Reinventing Jean Vicquemare - httpsawesome (2024)

There’s something about Jean that no one knows. Not even his former partner Can-Opener, Possibly-Psychic, Sticks-His-Nose-In-Everyone’s-Business sh*tkid knows about this. Which is a f*cking goddamn miracle because if he let slip even a hint of something like this existing then Harry would have chased it like a bloodhound and Jean would have had to kill him. And then himself.

But no. Thankfully not a single person besides himself knows that he likes to wear women’s clothing to destress.

At most they know that he has a blonde wig. He was able to play it off as a joke, an impersonation of Bevy, haha. It didn’t remind him of Guillaume at all when he got it and if he’s being honest with himself, he doesn’t like wearing it as much now that the comparison has been drawn. He still does, when needed, an indulgence that he dips into very rarely.

There is a single dresser drawer in his bedroom dedicated to his feminine things. He doesn’t collect things like Harry, and there’s no reason to have a real variety since he’s never going to wear them out. So it’s just enough.

JEAN’S SECRET CROSSDRESSING STACHE:

1. A single tube of lipstick. Bright red.
2. A single container of cheap, drugstore perfume. Tropical scented.
3. A pair of strappy black kitten heels.
4. The previously mentioned blonde Bevy wig.
5. One pair of dark stockings. No garters.
6. A black skirt. Plain, knee-length, made for comfortability rather than style.
7. A red co*cktail dress with spaghetti straps. The neckline is shockingly, brazenly low, and it is incredibly tight in the chest. Helpful in giving the impression of breasts. There is a slit that starts around the waist so that even though it is knee-length when he wears it an entire leg is exposed along with some of his ass.

That’s it. Seven secrets that, if everything goes to plan, will go to the grave with him. Or be discovered after he dies, either self-inflicted or in the line of duty. Whoever is the sorry bastard that will have to go back to his place to collect his belongings is sure to get a surprise and they can either believe he had a secret girlfriend and go on a wild goose chase to find her, or they can carve fa*ggot onto his headstone. He doesn’t care, he’s dead.

The kicker to keeping it under wraps is never, ever, ever having anyone over to his place. He does not host get-togethers. If a party is getting good he does not volunteer that it gets moved back to his home. He does not open it up to guests who need a place to crash, even for a night.

The risk is just too high.

Thankfully Harry never f*cking cared to see his place. If Jean let on that it was off-limits then he would have been more interested and would have barged in. Tore the place up just to see what Jean was hiding. But he never let on the importance. And Harry was too wrapped up in his own bullsh*t to care.

But now he’s not. It’s been five months since Martinaise. Five months of Sober Harry. Currently his record. And he doesn’t really show signs of stopping. Not now that he has a better partner. Apparently that was all he needed - replace Jean with someone more patient, more competent, someone just overall better at being a man than Jean could ever be.

Figures it's when Harry is at his least messiest that Jean f*cks up the one thing in his life he had a lid on.

Really it wasn’t that unusual of a day. Drunk, high, and suicidal. Happens a few times a year. Except for some f*cking reason he was interrupted from staring down the barrel of his gun by a knock at the door.

It reverberates in his head. He’s swimming in a dark, cold ocean and there’s knocking. It’s completely black. Where would knocking come from in the ocean? It’s the hammering of his own heart. Trying to escape. Trying to dodge out of the way of the bullet. The shark?

The metaphor got away from him. Give him a break, he’s plastered.

“Go’way!” He slurs loud enough that his neighbors possibly hear. He had to be loud to break through the surface of the water.

He expects. . . actually he isn’t sure what to expect. It could have been Torsen, they could have sent him expecting Jean to put up a fight and they needed someone strong enough to put Jean on his ass. It could have been Judit coming here on her own free will, the only person Jean thinks would be slightly worse off if he blew his own head off. Could be sh*tkid wanting to take one last thing from him before going back to his new, better partner and never looking back.

There is more knocking. “Khm. Officer? Is everything okay?”

The voice is the most shocking of them all.

He’s back in the ocean but it’s not completely black anymore. There’s just enough light to make out an incomprehensibly large shape swimming by him. Following him in circles. Watching. Waiting.

It’s weird to be the one being watched now. Because if he’s being honest with himself (and he can only lie to himself about so much, he has to be honest about some things) he’s been watching the lieutenant frequently. Whenever he feels like he is unlikely to get caught. And, like a f*cking idiot, in moments that are riskier than that.

Kitsuragi has to have noticed. He just hasn’t said anything.

That’s why he’s imagining that he’s here, now, at his front door. A final nudge towards the inevitable. So he can hear Kitsuragi tell him that he’s being weird, stop watching my every move, I’m better at damn near everything than you, except perhaps for my eyesight.

There is another round of knocking, louder, almost at a pound. Then an attempt to open the door only to find it is locked. “Officer - Jean. Please let me inside, I would rather not use force.”

“f*ck. It’s not a dream?” He asks the air.

There is a moment of silence. “No.” Eventually comes through the door.

“f*ck. sh*t f*ck.” Jean drops his hand with the gun but doesn’t loosen his grip. He stumbles to the door. But not before falling on the floor first. “f*ck! Dammit.”

“Jean?” A concerned voice floats closer to him now. The shape is ever so much closer, still watching.

“I’m fine.” He did not realize that he was holding a beer bottle in his other hand. It has spilled all over himself and the floor. Perfect.

Eventually he is able to unlock the door. He doesn’t open it, instead turning around and stumbling back to the couch. He hears the door gently open and close as he plants himself facedown on the cushion, the empty bottle pressed between himself and the couch, and the gun hanging lazily off to the side.

He can hear Kitsuragi’s footsteps very decidedly approach him, louder than they really ought to be, and it took until Kitsuragi was gently prying his fingers off of the gun that it was on purpose. Him making his movements known so it will be less likely to startle Jean.

Like a bear in the woods and how you’re supposed to make yourself super big to intimidate it. Except he’s a city boy and hasn’t encountered a bear in the woods so it could be all crap.

He relinquishes the weapon. He can hear the clip being emptied before it is holstered on Kitsuragi’s person.

Jean still hasn’t looked up from the couch. Maybe if he never looks up then he can pretend this never happened. That the newest member of the team, the f*cking coolest and the hottest didn’t just witness Jean at his worst. When he’s supposed to be the competent one to Harry.

“Is there anything else in the house that I should be aware of?”

It takes a second for Jean to understand the voice through all the water.

“No.” Words feel impossibly thick and hot, spilling out like tar. “I took it all already.”

There is a moment of tense hesitation. Eventually Jean can decipher that it’s because Kitsuragi is contemplating if he needs to call for an ambulance or maybe force Jean to vomit immediately.

“Nothing poisoned.” He eventually says. The words continue to pour out hot, heavy, and unpleasant. “Just my usual sh*t. The only thing gonna kill me is the gun.”

It’s not that comforting of a statement.

He doesn’t know how long he stays like that. He can hear movement around him - his apartment isn’t trashed by any standards, but it isn’t the cleanest either. It would be extra selfish of him to kill himself in an apartment full of dirty clothes and food that can spoil, but that’s just like him isn’t it? Selfish bastard.

He lets himself sink further into the inky blackness now that the shape is not actively watching him.

He shouldn’t have, because when he processes the words ‘I’ll go get you a change of clothes’ it’s too late for him to react.

He attempts to stand. He’s too far deep into the water and he’s attempting to breach the surface too quickly.

THE BENDS: Also known as Decompression Sickness. It can occur when undersea divers ascend too quickly then the compressed nitrogen in your lungs forms bubbles which can damage the inner muscle tissue. In a worst case scenario it can cause paralysis or death.

Jean doesn’t get the bends when he attempts to get up from the couch too quickly, but he does get incredibly dizzy. He falls to his feet again and has to take a second for the world to align.

From the living room he can hear Kitsuragi open one drawer and close it.

The room is still spinning at a nauseatingly intense pace. He is able to slowly rise to his feet when he hears the second drawer open and close.

There should be no reason that he needs to open the third drawer. Except for the fact that it’s been a long time since Jean has done any laundry, so the chances that the first two are empty are in fact very high.

He makes it to the doorway when he can see Kitsuragi open the last drawer.

“I have a wife!” Jean blurts out as soon as Kitsuragi closes it again. Like a gentleman, he has no interest in pawing through what he has just seen. He looked only enough to process what it was and that it was not what he was looking for. “I have a secret wife. Those are not my clothes.”

And maybe he would have believed that story if Jean hadn’t blurted it out immediately, or had looked red-faced at saying it. Maybe he could have played it off. But there is a sinking feeling in his gut that he very much did not.

“Apologies, Officer.” Is all he says. If Jean could see clearly he would have seen that his ears turned slightly pink. He moves to the closet and finds a clean sweater and dark pants. Too formal for lying around the house but the only option he has right now for a change of clothes.

“Do you feel up to a shower at this moment?”

“There is an approximately 80% chance I will drown.” Some of it isn’t even from how unsteady he is on his feet, some of it is coming from how he will deliberately try and drown in a centimeter of water if given the chance right now.

