Cursed Pop Star - 13

Chapter 13: Toronto Tour

The Il Gato bakery was already well into its operational hours when Romeo arrived. That was to be expected, of course. Bakeries were famous for being early morning things, while popstars… weren’t. Romeo was a bit more of an early riser than most in their business, though. Likely due to growing up in their mother’s bakery, and frequently being drafted to help out before school.

That pressure had mildly killed their social life in middle school and the first couple of years of high school, but Logan and Frankie hadn’t ever minded. Doing band practice reasonably early in the evening had actually been rather popular with Logan’s parents and neighbours.

Of course, then their videos had been discovered online by Hank Collins (along with a couple million other people), they’d been propelled into fame, and Romeo had moved out to be closer to the studio as soon as their mother had let them.

They’d always be allowed to stroll back in whenever they got the chance, however. Today proved to be no different, as their mother lit up upon seeing them.

“You’re… you’re back to—” Erica started to say, before glancing over her shoulder.  Her employees were still a bit too close, easily within overhearing range. She waved to get the attention of one of the bakers, gesturing towards the door. “We’re going upstairs.”

“Sure thing, Erica,” the woman replied.

Romeo followed their mother up into the apartment, getting enough space to talk privately. It wasn’t a strange thing to do, as Romeo frequently had off the record and tabloid sensitive career information to share.

“So, I am thrilled to see you again, dear, but… are you going AWOL again today? Rachel doesn’t like it when I hide you from her,” their mother asked, once the door was shut.

“No, mum,” Romeo sighed, heading over to the kitchen in search of cookies. “I booked the day off weeks ago.”

Their mother almost always had fresh cookies from the bakery around, and they’d had a small breakfast to catch the early train. A bit of digging revealed peanut butter chocolate chip ones in the fridge.

“Can I have some?” they asked, holding up the tray.

“Of course,” their mother replied. “What brings you out here, though? Besides your love of raiding my cookie collection.”

“Ah, well, a couple of things. First, I wanted to show you… well, that I can be like this again,” they said, waving vaguely at themself. “And I thought you might be interested in seeing the change.”

“It’s easy to do?” their mother asked.

“Sure. Feels a little funny, but not exactly bad,” they replied.

With that, Romeo walked over to the sink and wet their hands, then lifted their shirt to scrub off the marking on their upper hip. The transformation then washed over them, shrinking them and shifting their proportions to cause their clothes to grow even more baggy. Still, it was passable for them to wear it. From ill-fitting on a man to adorably oversized on a woman, really.

“Wow… that’s…” their mother mumbled.

“Mhm, it’s pretty—wait. I should put a bra on,” Rosalind muttered, realising they hadn’t been wearing one.

They went to the chair they’d left their bag on and began digging through it to pull out a sports bra. Then they pulled their shirt off to then struggle the tight and elastic nonsense of the sports bra on, somewhat regretting they’d gone for one over a regular bra. As they pulled their shirt back on, they realised the odd look on their mother’s face.

“That just wasn’t something I ever expected to see you do… even after seeing you transformed, it… it never really registered,” she explained. “I—but don’t you want to change back?”

Rosalind shrugged. “I’m not really feeling either gender today, and I’d told Mario I’d show him around Toronto a bit the last time we met… and, uh… I looked like this when we met.”

“Ah… it’s good that you don’t feel masculine today, then,” their mother replied, walking towards the door back down to the bakery.

“I think I’m whatever about gender a lot of the time, these days? Maybe always have been,” the explained.

They then flopped on the couch for a bit, knowing there was still about an hour until Mario’s shift ended. After a bit of channel surfing, they decided to do a light workout. A few crunches and push ups. The latter were harder with shifted musculature, but they could still manage well enough.

Combined, however, those activities only covered about thirty of the sixty-eight minutes they had to wait. So they had a couple more cookies. Then poked about on twumblr. Both on their public account (liking a few PR friendly posts from others) and then switching to their anonymous one, where they actually acted like a human being. Otherwise known as finding and sending annoying memes to their bandmates and other friends.

Then the wait was more or less over and they slipped downstairs. The baker from before gave them a double-take, but ‘Rosalind’ and ‘Romeo’ looked enough alike that seeing them for thirty seconds and hour ago was easy to dismiss as misremembering.

Thank goodness their hair didn’t change colour or anything like that. Just a couple cup sizes added onto their chest and a handful of centimetres taken from their height. The former was made even less obvious by a now baggy shirt and compressing sports bra.

Having passed inspection, they floated about, giving a slight charm offensive towards customers. Their hat and face mask removed, they were recognisable enough, and didn’t mind it being known they’d shown up at their mother’s bakery. Or ‘aunt’s’ bakery, as far as anyone knew.

After a middle aged woman hurried out, smiling from ear to ear while carrying an new photo on her phone alongside her order of muffins, a familiar face appeared. Mario had returned from his last cake delivery of the day.

“Got it there with most of the icing still attached?” Rosalind asked, wearing a playful grin.

“I believe so?” the Grade A all Italian beefcake replied, seeming confused.

“Despite his wild Italian driving, somehow the cakes do arrive intact,” their mother said with a smirk of her own, before turning to Mario with a more gentle expression. “Forgive her, she’s just a gremlin. Valenti family genes run deep, but we tease out of familiarity and friendliness.”

Rosalind nodded enthusiastically.

“Ah. I had noticed you did do that, signora Erica,” Mario said, seeming to clue in.

“Well, time for you to clock out, right?” Rosalind asked.

“Mhm! Yes. Then it is off to Toronto… sì?” he asked.

