Author's Note: Chapter three already? Boy, I'm on a roll! Though, in all honesty, what's more fun than writing when it's so hot and humid you feel like you're sitting in a hot bath no matter what you do? Move as little as possible... drink enough iced diet soda to float an aircraft carrier... eat lots of fruit straight from the fridge... that is my new summertime regime. Well, that said, please enjoy the chapter, and thank you, as always, to my great reviewers!
Disclaimer: I do not own these boys, or their Gundams, or anything else. If I did, Wufei would have been a costumed super hero, fighting for Truth and (more importantly) Justice. And his cute little animal sidekick would have been a panda.
For Your Info: This chapter rightfully belongs to Wufei. I figure since he'll probably be facing up to his greatest fear, he should go now and have the rest of the story to recuperate.
o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o
It seems one of the great ironies of life that, at the beginning of any given summer holiday, someone does not want to go. They beg, whine, scream and complain against accompanying the rest of the group or family, all to no avail. And then, magically, when the trip has been completed, they do exactly the same number in reverse, begging, whining, screaming, and complaining against going home.
Not so with this particular vacation. We had only officially been on vacation for two days, been in residence at Quatre's family's home for just over one, and I was ready to be gone. There was no meaningful work to do, no television to watch, no Internet (much to the borderline trauma of Yuy) and no air conditioning. The animals were annoying and the insects were horrible.
I thought all this on the second night of our trip, falling slowly asleep in my guest room despite the constant hootings, chirpings, and howlings outside my window. Little did I know what the third day of our little "adventure" would bring...
O.O.O.O.O
I was awoken just after dawn by an almighty crash from downstairs. I glared around at nothing in particular for a moment, debating on whether or not I really wanted to know what had happened. I could hear no one else stirring in the house. It was up to me, then, whether I wanted to or not.
So began the third day.
Only two days to go, I reminded myself as I dressed, in shorts and my blue tank top to combat the heat. That is not so bad. You can always catch up on your reading...
Somewhat cheered by the idea of a good book and a glass of cold lemonade in the hammock in the backyard, I quickly made the bed and went to investigate the crash. Making my way downstairs, I was confronted by the biggest mess I have seen to date outside of a war zone.
The kitchen was in shambles.
The screen door was hanging lopsided by one hinge. The pantry doors were open wide, the dry goods scattered and tossed about the room. Elbow maccaroni crunched under my bare feet as I walked disbelievingly to the middle of the floor.
Everything that had been placed on top of the cabinets was destroyed. Flour and sugar canisters had been spilled and scattered like new snow. The bowl of strawberries was turned over, smearing part of the counter top bright red.
The refrigerator likewise was open, it's contents either consumed or splashed and thrown all over the floor and cabinets. The milk jug had overturned, still dripping off the top shelf into a large puddle at the base of the appliance. There were worms swimming in there too, I noticed. The Styrofoam bait canisters had been chewed apart.
And, worst of all, the vegetable drawer was open. The snakes were gone.
Under the table, hunkered down amid the overturned chairs, were the dogs.
"Get out of here!" I screamed, kicking the chairs out of the way. Looking perfectly guilty and equally terrified, the three animals beat a hasty retreat. They seemed to fly under the broken door and off the porch. I followed in hot pursuit, stopping only at the bottom step of the veranda. "And STAY out!"
Breathing heavily, I returned inside. I was not going to clean up that mess on my own. Upstairs I went, nearly dragging Barton and Winner back down with me. Yuy and Maxwell were strangely absent, but I did not think much of it at the time. I had other things on my mind.
"What's the matter, Wufei?" Barton yawned.
"Just look at this mess!" I demanded, pulling my captives into the kitchen. They were suitably shocked. I pointed to the paw prints in the milk and flour. "The dogs," I said firmly, "should stay outdoors."
"Now, wait a second!" Winner protested. "I put them out before I went to bed last night! And I closed and locked both of the doors, not just the screen."
The three of us stared at each other for a few moments.
"I will get the mop," I sighed.
As soon as the others had dressed and Barton had seen to his rabbit, we set about putting the kitchen to rights. I mopped up the milk and the rest of the liquid messes while Barton wiped and straightened the counters.
Winner swept up the flour, sugar, and dried pasta, then picked up all the chairs and replaced them around the table. "Bad, bad dogs!" he scolded when three furry faces appeared at the door. "Go on, back outside. It looks like you've already had enough breakfast."
"On that note, is anyone else concerned that almost all our food is gone?" Barton remarked casually.
Winner wasn't. "We'll go to town this afternoon and get more," he reassured as he checked the fridge. "Hey, there's a gallon of tea in here that didn't get dumped! Anybody want some?"