Kitsuragi nods. “I’m not a gambling man most of the time, so I think I will wait until it goes down to at least 40%”

It takes a while for Jean to be up to shower, but thankfully he is able to do it himself. They do not talk while Jean is sobering up, which just makes his anxiety run that much more wild which makes him sober up that much more quickly.

The sweater that was picked out is not one of his favorites. Yes, the color looks nice on him, but it clings to his muscles in a way that should be flattering but he never liked. It makes him so strong-looking, so broad, a complete rectangle with no curves to speak of. The pants are no better and they accentuate a straight posture.

Useful for formal RCM events and unwelcome when he’s supposed to be comfortable in his home. He’s not going to say anything though.

Kitsuragi is still there after he gets out of the shower.

He’s still there a few hours later. They start talking now that Jean is sober, less anxious and slightly less suicidal. Kim - he was told to call him Kim - had the idea to make them a meal. He took some of the meager ingredients that Jean had and somehow was able to waste it all and make something terrible.

“I guess I shouldn’t have even tried. I’ve never been much of a cook.” He sighs. “What is a place near here that delivers? I’ll pay.”

“f*ck, Kits - Kim. I’m not going to make you pay to feed me.”

“It’s the gentlemanly thing to do.” He shrugs but there’s an insistence to it.

It’s a very deliberate wording, Jean thinks. There’s something in that sentence that prickles the back of his mind. But he can’t figure out what.

He lets Kim pay for dinner.

Something greasy and comforting. Lots of delicious salt that is, in a way, more dangerous for his health than a gun.

They talk a lot that night. A lot less emotionally heavy topics than one might expect, and nothing at all about what Kim had seen in the dresser. But they talk mostly about easy things. Movies they like, music, books, some things they have in common and some they don’t.

Jean is surprised at how much they have in common. He’s also surprised at just how easily the conversation flows between them.

“I’m not a danger to myself anymore.” He eventually says, an hour or two after it has gotten dark. “You don’t have to stay.”

He hesitates.

A man of habit, he very much would like to finish the night in his own bed. Anyone could tell that. But he’s also not going to leave if Jean is really still in danger, even if that means f*cking up his back and sleeping on the beer-stained couch.

“You can take the gun if it makes you feel better.” Jean relents. “I’d like it back tomorrow, of course.”

“Right.” Kim stands up and stretches. Jean tries to not look at the sliver of skin that shows when his white undershirt rides up but he fails pretty pointedly. “Then I will see you tomorrow, Jean.”

There’s something in the way that he says goodbye. Like he’s leaving more because Jean brought it up in the first place. ‘I can take a hint, I don’t want to overstay my welcome’ hangs in the air but he doesn’t know how to insist that he’s not kicking Kim out. He just knows that he doesn’t want to stay. And that Jean kind of is kicking him out because he really, really doesn’t want to wear these stifling clothes anymore.

When he gets to the door he looks back for a single second. Less than that, actually. Hardly noteworthy in anyone else but Kim is a man whose every move is deliberate and planned, so a deviation even that small means something.

Whatever he was thinking of saying dies before it even reaches his teeth. He turns to leave.

As soon as the door clicks shut Jean strips right there in the living room. They are left in a heap with the other dirty clothes, even though they are definitely not dirty and could have been worn again. He falls asleep wearing the black skirt and nothing else.

They do not talk about this the next morning. Or the next week. Kim does not come by his home again.

Jean is mostly okay with that.

Like usual after his near death spirals, he gets in a better mood. Over the hump so-to-speak. He’s able to do his laundry, buy some groceries, cook a meal. A semblance of happy, which is the most he can ever hope for.

What he’s not okay with is the feeling of waiting for the shoe to drop. He knows what Kim saw. He knows his ‘I have a secret wife that no one knows about and she has one dresser drawer of clothes much too large for most women and I love her despite the fact that she couldn’t be the one there to pry the gun from my fingers’ was not believed.

So what? He’s just going to keep Jean’s secret? Not gossip about him while getting coffee? Not blackmail him into an exorbitant amount of money? Not kill him?

Kim wouldn’t ever do any of that sh*t, of course. He knows it. But he also doesn’t know what else to f*cking expect, frankly, so he just sits and waits for things to get worse. Things always get worse.

It’s over a week after the incident that anything else develops.

He’s on the balcony taking a smoke break. By himself, like he likes it. So of course it has to be ruined by Harry.

He saddles next to him, silently. Unnervingly silent considering how big, loud, and flamboyant of a man that he is.

Jean looks back and bites back a sneer. Barely. His canines still end up on display, but Harry doesn’t even look at him. Just staring off into the horizon, smoking his own cigarettes.

It’s a familiar scent but not as familiar as it used to be. Harry used to never buy his own, just steal from everyone around him which meant he was mostly stealing from Jean. But he’s not smoking the same kind this time, instead he’s creating a mixture of the pure tar aggression of Jean’s smoke and softer, chestnut smoke.

Of course sh*tkid can’t even choose his own cigarettes to smoke. Even when he’s buying his own, he’s buying the same f*cking kind as the person he’s admiring. Of course.

Jean wants to start a fight. He wants to punch him and get absolutely beat in return. He wants to strangle Harry with the stupid f*cking ugly tie and then get threatened to be pushed over the side of the balcony for it. He wants the risk of falling four stories directly on his neck to be real.

But Harry is not here for a fight. He’s not even here to talk.

Is this an attempt to mend the bridge between them? Is this a precursor to them, what, becoming friends?

He wouldn’t phrase it as ‘becoming friends again’ for the simple fact that the Harry he was ‘friends’ with is dead. At least for now.

f*ck. He shouldn’t think about it like that. Because then he’s falling into the trap that Harry is actually better, and he’s not going to relapse and erase all this progress again and leave him heartbroken again.

The man he was friends with is just. . . not here right now.

Jean did not realize he was standing there staring at Harry, still pointedly avoiding eye contact like Jean is an aggressive dog begging for an excuse to start a fight, until he saw a flash of orange in his peripheral vision.

Kim Lieutenant Kitsuragi, while they’re at work, had just placed a cup of steaming coffee on Jean’s desk. He suddenly looked up and, when their eyes connected and he knew Jean was watching him, he placed a silver tube deliberately under a piece of paper. Completely hidden from view of everyone. Then he returned to his own desk at a leisurely pace.

When their eyes locked he felt a hot stir in the pit of his stomach. Immediately he buried it in the deep hole alongside all the other emotions he refuses to examine or analyze.

He lets himself sit silently with Harry a few moments more, not because he wants to but because it would make him seem way too f*cking eager if he immediately booked it to his desk to see what was slipped his way. He has some pride after all.

(That’s a lie and he knows it.)

The casual walk he forces to get to his desk doesn’t f*cking feel very casual. Especially not with the tell-tale pricking at the back of his neck that makes him know he’s being watched.

FACT: He is not psychic. sh*tkid might be actually f*cking psychic, or the brain damage from the substance abuse is that extensive that it extends to everyone around him playing along with his ‘psychic abilities’ but Jean is not psychic. He cannot actually tell with any certainty if someone was watching him, he can only know that some part of him wants a very particular someone to be watching him. So he imagines the prickling feeling.

When he sits down at his desk he immediately takes a sip of the coffee (black, not his exact preference but he doesn’t mind) and slyly picks up the silver object, palming it, and moving that hand under the desk.

It is small enough to be completely hidden in his fist. It’s cool to the touch, smooth, and since he hasn’t really examined it in any detail it took until his thumb clicks it open that he can tell what it is.

It’s a tube of lipstick.

Shoe: dropped.

His first instinct is to get monumentally angry. Clearly he’s being f*cked with. The f*cking lieutenent is making his cards known, giving Jean a tube of lipstick at their place of work to play f*cking mind games. ‘I know what you are’ he’s saying. It doesn’t matter that it feels like a higher quality tube of lipstick, not the cheapest one available on the very bottom rack at Frittes! which was stored there for so long it could have been expired.

But, when he schools his face to be as neutral as he can be and glances over at Kitsuragi’s desk, he isn’t showcasing a knowing smirk. There’s no dark inclination hidden behind his glasses. No promise of hurt to come in the future.

Instead he is tilting his head slightly. Analyzing Jean’s reaction.

Trying to gauge if he has misstepped.

Jean has no idea what the f*ck is happening to him right now.

He looks down at his lap. Slowly and gently he unfurls the lipstick - a dark red. Slightly darker than wine, but unmistakably red. Different than the lipstick he has hidden away right now, which is the only shade he has ever experimented with. Just the one tube of cheap, bright as f*ck, almost neon red that he put in no consideration for how it would look on his skintone or eyes or any f*cking thing.

He can’t help but think, instantly, that this darker shade would look a lot better on him.

As quick as that thought permeated his brain, he clicked the lipstick closed and slipped it into his suit pocket.

He refused to look over at Kitsuragi. If he did he would have seen a very tiny, satisfied smirk cross over his face before being swiftly repressed.

