I'm With the Pilot

Title: Girls Like Mystery
Rating: Hard R
Pairing: Female!Chris/Female!Zach
Word count: 3,452
Warnings: Genderswap, femmeslash.
Summary: Chris is tired of pretending she plays for the other team. It doesn't help matters that she has a hot best friend.
A/N: Props to adoorhasopened, who beat me to the punch on this idea with her own excellent genderswap Pinto fic. Also mentions two other genderswapped minor characters. Title taken from a song by The Cribs.



The first words out of Chris' mouth are "I can explain." Margo, the loving and kind publicist she is, responds with one of her signature long sighs, which usually mean a) something has gone terribly wrong and b) it's Chris' fault.

"So, what was wrong with Beau?" Margo asks. "Not smart enough? Dared to frequent the local Starbucks? Didn't know any eight-letter words for 'elocution?'"

"I just didn't like him," Chris replies. She flips through the Times, legs curled beneath her, and idly drinks from a bottle of Smart Water. "Too, um...meathead-y. Also, he had a penis. Kinda harshed my buzz."

And also—but Chris won't tell Margo this—way too fragile in the ego department. Either Beau's publicist didn't quite tell him what he was getting into when he started going out with a lesbian or Beau had some crazy idea that he could, you know, change Chris' mind. Not likely, especially not when his master plan seemed to involve dragging Chris to as many nightclubs as possible, all packed with hot women running around in skimpy outfits. It was like bringing a kid to a candy store and smacking her hand when she reached out for a glistening, apple-red lollipop. Except, in this case, replace the lollipop with tits.

So, yeah, Chris is used to women throwing drinks in her face out of jealousy, but men? That was a new one.

"You looked like you'd just won first place in a wet T-shirt contest," Margo huffs.

"It's not my fault that there was a TMZ camera crew right outside the club."

"No, it's mine. I was trying to get you a nice photo op on Beau's arm and this is what we got instead. You, walking out of the club alone, looking like a drowned cat."

Chris cocks her head. "Well, then you should be glad I was wearing a bra. Don't I get points for that?"

"Yeah," Margo says, sighing again. "Sadly, you do get points for that."

*

"I do not look like a drowned cat," Chris huffs. She turns the laptop so Zach can see. "Right?"

Zach sighs in response. All day today with the sighing. Chris is about to start punching people in their throats.

"Can't you see I'm busy, Christine?" she asks, and yes, Chris can definitely see that, what with all the bending and stretching and Zach's uber-fine ass sticking up in the air with her panties showing above the band of her yoga pants. Yeah, Chris can see all of that.

"So sorry to interrupt your calisthenics, Zakiah."

Zach's head whips around so fast that her dark ponytail nearly smacks her right in the eye. "Don't call me that."

Chris grins. "You started it! You called me Christine."

"Because I'm bored by your bitching and moaning. Big deal, Beau threw a gin and tonic at you. I'm sure you deserved it. And at least it was clear. Remember when that redhead dumped that blue drink on your head?"

"No," Chris says, clearly lying. "You wound me." She pouts and scrolls through the photos again. "Whatever. I don't look as bad as Margo said."

"Lemme see." Zach gives up on her exercise and walks over to the sofa, sitting down beside Chris. She smells faintly of sweat but not body odor, and Chris gets a whiff of that hippie perfume Zach buys at the local organics store. Why Zach can't buy her perfume at Sephora like a normal person, Chris will never know. Zach takes the laptop and laughs at the photos. "Cold in that club, huh?"

"Freezing," Chris mutters. She pulls her cardigan tighter around her shoulders, getting cold just thinking about her poor nipples-turned-icicles. "I don't get why your publicist doesn't do this to you."

"Do what?"

"You know, make you go out with male models and sexist creeps. You walk around in Birkenstocks and hang out with Jessie Twyla Ferguson, that big lez, and yet I've never seen so much as a blind item about you. How do you always manage to fly under the radar?"

"I just don't talk about it," Zach says, shrugging. "And I'm happy with my career path. You're the one trying to break into blockbusters and all that shit. You need some man candy if you're going to do that, apparently."

"It doesn't hurt that you played a scary-sexy serial killer for years." Chris takes the laptop back and smirks. "Men all over America are already jacking it to smoky-eyed photos of you. Oh, hey, that reminds me." Chris opens a new tab in her browser and types. "Gotta order my Sylarella 2011 calendar."

"Ugh. I'm making tea." Zach stands and walks to the kitchen, her toned ass swaying behind her, and Chris most certainly does not leer, not even a little bit. No, she plays it off as simple attentiveness as Zach fills the kettle and puts it on the stove. "Why don't you just come out if you're so tired of this?"

