How to leave the closet

Alfred had decided for them to go to the best place in town as he called it. But apparently, everyone shared his mind, for as they arrived at the entrance to \'Glorified\' there was already a line of people just waiting to be let in. Arthur sighed and plunged his hands deep down into the pockets of his jacket. "This can take a while," he mumbled and shrugged his shoulders from the cold. Alfred tip-toed and tried to get a glimpse of the doorway.



"We don\'t have a while to wait, it\'s no fun," he said biting down onto his lower lip. He sighed and fell back down onto his heels, slumped an arm around Arthur\'s shoulders. "If we can just find Toris, it\'ll be no problem cutting the line." Arthur raised his brows and sent him a curious look.



"Toris?"



"One of my friends, he sometimes works here as a bouncer."



"Oh…" Arthur tried tip-toeing, too, to get a better view, although he had no idea what the man looked like. "You surely know a lot of people around here."



"Well, I practically spend every day of the week down here," Alfred smiled and flashed a grin as he continued, "it\'ll be so much fun introducing ya to \'em all!" Arthur laughed.



"Ah, showing off the straight fellow, hah?"



"Exactly, sir." Alfred offered him a sloppy salute. Someone snickered.



"Oh, that\'s, like, totally cute." Arthur turned around only to be met by high heels and strawberry lipstick. The girl wasn\'t very tall, had very bright, almost white, hair and green eyes. She raised a perfectly plucked eyebrow at him. "Oh, hey stalker, could you, like, stop staring? I know I am super hot, but you\'re totally so not my type of guy." Arthur blinked and hastily looked down somewhat embarrassing. Alfred snickered and clapped his back.



"Owh, Feliks, be kind to the man! He\'s not used to seeing guys like you around here." Arthur almost choked on his own spit. Guy? Feliks straightened up in his back and grinned.



"Like, sorry guys. Gilbert called and said you were coming, so I, like, thought I would come and make sure you got in, yeah."



"That\'s so cool! Thanks, Feliks!" Alfred hugged the other. Arthur went back to staring at them, not sure how he should react. But he tried to smile the smile of a thankful man, for it seemed Alfred\'s friendship with everyone could do some good. After all, he was freezing cold. Standing in line for an hour wasn\'t his idea of a good night.



Feliks, the guy that looked like a girl, freed himself of Alfred\'s embrace and stepped over to Arthur, looking at him as if he expected something. He sloped his head to the side and winked at him. "Eh, I totally don\'t see you greeting me nicely, man." Greeting him nicely? Arthur wetted his dry lips with his tongue, uncertainty written all over his face. "Greet me as a girl." He held forward his hand. Long, pink nails. Arthur cleared his throat.



"Uh, right… Sorry, Miss." He softly took Feliks\' hand in his, bowed down and gave it a light kiss. The guy\'s grin was wider than his face allowed.



"I totally like this one, Alfred, totally! He, like, said miss and all, did you hear that? So cool!" Feliks turned to Alfred who nodded.



"Is Toris working today?"



"Yeah, like, he never misses one of my shows!" Arthur crossed his arms and swayed from heel to toe and back again as he tried to stay warm while Alfred and Feliks chatted away. He found it somewhat calming that the guy seemed to be fairly normal even though he was wearing woman\'s clothing. He, however, had to admit that he preferred a regular man in trousers and shirt and not frilly skirts and leggings. But it was still thrilling seeing a cross dresser up close. He really looked like a woman. If he\'d met Feliks somewhere else, like at work, he could have been fooled easily.



"Arthur, wake up." Alfred snapped his fingers in front of Arthur\'s eyes. He blinked and focused on his cheery blue eyes. "Come on, we\'re cutting the line. Toris is at work, so it\'s no problem."



"Really?" Uh.." Arthur saw the back of Alfred showing itself forward in line. He reached out and took a hold of his jacket, shyly stepping in between the others. He felt like an intruder, or some newbie getting all the benefits from doing nothing. At first he tried smiling friendly at the faces he passed, but all the eyes looking at him as he stepped over toes and wrinkled shirts made him uncomfortable, and instead he kept his eyes on the ground.



