Chapter 22

Chapter 22

The Saturday before the election, Elias stood atop a tailor’s riser, while his assistant, Kenneth, dutifully dressed him, just as he had done before every other big event in his employer’s life. On this particular occasion, his duties didn’t bring the same satisfaction as they usually would.

Without halting his tasks, Kenneth felt himself compelled to break the silence. “Mr. Arnault, I once again must once again advise **** caution with your current situation, sir. Ms. Demir stands to be in the public eye in some form or another for the foreseeable future. Remaining attached to her could potentially derail any investments, not to mention the cloud that would hang over any public contracts the company is awarded. Sir, I must be frank here, the woman seems flighty at best. She probably won’t be winning the election, but that doesn’t mean the general public won’t keep its fascination. I wouldn’t be surprised if she wound up on the Fox News morning show, or something, and you know how trash those people are. I mean, sir…well… you’ve only known her for six months.”

“I’ve known her longer than that, Kenneth.” Elias replied, brushing away the lithe hand of the young assistant, and buttoning the last button of his blazer himself. Adjusting his tie one last time in the mirror, a slight smile played at his lips as he thought back to the first time he met Reagan Demir.

It was the night of a big debate tournament, and his sister and Reagan’s club had cleaned house. Elias made the trip to see his sibling’s campus, but mostly to cut loose one final time with some easy undergrads before he made his way across the country to business school.

Once upon a time, his little sister tried to follow him everywhere, but by the time she hit puberty it turned into a contentious relationship, and mostly stayed that way. A bonus for making the trip, and showing his support for her was seeing that almost adoring look on her face which he hadn’t seen in many years.

His first impression of Eva’s new friend was one of a stuffy, button-down goody two-shoes, but after the competition ended, and the three of them shared a few beers, he began to see just how meticulously crafted that construct Reagan had created was. On the surface he might have been everyone’s best friend, but it was clear watching him destroy his competition on an environmental policy debate, where the blonde was unfortunately saddled with the obviously losing argument, that the youth he found himself more and more infatuated with was a being of pure ambition.

Elias watched the blonde, blue-eyed young man take a losing position and turn it into a victory by pushing his opponent off balance, playing with phrasing, and finally getting the person to accidentally agree, thus shooting himself in the foot. It had been a misstep on his part, one he tried to correct, but the damage had been done. It had been like watching a creation of Aaron Sorkin, and Elias enjoyed every second of it.

Elias and Reagan spent the evening stroking each other’s egos as they regurgitated the ideals of Libertarianism at one another for no reason other than the satisfaction of having another shout “You’re absolutely right!” with the type of ignorant confidence only the drunk can muster, as the two slipped further and further into the **** state with every refill of their cups.

For Elias though, there was another reason. There was something about the way the little twink, as he was now certain was an apt descriptor for Reagan, that had captured his attention. Everything about this creature was gorgeous, save the beginnings of a scraggly beard sprouting from his chin, but that was a minor offense the older boy could forgive.

The drinks continued to flow, and Eva, having long grown tired of watching her brother and her best friend practically blow each other, had left the room. As the hour grew later, the two began to talk both closer, and louder, until they were basically screaming speeches about personal liberty in each other’s faces. By this point only the two remained, sitting on a small couch out in the dorm room hallway. That’s when the unthinkable happened. They both ran out of things to say.

Breaking the silence, Elias leaned a little closer, and whispered, “So, you wanna show me your room?”

“Sure, it’s a floor down,” Reagan replied earnestly, “but I don’t know why you’d care. It looks just like your sister’s.”

Elias tried to maintain his composure, but couldn’t help himself. One chortle escaped, followed by a snort. The confused expression on his conversational partner’s face was the most adorable thing he’d seen all night. It seemed like the perfect invitation for a kiss. When he closed his eyes, and leaned in, his lips only met the empty air, and when they opened, Reagan’s head was craned back like a cat getting sprayed by a hose.

