Seven’s expression was drawn flat, and no color came to his cheeks as Victor’s palms pushed warmth on his thighs through the thin fabric. He thought to pull away in protest, to wipe that smirk from those pink lips with harsh words - but his heart would not allow him to be so cold. Instead, he followed after Victor in silence for a few strides. Even the experience of walking in the dress was foreign; he felt naked, little but the stale air in the shop and a hint of fabric touched his thighs as he moved – where there should have been the comforting wrap of trousers there was nothing. Crimson eyes grew narrow, starving Victor of those gorgeous irises before cutting him off completely when he turned on his heel and the face turned to feathered white hair. Attempting to push discomfort from the front of his mind, Seven gathered a collared shirt as blue as a midsummer sky from a nearby rack into his arms as Victor cheerfully planned out their day. It wouldn’t be long before Victor had noticed that Seven was no longer trailing him and as his vapid gaze focused on the shirt suitable for a young man that he cradled in his pale arms, he felt the familiar warmth of a body at his back.
When Victor closed in, Seven’s ear met those grinning lips that dared him to finish the day in the dress. The dress he only donned on a whim in a dressing room game the other had started; a game that had gone sour before it even began. Pink flared on his cheeks and his chest rose in a deep breath before he broke the contact and turned to face the teasing countenance. “Why are you doing this?” The question was accompanied by a free hand that reached up to fuss with the dark lining of Victor’s linen jacket. Then, the inquiry morphed into hurt accusation: “You kiss me only in the darkness of my room and dress me like a woman.”
“I’m a man,” Seven swallowed; the statement was absurd coming from a boy impersonating the likeness of a Konti whore, and he seemed to be convincing himself as much as Victor he took a step closer to narrow the gap between them. He cleared his throat, splayed white fingers now pressing his heat against Victor’s pinstriped chest. “And I like you; I like you a lot. Enough to wear this ridiculous thing outside for you but I need to know one thing,” his voice cracked, and digits twitched, feeling around the rim of a button before dipping momentarily between the folds of the crisp linen shirt to touch the skin beneath. Seven’s eyes narrowed again, boring holes into those that stared back at him, infinitely darker. “Will you have me as a man, or will you hide me in skirts and the blackness of the citadel?”
Seven would never admit that he would comply with Victor’s requests regardless of the outcome of his answer; his adoration for the man he had nursed back to health bordered on obsession. It was all he could do not to give in to Victor’s whims without questioning them first. Seven longed for that curious hand on his face; Victor had fussed and obsessed so many times in their dark world with the soft skin of Seven’s lips, his cheeks, and the subtle curve where his chin meets his neck. Exhaling, he resisted the urge to lean forward and close the small gap of air and clothing that still separated them and looked up at Victor again beneath heavy white lids with a hopeful, but thin smile.
“Prove to me that you accept me as I am, and I’ll wear whatever you want me to wear.” The smile grew as he searched Victor’s face for a modicum of sincerity, praying he would find more than manipulative charm in his response. Then the demand turned desperate as Victor got his flushing prize: Seven’s cheeks attracted enough burning red to match his flickering irises and his lips moved in a breathless murmur. “Please.”