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artificialqueens · 5 years

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I'll Be Seeing You (Kamjie) - Mac

AN: I’m hopping on the Kamjie train. Sue me. ALSO, BLESS Mia for beta-ing and being a dear.

Summary: Across all the years of Kameron and Vanessa’s respective careers, they just can’t seem to get the timing right or stop making out long enough to figure out the timing.

Two years ago

The season 10 press tour was a hectic time.

The dolls were working fifteen-hour days with their only breaks being the short car rides between different filming studios. They were tired physically and emotionally; keeping the secrets of the season under threat of legal action was much more mentally draining than one would think.

Kameron was exhausted.

On top of the immense stress she was under, and the crippling need to perform to the level of her fellow sisters, Vanjie and Aquaria’s not so casual flirting at every given opportunity was driving her slowly insane.

Kameron had been infatuated with Vanjie since she first walked her short frame and loud mouth in the werkroom. Even though she had gone home first, Kameron had set her sights and her heart on the younger queen.

So the post-press flirting between her fellow top four sister and the early out was a bit more irksome to Kameron than the rest of the girls.

It was so irksome in fact that Kameron brought it up to Vanjie, albeit when they were both incredibly drunk and hanging off their respective bar stools for fear they would collapse if they had to stand on their own feet.

“What’s up with you and Aqua?” Dane slurred in between gulps of his drink.

“Oh, me n Gio?” Jose chuckled and scratched the back of his head, nervously ducking away from the blush spreading on his cheeks. “We just talkin’.” Jose’s eyes found Aquaria’s through the mass of bodies. If Dane weren’t seething with unfounded jealousy, he might have found it impressive.

“That don’t look like just talkin’.”

Jose chuckled again, less nervous this time.

“You know how it is. I take what I can get.”

“You can get better than that.”

“You offerin’?”

Dane whipped his head around, making the room spin more than it probably should, and causing him to sway a bit closer to Jose.

His expression must have displayed his shock rather than his eagerness because Jose tried to cover.

“I’m kidding. Kidding.” Jose said, but his tone implied otherwise, and he didn’t move away. The younger man looked down at his hands and mumbled something under his breath about white boys.

They were so close, if Jose had turned his head a few inches upwards they would be breathing each other’s air.

“I wasn’t.”

Before either of them could blink, or think it through, their lips were pressed together. It was a mess of tequila and vodka. Fire and ice. They were testing each other, seeing how far the other would go, how far they could make the other go. Dane heard himself mumble “fuck it” and he let his control slip.

Without any hesitation, Dane pinned Jose against the nearest wall, cornering him in with his own body, invading Jose’s senses. It was a miracle of science and physics that lead them to that point, because Dane doesn’t remember standing up and he for sure doesn’t know how he maneuvered them to their current position, but he wasn’t complaining. Jose was panting and whimpering against Dane’s lips, so most of his higher thinking processes were suspended anyways.

Jose kissed like he lived, loudly and with passion.

They made out aggressively against a dirty bar wall for what felt like minutes and hours at the same time. As time went on, the kisses became less aggressive - slower, softer even. But whenever it would get too soft, Dane would bite Jose’s lip or Jose would pull Dane’s hair and they were right back into battle. They kissed and bit and whispered dirty things until the lights flickered on and they realized they were the only ones left.

They both had sense enough to be embarrassed at their behavior and made sure to keep a wide berth as they exited the bar.

They called an Uber and were back to the hotel in minutes. But before they could part ways, Jose handed Dane’s phone, the phone he hadn’t even realized was gone, back with a cock to his head.

“I put my number in there. Lemme know next time you offerin’.”

Dane blushed and ducked his head. It was easier in the dim bar to pretend that he wasn’t really making out with his long-time crush, but now, in the bright hotel lighting, he couldn’t deny that the butterflies had only increased in magnitude.

Jose seemed blissfully ignorant of Dane’s inner turmoil but took advantage of his lowered head to press a chaste kiss to Dane’s cheek.

“See ya around, Kammy.” Jose smiled as the elevator door closed behind him.