The young blonde’s face flushed red, twisted in an agonizing contortion of frustration and sadness. Elias' inebriation and feeling of rejection had him miss the clenched fist Reagan held at his side.

“Eva means a lot to me. How about we call it a night, and forget this conversation ever happened?” Reagan said, and then he headed off to bed without another word.

What Elias did see was a tortured soul, unable to reconcile his feelings for his best friend with his attraction for her older brother, and somewhat ashamed of who he truly was. If he could have read minds he would have known that the flush in Reagan’s face was the small man fighting back the desire to punch his friend’s sibling in the face, especially since he wasn’t ready to call that bridge burned, and he might yet bed her. Elias might also have known that Reagan was mourning the loss of a perceived masculinity he’d constructed in his mind. The fact that a man would even think he was queer, let alone interested, felt like a blow to the gut.

And so the two parted ways, never mentioning the event again. For Reagan’s part, that was because he only remembered a few pieces the next day. Elias said something offensive, and he needed to put him in his place. He just filled in the rest with what he assumed was him coming out on top, though in the present day he couldn’t deny in their relationship, he’d been, exclusively, the bottom.

Elias spent the next morning lamenting the literal “only one” who ever got away. That kind of rejection was one he wasn’t used to, but for his sister, it was one he’d have to stomach. That’s why when Eva asked if he’d like to go out with the newly crowned “Reah” he jumped at the opportunity.

Snapping back to reality, Elias said plainly, "Look, I know you’re not the most fond of her, Kenneth, but you’re going to have to get over that. In fact, it’s time you began thinking of Reah as an extension of myself. Her needs are my needs. Anything she asks for, you grant that request without a moment’s hesitation, are we clear?” Elias held the gaze of his employee and spoke with an easy, almost friendly, voice to both get his message across and not send him into some fit.

At a loss for words, Kenneth could only nod in reply, as he silently plucked a ball of lint from his employer’s jacket.

Elias wasn’t delusional. He knew Kenneth harbored deep feelings for him. In his assistant, he found the kind of loyalty that money just couldn’t buy, and he wasn’t about to ruin that by giving the young man what he wanted. No, he would be the only executive he knew that didn’t fuck his secretary, even when it was freely his for the taking. He’d gladly take the perfect assistant over a one-night stand, an NDA, and an out of court settlement. Besides, that didn’t mean the extraordinarily pretty young man would suddenly stop being eye-candy. Satisfied his point was made, Elias turned on his heels, and strutted out the door.

Later that day standing on the sidewalk, in a park just a few miles down the road from campaign headquarters, Reagan stood, impatienting sipping on the straw of his pumpkin spice latte. Looking at the drink with his glossy nails wrapped around it, he couldn’t help pressing his lips together, unhappy with himself.

‘Gah,’ he thought, ‘when did I become such a basic bitch? Eva keeps ordering these things for me, but now every time I see a damn Starbucks, it’s like I’m addicted. God, this can’t be over soon enough. Now, where the hell is my man?’

Reagan dug through his little brown handbag, and fumbled to find his phone, his rock-hard nail extensions clicking on every little piece of plastic in the thing. The campaign in its home stretch, Eva told him everyone in the office would be dressed casually, so she told him to look put together, but not overdone.

Following the instructions, as he thought, to the letter, Reagan tried first to choose a nice pair of slacks, but in every one the image in the mirror didn’t reflect the grace and dignity of the office he pursued - or so he told himself, even as he turned to see his rear end in the reflective surface. The slacks were cut in such a way that they hugged his ass tightly. He was sure some would call him thick, thanks to the squat exercises he’d taken up, along with a generous helping hand by the hormones pumping through his veins. Part of him wanted to wear a suit - a men’s suit, so he could catch a glimpse of his “true self” but one look at his curves told him he could toss that idea out the window.

