Rooftops At Sunrise

24

[Content warning for: gender dysphoria.]

"What the hell did you two even do?" Lucas groans, over his pop music that he has put on again, whilst having tasked himself with driving the two young adults out of the field and back into a city, where he hopes they will be able to find a place for them to shower and properly dry off. "I fall asleep under your orders, because it's supposedly going to make you feel safer, and you come back drenched from head to toe—do you want to catch a cold?"

"Come on," Damian sighs. "It's not that bad. We probably won't—"

"You should take them off," Lucas suggests. "Just to be sure. Then, wrap yourself up in a blanket."

"Huh?"

Lucas raises a brow at him, then stares at the pair once more in his rearview mirror. "I mean, I would have told you to change instead, but your other clothes either need to be dried off, too, or washed. I promise we'll find a laundromat for you two soon, though. That's the next thing on my list!"

"Okay, I'm sold." Aoi starts stripping, without any concern whatsoever for the world surrounding her.

When Damian catches onto what she is doing, he jumps away from her as if she is water, and he, fire. "Aoi!" his voice cracks. He covers his eyes with his palms. "What are you doing? T-that's— W-we're still—"

Aoi pauses with her long sleeved shirt halfway off her stomach. She spares him a glance, then raises a brow. "Uh, I'm making sure I won't get sick, like Lucas suggested? Why are you making such a big deal out of this?" She motions to her bare waist. "It's just skin. Have you not seen a naked human before?"

Damian's breaths hitch. He holds out a hand before his chest. "I—" Before he can even utter his reply, however, Aoi is already in her underwear, and making for the blanket that will supposedly keep her warm until they arrive at the next twenty-four hour gym, whose location Lucas has apparently looked up, minutes ago.

"Okay..." Damian frowns. His neck recoils back between his shoulders.

Granted, Aoi is now wrapped inside one of the blankets from his apartment that he has lent her, so there isn't much of her almost-bare body to see. But still... the young man thinks, I'm too uncomfortable to even take my shirt off. "How does this not bother you?" he finds himself asking her the question before he has much time to think the words through.

Aoi lets out a chuckle, then, a huff. She turns her attention, briefly, to where Lucas is bobbing his head up and down as he sings along and hums to yet another, corny love song. Honestly, Aoi thinks, as she cringes, why does he have the same taste in music as every sixteen-year-old girl Aoi has ever met in school?

Once the young woman deduces their elated driver will likely not hear any of the words she is about to say, Aoi shuffles closer to Damian, who pretends that he is not blushing one bit; then, she whispers beside his ear, "Literally, Damian, I've had too many people see me naked in a non-sexual setting for this to affect me anymore. All those electrocardiograms... pelvic exams... and how do you think a colonoscopy works? It's a whole team! Not just one doctor. I can't go back to being prude after that. It seriously marked me for life." She wishes she were joking, but Aoi wonders, sometimes, if her body is still hers.

Damian gulps. He averts his gaze from hers and avoids all eye contact. "I'm so sorry," he does not know why he feels such a strong need to apologize, but the urge is there, and it will not leave him be until he says it again. "Sorry, Aoi. Sorry, that... sucks."

"Whatever," she sighs, then pulls away from him. "It was a necessary evil."

Although Damian cannot see it—since he is looking away, too—Aoi also refuses to meet his gaze. "You should probably take off your clothes, too, dude," she tells him again. "At least, your shirt and jacket. Seriously, if you get sick for the rest of our trip, you can kiss goodbye to those aliens of yours."