for Mikke-chan
Nov. 24th, 2002 12:02 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
windandwaterTHIS IS A SNIP FROM MY MOMENTS OF RAPTURE FIC! DON'T READ IT IF YOU DON'T WANT TO KNOW!
Are you sure you wanna read this?
I think it sucks.
Last chance.
--------------------------------------------
The right side of the bed was empty.
Free hand fumbling against the cold and still air where a slim, warm body was supposed to be, Heero's eyes shot open. He blinked stupidly across the bed, as if looking would find Duo ensconced in some corner of the bed where he couldn't reach. But blinking his eyes did nothing but drive the sleep further away, and Duo still wasn't in the bed. Rolling over onto his back, Heero listened carefully. There was no flush of the toilet, there wasn't the sound of water rushing through the pipes, there wasn't even the sound of Duo humming to himself as he did some tedious chore. There was no sound except the wind against the eaves and the soft sounds of the ocean. He didn't know why he did this -- continued to lay in the bed as if, on this night, it would be different and Duo would slink out of the bathroom or the kitchen after a midnight snack and come back to bed.
But it wasn't midnight. It was 3:47 AM.
And Duo wasn't in the bathroom. He was where he always was.
Rising reluctantly, as if the weight of his own inexperience was pulling him down, Heero left the bed and crossed over to the large window. The right side of the bed was closest to the window; you could lay there and stare out across the ocean without having to shift position. For not the first time, Heero cursed his obsessive need to be the closest to the exit. He kept the bedroom door to his back and slept on his left side, keeping his right arm free to grab for a gun. They had stopped keeping their guns under their pillows months ago, but Heero still kept his arm free. It made him feel better to think that he could protect Duo from any intrusion or danger by keeping his back to the door. Duo had simply raised his hands in exasperation and not questioned what he termed "crazy Heero logic" and took the right side of the bed without further complaint.
Heero moved the long drape aside, staring out the polished glass of the window. The tide was out; leaving a wide stretch of beach that was unblemished and clean, except for a set of tracks that Heero had come to recognize as familiar. Tilting his head, he could make out the slim form wandering down the deserted beach, clad only in sweatpants and bare feet.
"Duo..." Heero sighed.
Then he let the drapes fall back shut and went back to bed.
--------------------------------------------------------------
When Heero woke again, it was to the familiar feel of Duo tucked against him, all warm skin and long hair, snoring as if he had been lying in Heero's arms all night. It was mornings when Heero questioned himself the most, when he wondered if those late night occurrences weren't just byproducts of his subconscious fear of Duo leaving him one day. But Heero had never much listened to the psychiatrists who had tried to stuff him into their preset metal states and their canned diagnoses. This had happened too many times to simply be a recurring dream. Heero knew that Duo left their bed in the middle of the night to walk on the beach. He just didn't know why.
Duo stirred in his arms, one hand rising to his amaryllis eyes to rub at them.
"'Mornin', 'eero," Duo yawned.
"Morning, Duo," Heero returned.
Then, because it felt right, he leaned over and kissed his lover. Duo came wide-awake and then playfully pushed the Japanese man away.
"Yuck! Morning breath!"
"So sorry to offend you."
A pillow hit Heero across the face. "The bathroom for you! Or else you don't get breakfast!"
Heero nodded and slipped out of the bed, but not before stealing one more kiss. Duo threw the pillow at him but Heero had closed the bathroom door at the last second, feeling the wood shudder as the mass of cotton and polyester fiber smacked against it.
Mornings were always the same.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Heero was nursing a mug of coffee as Duo puttered around the kitchen.
Mornings in the Maxwell-Yuy household went like this:
Heero used the bathroom first while Duo set up the coffee maker.
Heero left the bathroom and sneaked a kiss from Duo as they passed in the hallway. Duo entered the bathroom and Heero went outside in his robe and slippers to get the newspaper. The length of time varied, depending on where the paperboy had decided to throw the newspaper. Ideally on the porch -- more often it was in the bushes, or on the lawn, and once Heero found the paper stuck in the braches of the tree in the yard. On that morning, Heero had decided he really didn't need to read the paper.
Heero entered the house with the paper (or not, depending) and went straight into the kitchen. Duo would already be there, setting out a mug of black coffee for Heero as he fixed breakfast. They would indulge in mutual dodging and teasing as Heero fetched the milk and sugar, and Duo looked for eggs. The Heero would sit at the counter with his coffee, open the paper, and read articles out loud. Duo would interject his opinions whenever he felt it was necessary.
