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Lev walked as though he were out of his body back to his and Alisa’s booth. He’d stepped away to take a call from his agent. Alisa looked up at him upon noticing his approach and straightened her posture upon seeing the awe-laced, stunned look in his face.
“What is it? What did he say?” Alisa asked.
Still in disbelief, Lev sat back down first and stared at Alisa for a second before blinking a few times to reacquaint himself with reality. “They want me to…” he trailed off, still not with it, “I’m going to…”
Carefully, Alisa partially stood up and leaned over the table, mindful to push her hair aside so it wouldn’t dip into any chili oil saucers. She grazed her fingers against Lev’s shoulder. “Hey, Levochka, come on, what did he say?”
Lev took in a deep breath; Alisa sat back down, waiting. “I’m…” Lev scrunched his eyes, feeling that any second he would just burst into a flurry of emotion, yet at the moment all he could do was speak barely above a whisper, “I’m going to be on the front cover of Sunrise Magazine.”
At once Alisa’s hands went to cover her mouth, stifling a gasp. “No,” she said, muffled, shocked.
“Yes,” Lev assured, though perhaps more to himself, still yet to be certain he wasn’t dreaming, “Kuroda-san said they just called and they want me for next month’s… next month's issue…”
Holy shit. Since he’d sat, his chin had been pointed slightly down, but now that he’d said it out loud his feverish disbelief was breaking for the way of unbridled excitement. He puffed out his chest and raised his head—and his volume, too.
“I’m gonna be on Sunrise Magazine!” he exclaimed, turning the heads of most, if not all the other diners, who were likely questioning if they were in the proximity of someone hot and famous or someone drunk and crazy.
Nevermind that she was contributing to the scene they were now causing, Alisa slid—read: scrambled—out of the booth and over to Lev’s side, who she pulled out from the table so they could face each other as they jumped up and down screaming.
After about a minute, Alisa went still, abruptly awash with a serious look. “Oh Levochka-kun…”
Lev also stilled. “What?”
“I’m so happy for you,” she said, “but I don’t think I envy you…”
“What do you mean?” Lev asked. At the same time, the two returned to their seats, as well as to a more courteous volume.
“Well—what I am saying? If they scouted me I’d agree in a heartbeat”—she shook her head— “but… you know the rumors, don’t you?”
Lev pressed his lips into a line. While Sunrise Magazine was the acme of the Nippon modeling world—getting into it was undeniable evidence that one had ‘made it’—they did carry a reputation of being grueling to shoot for.
“Of course,” Lev said, “but it can’t be that bad, right?”
Surely, many of the whisperings Lev had heard had been exaggerations made to scare him. Modeling was a cutthroat industry, it wasn’t uncommon for some people to stoop low, disregarding any humanity, just to falter their competiton. Portraying posing with Sunrise to be hellish was certainly a method to kill a many’s ambitions. Lev wouldn’t fall for it, though, nor was his resolve so easily broken.
Alisa held a tone. “I don’t know… but would everyone be saying it if it wasn’t based on at least some truth?”
Lev huffed and crossed his arms. “Well, even so, I’m not afraid.”
He'd endured Yaku’s receive practice during the Fukurodani Group training camps, so he could survive anything.
“I know you aren’t,” Alisa said, warmly, then at once became stern as she continued, “but you’ll need to be on your best behavior if you ever want to work with them—or anyone—again.”
Hmph! “I’m always on my best behavior!”
Alisa sighed. “I mean it. Do everything they say exactly. Don’t ask for anything. Don’t make any trouble. Be… obedient, like a dog.”
Lev groaned. “I pee on the floor once and you always want to compare me to some puppy—”
“I’m being serious,” Alisa cut off, “did you hear about what happened to Hiiragi Nana? She was too loud on the phone during a break and that was all it took for her to get blackballed. Kayama Mitsunari? He fixed a stray hair without asking.”
The cautionary tales were so ridiculous that Lev hesitated to believe them, but it was true that several models had fallen off the face of the earth— complete turnaround from the rising star status they'd previously wielded—after a shoot with Sunrise that later became rumor-mill fodder.
Lev held Alisa’s gaze, a silent assurance that he was, indeed, listening to her warning. “I promise,” he said, “for all six, eight, ten—however many hours long their nightmare shoot is, I’ll be the perfect model… the model model!”