Dane smiled back and hoped his nerves weren’t too obvious. He couldn’t speak on account of his heart hammering out of his fucking chest and closing his throat up.

He made his way back to his room in a daze and didn’t even take his shoes off before passing out. His dreams were filled with dark eyes and the smell of strong cologne mixed with tequila.

Fifteen Years Ago

Dane didn’t know what the fuck he was doing here. He had just come out with some guys he met at work. He had heard the words ‘gay bar’ and ‘new clients’ and like any good gogo dancer slash occasional escort, he had jumped at the opportunity. His new friends had said nothing about there being a drag show.

With the atrocity that was whatever was happening on stage, no one was glancing twice at him. And for a scrawny fresh-faced eighteen-year-old gay boy, that was rare.

Dane found himself holed up at the bar cradling a virgin martini because he couldn’t bat his eyelashes appealingly enough to get one of the bartenders to not ask for an ID.

He finally gave in and turned to look to the small stage where a… woman? Man dressed as a woman? Dane didn’t know the proper language for this type of thing. The small stage housed a… person… performer that was mouthing the words to some 80’s synth-pop song. It didn’t seem like anything special, certainly not as attention-grabbing as he was, goddamnit.

Until the performer began dancing.

They were dropping and dipping and throwing their body around the stage in a sort of practiced chaos. It was alarming and exhilarating to watch and Dane quickly found himself enthralled.

He got up from the bar to walk toward the stage. Up close, he could see the layers of makeup pasted on the performer’s face. He could see the flaws, could see the creases around the eyes. Could see the crack of the illusion, but it only made him more intrigued.

The performer looked down at him and motioned to the tips in her hand. She broke her flawless lip-synch to speak to him. “It is customary to tip a lady if you’re ogling the goods.” She winked.

Dane blushed at being called out and rummaged around in his pockets for bills. He gave her five dollars and mouthed, ‘sorry.’

She smiled kindly and shook her head to say, ‘don’t worry about it.’

He backed up into the crowd and watched as she finished her performance in a jump and split. He cheered and clapped along with the other patrons.

Dane watched, utterly captivated as performer after performer awed him. They each did something different, each had their own schtick that made them unique. He tipped each and every one of them.

As the show ended, Dane realized he had lost track of his buddies. He was just about to head for the door, but something made him stay. He didn’t know why but he got the feeling that he needed to stay.

Dane sat up at the bar again, and not ten minutes passed before a familiar face sat down next to him. The… man, well, now he was a man, had kind eyes and a patient smile.

As was customary for Dane, he immediately started apologizing. “I’m sorry ‘bout earlier, I never been to a drag show before an’ I don’t really know the rules.”

“Don’t sweat it, kid. We all started somewhere.”

The stranger didn’t seem too afraid to speak his mind, but Dane, at least when he was nervous, couldn’t ever seem to find his voice. They ended up talking for hours. Well, the stranger did most of the talking, but Dane began to warm up to him near the end, even cracking a few jokes here and there. He found out he had more than he’d have thought in common as an 18-year-old gay boy growing up in rural Tenessee with a fifty-something-year-old drag queen from New York.

Dane came back next week, and the next week, and the week after that. He eventually convinced Bianca to let him lounge around the already cramped dressing room in exchange for cleaning her wigs and styling them (she had found out quickly Dane was a wizard with hair.)

Finally, one night, Bianca, convinced him to let her put makeup on him, show him how pretty he could be as a woman. Dane had rolled his eyes but let her do her thing.

When he saw himself he nearly screamed. He looked… horrible. He looked like a clown.

Maybe that makeup worked for Bianca, but it certainly didn’t work for him.

“What’s wrong?”

“The contour is too much here.”

Dane, unprompted picked up a brush and began to blur the harsh line a bit. He dipped into the darkest of the colors Bianca had and softened his jawline. Grabbed a small brush and buffed his eyeshadow out. He smeared and pushed and cleaned up what he thought would look good. When he finally looked at himself in the mirror… it wasn’t him at all.

It was someone else. Someone else whose makeup skills could use a bit of work, but who definitely had potential, at least according to Bianca.

