"Bored." Rin grumbled. She was lying down on her back, spread out on the floor of her room. "Bored! Bored! Bored! Bored! Bored!" She kicked her legs up in the air and moved them in a kicking motion. After nearly kicking Len a couple times Rin finally flopped down on the ground. She rolled over onto her stomach and began to crawl across the floor to her cell phone. She picked it up to check for messages, but when she saw that there were none, Rin threw her phone onto the ground. "This is the most boring day EVER!"
"Over reacting much?" Len was sitting cross legged in the middle of the carpet. He was happily leaning over a book, flipping the page every minute or so.
"What do you mean by that?" Rin glared at her twin. "You have any ideas?"
"Read a book." Len suggested. "Get a snack. Go online. Watch TV. Play a video game. Go outside. Talk a walk. Draw a picture. Do the homework."
"Ok stop it." Rin made sure that Len had finished saying his list of things she could do. She hadn't expected him to actually give her ideas. But either way she didn't want to do any of that. It was a Friday night and there was nothing to do. None of her friends were around to hang out with and that included Miku. It was just awful. Rin glanced over to her counterpart. Len was still reading that book. And he seemed perfectly fine doing that. "What are you reading anyways?"
"The book from English class." Len lifted the book to show his sister the cover. Then he went back to his reading.
"How could you read that junk?" Rin spat. She hated all of those assigned books. They were always about some guy who was mistreated as a kid, grew up in some hell hole, then managed to come out relatively ok. They were all the same.
"I like it. It has a good plot. The characters are cool. And it's got some humor to it."
"Humor my butt." Rin got up and began to walk around the room. She stopped several times to look at her shelf to see if there was anything that she might want to read again. But today none of it seemed to interest her. All of it seemed so old. There was just nothing left to do inside of the house. Rin needed to get out. But where? Maybe the mall? She hadn't gone clothes shopping in a while. And she did need some new shorts. Spring was coming up after all. But she didn't want to go alone. Miku was off doing something or other. She didn't really feel like finding someone else. Besides, Rin didn't feel like asking some guy to go shorts shopping with her. Then a light bulb went off in her head. Rin had a slight grin on her face as she turned to face Len. "Hey Len. Can you go to the mall with me?"
Len let out a sigh and closed his book. "I guess." He got up and walked over to his dresser and grabbed his wallet. Then he turned to walk to the door. Then suddenly he was cut off by Rin standing in front of the door, that slightly evil smile still planted on her face.
"You can't go out like that Len." Rin slowly stalked towards her twin.
"Um Rin. What are you doing?" Len asked with a shaky voice. He gulped slightly.
"Nothing. Just getting you changed into something better." Rin lunged at Len, dragging him off into the back of the room. Laughing.
"Rin. Why are you making me do this?" Len asked, completely embarrassed. He looked down at what he was wearing. Before they had left Rin had jumped him and forced him to dress like this. He was wearing a red plaid skirt that barley went half way down his thighs and on top, he had on a dark green, long sleeved shirt with two red hearts on the right side of his chest. He was also wearing tall white socks and black convers shoes. His hair had been combed straight with a plain black head band holding it down. Len blushed as he pulled at the bottom of the skirt a bit, trying to see if her could get it to cover him some more. Why had he been the one to dress like this. Rin's outfit was much less revealing. All she had was jean shorts and a tank top with a hoodie over it.
"Because, I wanted to go shopping." Rin stated. "But, it's awkward to shop with a boy so this works out perfectly. You look just like a girl too." She knew that it would make him happy to hear that. She even noticed him lift his head a bit more. "I let you wear shorts underneath too so no one's gonna up-skirt ya. And on top of that if you wanna be a girl that badly you need to learn how to dress likes one outside of our room."
"I guess that makes sense. But what if someone recognizes me?" The thought of someone he knew seeing him dressed like that made Len's nerves even worse. What would he say? And how could he explain something like this?
"Don't worry about that." Rin reassured him. "The reason I picked this mall is because no one from school ever comes here. It's pretty out of the way and there really aren't too many stores that kids our age can afford. But on the off chance that there is someone here we can just say you're my cousin or something. But just make sure you bring your voice up a bit like you practiced at home." Len nodded and cleared his throat. He began to quietly test out his voice, raising the pitch to sound like a girl's. When Rin noticed Len's look of approval, she grabbed onto his hand and began running off to the first store.
It was one of those stores that Rin gets almost everything from. Len recognized some of the clothes from one of the magazines Miku was always showing off. Rin wasted no time going into the spring section and looking over the large assortment of clothing. She pulled a couple pairs of shorts off of the rack and asking for Len's opinion on them. Even though he was still pretty nervous about being dressed the way he was, Len quickly adapted to telling Rin what he thought about what she picked out, and even suggested items as well.
"If you see anything you want just pick it up." Rin said as she piled clothing over her arms.
"Are you sure? I mean it's not like it'll matter if I have it or not." Len scratched his arm and looked down at the floor.
"Yeah of course. We can always say it's mine if mom or dad asks anyways. And it's not like you can barrow my clothes forever." Rin giggled at the thought. She honestly didn't care is Len was barrowing her clothes anymore. At first she couldn't even comprehend why he was the way he was. But after these past two weeks, Rin didn't even care. Although she knew that him taking her clothes would probably bug her eventually.
