'Thinking'
"Speaking"
*** Time passing or scene change
Mission: Nerima Part 8
Duo rubbed the back of his neck and shook his head in disbelief. This hadn't been quite what he'd had in mind when he'd came to the dojo looking for a distraction, but it had certainly taken his mind off of his own problems! "Let's see if I've got this straight. First, your dads arranged a marriage between the families before you were even born. Then, in the process of dragging him all over the planet for 'training', Ranma's dad engaged him to Ukyo and made off with her dowry. And then, as a result of his last trip before coming back here to Nerima, Ranma ended up engaged to Shampoo according to the laws of her village," Duo summarized.
"Well, leaving out the half a dozen or so other families he arranged my marriage into during the training trips, and not allowing for any that we haven't found out about yet... yeah, that about sums it up," Ranma replied. 'Well, except for the whole Jusenkyo mess...' he added silently.
"There's also the little fact that you are quite definitely gay and not interested in following through with any of those marriages," Akane said drily.
"Uh, yeah, that too," Ranma said sheepishly, still uncomfortable talking about his sexuality. He suspected that Duo wouldn't have any problems with it, since Duo didn't seem to have any problem with the budding relationship between Winner and Barton, but Ranma's deeply seated dread of his parents' reaction had tainted his perception of everyone else's. He had seen his father's reaction to gay couples before and it did not bode well for himself. His mother, he feared, would have much the same response. Add to that the fact that he suspected she was perhaps more than slightly unstable - carrying a katana around for years on the off chance that she might need it to enforce the seppuku portion of her husband's contract to make their son a "man among men" was not precisely the action of a sane person - and he thought his dread was not unjustified.
Ryoga slid across the floor till Ranma's shoulder was touching his before saying, "You're leaving out one other important detail, Ranma. That insane contract of Nodoka's."
Ranma flinched, distinctly uncomfortable talking about the seppuku contract. He leaned into Ryoga's shoulder, grateful for his supportive presence, before explaining, "When Pops talked Mom into letting him take me on the training journey, she put a condition on it. He could take me if he signed a contract agreeing that we would both commit seppuku if he did not succeed in making me a 'man amongst men' by the time we returned."
Akane added, "And Auntie Nodoka's definition of manly behaviour is a bit - uh, strange? Basically, being a pervert - trying to peek at girls changing their clothes, groping girls, and so on - makes up the vast majority of her ideal. As you can see, this is a bit of a problem."
"There's also the fact that she carries that damn katana around like a baby," Ryoga muttered.
Realizing that he was gaping like a fish, Duo closed his mouth with a snap. "I'm startin' to realize that there's worse things than being an orphan," he muttered under his breath.
***
Heero sighed and dropped the note back onto the counter, feeling distinctly discouraged. So much for his plans for the weekend.
Duo had worked most of the day Saturday and then had returned home quite late after apparently spending the evening with his new friends. This morning, he'd once again managed to leave the house before anyone else was even awake. 'At least he left a note to let us know that he was going to be out for the day,' Heero acknowledged reluctantly. 'And it's nice that he's found study partners to work together with on homework. But I was really counting on suggesting that the five of us should have a group study session today...' He sighed wearily.
If they'd all done their homework together, it should have helped keep Duo from feeling as if they'd singled him out, yet still have shown him that they were here for him and wanted to help. It had certainly seemed like a good plan. Heero had hoped that, if he'd been patient and helpful in a group study session, Duo would have been more likely to accept if he'd offered one-on-one help at a later date. At the very least, it should have helped to make Duo a little more comfortable in his presence. Given him an opening to begin rebuilding at least the comrades-and-partners portion of his relationship with Duo.
Well, so much for that idea. Rebuilding any part of their relationship was going to require one very important ingredient that seemed to be in extremely short supply.
Duo's presence.
Heero sighed yet again and headed back upstairs. He'd lost his enthusiasm for a group study session; he might as well work on his homework in his room. At least that way he wouldn't have to spend the day dealing with Wufei's irascibility and watching Quatre and Trowa's flirting.