"Toris!" Feliks had made his way to the front on no time, hugging a taller guy. "So, like, Alfred and his date totally want to get in - that\'s alright, isn\'t it? You totally won\'t tell the boss, right?" Arthur could only hear parts of what was being spoken in the turmoil of people complaining about them getting quick entrance. Bits like "give you a totally nice reward" and "best man ever" reached him in Feliks\' begging voice, and before he knew what was going on, he was let inside the filled room, a heavy smell of sweat and alcohol blowing him over.



"Holy-" Arthur\'s fingers slid from Alfred\'s jacket to quickly slam over his ears. Outside the music had been soothing, but inside it was devastating loud, even louder than at the last place. But as he peeked towards Alfred, he seemed nowhere bothered; instead he was just zipping his jacket open and taking a look around. As Alfred caught his gaze, he laughed - or so it seemed, Arthur couldn\'t hear the sounds coming from his mouth - and gestured for Arthur to follow him.



Feliks hadn\'t been the only cross dresser, but he\'d been one of the more successful. Arthur took his time to eat up every detail possible with his eyes as they walked along the walls. Most of the men in dresses really looked like men in dresses. No more, no less, hairy legs and whiskers sticking out through their make-up. Arthur grimaced and had to look away as one of them winked at him. He wasn\'t disgusted by the general thought of a guy wearing a dress, but couldn\'t they at least try to look like ladies? Flashing cock and armpits with hair long enough to make ponytails of was just doing no good for their gender-disguising.



Alfred suddenly grabbed his arm and drew him in close. With his lips pressed closely to Arthur\'s ear, he howled: "Feliks will be on stage in a few minutes - I wanna go see him before the show. Ya just wait here, \'kay?" Arthur nodded and received a wet kiss on his forehead. "Cool." Alfred\'s hand slid down his arm and gave his hand a short tug, before he tumbled away. Arthur leaned against the wall and crossed his arms while trying to look casual, as well as he tried not to be seen.



It was painfully hot. All the dancing bodies were heating up the room and only little fresh air was allowed in through the door. Arthur zipped his jacket open and took it off, tucked it in underneath his arm. He planned on just watching the crowd without mingling with the gays, but as he let his gaze roam over the dancing men, someone was staring openly at him. At first Arthur tried to ignore the insisting eyes, then he tried to figure out if he\'d seen that person somewhere before, and then fear kicked in as the rude man started to walk towards him.



"Dear God, let it not be someone from work I can\'t remember, let it not be an old client, let it not be some rapist. Let it be someone who\'ve mistaken me for someone else."



Arthur was smiling awkwardly as his brain rambled on. Then the guy was in front of him, just staring. He was a little tinier than himself, Asian, with long, black hair and brown eyes. He raised a brow and tapped at Arthur\'s chest with a finger.



"Oh, so that\'s the great man, hah? Doesn\'t look so great from where I\'m standing." He took a step back and snorted unimpressed. "I can see why Kiku is upset." Arthur was bewildered.



"What-eh… Are you talking about? I\'m not sure I\'m following you…" The man looked even less impressed.



"You\'re not even from around here, are you?"



"What\'s that question for?"



"Listen!" The man stepped forward and grabbed him by the tie, tightening the knot as he did so. Arthur placed his hands over the other\'s to shove them off, but he found himself stopping as he looked into a pair of angry eyes. "Kiku is like a brother to me, you get that, hah? I\'m not letting some stuck-up straight guy run away with his love, count on that!"



"I have no idea what the hell you\'re talking about! Let go!" Arthur took a hold of the man\'s wrists and shoved him away. "What a rude way to approach a stranger!" The man smiled a sick, humoured smile.



