Author's note: Don't ever ask me to write an emotional thing from Renji's POV because I will not be able to take it seriously at all I'll probably revise this or something later Cover Me is going to update in a few days posts this really quick and runs away okay bYE

The worst part isn't that you found out, since that was bound to happen sooner or later. You're perceptive and nosy, and you always butt in on my thoughts even when it would be easier to leave them the hell alone. To be honest those are probably some of my favorite qualities of yours, but it doesn't make them less obnoxious.

It wasn't that I don't feel like I can even fully explain it to you yet. All the ways I try to sum my feelings up seem wrong, the words I need don't exist. I barely even understand myself half the time, how can I be expected to lay it all down on a map for someone else? I don't know. But I can try.

When Rukia and I were little kids, adult supervision was out of the question. Your childhood was the same, you know how it is when you have to band together with the other orphans just to stay alive. We made our own rules, learning to survive and thrive without parents. One thing you can at least say about growing up without an adult around is that it makes you a really good liar later on. A mom and a dad are supposed to love you for who you are, no matter who that is. Without parents, you have to learn to trick people into liking you.

Anyway, yeah when we were dumb little kids we got bored the way dumb little kids do and we'd play games. Anything we could make up our own rules to and didn't involve toys we couldn't afford or steal. I have a vivid memory of our little group splitting into boys and girls for a game that involved teams, and me being extremely distressed because I wanted to be on the girl team with Rukia. I tried to explain to my friends that it wasn't that I didn't like the boys' team anymore, since I was just fine playing with them yesterday, just today I wanted to play with Rukia and if she was on the girls' team than that's where I'd go, too. There wasn't really a reason to. I just wanted to.

I didn't really notice I started feeling like this more and more until the feeling started extending to everything. I didn't hit puberty so much as it hit me, at full force like the shakkaho of Mother Nature aimed directly at my face. Seriously, it was like one minute I was a shrimp and the next I had tripled in size. And as completely confusing and weird as that was by itself, it was nothing compared to the confusion and weirdness I got from interacting with other people my own age. Sometimes I'd hang out with other guys and legitimately enjoy the time spent. I could talk to them about stuff I couldn't really discuss with Rukia. Or any girl, really. Ever.

Other times I felt disconnected from my male peers. I could talk about the same things but the motivation and interest behind those conversations had decreased substantially. Overnight, I had lost the ability to relate to my friends the same way I had done just the previous day. I was just sharing the same space as them, feeling frustrated and indignant that things weren't the same when nothing about anyone else had changed. I felt like I had been cheated out of the capacity to participate in the strange ritual of male bonding, a forum that had once been so easy for me.

But the next day everything was back to normal. My power to communicate and enjoy the company of other guys rose from its ashes like a phoenix and I would pass the previous experience off as an abnormal social funk until the cycle would begin all over again. For years this went on, like a bad cold that would come back just as soon as I thought I had shaken it off. It wasn't debilitating and sometimes it wasn't even noticeable, depending on how many other things I had to occupy myself at the time, but it was always there, creeping around at the back of my mind.

There were a lot of things I like about being a guy, especially in the Shinigami Academy when they started coming in handy. I liked the power, the way that being aggressive and dominant was an expectation. My teachers and school staff never exactly approved when I got into fights or acted crass and stupid with the other teenaged boys, but it was anticipated and therefore tolerable.

Some things I didn't like so much, though. The more I realized that being aggressive and dominant was an expectation the more began to realize, hey- this is an expectation. I didn't like the idea that my behavior was centered around my gender. I didn't like the idea that by acting like myself I was somehow filling a quota, and if for whatever reason I acted differently this suddenly meant that I had failed.

At that point I did my best to throw myself in to training for as long as I could, because the more I stopped to think, the more questions I couldn't stop asking myself; why was I uncomfortable with the idea of accepting my gender as a factor in my identity? Was it because sometimes I couldn't relate to other people of my gender? Why was I suddenly afraid that I wasn't passing the requirements to be a guy?

And women- women like Rukia and Momo and a good chunk of my teachers at the academy, they were strong, smart, and graceful, yet it was weird when I got along better with them? Why was it that sometimes I could relate to my female friends better than my male ones?

Eventually I just accepted that I was abnormally good with women. The more I hung out with them, the more popular with them I got. They liked the way I looked and how I could talk to them about things they didn't feel like discussing with other guys. As an added bonus, my friends praised me for my ability to talk to girls, something that most guys my age compared to high-level kidou or dark magic.

What happened next was almost like denial, if you can define denial as complete misinterpretation for the purpose of being socially acceptable. It was exciting to be admired for something that came so naturally, or at least as exciting as something is allowed to be when you're pretending to be casual about it to look cool. Even on days when I didn't feel like I fully understood them anymore, guys wanted my company in hopes I would be a wingman for them. Girls liked me, and even grew to accept that I showed no signs of making romantic advantages on them ever. There were no downsides and everything was beautiful.