Alisa’s shoulders relaxed, her expression softening. “Thank you,” she said, “I know you’re going to do great.”
With confidence, Lev grinned. “I’ll be the ace I was born to be!”
Lev’s heart was still racing ten minutes after settling into the hair and makeup chair in his dressing room. All of the previous night he’d been so nervous—but excited—that he couldn’t fall asleep until who knew how late. Naturally, he didn’t wake up when he was supposed to, instead being shaken awake by his agent—who refused to answer how he got inside the apartment—and in a ten minute panic rushed him through a shower and out into the waiting taxi to the Sunrise Magazine studio.
After literally running through the doors, Lev had arrived eight minutes before the prescribed time. It wasn’t late, no, but he couldn’t help but feel like all of Sunrise’s crew was judging him, every glance as if to say who do you think you are?
He sighed as the makeup assistants worked through prepping his skin—they explained hair would be done second as the styling would require it be in the way of his face. Though it wasn’t dissimilar to the process he went through for other photoshoots, there were several steps that he didn’t recognize. Whatever all the extra layers of cleansing products were doing, the luxury of it all was impossible to miss. It was like the difference between eating at a nice restaurant and eating at a restaurant so upscale that each dish cost a month’s savings and where disgustingly rich people from all over the globe would fly in just to dine at.
I’m here. I can’t screw it up. Alisa’s warning to be as… obedient as possible sat at the front of Lev’s mind. If he still wanted a career after the day was done, not even to mention a good one, he had to lock in. Arriving not quite early enough meant he was already working from a bad start, which in turn meant the pressure to be perfect wasn’t just present, it was overwhelming.
One hour into hair and makeup—and with no immediate end in sight; the duration of the preparations yet another sign of Sunrise’s luxury and meticulousness—was when a dull ache in Lev’s middle crept into his awareness and reminded him of one, among many, of the things he had neglected to do in his haste to get out the door that morning.
He’d brushed his teeth in the shower and scarfed down a banana and iced coffee in the cab. At no point, however, had he gone to the bathroom. The last time had been before he went to bed, which was hours before he actually fell asleep, and also before when he’d gotten out of bed to see if a cup of warm milk would calm him—it didn’t.
In the panic of getting ready, he hadn’t thought about it, nor did it cross Kuroda’s mind—who seemed to have thought of everything he needed to get done and how to multitask them, except for finding an opportunity to pee.
It’s fine, he told himself. Yes, the need was there, but it was only annoying in the way that having the hems of your pants wet after stepping in a puddle was annoying—you’d feel it with every step brushing against your leg, but it wasn’t anything worth having a big fuss about. You’ll change into new pants at the next opportunity, and maybe you’ll look forward to it, but not enough to drop everything.
…and sure, the shoot day was certain to be long, but there was simply no way Sunrise could be so draconic as to not schedule in breaks. Lev was pretty sure it’d be illegal, otherwise. He was also pretty sure they showed him a schedule at some point before he’d been ushered into the makeup station, but he hadn’t exactly made it a point to memorize it. It wasn’t like it was on him to make sure it got followed; all the crew on set would have that covered.
He just had to be still, make no trouble, and let the magic happen around him… and as soon as they’d call a break he’d find a bathroom. It was a plan. It was simple. He could breathe easy—which he ought to, because if he got blackballed for running too hot from stress and making hair and makeup’s job harder, then that wouldn’t do at all.
Everything was going to be just perfect… it has to be.
After three hours of hair and makeup, Lev was, one, drop dead gorgeous, and two, uncomfortable. He stared at his face in the mirror of his dressing room, in awe of how his skin could simultaneously look so smooth and like it was glowing—in an angelic, not radioactive way. His hair was draped over his forehead and right eyebrow in a way that wasn’t dissimilar to how Kuroo styled his hair in high school. Pfft—if that old geezer called him up after the cover was out trying to take credit for the look, Lev would have to hang up.
As for the second matter… the toll of all the fluid he was retaining had progressed from I’ll-go-whenver-there’s-a-break to I-really-hope-there’s-a-break-soon. He closed his eyes, trying to remember the schedule he’d been shown to partial avail. It had a timeline on the side, with blocks for each section of the shoot spread across it. Amidst the tall blocks, he vaguely recalled seeing a smaller section, which was probably the lunch break. Of course, knowing that there’d be a lunch break—which he really didn’t need to fry his brain cells to figure out; it was a legal requirement—wasn’t so much of a success as knowing when it would be. Not committing to memory how long the shoot would be also wasn’t helping his case; if convention followed and the break would be around halfway through the day, then he didn’t know how close he was to said halfway point.