After two weeks of performing with his work-in-progress mug and his generic drag name, Dane felt he was finally getting the hang of this whole adulting thing.

He quit his job at the strip club, followed Bianca’s advice and took up hairstyling. He started having a steady income and a job he didn’t regret in the morning.

Dane started living life as Kameron Michaels.

And life as Kameron Michaels was pretty damn good.

Four Months Ago

They had a gig together. Well, a bunch of other Drag Race girls and a handful of local queens had a gig together. Kameron and Vanjie just happened to be some of those girls.

Kameron was doing her makeup and trying her best to ignore Asia. Her closest friend was very much aware of Kameron’s little crush and liked to remind her of it at every given moment.

Kameron had asked her nicely to please not do this. Well, actually, her exact words were more along the lines of I swear to Jesus H Christ, Asia if you fuck this up I’ll strangle you.

But it was Asia, so Kameron didn’t know what she expected.

For her part, Asia did hold back… for about five minutes. Then she was all up in Vanjie’s business asking about Brooke Lynn.

Vanjie was joking back, giving just as good as she got, but the playfulness wasn’t there. Kameron could tell Asia was hitting too close to home with some of her comments. The longer it went on, the more Kameron tried to cut in.

“Where you goin’ Vanj? Goin’ to call Brooke Lynn?”

“Asia, knock it off,” Kameron called over to her sister. “She doesn’t want to talk about it. Let her be.”

Something flashed in Asia’s eyes a moment, something angry and fierce, but it was gone as soon as it came, as was Vanjie, who stormed out of the dressing room.

Kameron followed a few minutes later, giving the younger queen time to cool off, or punch something, or… yell. She found her leaning against a wall in the far hallway. Kameron tried not to think about the last time she saw Vanjie pressed against a wall.

“Hey.”

“Do you want company? Cause if not, that’s okay, just tell me and I’ll go. But I wanted to see how you were because you seemed upset and I don’t want you to be upset so I came out here to see if I could make you less upset and I-”

“Kameron.”

“I’m rambling, aren’t I?”

Vanjie nodded.

“Sorry. I’ll just…” Kameron motioned back down the hall.

“No, stay.” Vanjie grabbed Kameron’s hand. “Please,” she added.

“Okay.”

Kameron dropped Vanjie’s hand and slowly slid down the wall. She stopped halfway down and held up a finger, making a funny face. She slid down a bit more and stopped again. Then slid down all the way.

Vanjie was in stitches she was laughing so hard.

“And they said you didn’t have a personality.”

It was Kameron’s turn to crack up.

A beat of silence passed before Kameron spoke up. “Congratulations on your season by the way. You were incredible. You should be proud.”

“Proud of walkin down the runway in a bodysuit every week?”

Kameron shook her head. “No. Proud of making the world fall in love with you.” Kameron met Vanjie’s eyes and had to look away a second later. “The real you, this time.”

“Kameron-”

“Dane.” Kameron corrected.

“Dane.” Vanjie tested the name out on her mouth. It felt weird but right at the same time. “Do you really think so?”

“I really do.”

Something passed between the two of them, something familiar yet foreign. An energy… or a vibe… or a connection of some kind. Suddenly everything fell into place, and Kameron was burying her fingers in Vanjie’s short hair before she could think about what she was doing. Their lips were inches apart, and there was no booze this time, nothing to blame it on. This wasn’t about to be a kiss of passion or a kiss of regret. This was purposeful, practiced.

Their lips were centimeters apart… when suddenly a voice called out.

“Big D! Dane! Kam! Where you at?”

The voice sounded too close for comfort, and the moment was effectively broken. Kameron sighed with her forehead pressed against Vanjie’s. They stayed like that as long as it was safe to do so before Asia’s voice came from the hallway they were in. Kameron pulled back and stood up.

“Wait.” Vanjie followed her up on her feet, and pulled Kameron close and pressed a quick kiss to her lips. “To remember me by,” Vanjie spoke dramatically.

“As if I could forget you.”

Vanjie laughed, but Kameron meant it.

One year ago

Jose was screaming.