Looking over the top of the World section when he heard the unmistakable sounds of the electric mixer over the sounds of frying bacon, Heero raised one eyebrow and he lowered the paper.
"Pancakes?"
Duo looked up from the bowl of batter he was whipping into submission. There was a streak of pancake mix across his cheek, and he had tucked his braid down the back of his shirt 'just in case.' "Yeah, pancakes," he answered, raising his voice over the electric whir.
"After the last time?"
The last time Duo had made pancakes, he had accidentally lifted the mixer from the bowl without turning it off first. Buttermilk pancake batter had splattered all across the kitchen and the two young men that had been in it. This had led to a food fight where more batter, as well as butter and eggs had been hurled around. Then Heero had absently licked batter from Duo's floury fingers and they ended up making love on the kitchen floor. They had both forgotten to eat breakfast that day... and they skipped lunch, too. The Japanese man vaguely wondered if the same thing would happen this morning.
Narrowed violet eyes were focused on him, and the American man had an outraged expression on his face. "Hey! I think there's a rule about insulting a chef in his own kitchen!"
"I'm just bringing up--"
"Do you think I don't know how to make pancakes?"
"Oh, I know you do. But I don't want to have to clean the kitchen again."
Duo made as if to raise his fist threateningly, then remembered at the last minute that it was the one holding the mixer. He turned off the appliance *then* raised it from the bowl, waving the batter-covered beater at Heero. "I didn't see you complaining at the time! Now you turn the bacon before it burns or I'll show you just what I can do with this thing."
A large glob of pancake batter fell from the beater and splattered on the tiled floor.
It was a regular morning.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
The right side of the bed was empty.
Heero groaned, wondering if he should even bother to get up and look. But, in the end, he couldn't drown out the voices in his head that harped and sniped and warned him that *this* night would be different. He pulled himself from the bed that was kept warm by his body heat alone and crossed the room to the large window. He pulled aside the drapes and peered through the polished glass and into the night.
Familiar footsteps tracking through the damp sand.
A slim form wandering just out of the reach of the lapping waves.
The drapes fell.
Heero went back to bed.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Heero was paying bills at the dining room table.
As he wrote off checks and balanced accounts, he let his mind wander. This always happened when he was doing such mind-numbing activity. It was almost funny, that his younger years as one of the Earth Sphere's most dangerous people had lead to him living a suburban life with his lover. After the Wars, when peace had descended and normal people went on with their lives, Heero and Duo had made a pact to always be there for each other. Or rather, Duo had, and Heero had just followed because he had no idea of anything else he could do. And it had been a hard struggle; a road that was lined by anger, misery, depression and confusion. The Japanese man could still remember the neighbor-waking fights that he and Duo had engaged in, at the beginning. They had even had the police called on them and Duo was -- to this day -- pissed that his criminal record had the innocuous line "disturbing the peace" on it, right next to the charges of theft, grand theft, homicide, mayhem, arson, and larceny. Of course, Duo didn't have a real criminal record per se, considering that most of those crimes had occurred before he had a legal identity, but Duo was still miffed about it. This phase of their relationship had lasted some months before the stress of it made them both a little crazy. Then, one day, in the middle of one of their arguments, someone had snapped and they were rolling around the living room floor, ripping the clothes from each other. Heero had never been able to figure out who had started it, but he wasn't complaining. They had been together as a couple since then.
He wondered why Duo always left in the middle of the night.
Heero could come up with no reason that would necessitate Duo leaving their bed in the middle of the night to walk on the cold, deserted beach alone. When he had first realized what had happened, Heero had thought that his braided lover would bring up the subject himself. He had thought that it was just a passing thing and Duo would work out his problems himself. But none of that ever happened and now, seven months after the first time (that Heero knew of), Duo was still making his nightly haunts. The only time Duo didn't go out was when it was raining, but Heero figured that Duo knew he'd never be able to crawl back into bed without waking Heero if he was dripping wet. But it still gnawed at his mind... Heero wondered if he wasn't doing something wrong, if there wasn't something more he *should* do. He was tempted to bring up the subject himself, but was afraid of Duo's reaction. Would he think Heero was trying to coddle him? Would he think Heero was being too overprotective? Walking on the beach in the middle of the night wasn't a dangerous activity... it especially wasn't dangerous to the young man who still called himself Shinigami. Would Duo be hurt that Heero hadn't asked sooner? Would he be upset that Heero had known for months without saying anything? This uncertainty clawed at Heero and led to his indecision.
"Yo, Heero!"
Heero looked up from the bills. "Hn?"
"Quatre's on the vidphone! Come on and talk to him!"
