Ruby tensed up as she heard Yang's motorcycle roll into the driveway, followed by the sound of the front door slamming open.
"I'm home!"
Yang tromped through the house, splattering mud and dirt everywhere with every step. Taiyang just gave Yang a look.
"What?"
He looked askance at Yang's dirtied shoes.
"Oh, fine." Yang groused sullenly, kicking her boots off into the corner. He sighed with deep resignation.
"How was your night out on the town?"
"It went fine." Yang said airily. "I met some cute girls-"
Both Ruby and Taiyang did simultaneous spit-takes.
"-but I beat two of them up and the other one was a little spacey."
Taiyang stared. "I, uh, didn't know you were looking for that sort of thing."
"Hey, I said I met cute girls. Not that I was looking for them." Yang snarked back, rummaging through the kitchen, before pulling a container of orange juice out of the fridge.
She chugged the entire thing down straight from the jug. Ruby gagged melodramatically from her place at the kitchen table.
"Yeah, yeah. Love you too, Rubes." Yang said, before ruffling Ruby's hair and making for the stairs to her bedroom.
She didn't call me Reuben. Ruby realized distantly. Does she know?
She mulled it over for several seconds.
Nah. There's no way she recognized me.
That was what she wanted to believe, anyways.
And thus Ruby went back to her status quo, hiding her hormones in a box and hiding her changing body under baggy hoodies and sports bras, pretending that she was regular old Reuben Rose and that she was not a girl.
It was about six weeks later when Ruby realized just how wrong she was.
"Ruby Rose…" Ozpin had said. "You have silver eyes. I don't suppose you're any relation to Reuben Rose? He has silver eyes too, you know."
She waited in the police station, kicking her feet up and down as boredom overwhelmed her.
There had been no time to change out of her clothes, of course. Not that she even had boy-clothes to change into, which made the whole situation rather inconvenient.
She could hardly ask the policemen to let her go on her own, not when she'd just gotten involved in a Dust-shop robbery. Not when her father had already been called. So she waited for her dad to come and pick her up.
She almost considered using her Semblance to flee, but quashed the thought. She didn't want to get in more trouble with law enforcement, no matter how appealing it seemed at the moment.
Finally, Yang walked in the front door, with Taiyang conspicuously absent.
"Hey, Rubes." She whispered quietly, before sitting down next to her on the bench. Ruby's heart skipped several beats, as she waited for the chewing-out she half-expected.
"What were you thinking, going off and fighting robbers!? You could have gotten hurt, you dummy!"
It took several moments for the words to sink in, and for Ruby to realize that she was not, in fact, being berated for wearing a skirt. But being berated for worrying her sister.
"Yang, I-"
Yang grabbed her in a hug, nearly choking the life out of her. "Don't ever do that again, you understand me? Me and Dad had a heart attack when we heard what you did."
Ruby practically melted into Yang's grip. "I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry..."
She wasn't just apologizing for fighting the crooks, but Yang didn't take it that way.
"You'd better be!" she hisses, before letting go and leaning back to survey Ruby from head to toe.
Ruby blushed under her sister's piercing gaze, and said nothing. Yang, thank God for small mercies, said nothing either.
"Dad's waiting outside. Do you want to break the news, or should I?"
"Uh… are you sure I can't just sneak out the back?"
Yang flicked her on the nose. "Quite sure. Come on, coming out with… all this... isn't going to be that bad."
Ruby almost opened her mouth to disagree. Maybe you haven't noticed, but I'm Dad's dear 'little man'...
"If it's not so bad to talk about it…" She eventually whispered. "Then why did you never talk to me about that night when you saw me at the nightclub?"
Yang looked down.
"I know that you figured me out… didn't you? Why didn't you talk to me about it?" She continued murmuring. "I felt so worried, trying to figure out why you didn't say anything… I thought that maybe you were ashamed of me, too ashamed to talk about it…"
"That's not it!" Yang said suddenly. "I was never ashamed of you! I don't… I don't know what exactly is going on, not with everything you were hiding from me, but you're still my family. I still love you, and that's not going to change."
Ruby actually sniffed, tears leaking from her eyes. "I actually… I actually thought that maybe you hadn't figured it out, but you knew all along… man, I'm such a hypocrite."
Yang raised an eyebrow.
"I hid all of this from you for years, and you've barely blinked an eye… but you helped me keep that secret, and I'm a blubbering mess." Ruby eventually said, looking away from Yang.
"Yeah, well." Yang said, as she put a hand on Ruby's shoulder. "It's my job to be the stoic older sister, isn't it?"
Ruby actually began bawling. The police officers watching the debacle coughed awkwardly.
"And… I'm sorry for not saying anything. I figured I should let you come out on your own pace, but… I guess I sort of left you hanging there, didn't I?"
Ruby finally managed to choke out a laugh.
"Sometimes we can be really dumb."
Yang smiled.
"Not you, Rubes. Just me."
Ruby shook her head. "No, I'm pretty dumb too. But… you don't have to call me 'Rubes'... just call me Ruby."
Yang smiled widely, and Ruby met her eyes and allowed herself to fall into her own hesitant grin.
"It's going to be okay, Ruby."
And it was.