What He Means To Us: Bon Clay
His name is Bentham.
He likes ballet, slippers, makeup, booze, and tears!~
Okama way!
When people see him, opinions vary (like any other person.)
Some think he's fascinating, others strange.
Usually, they think he's a freak.
Which is fine, their opinions don't matter anyway. When they see him, they think he's confused, pathetic, unnatural, which is fine by him, because how can something that makes him feel a semblance of right be so wrong? When he was younger and newer and sadder, opinions mattered the most. Now, he knows you can't please everybody or make them understand you (most don't want to understand, they only want to be cruel.)
And so, he provides support and a place to belong to those who are younger, older, sadder and newer, away from those who only want to be cruel or poke and prod. He offers them a place where they can embrace themselves and drown out the sounds of those that don't understand, or can't, so that they don't feel so wrong, when they could feel a little right.
When people see him, they see a man in makeup and slippers, seemingly trying to be a woman.
He's not a man or a woman, because even though he likes makeup and slippers; he doesn't favor wine over scotch, he doesn't like heels all that much and he may like dresses, but prefers something that doesn't hug too tight or have many frills. And even though he prefers scotch over wine, he doesn't like facial hair (on himself anyway), and though he doesn't wear heels, he envies those who do (he may be graceful, but heels can throw him through a loop), and though he doesn't prefer things that hug too tight or have many frills, he'd rather jump into fire than to wear men's clothes.
He's not a man or a woman, he's Bentham, Mr. 2, Bon Clay, Bon Kurei. It's not as complicated as many think, or all that fascinating either.
But before he's Bentham, Mr. 2, Bon Clay, Bon Kurei, or even an okama, he's a friend.
His name is Bentham (but he prefers Bon Clay) and he's an okama and friend. When he first met that straw hat wearing little boy (forget the fact that he was seventeen) who was trying to save that desert country, he saw no disgust, pity, cruelty, or fascination in the boys eyes. He saw anger (for the boy's friend) and curiosity (but not about how he looked, more so about his devil fruit power) and decided that this boy was a friend (even if he was an enemy at the time.)
(He couldn't predict where this friendship would lead him-
nor the little boy with a man's eyes.)
He has many names, but he prefers to be known as a friend, and he can be whoever he wants to be (physically). One touch with his right hand, and he could be Boa Hancock - said to be the most beautiful woman on all seas-, or Dragon the revolutionary. He would like to say being a woman or man doesn't prompt his interest about how these people live and are viewed, but it does and the experience is always a lesson.
But he's a friend, and an okama, with many names, and he doesn't want to be anyone else.
(A touch with his left hand, and he's himself again.)
When he was shipped to Impel Down, he chanted the Okama Way under his breath even as the other prisoners threatened and held out hope for a miracle (because Ivankov, the most admired queen of the drag queens, said to believe in miracles, and she must be right, if someone like Monkey D. Luffy can exist). When news of Portgas D. Ace's execution reached him, he tried not to connect the dots because Monkey D. Luffy and Portgas D. Ace couldn't be related, discrediting information from before they arrived at Alabasta.
(But they were, and it made him break a little inside.)
His name is usually Bon Clay, and he's an okama and more importantly, a friend. So when that little boy in a straw hat with a man's eyes was running through hell and found him in search of his brother, he said he would help, because said little boy was a friend.
It didn't go right, and Monkey D. Luffy almost died. (He did die in ways, Bon Clay knows this). And Gol D. Roger's son died. (But that doesn't matter, Ace died, that's what matters.) And Bon Clay was reminded that people other than him, have many other names and faces, and maybe that's why Monkey D. Luffy didn't judge him (because how can you judge someone with your brother's eyes?)
His name doesn't matter, and neither the fact that he's an okama. Just that he's a friend. A friend of many, also Monkey D. Luffy. The boy who's no longer a boy who has the eyes of a man (even at seventeen) - with a passed brother that had many names and faces and now a gaping hole in his chest-, who ran through hell and lost.
To him, Monkey D. Luffy is a miracle, but above that, he's a friend.
- And you never leave a friend behind, even in hell.
"BON-CHAN!"
A/N:
Beta'd by: psychotriton
I'm sorry if I have disappointed you with this one. I love the dynamic of Bon Clay and Luffy's friendship, yet I feel like this chapter wasn't even close. Also if anyone's interested, would someone like to do artwork for this fic? So I could have a cover image for it? If not, sorry I bothered and 'till next time.
- Monkey D. Anea