"I dunno," Chris says moodily. "We can't all be lovable talk show hosts who wear sneakers, dance in aisles, and charm the collective pants off homophobes across America."

Zach cringes. "Nor would we want to be. Why don't you go out with Karl or John a few times if it's that important?"

"They're both married. I'll either look even more gay or desperate."

"Anton?"

"Cougar."

"You're thirty!" Zach laughs and folds her arms over her chest, leaning back against the kitchen counter. Chris can see the small sweat stains in Zach's ribbed tank top, along the collar and under her armpits. "I hardly think that qualifies."

"Augh, don't remind me!" Chris throws herself down onto the sofa dramatically, draping an arm over her eyes. "Maybe I can get a gig selling anti-aging cream. Some shit that you slather on at night. Or, hey, Botox?"

Zach rolls her eyes. "Thanks a lot. I'm older than you, remember?"

"And yet you look younger, so fuck you and the skinny horse you rode in on."

"Okay, drama queen." Zach turns and opens the cabinet that Chris mentally refers to as the Tea Vault, where there are about eighty thousand different types of tea waiting to be brewed into something either semi-palatable or truly heinous, all named after random abstract nouns. "I'm feeling either like Serenity or Balance. Any preference?"

Chris smirks. "Whatever has the most stars and moonbeams."

Zach nods and looks over the boxes. "That'd be the Serenity."

*

"Chris, are you listening to me?"

And that'd be a negatory. Chris isn't listening to Karl, can't listen, really, because Zach and Zoe are dancing all sexy a few feet away from their table and whatever Karl has to say can't be nearly as interesting as two ridiculously hot women grinding against each other as blue and pink and gold lights swirl all over their tight bodies.

Chris squeezes her thighs together surreptitiously and looks over at Karl. "Yes."

His nostrils flare slightly. "Then what did I say?"

"Okay, you got me. No, I wasn't listening. In fact, whatever it was, I don't care."

Karl rolls his eyes from here to Kentucky and sips his beer. "That's too bad. Because I was saying that you should go for it with Zach."

"Ha. Right." Chris blinks and leans in a bit. "Pardon?"

"God, you're lucky you're gorgeous," Karl says, shaking his head. "Zach likes you. You can't stop staring at Zach and, I presume, like her back."

"Okay, first of all," Chris says, lifting her thumb and making a grand gesture of counting it. "Margo would kill me. Secondly?" Index finger. "Zach has never shown any interest in me. And three..." Middle finger, which she'd like to wave in Karl's face a bit. "She could do better."

Karl gapes at her. "Did you really just say that, Pine? Are you seriously attempting self-deprecation?" He pretends to yawn. "Christ, you're boring me."

"Oh, okay, what, she can't do better? She could! If, you know, she wanted to. Or at least find someone who has more in common with her."

"More in common?!" Now Karl starts the finger counting thing. He has really long fingers. Good for Natalie. "You read the same books. You like the same frou-frou coffee. You fill notebooks with sappy, terrible poetry, Zach waxes poetic on Twitter."

"It's not terrible. They're works in—"

"You wear the same ugly glasses. You—"

"Mine are prescription," Chris interrupts again. She smiles sweetly.

"Oh, whatever. The last time I was at your place, I even saw some of that bizarre tea in your pantry. That, uh...Power tea."

It was Serenity. "Big deal," Chris scoffs. "Zach left it there the last time she was over." Chris totally bought it herself.

"Listen, just...think about it, okay?" Karl rubs her shoulder and it's probably meant to be a reassuring gesture, but it just makes Chris tense. "You've been mooning over her all night. It's distracting."

"I've been appreciating the sight of two beautiful women dancing. There's a difference."

"Uh huh." Karl smirks and looks unconvinced. "And I'm sure you can tell me what Zach's wearing. Without looking at her?"

Chris exhales and imagines Zach, standing by the bar and looking statuesque and beautiful as she fusses with her silky, dark hair. "It's like, skinny jeans and this weird vest thing over a long-sleeved thing. Knee-high boots. I dunno, I can't make heads or tails of it. She looks like she stumbled out of a Salvation Army."

Karl laughs and nods. "Okay. And what's Zoe wearing?"

Chris opens her mouth to speak. Then she shuts it again. Blinks. Gives Karl a dumbfounded look.

"I'm impressed by how much I hate you right now," she says.

Karl shrugs. "It's a gift. Feel free to compare notes with Nat."

"You know, I think I will."