"You didn\'t seem to think so as you approached Alfred rather bluntly." Arthur\'s eyes widened. The man\'s smile turned to a smirk. "Right, I know it all. The pants down, stiff cocks. And now you have the nuts to go and be seen with him here, hah? Guys like you make me sick!" He spat the last sentence, straightening up in his back as he sent Arthur a wicked glare. "If you\'re with Alfred, then Kiku is hurt. And I don\'t like my brothers being hurt, you hear me?" Arthur was fiddling with getting his tie back straight. He hesitated at the man\'s words.



"You\'re threatening me?"



"Yao takes care of his family." The man, apparently called Yao, turned his back to Arthur. He threw a short look over his shoulder. "Take care." And as swiftly as he\'d arrived, as swiftly did he disappear into the crowd. Arthur was left with a bad feeling clenching his heart tightly.



"Come, we have to hurry to get to the front!" An arm grabbed Arthur around his waist. He squirmed, assured that it was Yao coming to beat him up for good, but as he looked up it was into Alfred\'s smiling face. It was as if relief filled his body at once, and the beat of the music returned to his ears, when before it had felt as if he and the stranger had been trapped in a parallel dimension, only seeing and hearing each other.



"Don\'t go like that!" Arthur scolded him, and Alfred grinned.



"Sorry, but come on." He pulled Arthur with him into the crowd and towards the lit-up stage that had been taken over by a flock of girls dressed in pink. Arthur had no time to think over whether he should tell Alfred about his meeting with Yao or not, for suddenly the music was stopped, and another CD was set to play. "Boy, boy!" the girls started crying and swayed with their hips, and they turned to face the crowd. They were not girls. They were men. And now Feliks came out from between them, holding a microphone and pouting with his pink lips. Alfred hauled Arthur in closer, smiling brightly.



Feliks stopped when he was in the centre of the stage, spread his legs dramatically and started singing into the microphone with a deep voice: "Turn around. Stand up like a man and look me in the eyes! Turn around. Take one final look at what you left behind!" He was rocking his hips like a madman, matching the beat of the music perfectly. Arthur couldn\'t help but let go of a smile as the girls started to match Feliks\' movements. "Then walk away, from the greatest lover you have ever known! Yes walk away! You\'re telling me that you can make it on your own by yourself, all alone without my help. Mister! - you just made a big mistake!"



"Wow, this is great!" Arthur admitted and broke out in a big grin as Feliks ripped off his skirt, revealing a shorter rainbow-coloured one hidden underneath. Alfred swayed eagerly with the beat.



"I know, ya, I know!"



"You think you\'re a man, but you\'re only a boy! You think you\'re a man, you are only a toy!"



"He does this often?" Alfred chuckled.



"A lot!"



Feliks was now standing on the edge of the stage as he laughed into the microphone and sent them a suggestive glare.



"Where are the men?!" he screamed. Arthur gawked as Alfred pushed him towards the stage.



"That\'s ya cue, sweetie!" Arthur struggled to get away from the platform, but two of the dancing men reached down and grabbed him by the arms and someone pushed him from behind and suddenly he was where he didn\'t wanted to be - on stage for public display.



Arthur felt as if he was about to faint as he gazed at the many faces down there underneath him. He felt they were staring, seeing his fear as if they were wild animals on hunt. He opened his mouth, but no words would come out, and he tried to get down from the platform, but there were too crowded and therefore nowhere for him to set his foot. He tried looking for his lost jacket, just to have something to cover up in, but it was nowhere to be seen.



"I didn\'t ask for this! I never did anything wrong! I just stood there, watched the show, had fun! I did nothing to deserve this!"



Arthur was about to boil over from embarrassment, but then Feliks grabbed his wrists and pulled him in for a dance, and he felt he had no choice but to follow, so that\'s what he did. He took a hold of Feliks waist as had he been a girl, and grabbed his hands with the microphone, and then he started swirling around with him. Feliks blinked with his eyes in surprised, he had clearly counted on him leading Arthur around, but then he laughed and fell into the role of the submissive female perfectly. He allowed Arthur to decide their way, and soon the fear that had been burdening Arthur\'s heart was changed into a bubbly feeling of glee. Delight spread across his face as he looked at the crowd, dancing men and cheering men and men smiling and having fun. No one pointing fingers, no one sending him strange looks, no one wondering what a man like him was doing on stage with a girly boy like Feliks. It was like in a movie.



