Shopping Is Hard
To me, the subway is murder. Anyone who's ever ridden a weekday train in the capital region would surely agree—there are too many people, far too many. Finding a seat is hard enough, and even shifting around comes with restrictions. I hated that feeling that everyone around me was surveilling my every move, that suffocating crush of being packed body to body with strangers. The unavoidable physical contact, too.
Time to stop thinking and face reality. Right in front of me stands an office worker, one hand gripping the handrail, the other clutching a briefcase. His back is turned, so I can't see his expression, but I'm sure he's flustered—because my chest is pressed flat against his back. I'm so sorry, but this is not intentional on my part!
Lee Sooin and I had agreed to meet next weekend, in front of a certain cafe in Sinchon. Wearing the leather, of course. Apparently showing up bare-faced was too embarrassing, or something like that—which I completely understood. The problem was that only after we'd set the date did I remember I didn't currently own a bra. Oh no. What am I going to do?
On my last outing I'd squeezed my eyes shut and made do with band-aids, but that wouldn't fly this time. My image would be branded perverted for sure. No, wait—wasn't I already beyond saving the moment I bought a female skinsuit to enjoy? Either way, I needed underwear. If I ordered now, a delivery would arrive before the weekend, but remembering my earlier mistake, I figured it might be better to visit a store in person. Might as well pick up a few other things while I was at it, and hear what the staff had to advise.
As it happened, there was a large department store about thirty minutes from my apartment by subway. What about class, you ask? Today was technically a weekday, but every lecture had been canceled—a free day. There couldn't have been a better day for a relaxed shopping trip.
And now, here I am on the subway. No—the hellway. With every jolt of the rattling train, my whole body bounces up and down. Chest included. The office worker ahead of me is probably thinking something soft and broad is rubbing against his back. And since I'm currently wearing band-aids in place of a bra, he's probably also sensing that something is, well, jutting out. Ugh, my head hurts…
Huh?!
Something hard has just made contact with my backside. What the—is he a groper? To think men with that much gall still existed. I turn my head slightly, ready to give him a piece of my mind, and find a man who looks barely into his twenties, both hands gripping the handrail, his face flushed scarlet. Hold on. Both hands? Then whatever's touching me right now is…?
"Um… I'm not doing this on purpose, it's just, everyone keeps shoving into me… I'm really sorry!!"
The moment our eyes met, he whispered it in a voice so small only I could hear. Judging by his expression… he really did mean it. The crowd had grown since earlier, and besides, I was hardly in a position to point fingers. I gave a small nod, quietly answered, "It's fine," and turned to face forward again. Ten minutes. Just ten more minutes and I'd be free of this. Hold out a little longer!
Those were the longest ten minutes of my life. Truly. When I felt that sensation against my backside steadily growing, I was mortified beyond words. Well… it happens. I'm a man myself; I know exactly how those physiological reactions work. And when the train braked into a station and I lost my balance, grabbing the office worker's shoulders with both hands, I nearly wept. Sneaking a glance as I got off, I found him wearing the deadest eyes I'd ever seen. Apologizing silently, over and over, I fled the station.
At last, I had arrived. After an eternity of endurance (thirty minutes), I stormed the department store. I'd visited a few times before to buy clothes, so the layout was familiar—though of course, today's purchases would be women's. Men's floor: the sixth. Women's floor: the seventh. Farewell, sixth floor—and welcome, seventh. The view of the women's section rising slowly into sight over the escalator was… surprisingly ordinary. Well, it's not like there was any reason for it to be special. What had I even been expecting?
I wandered around slowly, studying the merchandise, but knowing next to nothing about women's underwear, everything looked more or less the same to me. Ideally I'd buy the same brand as my panties, but what was it called again? The memory wouldn't surface. Left with no alternative, I stepped into the nearest lingerie counter.
"Excuse me, could I ask you something?"
"Of course, ma'am. What can I do for you?"
"Well, the thing is, I'm looking to buy a bra, and I was wondering if you could recommend one."
"And what are you wearing at the moment? The lines we carry are… um."
The clerk, who'd been chatting away with a warm smile, faltered mid-sentence. The way her gaze darted back and forth around my chest told me everything I needed to know. Ah. She's figured out there's nothing under my clothes. But the fact that her smile never wavered even as her words died—maybe she was a veteran of the trade?
"Ahem. Well then, first we'll need to measure your bust size. Could you wait for me in the fitting room for just a moment?"
"Ah, yes—no! I'll, I'll measure myself!"