Barton and I both passed. It seems neither of us are the biggest fans of tea, hot or cold.
"Suit yourself," Winner shrugged, pouring himself a glass. Dropping in some ice cubes, he took a large gulp. Tea sprayed everywhere. "Oh, yuck!" he yelled, frantically scrubbing at his mouth. "It's disgusting!"
"Why?" Barton asked, surprised. "What's wrong with it?"
"Too... sweet! It's like... like sugar water! I didn't even taste tea in that tea! Eww!"
I blinked. Oh. Obviously it had been sweet tea, a drink commonly associated with that part of the country. I supposed it had been aptly named. Winner poured it firmly down the sink.
Suddenly I heard footsteps on the porch. We had been so busy with the sweet tea incident I hadn't even heard a vehicle pull into the yard. Idly I wondered who it could be. Did they even know that the family in residence was away at the moment?
"Hello...? What's going on in here?"
The screen door teetered on its one hinge as Yuy and Maxwell came into the house. They gazed around the kitchen at the mop and bucket, broom, and wads of paper towels.
"Watcha doin', guys?" Maxwell asked. "Spring cleaning?"
I grimaced. "Something like that. You two could have helped. Where were you?"
"We went for supplies," Maxwell said defensively, clutching a large pizza box to his chest. Yuy was protectively cradling a paper sack in his arms. It appeared to be full of miscellaneous bits of pipe and wire, and bottles of household cleaners. I decided not to ask.
"You bought other food besides pizza, I hope?" Winner inquired.
"Uh, no, not exactly." Maxwell quickly found something else to look at. "Oh, and by the way, we borrowed fifty bucks from you."
"Oh. Okay... was it my card, or the cash?"
"The cash. But don't worry, though, I'll totally pay you back when we get home." The braided one dropped into a chair at the table, fishing another slice of pizza out of the box. It sounded almost empty. "So, what happened? Why the cleaning?"
"The dogs somehow got inside and made a mess of things," Barton explained. "They ate what amounts to everything edible in this house. As you can see, they broke the screen door and came right into the kitchen."
"Uh, yeah. Must have been those dogs!" Maxwell said loudly, a look of complete guilt on his face.
I stared at him in disbelief.
He looked uncomfortable. "What?"
"You mean to tell me," I said slowly, "that you and Yuy left this house at the crack of dawn to go for pizza and Mr. Clean, and in doing so broke the screen door, and yet you neglected to close the outer door or inform any of the rest of us?"
There was silence.
"...couldn't get the screen unlatched," Maxwell mumbled petulantly.
"...was going to fix it... got back," muttered Yuy, staring fixedly into his bag.
More silence.
"Well..." Winner finally spoke up, attempting to get things in order. "What's done is done. We've cleaned as best we can and we can always buy more food. Until then Trowa and I can go out to the barn and see what Sis has stashed in the freezer. But... let's try to be more careful next time?"
"Right."
"Affermative."
That cleared, theblonde and the banged oneheaded for the barn. Barton, however, waited for Winner to leave before looking back over his shoulder with a small, almost smug smile on his face. "Oh, and don't forget there are now ten to fifteen snakes loose in the house. If you come across any, just put them out in the yard, okay?"
Maxwell immediately folded his legs up onto the seat of the chair and off the ground with a shudder. "I hate snakes!"
"Then don't move," Yuy said, calmly reaching past his braided companion and grabbing an unforseen reptilian tail hanging out of the birdcage. Maxwell immediately scrambled away, looking terrified.
The parakeet was nowhere to be seen. However, the snake did have a rather noticeable bulge in it's middle, probably what kept in from slithering out of the cage in the first place. It was now too fat to escape.
"Poor bird," Maxwell whimpered.
Yuy took the snake out onto the porch and dropped it off in a clump of vibrantly flowering rhododendron bushes. Sated by its recent meal, it made no protest of the handling, sneaking off under the porch. The belt-maker would undoubtedly weep.
"I'm going upstairs to... unpack," Yuy said when he returned to the kitchen. "Then I'll fix the door."
After he had departed Maxwell and I sat staring at one another, wondering whether we should tell Winner about the fate of the bird or let him find out on his own. I threw away a clump of greasy napkins poking from the pizza box. There were a few precious seconds of calm.
"I think we should tell him," I finally decided, moving to the sink to wash the grease off my hands. "If he notices the bird is gone without being informed, he might think he is losing his mind."
"Yeah," Maxwell agreed, chewing thoughtfully at a crust. "Either way he's gonna feel responsible. He'll want to buy his sister another bird..."
I nodded. He was probably right. It was after all our fault that their parakeet had gone to its ancestors, in a roundabout way.
