6/3/2012

Just so you know, "straight" or "het" isn't really my bag, but I got a particularity poignant plea from a reader to write Hiroki genderbent. I am always up for a challenge and also was curious if I could write this piece and keep him in character as a her. One of my critiques of so many genderbent fics and the reason I stay away from them is the way in which writers often tweak the characters when the characters become women. It's generally not flattering and unfortunately reveals a great deal about how writers and culture in general stereotypes the female gender.

*steps down off of soap box... *

Anyway, here's my attempt at the genderbending you enjoy it. Also, rest assured that after this I'll be going "straight" back into yaoi. Heh.

Disclaimer: I do not own Junjou Romantica or any of its characters

This fic was for FF's yaoifangirl4ever and her ill friend. Hope that this passes your time while you are ill, sending good thoughts and healing energy your way.

So the specs of this piece… (1) genderbender- Hiroki is a girl (2) takes place in high school (3) Hiroki is upset about Akihiko and Takahiro (4) Enter Nowaki –

Note: Nowaki will be fifteen, Misaki and Shinobu are thirteen, Akihiko, Takahiro, Hiroki are sixteen and Miyagi is eighteen. Otherwise Hiroki would be sixteen and Nowaki would be twelve, Akihiko sixteen and Misaki six and I won't even get into Miyagi and Shinobu...

So the first chapter is a bit rough, but I promise it gets better it you'll hang in through the second chapter. Most all the main couple characters will make an appearance here in some form and there are many canon elements for those of you who like that sort of thing.

Teen Hiroki

Chapter One: Park Bench

Hiroki sat on the park bench dejectedly swinging her feet. She studied her shoes, hoping that focusing on the panda ornaments she'd attached earlier to her laces might distract her enough to keep the tears at bay.

Today was supposed to have been such a wonderful day. She had started out with such high hopes.

Stupid Akihiko and that idiot Takahiro.

Hiroki's brow furrowed and she tried to rub it away. Her mother always told her she'd end up a wrinkled old lady before she was twenty if she didn't stop frowning. Her grandmother, (Her father's mother) the grand-dame Kamijou, a very severe and stylish woman who already did not approve of her unruly ways, had recently offered to buy Hiroki botox injections for her sixteenth birthday (just passed) to assure the unworried countenance more becoming a lady.

An angry tears welled up in Hiroki's eyes and one escaped. With her head bowed as it was, the drop fell straight down, staining the sleeve of the light jacket she wore over her school uniform. Hiroki sniffed.

She hated Takahashi Takahiro.

Why did he have to come and mess everything up? Aki was my friend first.

The memory of when she'd first met Akihiko flashed in Hiroki's mind. It had happened at her secret place in the wild space between the two families' estates. He, of the strange silver hair and arresting amethyst eyes, had been the first person she had ever met who didn't point out to her right away that "Hiroki" was a boy's name.

Told by a soothsayer when she'd finally conceived that her first and only child was supposed to be a boy and that Hiroki was the name that would be most blessed, Hiroki's mother had held to the woman's words. The aunties always laughed at family gatherings, telling Hiroki how, even after she was born, her mother stuck to the name and almost seemed, the first few months, to expect her daughter to suddenly, like some late blooming seed, sprout the missing stem. The terrible embarrassment of having to hear this story over and over was just one of the reasons Hiroki didn't think the name was blessed at all; in fact she thought it was more of a curse.

Takahiro, of course like everyone else, when he'd first met her had pointed out the discrepancy of Hiroki's name. Not like he should talk, after all, the new boy had a younger brother named Misaki.

Which is a girl's name. Hiroki knew this because she had met him at the Takahashi funeral.

Recalling this, she suddenly felt bad. Hiroki knew that she shouldn't be harboring such ill thoughts against someone who'd so recently suffered such a terrible loss. Still, the moment that Takahashi Takahiro had shown up, her world had suddenly turned upside down.

At first Hiroki had thought Akihiko liked the new boy because he was so completely "average." For some reason her lbest friend had been obsessed with "normal, average families," for as long as she could remember.

Probably because his own is so messed up.

Because of this, until recently, Usami Akihiko, Hiroki's "best friend," had spent more time at her house than his own. Her mother, in fact had all but adopted the youngest Usami and there were times Hiroki was sure that her mother liked Akihiko better than her. Lately, however, Akihiko had been noticably absent from the Kamijou home, spending all his time trailing the boring, normal, Takahiro around.

The only reason that Takahashi had even been allowed into their elite academy was because some aunt had left the family a little bit of money and the middle class Takahashi's had thought the best investment of it was their sons' education. Now that both Takahiro's parents had been killed in a terrible automobile accident. The Academy, out of sympathy for his loss had decided to let him stay at the school on a hardship scholarship through graduation.

Hiroki knew she was being terrible, but seriously she wished the school had just kicked him out. Since the tragedy, Akihiko had been even more devoted to the four-eyed simpleton than ever and after what she'd seen today, she knew Akihiko's interest Takahiro was far more complex than she'd originally thought.

Thank you for reading.