Heero smiled a little and removed the reading glasses from they were perched across his nose. "So he's back from his trip to L-3?"
Duo nodded, slinging one arm around Heero's waist as they both entered the living room together. "Yeah! He says he's got gifts for us!"
Heero draped his arm around Duo's shoulders and turned to the vidphone. "Hello, Quatre."
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The right side of the bed was empty.
Heero bit his lip as he stared out of the glass. A storm had been brewing for the past few days, and now the tide was high, battering waves throwing themselves against the sandy beach, the wind lashing the waves into foam. Still, Duo was walking out in the dark, bare-footed and agile, avoiding the waves and keeping himself from getting wet. For some reason, Heero could not bring himself to lie back down in their cold bed and instead chose to stand before the window, watching his lover's strange nocturnal acts. He pressed one hand against the glass, as if he could somehow reach out from where he was, scoop Duo into his embrace and protect him from whatever drove him to this unending punishment. Weary, Heero pressed his forehead against the window as well, the sharp bite of the cold glass giving him only a taste of what Duo must be enduring outside.
A door shut downstairs.
Heero's eyes shot open. He gave a quick scan of the outdoors -- no one there -- and heard the tread of footsteps across the tiles. Duo had come back in! Hoping that he wouldn't be caught, Heero dropped the drapes he had fisted in his hand, rolled across Duo's side of the bed, and sprawled himself across the left side. He hurriedly pulled the blankets over his shoulders, using his training to calm his heartbeat and ease his breathing so that he could fake sleep. The footsteps were on the stairs now. He could only hope that Duo wouldn't realize the sheets were not warm. Heart still beating a bit too fast for his tastes, Heero shut his eyes as the bedroom door creaked quietly. Duo had always complained about the slight squeak, but Heero was secretly glad that Duo had never gotten around to greasing the hinges. There was a small rustle as Duo pulled off his sweatpants and stuffed them -- deep -- into the laundry hamper. Then he moved carefully, slipping into the bed in such a way that the bed hardly dipped under his weight. Then cold arms were wrapping themselves around Heero's chest, and he could feel a bare leg slip between his own and the smooth pull of Duo's silk boxers against his skin. It took every ounce of willpower Heero had not to raise his arms automatically and pull his lover in closer to him.
Duo sighed, snuggling in closer to Heero and immediately dropping off to sleep.
For some reason, Heero wanted to cry.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Are you sure you wanna read this?
I think it sucks.
Last chance.
--------------------------------------------
The right side of the bed was empty.
Free hand fumbling against the cold and still air where a slim, warm body was supposed to be, Heero's eyes shot open. He blinked stupidly across the bed, as if looking would find Duo ensconced in some corner of the bed where he couldn't reach. But blinking his eyes did nothing but drive the sleep further away, and Duo still wasn't in the bed. Rolling over onto his back, Heero listened carefully. There was no flush of the toilet, there wasn't the sound of water rushing through the pipes, there wasn't even the sound of Duo humming to himself as he did some tedious chore. There was no sound except the wind against the eaves and the soft sounds of the ocean. He didn't know why he did this -- continued to lay in the bed as if, on this night, it would be different and Duo would slink out of the bathroom or the kitchen after a midnight snack and come back to bed.
But it wasn't midnight. It was 3:47 AM.
And Duo wasn't in the bathroom. He was where he always was.
Rising reluctantly, as if the weight of his own inexperience was pulling him down, Heero left the bed and crossed over to the large window. The right side of the bed was closest to the window; you could lay there and stare out across the ocean without having to shift position. For not the first time, Heero cursed his obsessive need to be the closest to the exit. He kept the bedroom door to his back and slept on his left side, keeping his right arm free to grab for a gun. They had stopped keeping their guns under their pillows months ago, but Heero still kept his arm free. It made him feel better to think that he could protect Duo from any intrusion or danger by keeping his back to the door. Duo had simply raised his hands in exasperation and not questioned what he termed "crazy Heero logic" and took the right side of the bed without further complaint.
Heero moved the long drape aside, staring out the polished glass of the window. The tide was out; leaving a wide stretch of beach that was unblemished and clean, except for a set of tracks that Heero had come to recognize as familiar. Tilting his head, he could make out the slim form wandering down the deserted beach, clad only in sweatpants and bare feet.
"Duo..." Heero sighed.
Then he let the drapes fall back shut and went back to bed.