He was yelling and wanted to throw things and felt like he needed to hurt someone, hurt something back.

Brock had left his apartment ten minutes ago with a half-hearted apology and too many excuses to qualify as a reason.

Jose was alone in his apartment with a broken heart and his mother’s voice telling him to stay away from the white boys. They only break your heart, she said. And however much Jose hated to admit it, she was right.

He called Alexis.

She told him she would be there if she could. Told him to take a shower, eat some ice cream, cry it out. It was all good advice, but Jose didn’t want it. He wanted someone to be mad with him. He needed someone to be irrational with him. He didn’t want responsible, normal advice, he wanted more than that.

V: u wanna do something reckless

K: where do I meet you?

V: i knew you were that girl

An old red truck pulled up to Jose’s apartment not twenty minutes after the younger man’s first text.

Jose hopped in without thinking twice.

“Where we headin’?”

“I don’t care, just drive.”

“Okay.”

They drove for miles and miles and miles until the distant city lights’ only purpose was to light the side of Dane’s face. They drove up and up and up into the neighboring mountains that surrounded Los Angeles. Music on the radio blared in Jose’s ears and his mind was blessedly quiet, filled with the sound of the whipping wind and his empty chest.

They rolled to a stop finally at some touristy lookout spot, but Jose didn’t pay it any mind. Dane hopped out of the truck without a word and led Jose cautiously by the hand to sit in the bed of the truck; the two sat looking out at the city below them, the life they’d left behind. Dane pulled out a blanket from god knows where and covered their legs and feet.

“He broke up with me.”

There was a beat of silence.

“I’m sorry, JJ.”

They were the first words Dane had spoken since they had gotten out of the truck. Jose felt bad, felt like a horrible person for dumping all his baggage on the older man. Sure they were friends, sure they talked about important stuff, but not like this, never like this. They had kissed, there was history, he shouldn’t be crying to Dane about another guy, it wasn’t right.

But no matter how not right it was, Jose couldn’t keep his mouth shut, a well-known flaw of his.

“He said he loved me, but he wasn’t ready for a relationship. He said he didn’t want to lead me on.” Jose laughed bitterly. “Bit late for that asshole. We’ve been dating for four months. You in this. You can’t just leave.”

Dane nodded along with Jose’s words, letting him vent. Letting himself be Jose’s personal sounding board.

“And don’t even get me started on his fuckin feet, Mary. Jesus, those toes were na-sty.”

Dane opened his mouth to chime in, but Jose kept on his tirade.

“But like I loved him, ya know? And I thought he’d love me too, but guess I was wrong cause if he fuckin’ liked me he wouldn’t be a fuckin’ DICK.”

“Well-” Dane started to speak.

Jose cut him off again. “I just don’t get it. If he didn’t want me, he shoulda said so when we were suckin’ face in front of a hundred fuckin cameras.”

Dane couldn’t contain his chuckle at that one.

Jose finally turned to look at his conversation partner. “What you smilin’ at hoe?”

Dane tried to control his giggles, but he couldn’t. “Nothin, I just didn’t know you were on season 11.” His words were interspersed with light chuckles.

Jose’s face went white.

“Shit. I fucked that up huh.”

“Sure did.”

They both proceeded to burst into another round of giggles before Jose tried and failed to be very serious and made Dane promise not to tell. Dane interlocked their pinkies amidst laughter and promised.

A few more minutes passed before Jose began to shiver at the cool air up in the mountains; he shifted closer to Dane.

Dane was on edge. He was pretty sure that Jose knew about his crush because his heart was pounding against his chest and there was sweat soaking his brow. Dane stiffened up at the contact on instinct, but Jose just rolled his eyes and picked Dane’s arm up to wrap it around himself. Dane smiled to himself and tried to ignore the guilt in his gut. He shouldn’t feel this way. Jose literally just broke up with someone.

“I can hear you overthinkin’.”

“Sorry, I just-”

“Stop apologizin’! Just relax.”

Dane did his best.

The two stayed that way for a while, with Jose tracing patterns on Dane’s chest through his shirt and Dane trying not to pass out from the rush of affection. Jose traced words and pictures and a future he had always dreamed of. It looked a little like this.

