(AU) Eventfic - Luceti Cross Beauty Pageant

[seikilos]

Title: The Superfluous Role of Dignity in Friendship
Fandoms: luceti, Tales of Legendia, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, original works, The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, Tales of Phantasia
Rating: PG
Words: 1252 + 164 omake
Disclaimer: I don't own any of the above fandoms.
Summary: There is no greater love a dignity-conscious man can show for a dear friend than to enter a crossdressing pageant for her sake.
Author's Notes: Okay, I had a lot of fun with this one. Basically, Haruhi shamelessly used Grune to get as many signups as possible for her crossdressing pageant. Lots of names were submitted, but I realized after a while that, had this pageant occurred with the cast we had last fall, there would have been a few more names involved....

The omake bit is an idea I had that I couldn't make fit into the story, but was far too tempting to pass up. So yup.

"This is . . . utterly, utterly r-ridiculous," Giles huffed.

Around and around he turned, his arm halfway up his back and two-thirds dislocated (or so it seemed to him) as he tried to work a tiny zipper those last few centimetres.

"I will admit to having done s-some ridiculous things in m-my life" —really, more than his fair share, when he thought about it— "but this—surely must be the very worst."

Helios pulled the lipstick from his lower lip to sigh. "I-I know, but it's for Grune and, ah, she'd be s-so disappointed if we didn't turn up."

Giles stopped turning for a moment to sigh as well. When he spoke again, his tone was resigned. "Yes, it, um, is for her, isn't it?"

He could picture the uncomprehendingly hurt look on her face when she realized he had decided his dignity was more important than her happiness—but since it made him feel like a horrible person with a shrivelled soul, he preferred not to.

Instead, he asked Helios, "Could you do up my zip?"

"Ah, yes, um, yes, just a minute." Helios capped his lipstick (really Adele's, but his for the moment) and left the mirror to rescue Giles from dislocating his arm the remaining third of the way.

Even with the reminder of why he was participating in the Tanabata cross-dressing pageant, though, Giles couldn't help complaining a little more.

"I-It isn't as though I make a—a convincing woman." He felt Helios pat the zip into place with his warm hand and turned to face his friend. "You at least look as though it's possible. I only look foolish."

Helios scratched the back of his head and gave an uncomfortable little laugh. "I th-think you're giving me too much credit, o-or the audience's eyesight not enough."

"No, you look. . . ." Giles finally raised his eyes to Helios' face after having spent the entire conversation looking everywhere else. He blinked. Looked him over. Blushed when he realized he had stopped mid-sentence like a fool. ". . . Surprisingly, um. S-Surprisingly good."

Helios' cheeks went pink. "Ah, th-thank you."

Someone knocked on the bedroom door; Giles spun and experienced the extremely odd sensation of fabric whirling around his legs. (There was entirely too much air . . . there. It left him feeling vulnerable, which did absolutely nothing for his mood.)

"Are you two almost done?" Ginia called through the door.

Giles' shoulders dropped. ". . . Yes. Um."

"Yes, you can, ah, c-come in," Helios added.

The door opened, Ginia walked in, and . . . good lord. Helios might have made a passable woman, but Ginia, she was . . . she was stunning. He took in the fit of her black three-piece suit, her slicked-down hair—and just then, his mind helpfully reminded him of some of the things she had done with his tie—

No, no, they were meeting Link any minute and meeting Grune and going out in public and he could not be having these thoughts.

Ginia flicked her eyes over the pair of them, a mischievous smile lurking behind her outwardly innocent one. It was the dimple, Giles decided. That was not a harmless dimple no matter how one looked at it.

"Looking good, boys," she said cheerfully, and then once they'd mumbled their thanks, added, "Helios, you have lipstick on your teeth."

"Oh, d-do I?" Helios rushed to the mirror to check.

Ginia fixed her attention on Giles and set her hands on her hips; Giles forced himself not to slump under her critical gaze (or notice how incredibly appealing—no, he was not going there).