Hopefully, he was closer to halfway through than the beginning, though. He wasn’t on the immediate verge of wetting himself—surely not—but the signals being sent from his bladder to his brain were probably taking up at least a third of everything that was going through his mind at any given moment.
The other two thirds were devoted to being the obedient, perfect model, an effort which continued when he was ushered to the dress department. The wishful part of him had hoped there’d be a small break between hair and makeup and dress where he could find a bathroom—emphasis on find, because getting the opportunity wasn’t the only hurdle. He didn’t know where one was. In all his nervousness he hadn’t taken in much of the layout of the studio on the way in, nor was there one attached to his dressing room.
Perhaps on set for any other magazine shoot, he’d just ask for a bathroom break, but the stakes at hand overrode his usual compulsion. Asking for anything or imposing himself any way upon the crew could be the thing that meant never getting booked again.
Did you hear about Haiba Lev? Yeah, he got blackballed for interrupting the crew for a potty break. Most studios don’t even know his name, they just call him Piss Boy.
Lev let out a breath as the assistants around him took measurements of his torso. Don’t panic. His career wasn’t going to be torpedoed because he had to pee. The break would come, and he’d go and the rest of the day would be a breeze—well, aside from heart-arrhythmia-inducing pressure to not screw up… and the torturous nature of the shoot itself, if rumors meant anything. Given the level of attention put toward making him look like he was sculpted by the gods to be the image of beauty, he could only imagine the shoot itself would be equally long and meticulous.
Dress, fortunately, went by at relatively quick pace—no doubt thanks to the simplicity of the outfit: a thin, black, vaguely see-through chequered button-up shirt, with the sleeves precisely rolled up to his elbows, and a pair of faded-burgendy jeans which hugged his ass perfectly and—mm—were held up by a black belt that pressed into his bladder.
Oh damn did he look hot—but oh boy was it coming at a price. With the wardrobe only exacerbating the problem, Lev had to consciously fight off the instinct of his legs to bring themselves closer together. He had to keep his feet shoulders-width apart and his knees pointed straight. If anyone looked at him and thought he had bad posture he was as good as dead.
…and in the interest of staying alive, he needed that lunch break to happen sooner, rather than later. Grimly, Lev realized as the assistants backed away from him, the point of critical mass was a lot closer than he dared to reckon with, as the challenge wasn’t to hold out until he burst, but to hold out and not show any outward signs that’d affect his ability to pose.
Push come to shove, he could squirm around in agony for a while, but to avoid the squirming alltogether… well, his knees were already attempting to turn inwards and his lower back ached just from the effort of keeping his body straight. If the shoot was supposed to be long and torturous without a protesting bladder, then Lev needed to go back to school and learn a qualifier more extreme than torture—because that was what he was staring down the barrel of.
Lunch break. Lunch break. Lunch break. Lev pressed his lips into a line as he was led out to the set, where what looked to be the world’s most expensive camera was positioned opposite a gray-white gradient backdrop, with large, wide lights pointed upwards on the floor.
If his chest didn’t feel like it was going to explode (from worrying about the prospect of some other organ exploding), then Lev would’ve been in more awe of just how incredible he knew he was going to look. Alas, he was but reduced to a shell of a man, going through the motions of nodding, being polite, and taking instructions from the crew like an obedient robot clinging to its programmed duties whilst its battery neared zero.
An assistant handed him a burgundy jacket which matched his pants and the director instructed him to hold it slung over his left shoulder. Despite operating as though he were floating outside his body, Lev could still glean the look they were going for: one of contrasts—rugged yet casual, off-work yet dressed a bit too handsomely to have come from the office, a bold color yet faded.
This better not be my last best look, he thought, then, despite trying to blink and shut out his distracting inner voice, strayed even further from his thin, desperate focus, when he spotted a production assistant walking behind the front cameras while sipping from a tall, aluminum water bottle.
In his first year of high school, Kai had a bottle that looked just the same, but that wasn’t the sort of detail Lev would hold onto unless it was attached to a memory… and it sure was; one that both suited and made him fear the present moment even more than he already did.
