Work Text:
“It’ll fit.”
“If you say so.”
It was the third shirt that Maximus had dug out of his closet to try on. This was the only one thus far that he’d agreed to actually try on- everything else was dismissed as ‘well, I never liked this anyways’ and tossed into the pile to be replaced. Red couldn’t really be sure why he had done that, but it wasn’t hard to make assumptions; Max may have been unwilling to damage his pride by trying on something that he knew wouldn’t fit, and rather than suffer the embarrassment of admitting he’d outgrown it, he would rather just dismiss it immediately. They’d been putting this off for awhile, and it seemed like his denial had only grown more intense as he’d grown larger.
“See, it- uh- yeah! It fits.” He had to bend himself at an odd angle to hide the sliver of skin that it now failed to cover, but otherwise, it did fit. Red cocked an eyebrow.
“Uh…sure. Keep that one, then.”
Maximus struggled to remove it for a moment before tossing it in the ‘keep’ pile. Really, Red couldn’t understand why he was taking this kind of attitude with this- if he just admitted he was too big for his old clothes, it’d be easier to replace them and avoid any future embarrassment for at least the next few months. Max apparently deemed the next shirt too small right away, not even bothering to tell Red his excuse before tossing it in the ‘replace’ pile. The next after that, however, was apparently the point of some careful consideration.
“What’s wrong?”
“It’s, uh- nothing,” Max held the shirt up to himself in a way that he apparently thought Red wouldn’t notice- feigning an action of checking the tags before lowering it again quickly. It was one of his old favorites- a band t-shirt with a long-faded autograph on the stomach. “I’m just reading the label.”
Red turned back to his own pile of clothes. He didn’t bother hiding how most of his older clothing didn’t fit him; he was down to the last few garments, now, almost everything else either preemptively thrown into ‘replace’, or briefly tried on and thrown there after getting stuck on Red’s shoulders. He still had pants to try on, after Max was done with-
“Fuck.”
Max was half-wedged into the shirt before it caught at the lower part of his ribcage- ironically, right about where the autograph had been. Evidently, he’d tried to pull it down over the sides of his stomach, as the very bottom of the shirt looked like it had ridden back up to where it was currently settled. There was no way in hell that he’d ever be able to fit it past that point. Max all but pouted as he tried to wrestle himself free, stopping very briefly along the way and continuing much less aggressively as it had just barely showed signs of ripping.
There was a moment of silence between them both as Max held the offending object in one hand, seemingly torn between keeping it and throwing it out.
“I just need to get it tailored.”
“I can get you a new one online.”
“No! I don’t-…need a new one.” Max’s voice broke as he protested. Finally, he huffed and tossed it into the ‘replace’ pile. He scowled as he grumbled, “Let’s just do pants.”
Red hid a smirk as he turned, again, to his own clothes. Immediately, he could tell that most of them wouldn’t fit. The ‘curse’ of having thick thighs. Thankfully, most of his favorite shorts seemed like they still fit him, as did some of his more expensive jeans. He could only guess how well Max was doing with his own clothes. If the muttering and occasional noises of someone trying to jam themselves into something one leg at a time were any indication, that guess would have been ‘not very well’. Red had just zipped himself into one of his favorites- second-hand cargo shorts with an obnoxiously vibrant camo print on them, with holes worn into the ends in a fashionable rather than embarrassing way- when a different noise from behind him caught his attention.
“There!”
Sure enough, Max had been able to fit into one of his own old favorites- well, make that two, actually. The white button-down shirt that he broke out for special occasions, paired with a dark pair of work jeans that had always felt uncomfortably rough to Red. They looked odd together, but Maximus seemed caught up in the triumph of getting both over his stomach and thighs, respectively.
“I’m taking a break to sort through this.”
Red didn’t argue. “Alright. You look nice, by the way.”
“Same on your end.”
Red busied himself with stripping his shorts back off and running through lists of stores to visit later in the day, when as he folded the shorts neatly for the ‘keep’ pile, he heard a noise so distinct that he hardly needed to turn to imagine it.
Apparently, Max had let go of the breath he’d been holding in once Red turned back around. His jeans had split down the seams of each thigh, and the weight of his stomach pushed down the zipper under a button he hadn’t even bothered lying to himself about closing. The bottom two buttons- quite nearly the bottom three, as the lowest seemed to be barely held back from bursting- had given out after Max let out his held breath. Maximus’s soft, thick middle spilled out of the gap the missing buttons created, and the rest of his chubby stomach appeared to be mere moments from full exposure.
The blush on Max’s face was redder than his partner’s namesake, and it took another long moment of silence before Red spoke up.
“You know, I can just do clothes shopping myself if you have nothing to wear.”