*

Two days later, Chris can't stop thinking about Zach and she officially hates Karl with the fire of three suns, all colliding with each other and burning up any innocent space debris in their collective path.

Then Chris remembers that she has a coffee date with Zach and she starts plotting ways to mail a live bomb to Karl's house without harming Natalie and the kids.

She's not prepared for Zach to walk in with a brand new haircut—a short haircut, her glossy Italian tresses chopped off and revamped into something sleek and modern. Chris can also tell that Zach had her eyebrows plucked today, since they look utterly perfect. Chris has seen them in other states, but Zach's rampant strays never make her look any less gorgeous.

"Okay," Zach says dryly, in response to Chris' blank stare. "You either hate it or you're constipated."

"It's, um...nice."

"Nice? Surely you can think of a more expressive adjective than that."

But Chris can't, she really can't. Because the new haircut is fucking adorable and Zach's eyes look doe-like, almond-shaped and huge, and Chris is having fleeting romantic thoughts of drowning in limpid pools and all that shit. Also, the elegant slope of Zach's neck is now in full view, and Chris imagines dragging her lips down that pale curve, all the way from Zach's ear to her shoulder, then down to the delicate jut of her collarbone and...

"Really...nice," she says weakly.

Zach purses her lips and squints and—shit, are those tears in her eyes? Where the hell did those come from? "I thought you would like it. I mean, you always..." She shakes her head and backs away from the table. "Great, now I have to go get extensions."

"No, wait! No, hey, I didn't—"

But then Zach is gone and Chris is alone in a room full of strangers who just witnessed the weirdest moment ever in Chris' entire friendship with Zach. They're all staring and judging with their eyes, like Chris ran over Zach's cat or something.

If looks could throw drinks in her face, Chris would be drenched by now.

*

Chris uses her spare key to get into Zach's place. She finds Zach sitting on the floor with Noah, in front of the TV. She's cramming granola into her mouth, which is Zach's binge food of choice, her equivalent of a normal woman's potato chips or Ben and Jerry's. Though it happens to be chocolate granola this time, so it must be bad.

Also, she's wearing a beanie.

"Zach. Seriously. Take that off. It's hideous. You'll end up on Go Fug Yourself two seconds after you leave the house."

"No," Zach pouts. She covers her head protectively. "My hair is hideous. The beanie is hiding it from view."

Chris huffs and kneels beside Zach, ripping the beanie away. "Your hair is gorgeous. Okay? Here, Noah, go fetch." Chris throws the beanie across the room. Noah glances at it and then puts his head down again. She can't blame him for being disinterested; it truly is fug.

"You don't like it. You said it looked 'nice.'" Zach sniffles and when Chris is this close to her, and wearing her glasses to boot, she can see some faint freckles on Zach's face, high on her cheekbones, and jeez, why does Zach have to be so damn pretty, anyway? It doesn't seem fair to all the other people in the world. "You only use that word when you're trying to be...well, nice."

"I guess I was a little speechless." Chris licks her lips nervously. She doesn't miss how Zach's gaze shifts immediately to her mouth. Huh. "Since when do you care what I think, anyway?"

Zach goes a little red in the face. "It seemed like you were thinking of telling Margo to stop with the fake boyfriends, that's all. Like you were tired of it. And then John Cho gave me this stupid pep talk..."

Chris gasps and clutches Zach's shoulder. "Karl gave me a pep talk! Those sneaky fucking breeders."

"Oh, my god." Zach laughs loudly, somewhere between delight and embarrassment. Chris watches avidly as Zach's fingers make their usual journey through her shortened locks; she tries not to make any sort of embarrassing noise. "It's so dumb. John said I should just, you know, go for it. Because that's so easy to do. So I was looking for a way to get your attention and I've noticed how you seem to gravitate toward women with short haircuts, so I thought..."

"You look stunning either way." Chris realizes she's said it aloud a moment too late, but it's okay, because Zach is smiling at her. God, Chris could just melt for this hippie's smile. She clears her throat and smiles. "I gravitate toward beautiful women. Hair has nothing to do with it, Zach. But...yeah, I do really like it. I like it any way you style it."

"Okay, okay, I get it. You're interested. I am, too." Zach laughs and hunches her shoulders slightly. She looks almost shy. "We wouldn't have to announce it to the world, you know. We could just keep hanging out as best friends, then go home and have sex."

"Right," Chris says. She's a little stuck on go home and have sex. Because that means going home and having sex with Zach. Zach of the beautiful hair and killer ass and body that won't fucking quit, thanks to all that soy and yoga. And the hair and the body are just icing, truth be told.

