It was a long time coming.
Kakeru had wanted to do it ever since he first came up with the idea. Kimi enthusiastically joined in because it involved two of her favorite things: dressing up cutely and being photographed.
Machi had no opinion. Yuki was opposed. Nao was extremely opposed.
It was a perfect stalemate. Two ayes, two nays, and one abstention. The motion was not carried.
Kakeru and Kimi certainly didn't forget about it: in fact, now that she knew Nao's thoughts on the matter, Kimi had a third reason to want to do it: to annoy him. So it was brought up again and again. Always to the same result. The motion was never carried.
Then, a breakthrough. Kakeru read the situation perfectly. The day after Yuki became Machi's boyfriend, Kakeru brought the topic up again. Three yeas, one nay, one abstention. Motion carries.
Against this new balance of power, Nao needed a new tack. "You've got no right to decide what I do off of school grounds. I'm not going to sacrifice my free time and dignity just because you voted on it. I refuse!"
A dilemma. It wouldn't work with just four of them-all five needed to be present. Kimi decided it was time to call her former senpai: Nao's sister.
It turns out that Nao's sister was easily brought on board. She took on the next job: bringing forward the request to management.
"Have you got anything planned for Sunday?"
Nao looked up from his studies towards his father. "Not really? I was planning on taking it easy, probably reading. Maybe go for a bike ride. Why?"
"Oh, I see. That's what you're planning on doing after the photo shoot?"
Nao unconsciously crumpled the piece of paper he had his hand on. "What?"
"We heard that you were getting together with your student council to take some photos?"
"No, but I'm not… who told you about this?"
"Azumi. I guess Kimi was talking to her and it came up."
Not for the first time, Nao reflected on what a massive mistake it had been to go to the same high school as his childhood frenemy. "I don't want to…"
"Your mother and I don't have a picture of you with the student council. I think it would be a nice souvenir for us."
"Yes, but…"
"Your mother really looks forward to seeing it."
Nao smacked his forehead on the surface of the table, then looked up again. "Fine."
When Nao called Kakeru with his grudging acceptance, he did set a condition that in addition to the ridiculous photos they had planned, they would also do at least one normal pose in school uniforms. Kakeru agreed, which should have been a warning sign.
The other warning sign should have been the presence of Yuki's ridiculous brother. Nothing could possibly go smoothly with him there. Kakeru loved Yuki's brother because of course he did. They were the same brand of ridiculousness.
Ayame was there because he had brought the costumes. To be fair, the costumes were pretty much perfect: they were close to motion picture quality. They were still ridiculous but at least they weren't ridiculous and cheap.
Nao asked if they were going to do the school uniform shoot first. Kakeru smirked. "Yeah, right. You think I don't know you're planning on sneaking out as soon as they're done? We do the sentai photos first, Chibi."
Kakeru had hit the nail right on the head. Granted, Nao had figured it was a plan with little hope of success anyway.
So he put on the blue spandex monstrosity. It was tight and thin and he was embarrassed to even look at himself in the mirror in costume.
He thought that was enough, but as soon as he got out of the changing room, the woman in the maid costume sat him down in a chair and fluffed up his hair with a brush, applying what Nao considered to be an excessive amount of hairspray. He tolerated her putting a bit of blush on his cheeks, but refused as soon as he saw her holding a lipstick.
The studio had a large greenscreen. Kakeru explained that the photographer would put in a variety of action backgrounds afterwards. Explosions, urban landscapes, mountaintops, whatever.
Objectively, Nao had to admire the professionalism of it all: quality costumes, makeup, post production.
He hated every stupid moment of the shoot.
Pose after pose after idiotic pose. Kakeru was in seventh heaven, of course, and Kimi lived for being photographed. Yuki was less enthusiastic but at least seemed to be taking things in good humor. Machi was the only other one who did not seem to be having a good time. Not long before, Kakeru had dropped the bombshell that he and Machi were siblings. Nao felt a pang of sympathy for her. After graduation, he planned on never seeing Kakeru again, but she was stuck with him for life.