As I stood at the kitchen sink, methodically washing my hands and pondering the dynamics of ourselves as related to the animals currently in our care, a large object struck the window with jarring force. It stuck to the sill, beating its wings and viciously pecking the glass.
It was a rooster.
"What on Earth...?" I was taken aback. Why would a rooster suddenly do a suicide dive into the window? It made no sense.
"Well, obviously it's after you, Wufei," Maxwell said from his seat at the table.
"What? That's absurd," I snorted. "Poultry do not prey on humans. Even you should know that, Maxwell."
"I dunno. Think about it, Wu. You've done something to make him hate you. You took out that other chicken yesterday, and he knows it. You killed his lady, and now he's pissed! Now you must pay!"
By this point the braided baka was laughing hysterically.
"That is ridiculous, Maxwell!" I yelled, cranking open the window to push the rooster, still squawking and attacking, off the sill. "Chickens have no concept of revenge! It probably has ten other chickens just like the first one to choose from, so why would it care if that particular one was killed?"
Maxwell shrugged. "Maybe they were married."
"Chickens, do not participate nor join in holy wedlock!" I screamed. This was getting out of hand. Very suddenly I had a mental picture of a tiny poultry wedding... the brave wife trying in vain to drive intruders away from her tree, leading to her untimely death... and then the grieving husband, bent on retribution, out to bring the murderer to justice...
I shook my head viciously. That scenario was just a bit too familiar for my liking.
The stupid thing was still clinging tenaciously to the wooden window frame. I growled. If it tore the screen there would be one less animal in the chicken coop that evening.
"Shoo! Scat! Get off of there!" Suddenly Winner's hands appeared, plucking the rooster off the window and tossing it gently out into the yard. "I swear, Trowa, I don't know what's wrong with these animals!"
Moments later he and Barton had returned to the kitchen, which seemed by unspoken agreement to have become central command. For some reason, Barton looked upset. Here we go again, I thought.
"So?" Maxwell queried. "Did you find anything to eat?"
Barton and Winner exchanged glances. "We think once it was probably a coyote."
"Uh... 'probably'?"
"It looked like it had been savaged by a dog. Or blown apart." Barton looked miserable. "Quatre, the things these people do to animals! It's not right! You could buy a belt or a decent lunch right there in town without killing–"
"I know, I know!" Winner too looked upset. "It's all her husband's doing, and just for the record, I was against the wedding. But in regards to Duo's question... no. Nothing I'd be comfortable eating. We'll have to go into town."
"I'll go with you," Barton volunteered.
Once it had been decided, Winner only had to grab his wallet from Maxwell and the keys to the Hummer from Yuy before they were off.
"Use caution when you first approach," Yuy warned them as he handed over the keys. "The bees have yet to leave the paint."
Maxwell and I watched them go.
"I hope they bring cookies," Maxwell sighed. "Well, Wu, I guess we're alone for awhile. Wanna explore the attic with me? Looks like it'd be absolutely huge from outside."
I had my doubts. "Would the owners appreciate you rummaging in their belongings?"
"Nah, they won't care. It's an attic, not their bedroom."
"Should we ask Yuy as well?"
Maxwell hesitated. "Uh, Heero's kinda busy right now. I don't think he'll wanna. Come on, let's go!"
And so I found myself trailing the braided one towards the stairs, ready to spend the afternoon mucking around in a sweltering, dirty attic. We cannot roll much further down this hill, I thought as we climbed the steps. How wrong I was...
O.O.O.O.O
It was nearly one o'clock when we heard the Hummer coming back.
Taking it as our cue, we left the confines of the attic for the slightly cooler and much less dusty freedom of the kitchen. It had been an... interesting morning.
In one corner of the enormous attic, Maxwell had managed to locate a large box of costumes and props. He had gone headfirst into the box, only to emerge dressed as a pirate captain complete with velvet cape and big, floppy hat with a feather plume in the brim. Waving a plunger in leu of a sword, he'd called me a scurvy dog and demanded a duel. I pulled the hat down over his eyes.
Now, sitting in the kitchen with glasses of ice water, we were joined by Yuy. He smelled like chemicals and gunpowder and had a very satisfied look on his face. "We are now prepared," he announced.
I did not ask. Maxwell nodded as if he understood, so I decided to leave it at that.
Winner and Barton made a welcome distraction. I rose to help them bring in the groceries, but paused. They did not appear to have anything. Winner had an odd look on his face. Barton looked tired.
"Didja get the grub?" Maxwell asked, oblivious.
"Nope," Winner answered just as flippantly, tossing the keys onto the cabinet and dropping into a chair.
Maxwell blinked. "Huh? Why?"
"Well, it appears," Barton said with deceptive calm, "that they do not accept credit in any store in that tiny little backwater town. And we can't find Quatre's checkbook."