“Dresses can be casual.” he said out loud to no one, before searching through his ever growing collection, and returning with a shirtwaist, decorated in a blue and black geometric print. After donning the proper undergarments, Reagan sighed, realizing he hardly noticed the two massive breasts affixed to his chest anymore, not that they didn’t get in the way or cause stress on his back, but they had become part of his new normal. He decided it best to shove that complicated feeling to the back of his mind while he continued getting dressed. A simple pair of brown leather shoes followed - strappy sandals, and then it was time to search through the jewelry rack.

Settling on a dangly pair of colorful bobbles, matching the dress, Reagan slid the post through his pierced ears, and he examined his reflection once more. While more colorful, though barely, than his typical outfit, it was evident that Reagan held Ms. Demir to the same rigorous caliber of dress as Mr. Demir, and while that might have suited his taste in an albeit twisted sort of way, he knew now more than ever that women were held to a much higher standard. There’s no way he wouldn’t be the most overdressed person at any photo-op that presented itself, and he didn’t want to make the same kind of mistakes like the wife of that flop, Desantis.

Thinking back to his days in the campaign office, Reagan conjured up an image of the interns, at least as best as he could remember them. Thinking one of them must have worn a choker at least once, he decided that was the way to go, and he found a blue band that matched the blue of his outfit, fastening it behind his slender throat. Once again examining his reflection, Reagan found his appearance satisfactory, but the ease with which he’d created the look left a pit in his stomach. He felt like he was fast becoming the kind of woman he studied to be in those accursed magazines. Not that that wasn’t the plan, but facing the reality that he could hardly remember the man he used to be was never going to go down easy.

Touching his left cheek, he slid his finger down to the corner of his lips, feeling no sign of stubble, thanks to the ongoing procedures done at home, and the salon. Reagan’s mind drifted back to a time when things were simpler - when his father was still alive.

When he was a small child, back when he was young enough that his father was willing to hug him, he would sit in the man’s lap while he worked at his leather station. At the time, his father was the pinnacle of manhood, something Reagan should aspire to, as the patriarch frequently reminded him. A man needed a hobby. Working on cars, hunting - he was taught through action there should be one, and it shouldn’t be something like decorating or planning dinner parties. Those were the domain of his mother.

His father had leatherworking. That scent of leather was an anchor to a time in his life when he felt most safe, a feeling that seemed as foreign as the surface of Venus, at present.

Returning to his collection of vestments, Reagan found a piece he’d chosen the one time Eva managed to drag him along on a girl’s day. Their shopping excursion was mostly to cater to Eva’s whim, but in one particular accessory store, Reagan spotted a curiosity - a leather corselet, embellished with a matching belt, and a portion that draped down in the front. The way the fragrance of the piece reminded him of his father was enough to add it to the deluge of purchases he otherwise had no interest in, than that of how they were meant to help achieve his goal.

“I seriously doubt you’ll ever find an outfit for that, Reah.” Eva mocked, snickering to herself. She couldn’t help but tease her feminized friend with what she believed to be an impossibility. “If you ever manage to make that thing look good, you’ve earned yourself a kiss from me.”

“Ha. Ha.” Reagan shot back dryly. If he could only make that one stupid decision for himself, no matter how small, he was going to do it.

Retrieving the piece, Reagan buckled it in place, and once again returned to the mirror. This time, in spite of himself, he liked what he saw, evident by the smile that crept right onto the corner of his lips. It stayed in place, as he collected his purse, and headed off for the day’s trials. The days of having to concentrate to move with a feminine grace were long behind Reagan now, as were any thoughts of it as practiced movements became second nature.

Just as he was about to leave, his phone chimed. Elias messaged, telling him about a food truck festival in a nearby park, to raise funds for the Wounded Warrior Project. His boyfriend, as he’d just started thinking of him, had already managed to set up the photo-op.