It became increasingly difficult for him to follow the instruction to smile–or at least put on a neutral expression. After two hours of shooting, Nao's face was seemingly frozen in a humiliated scowl. The announcement that they were done brought a feeling of relief so profound as to be exquisite.
"Okay, school uniform shoot next, then the afterparty!"
Fat chance of attending that, Nao thought, who'd had enough of the student council for one lifetime. He'd just get out of the skintight blue suit, put on his school uniform and…
"WHERE THE HELL'S MY UNIFORM?"
A search of all the dressing rooms brought up nothing. Kimi, Kakeru, Machi and Yuki had all changed into their school uniforms, but Nao's had somehow gone missing. Perhaps another customer had taken the clothes by mistake? Or they had been accidentally taken by the laundry service?
The ultimate result: while his classmates were in their school uniforms, he was still in a skintight blue ranger outfit.
"Well, nothing for it. We'll have to take the school uniforms photo as is. Nao will stand out a little, but…"
"No! I refuse! I've put up with a lot of idiocy today, but that is my limit! I'm not going to be the one person dressed ridiculously when I never wanted to put on this outfit in the first place!"
It was Yuki who finally called a halt to it all, and while Nao appreciated it, he wasn't sure which was worse: being bullied, or being saved from bullying by his rival.
But once that humiliation had been escaped, another one loomed before him. How was he going to get home? It was a half-hour train ride to where he lived, and sure the trains weren't as full on Sundays but there were still people.
Ayame came up with a much better solution. His store was only two blocks away. He had a huge variety of clothes that Nao could change into as long as he didn't mind…
Nao instantly agreed. And he did catch a lot of attention on that two block walk, but two blocks was better than a half hour.
Nao waited on Ayame's couch with a certain amount of trepidation. The store seemed a bit more feminine than he was comfortable with.
Ayame bounced into the room, pulling a rack of clothes behind him. "I don't have as much for a gentleman of your stature, but I do have a variety for you to choose from." He pulled a couple of outfits off the rack. "Policewoman? Nurse? Librarian? Stewardess? I also have a wedding gown, but I'd prefer that not be worn outside."
Nao's mouth hung open. Kakeru and Kimi's grinned widely.
"Don't you have any men's clothes?"
Ayame laughed. "But these are men's clothes! For men who wish to dress as a policewoman, a nurse, a librarian."
Yuki gave his brother a look. "Niisan, you surely have got something a bit more unisex than those."
"Well, I suppose he could wear a trenchcoat over the rest of the costume."
"Nao, does a trenchcoat sound all right to you?"
"Fine. as long as it covers everything up!"
Once Ayame handed it over, Nao put it on and buttoned it to the top (ignoring that the coat was a light pastel pink). The boots were the only thing remaining visible of the blue ranger outfit. He turned to leave, but Ayame stopped him.
"You're forgetting one thing…" Ayame set a white homburg on Nao's head. "Never forget to accessorize… now let me see, which scarf would be best?"
As Ayame pondered, Nao fled the premises.
Everything had gone wrong. Hopefully at least nobody would be home and neither of his sisters would see him in the sentai costume.
They were home. They saw him in the costume.
Worst Sunday ever.
The next day, Nao arrived in the student council office with a large bundle. "President, can you return this for me?"
He noticed a similarly sized bundle on the table he usually sat at. He slowly walked over to it, looked inside, and found it filled with his clothes and shoes from the day of the photo shoot. "Where did this come from?" he asked quietly.
Kakeru bounced into the room. "Oh, I found it! Aren't you grateful?"
"Where did you find it?" he asked dangerously.
"It was a total accident. I happened to be looking through my bag, and there it was! I guess it's left over from when I sneaked into your dressing room and stole all your clo…"
Kakeru whined, holding his jaw in pain from his position on the floor.
As Nao rubbed his sore knuckles. Yuki sighed. "In future, Nao, a non-violent solution would be best."
"Sorry, president."
"I'll overlook it in this case, because he totally had it coming to him."
"Thank you, president."
Author's notes:
This story was inspired by a piece of fanart by tumblr user h0llyw0lly. This being FFN, of course I can't link to the fanart in question. I've also posted this to Ao3, and that does have the link there.