"And someone--" I here took up the story with a withering glare at Maxwell and Yuy, the volume of my voice rising quickly and without my conscious control "–spent the only cash money we had on pizza and arson supplies! This is wonderful! Now we are stranded in the middle of nowhere with no food! "
"Wufei, calm down," Winner implored pleadingly, raising his hands in a peaceful gesture. "They couldn't have known... Hey, where's Chirpy?"
He was looking at the birdcage.
I stopped ranting momentarily to trade looks with Maxwell. He shook his head 'no.'
"Sorry, Quat,"the American said soothingly, "Chirpy's gone. I guess he musta gotten out when the dogs trashed the kitchen. I'm really sorry..."
Winner moaned, dropping his head into his arms. "Great. That's great. No food, no money, no checkbook, and now my niece's parakeet is gone. What else could possibly go wrong?"
"Uh, no fish?" Maxwell pointed meekly at the bowl on top of the microwave, wherein a small green and tan snake was coiled, all but its eyes and nostrils submerged. The three goldfish had vanished.
Winner honestly looked ready to cry.
"What am I going to tell Katie?" he wailed, burying his face in his hands. "She won those fish at the fair! A six-year-old kept them alive for two years and I've let them die in two days!"
"Uh, it wasn't exactly your fault," Maxwell began, but Winner paid him no heed.
"Oh, and let's not forget that Chirpy flew the coop," he continued miserably. "How am I going to explain that? Now all that's left is the hamster... Oh, Allah, the hamster!" Suddenly he shot to his feet and ran for the stairs. "If the hamster gets eaten it's all over!"
"I'm going to check Thumper," Barton said hurriedly, and likewise ran from the room.
I snorted. It was doubtful that any of the escaped snakes were big enough to handle that rabbit anyway. But even so... No use in being lax in security.
I took the empty fish bowl out into the yard and dumped it, snake and all, into the weeds. Two down, roughly a dozen to go. Kicking away the rooster that had tried a surprise attack on my bare legs, I sighed. Were not vacations a time to relieve stress?
Headed back inside the house I was met by Maxwell and Barton going out.
"We're gonna check the Hummer again," Maxwell informed me, "and see if we can find the checkbook. You can help Heero look inside, if you wanna."
As if I had anything else to do. Replacing the bowl, I went to assist Yuy. We searched for a good half hour, thoroughly checking the living room and dining room. No luck. We were about to search the kitchen when the two came back inside.
"Did you find it?" I inquired.
"Well, not exactly. But we did find this." Maxwell looked a bit uncomfortable as he held out one of the agricultural fair brochures that Winner had stuffed into the Hummer's console. It was the one that detailed different events and their date and time.
Barton nodded. "We think we might have a plan."
"A plan for what?" asked Yuy.
"To get us some cash. Family meeting!" Maxwell yelled decisively, motioning us all to sit at the table. "You too, Quat."
The blonde had just come back downstairs. "Uh, okay. Trowa, I moved Thumper up to Katie's room with the hamster and locked the door. You don't think those snakes could... get up those stairs... do you?"
"Probably not. Come sit down. Duo and I have an idea."
Winner took a seat and the powwow began. Maxwell spread the brochure over the tabletop.
"This right here," he announced, pointing at a block of words on the paper. "Me and Trowa talked this over, see, and we think we've really got a shot at some cash."
I glanced up at him incredulously. "A group karaoke contest?"
"Yeah! Remember when we all sang at the Preventers Christmas party?"
"I try not to..."
"Everybody complimented us! Noin even said we could form our own boy band, remember?"
"Noin was drunk, just like everyone else."
"And I bet everybody at this contest tonight will be, too!" Maxwell declared triumphantly, as if he had made a major point. "It'll be a piece of cake! Think about it, guys. The winners get two hundred and fifty dollars! That's more than enough to buy food for the rest of the weekend. And Quatre, while we're at the fair you can get some more goldfish for your niece. She'll never know the difference!"
"Well..." I could tell Winner was thinking it over. "I guess we could at least give it a try..."
"I have no objections," Yuy decided. "As it was partially by my error we lost our supply of rations, I feel obligated to participate. But only on one condition. I carry my gun as usual. If we are going to be drawing that kind of attention to ourselves, I insist that we have at least one weapon at our immediate disposal."
"Okay," Maxwell agreed immediately. "You can keep the gun. It's a costume karakoke contest anyway, so we can either make the gun and holster part of your look or hide it under the outfit."
I sighed. Arguing would do no good, if Yuy and Winner had agreed to idea. "I suppose I am in, as well."
"Awesome!" Maxwell was all smiles. "We'll win this for sure!"