It goes unmentioned for the rest of the day. Like almost every day, Jean stays late. There’s almost no point to doing so because no matter how much work he puts into the paperwork, the cold cases, the evidence filing, there is a new mountain of it to go through tomorrow. But it needs to be done, so he stays late.

He arrives home with more greasy takeout slightly after midnight.

Despite his exhaustion there is an insistent buzz underneath his skin. He forces himself to eat first, then shower, brush his teeth, everything he usually does before bed until finally he is left shirtless and in his boxer shorts staring at the steamy mirror with the new lipstick in hand.

He applies it before he can think too much about pesky implications.

It does look better than his typical color. The dark wine-red pops against his pale skin, but not only that, it fits with all of his features a lot more. Suddenly his long face feels like it is suited for something, somehow his cheekbones are subtly lifted and if he wasn’t such a sorry bastard he would say he was slightly easier to look at.

And he does. Look at himself. Even when dolled up he avoids mirrors more than is strictly necessary since spending too much time peering at his ugly mug makes him more depressed. But there’s something different about tonight. He can look for a long time before he starts to hyperfocus on the things that he doesn’t like.

The dark feeling in his chest is quieted for a moment, but comes back with a vengeance when he has to wipe it off so he can sleep.

He lovingly adds it to his bottom drawer before turning off all the lights and crawling into bed, covered head to toe by his comforter.

“Did she like it?” Kim Lieutenant Kitsuragi asked.

Sometimes he really wished that he hadn’t told him that he could call him ‘Kim’ while he was in his home. Now he wants to even at work, which is not professional at all and not good at maintaining a healthy boundary of authority and respect for his superior officer.

They are taking a smoke break together. It is at the end of the day, the sun is setting now, and everyone with healthy work-life balances is planning on leaving soon. This includes Kitsuragi tonight, even though he stays late some nights. Jean plans on getting back to work after his smoke break is done.

It is the next day. Kitsuragi couldn’t wait more than 24 hours to ask about the gift apparently.

“Khm?” They were not speaking before this. Jean had come out alone but it was only mere moments before Kitsuragi silently took to the other side. It was several minutes of silence before the question was asked to the night air.

He hopes that his hesitation comes off as him being stuck in his own mind and like he didn’t quite hear him but ever since he felt the presence by his side he has been hyper-aware of both of their bodies. His entire right side is filled with the similar buzzing sensation he felt before trying on the lipstick.

Kitsuragi gestured with the hand holding the cigarette. “Did she like it?” His voice is naturally soft-spoken, with only a hint of a rumble held deep within his chest.

Like everything else about him, the rumble is evidence of the superhuman control he exerts over all aspects of himself. Letting everyone know of the power he is capable of just beneath the surface, only letting out when he wants to let a little loose.

Jean coughs to bide time before he answers. What game is he playing at here? What answer does he want? Should he just say no? Should he make up a story about him giving it away to his secret wife, who he should probably name if he’s going to keep up with that stupid f*cking facade?

“Yes.” is all he eventually says.

He nods, takes a long drag of the cigarette and lets the ash fall over the side before he says something else. “I would like to see it.”

Jean coughs for real this time. Because he is not a pillar of control like Kitsuragi is, he cannot help that his face turns red, feeling that much warmer when he gives Jean a sideways glance full of concern and amusem*nt.

“I don’t have it with me.” He says once he’s calmed down. It has turned into a hushed whisper. He’s hoping it appears like the cough f*cked up his voice, a little, so he had to whisper. Not because he got a twinge of pure panic at them being overheard.

He knows from experience that anyone inside can’t hear what they’re talking about on the balcony. Unless they start yelling, which is unlikely to happen considering he is out here with Kitsuragi and not Harry. But still: he whispers.

What if he did bring it with him? Would he have put it on for him? Not out here on the balcony, even if he directly asked, but in the bathroom? Would he have done that?

“I assumed you didn’t, since it’s not yours to bring.” He says cooley. He’s just so cool. “It’s at home, with her other things.”

He cannot explain it but this conversation is causing his insides to feel like they are on fire. It’s like there’s an entire layer of Panic surrounding him, a voice living on his outer shell telling him to Shut This Down, stop all conversation on this topic NOW and get out of there. But the roaring heat below that is louder.

“If it is no intrusion,” he is not looking directly at Jean, just a side glance as his head is pointed forward. “I would like to see it. On her.”

“I er - “ He stutters out. Coughs, tries again. “Um. Uh.”

Kim’s face turns incredibly stony. If it wasn’t for the smile that broke through Jean would think that he found it embarrassing at how wordless this has left Jean. Instead, he is trying his damndest to not break into a fond smile.

f*ck this, he doesn’t deserve to see anything now. He should say no. Tell him to f*ck off.

“Sure.” He eventually says. “Yes. Absolutely, yes.”

“Tonight?” He finally turns to look squarely at Jean. He is still smiling, his eyes twinkling.

“Yeah. Tonight works. Yeah, yes.”

He takes one last drag out of his chestnut-scented cigarette. It made Jean realize he had neglected his own for most of the time he was out here. Kim smoked it until it was almost down to a stub but not quite. He is not the kind of guy to waste anything, not even a few puffs. Blame a childhood on receiving nothing but scraps and having to make do with that. But instead of savoring it he reaches out and adjusts Jean’s free hand so that it is delicately placed between his fingers instead and walks back inside.

When Jean smokes it to the very last drags it is still warm against his lips. An indirect kiss.

A hint at tonight’s promises?

Jean had taken to riding the train to work and often walking home, since he rarely catches it before it stops running for the night. Tonight he has found himself leaving the precinct at a normal departure time and in the backseat of Kim’s Kimeena.

He has no idea how to make himself comfortable back there. Instead he goes for trying to make himself as small as possible, laying one leg in front of the other and keeping his hands to himself.

It isn’t until he sees Kim look at him through the rearview mirror, ears turning pink and with another amused look on his face, that he realizes just how f*cking gay the position he chose looks.

He changes it so that his legs sit splayed out, arms crossing over his chest to enunciate its broadness. Making a real show of masculinity. Kim is not looking at him anymore and the amused look disappeared from his face.

He is unsure if he misses the look or the comfortability of the pose more.

Should they be talking? There’s a weird tension filling the compartment between them. But not necessarily bad. To be completely honest, Jean is too anxious to think of how to start the conversation. All he can think about is that he is going to his home with the specific purpose of dressing up while someone else is there. Someone else is going to see him dressed up.

The only time he has ever imagined a situation like this is when he dressed up while alone and then pictured someone from the precinct - Chester, Harry, f*ck sometimes Pryce - barging in and seeing him at his most vulnerable and laughing, or screaming slurs at his face, or killing him in his own home.

Yeah, yeah, he’s a real piece of work. What else is new?

Logically he knows that Kim is not going to do any of that. If he were, he would have already done it instead of buying him a tube of lipstick that looks so well on him that there must have been thought put into it.

So if he isn’t afraid of violence, what else is there for him to feel?

He settles on excitement.

They arrive at his place too soon. Kim gets out first and before he can really move the door is opened for him.

How gentlemanly he thinks and there’s a split second where he’s weirdly pleased at the gesture but when he tries to compute why he is filled with his default emotion: anger.

When his feet touch the ground he has half a mind to yell at Kim. Say something that will push his buttons, then say it again until he’s knocked on his ass and Kim drives off in a huff. Because then he would know what to do. But even that is drained out of him when he looks Kim in the eyes and sees unbridled hunger evident nowhere else on his frame - something he wasn’t able to taper down before Jean caught it.

God, the rapid switching of emotions is going to leave him drained before anything happens tonight.

He can’t even fathom what he wants to happen tonight.

His lips recall the warmth of the cigarette.

“After you.” He says, and it would appear a lot more gentlemanly if he wasn’t just telling Jean that he has to be the one to unlock his own front door.

For some reason he keeps walking. He unlocks the front door and Kim walks inside and closes it quietly behind him.

The heat has quieted down now which means the panic is louder than ever. This is it. Are you going to bring her out now? In front of an audience? Someone who knows where you work, has power over you, someone who could easily -

“Jean,” Kim says so so so gently, laying a hand on his elbow. He now realizes that he’s been standing frozen in the center of his living room for several minutes.

He yanks his arm out of his grasp. “Let’s get this over with.” he snarls.

He feels guilty pretty much as soon as he turns his back. He tries to make it evident in his shoulders, somehow silently telling him to follow Jean to the bathroom.

There isn’t a mirror in his bedroom so as soon as he collects the silver tube he moves across the hall to the bathroom. Before he has even uncapped it, Kim slides so he is leaning on the doorway and watching Jean. Due to the light it is impossible to tell what his eyes look like.

His hands shake lightly as he slowly and carefully applies the dark lipstick.

The result was just like before. It really was a nice shade on him.

Kim ‘hmm’s’ behind him. “I was right. It looks very nice.”