Some team on the other side of Tokyo had requested a practice match, and despite not being a school Nekoma had much history with, Coach Nekomata had insisted that Coach Naoi accept on the basis that a certain rookie middle blocker with lofty aspirations to become the ace needed to be housebroken… which Lev certainly had been, both metaphorically and, perhaps, literally.
Lev jumped Kenma as soon as the court was cleared. “I did it! I did it!” he exclaimed, jumping up and down, “say something?”
Kenma groaned, exhausted. “What… what did you do?”
Lev’s jaw dropped, staring at Kenma utterly baffled that he wasn’t buzzing the same way he was over how the matches had gone. “I hit like eighty percent of your tosses!”
Unimpressed, Kenma drooped his head and turned to continue on his way toward the visitor locker room. “And everyone else hits them every time. Do you see them celebrating?”
Mm. Lev frowned; tired and cranky Kenma was definitely not the most fun person to deal with. However, nothing could make chasing validation that he so rightfully deserved an unworthwhile pursuit. “Hey! For me, it’s—”
From behind, a hand landed heartily on his shoulder. He turned his head, startled.
“Lev,” Kuroo said, lips upturned in the slyest smile, “good job out there.”
Attempting to capitalize on the interruption, Kenma sped up. Unfortunately for him, his legs weren’t nearly long enough to get him around the corner before Kuroo cleared his throat. “Kenma.”
“Mm?”
Kuroo huffed. “I know its not in you to give in so easily, but I know you will, so right now”—he turned to face Lev—”I’m giving him permission to pester you until you finally pay him a compliment.”
Lev’s breath hitched and he blinked about a thousand times to make sure his eyes weren’t deceiving him. Kuroo-san… was taking his side?! Oh, what an unfamiliar feeling—he’d just been tired out from his first proper matches, but now it was as though pure energy was flowing through his body unimpeded.
“You heard him!” Lev said, then in one large step crossed the distance Kenma had put between them, “you can admit that you’re proud!”
For the twenty minutes that followed, Kenma knew no peace as Lev hovered his shoulder seeking his ego fuel like a vulture on whatever the avian equivalent of catnip was. For the first half, Kenma had tried pleading for help from any of his other teammates, but they all either seemed content to leave it alone, or were held back by a snickering, barely-holding-back-full-belly-laughter Kuroo.
Finally, Kenma let out a sigh after slipping on a fresh shirt. “Alright… you sucked less today,” he said, but then continued after a heavy glare from Kuroo across the room threatened to topple him, “and you’ll probably suck even less the next time.”
Lev pursed his lips. “C’mon, Kenma, that’s not really—”
“Good lord! Just take it!” came Yaku’s voice, who popped his head around from the end of the row of lockers just beside Kuroo, who he then faced. “Have you had your fun yet, fish-brain?”
Kuroo scrunched his face, then solemnly met Lev’s gaze. “Alright, that counts. Now get ready, Lev, we’re leaving in one minute.”
“What?!”
“Change fast, Skyscraper,” Yaku quipped, then left the room, Kuroo and Kenma soon following without a word.
Oh crap! In the entire time that Lev had been on Kenma, everyone else had changed and freshened up while he’d continued marinating in his sweat-drenched jersey. In a panic that got his heart racing as fast as it’d been during the games, he aggressively scrubbed himself of sweat and scrambled into a change of clothes.
At precisely the same moment that Kuroo popped his head into the doorway to announce that time was up—to an audience of one—was when Lev became aware of the fullness in his middle. Given the intensity of playing in his first full matches, every time he subbed out of the backrow he’d chugged water like a stranded desert-goer.
He eyed the urinals on the opposite side of the locker room from the exit then back at Kuroo. “Wait, I’ve—”
“No time! Run!”
Shoot. Lev bit his lip, aware of what he was submitting himself to, then booked it out of the locker room, following Kuroo all the way out and straight onto the bus. As he sat he was barraged by a million snickers about being late from every direction; he fought for his life to shift the blame to Kuroo, but, despite some willingness to agree from Yaku, the talk fizzled out not because Lev definitively “won” but because everyone was tired and had no energy to keep it going.
Mm. Slowly, his heart calmed as he relaxed in his seat. His arms and legs were heavy and he leaned against the window—he had no seatmate; Inuoka and Shibayama sat together across from him, Teshiro was home sick, and the rest of the team sat toward the front—thinking about perhaps catching some sleep on the ride back to Nekoma.