***
Shampoo gave one last glance back over her shoulder at the unnaturally blank expression on the cobalt-eyed boy's face before joining Ranma and the others under the tree for lunch. "You're hurting them, you know," she told Duo. "You have breakfast at Ucchan's, lunch here with us, supper at the Cat Café; you've spent your evenings and the weekend working and studying with us as well. Would it really be so bad to spend a little time with Heero and the others?"
Duo sighed heavily. "Unfortunately, yeah, it would. I'm glad Q and Tro finally got together but it's painful to watch them. Tro was almost as silent and withdrawn as Heero, but in just a few days he's opened up incredibly with Quat. Seein' them together like that - it just makes it all the more clear what I'm missing. And Wu's bein' a real jerk - watchin' these two," he jerked a thumb towards Ranma and Akane, "scrap constantly is stirrin' up all sorts of crap of his own and he ain't dealin' with it well at all. Heero... well, leavin' aside the fact that I'd just be torturing myself with someone I can't have, if I go over there and sit on that dinky little bench with him to have lunch, I'm gonna end up touchin' him and my ribs are still gettin' healed up - I don't really want 'em fractured again already."
"Why are you so sure he'll react badly?" Ranma asked. Ranma's own revelations about himself over the past weekend had led to Duo opening up and confessing why he was avoiding his housemates so much but the obvious unhappiness on both sides of the situation didn't quite ring true with Duo's interpretation of events.
"I already told you guys what happened before - do you even need to ask that?"
"Look," Ryoga said, frowning thoughtfully, "you said that at the party you came up and touched him from behind, right?"
Duo nodded.
"And you didn't speak until after you touched him?"
Duo nodded again, unsure where this was going, but Ranma sat up from his sprawl on the grass, realizing what Ryoga was getting at.
"You said he let the girl - Relena, right? - hug him... Did she touch him before he knew she was there, or did she wait till he was looking at her?" Ranma asked.
"Uh, I think he was looking at her first," Duo said looking confused.
"But they were both busy looking out over the crowd when you snuck up on them?"
"Yeah..."
"Heero - he was trained to be soldier from small child?" Shampoo said, joining the conversation as she too realized where this was headed.
Duo nodded, the distinct impression that he was missing something obvious growing by the moment.
"And you, stealth expert, snuck up on him and girl he supposed to protect, girl who just rescued?"
"Yeah... Ouch, hey, what was that for?" Duo demanded, snatching his braid back from Shampoo's distinctly ungentle grasp.
"Stupid!!" she said, stomping her foot angrily. "You sneak up on trained soldier, man who soldier all his life, man who supposed to be on guard, touch without warning, then wonder why get hit?! Stupid, stupid, stupid!! Shampoo hit too if do such stupid thing! Warrior not supposed be caught by surprise, warrior always must be on guard, but if IS surprised, training say attack, take out threat before can hurt! No can blame warrior for follow training, instincts!" Shampoo's Japanese got progressively worse as she became more agitated, till she finally lapsed into a spate of fast, furious Mandarin which Duo could only make out the occasional word of.
Surprised at Shampoo's reaction, Duo stopped to actually think about what had happened from an outside viewpoint, leaving his own emotional response out of consideration for the first time since the incident. 'Okay, so what if he really did just react without realizing who was there... He'd been ridin' the killing edge ever since Relena got snatched, probably still hadn't completely come down from it... What would I have done in his place...'
Duo cringed guiltily as he realized, 'I'd have probably done the same damn thing, or close to it. And if I hadn't already had bad ribs, he woulda just knocked the breath out of me long enough for him to evaluate the threat... Doesn't excuse him for messing up my ribs to start with, but if I give him some credit for his half-assed attempt at an apology for that... 'Specially since I didn't let him finish once he got to the bit where he started blaming me for irritating him into hitting me too hard; I never did let him explain why I'd irritated him so bad...'
"Umm, oops?" Duo said out loud, giving Shampoo a sheepish look.
"Braid-boy understand now?" she demanded.
"Yeah, I do - ouch!! Easy on the hair!" he yelped as she grabbed a fistful of the chestnut length, jerked him to his feet, and started dragging him across the schoolyard towards Heero.