Movie. True. Movies were always better than reality. Arthur remembered. He remembered sitting in the living room with his family, his brothers complaining about the film they watched being stupid. His mother had been furious. \'What is that?\' she\'d asked, \'a main character being gay? That\'s disgusting! That\'s disgusting!\' His father had turned off the television. \'You never saw that,\' he\'d grumbled and went to mow the lawn, to take a drink, to do something, anything manly that would assure him that he was everything but like those homosexual fellows.



His mother had hold a long speech about the difference between movies and reality. \'In movies, sometimes things are being portrayed as being okay when they\'re really not. As the good viewers, we must learn the ability to tell the difference between good and bad.\'



He\'d asked her why the movie they\'d just watched was bad. She\'d grabbed him by the shoulder and shaken him. \'Why? Why\'re you asking such a question, boy? Would you like to be like him in the movie? Chasing men and illnesses! Gays are made of diseases and sins, I\'m telling you! Such a man makes his mother cry!\'



Arthur had always tried to do his best not to see his mother cry. He\'d been taking a good education, he\'d gotten a good job, a wife. But it had all made him cry, it had all made him unhappy.



This was making him happy. This was thrilling. It was like in the movies, but better, much better, for this was reality, and if his mother wanted to cry, she could weep the night away!



"Alfred! Alfred, look, I am dancing! I am dancing on a stage with a cross dresser!" Arthur cried, and Alfred gave him a thumb up.



"Way to go, Arthur!"



"Come, join me!" Arthur let go of Feliks who hastily went back to singing. He offered Alfred his hands with a big smile, face flustered and heart beating rapidly. "Come and dance with me!" Alfred had no hesitation in him as he grabbed onto Arthur\'s hands and set off with his feet, swinging himself onto stage. Arthur was pressed to his chest, and he buried his face in the crook of his neck.



"How come ya\'re suddenly so happy?" Alfred asked with a pondering look while they awkwardly tumbled around in between the professional male-dancers. Arthur shrugged his shoulders and mumbled something. "What?"



"I am just feeling good." Alfred slipped a hand through his hair. Arthur looked up.



"Is that so?"



"Yeah."



"Hmm." He leaned down and captured Arthur\'s lips with his own. Arthur sighed and stretched his arms to lock them around Alfred\'s neck, drawing him down for a more passionate kiss. He wondered if Alfred could taste his joy and relief in that kiss, for he wanted him to so badly.



They stumbled off of stage, went to the bar, still closely entangled. Arthur was almost letting Alfred carry him all the way, hanging onto his shoulders as if his dear life depended on it. He got his cosmopolitan as well as some Sex and the City-joke. Alfred got a shot of vodka and a seat next to Arthur.



"I want to try that again!" Arthur exclaimed, his eyes resting on the stage. Feliks had gotten down again, some bloke and his three lovers had taken over, making a strip-show. Alfred stared openly.



"How about trying that instead?"



"I am not stripping in public."



"Just yet."



"Just yet." Arthur nodded and looked at Alfred. Then he snickered. "I must admit," he said, taking his glass and swirling the liquid around, "that I am glad you brought me here." Alfred ruffled his hair and smiled.



"And I\'m glad ya came."



"Feliks seems nice."



"So is his boyfriend." The brown-haired bouncer man from earlier took a seat next to Arthur. Alfred smiled.



"Of course. Hey, Arthur, Toris. Toris, Arthur." Arthur nodded towards Toris.



"I\'m Feliks\' boyfriend," he introduced himself further. Arthur smiled a little.



"And I seem to go by \'Alfred\'s date\'."



"Oh, flattering," Toris giggled. Alfred stuck his tongue out at him.



"You\'re just jealous."



"Ahh, I, like, totally disagree with you on that." Feliks\' arms sneaked around Toris waist, and a lipstick-mark was quickly left on his cheek. "Liked my show?" Toris leant back and kissed Feliks\' chin.