“Yeah, that’s probably best. I know it better than Hammer City or the Niagara Region,” Rosalind replied.

He nodded, looking nervous. “Are… are you free to do this? You are a celebrity now?”

It took them a moment to remember the ‘now’ was because he didn’t know they were Romeo and had been famous well before meeting him. Juggling the two identities and faces was more than a little confusing.

“Being famous is tiring. It’s nice to pretend I’m not every so often,” they replied. “Casually hanging out and giving you a tour is a good way to do that.”

Mario lit up happily at that, heading off to grab his jacket.

-

The one thing she hadn’t thought enough about, before agreeing to show Mario around the GTA, was the fact it would mean riding in his car again. Their knuckles were white as they held onto the seatbelt with the desperation of a mountain climber grasping their life line. Some part of their brain was registering that was mildly foolish and imparting no assistance in the result of a crash, but the primal portion of their body that had taken over most of their neurons insisted they had to hold on to something. If they let go of the seatbelt, well, there was only about a 50% chance they’re go for the dashboard in place of panicking and grabbing ahold of the tall and muscular specimen beside her… generally that would be logical. Say, in a haunted house or somewhere he could provide protection. However it was a rather poorer idea when he was the one driving the vehicle.

They let out a quiet thanks to an unspecified deity when he finally parked the car in a downtown Toronto parkade. Then they clambered out with shaky legs, trying to regain their cool.

“We should get lunch,” they said, fixing their mask back on.

“Can we get something East Asian? I will guess Toronto is good for that?” Mario replied.

“Mhm. There’s a good cheap Korean joint not far from here,” Rosalind replied.

The pair went down to the ground level and hopped on a streetcar. Even if the driver was probably a bus driver who recently changed lines, it was still far less terrifying than riding with Mario. They took it over to Spadina, getting out and walking a couple blocks to the restaurant.

Mario ended up ordering a spicy beef bulgogi, while Rosalind got some savory pancakes. The portions were generous and the food was high quality. Just as Rosalind remembered it the last time they’d managed to sneak off for some casual dining out. Mario seemed quite happy with it.

After the meal, they set out down Spadina, heading to show off the old Chinatown. They then followed the street towards the rising sea of condos towards the south, Mario impressed by the sheer amount of existing towers and the roughly as numerous rising buildings under construction.

“I heard from JK that Toronto sometimes has more cranes than New York… I don’t know if it’s true, but I’d believe it,” they said.

“It’s like they’re building a whole new city,” he replied.

“Something like that,” they muttered, taking a turn.

It would bring them deeper into the forest of high rises, which Rosalind figured Mario would appreciate. It also didn’t make the walk to their destination too much longer. The only drawback was having to go under the scaffold covered sidewalks beside various construction sites. Those were both a bit more crowded, thinner than the other sidewalks, and prevented Mario from getting a good view of the towers rising overhead.

But, hey. That was Toronto. The whole city was an eternal construction site.

When they emerged from the last construction scaffolding, they were now at the base of the Canada Tower. The concrete monolith to a world record now firmly lost, but an impressive building all the same.

“It’s bigger than I thought, up close,” Mario mumbled, looking up.

There was a brief moment where an inappropriate reply flashed through Rosalind’s mind, but they dismissed it. Mario seemed a bit too soft, naive, and wholesome for that sort of thing.

“Tickets are fairly reasonable,” was what they said instead. “And the views are pretty good.”

-

Above the city, at the upper sky pod, Rosalind found themself enjoying the view more than they’d thought. They’d always liked being up high. Perhaps the instincts universal to all primates… but maybe influenced by their winged and divine father’s genes.

Even if they still found that whole concept strange to think about. And they’d yet to meet him.

Which, really… was it that much of a demand to want their father to come visit? Especially now that they knew who he was, so wouldn’t be surprised? They were a world famous celebrity… wasn’t Eros proud of them?

“I think the sign on the top of that building is farther away now than when we were on the ground,” Mario said, leaning over to look at the window some more, drawing Rosalind out of thoughts of their father. “And that’s a tall building.”

“Huh. I think you’re right,” Rosalind replied.

Mario moved around the edge of the pod, to look out across the lake. It was a bit bright, with the shimmering of the sun on the water, but it wasn’t unbearable.

“Quite the lake… you can just barely make out part of the other side,” he said as they walked over to be back at his side. “What are those towers over there?”

Leaning over themself, Rosalind realised where he was looking. “Ah, that’s Niagara Falls. The hotels and casinos and such.”

“There’s casinos?” he asked, sounding surprised.

Maybe he thought Niagara Falls was all about the nature?

“Mhm. It’s like Canada’s Vegas… or… maybe more Atlantic City, since it also can’t really compete with the real Vegas.”

He nodded, though it seemed clear to Rosalind that Mario didn’t actually know what Atlantic City was. Instead, Rosalind decided to point out the other main sights.

“Over that way you can see Mississauga’s skyline. Kind of a mess if you actually visit on the ground, but it looks impressive from a distance,” they said. “And you might be able to make out Hammer City. It’s downtown is kind of hidden by the Niagara Escarpment, but if the sun’s right you might be good.”

Mario nodded, leaning in to try to make it out. Rosalind was fairly certain they saw a slight glint of some of the newer buildings, but it was always hard to say. Mississauga was much closer, and so easier to enjoy the view of.

They didn’t realise, though, that Mario was enjoying a different view at the moment.

“Is there something in my hair?” they asked, when they realised where his eyes were.

Normally, when a guy looked at them like that they’d get ideas, but Mario was straight, so it had to be something else… so they ran a hand through their hair, checking for fluff.