"And if it works out," Zach continues, "we can announce it when we're closer to talk-show age."

"Ha, right."

"Tell everyone we're in a Boston marriage. See what happens."

"Boston. Yep. Celtics. Good team."

Zach sighs. Again, with the sighing. "Chris, are you listening?"

"Not at all." Chris smiles and reaches out for Zach. "But I am taking off your shirt. Oh, and bra, too. Bra's gotta go."

"Oh, Jesus," Zach says, lifting her arms and laughing. "If you insist, Christine."

*

Chris ends up showing Zach just how much she likes her new haircut by basically shoving her face into it as she fingers Zach to a gasping orgasm, right there on the living room floor. Then they move it to the bedroom, where Zach licks Chris to within an inch of her life. Chris is all trembly and breathless after that, so they tangle themselves in the sheets and each other, trading lazy kisses, sighing through soft aftershocks of pleasure. This time, they're the type of sighs that Chris can live with.

Eventually, Zach gets up to make them tea because, well, Zach is still Zach. Chris stretches her limbs, slips her glasses back on, and grabs one of the paperbacks from Zach's nightstand, turning onto her stomach as she flips through it. Zach returns soon, carrying a tray with two steaming mugs. She lets out a little gasp.

"What?" Chris says, looking up.

"Just...the sight of you, lying in my bed, wearing nothing but your glasses." Zach puts the tray down and bends to the mattress. She kisses the small of Chris' back, where it begins to curve into the very round swell of her ass. "I could get used to this," Zach says.

Chris hopes sincerely that Zach has the good sense never to bring up the fact that Chris is blushing like crazy right now. "You should have said something. I can't believe it took Karl Urban to school me on this one."

Zach settles back against the pillows and picks up a mug of tea, blowing on it. "What did he say to you?"

"Oh, you know. So much in common, you like each other, I have a hard-on for you, etcetera."

Zach nods sagely and sips. "He does, it's true."

"What did John say to you?" Chris asks. She makes grabby hands for the second mug. Zach hands it to her carefully.

"He said, and I quote, 'It's a waste of two hot lesbians not to be hot together.'" She shrugs. "He was a little drunk."

Chris laughs, holding her mug with both hands. "And that convinced you?"

"What can I say? It was a cogent argument."

Chris takes it upon herself to snuggle against Zach, and Noah and Harold eventually make their way to the foot of the bed as well. They watch something vapid on TV and Chris finds a crossword to do while Zach plays with her iPhone. It's pretty much as though nothing has changed, except for the fact that they're in bed. Oh, yeah, and naked. Okay, yes—it's a vast improvement.

Chris still hates Karl, but admittedly, slightly less.

*

"Chris." And there it is again, that signature sigh, long and loud as it filters through the phone line. It's almost as though Margo takes pleasure in it.

"Yes, Margo? My life, my love, my everything?"

"Is there any way I can convince you to stop hanging out with Zach Quinto in public so often?" she asks.

Chris pretends to consider it. What she's really doing is watching Zach fold clothes on the other side of the room, dressed in only a bra and boy-short underwear. Chris tilts her head strategically so she gets a clear view of Zach's bodacious ass when she bends to pick up each article from the basket.

"Mmm," she muses. "Probably not."

"Even when Zach is sporting that lady-killer hairstyle?"

"I like it. It's fetching."

"Okay, kiddo," Margo says, sounding resigned. "You leave me no choice."

A few minutes later, Chris hangs up and gets hit in the face with a red T-shirt. "What the—?"

"I thought it might be fun for you to wear a shirt that isn't white and V-necked." Zach grins and sits down on the bed beside Chris, kissing her lingeringly. "So what'd Margo have to say?"

"She's said I've forced her to devise a whole new public persona for me." Chris kisses Zach again and smiles wryly, making air quotes with her fingers. "Young lesbian chic."

Zach smirks. "Too bad you're about as chic as a senior citizen's hope chest."

"Hello, beanie? Beanie." Chris lifts a fist in the air. "Never forget."

"I don't get why you need a label. Why can't you just be mysterious like me?" Zach asks, nuzzling Chris' jaw.

"You realize you're slipping there, right? There's no mystery about your puffy vests and ratty jean shorts, babe."

Zach smirks and pushes Chris playfully down to the bed. She straddles Chris' lap and slips her bra straps from her shoulders, one after the other. Chris watches avidly, wondering which deity she has to thank for a sight like this.

"I think you like them," Zach murmurs, once the bra comes off. "You do, don't you?"

Chris smiles and cups Zach's breasts, kissing them tenderly. "Almost as much as the moonbeams," she says.