"I like all of your shows. Leaves the audience flabbergasted."



"Flabbergasted? Like, a really nice word." Arthur watched the two of them getting all cuddly with each other. Alfred kissed his earlobe and tickled the back of his neck with his fingertips.



"You\'re jealous?" he asked in a low voice, smirking jokingly. Arthur snorted at the humour.



"Oh, I\'ve always wanted a man in dress, of course I am jealous," he whispered back, making the other chuckle.



"Well, we\'ll be heading home for the night," Toris announced and got up. Feliks clung to his arm.



"Yeah, for the night. Like, really for the night, if you totally get the sexual joke, yeah." Toris rolled his eyes. Arthur smiled politely.



"I think we all got it."



"Nice."



"Yeah, so, bye." Toris was quick to end the conversation without any more of Feliks\' sexual references. Arthur watched Toris\' calm frame and Feliks\' swaying butt all the way out of the club. He then turned to Alfred with wide eyes.



"Just where did you meet that couple, be honest." Alfred seemed to give it a good thought, though his eyes didn\'t promise any brain-activity.



"Somewhere… in the town… when I was stoned."



"That was very precise." Alfred sighed.



"I know, \'young people of today\'." Arthur downed his drink and hammered the glass back down onto the table.



"No, \'young person of today\' is the cue, the answer is Alfred. Ding-ding-ding, correct, what have I won?" Alfred stared at him.



"What have you been drinking when I was looking away?"



"Confidence." Arthur held up his arm and tried to show off his muscles, but nothing really moved underneath his skin. They both stared at his arm for a second before breaking into helpless laughter.



"Mhmm, I think they\'ve added a secret ingredient to this drink," Arthur snickered and gave the glass a poke with his finger. Alfred nodded with unsmiling eyes.



"Like, a little manliness?"



"Did you just say \'like\'?"



"Totally."



"Like, that\'s totally not in fashion right now, yeah." Arthur swung his hand around in the air, imitating Feliks. Alfred made a loud gasp as if he was finding Arthur\'s gestures very rude, and he stood up.



"Like, say that again?" Arthur stood up as well.



"If I have to, like, yeah!" Alfred grabbed his waist and swung him around.



"Uhh, dare you to try again!" Arthur grimaced and grabbed onto Alfred\'s shirt.



"No swinging after three cosmopolitans, Alfred." Alfred stopped and scratched his neck.



"Sorry."



"Like hell you are." Arthur smirked and took a hold of his head with a hand on each cheek, bringing it down in his own level. Alfred blew hot air over Arthur\'s lips.



"Then what am I?" Arthur kissed him shortly.



"Mhmm, tasting of vodka. That\'s what you are." Alfred snickered.



"Oh, gimme some cosmopolitan already," he mumbled, took a hold of Arthur\'s head and kissed him. Arthur responded to his affection with eager, sloping his head to the side to get more of Alfred\'s lips, his tongue and the warm breath of his. There was something calming, yet exciting, about letting go and just sense the other. Arthur allowed his knees to go weak as they wanted to, and he leaned in against Alfred\'s chest, feeling his trained muscles move underneath his tight shirt. That\'s how he felt good, he realised. Like that.



*



A shot of vodka and two glasses of strange liquid later, he, however, didn\'t feel all that good.



"Hell," Arthur gasped, pressing the palm of his hand to Alfred\'s chest to keep himself distant from his warm body. "I feel like I can\'t… breath." They were in the middle of the dancing mass. Alfred looked like he hadn\'t even understood that they were dancing, randomly throwing himself at Arthur as if they were alone in his bedroom.



"What?"



"Breath.""Good plan."



"No, you see, I can\'t do that."



"Do what?"



"Breath!" Alfred grabbed Arthur\'s shoulders and started to make his way towards the bar.