"The contest begins this evening at nine o'clock," Barton informed us. "Twenty one hundred hours. Even allowing time to get there and register, that's plenty of time to find a costume and get ready."
I considered the box of costumes in the attic. I could go as a samurai, perhaps, or a Musketeer. Perhaps this might not be so bad after all.
"Okay, then," Winner said brightly. "Meeting adjourned to look for costumes?"
"Sure." Barton nodded as we began to leave the table. "However..."
I paused.
"There is one small detail that we declined to mention."
Winner was at the sink, filling a glass with water. "Oh? What's that, Trowa?" he asked lightly, taking a drink.
"It's a ladies' contest." Maxwell said it all in one breath. "We'll have to go in drag."
My eyes bulged. Yuy froze. Winner nearly choked on his water.
"W-what?" the blonde coughed, thumping himself on the chest and staring at the two of them with huge eyes. "What did you say?"
"He said," Barton repeated slowly and with great deliberation, "that it is a women's contest. We will all have to pretend to be women in order to compete and have a chance for the prize."
"You mean wear dresses and makeup?" Yuy asked with a frown. "And act as if we are female?"
"Yeah, that's about the gist of it."
"No." I put my foot down immediately. "Forget it."
"But, Wu...!" Maxwell whined.
"Put the idea from your mind, Maxwell! There is no way on this Earth that I will ever masquerade as a woman! Not for any reason!"
"So you'd rather starve for three days?" he demanded, braid swinging wildly as he spun to face Winner and Yuy. "Think about it, guys! No drag means no contest, and no contest means no prize money, and no prize money means no food! That, to me, seems like a very good reason to put on a dress!"
Barton nodded. "I agree. I have also considered this in great detail. I believe that wearing a feminine costume and playing the part of a teenaged girl will not be so different from wearing my clown costume and performing at the circus. In either case one has a role to play. One is able to distance oneself from who one is every day and concentrate on the act."
I stared at him blankly.
"Also in either case, no one knows who you really are. That helps a lot."
"Well, I guess so..." Winner was wavering.
"But we know who we really are!" I yelled.
"Come on, Wufei," Maxwell sighed, holding up the paper. "Let's grow up a little and get over it. The minimum number of girls for each karaoke group is five, it says so right here. There are exactly five of us. If you're not in, no one is, and all we got to eat is frozen coyote with buckshot. We need you."
I began to stammer. I broke out into a cold sweat. Was that true? Might I have to sacrifice my pride for the sake of my companions?
"No! I won't do it!"
"But, Wufei..." Winner began hesitantly. "It... doesn't sound that bad, does it? If it gets us money to eat?"
"Exactly!" Maxwell exclaimed. "And it won't be that hard to look like babes, anyway. All we need is a dress, some makeup, the right hairstyle, maybe some socks stuffed in a bra... And besides, aren't country girls supposed to have muscles? We'll pass as chicks, no problem."
Winner nodded thoughtfully. "Yeah... yeah, I guess that could work..."
I could not believe it. Everyone else was actually beginning to agree to this madness! But wait. Yuy had not acquiesced. Maybe there was still hope!
Yuy was staring silently at the rest of us. The cogs and gears were working, turning in that terrorist brain of his. Any moment now, I knew, he would announce that they were all insane. Yes, any moment now...
"You know... all the theater groups of ancient Japan were made up of men," he said. "Also those of England and ancient Rome. I see no reason why we could not pull off a similar farce. Mission accepted."
"NO!" I shrieked. I could not help it. I could feel my masculinity slipping away even as they spoke. "I will not do it! I will not! I do not care how hungry I become! I will not...!"
My stomach chose that moment to rumble loudly.
Maxwell and Barton swapped knowing, almost triumphant glances. "He's in."
"Don't sweat it, Wu-man," Maxwell grinned. "I saw the cutest little Chinese dress up there in the costume chest. You'll look great!"
"I do not wear 'cute little' anythings, Maxwell!" I screamed, but there was no response. Everyone else was heading for the stairs, already intent on their costumes. "Maxwell? Maxwell! This is... this is... INJUSTICE!"
O.O.O.O.O
Four o'clock that evening marked twenty four hours since I'd last eaten, having foolishly bypassed dinner the night before in favor of a solitary stroll around the farm. By five I was becoming noticeably uncomfortable, my stomach growling constantly. By seven I was resigned to the dress.
It was indeed, as Maxwell had said, a cute little thing. It was bright red, sleeveless, with slits up to the knee. There were black ties down the front and black accents at the throat, shoulders and hem. Twisting dragons and twining birds in black and gold thread decorated the fabric. I was sure any of the girls I had grown up with would have adored it. I did not.