And yet something was still off. Being able to talk to girls was fine, and even being friends with them was good, but the moment I showed similar interests as women people gave me suspicious looks. I started getting jealous that girls could care about clothes, like it wasn't allowed for me to do the same. Getting into fights appeared more pointless when I realized that nobody thought it was harmless when girls did it. Worst was when I started envying them for how much attention the guys gave them, and at that point I forced myself to stop thinking like that. I think I finally cognitively accepted that something was different about me when I caught myself wishing that I wasn't so good at fighting so people wouldn't think it was weird for me to do girl stuff.

Now, let's skip ahead to the present, past all the stuff with Rukia's adoption into the Kuchiki Clan, my promotion into the Sixth Division, yadda yadda yadda. All this with constant cycling of my emotional availability between genders, kept as my carefully guarded dirty little secret. Sometimes I would fake it, for fear that if I just allowed myself to act naturally somebody would notice that I had lost my feeling of masculinity.

The hardest it ever got was after I started dating you. Before, I could always divide things into clear-cut boxes of male vs. female, and could react accordingly based on which box they were in. Our relationship blurred the line, wrecked the gender roles that I had carefully constructed in my mind to keep me in complete control over myself. I liked being held by you, that you took care of me when I was sick. I liked that I could do girly stuff like cuddle with you and you didn't think it was weird. But I was scared that I liked it.

It got harder and harder for me to fake feeling like a man on days when I didn't at all, eventually to the point where you caught on. You're a real piece of work, you know that? You and your goddamn flowers and the world-shattering relief that you weren't rejecting me, and the realization that you were the only person I trusted enough to tell the truth. Because as frustrating as it was have a gender that changed beyond my control, the worst part was that nobody knew, nobody even suspected. Because that's the world we have, isn't it? You're male, assumed man until forever. People can know your sex and suddenly they think they know all kinds of things about you, and you don't really know how to explain that they're wrong.

I gave in. I gave in to your stupid caring and acceptance and when I woke up to you braiding those fucking flowers in my hair I finally realized how destroyed I was inside.

And then, everything just came pouring out. All the bitterness and resentment and discomfort that I had been suppressing just came spewing forth from the depths of my repressed emotions in an exploding volcano of a rant. By some miracle you managed to sit there quietly and just listen for me to complain about how some days I didn't feel like I was a man and how much I hated feeling like I don't fit in my own body. I didn't care how stupid it sounded, me throwing a tantrum like a little kid, bemoaning that it wasn't fair. Like a little kid stomping my fists and whining that it's never the way I want it. No one else has to feel this way. No one else even understands.

Even you didn't really understand. But you accepted. And you hugged me while I grit my teeth and cursed into your shoulder as if that made a difference. You were there for me and that was enough.

Every morning since then, the first thing you say to me is ask if it's a guy day or a girl day. You don't have to do that, you know. Not all the time, but you do and I hate the little flutter of hope I get when you do because you're spoiling me. If you keep this up then soon enough I'm going to expect everyone to treat me the same, and I'm just going to end up disappointed when they don't.

Sometimes I feel really shitty that I'm like this, with all these issues, not for me but for you. It's like I have a ton of baggage and now you're obligated to help me carry it all. You must just have some terrible luck. If you're unlucky, maybe that explains what happened last week, and why I did what I did.

You were assigned to a mission in the human world. Short, perfectly routine, as any work expected of you is. Doesn't mean I didn't worry about you, you know? Is that how you always feel when I'm away? Because that's a really awful feeling. Wow. Anyway, you came back in once piece, for which I was grateful. You brought back a souvenir, too.

A rectangular, brown paper package you kept tucked under one arm like you had been entrusted with the key to Soul Society. You wouldn't tell anyone what it was, driving everyone crazy with your stupid cop-outs. I don't care how funny you think you are, no one ever wants to hear "the entrails of my latest victim" as an answer.

So I was a little surprised when I go home by myself and I find a suspiciously familiar package planted under the covers of my futon. I have a memory seared into my mind of me saying out loud to myself that if this was supposed to be a weird lesson to get me to lock my doors I was going to be eight different kinds of pissed at you.

In retrospect, it was really sweet. I guess I never got to tell you that, but at the time my brain didn't seem to comprehend the thought. I opened the package and suddenly I understood nothing. It's so strange, sometimes everything I do seems like nothing but feelings, and suddenly I was overtaken by this bizarre emotional deadening as I turned the dress over my hands.

I didn't even know they made sundresses in that size, particularly ones of smooth white cotton with a black floral pattern going around the hemline. I didn't know what suddenly made you decide to buy this for me or what you thought my reaction was going to be. I don't claim to know anything except I had to try on that sundress at that moment and no force in life or the following could have stopped me.

Maybe I should have waited though. I don't know what for- you, to keep me calm for when things inevitably went to dodge. Myself to get to a less uncontrollably emotional place, maybe? Whatever sign I should have waited for, I didn't. I wanted to wear the motherfucking dress. I was going to wear the motherfucking dress.