…except he couldn’t bring himself to relax all the way because, as the rush from running to board subsided, the ache in his bladder reared its ugly head once more. Ulgh. Lev was in the habit of claiming that many features of his anatomy were proportionally as large as his limbs, but in that moment he knew that his bladder was not one of them.
Math was not Lev’s strongest subject—or actually, it was a tie between it and every other for either strongest or weakest—but as he sat wide-awake in his seat while everyone else drifted off, he considered the timeframe he was working with. The ride over had been somewhere between half an hour and forty-five minutes, but that’d been when traffic was pretty tame. Now that it was later, and many workers would be clocking out, the traffic was probably going to add at least half an hour. It’d been about five minutes since the bus departed, and most of it being spent stuck waiting for lights to change was unfortunate proof that Lev’s estimation was close to correct.
He didn’t bother trying to remember how many bottles he’d chugged during the games, because by the way it felt like someone had inflated a balloon in his middle he could safely say the answer was ‘too much.’
So… An hour minimum, and a bladder that was already overfull… put together they made a sum of trouble and hell; the former was what Lev was in, the latter was where he felt like he was. On most days his fantasies were dominated by either delusions of being the ace or things that would require the author to change the rating of the work, but at that moment all such thoughts were replaced by visions of a bathroom, a toilet, a patch of grass, anywhere socially acceptable.
Stuck in a bus, he had no options; he couldn’t give in to what he wanted—no, needed. All he could do was sit—or, no, that's not comfortable—and sit in a different way, and when that didn’t work, another way. He crossed his legs; he uncrossed them. He sat tall; he slouched. No matter what, the press of his bladder could not be lessened.
It only got worse.
After twenty minutes of contorting in his seat the bus wasn’t even half of the way to the school. At first the dread had centered around knowing he’d have to suffer, but as he clenched all his muscles and squirmed, his dread shifted to the opposite—that he wouldn’t have to suffer long because his bladder would explode and he’d die on the spot.
Shit. He couldn’t wait. Desperation overcoming the little shame he possessed, he eyed ahead of him. Across the aisle a few rows away was the back of an inexplicably spiked-up mop of hair. Surely, with his smooth talking and captainly privileges, Kuroo could convince the coaches to pull over somewhere.
At the same time however, communicating the ask would be trouble. Yelling would wake everyone up, while standing up and walking over was out of the question. He could barely keep it together sat in his seat; there was no way he’d manage tip-toeing through a moving vehicle without falling on his ass and wetting himself on impact.
An ace can do this, Lev told himself as he took a deep breath and scooted toward the aisle. With every shimmy of his body his bladder thrashed against his protesting muscles, but it wasn’t like he could avoid that pain if he remained as he was either.
“Inuoka,” he whispered, “hey Inuoka!”
“Mm”—Inuoka stirred—“what’s up?”
“Can you pass a message up to Kuroo if he could ask for a stop?”
“Uh, sure,” Inuoka said. “What for?”
“I need to pee”—Lev squeezed his legs tighter—”bad.”
Inuoka glanced at Lev up and down, then met eyes again—this time wide, like he understood bad to be an understatement. He leaned around the seat and tapped on Fukunaga’s shoulder.
Lev threw his head back against the seat and sighed. He was relieved that getting the message along wasn’t too difficult, though he still lacked the only relief that he really cared about.
A minute later, Lev could just barely make out the sound of Kuroo’s voice, too low to hear his words exactly but nonetheless reassuring… which was a feeling adopted all too soon as the previous chain of Kuroo, Kai, and Fukunaga worked its way in reverse.
Inuoka winced as he gestured for Lev’s attention after absorbing Fukunaga’s whisper. “Kuroo says sorry, they can’t stop.”
Shit shit shit. If it weren’t for not wanting to wake Yamamoto by banging his head into the back of his seat, Lev would’ve been fully doubled over in agony. “Well, can you tell them I’m about to piss myself?”
“Will do,” Inuoka said, then started the chain again.
As he waited for a response, Lev shut his eyes and clutched his stomach. He wanted to bury his hands even lower, but some vestige of prosperity prevented him. He’d only just started syncing with the team, getting even the most stubborn—read, Kenma—to come around and tolerate him. Being blatantly indecent could reverse the progress he’d—
“Hey,” Inuoka whispered, “they still can’t stop.”