"Go to the bathroom. There are open windows and air." Arthur was just stumbling along, nodding like an idiot. Sure. Bathroom. Air. He didn\'t even noticed as Alfred let go of him, too focused on making his way to the toilets. He slammed the door open and tumbled to the nearest stall, locking the door behind. He slid down to sit on the toilet seat, taking in a deep breath. It smelled. But the air was fresher out here, he had to admit that. The sounds were not that pleasant, though. Someone was taking their sweet time pissing. It sounded like someone else was sniffing cocaine. The stall next to him was empty. He leaned his cheek against the wall and allowed his burning brain a time-out.



"Too much… to drink…" His brain agreed. His heart didn\'t. It bounced around happily. All the kisses from Alfred and his tender touches and his smiles and the dances. Would he rather had missed all of that to avoid a simple headache? The answer obviously had to be no.



Arthur blinked. What was that? As he moved a little, he noticed the hole in the wall separating his stall from the next one. It wasn\'t huge, large enough for a cock, which was just what it was indented for. He couldn\'t help but smile. Silly.



The door slammed open. He could hear how two sets of feet made their way across the floor. Arthur eyed the shadows flickering across the ground, shaking and needy, the two men were clearly touching each other not so innocently. The door to the stall next to him was opened and locked, and the sloppy noises of kissing grew heavy. Someone sat down on the toilet loudly, and a zipper was ripped down.



"Don\'t be so brutal," a muffled voice grunted before it turned messy, the sound of licking and moans filled the bathroom. Arthur sat all quiet and listened shyly to the action going on just next to him. He had to admit that it sounded rather hot, but he had a hard time connecting the sounds to the images he was getting in his head. Probably due to the alcohol.



Arthur\'s gaze flickered to the wall. There was the hole… He grinned.



"What is happening to me? A man doesn\'t do that… Or, well, I guess it was a man who made that hole in hopes of it being used."



Arthur leant towards it and took a peek. He had a hard time holding back a gasp as the sight that welcomed him from the other side.



He could see the frame of a younger man getting his mouth abused by a cock, the man above him furiously having taken a hold of his head, shoving his member in and out his mouth. Spit was dripping down his lips, dirtying his chin and turtleneck sweater. The man ripped his head back to get a mouthful of air down, before he willingly offered himself to the other again.



"Wow…" Arthur licked his lips. The scenery was getting his blood flowing south, and it wasn\'t a good thing, for he had only planned for a short break in the bathroom. He placed a hand over his groin, just letting it rest there for now.



"Fuck!" The standing man\'s movements grew more erratic. The other just followed along until he was suddenly shoved back, and cum spilled across his face. He made a face of annoyance.



"Damn, that wasn\'t necessarily!" He ripped off some toilet paper and wiped off the sperm from his cheek. The other man chuckled deeply.



"I can always trust you when I need quick relief." He leant down and kissed the other man\'s forehead.



Arthur felt sick.



Not because of the scenery, hell no, but as he saw the man who just came, the blood froze inside his veins. It was Francis Bonnefoy, his chief from work, Alfred\'s dad, and apparently a homosexual blowjob-pimp.



Arthur slammed the door open, but his legs had decided to go numb, so he fell down onto the floor. He gasped desperately, trying to get to his feet as quick as possible. He most certainly wasn\'t in the mood for a confrontation with Francis!



Finally on both feet again, he made it to the door and outside. Alfred waved at him as soon as he caught his gaze, but Arthur was too provoked to really noticed. He just wanted to get out. All the way out. But he stumbled and fell.



"Arthur?" Alfred staggered over to him and kneeled beside him. "Arthur, are you alright?"



"No! Your dad-…Your fath… I…" Arthur hid his face behind his hands. Someone came over to them. He could hear noises above his head as they talked.



"Bring him home, I\'ll call a cab." Arthur was lifted to his feet by Alfred\'s strong arms. He leant up against the other as they walked towards the exit.



"You\'ve had too much to drink, that\'s all," Alfred promised him, though he wasn\'t walking in a straight line himself. Arthur shook his head as his throat was burning for getting the chance to explain, but it only took thirty seconds for him to forget. Instead he just leaned into Alfred\'s embrace, closed his eyes and passed out with a sigh.