At some point, I became aware of the feeling of my chest being constricted, followed by an awareness of oppressing, claustrophobic panic welling inside me as I started to realize there wasn't enough fabric to stretch across my body. But I squeezed myself into the dress anyways, perhaps out of stupidity. Or maybe spite. No one could tell me not to wear a dress. Not society, not fear, not even myself. For one shining minute I was master of my own destiny.

It all would have gone perfectly if it were a size or some bigger. But no, fate conspired against me, for reasons I don't fully understand. Maybe in an alternate universe things turned out differently, and the zipper didn't get stuck because I was too big for this one stupid dress, and I didn't spend ten minutes struggling with the zipper and I didn't pull so hard that I ripped the back of the dress, but I guess I'll never know.

At that point, I'd had enough. I had enough of things I can't control stomping on me and trampling my feelings, leaving me vengeful with nothing blamable to take it out on. I had enough of not feeling like I don't fit in boxes- or clothes, for that matter! I had enough of being uncomfortable. I just snapped, and through what I can only describe as a complete mental breakdown the dress came off my body and became a wrecked pile of torn up strips of fabric.

I cleaned up the destroyed swatches of fabric the way you might clean up a murder site. I stuffed the remains of the dress into the brown packaging and, after checking to see that no one was in the hall, stuffed it down the garbage shoot of the Sixth Division living quarters. Like that just erased it from existing or something. Like I didn't have red marks on my shoulder from where the fabric bit into my skin. I'm not proud it happened, but it did.

I never told you what happened to the dress. I think you knew, anyways. Maybe it was just my imagination, but you seemed to bear an especially striking resemblance to a kicked puppy dog during the past few days. In stories and films, the murderer is always being followed by some reminder of their crimes, even if the reminder is all in their heads. Their guilt plays games with their mind, never letting them forget their misdeeds. Maybe you never even noticed the dress vanished. Maybe you're still waiting for me to wear it on a special occasion and tell you how grateful I am that you can accept the parts of me that I'm still struggling to deal with myself.

I reach the point where I finally can't stand it anymore. You look at me in surprise as I clutch a fistful of your uniform, maybe as an anchor or something. I want to say something profound, but the words don't make it from my brain to my mouth. All that comes out is me, in a voice that sounds like I'm begging. "How can you know?"

You blink, startled, looking at me. You bring your hand to mine and your skin is cool to the touch, and it grounds me. "Know what?"

"Who you are. What you are. Anything! How can everyone be so sure of themselves and I can't?"

You consider that for a moment, looking off for a minute like the answer is just going to come to you. If it were that easy, it would have worked for me a while ago. "Maybe they aren't. I don't think anyone is sure of themselves, really."

I take that in, feeling no less confused. "Then is this all in my head?"

You look back at me, eyes wide like you had never even considered the thought. "Do you think what you feel is real?"

"Yes. I mean I think so. It's the only thing that's felt like it fits."

"Then no, I don't think it's in your head." You say firmly, using a voice you might use if you were stating fact. "You're Abarai Renji, and you're a person. If you don't always feel like you're the same gender as you were before, that's just a part of being Renji, isn't it?"

Maybe it is. It doesn't make it easier, though.

"The dress was too small. I ripped it, so I threw it away. I'm sorry."

"Did you like it?"

"I loved it."

"I'm sorry it was the wrong size."

I kind of wish the dress had worked though, not that it fit but that it had worked. Like if I could just dress differently, that would be enough to turn me into this completely different person and suddenly I would never feel uncomfortable about the things I hate about my body again. Maybe it's better that I didn't fit though, that I couldn't delude myself into thinking that was the magic answer. It didn't make me accept myself. You did that.

That's kind of a weird epiphany to have. If I ever finally end up explaining my situation to people, they may eventually ask me "so at what point did you stop thinking that you were maybe a huge mistake" I'm going to have to sit there and explain that, just like my how body didn't always reflect the person I was on the inside, my clothes didn't necessarily reflect that either. And they'll say "But you did start dressing differently on your femme days, right? When you finally balled up and actually bought some women's clothes so your boyfriend wouldn't keep wasting all his money on stuff that didn't fit you." and I have to tell them yeah but you're missing the point it was never really about the clothes try to keep with the program, goddammit.

I want to promise you that this means I've accepted all my sums as a whole. That I'm comfortable with my gender and the way it shifts like water flowing through my hands, but part of me is still stuck on the fact that there are going to be some circumstances where hope and acceptance aren't going to make me feel less isolated from the rest of the world. I'm my own little island, cut off from the rest of civilization by an ocean full of resentment and confusion and fear.

But as long as I have people like you who are willing to build a bridge all the way over that ocean from my island to yours, the waters don't seem as deep or stretch on forever. And knowing that at least I'm not a little dot of an island left to combat the forces of the ocean alone, that bridge gives me a feeling that's at least a little like hope.