"Oh. Yeah." Len said. He went back a bit and searched through one of the racks, then pulled off a pair of white shorts with blue vertical stripes going around the rims. "I'm not really sure what my size is in woman's clothing, but I fit in your clothes so I think I'm most likely the same size."
"When we're done picking stuff out we can go try it on in the changing rooms." Rin smiled as she picked up a light gray tee-shirt. She held it up to Len, picturing it on him. "Try this with those shorts you just got."
"Ok." Len grabbed the shirt from his sister. Then the two of them continued to search the shelves. Len didn't think he could have this much fun shopping. Normally he would just grab a random pair of shorts or a shirt that was in his size and get going. But running around the store with Rin like this seemed so natural that Len couldn't help but smile. When the twins had picked out a good amount they headed over to the changing rooms. There was a small line waiting outside so they went to stand at the end of it. This was when Len noticed all of the people in the store. He hadn't noticed them before. But now it seemed like they were looking at him. Judging him. Had they noticed he was really a boy? Len began to pull at his skirt one more. Again, the thought of how exposed he was went through his mind. They must have figured it out. Then he felt Rin hand on his. She gave him a slight smile as they went forward in the line. Len took a deep breath and relaxed. He really needed to calm down. After a little while longer they were at the front of the line.
"Hello there." The lady monitoring the dressing rooms said as they approached. "It'll be a while before two rooms are open, but there it a large one open at the end of the hall if you don't mind changing together."
"That's fine." Rin said with a smile. Then she led Len down to the changing room the worker had told them to go to. When they were both inside she locked the door and put her pile of clothes on the stool in the corner. Len followed her lead and put his pile on the other stool in the room.
"Is it really ok for us to change together?" Len whispered over to his sister.
"Yeah. I mean we're twins. We share a room. And it's not like you've never seen me change." Rin said calmly. "But if it really bugs you then just look the other way." Then she began to pull off her clothes and put them in a messy pile on the floor. Then she grabbed the first articles of clothing and put them on.
"Ok then." Len turned around and began to do the same. He had on a pair of shorts under the skirt, which covered a pair of briefs he had managed to find a while back. He kept the shorts on while he changed. He put on outfit after outfit. When one of them had changed into something they would turn around in order to show it off to the other, getting either a yes, no or maybe. Then when they decided if they wanted it or not they would put the item in either a buy or no good pile. They would even switch the clothes from time to time, even though they would look exactly the same, it was still fun. Len was right, he and Rin were the exact same size. It was kind of funny how that worked. But at the same time it was pretty lucky. They wouldn't have to worry about getting Len his own set of clothes.
When they were done deciding what to buy and what to put back, they left the stuff they didn't want in the changing room, then went over to the cash register. Rin pulled out the debit card that their parents had given them. Because their mother didn't want to keep handing them cash, she had just set up a bank account for each of them. This way they were able to make their own purchases easily. It was rather ideal actually. When they had their shopping bags in hand and had left the store, Len came up with the idea of ice cream.
"It's pretty hot today. And on top of that you did pay for the clothes. So let me pay for you." Len said as he pulled out a twenty dollar bill from his own wallet. Using his 'female' voice had started becoming so natural after using it this whole time. It even surprised himself how easy it was to talk like that.
"That sounds great." Rin smiled. "Thanks Len!" They went over to the ice cream stand and picked out their flavors. Rin picked cookies and cream and Len picked mint chip. With their cups of cold deliciousness in hand, they went over and sat down at a nearby bench.
"Thanks for today Rin." Len said between licks of ice cream.
"No problem Len. In all honesty I should be thanking you for saving me from the deadly cured which is boredom." She waved her spoon around in her brother's face as if to prove a point.
"Any time sis." Len giggled. He was about to continue when they suddenly heard a very familiar voice. From behind them.
"Do you really think that purple is the best color? The black one would suit you better." Said the voice. Rin turned around ever so slightly to make sure it was who she thought. Unfortunately it was. There was no way to mistake that hair. Miku. Her long turquoise hair flowed behind her as she talked on her cellphone. Rin had no idea who she was talking too, but she did know that she and Len HAD to get out of there. Rin reached down and grabbed Lens wrist, and made a slight motion for him to follow her, which he did without arguing. They slowly tried to blend in with the crowd of shoppers. Unfortunately it didn't go the way they planned. "Rin? Is that you? Wait up!" Miku called out for them. In a panic the twins began to run. They ran all the way to the exit of the mall and made it just in time to make it onto the bus they needed to get home, right before it left.
"Crap." Rin muttered, catching her breath. "I didn't think her of all people would be there." Then she turned to look at her winded twin. "You ok Lenny?"
"Yeah I'm fine." He smiled. "I down know how we managed to hold onto out ice cream though." He said as he put a large scoop into his mouth.
"Wow. I didn't even notice that." Rin laughed. "But still, I'm sorry that we nearly got caught."
"I don't mind running a bit." Len joked. "But it's a bit strange running around in a skirt. I'm not all that used to it."
"Ha-ha! Well you'll have to get used to it at some point."
"I guess we'll just have to run into Miku more often then. Actually…..never mind. Let's never do that again." Len thought it over. If he had to get chased by that girl every time he went outside, dressing like this wasn't worth it, even if he did love it. "But I guess I will have to tell her eventually."
"Eventually is eventually cause it happens eventually. But right now you need to worry about eating that ice cream before it melts all over those clothes." Rin stated. "I hope you remember who those belong to." Then they both began to laugh a bit.
"Thanks Rin."
"No problem."