"Defying Gravity"

A Romance in Three Parts

Written By: Kaeru Shisho

Disclaimer: I don't own any part of Gundam Wing or its characters, nor do I make any monetary profit off this story.

Rating: NC 17

Warnings: AU, yaoi, some language

Pairings: 1x2x1, 3x4x3

Summary: A multi part story of romance starting with a turning point vacation, developing throughout a dangerous UC mission, and moving ahead through the unexpected challenges of a summer vacation.

"Part One: It's a Vacation"

The next day we woke up to find a foot of new snow covering the landscape. Luckily we had food to last and the Wii to consume our leisure time. This was the last day of our vacation. We'd all be leaving the next day, assuming Heero had picked up the chains for his car. Frankly, I was glad. I was anxious to get the hell away from my dilemmas and back to simply staying alive and completing the next covert operation, but when I thought a second time about leaving and returning to my dorm cot and that inevitable next assignment, the prospect depressed me.

Then again, maybe it was being stuck inside with my injured body and nowhere to run away from my active imagination and confusion that was depressing my mood. Quatre coerced Heero into baking cookies with him to "cheer us all up," meaning me. That left Trowa and Wufei to die at the hands of my matchless Wii skills.

"Okay, break time!" his light tenor warbled. Quatre set two plates, piled high with cookies, on the coffee table, blocking the TV.

No amount of groaning and moaning would move the guy, so we ended the game prematurely. Quatre could be stubborn, too. I guess we all took turns being bone-headed and "obdurate", as Wufei would say. Heero set a pot of tea, cups, glasses, and a gallon of milk on the table, and that was too much good eats to ignore. No sooner had we started in on the cookies, than Quatre cleared his throat.

"So, has everyone enjoyed the cabin? Comfortable? I think we all get along very well. We work like a team, don't you think?"

Trowa smiled faintly. He reminded me of a man who'd swallowed a bite of his lover's cooking, hated it, and was agonizing over whether to make a run to the bathroom or simply maintain a pleasant exterior and deal with the consequences. Then again, maybe I was reading him all wrong, but he was creeping me out with that inane smile.

Heero looked at me then he became fascinated in his left shirt cuff. He rolled it up then down. He found a thread to tease the living daylights out of. I wanted to rip the thing off, the sleeve, the whole shirt. That would do.

"Yes," Wufei said his expression suspicious, which was nothing out of the ordinary.

Quatre looked from face to face, landing on mine. Trowa's smile turned languid and his eye closed. Heero fidgeted. 'Fei riveted his beady little eyes on me. I guessed that was my cue to say something.

"Yeah, it's been swell. Now, spit it out, Q-man. What's your point," I said.

"Well, okay. It's this idea I had. What if we rented a house together and all moved out of the Preventers' dormitory?"

Wufei approached the idea from the practical side. "Can we afford a five bedroom house anywhere?"

"I found a four bedroom place that's very reasonable and close to work. Trowa and I can share."

"This isn't just about you and Trowa wanting more privacy, is it?" I asked bluntly.

He had the decency to blush. "No."

Heero stared down Trowa. "Have you both seen this house?"

Quatre gasped. "Oh, no! I just found it on the internet listings. I wouldn't have presumed...not without seeing what you all thought first."

"There would be advantages to such an arrangement," Wufei declared.

"There are many annoying people I'd be happy to never see again outside of work," Heero agreed.

"Ditto," said Trowa.

"It would be nice to come home to... my own place," Wufei said.

"Duo? You haven't said anything. Wouldn't it be nice to get away from work? To have a place to call your own, to keep your things?" Quatre asked.

"Yeah, I guess. Never knew a place like that before."

I watched as my bud rinsed his cookie in milky tea. Quatre's gestures were elegance personified. It was fortunate that his mind followed suit or he would seem affected. I broke my cookie into pieces and ate one.

"Duo, I'd like you to consider doing this, and give up the suicide missions."

My eyes hardened. He was entering dangerous territory, a mine field littered with explosive topics. His eyes flooded with tears. He wiped them away with a sleeve.

"Do you have any idea how much you are missed when you're gone? What is does to the rest of us knowing you have taken on so much risk, that we can't help, that we never know when the next time we see you may be the last?" Quatre's voice wavered, and he paused a moment to compose himself.

"I, ah..."

"We all love you, Duo. You're our optimistic brother with a heart of gold, or used to be. It takes longer to get our friend back after these missions and that's not good. It's starting to bankrupt you emotionally! We need you for balance. I need you, Duo."

Emotionally Bankrupt. I searched the eyes of my friends and saw the truth of what Quatre had said. And suddenly, it's like all the starch had gone out of me. Heero's cell phone chimed. He checked the caller id irritably, stood, and took the call in the kitchen. He shook his head as if the caller could see how much he didn't want to talk.