"I'm sorry? But…"
"I'm just… a little shy about showing my back to other people. If you could just hand me a measuring tape, I'll take the measurements myself and tell you the numbers. Okay?"
"I see… well… all right, then…"
Wearing a distinctly dubious expression, the clerk handed me the tape and walked me through the measuring process in painstaking detail. Dodging her suspicious eyes, I slipped into the fitting room as fast as I could. Once I'd confirmed the door was locked, I leaned my back against the mirror and let out a long, long breath.
Phew… that was close…
Like an idiot, I'd completely forgotten there was a zipper running up my back. If I'd happened to pull it down while measuring my chest… ugh, I didn't even want to imagine it. If I'd caught on even a little later, it would have spelled disaster in every possible way.
All right then—time to take those measurements.
From what the clerk had said, choosing a bra meant measuring both the underside of the bust and its fullest point. What were the terms again… right, top bust and underbust. For the top bust, you hold the chest up straight and, starting from the nipple… uh…
"…Yeah, two hands aren't going to be enough for this."
Somehow, after a full thirty minutes of effort, I managed to scrape together a measurement. When I finally emerged from the fitting room, the clerk's eyes, fixed on me, had somehow turned colder than before. I had, admittedly, taken quite a while…
I examined the options she presented, one by one. Black, to match the panties—and as for the design… difficult. Anything too plain felt a little sad, but anything too racy felt like a lot of pressure. Wait a second. Why am I agonizing over this? It's not as if I'm planning to show my underwear to anybody.
After all that dithering, I picked out three that seemed reasonable enough. Leaving behind the clerk's worried face and her "Do you know how to put a bra on?", I ducked back into the fitting room.
"This one's soft, so it's comfortable, but… hmm, is it?"
I put on the bra and turned in place, checking myself over from every angle. Call it the aesthetics of concealment, but there was something about this—something different from a bare chest, an appeal all its own. The one I had on was elaborately trimmed with silk lace across the front of the cups. Pretty, sure, but wasn't it a bit unbalanced?
I tried on the other two as well. One had hardly any pattern, but made up for it with less coverage—dreadfully racy. The other felt like a happy medium between the first two. Hmm. Which to pick…
In the end, I bought all three. So what had been the point of agonizing? The rest of the shopping went much more smoothly. Coats, cosmetics, toiletries—nothing nearly as fraught as underwear. Though at the cosmetics counter, one innocent question—"What kind of makeup would suit my face?"—held me captive for over forty minutes.
A face as pretty as yours needs proper care, your eye color is so unusual—where did you get those colored contacts, with a skin tone as fair as yours you should really use this brand… and on and on and on. I understood less than half of it. No, forget half—I'm not sure I even caught a quarter. It's all so complicated!
What I'd overlooked until the trip home was the fact that a woman's body is far more delicate than a man's. Walking to the subway station with both arms loaded down with bags, then spending another thirty minutes wedged between strangers in suffocating proximity, then staggering from the station to my apartment, gasping for breath. It was brutal.
"Haaah… hiiih… I thought I was going to die…"
The moment I got home, I dumped my purchases wherever they fell and flopped onto my back. Maybe I should get some exercise, even in this body, I thought, fanning my sweat-drenched face. The body inside the leather didn't sweat, which was admittedly nice, but unfortunately the arms and legs I'd overworked while wearing it kept aching even after I took it off. Should have seen that coming. From now on, anything I need gets ordered online, period.
Oh, and I ordered two more skinsuits. Laying out everything I'd bought apparently triggered an irresistible urge for impulse shopping… I'd only meant to order one, but midway through filling in the customization options, a brilliant idea struck me, and I ended up adding a second. What idea, you ask? It's a little hard to explain until the thing actually arrives… let's just say: a fox beastgirl. I'm not certain it's even possible, but if it isn't, they'll refund me—no harm done, right? That's what I'm telling myself.
My bank balance was starting to worry me. I'd spent far too much over the past month and needed to make some of it back somehow… I should probably think a bit harder about a part-time job, too. A few ideas involving the leather did come to mind, but they were a little… hmm… let's just say questionable. Did I really need to go that far to earn money?
All in all, today's shopping trip was a success. Exhausting, yes, but I'd bought everything I needed. All that remained was to wait for the weekend. What would we talk about? What would Lee Sooin look like? I let my imagination run wild as I looked forward to the days ahead. The first person I could ever talk leather with in real life—my heart was pounding. And time flew by like an arrow, until at last it was the weekend—
The day we'd promised had finally arrived. And now—I'm coming to meet you!