Shipping = The (fan) act of envisioning two characters from a series of manga, anime or other media to be together in a relationship. Shipping is a common part of fan culture, where fans are dedicated to a certain 'ship', aka two characters being together in a relationship. Sometimes this can become a 'shipping war' where the shipping of one couple will automatically void another couple and fans will argue for who the best 'ship' is. I don't tend to get involved in these things often, but after last weekend, I'm definitely one-hundred percent behind a Sakura/Aoi ship, or Aoi/Sakura, I'm not picky.

I dump my bags next to the door and let myself fall on my bed. I'm tired, really tired. There is something about a weekend at a convention and then the travelling home that just exhausts me. Taking the train back was simple and nothing happened to slow us down and the bus to my place was right on time too. But now I'm back home, I'm tired.

I reach out, turning my computer on. I have no idea what I'm going to do with the rest of my day, but I should probably really check the cosplayer forums and see what the guys have been up to while I was away. I've stayed off Discord and other places most of the weekend, too busy with everything, and especially too busy with Izzy.

Just thinking of her gives me these butterflies in my stomach and I grab my phone, looking at the pictures we took. She's beautiful, and I don't know how to react to her most of the time. A girl like her, so cute and adorable and sweet, why would she even look at me? Like... It's like a dream come true, and dreams usually aren't reality. You wake up from them and realise that things aren't as fun or good as they seemed. But that hasn't happened yet.

My phone dings and a notification shows up at the top of my screen. 'You home yet?' It's Benji, one of the friends who couldn't come to AmAnime because they were saving up for another event later this year.

'Yeah. Why?' I send a message back.

'You haven't posted anything last weekend. You got lost or something?'

'Nah. Just got busy, forgot to post.' I usually do post quite a lot of pictures on Twitter or other places during cons, but with me all dressed up as Aoi or in the goth dress, I didn't want to show that off until I was sure I was comfortable with doing so.

'Did you compete in the cosplay competition? I couldn't see you on the website.'

'Yeah, I did. Will show later.' When I get the courage to do so...

I sit up again, sliding behind my computer and I log on. I first check my Twitter, it's easier to browse on a large screen instead of my phone and find that Izzy, Jason and some of the others are now following me there. Cool.

Clicking on Izzy's profile, I see that she's already posted a couple of pictures from the weekend. Just of her or her and her friends, none of us two together, but I guess that's not unexpected. She knows that I wasn't comfortable yet and I guess it's up to me to post the first picture of myself in a skirt.

I smile when I see a picture posted by Jason of Izzy asleep on the train. They didn't even have to go that far and she still managed to sleep? That's skills. Though, the way she's got her face angled to the window, the sun on her face, she looks adorable, like an anime character. And she's not even all dressed up as one, just in a regular t-shirt.

I hit the reply button to the tweet. 'Obviously a sleeping princess. #PostConBlues #SleepingPrincess'

Then I take a shot of all my bags in a heap on the floor and send out a tweet myself. 'Finally back home. Crazy weekend. Lots of fun. Made loads of new friends. Now alone. #PostConBlues #ReadyForConCrud #TooTiredToUnpack'

I look at the other pictures on my phone and decide against posting any of them just yet. I need to come back down to earth first and consider how I feel about being open about my crossdressing. It's not uncommon to crossdress, heck, I've just spent most of the weekend surrounded by people who were crossdressing, but it's new for me, and that scares me.

I get a notification of a reply to my tweet and click on it. It's from Mya. 'Just surprised you got everything home safe in the first place. Next time I'm not carrying all of that again...'

I grin. Well, she's got a point, really. But I should probably invest in big sturdy suitcases or something. Dresses take up a lot of space, especially all the layers of the skirts. If I'm doing this again, that is. Though, I'm pretty sure that I probably will. It was amazing, no matter how scary it was sometimes.

And I met Izzy. I wouldn't have spoken to her that easily if we hadn't both dressed up like characters from Magical Princess Club, so that was definitely a good thing.

Now to get the courage to share this part of myself with people outside of those who were actually at the con...

Maybe later.

Maybe.

***

I put the pan with pasta on the table as Mom looks at me curiously. Since I was at home anyway, I decided to cook dinner, but I'm pretty sure that's not why I'm getting the questioning looks.

"What?" I finally sit down, waiting for Mom to start scooping pasta and sauce onto her plate.

"You look... happy." She raises an eyebrow at me. "Differently happy."

"So?" I shrug, grabbing a spoon since she's apparently not going to do anything and Dad is also looking at me. I scoop pasta onto my plate, but stop before I get the sauce, too nervous about their staring.