Lev didn’t want to open his eyes, because what difference would it make being able to see the person delivering him fatal news? However, since it really was the same either way, he did and saw that Inuoka clearly had more to say.
Or… more to give? Lev stared at the object in Inuoka’s outstretched hand. “What… why are you handing me this?”
Inuoka gestured with a metal bottle, beckoning Lev to take it. “I, um… I think you know.”
It was salvation. It was a drop of water after days wandering lost through a desert—or, no, it was not that, couldn’t be that. It was… something really dry that would help a person in peril. Yeah. That’s what it was.
Lev took it. “Thanks. So this is like a spare, or something?”
Inuoka pursed his lips and looked down the aisle and back. “Um, I think it’s Kai-san’s?”
At once, the sharpest pressure in his middle yet forced Lev to twist into himself, and at the same time he gasped and nearly dropped the bottle. “Mm, ah-hah… this is Kai’s?
Inuoka nodded.
“No, I can’t do this to his—”
Another pang rippled through his bladder and Lev’s breath hitched as he felt a wetness beading where he’d been desperately trying to keep dry.
“Tell him I say thanks,” Lev said, quickly, then shimmied himself to the very edge of his seat and scooted toward the window. As much as he could, he turned his back so neither Inuoka nor Shibayama would see what he was about to do—though he could just barely hear Inuoka passing the message along, so at least the former was too pre-occupied to bear witness anyway.
“Oh my god,” he muttered aloud as he positioned the bottle and freed himself. Without a second to spare he was going, his stream pittering against the metal sides. As his shoulders relaxed he remembered how it’d felt when he’d poured all that water down his throat, needing whatever he could get from pushing his body to its limits on the court, then thought, heh, that paled in comparison to the relief coursing through him now.
The longer he went on the more he could feel his bladder, surrounded by sore muscle, deflate. His surroundings, and the fact that the whole team was nearby certainly hearing what was going on, were lost on him as he let nature be—the wide mouth of the bottle eliminating any trouble the motion of the bus would’ve caused aided in enabling his dissociation.
When he was done his whole body felt lighter in every sense of the word: his bladder was empty, the pressure was gone, his muscles no longer needed to be clenched down, and he was even a bit dizzy from the relief.
Dizzy enough, in fact, that his brain hadn’t quite turned back on when he screwed the bottle shut and leaned into the aisle to hand it back. Inuoka made a choked noise when he saw it, and it was at that moment that Lev realized Kai probably wasn’t expecting it back.
“Um, I don’t think—”
“Sorry, right,” Lev cut off, regaining enough shame to hold the bottle further away, “I’ll, uh, okay…”
The rest of the bus ride went by in a blink—quite literally, Lev, doubly exhausted from all the practice and holding on for dear life, fell asleep almost immediately. When he awoke, it was to Yaku pointing and laughing at him in the aisle.
“He’s cuddling it like a baby!”
Lev blinked the sleep out of his eyes and looked down at himself, confused, discovering that he was holding Kai’s—erm—emergency present in his lap. Before he could even process his offense, though, Kuroo, who was also in tow, spoke.
“Okay, enough laughs,” he said, “let’s go.”
“Right!” Lev said, then stood. When he scanned the rest of the bus, everyone else was gone, except for the three who apparently came to greet him—Kenma stood beside Kuroo.
Wait a minute… If Yaku came to laugh, and Kuroo came to actually be responsible, then what was Kenma there for?
“Mm,” Kenma made a noise, noticing Lev’s eyes on him, “I don’t think this is more embarrassing than throwing up on your senior.”
What? Kenma turned to leave, as if what he’d said required no further elaboration. Lev could admit he wasn’t the best when it came to… well, understanding things in general, but that simply meant he had no choice but to press.
“What does that mean?!” Lev asked, loud and baffled.
Kenma stopped but didn’t look back. “You’re bound to meet Shouyou eventually.”
Lev drew his head back, more confused. “Who? What?”
It turned out to be weeks before Lev ever found out what Kenma was talking about. The denomination of time that Lev was currently worried about, however, was much, much smaller.. The shoot had been going for ten minutes and it was taking every ounce of strength in his body to hold still and pose. The director had him puffing his chest out, holding his jacket over his shoulder. The look was cool, confident, and sexy, but on the inside it was nigh impossible to feel any of things when he knew he was but the slightest falter away from losing his resolve and crumpling in on himself.