At one point, it looked exactly like this: Jose in the back of a beat-up old truck with a beautiful boy who would move heaven and earth (or drive to his home in the middle of the night) for him…

Dane let Jose fall into a light sleep, brushed the younger man’s short hair with his fingertips, and tried to slow his heart to fit the mood. Eventually, it did, but only after flipping the fuck out in his chest for a solid half-hour.

When the breeze began to bite more than caress, Dane ran his hand up and down Jose’s arm to wake him gently. The younger man groaned and buried his head deeper into Dane’s chest.

“C’mon, baby. Let’s get you home.”

Jose pouted, but let himself be coerced, and practically carried into the truck. The drive back was basically the same, but this time Jose kept his and Dane’s fingers intertwined.

They pulled up to Jose’s apartment sooner than either would have liked.

Jose stalled a bit, using his other hand to trace where his fingers interlocked with Dane’s. But he could only do that for so long before the lonely apartment called to him.

“Thanks for tonight, Kammy. You da best.” Jose pressed a quick kiss to Dane’s cheek and ran inside before either of them could say anything more.

Dane sat outside Jose’s apartment for a little while, letting his head spin and turn and over analyze every touch. Only after a light in the window went out did Dane finally pull away.

Now

Dane was beating himself up mentally for what felt like the millionth time since the tour started when Jose came in.

Werq the World was exhausting. Anyone who told you otherwise was lying or a sociopath (or Violet, who seemed to only become more energized the more cities they visited.)

Dane was beating himself up because this was his last show until the South American leg started. Probably the last time he’d see Jose for the next few months.

The two had gotten increasingly close over the course of several cities, sitting beside each other on the bus and talking quietly in dressing rooms. They hadn’t… done anything. Which was maybe what was most infuriating. The past two years had shown they were both very bad at keeping their hands off one another. But alas, it was the last day of tour and Dane was beating himself up about not just fucking doing something when Jose walked in.

“Hey, Danemals, get it? Like the yogurt? Danimals?”

Dane would have cracked up if he weren’t having an existential crisis at the moment.

“Woah, what’s up? You look like you’re stressin’.”

“It’s nothing. Don’t worry ‘bout me, I’m just being dramatic.”

“Hold up a hot second, Mary! You talked me through so many fuckin’ breakdowns by now, let me help you out this time.”

Dane sighed and sat down. Fuck it. He thought. It’s the last day of tour. If this goes badly, I can just never see him again, right?

Dane took a deep breath in and out. “JJ, I like you. I mean I have liked you for a long time now. And I know you said somethin’ one time about being done with white boys, which I totally get by the way - I’ve been there too - but I really think that we could be good together if you gave me a chance. And I also know you aren’t really looking to date right now, but I think I’d make a great boyfriend, and I know we wouldn’t see each other all that much, but I think we could make it work. I want to make it work because I really like you and-”

“Dane.”

“Yes?”

“Shut up.”

“But-”

Jose stopped him with his lips this time, a much more effective tool than his words. Jose smiled when Dane didn’t immediately kiss back, shock overtaking him. But eventually, Dane composed himself to return the kiss, lips synching up with Jose’s almost on instinct.

And what a kiss it was.

No holds barred, everything on the line. It was a practiced sort of messy, the kind that meant new beginnings.

Dane only pulled away from Jose when breathing became a necessity. But even between gulps of air, Dane pecked Jose’s lips over and over and over again, just because he could.

“I like you too,” Jose said against Dane’s lips, smiling all the while.

Dane pulled Jose even closer and kissed him once, twice, and once more for good measure, with Jose giddily laughing with ever press of Dane’s lips to his own.

“Why’d you keep kissin’ me like that?” He manages to get out between smiles.

“Just givin’ you something to remember me by.”

Jose smiled at his own words echoed back at him.

“As if I could forget you.” He repeated.

#rpdr fanfiction #kameron michaels #vanessa vanjie mateo #kamjie #fluff #light angst #getting together #ill be seeing you #mac #canon compliant

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