FACT: Jean does not take compliments well. He is a master at redirecting kind words to someone else, or downplaying them, or turning them into a self-deprecating comment that reinforces his own worldview and makes the compliment giver feel bad at even attempting to be nice. But for some reason his brain is not working right now, all neural pathways set to rebuke him have been rewired, at least for this moment, so all he can do is blush and coquettishly avert Kim’s eyes by looking down and away.

Which is how Kim was able to sneak up on him even though they’re in front of a f*cking mirror. Great detective skills Vicquemare, you deserve an award.

He didn’t notice he was being approached until he felt Kim’s heat all over his side, and his fingertips gently cradled his jaw. A hold that he could easily break if he wanted to but the pure warmth emanating from his hand is keeping him locked in. How long has it been since he has felt the intimate contact of another man? Too long. Longer if he only thinks about a man not trying to hurt him, or use him for his own pleasure. Jean’s face is forced to turn back to the mirror.

“Don’t you want to see how pretty you look?” There it is again, the barest hint of a rumble underneath his soft-spoken nature. Jean’s spine could collapse with how hard it shivered.

He tried to reply but his throat was impossibly dry. All he could do was swallow the hot air.

“I like it when my partners actually speak to me.” Kim says and then, like a f*cking bastard, moves his thumb along his jaw creating a path of electricity in its wake. He’s not going to be able to do this, he’s f*cked. f*cked beyond recognition.

He swallows again and lets the words clumsily fall out.

“I like the shade you picked.” His face is impossibly red. The roaring heat is back and threatens to melt him from the inside out, he’s sure that Kim can feel the scorching sensation through his gloves but he doesn’t pull away. The opposite in fact, since he just ‘hmm’s’ and moves even closer, his other hand gently being placed on Jean’s stomach in a reassuring move. And in a selfish one, since it also gives him the opportunity to feel more of Jean.

He had to unshackle himself so much to let those words be heard. Which means he couldn’t stop his stupid mouth from running ahead of him.

“If you wanted to see - “ he almost said something stupid like ‘more’ before he recalled their little game from earlier “her. If you want to meet her. She could be persuaded to come over.”

Kim quirks an eyebrow curiously and it was all f*cking over from there.

He found himself alone in his bedroom anxiously adjusting the red co*cktail dress. Smoothing over nonexistent wrinkles, placing the straps in the perfect place only to adjust them subtly again and again. Trying out different f*cking poses like he’s thinking about taking prom pictures or something.

He thinks about adding the stockings but decides against it. He does put on the kitten heels though.

Possibly for the first time in his life he wishes for a mirror in the bedroom. Just to double-check how he looks. There’s something subtly wrong about all the components - how they don’t really match. The kitten heels are cute, the co*cktail dress is sexy, and the lipstick is alluring. All satisfactory on their own but don’t really mesh together into one picture. A side effect of picking up things as he can find them, snatching them secretly and without a plan.

It’s a miracle he found heels in his size in the first place.

On an impulse he puts the blonde wig on. But f*ck, sh*t, the wig is a f*cking mess so he has to spend a few moments hurriedly brushing it down.

It’s not perfect, none of this is, and the worst part is that it looks so obvious that he tried to make it perfect and failed.

He should call out to Kim that he’s changed his mind about all this, actually. He should put on sweatpants and say ‘she couldn’t make it, I’m sorry for wasting your time, you can do literally whatever you want to my body to make up for the loss’.

But he doesn’t. With a shaky breath, he opens the bedroom door and steps into the living room.

Kim chose to sit on the armchair with his legs spread, boots planted firmly on the ground, slouched comfortably with one gloved hand (the same one that held Jean’s face?) dragging across his bottom lip hungrily. The perfect picture of masculinity, Jean almost folded to his knees and crawled to his lap, not even bothering to show off and instead moved to directly begging for Kim’s co*ck in his mouth.

At least if he did that then he would know what to do with his hands. Even when he’s in the middle of a very long dry spell he still knows how to suck dick with expertise. Those skills are unlikely to ever rust over for him.

Currently he is just standing in the entranceway, posture far too awkward for such a daring outfit.

It doesn’t seem to bother Kim at all though. He looks at Jean like he is genuinely appreciative of what he was given and he’s eagerly awaiting the moment that he can finally partake. Kim lifts a gloved hand from the arm of the chair and subtly beckons Jean closer.

Before he can think too much about it, Jean saunters over and delicately climbs onto his lap, knees on either side of his hip. Considering the cut of the dress and the fact that he doesn’t have any underwear on (he only owns boxers and briefs, both would feel out of place underneath the red feminine material) so he’s showing all of his cards. Literally. He’s partially hard already, the only thing dampening the mood is the near panic attack he almost pushed himself into while in the bedroom.

He’s also, and this is not bragging, decently large. Enough that he has had a few partners look at him and declare that it was hands and mouth stuff only.

Kim doesn’t look surprised at the move that Jean went with which makes him think that maybe he had a particularly good ‘reading people’ moment and this is what Kim was silently asking for. He also has the decency to not react to how heavy Jean knows he is, and instead act like he weighs almost nothing at all, which he shouldn’t find nearly as sexy as he does.

Kim leans forward to kiss him, but not on the mouth. On the corner of his lip, then on his jaw, then lower and lower until he finds a spot in the crook of his neck and he makes himself busy kissing and grazing his teeth there. Jean’s brain felt like it was drowning in warm fuzz so it took slightly too long to stop being disappointed at the lack of mouth-to-mouth contact and realize that Kim avoided kissing because he didn’t want to mess up his lipstick.

Because he looked that good in it.

Well, that can’t be really true, he decides. But Kim wants him to think that, so he can pretend for the moment.

His brain completely short circuits when Kim places a hand on his exposed thigh, the cool texture against his flushed again pushing away all insecurities for the moment and allowing him to relax enough to get fully hard. It pushes the fabric of the dress to the side, leaving him feeling extremely exposed.

Suddenly Kim makes a quiet sound of disapproval and Jean almost shrinks at that, not understanding what exactly he did wrong but anticipating the worst.

“I’m doing this all out of order, aren’t I?” Kim murmurs against his skin. He tears himself away to look Jean in the face. “I have you in my lap and I haven’t even asked for your name.”

The noise he let out was involuntary and pathetically whiney.

Kim initially looked like he didn’t react to that at all, but since Jean was so close he could see his eyes glaze over and the tips of his ears turn bright red.

Good, not only in the complimentary sense, but because he had remembered that Kim wants him speaking so it gave him a few seconds to muster up the strength to say something.

He had never given a name to this . . . persona he puts on. It’s not even really a persona since that would mean he put actual thought behind it. To him, it is a thing he does sometimes and only in private, but suddenly he needs a name and it has to be a good one.

“Vicky,” he says.

Really?

THOUGHT GAINED:

Reinventing Jean Vicquemare

So you gave yourself a female name on the spot and it’s obviously just based on your last name. No creativity, thought, or real effort put into it. It works for now but there have to be more fitting names. Maybe do some research about female names statistically just as common as yours, so you can pretend that it was the name your mother would have given you if you were born of the other persuasion.

Temporary research bonus:

+1 Conceptualization: Names have meanings and you’re overanalyzing them.

-1 Composure: Still repressed.

Whatever. Kim seems to like it, at least.

“Well, it’s nice to finally meet you.” Kim’s arms snake around his her waist and brings them closer, so she’s rutting against his stomach/chest. He’s still clothed so it is just Vicky rubbing her co*ck over his rough undershirt.

Not very ladylike.

“Please,” She whimpered.

Kim actually chuckles at that, the f*cking bastard. “So needy already?” But he obliges in finally - f*cking finally - putting his hand on her co*ck. It’s still too slow for her but he has a firm grip on her waist now so she isn’t able to thrust into his hand, at least not too hard.

A dry leather glove shouldn’t feel as good as it does.

“We can - f*ck - we can do whatever f*cking scene later.” She stutters. “It’s just been so f*cking long. Have mercy on me.”

He smirks and she should feel . . . at least annoyed by that or something, but mostly she focused on how she felt after he removed his hand from her. Cold and lonely and needy enough to whine again. Except it was cut short when she saw Kim remove his glove with his teeth, wet his palm, and swiftly returned his hand to her dick, using his thumb to spread her pre-cum to ease even more friction.

His hands are not particularly broad, and they’re more well-taken care of than most of the men in the RCM, and his fingers are intoxicatingly slim and bony. Just like the rest of him, they appear scrawny but are hiding behind strength. Or in this case, dexterity.

He’s very good at this.

She wasn’t lying when she said it had been a long time, but she also hadn’t even done something like this before. Usually sex is something she indulges purely to satisfy her needs. Utilitarian. Efficient. Nothing quite this tender or hot or exactly what she wants and would never, ever, let herself have.

It is, perhaps not surprising, an embarrassingly short time before she c*ms.

The room was filled with her whines, mews, and desperate pants during all this. In the very back of her mind, Vicky rationalized this as knowing that Kim likes a vocal partner and this is just her following that thread. The noises were just to substitute words since she’s beyond vocabulary.

The crescendo approached its peak so rapidly that she couldn’t give any real warning, just a single high-pitched breath she sucked in before it was all over. Her body constricted and she closed her eyes tight enough for tears to be forced out, shuddering impressively the entire time.