The assistant with the metal bottle was in his periphery, and besides reminding him of one of the greatest reliefs he’d ever experienced at the worst time possible, the sight put to the front of his mind the dilemma he’d faced on that bus—or rather the one he didn’t: his bladder had made the choice for him to use that bottle when he did.
He couldn’t let it get to that point again… but it was going to be sooner rather than later. It was either he continued until he couldn’t help but squirm, and thus make a fool out of himself, or ask for a toilet. The latter option wasn’t great—it was disruptive and went against the cause no trouble advice—but it was, if barely, the better option of the two. Of course, the third and true best option was that break would be called, but his idiot schedule-ignoring ass couldn’t count on that being anytime—
“It’s these lights,” the director said, arms crossed as he stood behind the camerawoman. “Kiminami! Bring in the secondary.”
At once the entire crew set into motion, including the assistants who led Lev onto the set who, without explanation, began guiding him back toward his dressing room. From the sounds of it, the set lights were going to be swapped out, and—actually—Lev did make out the assistant saying something about preserving his makeup from light exposure, or something. He didn’t catch much of the explanation before because he was too preoccupied with trying to walk whilst his bladder sloshed its contents around with each step. It was like waves crashing against a cliff, slowly wearing it down until eventually the lighthouse atop the bluff would crumble into the sea.
Only once he was back in his dressing room and stopped did the pressure calm enough for Lev to remember he was going to ask for a toilet. They weren’t exactly taking a full break by the looks of it, but surely it’d be long enough that he could go and not cause any delay in the schedule.
“We’ll knock when they’re ready for you,” the assistant said before Lev could open his mouth, then shut the door.
Crap. With no eyes on him, the first thing Lev did was twist his legs together and bend at the waist, then he stared at the door. Okay, the thing to do would be to poke his head out and get someone’s attention. That was what any rational person ought to do in Lev’s situation.
…but what if someone was standing right on the other side and he startled them? What if that person was holding a cup of scalding hot coffee and spilled it on a cart with important equipment a PA just happened to be rolling past at the same time? What if nothing dramatic like that happened but word still spread that he couldn’t wait until an actual break for the potty and he’d get blacklisted from the industry because nobody wants to work with a model who can’t hold their pee?
He hadn’t been to the point of wetting himself before, just the verge of no longer being able to act like nothing was wrong, yet his panic seemed to spread from the confines of his mind to his body. He bounced on the spot, his need suddenly worse than before.
It has to be now. He just needed the courage to open that damn door. As he tried to muster it he paced—read: squirmed—in a circle, taking in the surroundings of his dressing room at the same time that he hoped his fear would subside.
He saw himself in the mirror, perhaps the most confusing mix of unbelievably gorgeous and destroyed a man had ever looked. He was like the Titanic the day after it sank: probably still majestic but hard to ignore the difficulty of its situation. On the next wall was a rack of clothes and other accessories, among them the outfit he wore in and the rest alternates for the shoot. In the corner a floor plant, which if Lev remembered anything from the last time he spoke to Kai it might’ve been a fruiticosa tree, or something like that, then on the next wall—
Lev’s eyes wandered back to the plant, or more specifically the rattan base it was planted in. The moment the thought crossed his mind Lev was struck with startling clarity, so clear that it, if only for a fraction of second, pushed aside the frantic signals being sent from his bladder. Peeing in that plant was probably the most disgusting, insane, and disrespectful thing he could do in the entire studio, but it was also a now or never matter. The longer he hesitated, the sooner the assistants would come knocking—and he sure as hell wasn’t going to make them wait, much less because he wasn’t finished watering the plant.
The last time he made such a snap decision might’ve been on the court in high school, when he’d have less than a blink to decide where to hit the ball. He stumbled up to the plant and, heart racing, undid the buckle of his belt so he could comfortably lower his pants—they were on quite tight to highlight his best features—and unzipped. His career could be over if he got pee on anything besides the dirt, so once he was free he shuffled just a little closer so that he was practically overtop it and, finally, let go.
The stream struck the base of the tree then trickled and seeped into the dirt. Though the threat of being called any second loomed like word of stormy weather, Lev’s shoulders nonetheless relaxed as the weight in his middle grew less and less.