--------------------------------------------------------------
When Heero woke again, it was to the familiar feel of Duo tucked against him, all warm skin and long hair, snoring as if he had been lying in Heero's arms all night. It was mornings when Heero questioned himself the most, when he wondered if those late night occurrences weren't just byproducts of his subconscious fear of Duo leaving him one day. But Heero had never much listened to the psychiatrists who had tried to stuff him into their preset metal states and their canned diagnoses. This had happened too many times to simply be a recurring dream. Heero knew that Duo left their bed in the middle of the night to walk on the beach. He just didn't know why.
Duo stirred in his arms, one hand rising to his amaryllis eyes to rub at them.
"'Mornin', 'eero," Duo yawned.
"Morning, Duo," Heero returned.
Then, because it felt right, he leaned over and kissed his lover. Duo came wide-awake and then playfully pushed the Japanese man away.
"Yuck! Morning breath!"
"So sorry to offend you."
A pillow hit Heero across the face. "The bathroom for you! Or else you don't get breakfast!"
Heero nodded and slipped out of the bed, but not before stealing one more kiss. Duo threw the pillow at him but Heero had closed the bathroom door at the last second, feeling the wood shudder as the mass of cotton and polyester fiber smacked against it.
Mornings were always the same.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Heero was nursing a mug of coffee as Duo puttered around the kitchen.
Mornings in the Maxwell-Yuy household went like this:
Heero used the bathroom first while Duo set up the coffee maker.
Heero left the bathroom and sneaked a kiss from Duo as they passed in the hallway. Duo entered the bathroom and Heero went outside in his robe and slippers to get the newspaper. The length of time varied, depending on where the paperboy had decided to throw the newspaper. Ideally on the porch -- more often it was in the bushes, or on the lawn, and once Heero found the paper stuck in the braches of the tree in the yard. On that morning, Heero had decided he really didn't need to read the paper.
Heero entered the house with the paper (or not, depending) and went straight into the kitchen. Duo would already be there, setting out a mug of black coffee for Heero as he fixed breakfast. They would indulge in mutual dodging and teasing as Heero fetched the milk and sugar, and Duo looked for eggs. The Heero would sit at the counter with his coffee, open the paper, and read articles out loud. Duo would interject his opinions whenever he felt it was necessary.
Looking over the top of the World section when he heard the unmistakable sounds of the electric mixer over the sounds of frying bacon, Heero raised one eyebrow and he lowered the paper.
"Pancakes?"
Duo looked up from the bowl of batter he was whipping into submission. There was a streak of pancake mix across his cheek, and he had tucked his braid down the back of his shirt 'just in case.' "Yeah, pancakes," he answered, raising his voice over the electric whir.
"After the last time?"
The last time Duo had made pancakes, he had accidentally lifted the mixer from the bowl without turning it off first. Buttermilk pancake batter had splattered all across the kitchen and the two young men that had been in it. This had led to a food fight where more batter, as well as butter and eggs had been hurled around. Then Heero had absently licked batter from Duo's floury fingers and they ended up making love on the kitchen floor. They had both forgotten to eat breakfast that day... and they skipped lunch, too. The Japanese man vaguely wondered if the same thing would happen this morning.
Narrowed violet eyes were focused on him, and the American man had an outraged expression on his face. "Hey! I think there's a rule about insulting a chef in his own kitchen!"
"I'm just bringing up--"
"Do you think I don't know how to make pancakes?"
"Oh, I know you do. But I don't want to have to clean the kitchen again."
Duo made as if to raise his fist threateningly, then remembered at the last minute that it was the one holding the mixer. He turned off the appliance *then* raised it from the bowl, waving the batter-covered beater at Heero. "I didn't see you complaining at the time! Now you turn the bacon before it burns or I'll show you just what I can do with this thing."
A large glob of pancake batter fell from the beater and splattered on the tiled floor.
It was a regular morning.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
The right side of the bed was empty.
Heero groaned, wondering if he should even bother to get up and look. But, in the end, he couldn't drown out the voices in his head that harped and sniped and warned him that *this* night would be different. He pulled himself from the bed that was kept warm by his body heat alone and crossed the room to the large window. He pulled aside the drapes and peered through the polished glass and into the night.
Familiar footsteps tracking through the damp sand.
A slim form wandering just out of the reach of the lapping waves.
The drapes fell.
Heero went back to bed.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Heero was paying bills at the dining room table.