It was only after she had calmed down enough to open her eyes again that she noticed that Kim had carefully made sure that none of the mess got on her dress, instead only some of it was on her skin but most of it was splattered against Kim’s pants and undershirt.

f*ck. That’s - it’s just so - f*cking Hell. f*ck.

Finally she kisses him, not giving a damn if it smears her lipstick. She’s hungry, touch-starved, and kisses him like everything that’s wrong with her can be fixed if she just memorizes the feel of his teeth on her tongue.

One of her hands is cradling his cheek and the other one is on his neck, curving around his jawline. She could feel his heartbeat hammering away.

She breaks the kiss with difficulty, but seeing the color that transferred from her mouth to his made it easier. “Let me - “ she had moved to slide off of his lap, finally going to put her knees on the ground, feeling like even if she was able to give him the best blowj*b of his life it still wouldn’t be enough for what has happened for her.

In a flash, the image of her mouth stretched over his co*ck, leaving a ring of dark red on his skin and strings of salvia falling out of her mouth and messing up her face even more crosses her mind. Maybe if she was twenty again and her body not quite so abused then it could have been enough to get her going for a second time.

With an almost breakneck speed Kim’s hands reach back to her waist and hold her there, forcibly but not rough.

She frowns and tries a different approach. She brings one hand down to his crotch and presses into. . . nothing.

Ah. In her eagerness to chase her own pleasure it seems she has misread this whole situation. Horribly.

Her face was a very obvious mixture of confusion, guilt, shame, distress, basically think of a bad emotion and it passed by on her face so fast that she couldn’t even consider hiding it.

“This is not because of you.” Kim’s bare hand cups her cheek, thumb rubbing reassuring circles into the skin, and she leans into the touch. As if she wasn’t vulnerable enough for one f*cking night. Her detective skills were still firing off, surprisingly, and she caught an unfinished note at the end of his sentence. Like he considered saying something else at the end but decided against it only at the last second. Maybe something he didn’t even consider and it almost slipped out because his composure was fractured ever so slightly.

She hoped it was something like ‘sweetheart’. She can almost imagine how that word would sound in his voice. She could imagine it, several times in fact, but that will have to wait.

“You did very good.” He mused and the buzzing on Vicky’s skin was back, stronger than ever. She felt like she was making a sound, akin to a bee.

The good feeling that the praise gave her didn’t last long since Kim left without ever undressing more than his gloves. He gave her a kiss before leaving, but no explanation. No words. Which, if she’s going to be particularly cruel, is a bit hypocritical of him. Just a tad.

She retreats deep into her kitchen before he opens the front door, impossible to be seen from the hallway even by the most prying eyes.

As soon as the door shuts she is on the hunt for a cigarette. She lights up inside, because f*ck it, and heads back to the bathroom. Just to. . .look at the mess her face is in right now.

She lets Vicky stay for a little longer before going to bed as Jean, face-scrubbed and clothing gently laid in the dirty laundry.

The next day Harry walks into the precinct, looks at him, and then does the most obvious doubletake in history. Jean is livid immediately.

“You look brighter!” He says sincerely, and too loudly.

“f*ck off.” Except there’s not enough bite in it. Harry grins toothily and moves to his own desk.

Several weeks go by without them acknowledging that night. Fine by Jean, except for the fact that whenever he sees Kim (who’s now Kim in his mind forever, never Lieutenant, never Kitsuragi) he just wants to touch.

When they make idle small talk at the coffee machines he wants to place his hands on Kim’s neck again, feel the heartbeat quicken then slow down as he gets used to the contact.

When Kim walks to his desk to ask for advice on a case he wants to push his chair closer and rub his hands over Kim’s legs and thighs as he stands over him.

When Kim lets out a particularly stress-filled sigh at the caseload he wants to bend himself over Kim’s desk and let his body get used like it's just another stress-toy.

He wants to massage the pomade into Kim’s hair for him. He wants to absentmindedly smooth out the creases in the man’s jacket. He wants to f*cking shine his shoes for him. None of this is good wants to have about his coworker who has given him one (1) handjob and wasn’t even into it enough to get a little hard.

That one night left him weightless for several days like a two-ton weight was removed from his shoulders that he didn’t even notice was there. Harry may have been the first one to notice it but he wasn’t the only one. Everyone else had the tact to not mention it, however.

Especially since it didn’t last forever and it wasn’t too long before Jean was back to answering mostly in sarcastic bites. He’s sure that the assumption everyone made about him is that he had a one-night stand with a random girl that was good, but he’s not in the throes of emotional anguish or a perpetual horny yearning.

Emotional anguish is almost an understatement.

Even before Their Night, Jean had a habit of watching Kim. It was a harmless crush back then because Kim was a handsome guy who was also competent at his job and that was always an easy way into Jean’s heart. But now he watches him all the time. Still making sure to not be too obvious but with such a dramatic increase in how many glances he steals he knows that it couldn’t have gone completely unnoticed.

He cares very much about that and wants nothing more than to go unnoticed, but he still can’t stop.

All the extra watching has made it so he noticed stuff he didn’t before. The ease between Harry and Kim. A flow that seems to go beyond work partners. It clicks together when he sees Harry slide a hand on Kim’s upper back, between his shoulder blades, a movement that Jean has imagined doing a few a handful a dozen several times.

He felt like a f*cking idiot.

For the first time in weeks he felt like he was back in that stupid f*cking ocean metaphor his drug-addled brain thought of. He felt adrift in the black ocean but instead of being watched by one gigantic, all-encompassing, world-swallowing figure, it is by every life form in the sea. Large and small, life-ruining and not. They all see him. He can’t hide.

“Officer?” A soft-spoken yet authoritative voice broke through the mental spiral he was traveling down.

Kim was looking at him with concerned eyes, flickering between his face and the stapler in his hand.

He blinked and realized that he had, in his distracted state, stapled a form seven times along the right side.

“sh*t,” He murmured to himself. Not looking at Kim at all (for a change) he stood up. “I’m taking a smoke break.”

He was not followed out on the balcony. The nicotine did not do a good job covering the twinge of pained disappointment in his chest.

“I’m sorry.”

It was a few days later, mid-afternoon. Jean was using the sad excuse for a gym that the precinct has. With nothing to distract him from the monotony of lifting weights, he had retreated back into the prison of his own mind and was dwelling on things that made him feel bad. A very useful strategy to building core muscles. As such, he had not been aware that Harry had entered the room until he uttered his favorite phrase since coming back from Martinaise.

“For f*cking what?” He didn’t let Harry break his stride, even though honestly he was kind of f*cking spooked with how suddenly Harry was right there.

“Everything.”

“Asshole.” Jean finally puts the weights away and sits up on the bench, looking Harry in the face. Harry is dressed in his normal clothes so it was clear right away that he came in here for the express purpose of talking to Jean alone. He’s a predictable man, he works out on a pretty strict schedule but it’s not often that he monopolizes the gym. Harry must have been waiting patiently for an opportunity to be alone with him that doesn’t include actively stalking or closing a door behind him since that would likely make Jean’s hackles rise. Like he was being backed into a corner and had to resort to biting his way out of there.

Harry looked surprised at the reaction and looked like he wanted to shrink away, curl into himself to become smaller, but resisted.

“You asshole!” Jean continued. It was weird seeing Harry stand there so pathetically and he felt guilty, just a bit, but also not. “You can’t apologize for sh*t you don’t f*cking remember. It doesn’t mean sh*t, otherwise.”

“Right,” Harry nods, taking the abuse in stride which just makes Jean feel angrier. And lost. But he’s slowly starting to get used to a Harry that isn’t going to call him a co*cksucker without any hesitation or a Harry that isn’t going to throw a coffee mug at his head because he, Dei alive, told him he needs to do his work. “But I am. Sorry.”

For a second Jean just sits there and stares. He’s breathing on the ragged side, he’s covered in sweat and probably doesn’t smell that great. But the exercise both cleared his head while also making it a little harder to string a sentence together.

“Okay.” Which is not an acceptance of the apology, but it’s more than Harry expected to accept.

“Okay.” A massive grin spread across his face so quickly that it might have hurt, just a little.

“This doesn’t mean anything.” Jean points.

“Right, right. Of course.” He holds up both of his hands in appeasem*nt, but his stupid grin hasn’t been wiped. The anger from earlier comes back and the only thing he wants to do is go out of his way to wipe it away.

Should he? No. He will regret it. It will just make him feel like f*cking sh*t.

“You’re still the same f*cking asshole that would try and twist my arm behind my back until I relent and suck your dick. Not the kind of sh*t I would forget.” He says, because all he knows is to do sh*t he will regret and bite him in the ass.

Harry winced like he was punched and his hands started picking at his nail beds, almost at their own volition. It successfully wiped the smile from his face, probably for a long time after this conversation ends, and he says “sorry,” more quietly than he’s said anything.