Heero had looked up when Shampoo had first started shouting in Mandarin, muscles tensing as he realized she was yelling at Duo. 'Stay out of it, Yuy, he won't thank you for interfering. Hell, with your luck where he's concerned, you'll just make it worse.' Shampoo's Mandarin was much too fast for his limited knowledge of the language but, judging by Wufei's wide-eyed expression, most of the vocabulary she was using wouldn't have been in the textbooks he had learned it from anyway. Duo's pained yelp had him halfway to his feet before he realized that the Chinese girl was headed towards him with Duo firmly in tow.
"Shampoo sorry, had not heard full story before or would have straightened out mess sooner," the young Amazon apologized before shoving Duo to stand in front of Heero. "Braid-boy busy feeling, not thinking," she explained, whacking Duo in the back of the head just hard enough to draw another "Ow!! Shampoo!!" from him. "He understand mistake now," she said, glaring at the braided teen as Heero stared in astonishment.
"Yeah, yeah, I do," Duo muttered.
"Good. Then fix," she ordered before handing Duo's braid to Heero and instructing him firmly, "Don't let go till straighten out problem - sound like boy has bad habit of running off. Not worry about class, others get work." Satisfied with her work, Shampoo turned and shooed the other pilots towards the school. "Time for class, go now."
Thoroughly confused, Heero looked from the braid in his hand to Shampoo's retreating back to Duo's flushed, averted face before saying hesitantly, "Sit, please?"
Silently, Duo joined Heero on the bench. Stealing an embarrassed glance from underneath his bangs, he realized Heero was gently, almost reverently, stroking the braid-tip that he clutched. 'Huh, maybe it wasn't all my imagination after all. Maybe he is actually interested... There's a lotta stuff to be explained if he is, though.'
"I'm sorry," burst from two mouths at once.
Heero turned towards Duo, startled. "You're sorry? For what?"
"A bunch of stuff, actually," he answered, sighing. "For sneakin' up on you like that at the party when I shoulda known better. For bein' petty about what happened and not givin' you a fair chance instead of gettin' mad and walking away every time you say something that upsets me. I was just so tired of always being the one makin' all the effort towards being friends... It seemed like, after all that time, nothin' had changed between us yet you'd at least let Relena be a friend. I was so busy resentin' the fact that she'd finally got through to you when I'd spent even longer trying without any success that I wouldn't give you a chance when you finally did try to be friends."
"The incident at the party wasn't your fault," Heero protested, "I shouldn't have reacted like that."
"Maybe not - but Shampoo pointed out a few things I shoulda realized myself. You've been trained to think and act as a soldier for most of your life. You'd just finished rescuing Relena the day before and were probably still in full-blown protective mode. Then I went and snuck up on the two of you from behind and touched you without any warning. I can't honestly say that if our positions were switched I'd have reacted a whole lot differently myself and I know my training was nowhere near as intensive as yours. If my ribs hadn't been bad already, you'd have just knocked the wind out of me for a minute. How about we just agree that we both made mistakes and let it go?"
'He's forgiving me for that? I can't believe it... I thought I'd messed things up beyond the point of fixing them...'
"Deal," Heero agreed quickly, not wanting to give Duo time to reconsider.
"Deal."
Duo extended his hand for a handshake and Heero reluctantly released the braid in order to shake hands.
"So," Duo said, drawing his braid over his shoulder and fiddling with the end nervously, "I hear you've got a spare futon in your room. Think you'd be willing to put up with a roommate? The attic wouldn't be half bad 'cept that not bein' able to stand up straight to walk across the room is gettin' kinda old."
Heero's heart raced as he realized he was going to get the chance he'd hoped for when they first received this mission. At the very least, the other teen was giving him a chance at friendship. If he was very, very careful not to blow this chance, maybe Duo would give him a chance at more than that. The Deathscythe pilot had quite openly flirted with him towards the end of the war; hopefully, once they were sharing a room, he would do so again. And, this time, Heero intended to waste no time in responding.
"Yes," he said simply, afraid of saying too much and messing things up again.
Duo gave him a small, cautious smile and tried not to get his hopes up too high. "Okay." Sharing a room wasn't much, but it was better than the way things had been. And, hopefully, it was just a beginning.
TBC...
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