As he wrote off checks and balanced accounts, he let his mind wander. This always happened when he was doing such mind-numbing activity. It was almost funny, that his younger years as one of the Earth Sphere's most dangerous people had lead to him living a suburban life with his lover. After the Wars, when peace had descended and normal people went on with their lives, Heero and Duo had made a pact to always be there for each other. Or rather, Duo had, and Heero had just followed because he had no idea of anything else he could do. And it had been a hard struggle; a road that was lined by anger, misery, depression and confusion. The Japanese man could still remember the neighbor-waking fights that he and Duo had engaged in, at the beginning. They had even had the police called on them and Duo was -- to this day -- pissed that his criminal record had the innocuous line "disturbing the peace" on it, right next to the charges of theft, grand theft, homicide, mayhem, arson, and larceny. Of course, Duo didn't have a real criminal record per se, considering that most of those crimes had occurred before he had a legal identity, but Duo was still miffed about it. This phase of their relationship had lasted some months before the stress of it made them both a little crazy. Then, one day, in the middle of one of their arguments, someone had snapped and they were rolling around the living room floor, ripping the clothes from each other. Heero had never been able to figure out who had started it, but he wasn't complaining. They had been together as a couple since then.
He wondered why Duo always left in the middle of the night.
Heero could come up with no reason that would necessitate Duo leaving their bed in the middle of the night to walk on the cold, deserted beach alone. When he had first realized what had happened, Heero had thought that his braided lover would bring up the subject himself. He had thought that it was just a passing thing and Duo would work out his problems himself. But none of that ever happened and now, seven months after the first time (that Heero knew of), Duo was still making his nightly haunts. The only time Duo didn't go out was when it was raining, but Heero figured that Duo knew he'd never be able to crawl back into bed without waking Heero if he was dripping wet. But it still gnawed at his mind... Heero wondered if he wasn't doing something wrong, if there wasn't something more he *should* do. He was tempted to bring up the subject himself, but was afraid of Duo's reaction. Would he think Heero was trying to coddle him? Would he think Heero was being too overprotective? Walking on the beach in the middle of the night wasn't a dangerous activity... it especially wasn't dangerous to the young man who still called himself Shinigami. Would Duo be hurt that Heero hadn't asked sooner? Would he be upset that Heero had known for months without saying anything? This uncertainty clawed at Heero and led to his indecision.
"Yo, Heero!"
Heero looked up from the bills. "Hn?"
"Quatre's on the vidphone! Come on and talk to him!"
Heero smiled a little and removed the reading glasses from they were perched across his nose. "So he's back from his trip to L-3?"
Duo nodded, slinging one arm around Heero's waist as they both entered the living room together. "Yeah! He says he's got gifts for us!"
Heero draped his arm around Duo's shoulders and turned to the vidphone. "Hello, Quatre."
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The right side of the bed was empty.
Heero bit his lip as he stared out of the glass. A storm had been brewing for the past few days, and now the tide was high, battering waves throwing themselves against the sandy beach, the wind lashing the waves into foam. Still, Duo was walking out in the dark, bare-footed and agile, avoiding the waves and keeping himself from getting wet. For some reason, Heero could not bring himself to lie back down in their cold bed and instead chose to stand before the window, watching his lover's strange nocturnal acts. He pressed one hand against the glass, as if he could somehow reach out from where he was, scoop Duo into his embrace and protect him from whatever drove him to this unending punishment. Weary, Heero pressed his forehead against the window as well, the sharp bite of the cold glass giving him only a taste of what Duo must be enduring outside.
A door shut downstairs.
Heero's eyes shot open. He gave a quick scan of the outdoors -- no one there -- and heard the tread of footsteps across the tiles. Duo had come back in! Hoping that he wouldn't be caught, Heero dropped the drapes he had fisted in his hand, rolled across Duo's side of the bed, and sprawled himself across the left side. He hurriedly pulled the blankets over his shoulders, using his training to calm his heartbeat and ease his breathing so that he could fake sleep. The footsteps were on the stairs now. He could only hope that Duo wouldn't realize the sheets were not warm. Heart still beating a bit too fast for his tastes, Heero shut his eyes as the bedroom door creaked quietly. Duo had always complained about the slight squeak, but Heero was secretly glad that Duo had never gotten around to greasing the hinges. There was a small rustle as Duo pulled off his sweatpants and stuffed them -- deep -- into the laundry hamper. Then he moved carefully, slipping into the bed in such a way that the bed hardly dipped under his weight. Then cold arms were wrapping themselves around Heero's chest, and he could feel a bare leg slip between his own and the smooth pull of Duo's silk boxers against his skin. It took every ounce of willpower Heero had not to raise his arms automatically and pull his lover in closer to him.
Duo sighed, snuggling in closer to Heero and immediately dropping off to sleep.
For some reason, Heero wanted to cry.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