Jean does not say ‘it’s okay’ because it’s not. He does not apologize for hurting Harry, he doesn’t even think he should. But he also doesn’t get up and leave, which he thinks is a mistake and another crack in his foundations. He grabs a towel and starts cleaning up the sweat from the bench.

“I uh - “ Harry coughs. Jean is not looking at him, which is probably how he was able to muster up the courage to say anything after that last revelation. “I picked up cooking. As a hobby. To keep me busy outside of work.”

“Okay,” Someone should give him a medal for all the times he is ignoring his instincts, which are screaming at him to have said ‘shut the f*ck up, I don’t care, stop talking to me’ instead.

“I was planning on cooking something special this weekend.” Jean turns around and Harry balks for a second but keeps going, still damaging his nail beds. “You could come over, if you wanted. Free food.”

Jean narrows his eyes and says nothing.

“No pressure! And it won’t be just the two of us.” He’s sweating profusely. He might have a heart attack. “I invited Kim. He’s coming. It’s this Saturday since that’s when I have off. I know you two are close so it might make you feel better to have him there. Still no pressure.”

Hey, what?

“What the f*ck do you - “ know “mean by that?”

His face got even more red, almost purple, and his eyes started to fill with an overwhelming amount of panic.

f*ck, okay. Jean needs to be a little nicer because Harry is rapidly approaching actual dangerous levels of stress. He anticipated having to clean up his dead body one day but he’s not going to let it happen before he finds out what he knows about him and Kim.

“Kim didn’t tell me much!” Harry ensures him.

“But he told you something.”

“Only after I figured it out on my own.” He tapped his forehead with his pointer figure. “I had added some points into Esprit.”

Jean squeezed the bridge of his nose to stave off the migraine he felt developing.

“It told me you two had a developing relationship and when I asked Kim all he said was that you two had uh - hooked up. But that’s not the phrase he used. No details, because he’s a gentleman, not a gossiper.” Jean still hadn’t gathered the words to say so Harry kept going. “I have nothing against it. You’re not going to hear a disparaging remark from me, no sir. In fact, I will go so far to encourage it! Everyone should be at least a little in love with Kim, it only makes sense.”

His instincts were to immediately throw out the idea that he’s in love with Kim at all but he knows that if he did then Harry would catch it and then know it’s a lie, so he didn’t. “So, what? You’re not f*cking him?” He says with bite, the only way he knows how to say anything real.

Something stirs within Harry’s memories. Something letting him know how Jean speaks, how this isn’t meant to be hurtful this time. How deeply embedded are Harry's memories of Jean? Nothing huge has broken through, at least as far as he has been told. But there’s been hints of tiny things. Muscle memory, almost. Neuro pathways that were less forgotten and more like they were covered in a layer of dust and cobwebs.

“Well, sure. But not exclusively.” Harry tilts his head and his eyes go far away, a sign that his head is telling him bullsh*t again.

“I’m going to take a shower.” He doesn’t want to wait around to hear whatever Harry has discovered.

He deliberately did not give Harry an answer about Saturday.

He spends several days pointedly not thinking about it. Avoiding hard topics is something he has a lot of experience in, believe it or not.

It isn’t until Saturday rolls around and Harry is not at work, but Kim is. As usual, Jean spends the day watching him.

He’s calm. He’s composed. He acts like he doesn’t notice the staring. Then, at the end of the day, when he usually would leave. He meets Jean’s eyes and then goes out to the balcony.

Yeah, sure, he could smoke.

He doesn’t have the balls to saddle close to Kim’s side. Still, they are close enough that he can feel the warmth on his side. The warmth that he has been craving since that first night on the balcony. They don’t say anything for the first few moments and Jean, quite suddenly, realizes it is because the ball is in his court.

“Heard Harry got this idea in his head. Heard he’s cooking some f*cking. King’s feast, or something.”

“Hmm,” Kim takes a drag. “Going to feed the entire neighborhood, I heard. Food and communist propaganda.”

Jean rolled his eyes. But fondly.

This is the opportunity he has to reject the offer. Let Kim know that he isn’t coming. They probably assumed as much, why would he think they were waiting for an answer? He shouldn’t even say anything. He should just go back to his desk and plan on working well into the morning.

“Could I bum a ride off of you?” He says instead. Kim looks over at him, questioningly. That bastard, he knows what Jean is saying. He elaborates anyway. “For the dinner. So I don’t have to walk there.”

“Of course.” Kim smiles. “It’d be cruel to let you walk there. Plus, you’d be late.”

“I doubt being late would make much of a difference.”

“It may surprise you, but he takes cooking very seriously. He probably has everything timed out precisely so they will be complete at the same time. All hot and ready.”

Something about how he says ‘hot and ready’ makes a shudder run through Jean. They are silent for another moment.

“He wouldn’t mind another guest.” He says casually, but there is an unmistakable pink coloring his ears that lets Jean know that this isn’t a purely innocent comment. “If you wanted me to swing by and pick up Vicky. He wouldn’t mind if she joined us.”

He feels like he was just hit by a cement truck.

He hadn’t even considered that. Why would he? Not only would that mean letting Harry know about his proclivities but that would mean stepping outside his house in Vicky’s clothing. Which he’s never done and never even considered doing.

Old Harry would look at him in a dress and burst out into laughter. Then probably rush to tear it off in a cloud of self-hating lust that would leave the dress ruined and Jean feeling worse than he thought possible. But, apparently, new Harry wouldn’t mind.

His instincts are telling him to jump off the balcony and make sure that he lands directly on his neck.

“Sure,” he chokes out.

Kim doesn’t hold back the self-satisfied look that develops after leaving Jean in that state.

When they make it back to his place he is infinitely glad that it is in a much better state. No longer a depression hole meant for Jean to die and rot in, but an actual place meant for habitation. Sure, a little cluttered, but clean. And he even has some smelly sticks, or whatever they’re called, around making the place smell. . . delicate.

Kim makes himself comfortable in the living room while Jean goes to get dressed.

If there’s one thing he knows is that he is not wearing the red dress. It is not a dinner party dress, first of all. And as much as he knows this new Harry probably would be cool if Jean goes full crossdresser in his own home, he doesn’t want to show Harry that much of himself at this stage.

So black skirt it is. He grabs a plain black T-shirt to match, wearing the skirt above his belly button and the shirt tucked in, giving a very subtle slimming effect to his waist. He thinks that this outfit would look nice with the stockings but then he looks down.

He only shaves his leg during the coldest months of the year in case he needs to wear anything shorter than his uniform pants. Which means his legs are hairy. They didn’t bother him a few weeks ago but they do now.

Wearing stockings over hairy legs just wouldn’t look right, to him. That’s not how Vicky would look.

Plus it’s uncomfortable.

Jean peers around the hallway, only peeking into the living room so he can see Kim but he can’t be fully seen himself. “I need to shave my legs. Just ten minutes. Super quick.”

Kim ‘hmm’s’, which is a very common sound for him and Jean has almost memorized by now. “Do you mind if I call Harry? Just to be considerate.”

“Oh right, yeah. Go ahead.” He hadn’t even thought about Harry’s dinner. He doesn’t want Kim to think he’s inconsiderate, but also he feels like he shouldn’t have to make himself rush on Harry’s account. At least not yet.

He doesn’t have to do a thorough job tonight, just get the worst of it off his body. He’s halfway through his right leg, it propped up on the porcelain lip of the bathtub, when surprisingly just a few minutes later Kim appeared in his peripheral vision standing in the doorway.

“Hi,” he she says, very cool and casual for someone who has never shaved her legs for an audience before.

“Hi,” Kim leans against the entranceway, making himself very comfortable. “Harry appreciates the extra time. Says he did some calculations wrong. We are in no rush.”

“Well, shaving my legs never takes that long anyway.” She swiftly cleans the razor in the warm water from the tab. No shaving cream since this is a rush job.

No lotion at the end, either, so her skin is going to be pretty irritated. But she’ll deal.

“We’re in no rush.” He repeats, but more darkly. With a husky, smoky quality. She gulps.

She almost forgot that being with Kim is a lot like playing a game, except she didn’t get the instructions so she’s working on the fly. But that’s okay, she’s good at picking up hints. Or at least, she’s been doing a good job so far.

She stretches her leg out farther than strictly necessary, making it look slimmer and longer and hopefully creating an expanse of pale skin that he would want to explore later, and she slowly drags the razor across the long plain.

Is this sexy? f*ck, she hopes so. It’s not something she has thought about before. But after a few swipes she looks up to see that Kim is completely entranced by the image and she can feel her face heat up by several degrees.

When she finished one leg she switched positions, making sure that Kim could still see, but it wasn’t as easy to work with anymore. She frowned to herself, but very quickly she felt a presence by her side and a voice speaking directly in her ear. “Let me,”

For a second she was reminded of when she said those words to him and it got her nowhere, but it was pushed aside when he gently took the razor from her hand and started shaving her leg for her.

He’s a lot nicer to her skin than she is, but that also means he’s taking his sweet time. Really savoring shaving her leg, which maybe should be weird but instead is causing an intense shiver to run up her spine and her breath to spike.

