I Feel Pretty, Oh So Pretty... (J'ash)

[Aftershock]

Lilu finished the final braid of blonde hair, biting her cherry-red lips with straight, white teeth in concentration as she used string to secure the end. The redheaded Candidate had met Jerashina the other day out in the Weyr, and had gotten along with her right from the start. She found it a bit odd that she had never seen her around before, and something told her she looked strangely familiar, but Lilu never liked pursuing such thoughts... if she thought too hard, sometimes her head would hurt and she would get really sad like she did when she first woke up back in Igen Hold, and so she generally accepted things at face value. She felt much happier that way, letting all the being pretty and boys and flirting help her forget the hurt in her soul. Running a brush through the back, she stepped back to see it all, putting a fist to her mouth and squealing quietly. "Ooooh! It's so perfect! You look beautiful," she gushed, holding up a mirror so Jerashina could see herself . She had braided two front sections of Jerashina's hair, then tied them together behind her head while using a warmed iron rod to add some waves to the back underneath where the braids linked. She reached forward to brush an errant hair from Jerashina's eyes before reaching out to a bowl of fruit, selecting a cherry and nipping off a piece before reaching out and rubbing the bitten part carefully over Jerashina's lips, staining them red with the juice.

As she reached over to the bowl of ashes mixed with ground blue flower petals and put her thumbs in it, rubbing her thumbs over Jerashina's eyelids, she said, "I was so happy to meet you, Jerashina! I haven't seen you around before, but it's always so nice to meet someone who I can have a makeover with! It's always so fun getting pretty so it's easier to tease the boys," she added, winking her clear blue-grey eyes as she wiped her thumbs off on a rag and reached for the blush, lightly dusting it over Jerashina's cheeks. "There, wonderful," she exclaimed, putting her hands on her skirt-clad hips. She smoothed out her tight-fitting blouse and said, "Okay, my turn, let me have the seat!"

[Shiny]

J'ash stared at the lie that was his reflection with disbelieving silver orbs. He glanced at the concentrating face of the girl standing behind him in the mirror and flashed a smile that was uneasy (although he highly doubted she would see it as anything other than friendly) when she connected eyes with him. With Lilu's fingers weaving through his lengthy, silky, arrow-straight hair, J'ash had to remind himself of exactly how he had gotten into this situation in the first place.

He had been getting hit on (mockingly, no doubt) again by men at every single meal that J'on hadn't gone to him with, and after one brutally mean bullying session, J'ash had snapped. For the next few days, J'ash had paraded around as his flashiest, girliest version of Jerashina ever, to the motto 'fine, if they want a girl then girl they shall have.' He had even worn the over-the-top dress made for him for the Auction, obvious undertones of extreme anger simmering below his overdone feminine appearance.

It was during one of his particularly outstanding dramatic events in the middle of the Dining Hall that he met Lilu. Pretty much all of the males around him had been staring at him, not realizing he was actually a he. In response, he pulled down one of his eyelids and stuck his tongue out, blowing a very rude raspberry at them. "Try anything and I'll sock it to ya, ya lumps of disgusting man meat." Lilu had been sitting at the same table and had witnessed his rebellion.

J'ash smiled and repeated Lilu as she stepped back, making sure to fix the male undertones of his voice into a more feminine one. Not that he had to try all that hard. "Beautiful." He stared at what she had done to his hair. It certainly was amazing. For a girl. Which he wasn't, but she didn't know that.

He let his eyelids flutter closed as Lilu began to work on his face, hoping to Faranth that she wouldn't notice the obvious embossed skin that decorated his face in scars. She probably wouldn't - he had made sure to cake on lots of foundation powder before departing to her living quarters. Her very girly living quarters. J'ash let a gentle smile grace his lips as he felt her fingers brush across his eyelids, and then something soft and juicy on his lips.

Opening his eyes to check his reflection, he had to remind himself that he did indeed have a phallus between his legs. Holy hell did he ever look convincing. "Wow, you're amazing, Lilu." He stood and switched places with the girl, noting that she was the same height as him - relatively tall. They were about the same thinness too, although he noted (sadly) that she had a little more muscle than he did. He was just a pile of sticks. "Getting pretty is a lot of fun, especially to tease those boys." That was indeed true, and was the premises of his Jerashina act lately.

