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"Of All People"Written By: Clara Barton Disclaimer: I do not own Gundam Wing. The following
is an intellectual exercise with no intention of profit. That said,
these characterizations, words, and situations are mine. Please ask
before reprinting. Rating: NC 17 Warnings: AU, academic au, nice and fluffy, no
really, happy endings and fun times and SMUT Pairings: 3x2, 3x6, 5x4, 1xH Summary: After his relationship with Zechs ends, Trowa meets Duo - a vaguely familiar, handsome stranger who promises to help him forget his ex. A/N: For Kangofu-CB. This past month has been absolute hell, and you got me through it. You got me through the year, really, and I can never thank you enough for being you.
A/N2: Thank you as always and forever to Ro for amazing support and superb editing. I am so damn lucky to have you.
"Of All People"
"Wait, wait, wait. You're full of shit. He broke up with you in an email ? What the fuck was the subject line, ‘I'm an asshole, and by the way, I'm dumping you'?" The sneer on Wufei's face as he summed up Trowa's recent relationship development said worlds about his opinion on Trowa's ex-boyfriend. Trowa sighed and raised his half-empty glass to his lips and took another sip of the whiskey sour, saving the tart aftertaste. "No, the subject of the email was ‘Job Promotion Came Through.'" Trowa remembered how excited he had been when he had opened the email. After all, Zechs had been angling for the promotion for months , but then, two paragraphs in - after a summary of the job offer, the excellent pay and benefits, and how Zechs had negotiated for a several thousand dollar signing bonus on top of all of that - Zechs had said that with the new promotion he would be expected to travel even more, and their relationship, already long distance with Zechs in DC and Trowa in Philadelphia, would just become even more complicated, and really, it seemed like the best thing for both of them if they ended things now before they got worse . The implication that things had been bad, from Zechs's point of view, was startling and upsetting. Not, of course, as upsetting as being dumped in an email , but it had left Trowa with a kind of numb, cold rage that he hadn't really known what to do with. "I knew he was an asshole. I told you he was an asshole," Wufei growled. "I'm sorry," Quatre said, sitting beside Wufei in the cramped booth at the back of the bar, their regular dive on Saturday nights. Quatre looked less murdery than Wufei, but his expression of acute pain and empathy only made Trowa feel worse. He could take murdery. Empathy was tougher. "It's whatever," Trowa sighed. "It's not whatever," Quatre insisted. "You deserve better. I said you deserved better the first time you introduced us to him," Wufei continued. Trowa rolled his eyes. "I remember, because you said it to his face, and he never let it go." Wufei looked a little smug about that as he continued to sip his own drink. "Good riddance," he muttered, and then winced when Quatre elbowed him. "What?" "Can you try to be a little sympathetic?" Quatre said in a low voice. Wufei gave first Quatre, and then Trowa, a look. "I am so sorry your asshole boyfriend dumped you via email. Clearly, he had hidden depths, and you should deeply regret his loss." Trowa snorted at the deadpan tone. And the words themselves. Zechs... He and Trowa had dated for three years, had been long-distance for the last six months, ever since Trowa started a new position as an assistant professor in the history department at Temple University. Before that, while he had been completing a two-year post-doctoral fellowship at Georgetown University, he and Zechs had been able to share an apartment and, as much as Zechs's position in the State Department had meant that he traveled frequently, they had still found time to be together. Much less so now that Trowa was in Philadelphia, but he had still made the effort of making the nearly three-hour drive as many weekends as he could. Apparently, it hadn't been enough. "I regret losing his dick," Trowa sighed. Quatre choked on his drink, and Wufei smirked before raising his glass. "Let us take a moment to acknowledge that grave loss, and let us all wish that it falls off." Trowa had to laugh, but he raised his glass and, after an eye roll, Quatre raised his own, and they clinked them together before tossing them back. "Was his dick really that great, though?" Quatre asked. "I mean, you said the sex was good, but..." "The sex was great," Trowa sighed, and then frowned as he realized how long it had actually been since he and Zechs had fucked. It was the middle of January now, and Zechs had been in Paris for two weeks, and for the two weeks before that Trowa had been visiting his sister in Georgia for Christmas, and the weekend before that Zechs had told Trowa not to bother coming down, and the weekend before that Trowa hadn't been able to because of an open house on campus and- He was fairly certain the last time they had actually been together had been