Boyfriend might have been an absurd job title as far as Reagan was concerned, but he had to call it something, and making that mental adjustment could save him from an embarrassing public slip-up. Before he made the jump to running for office he never would have imagined how much of a politician's time was spent working the phones. It was a constant, and heading to the park for a little PR was much better than the far less exciting parts of his job. Reagan couldn’t get into his car fast enough.

He hadn’t had the occasion to drive himself since this whole ordeal began, and should he actually manage to win the election, he wouldn’t have occasion to drive himself again for a long time to come, so he saw fit to give his driver the day off, and to allow one last indulgence of life as a private citizen. The Audi was leased by the campaign after all, everything above board, though still skeezy all the same. He hadn’t driven the thing in months, and it seemed a shame to let the thing go to waste. Speeding along barefoot, not wanting to crash in the unfamiliar heels, was a welcome taste of freedom as he headed to the park.

To say the feminized man was miffed would be an understatement. When Reagan arrived and found not a single food truck, let alone a soldier, or a camera, he sent his first ever angry text to Elias, clacking away with his nails.

Reagan: Where the hell are you?

Elias: OTW

The short three letter response was understandable if he was driving, but still the word miffed was an apt word to describe his mood. The only comfort Reagan could find was at a nearby coffee stand, and it came in pumpkin-spice flavor. Another text was sent, and another “OTW” came in reply. At this point Reagan was visibly pouting. It was only then when he saw Eva approach with an equally puzzled expression.

‘Of course she has something to do with this.’ Reagan grumbled to himself, lamenting the fact that Eva always seemed to be up to some scheme she didn’t think he needed notice of. ‘I’m in charge, why don’t I feel like it half the time?’

At that moment he knew he needed to stay on his toes, but nothing could have prepared him for what came next. In what felt like an instant a photographer seemed to materialize from a bush, Kenneth appeared walking up from god knows where, shooing folks enjoying the park out of the background, and then he stood on a stool, holding a ring light as high as his diminutive frame would allow. That’s when Reagan noticed, walking with purpose up the sidewalk, came his boyfriend, and it was the first time Reagan ever thought to describe a man as glowing. He had a swagger in his step, an easy smile on his lips, and a mood that could almost be felt like an aura.

“What’s going on, honey?” Reagan asked through a toothy smile, as he kept his eyes on the cameraman. Frazzled from weeks of public scrutiny, he couldn’t tell if Elias hired the guy, or if he represented some media outlet. When Elias’ knee hit the ground, and he presented a little box with a glistening engagement ring - a rose gold entwined band with a large blue diamond, Reagan’s attention was torn in twain.

“Reagan Esen Demir… Reah, will you marry me?”

The question hung in the air. Part of Reagan knew he was fully on display. That part of his mind raced. The photographer might not have been with the press, but that didn’t mean those vultures weren’t hanging around, or he wouldn’t sell the photos to them. They were always somewhere after all. Eva was there. Of course this was one of her schemes. She probably wanted a huge positive story to destroy any of the so-called October surprises before they cropped up.

For the other half of Reagan, the proposal was made, and suddenly he and Elias were the only two people in the world. A feeling of joy filled his heart. Ever since the day those hackers ruined his life, Elias had been the only positive daily experience. He had been the support that kept him going through the worst parts of his unwanted transition. Their conversations were the time when he felt the most stimulated. Cuddling on the couch was when he felt most safe. Riding his cock was somehow better sex than any of the tens he’d ever picked up on a night out. When that part of him heard the question, he swooned. That small part of Reagan loved the man, whether he could ever admit it to himself or not.

The politician held his manicured hand over his mouth in shock. Tears welled in Reagan’s eyes, and he uttered a simple, “yes” as Elias slipped the woven band over his dainty finger. He told himself that he was playing the part, that it was all for the press, that the tears were just for show, but the reality was that he was shamefully mourning. While one small part of Reagan was developing feelings for someone other than himself, another died that day, the last part that maintained any resistance to what he’d become. Until he took office, he was what he was, and that was now the happy fiancé of Mr. Elias Arnoult.