J'ash began by combing through her red hair, marveling over its softness and colour. He reached over and pulled a lovely light-blue coloured ribbon from her pile of silks and draped it over her shoulder for later use. He then began to braid her hair into one long tail, fingers expertly threading her fine hair around itself. "So tell me more about yourself and how you wound up becoming a Candidate!" He grinned, trying to divert anything that would get them onto the topic of gender.

[Aftershock]

Lilu bit her lower lip a bit in thought before responding, "That's a pretty short story. I woke up in the home of a Holder in Igen Hold up north, and I didn't remember anything from before that moment. I was really, really sad though, like so sad I wanted to die, so they gave me something because they had trouble holding me back, and then I was sort sleepy and numb for a while, and then this greenrider named Elisabeta and another rider named Farryl showed up, and told me I was going to be a Candidate down here in Selenitas Weyr, and here I am." She smiled as she finished her story, obviously expecting it to be all Jerashina wanted to hear.

[Shiny]

J'ash's predicament was momentarily shoved to the back of his mind as Lilu began to tell him a very much fast-forwarded story. "Woah, woah, hold on there, missy!" he said as he continued weaving her hair into a braid. "Can we slow that down a bit? I'm afraid I only caught bits. So you're from the North, but you don't remember anything..?" He watched her face in the mirror, trying to see if there was any of that 'uncontrollable' nature visible in her expression. All he saw was air-headed, blissful girlishness. But he wouldn't be surprised if there was actually something else hidden inside of her - maybe a brain?

"Have you ever tried to remember what happened before that?" Either she was hit very, very, very hard on the head, or some protective mechanism inside her head was blocking her past from her. All of a sudden, Lilu became all the more interesting to J'ash - not that she wasn't interesting in the first place - but now, there could be something really worth discovering that was not what colour of lipstick matched his dress in the different seasons.

Finally reaching the end of the braid, J'ash slid the powder blue ribbon from Lilu's shoulder and tied a bow to keep his hard work intact. "Well, I suppose I owe you a story, don't I? I was raised in a small Cothold near Blossom Hold. I guess you could call it a farm - we just grew enough to feed ourselves and sell a little of our produce for a few extra coin. I had parents and a little brother, but one day he, he died," J'ash gulped, but other than a momentary pause and a brief glimmer of sadness in his eyes, he seemed fine (he was getting rather good at hiding his grief when explaining his past), "and I was really, really sad, too. So sad I wanted to die. And then Farryl and Peppeth Searched me to become a Candidate, and here I am." There, he'd managed to get through that without shedding a tear. The bluegreenrider mentally patted himself on the back. Best to change the subject though - he didn't want to leak on Lilu's hair. That, and he was certain his voice might be dropping a little more into guy-sounding-range when he got upset.

"Fancy that, Farryl assisted us both in recovering from misery!" He smiled shakily, stroking Lilu's hair passively. Subconsciously, he suddenly felt a stronger connection to this girl. "Hey, can I touch up your face? Not that there's anything wrong with it, I just want to have a little fun is all~" Truth was that he was just finding something to keep them both busy so they could keep talking without her inspecting him too closely.

[Aftershock]

Lilu smiled vapidly at Jerashina's questions, saying, "No, you didn't miss anything. That's it. Very simple, in fact. I like it that way, honestly. Thinking too hard hurts sometimes." Frowning a bit at Jerashina's second question, she responded, "No, I don't like to think about it. I tried before, early on, and it just made me sad again. I don't like being sad, so I do my best not to think about it. Teasing boys and being pretty helps keep my mind off the sadness."

As Jerashina told her story, Lilu nodded supportively, reaching back to place a delicate hand on Jerashina's own. "I'm sorry to hear about your brother, Jerashina. I'm glad Farryl could help you, too, though. It's like we're sisters in that way," she concluded, grinning happily and clapping her hands lightly. At Jerashina's other question, she turned in the chair and said, "Oh, sure! I'd love to see what you can do! Make me beautiful," she finished, pouting her lips playfully.