before Thanksgiving. Trowa had been so busy with the end of the fall semester he hadn't even realized. He wondered if he should have made more of an effort or- "Stop second-guessing yourself," Quatre said, kicking him under the table. "Zechs was an asshole who clearly can't communicate, and you're better off without him. Even if the sex was great. You'll find another dick." It was Wufei's turn to snort into his drink, and he gave the blond-haired man at his side a fond, amused look. Quatre saw it, and his lips twitched upwards in response. "You two are disgusting," Trowa sighed. Wufei put his arm over Quatre's shoulders. "Why? Because we can communicate and have great sex and we don't mind demonstrating our affection for each other and neither of us would ever dream about breaking up with the other in an email?" "I think I'd cut off your balls if you did that," Quatre mused, a thoughtful expression on his face. Wufei removed his arm from Quatre's shoulders and carefully put a bit of space between them. Quatre gave him a beatific smile. "But since you'll never do that, you don't need to be afraid." "Mm," Wufei agreed, looking unconvinced. "Speaking of finding new dicks," Quatre said, looking past Trowa's shoulder, "I think I've spotted a rebound dick for you." "Quatre, that's not-" Trowa turned to follow Quatre's gaze, and saw a man across the bar, sitting at a table alone and reading a book while sipping from a glass of beer. He had glasses on, a chunky black sweater, and loose, long chestnut hair that brushed against his shoulders. He was breathtakingly handsome, and somehow vaguely familiar to Trowa. "He's reading a book," Trowa pointed out. "Exactly. So all you have to do is go over and turn on that... very rusty and always questionable Barton charm." "Wufei, your pep talks suck," Trowa muttered, and resolutely turned away from the sight of the attractive man reading alone. But Quatre had other ideas. He tossed down a wad of singles on the table, stood up, grabbed Trowa's hand, and hauled him to his feet. "No, no ," Trowa hissed, and tried to dig in his heels. But Wufei got up as well, and gave him a none-too-gentle shove. By the time they reached the handsome man's table, Trowa's face was flaming, and he was mentally cataloguing all of the ways he could - that he would - make his two best friends' lives miserable. They came to a stop beside the table, and the long-haired man looked up from his book and raised one eyebrow at them. Up close, he was even more handsome, with dark blue eyes and just a bit of stubble along his jaw, and fuck . Trowa loved the feel of slight stubble against his mouth, the slight, prickly burn and- "Hi! I'm Quatre. This is my boyfriend, Wufei, and this is Trowa." The man's lips twitched in amusement. He slid a bookmark between the pages he had been holding and carefully closed the book. Trowa craned his neck to see the title, Anatomy of the State . He had to raise an eyebrow at that. Who sat in a bar on a Saturday night reading a philosophical treatise on anarcho-capitalism? "I'm Duo," he said, humor in his voice. "Are you guys some kind of... swinger triad, or what?" Quatre's face turned red, and Wufei smirked. Trowa wished he could just sink into the floor. "What? No, no! Nothing like that!" Quatre grabbed Trowa's hand and jostled him closer to the table. "No, um, Wufei and I are very happy together. We're just... Trowa's wingmen." Trowa rolled his eyes. Duo's lips twitched. "Surely, I'm not intimidating enough to require two wingmen?" "I'm sorry about them. And about interrupting your evening," Trowa said. "We'll leave you alone to keep reading about the conquest and exploitation of humans." Duo's eyes flashed, and he leaned forward. "You've read it?" He tapped one finger against the cover of the book. Trowa shrugged. "Yes. I can't say it's a brand of politics or philosophy I particularly appreciate, though." "Amen to that." Duo made a disgusted sound. "My friend lent it to me, and it's got me seriously starting to question our friendship, because this..." Duo gestured at the book again, "is a bunch of garbage." "Not as bad as Rockwell's Against the State ," Trowa shrugged. "I've been spared that one," Duo grinned, and then his eyes flicked back over to Quatre and Wufei. He arched an eyebrow at them. "Oh. Right." Quatre clapped Trowa on the back. "I see our work here is done. Um. Well. We'll just-" "We'll see you later," Wufei finished, and mercifully pulled Quatre away. Trowa watched them go, and then looked back down at Duo. "Can I join you?" he asked, feeling more than a little foolish just standing there. Duo smirked, and gestured to the seat across from him. "Please. But only if you promise not to make me talk about this drivel. I promised him I'd read it, but I..." Duo gave a theatrical shudder. "I think I've still got my notes on it from a seminar I took in grad school. I can give them to you," Trowa offered. Duo arched an eyebrow. "Not even five minutes after we've met, and you're offering me grad school notes? You're pretty damn