The dirt, fortunately, was quite absorbative, dulling any trickling sound that would’ve been heard from outside. In that moment, however, even if had been loud enough to draw attention, Lev wouldn’t have cared. The whole day—hell, and the whole weeks leading up—his heart rate had been elevated from the stress of having his career hang in the balance of the shoot going perfectly or not. As he stood above the plant emptying himself, muscles tired but grateful to be relaxed, his troubles seemed far away as he gave in to the most basic, most human sense of relief.
Oh my god. Lev shivered as he finished and put his clothes back together—careful to make sure he looked just as he did before. Examining the plant, the dirt was a shade or two darker, and the very bottom of the tree was likewise stained, but it just as easily looked as if it’d been watered normally. Smell wise, the plant was in the furthest corner from the door, but more helpfully was the fragrant bouquet of fresh lilies on the counter by the mirror. From what Lev understood, they were one of Sunrise’s myriad luxuries which he’d get to take home with him, but it would hopefully be long enough before that happened that their overpowering nature would no longer be necessary.
I’d have much preferred a dressing room with a bathroom than flowers, Lev thought as he plopped himself onto the vanity stool and waited for his cue. Only once he was off his feet did it strike him just how exhausted he was from willing himself to stay still as he posed. Normally, after a shoot, he’d be tired from standing for long periods, but given how early the impromptu—and savior—tech break had occurred, he could confidently assign blame to the effort of holding.
Knock knock. Reprieve over as soon as it began, Lev looked to the door, where the assistants entered without him telling them to come in; his heart skipped a beat at the thought of what would’ve happened if he’d taken any longer to rip the bandage and use the plant.
He stood with a sigh, no choice but to be ready to take on the rest of the shoot. Given that he’d endured the day so far whilst wrestling with an overfull bladder, he actually felt pretty good about getting to the end without a hitch. That said, there could be no letting his guard down.
An ace must treat every challenge like its the hardest.
After the shoot concluded, the first place Lev went wasn’t home, though throwing himself into bed sure sounded heavenly, but to Alisa’s door. He’d survived his first—fingers crossed not last—cover shoot with Sunrise Magazine; he had all the details to share.
Alisa opened the door and immediately grabbed Lev by the scruff of his shirt and threw him inside, closing the door behind her in time for Lev to regain his footing and turn to face her.
“Whoa—”
“Tell me everything!”
Lev puffed out a laugh. “I think I killed it.”
“Think?” Alisa repeated, then squeezed around him to lead into the living area.
“I’m pretty sure,” Lev said, following, “I was obedient like you said I should be, and—”
Lev’s lungs were suddenly bereft of air as he froze in place, eyes locked with a floor plant on the other side of the living room. It was tall, like the fruiticosa that was in his dressing room. It was planted in a rattan basket, like the one from his dressing room. It made his heart skip a beat, like every time he pictured that damn plant in his dressing room and shivered at the thought of someone on set finding out what he’d done to it. Only hours had passed but it’d filled his thoughts nonetheless.
“Oh, right,” Alisa said, noticing Lev stop but not quite clocking his terror, “I put my earnings from my last shoot toward redecorating. How does it look?”
Lev tore his eyes away and stared at the floor, breathing fast.
“Levochka-kun?”
“Um…” Lev trailed off, needing another second to compose himself, then looked up at Alisa—he made a point to keep the doppelganger plant out of his periphery, “it looks… good…”
Alisa placed her hands on her hips. “Good? Be honest.”
Lev shuddered in a breath. “Well… maybe you could get rid of that,” he said, pointing toward the plant.
“Levochka are you crying?”
“No!” he yelled, quickly wiping his face with his sleeve.
“Is this about the shoot? Did it not go well?”
Lev shook his head and weakly pointed at the plant again. “No, this is just about… that.”
Alisa drew her head back. “My, Levochka! I was a little iffy but I didn’t think it’d be so ugly you’d cry!”
“It’s, um…” Lev considered explaining himself, but trying to justify peeing in a plant in his dressing room was truly impossible, so instead he scrunched his eyes and embraced where he was at, “so ugly. I can’t even, uh—maybe we can find a restaurant to talk instead?”
Alisa laughed, more shocked than tickled. “Wow… you sat through a Sunrise shoot, yet seeing my living room is the most difficult part of your day? The rumors must not be true.”
“Oh, they are,” Lev said, “they are.”
Tales of the longest, highest-pressure shoot of his career were prime to be told… just away from the triggering floor plant.
