balance and falls into my room. No need for thoughts like that, no matter how nice they are.
Instead of doing what I wish I could, I merely laugh at Zidane and give him a hand up. "You klutz," I comment. As he regains his footing, I ask, "So, what's so important that I was hurried by you twice to get up?"
"Long night?" Zidane asks, his hidden intentions clear to me. I sigh slightly. It's a morning ritual that we have been through since we met. He asks me about my long night, I never answer, and he thinks what he wants to think. The fact that he has never seen me with a woman does not seem to cross his mind.
"You didn't answer my question," I say instead as he leads me down the hall. He sighs and stops at the door of our boss's room.
"He wants to rehearse early today. There's some kind of ball after the show and the cast is invited. We're supposed to go shopping for new outfits. The others already went so it's just you and me."
"Great," I say in mock frustration, "I get to go with the fashion challenged one." Zidane gives me a false expression of hurt, but there is a smile hidden behind it. He drapes an arm around my shoulder.
"Are you saying that your best friend doesn't' have any fashion sense?"
I nod and shrug his arm off. "That's what I'm saying." His jaw drops as I open the door and walk into our boss's room. "Ya coming?" I say back into the hall. He closes his jaw and joins me.
"Can you believe this guy thinks that I, Zidane, have no sense of fashion?" he asks as he comes into the medium sized room.
"Yeah."
"Uh huh."
"I believe it."
"Stuff it," the boss bellows. "We've a rehearsal to do."
We walk together down the street toward the fine clothing store. I can tell that Zidane will try to prove me wrong. He believes whole-heartedly that he can pick out the perfect outfit for me. I don't doubt him. But it won't be my perfect outfit. It will be Blank's perfect outfit, a man's perfect outfit. I know my secret weights on my heart and I can feel it in my spirit. Maybe I've been hiding for too long. I sigh heavily. My thoughts have dwelled on that subject of late, but I feel helpless to change
"What's up, Blank?" he asks, worry in his voice. He thinks it has to do with rehearsal. I didn't do well.
"Yeah, well, I just can't get that one scene down. It's upsetting." It's not quite a lie. I haven't gotten it down yet, but I will for tonight. I'm not that upset about it, but I cannot bear to tell Zidane the truth.
I'm just tired of hiding what I really am. I've known him for three years and he still doesn't know, he can't know. It's a secret I've hide for longer than three years and I intend to keep it for much longer.
Being male is much easier than being female. But I do miss the dresses and the make up and the long hair. I absently touch my butchered hair than tug at my ear. I really miss earrings, the ones that dangle and sparkle in the light.
"Blank!" I stop and turn around. Zidane is standing at the door of the men's fine clothing shop. Without knowing it, I had walked past him and was now standing down the street at the jewelers. I turn back to the window display case and notice a pair of dangle sapphire earrings.
"What are you looking at?" he asks as he comes up behind me.
"Oh...um...I was just thinking that my mother had a pair of earring's just like this. It just reminded me of her," I lie. "Sorry. Let's go pick out a outfit." I turn away and walk back toward the clothing shop. Zidane looks at the earrings for a few more seconds than follows me back. He knows I'm not being entirely truthful, but he won't press it.
He learned long ago that I won't be pressed.
We enter the shop. Zidane talks to the shopkeeper for a few minutes while I look around. There is nothing in here that interests me. When Zidane walks up to me, I whisper that to him. He sighs.
"You never see anything you like," he complains. I shrug. He's right. I still don't like men's formal clothing. They just don't fit right.
"Thanks, Zidane, but I think I'll just stay home tonight. I don't feel like going to a ball after I've been up on stage all night. Besides, you know I'm not very social. You go without me," I say as I walk out of the store. Zidane follows me out at a run. I can see the confusion written across his face.
"Why are you really not going?" he asks accusingly. I don't stop walking so he is forced to keep up.
"I just don't. I want to stay in."
"You always stay in," he pouts. "I always tell these girls that you'll be there and then you don't show up."
"Simple solution to that. Don't tell them I'm coming." Zidane stops and looks at me as I walk away. I can feel his stare on my back, and it's hard not to look at him. I can hear his footsteps as he starts to follow me, then they stop and continue in the other way, back into the store perhaps.
I head back toward the airship I have called home for the last three years, my mind whirling in a state of confusion. Never before have I felt this way. I have been living life as a man since I was barely a woman. It was the only option open to me, and I have never looked back...until Zidane.
I never regretted my decision to bid my chest and cut my hair and put away all things girly. All of the sudden, I do. I know why: Zidane. He is the only man who has ever cared about me, the only man who treated me with respect. But he does not really know who I am no matter how much I wish I could tell him, show him, just who his best friend really is.
My steps slow. Why can't I show Zidane who I really am? As a plan begins to take form, I sprint the last few blocks to the airship. I ignore the stares and comments of my fellow actors and slam the door to my room, locking the door behind me. I look around the room and spot the trunk in the corner hidden under some blankets and costumes. I toss the stuff aside and throw open the lid of the trunk. I quickly remove all of the clothing and mementos from my life of Blank from the trunk. On the bottom is the only thing I ever kept from my past life.
disclaimer at the end of chapter 3