Looking into the mirror once I had it on, however, I was a bit shocked. A seventeen-year-old girl stared back at me. A scowling, well-muscled seventeen-year-old girl, but a girl, none the less.
I had put up my hair into two tiny pigtails, tied with red ribbon to match the dress. There had been a pair of black silk slippers in the trunk that fit the purpose of footwear. Rouge, dark eye shadow, and red lipstick completed the ensemble.
I was privately impressed. Makeup really did make a difference. Now, if anyone else I knew ever saw me like this, I could die on the spot convinced that I had at least done a good job of being feminine.
Barton was doing our makeup. He had professed knowledge of such matters, stating that Catherine had trained him to apply her makeup before performances.
Dressed in a Roman toga with a few extra folds of cloth for slight chest enhancement, he had brushed back his uni-bang and secured it with tiny ivy-leaf shaped barrettes. I had to admit that with a faint dusting of makeup and a pair of long false eyelashes, he looked like a tall, slim girl of eighteen or so. More mature than the rest of us, I thought sourly.
A makeup brush clenched between his teeth, he was currently working on Winner. The blonde was seated on the bathroom vanity, whimpering faintly as Trowa did his face and hair.
"Qautre, if you don't stop squirming we're going to have a mascara-brush-in-the-eye incident."
"Sorry."
"Quatre, hold still or your lipstick is going to go on wrong."
"Sorry."
"Qautre, quit wriggling or I'm going to burn you with this curling iron."
"Sorry!"
I sighed, wandering off to find Maxwell. I found him in the guest room he shared with Yuy, brushing his long hair in front of the mirror.
"Well?" he demanded when he saw me. "How do I look?"
He had undone the famous braid for the first time in my knowledge, replacing it with a loose ponytail held in place by a pale yellow ribbon tied in a bow. For his costume he had chosen a baby blue blouse sporting yellow buttons shaped like flowers and a darker blue poodle skirt with yellow flowers and butterflies stitched into the bottom. He had on pink blush, pink lip-gloss and was wearing blue lace stockings and roller skates.
"I'm a car hop!" he proclaimed happily, twirling a circle on the skates. "Cool, huh?"
I sweat-dropped. "Of course you are, Maxwell. Of course you are."
At that moment Yuy wandered in, adjusting the final touches of his cowgirl outfit.
I swear that in that moment I nearly died, seeing the Perfect Soldier cross-dressing as if it were no concern at all. And in all honesty, for him it probably was nothing more than another mission. He was doing what it took to successfully complete said mission, as he always did. I must try to follow his example.
"You look great, Hee-chan!" Maxwell exclaimed enthusiastically. "The plastic sheriff's badge is a nice touch."
"Are you sure?" Yuy asked, looking critically into the mirror. "If I want to successfully infiltrate this contest I must look completely convincing."
He did, really. From black leather cowboy boots with silver filigree to blue denim skirt, up past plaid cotton blouse and plaited cow-hide vest and on to red bandana and cowboy hat, Heero Yuy looked the part of a rough-and-tumble tomboy cowgirl.
The ever-present gun and holster fit right into the outfit, as Maxwell had promised. His dark hair and complexion made much makeup redundant, so a bit of the same red lipstick I was utilizing and a dash of eye liner finished the costume off.
Maxwell lifted his skirt and dropped Yuy a sarcastic curtsey, which the other responded to with a slight tip of the cowboy hat.
I suddenly felt sick.
"Okay, Quatre, you can look in the mirror now," came Barton's voice from the bathroom. "I'll be right back."
A second later he was peering into the bedroom.
"Good, you're all ready. Just a few more minor issues. First, we all need female names in case anyone questions us. Second, we're all going to have to shave our legs or we'll be a dead giveaway. And third, we're going to have to work a little on bust sizes. It'll be suspicious if we're all flat chested."
Now I really wanted to be sick. Luckily for me, not only I had eaten nothing for over a day, but a piercing scream from the bathroom suddenly forestalled the bust predicament.
Winner was having issues.
"I look like Little Bo Peep!" he shrieked, staring horrified into the vanity mirror.
I took it as an assumption that the lacy pink and white Victorian dress and matching white buckle-down shoes had not been his idea. Barton had added some pastel colored makeup and even some slight curl to his blonde hair. All in all, he looked more like a girl than some of his sisters did.
"And I look like Julius Caesar's wife," Barton replied calmly. "We've all got to tough it out. Here, let's play that to your advantage."
The banged one disappeared into the little girl's room and returned with a stuffed lamb.
"There. Now 'nursery rhyme character' is your angle."
Winner was not convinced. I felt a bit sorry for him. He had spent his whole life as the only male among more than two dozen sisters, and suddenly the entire dynamics of it all had been changed. He was probably close to a personal crisis.