Eva watched the spectacle unfolding before her with her jaw on the floor. When Elias texted about the PR event, she knew he was full of it. That kind of event didn’t happen that close by without her knowing about it. Still, she had to satiate her curiosity, and see what her oaf of a brother was up to.

When she arranged for Elias to “play the part” of Reagan’s boyfriend, she thought it would be especially funny not to let the older Arnault sibling in on the plan. The way Elias went on and on about Reagan after their first visit, she knew he’d only be too eager when he heard her bestie was available. His earnest attempts at romance amused her to no end, even more so as Reagan complained about the ruse in private, but she knew that under it all, Elias was a player. Once he’d had his fill, or he’d been turned down enough times, he’d be done with Reagan, and he’d move on to other things.

The idea of the smooth talking blonde being dumped by a man, her brother, made her a bit gleeful. She intended to follow it up with a speed-dating event or some other ****. When it became clear that Reagan truly had a chance at winning the thing, she decided to stop pumping the gas, and to let the two get to know each other organically, only interjecting with the occasional manipulation or two to keep Reagan from opening his mouth and spoiling the whole thing. Besides, Elias seemed to be falling for Reagan in a genuine way she’d never seen from him before. He might have been a torturous egotistical elder brother growing up, but since the beginning of this orchestrated courtship, they’d once again found a kindness in their dynamic that hadn’t been there for years. It wasn’t her intention, but this was good for her brother, and she didn’t want to snatch that away from him just yet.

What she could have never planned for was Elias popping the question, and crazier still, Reagan Demir, the person whose homophobia, and transphobia led her to inflicting such an elaborate and ornate punishment, happily said yes. She began to wonder if perhaps Reagan actually was transgender. Callie seemed to think so. The quickness with which those two assumed a sisterly dynamic was stunning to say the least.

Had all that toxic masculinity before been some kind of performance, or an overcompensation? Did he ever mean any of it or was he just playing the part his toxic ass father had laid out for him. The way Reagan smiled when he was with her brother, reminded her of the charismatic boy from poli-sci she’d met all those years before. Those tears were real too. Reagan could never cry on command. He could hardly cry, period. On top of everything else, Reagan was definitely a willing and eager participant in the exploits she witnessed after her disciplinary session just a couple of days earlier.

It was like, in an instant, she could see the construction of Reagan begin to fall away, and all that remained was Reah, a person as strong as she was beautiful, who could help make the kind of changes Eva truly believed the country needed. It was as obvious as the sky being blue that Reah loved her brother, and while she might still have complicated feelings about being **** to transition before she was ready, her new sister-in-law was going to do whatever it takes to keep the candidate on the right path. For the first time in years, she found a measure of forgiveness.

Eva approached the happy couple, puckered her lips, and planted a gentle kiss on Reagan’s cheek, whispering in his ear, “I’m glad to see I was wrong about that corset. Way to make trends, girl. You’re looking foxy. Welcome to the family, Sis.”

She wrapped her arms around the newly betrothed, and pulled them both into a tight embrace, then she gingerly kissed her big brother on the forehead as she made herself taller by standing on her toes. After that, she knew it wasn’t her time to shine. That was for her best friend, Reah Demir, soon-to-be Arnault. Looking at the man with the camera she decided the photographer needed a little more instruction. The bride-to-be deserved the best engagement pictures after all.

While the flash went off in the background, Reagan gazed deeply into his fiancé’s eyes. As the two inched closer together, their lips met and parted, just enough to share a taste. His arms clasped behind Elias’ neck, while the larger man’s hands found their way down to his backside, and the two pressed firmly together, his leg kicking up behind him like an old Hollywood movie.

He told himself, ‘Yeah... that's uh - perfect for the cameras.’ before closing his eyes and melting into his fiancé’s embrace.