I Trust No Man

I haven’t drawn/painted seriously in almost two months so my skills have regressed. //sweats

I really wanted to complete something that I wasn’t crying over, so I thought to try a redraw of my otp. If I butchered this, then there is truly no hope for me //sweats some more. (Click on image to view without the blur //idk why tumblr does this to me)

For Fruits Basket

Ritsuko Okazaki 

Tohru: Kyo I have something to tell you and it’s going to be shocking I know but I can’t keep lying to myself any longer

Kyo: I also have something important to tell you

Tohru: I love you and I always will but....I think I’m a lesbian........I know it’s a lot to hear but know i’m still committed to us, I just can never see myself with a man but somehow you’re the exception. That doesn’t make any sense, does it?

because i’ve gotta start living up to my url sometime. so consider:

kyo. yes, my lesbian fave. and it’s just so easy to read kyo as a lesbian while changing very little about the story. have we considered how inherently queer the “monster inside you trope” is? and especially because kyo’s arc in canon is largely about learning self-acceptance, forgiveness, and self-love through falling in love with tohru, i think the true form arc serves as an excellent allegory for kyo coming to terms with her sexuality, since in both cases it’s all about tohru staying by kyo’s side unconditionally, in spite of things that kyo views as “monstrous” about herself. it’s the monster lesbian story i want please give it to me!!!!!

for this AU, i’d have kyo already out as a lesbian at the beginning of the story, in sort of an open secret way. the sohmas definitely know that kyo is a lesbian, and it’s looked down upon by the sohma clan. the notable exception would be tohru, who doesn’t know that kyo is a lesbian—and same with true form, kyo does not want tohru to find out that she’s a lesbian because she thinks that, if tohru sees this part of her that she has no control over, it will ruin everything and completely disgust tohru

along with just fitting kyo’s overwhelming lesbian vibes, i think this creates a really good dichotomy between yuki, who is the golden boy of the family and deeply closeted, and kyo, very aggressively not in the closet and the black sheep/outcast of the family. wlw mlm hostility at its finest

and now we have tohru. while kyo is already out as a lesbian, tohru is deeply closeted, deeply unaware that she’s closeted, and also just. deeply repressing that she is a lesbian djjdjdjdjdkdj. i really like having this contrast in tohru and kyo’s experiences with coming out and realizing their sexualities because i think it fits their different personalities + upbringings, and also it just would be nice to have more than one Coming Out Narrative in a single piece of media. tohru is that girl in high school who absolutely knows what being gay means, grew up around queer people (kyoko’s girl gang hello…..), her entire friend group is made up of queer people—but she’s still like no i’m just the token straight friend in the group :) until…..lmfao

this mirrors tohru’s canon arc really well because she struggles so much with repression, particularly with repressing what she considers as “ugly” parts of herself, as well as her true feelings for kyo a lot. you can also draw a really neat parallel in the way that tohru accepts kyo’s true form in a very loving, non-judgemental manner, but it’s a lot harder to accept her own “ugly” qualities. i think that makes such a perfect connection to like, she’s obviously not homophobic and accepts that kyo is a lesbian no problem! but then when she falls in love with kyo, it’s a lot harder for tohru to accept that she is also gay because of intense internalized homophobia that she’s directing at herself

also bringing up our favorite gay yuki again, something that would be super fascinating in this is AU would be how yuki still envies how kyo embodies a lot of hyper-masculine, boyish traits, which yuki feels he can’t present in the same way. in this AU, there’s another layer to yuki’s jealousy though because kyo is a girl doing that. so yuki almost resents that kyo can pull that off and innately have those qualities come so easily to her (like being more brash and confident, getting along with groups, being more typically aggressive and “boyish”), when yuki is the one who is male and feels like those traditional masculine behavior expectations should come more easily to him

this would also tie really nicely into how yuki loves tohru like a mother, where it adds another layer to kyo seeing tohru in a way that yuki can’t. not only does yuki agonize over how he doesn’t love tohru romantically when heteronormativity makes him feel like he should—now, you also have kyo being able to see tohru “the way a man sees a woman” when kyo is a woman but yuki is a man, adding even more to yuki’s big bad comphet struggle

this just adds so much to yuki and kyo’s already very complicated dynamic, because now you have yuki’s internalized homophobia making him hate himself and directing that at kyo, scapegoating her as causing all of their problems with akito and the sohma clan by being out herself. meanwhile, kyo would struggle even more with eventually acknowledging that yuki isn’t the perfect, straight sohma prince that she views him as, and that hating yuki won’t fix her internalized self-hatred. all of this makes even more prominent that underlying theme of “you have everything i have ever wanted when you don’t deserve it, and i hate you but why can i not be more like you.” again, mlm wlw hostility at its finest

yes, yuki and kyo did hate-makeout once. yes, it did confirm for both of them that they are in fact homosexuals

one last thought: i know a huge facet of canon is that people of the opposite sex hugging triggers the zodiacs’ animal transformations, which is heteronormative lol. but honestly, i would keep the curse being activated by opposite sex hugs even in this AU—because i think it would be super interesting to explore how girls touching each other is a lot more socially accepted as “platonic” even when it is definitely not platonic lmao. but on the flip side of that, you can also then explore the Lesbian Experience of feeling like you’re evil and weird for thinking a girl is pretty and wanting to hold her hand, and therefore never so much as looking at a girl no matter what Ever

it’s already iconic how takaya accidentally Invoked Gay in canon by making kakeru the only friend of yuki’s that he can experience touch and physical affection from because they’re both male…..that’s gay shit…..but there are SO MANY LAYERS when you add lesbian kyoru to the mix. miss deeply closeted tohru is falling hard for kyo and slowly testing the waters with touch—brushing up against kyo, tapping on her shoulder, holding her hand….because they’re both girls and just friends right? it doesn’t mean anything because tohru is straight right? LMFAO meanwhile kyo is convinced that her crush on tohru is absolutely evil, and even though touching her wouldn’t trigger kyo’s transformation, it still terrifies her way more than touching a guy ever will

*thinks abt how rin is the only person that seems to immediately Get tohru on a deeper level, aside from kyo*

*thinks abt how rin is one of the few people tohru is willing to unapologetically show her unwavering aggressive side*

*thinks abt how rin is the only person whose relationship with tohru is one of give and take, aside from kyo*