forward, Trowa." They shared a grin at the tease, and Trowa felt himself relax a fraction. "It's my go-to pick-up move." Duo snorted a laugh, and then leaned across the table. "Yeah? How do you feel about...exchanging highlighters?" Duo's voice was pitched low, a throaty rumble that made that sentence impossibly erotic. Trowa felt heat rise to his cheeks, and he realized just how far out of his league Duo was. Handsome, funny, intelligent, not just dumped via email... He tried to swallow down the feeling of inadequacy and arched an eyebrow. "I'll show you mine," he said, "if you show me yours." Duo laughed and sat back, leaning against the back of his chair, and Trowa felt relieved that the tension between them broke with that movement. He also took the opportunity to mentally berate himself as Duo finished off his beer. You can do this , he told himself. You can have some meaningless flirtation with a total stranger in a bar. "So, do you come here often?" he asked, and immediately regretted it. What the fuck? Could he possibly sound more pathetic? Duo's lips twitched, and he shrugged one shoulder. "Every now and then. It's a little far from my place, but it doesn't have a live band on Saturday nights." Trowa nodded. "I hate live bands. In bars. They're fine at concerts." Again, Duo's lips twitched, but he mercifully didn't give into his clear desire to laugh. "Agreed," he merely said. "Do you want to get another round?" Trowa asked, gesturing to Duo's empty glass. Duo tilted his head to the side and regarded Trowa in silence for a moment. "Actually," he said, "I think I'm going to head out." "Oh." Way to go. Trowa wasn't the least bit surprised at how quickly - or how badly - he had just crashed. He didn't know what he had expected - that Duo would clap eyes on him, appreciate his lame humor, and what, give Trowa his phone number? Set up a real date with him? Haul him into the bathroom and make out with him? "What about you?" Duo asked, making no move to get up. "Me?" Trowa asked stupidly. "Yeah. Did you want to go or stay?" Trowa frowned, not really sure why it mattered to Duo what Trowa did since he was- Oh. Oh . "I can go," he decided, and immediately wished that he would just stop talking. "Great," Duo grinned, and stood up. Trowa waited while the other man left a tip on the table and picked up the book that neither man cared for. They were silent as they navigated through the semi-crowded bar, and when they stepped outside, Trowa shivered at the sudden gust of cold air that wrapped around them. Duo crowded him close to the side of the building, Trowa stumbling a few steps until Duo reached out to steady him against the worn bricks. "What-" "You're into me, right?" Duo interrupted Trowa's question. "Yes. Of course." "Of course?" Duo repeated with a grin. "You're gorgeous and funny and-" Duo interrupted him again, this time with a kiss. He was an inch or two shorter than Trowa, but close enough in height that all Trowa had to do was tilt his head just a fraction to find the perfect angle for their lips to connect. Trowa was struck immediately by how different it felt not to be kissing someone a good four inches taller than himself. He didn't have to crane his neck, didn't have to rely on Zechs to meet him halfway, didn't have to tug Zechs down to him. Kissing Duo was easy, and fuck, it felt good. Duo's lips were smooth and warm and slick moving over Trowa's, still curved upwards, and it felt nice. Duo stepped back, still grinning, and Trowa could only stare at him. "So... you coming home with me?" Duo asked, holding out his free hand. This was definitely not a possibility that Trowa had considered. "I have to walk my dog." It was Duo's turn to stare. "She's old - and if I don't walk her at eleven, she'll tear up my apartment and-" "Trowa, you can just say no , dude, it's okay." "No, I'm not saying no. I just can't go over to your place this late." Duo nodded slowly and stood there in silence, clearly waiting for Trowa to say something else. But Trowa had no idea what he expected. "Well," Duo said at last, "if you can't come over to mine..." "You could come to my apartment?" Trowa offered. Duo grinned again. "What if I have a dog that I have to walk at eleven?" "Do you?" Duo snorted a laugh. "No. I'm more of a cat person. But I don't have one of those either." Trowa frowned. "You aren't allergic to dogs, are you?" "No, I'm not allergic to dogs. Did you drive, or did one of your wingmen?" "Quatre drove." "Want a lift, then?" Duo asked. "Please." Duo started to walk away, but Trowa reached for his hand and hauled him close again. He wrapped his arms around the other man and kissed him, caressing Duo's lips until his smirk fell away and his mouth opened. Trowa tasted him, cataloguing the hoppy taste of beer, the heat of his mouth, the tangle of his tongue. Duo groaned, and his hands fisted in the front of Trowa's shirt, holding him in place as the kiss continued until, finally, they parted, breathless and dark-eyed. "Yeah," Duo said after a moment, "your place sounds great." -o- |