That had to wait, however, as we were all crowded back into the bathroom for the shaving ceremony. I could not believe it.
"I feel like part of a frat prank," Maxwell remarked.
I glanced down at the safety razor he was holding, then down at my bare legs, and groaned. It was going to be a long evening. I felt the faint hope that, wherever she was, my wife could not see me now.
O.O.O.O.O
"It's almost time to go, everybody," Maxwell announced a bit later. "Meeting in the kitchen before we leave!"
I sighed. We might as well get this over with as quickly and painlessly as possible. Or perhaps not so painless, as Maxwell almost fell headfirst down the stairs on his roller skates. Yuy's quick arm was the only thing that saved him.
"Okay," he said when we had reached the kitchen, recovered enough to sound perky. "Let's all go over things one more time before we proceed with the mission. When I call on you, use a girly voice to state your chosen girly name and the personality you're going to play tonight. We can't just be sporadically acting out or they'll think we're weird."
"I think we are weird," I muttered. But he did have a point.
"Okay. I'll go first." Maxwell took a deep breath, gave us a huge smile, and began in a high, falsetto voice. "Hi! I'm Dinah Maxwell, a cute, cheerful highschool girl out to sing with my best friends and have fun at the fair!"
I had to admit he was very convincing.
"Now Heero, you go."
Yuy adjusted his voice as best he could and took his turn. "I am Hana Yuy, a strong and silent girl who wants to get down to business and accomplish her mission."
"Good. Trowa?"
"I'm Trisha Barton, mature and sophisticated, but still warm and caring."
"Great. Quat?"
Winner sighed. "I'm Catrice Winner, shy but sweet. Uh, and the lamb is Fluffy, I guess."
"Excellent! Wufei...?"
"My name is Fei Wu," I growled, "and I don't speak English."
The others groaned. What more did they honestly expect?
"Um, you might want to work on that," Maxwell advised. "Alright then, men... uh, women... that's everything. I guess it's time to go. Let's knock 'em dead!"
We trooped out to the Hummer in the last dying rays of sunlight, headed off on what I thought might as well have been a suicide mission. Who knew. If the judges caught on that we were anything less than female, that might be exactly what it amounted to. Somehow I doubted that the residents of this particular area would look kindly upon a group of "confused" boys.
"Watch your stride," I advised Barton. "You still walk like a man. And make sure to keep your toga secure. If it falls, I have a hunch we would all be better off self-destructing."
"Now you tell me," he muttered.
We climbed into the Hummer and, trailed by its devoted following of lovesick honeybees, were on our way to dinner or despair. I supposed that at this point it could go either way. Now, one final item of business; a quick prayer to Nataku that no one asked to see any identification...
O.O.O.O.O
"Oh, just look at your hair, darlin'! Molly, come look at her hair. Aren't those just the cutest li'l pigtails you've ever seen?"
"That's just adorable!"
I let the women fuss over me, content to eat my toffee apple and bask in the glow of victory.
To my infinite surprise we had won the Ladies' Group Karaoke Contest, Teen Division, with a most appropriate country music song. The tune was still running through my head. "Men's shirts, short skirts... gettin' wild and doin' it in style," I hummed around the apple.
Now I did not regret the cup of strong, homemade alcohol I had accepted from that attendant before the show. He had most likely been attempting to flirt with me, but the drink had done its job and calmed my nerves. It was strong, very strong, but not entirely disagreeable. It even had an attractive name. "Moonshine," he had called it. Quite poetic.
At ease for the first time that evening, I took in the energetic atmosphere.
Barton and Maxwell were still hamming it up for the crowds.
Barton had experience, but Maxwell had discovered an affinity for performing and appeared to be enjoying himself immensely. While Winner and Yuy went to collect our prize, they had stayed behind to enjoy the spotlight for a bit longer. At the moment they were surrounded by a group of men of varying ages, all vying for their supposedly feminine attentions.
"You got right purdy hair, li'l miss," one said, giving Maxwell's bow an affectionate and somewhat suggestive tug. "That there ponytail's longer'n the Mississippi."
"Gee, thanks!" Maxwell giggled in his false high voice, pretending to blush modestly.
I snorted, smiling despite myself. If only they knew. Somehow, out here in the crowd, under the stars, away from everything familiar... it was almost possible to forget that the whole experience was real and not some insanely peculiar and disturbing dream.
Suddenly Yuy appeared at my elbow.
"Mission accomplished," he said softly, "but our identities are in jeopardy."
"Explain," I demanded just as quietly. Treating this escapade like the necessary mission that it was also helped to keep me from dwelling too much on the hard reality of it all.