“Everything alright?” He glances at her to check in. There’s no use hiding how flushed she is.

“Water is cold, is all.” She says, and Kim doesn’t even have to remove his glove to feel the water since it’s steaming up the tiny bathroom.

It’s a lot longer than ten minutes before her legs are nice and smooth. Kim turns to her medicine cabinet, almost reaching out to get something for her before thinking better of it.

“No moisturizing tonight.” She hums and pads back to her bedroom.

“Oh? Why is that?”

“Lack of moisturizer.” She shrugs. She takes the black stockings and her kitten heels out of the drawer and sits on the edge of the bed, starting the process of rolling it before getting an idea. “You wouldn’t happen to want to do this too, hmm?” She said it with a seductive lilt that she has never tried out before then and finds that it doesn’t feel that bad in her mouth.

There wasn't time for her to question if this was the wrong thing to suggest before Kim was kneeling at her bedside, holding on foot out and plucking the nylon stocking without hesitation. She gasped as he, ever so gently, encased her leg in the material and he looked at her like she was actually pretty. Or something.

When it reaches her inner thigh she has to cover her mouth with her hand to prevent more embarrassing sounds from coming out.

Figures, she lets one man see her in something besides a work uniform and she’s resorted to a whimpering mess. One man that acts super into all this, into this, but then goes cold if she tries to reciprocate.

Just to test the waters she lifts her bare foot and massages his crotch. He freezes and just like last time there is an obvious lack of interest.

“Does this do anything for you?” She tries to keep her tone exclusively curious but there’s an obvious pout in her voice.

He sighs. “I do owe you an explanation, my apologies.” While he speaks he gently puts the stocking on her other leg, just as reverently. “It was my natural inclination to - panic is the only word for what I did. Which I really shouldn’t have done since I think you more than most people would understand, but old habits die hard. Especially for old men.”

She tilts her head, silently asking for more information.

“I’m - “ he uses one hand to flippantly gesture to his chest and groin and back to her “in the other way. A reverse situation, you could say.”

Somehow she gets the implication behind his words. “Oh you’re - okay. I get it. But I’m not - “ she has no idea how to word this. “This is just a thing I do. Sometimes. There’s no reason that I do it. It just works.” She has no idea why those words feel uncomfortably hot coming out of her mouth, she wants to take them back and try again but they’re already dissipating in the air.

Kim gives her a look that is equal measures amused and sad, which is a very strange mixture.

THOUGHT GAINED:

Flippant Hand Gesture Towards Self

There’s a chance you might be a woma-

NO! OPT OUT! NOT THE TIME! Maybe later!

She slips into her trusty black heels. “I don’t give a f*ck what parts you have down there, to be clear.” She quickly sprays herself with the dollar store perfume. “I would like to get my mouth on you as soon as possible, hopefully before I’m eighty.”

Kim looks at her astonished, but still smiling. “Oh, I'm sure that can be arranged."

Vicky flushes embarrassingly and smiles, biting her lip eagerly.

When Kim reaches the front door she abruptly stops and rushes back to her closet to snag her RCM patrol coat, which when buttoned up covers her entire body. “For the ride there.” She says, even though there’s no need to explain herself. Kim gets it.

He holds the front door open for her and even holds open the door to the Kimeena. The real kicker is when he holds her hand as she exits, as if it is a tall carriage and she is wearing delicate glass slippers. She lets out a breathy giggle.

Thankfully no one sees them on the walkup to Harry’s apartment, because as thick and long as the patrol coat, it isn’t covering her choice of non sensible footwear.

If Vicky thought her place was cluttered but organized then Harry’s is basically storage. There are trinkets decorating every flat surface around, dozens of pictures hanging around them, and a frighteningly tall pile of only cookbooks visibly at the entrance of the kitchen.

But she’s been here when it looked worse. At least there are no bottles, loose pills, or used condoms decorating the floor like she half-expected.

Harry greets them happily, hugging Kim tightly as soon as they enter. It gave Vicky time to hang her coat up on an empty hook.

“Hi Kim! Thanks for coming!” It takes a moment before Harry can pull his eyes away from Kim which, yeah, she completely understands. “And thank you t - oh!” His eyes got large and his cheeks colored pink. “Wow! You look amazing. You’re so hot. Or er, pretty. You’re very pretty. And hot. You’re very pretty and hot, Jean.”

She rolled her eyes. “Tonight you can call me Vicky.”

“Vicky.” He breathes it out, like he needed to feel it in his empty lungs to fully wrap his head around it. “Is this something that I forgot?” His eyes looked incredibly sad, even if the rest of his face was still affected by his initial reaction to seeing her.

“No.” She peered at Kim, who was rubbing Harry’s back sympathetically. “You never knew. And thank the Innocents for that. This is the first time we’re meeting like this.” She takes out the silver tube that she snuck in the patrol coat pocket and applied it quickly while standing in that same spot.

It seemed like Harry was about to say something but all that came out was a choked off groan. Vicky raised her eyebrows at him, mostly amused.

“Maybe we should go to the table?” Kim asked, trying not to laugh. He was still rubbing comforting circles in Harry’s back. “I don’t know about you two but I’m quite hungry.”

The food was already on the table ready for them, still steaming and smelling delicious. Even her bitter and sarcastic ass couldn’t deny that. It was also something that looked deceptively simple, a crusted meat pie with vegetables that, if it were truly made from scratch, probably took hours. Another difference between old and new Harry, since the Harry that Vicky was more experienced with would much rather get sh*tty takeout seven days a week rather than heat up a pot of water.

“It’s the first time I’m trying out this recipe.” He picks up a cookbook at the top of the large stack and opens it up to:

Just Like How Mama Used To Make Meat Pie

The entire book was annotated with handwritten notes in Harry’s writing, both on scrap notes and written directly in the pages, and most of them seemed to actually be relevant to what was on the page.

f*ck, he reads cookbooks cover to cover? She never thought there was a person alive that did that sort of thing. Of f*cking course it would be Harry.

He was holding the book open to show off how he no doubt thought the picture looked better than what he made, but he was distractedly peering over the top at Vicky’s mouth. When caught, he became flustered. “Sorry! Sorry for staring. You’re just very pretty.”

The rest of the meal went like that. “Thank you Kim! Yes, it took me a few hours but I think it came out okay. I’m not sure how I never noticed your legs before, Vicky, but they’re very shapely.”

“Yes everything is from scratch, the crust was the hardest. The lipstick really brings out your eyes.”

“Did you make progress on the case? She never contacted you back, hmm, we’ll need to go back out and interview her in person when we can. That skirt looks really good on your body, it makes your waist look so - Dei, sorry, that was probably too honest?”

“Oh yes, I still want to try and beat you at Suzerainty! I have the perfect strategy. f*ck, Vicky, you’re so gorgeous.”

This is not how she expected the night to go. She expected, at best, to have a civil dinner with Harry then - well, she didn’t let herself think too much about what she wanted to happen but she knew that getting charmed by Harry of all people was not on her list. But the absolute onslaught of compliments would wear down even the strongest woman.

And the fact that Harry says all of them like they just slipped out. Broke through his composure as soon as the thought naturally occurred in his head. How it’s not really for her benefit or for him to gain anything, it’s just his thoughts.

By the time the meal is over she is red-faced, squirming, and full of meat but not in the way that she wants.

That’s a terrible thought. She should be ashamed of herself for thinking that cheesy ass line, actually.

It’s only after Kim starts sliding his hand up her knee, up her thigh, resting securely well inside her skirt that she says something.

“Harry,” She says exasperatedly when he starts talking about dessert.

He licks his lips and finally says something besides ‘sorry’. “It can wait, if we would rather wait?”

Kim was fondling her at this point. “Not that I don’t appreciate the effort you put in, I would like the dinner to settle before eating any more.” He squeezes Vicky through her underwear and she yelps.

She doesn’t wait for Kim to ask her directly what she wants.

“f*ck me, please.” She begs. Kim pulls the waistband of her underwear down and takes her co*ck out fully, moving in a rhythm that has her eyes fluttering and thoughts turn to syrup.

“Can I touch you?” Harry has leaned in closer, hands twitching on the table, but he hasn’t bridged the gap himself. His pupils are blown wide, green barely being able to be seen, and he’s practically panting. It is all too suddenly obvious to her that he has been wanting to touch her this entire evening but has restrained from doing so because she has not said that he could.

It throws her even more off her axis than she thought possible.

She pulls Harry by the hideous tie and kisses him forcefully on the lips. He immediately melts into it, which is far too intimate, far too romantic, but she also doesn’t want to stop. Mostly because it is helping her keep a tether to reality, kissing Harry, forcing his mouth open with her tongue and having him be receptive to everything she’s doing. Even when Harry’s hands started exploring every inch of her body, her waist, her thighs, her face and arms and ass. He even cups her pecs as if they’re breasts which earns him a fierce bite on his bottom lip which causes him to shudder.

Kim, who has been steadily pumping her co*ck throughout this, leans in so they’re pressed almost chest to chest and he starts kissing, sucking, biting her neck. She has to break apart from Harry with how intense her moans have gotten, only getting louder when Harry immediately rucks up her shirt and massages one of her nipples with his tongue.