"And you don't even have any lipstick to get on your teeth." The smile was edging toward a grin. "Shame on you, Giles. You've already put on the dress—why stop halfway?"

"It's because you can't make a silk purse out of a—a sow's ear," Giles replied, attempting to sound dignified. It was a hopeless cause and they all knew it.

"You're already a silk purse," Ginia told him with far more loyalty than truth, he thought, and kissed him on the cheek. "Do it for me and Grune?"

"For b-both of you?" he asked, somewhat surprised. Was she being serious? It wasn't because she was hiding a camera in her suit pocket, was it?

Another knock, farther away; Adele called, "I have it!"

"For both of us," Ginia said firmly.

A sudden burst of laughter, stifled, followed by apologies. Yet again, Giles sighed.

"I s-suppose that means Link is here." He looked back at Ginia. "And that I have, um, no choice. Helios, might I have the lipstick when you're done?"

"Oh, ah—I've been done for a while," the other man answered, looking a bit awkward. No doubt he had been feeling something of a third wheel.

Ginia shook her head. "Oh no, that's entirely the wrong shade. Come on—we're matching that dress." She headed for the door and opened it.

"I s-still don't see the p-point—oh."

Outside the bedroom door was Adele (who made a startlingly good man), as well as Link. The boy had been just on the verge of knocking . . . and he was wearing a flowy green sundress and a bright red blush.

"H-Hello, Link," Giles said tiredly.

Link sounded sheepish, but—more importantly—didn't sound as if he were laughing when he answered, "Hi Giles. Hi Ginia."

"Hello, Link." Helios came to the door. "That's, um, a nice dress."

"Thanks. It's good enough for the pageant, right?"

"It is, petit, and I'm sorry for laughing," Adele assured him. (Honestly, how did she manage to make herself look so masculine?) "You simply surprised me, that is all."

"It's perfect—you just need a little makeup," Ginia agreed. "Adele, will you help him while I take Giles in hand?"

"You do remember the pageant begins in less than an hour, yes?" Adele asked dryly.

Ginia smirked, and Giles found himself simultaneously mortified and entranced. "I'll keep that in mind."

Giles had just enough time to make a desperate check of Link's expression—went straight over his head, good—before Ginia tugged him into the bathroom and closed the door behind him.

*

It was every bit as humiliating of an affair as he'd expected—more so when he discovered he not only needed to go onstage in front of half the village, but to come up with an "appeal" as well. His had largely consisted of standing stiffly in place until, from the sidelines, Ginia had verbally nudged him into singing a few bars of—oh lord, he couldn't even remember now. It had been awful, that was all he was certain of.

. . . Well, he was certain of Grune's delight at the end, too. She had been theoretically dressed as a man, just like Ginia and Adele . . . but even if she had remembered to remove her veil and makeup, it would have taken a great deal of work that was probably beyond her to conceal a figure like hers.

But she had hugged him and thanked him and the others in turn for coming and had been so unreservedly happy that it had taken a good deal of the sting out of the evening. He hadn't minded so much, then—although he had still gotten changed out of those clothes as quickly as possible.

And . . . later that night with Ginia still dressed in her suit? That had removed the remainder of the sting. Very . . . very nicely indeed.







Backstage, it was somewhat comforting to see exactly how many others were holding themselves in the same stiff, miserable way. Most of the participants were trying not to move so as not to attract attention and were avoiding the eyes of all present. It seemed he was far from being the only one here against his will.

A tall figure stepped behind the curtain; automatically, Giles glanced their way.

And then the first true smile of the evening appeared on his face, because it was Dhaos.

Dhaos, who was wearing the largest ballgown Giles had ever seen, careful makeup that could only be courtesy of Grune, and a scowl that could vaporise a metropolis from sixty miles' distance.

By the time the other man's gaze had reached him, a perfectly innocent expression was on Giles' face. Dhaos' scowl managed to deepen anyway, but he said nothing and so neither did Giles.

Well, then. It seemed there truly was a silver lining to any cloud.