"The sheriff. He is somewhere in the immediate area. If he sees us getting into the Hummer he will surely become suspicious."
I nodded. Two groups of five strangers in town at the same time with identical yellow Hummers was too odd to be coincidental. It would be only a matter of time before they put two and two together and came up with five cross-dressing out-of-towners.
"Grab Maxwell and Barton," I told him. "I will take Winner and the money and disappear into the crowd. We will be less obvious if we split up."
"Roger. Rendezvous at the vehicle in fifteen minutes." He vanished into the milling mass of fair attendees, the spurs on his filigreed boots jangling faintly.
"Come on, Catrice," I said as I grabbed Winner's arm, trying my hardest to sound cheerful and girlish. "You wanted to get goldfish for your niece, didn't you?"
"Hmm?" he muttered around a mouthful of cotton candy. "Oh, yes! Thanks for reminding me."
Ten minutes later we were at the Hummer, Winner protectively clutching the plastic sandwich bag containing the five goldfish we had won. We had decided to give them the names of our girlish personalities. That would forever be the only evidence of our little foray into the realm of the female.
Several minutes later Yuy appeared, carrying Maxwell over one shoulder. The baka was still smiling and waving, blowing kisses at the crowd, and every few steps Barton would turn in response to the continuing applause and drop a bow.
"Ah, my public," Maxwell sighed as he was unceremoniously dumped into the Hummer and we sped away. "How they adore me..."
"Congratulations," I said sourly. "You just became the favorite fantasy girl of half the men in this town."
That shut him up.
O.O.O.O.O
Later, sitting in the Hummer with the windows down in the parking lot of the town's only pizza parlor, we five took a binding Tell-And-You-Die Oath.
Over blood and tomato sauce, we solemnly swore never to tell a soul of the events that had transpired. The night's performance had been a one-time phenomenon that would never, ever be repeated for pleas, threats, love or money. Never again would a dress, skirt, or makeup grace our perfectly masculine forms. Our house was from now on and henceforth a castle of men, and we were its lords.
Winner in particular vowed to have a tattoo of an anchor applied sometime in the very near future. He was still trying in vain to get over the Little Bo Peep scenario.
"Look on the bright side, guys," Maxwell said around a slice of pepperoni. "It's over. We won. We got the cash. Now we can go shopping, get on with our vacation, and never have to think of it again."
We all nodded emphatically, more than ready to go home and change. We would happily drink to that, even if all we had was fountain soda.
It was nearing midnight when we arrived back at the farm.
Groceries had been obtained. Makeup had been washed off in a gas station bathroom. Our hair was as back to normal as was possible with only one brush and no styling gel. We were more than ready to, as they say in the country, "hit the hay."
Barton was first to enter the kitchen with his bag of groceries. As he turned on the light, a stray snake shot across the floor into the darkness under the table. The banged one, uni-bang now back in place, dropped the paper sack he was holding and went after it.
"Come back here, you little sneak," he cajoled, crawling under the table on his hands and knees as the rest of us began to put away the food. "Time to go back outside. Trust me, it's much nicer out there than in our kitchen... hey, what's this?"
I glanced up as he appeared from under the table, a wriggling snake in one hand and something small and rectangular in the other.
"Oh, please no... Barton, tell me that is not the...?"
A nod confirmed it. "It's the checkbook! It must have been on the table and gotten knocked off when the dogs wrecked the room this morning. Wow, Duo, I suppose we should have searched the whole house before we started making crazy plans, huh?"
The container of orange juice I had been holding slipped from my numb grasp. Dimly, I could hear Maxwell's sheepish laughter.
Suddenly, I began to laugh as well.
I laughed like Winner on the Zero system. I could not breathe. Tears were coursing down my face. I laughed harder than I have ever laughed in my entire life.
Then I blacked out.
I do not remember going upstairs, changing out of the hated dress, or falling into bed, but I must have done so, for that is where I was when I came back to myself a few hours later. Moonlight spilled through the open curtains. There was an owl hooting loudly in the tall tree outside the window.
It was soothing enough for me to attempt to sleep, pushing away all memories of the evening.
Only two... more... days, I thought dimly as slumber claimed me.
There was a deafening bang from the room next door, and a final, rather startled squawk from the owl as Yuy fired his gun.
Idly, I wondered if any of us would survive that long.
O.O.O.O.O
To Be Continued
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(2nd) Author's Note: Yeah, I know. I made 'em dress in drag and sing for their supper. But, but, they were really pretty girls! Tee-hee, I'm so bad... The song they sang was "(Man!) I Feel Like A Woman" by Shaniah Twain, if you didn't guess. No drag next chapter, I promise... if you even bother to read the next chapter after this bishonen-abuse atrocity...