"Did you have a good time at the convention?" Dad keeps his eyes on me, reading my reaction.

"Yes, I did." And I squeeze my lips together to hide the smile trying to form on my lips.

"I knew it." Mom grins. "You've got that fluttery thing going on. You met someone."

"I may have." I focus on the sauce, looking at it so I can maybe hide my blushing.

"And you weren't going to tell us?" When I look at Dad, he's grinning.

"I was waiting for you to realise what was going on." I wink at them. "I don't have to immediately tell you everything, you know. A guy can have some secrets."

"Right..." Mom smiles too. "But you're not very good at hiding 'secrets' like this."

Dad also starts scooping things onto his plate. "Who are they?"

"She's called Izzy. She lives in Utrecht and studies fashion. We also both cosplayed characters from the same anime on Saturday."

"So, she's good at making clothes and she's into geeky things..." Dad shrugs. "Sounds like a great match." He doesn't say the rest, but I know that my parents, especially my dad, think that I don't date the right type of girls. It's just not that easy to find girls who are into the same things as I am like anime and manga, at least, not that I've found. It's hard.

"We are." I nod. "We've spent most of the weekend together, to be honest."

"I hope you didn't leave Mya all on her own, did you?" Mom looks at me.

"No. Izzy had some cool friends and Mya hit it off pretty quickly with one of them. She's seeing him later this week again." I didn't leave her all alone, if anything, it was the other way around more... Kevin and her were off together, just the two of them, pretty often.

"And you?" Mom grins.

"I'm going to visit Izzy next weekend. You know, after the unpacking and some good sleep." I take a bite.

"Sounds like you had a great time. Anything else happen this weekend, apart from being stuck to a girl the whole time?"

"Not the whole time," I grumble. We weren't that bad, not really... "Anyway, Izzy and I competed together in the cosplay competition and we won first place."

"Congratulations." Mom beams. "Do you have a picture of you two together? I've seen your cosplay, but if you won, hers has got to be good too."

I shrug, pulling out my phone and showing them a few pictures from the first day.

"She's cute." Mom smiles. "I get why you like her. But it's still a little strange to see you all dressed up like that. Just a skirt or dress around the house is one thing, but fully dressed up like a female anime character, that's a totally different look. It's hard to recognise it's you under all of that."

I shrug, an unease settling in my stomach. I already know that. I know that they think me dressing 'like a girl' is odd, even though they won't say a bad word about it. I know that they're still getting used to the idea of me doing this. And that makes me think of Izzy and how my parents may react to finding out Izzy is trans... I don't know. Not that they have to know about it right now, or I'd have to tell them, but they're still getting used to me crossdressing and I know that they've got a lot of questions that they won't ask.

Like the way they asked about me having met 'someone' and who 'they' were. It's no longer automatically 'girl' and 'her'. It's somehow like I've also supposedly changed my sexuality just because I changed my wardrobe choices... They've been acting like I've changed in more ways and I don't even know how to talk to them about it, about their assumptions.

And, somewhere, I'm scared. I'm scared that if I tell them about Izzy being trans, that they're going to expect that I want that too. That I also want to become a girl.

Because that's what makes them the most uncomfortable, that I look very much like a girl in the cosplay pictures. I've seen them look at them with that questioning look, like they want to ask me if I want to live like that all the time, but they don't dare to actually ask me.

So, instead, they've started to use words that could apply to more than just one gender. Like they feel that they have to be super inclusive or something just to keep me comfortable.

It's frustrating, but I also don't want to explain every last detail to them. Yes, I like dressing up in dresses and skirts and I've got wigs with long hair and Mya has been teaching me about putting on makeup. But I'm also still the same guy I've alway been. I like girls, especially cute girls with long hair, and my sexuality or my gender hasn't changed just because I now dress differently.

But I guess that my biggest fear is that they'll feel like my crossdressing is just a 'phase' between being a boy and wanting to live as a girl. That I'll want to be like Izzy too. And no matter the thoughts going through my head since Izzy told me about herself, none of them were that I wanted to be a girl. There have been a lot thoughts of asking her fashion tips and of how to get a more feminine shape in clothes, hence my stupid question about her boobs, but none of them were any more involved than that.

I don't know. I guess I'm scared that people will assume that I am trans too, like Izzy, or that I'll want to be different, when they find out about my crossdressing and that it will change things for me that I don't want to change. That people will treat me differently.

And that feels stupid. That worry feels so stupid, no matter how strong it is.

Being different isn't bad, but I've never really been different, so the thought is becoming it is scary.