Thinking about Laurance’s transition and how it affects his relationship with Cadenza.
Living on the streets, Laurance presented as a boy for purely practical reasons. The clothes he could find skewed masculine, and it was easier to blend in. Being taken in by Hayden, Laurance finally felt like he could drop that shield.
I don’t want this to come across as invalidating to his identity in any way, but Laurance’s phase of enthusiastically being a girl is so special to me, and plays such a big role in how I write him and Cadenza.
Cadenza obviously would have loved her new sibling regardless of gender or age, but she was particularly excited to have a little sister. She was over the moon to have someone to do “girly” things with. Laurance, for his part, saw all the clothes and hair and makeup as luxuries he had never gotten, so was happy to let Cadenza spoil him.
I wanna make it clear that even though Cadenza was really sweet and generous, she was also a 15 year old child and the lord’s niece. So she had a bit of a catty streak as well. Big “daughter of the mayor in a tiny town” vibe. This quickly rubbed off on Laurance, and they pretty much acted like they ran the village, regularly getting into mischief. All this to say, young Laurance and Cadenza are incredibly Poppy and Viva coded to me, and “It takes Two” perfectly captures Cadenza’s initial excitement at having a sister.
Obviously there was underlying dysphoria in the time that stopped Laurance from being 100% happy, but I don’t want it misconstrued that he was miserable or just going along with it. He genuinely loved doing everything with Cadenza, loved their reputation as the Zvahl sisters.
It was only when he started coming to terms with his identity, that maybe disguising as a boy had been more than an act, that conflict began.
Cadenza put so much value in their sisterly bond, to the point of sometimes annoying the other villagers. Laurance was scared that coming out would mean disrupting that, of Cadenza thinking less of him. It got in his head, and she quickly noticed that he wasn’t having as much as he used to.
When he finally came out, Cadenza acted supportive, but it wasn’t completely genuine. She understood that it was probably harder for him than it was for her, but she was scared his transition would mean he wouldn’t want to do things with her anymore. This came to a head when Hayden was preparing to take Laurance to a witch (aka how gender reassignment works in this fantasy world) and Cadenza tried to scare him out of it.
Hayden pulled Cadenza aside to talk to her. Laurance needed her support. And their bond with each other was deeper than the superficial need to enjoy all the same things, so even if Laurance decided he didn’t want to do those things anymore it wouldn’t change that they were siblings and they loved each other. Cadenza apologized and Laurance went through with the ritual.
Luckily, after some adjusting, Laurance being fully comfortable in his body made him even more enthusiastic to try out different hair and clothes, and Cadenza was happy to help him experiment, as it allowed her to expand the styles she made. All in all, they ended up even closer than they were before.