Just as embarrassingly quick as last time, she feels the tell-tale pull in her stomach to let her know she’s close.

“S-stop,” she says, weakly. It came out quieter than she intended, but despite that they both retracted immediately. She misses the warmth, the contact, so intensely that she almost pulls them back but she needs a second to think.

“What is it?” Kim asks gently. He took this as an opportunity to remove his gloves, she saw him go to pull them off and moved on instinct.

“No!” She grabbed his wrist “Leave those on, please. I just needed a moment.”

Kim smirks and she blushes, feeling like she’s barred even more of her soul then she thought possible.

“If you two keep going at it like you’re trying to devour me,” she pants, “then it will be all over way too soon. I want more.”

Kim chuckles and returns a hand to her face, cupping a cheek and using his thumb to pull at her bottom lip, no doubt smearing what lipstick she has left.

Actually, that’s a good question. She quickly and slyly looks over to Harry and sees, yes, his mouth is covered in the stuff. Almost as pigmented as if he put it on himself. He is gripping both of his knees with his hands like he didn’t trust himself to pull away from her when she said stop.

She wonders if he's inclined to being restrained, nowadays.

“What exactly is it that you want?” Her eyes flick back to Kim and he’s looking at her like she’s beautiful. Like he’s so eager to find out the exact way she wants to be unraveled so he can deliver it to her, with the help of his assistant of course.

She kisses Kim deeply and uses one hand to grip Harry’s co*ck through his pants, causing him to groan aloud. “Take me to bed.”

It takes until she’s following Harry down the hallway that she did the rather presumptive thing and asked Kim to take her to Harry’s bed.

Whoops. But, again, Harry kind of deserves this treatment. Kind of.

Harry’s room is filled with just as many trinkets as the rest of the house but without the distraction of the home cooked meal or the two men on her body she can finally take notice of the smell. She’s never been in his bedroom before but she has seen the inside of his place when it was at its worst. When it’s cleaned up nice and proper it smells almost citrusy. Like a tart green apple in a smoky room.

She is sitting on the edge of Harry’s bed and Kim comes to stand directly in front of her, his body between her open legs. Harry stands behind him, all too happy to let Kim’s authority reign supreme, and he’s looking at her like he’d be happy with anything she’d be willing to give. He’d be happy even if she ignored him for the rest of the night.

Kim grabs her chin and lifts her head gently so she’s looking up at him, eyes half lidded under his glasses. His gloves are so nice and warm against her skin, adding a scent of leather to the aromatic co*cktail. “What now?” And again, the ending hangs like he almost dropped a romantic epithet but it couldn’t come out.

Please call me something sweet, she thinks. Anything.

She is not going to be able to ask for that sober.

Instead she mouths along the waistband of his cargo pants, basically tonguef*cking the space between the button and his abs, and uses her hands to massage his crotch. Now that she knows what not to look for she can actually make him feel something. When he slightly tenses at the feeling she looks up at him, mouth still connected to his skin and says “I’ve been told I’ve had something of an oral fixation. I still want what I said earlier.”

She lets herself enjoy how bright red the tips of his ears get before she keeps talking. “I’d like Harry f*cking me at the same time, if that’s okay.” She asks Kim.

Harry groans again and in the corner of her eye she can see he’s practically vibrating with want. But she doesn't remove her eyes from Kim.

His gloved hand moves from her chin to her cheek, enveloping most of her face in the tender warmth. “Whatever you want, Vicky.”

THOUGHT PROJECT COMPLETE

Reinventing Jean Vicquemare

Vicky is more than fine as a name. At least with the way that Kim says it.

The setup that they end up with is Kim sitting at the end of the bed and back pressed against the wall with Vicky on the stomach with Harry bringing up the rear, feet planted on the ground. Kim is finally, finally, undressed and it is taking everything in her to not put her mouth on him and rut against the bed, Harry be damned.

Unlike Vicky, who at best is two minutes out of the closet, he's come to terms with his gender long ago. He has two perpendicular scars running through his chest, ending near his armpits. He's decently hairy, trimmed, and nothing like the animal that is their third bedmate.

She doesn’t know what he had to be insecure about, he’s the sexiest man that she has ever (somehow) gotten undressed.

She hasn’t been with someone with his kind of junk before but she’s sucked dick plenty and he has something in the place where a dick would be, and it looks mouthwateringly like a dick, so she’s confident she can do a good job.

She moves to take off her skirt completely when Harry gently stops her.

“If you could - I mean,” he stutters. “Not that I’m in the position to ask for anything. But you look very nice.”

f*ck it, Kim kept his gloves on for her. She nods silently.

“Just be careful to not get it dirty.” Kim says with such authority that Vicky knows Harry will consider keeping her clothes clean more important than getting off at all.

f*ck, what a gentleman.

Harry had barely grabbed the lube before her composure breaks and she licks the swollen bud in front of her, rolling the flesh around with her tongue, applying pressure in just the right way.

Kim clearly had not been expecting her to start and had let out a full body shiver, letting a throaty ‘f*ck. . . ‘ fall from his lips.

For a man constantly supported by iron walls, this is the closest to letting loose she has ever seen of him. She wants more.

She’s momentarily distracted from her motions by Harry starting the process of opening her up. He made sure to warm up the lube before entering her with a single finger, but f*cking Hell his finger is huge. She’s done this before but if she’s had a dry spell with sex in general like she’s described, then it’s been practically eons since she was properly f*cked. Her mouth stops moving and instead she goes slack-jawed for a moment, eyes squeezing tight.

Kim cards a hand through her hair and she opens her eyes to see him looking down at her, concern building between his eyebrows. “Everything alright? Need a moment?”

Harry completely freezes behind her at the first instance of hearing a problem.

She shakes her head ‘no’ and f*cks herself back onto Harry’s hand for good measure. “Like I said, it’s been a while.” and doesn’t wait for a response before going back to pleasing Kim, causing him to release a sigh from deep within.

She’s very good at keeping him teetering on edge and then dialing back, prolonging this as long as possible. By the time Harry is pistoning three fingers inside of her she’s moaning uncontrollably and Kim is covered in a layer of sweat, glasses long since placed on the end side table and he’s staring at the ceiling like he could see the night sky through it.

Harry removes his fingers and she lets out a sound that’s a lot like a sob.

“Shh,” Harry places one of his huge bear paws on her lower back, which is gathering an intense amount of sweat. “Just a little longer, baby. Just a few moments.”

She does not moan at the use of ‘baby’ but she does pop all of Kim in her mouth and suck with a ferocity that has his thighs unconsciously clench around her ears.

Harry’s dick is thick. It takes him a moment to bottom out and even then he has to stay still for several moments for her to adjust, leaving her panting and only making miniscule tongue movements now. He hasn’t stopped rubbing her back, under her shirt, but he has started moving up and down the entire space.

Kim is touching her too. Her hair, her neck, very often her face and lips. Thumb fiddling with her mouth and pushing into her space even more, really filling her in every way. Filling her mouth with the taste of leather mixed with tangy sweat.

She pulls off just enough to say “I’m close” before going back to Kim with a renewed fervor, causing him to curse. This was also all Harry needed to hear before pounding into her with a steady rhythm, not demolishing but not too gentle either.

All she can say is that she’s very grateful that Kim came before her this time, though it was only by seconds. She felt him tighten around her and the unmistakable wetness flowing down her jaw that was starting to cramp and she let herself go right there with him.

Harry had moved to stop his movements and went to pull out when she removed her mouth from Kim, looked at him behind her shoulder and said “Don’t you dare!” with a gravelly voice. Akin to a jazz singer in a smoky club, almost. She backed into him at a harsher pace than he would have ever considered and she let herself be used until he made a groaning sound like he was shot and he came.

Oh wow, he even used a condom. She didn’t notice. How considerate.

It’s also considerate on how the both of them move her to a spot in the bed that doesn’t have her mess on it, treating her like she’s a special and fragile thing that they are very invested in keeping in as perfect condition as possible.

There go the f*cking water works. sh*t.

It wasn’t body-wracking weeping or anything, just a few tears silently falling without her consent but they were still there to see them. Kim gripped her close to his sweat-drenched body and silently wiped them away and Harry, gaining some confidence, crawled to her other side after tossing the condom. He wrapped an arm around her waist and nuzzled her neck.

They should probably talk about whatever this makes them. If Vicky is invited into whatever they already have, if she even wants to (she does and she’s scared that if they ask her she will admit it before finding out if she’s even invited) and, possibly most important, who Vicky is once the sun comes out.

But for now they rest. Then they can worry about a shower. It is not big enough for two people, let alone three, and they have a tiny skerfuffle about the order to shower in. Harry doesn't even consider going first, despite it being his, and they both want Vicky to go first but she just wants to close her eyes for a few damn moments. But they get clean, then finally try Harry’s dessert (a chocolate/vanilla pudding cake of some kind). It is safe within those cluttered four walls.