"Sorry," I said. My eyes followed Heero like an addict his supplier; I had no choice but to keep him under surveillance; it might be the last day I'd see him. Quatre had been right about that. Everything.

Impatient with my obtuseness, Wufei said, "It's obvious. He wants you to do this move and alter your duty assignments. He wants you to value your life as much as he does."

"He's smitten with you," Quatre said.

"For the fucking love of...!" I laughed aloud at his archaic term, while, in my mind, dressing Heero in short pants and ruffled shirt, ascot at his neck, handing me a scented calling card.

My bud dipped his chin, cleared his throat, and wouldn't meet my eyes after his disclosure. I was damned glad that Heero was concentrating on his call, oblivious to the buzz going on around him.

"You may all be presuming too much about his personal life," Wufei said. "I do know, however, that Heero is a concerned friend, Maxwell, and that he is a fully functioning human being only when you are around.

"Because he likes Duo, a lot!" Quatre said, asserting himself again.

"I don't know, Q-man," I said with a smile. "I always believed that a person could fall in love in the time it took to stick out a hand and say hello. If there was anything, you'd think I'd have figured it out by now."

"One would think," Trowa muttered behind a hand.

"Not if you weren't looking," Quatre said. "Not if you were pig-headedly looking for the wrong...hand."

"What do you mean by that?"

"You know exactly what I mean. Some men think that in order to pass for 'straight', they must take part in conversation with other men about women. Instead of talking about women, they seem to talk about the idea of women, as if a relationship with a woman were more of an abstract idea."

"And you say I do that?"

"Yes," Quatre said. "You always have as long as I've known you. The only person you are fooling is yourself. Stop deluding yourself."

I looked at Wufei, hoping for his support. "Your personal inclinations are not my business, Maxwell. Winner, drop it. You are comfortable with your...choices, I take it. Please, honor our privacy and permit the rest of us to conduct our own self discovery in our own time."

Quatre nodded unhappily and didn't push the issue, which was excellent timing. Heero returned, glowering, the irritation radiating off him, like gamma rays off a brick of uranium. Had I a Geiger counter it would have been reverberating off the charts. He extended his arm, offering me his phone.

"It's for you. Lady Une has a mission. It starts next week."

Eew burn, man!

My phone was turned off and in by bag in my room upstairs. Deep down inside, I hadn't wanted to be contacted. This was why. So, what was I so say to my boss?

"Okay, I'll take that." I caught the phone mid air.

Heero stood, arms at his sides, fists clenching. He said nothing, but I could feel his eyes burning into my back as I hobbled into "my" bathroom to take the call. I came out a few minutes later and whatever conversation had been going on before had now screeched to a brink-of-the-precipice halt.

"I, ah, told her I needed a few months leave-of-absence to get my head together, see a shrink, and, ah... move. Oh, and stay off the bum leg. Hope you all still want to do that now that I've gone and committed myself. Or...did I just shoot myself in the other foot?"

"Yes!" Quatre cheered. "Everything's wonderful! Oh, Trowa, what a good idea this was!"

In one of the few ungallant acts of his life, Quatre took Trowa by the shoulders, pushed him back against the nearest wall, and kissed his boyfriend unmercifully. Trowa did not protest.

When I dared look, Heero was running a hand through his hair and smiling. The last day at the cabin took on a whole different meaning after that. It wasn't just an end, it was a beginning. We traded off gaming with planning for our big move.

(o)

It was Sunday afternoon, checkout day, for some of us. Wufei packed chains along with the shovel and scraper, and when it came time to leave, he was smug about it, too.

"I am surprised Yuy neglected to prepare appropriately for snow," he told Trowa as they cleaned up after breakfast. "He previewed the forecasts just as I had."

I was snoozing by the fire, resting my splinted leg stretched out along the entire length of the couch, having become very catlike in my convalescence. I'm sure they thought I was asleep, or they wouldn't be having this conversation within my earshot. As it was, just use the name "Yuy" or "Heero" in a sentence and I was all ears and whiskers. Meow, baby.

Trowa packed a few of the leftover food items for the ride home. "Don't be ridiculous, Chang. The man didn't bring snow gear for a reason."

"There is no excuse for poor planning."

"Confucius say: Look no further than the amount of time he's spent all week with Maxwell for your answers," Trowa said.

"Don't patronize me."

"Sure, Scholar Chang. You do know what Chekhov said, 'If you put a gun on a table in act one, it had better go off in act three.'"

"Barton, move out of my way."

"Clothes shopping, cross-country ski equipment, and now this." Trowa lowered his voice further so I could scarcely make out what he said. "Too bad they have to stay another night, alone in the cabin, while they wait for an order of car chains to come in. And what if that next big storm hits a little early and they have to stay another night, while the roads get cleared? Tough luck, real tough." Trowa chuckled. "Yuy's looking for some action."

Wufei snorted. "You have an overactive imagination distorted by your personal perverted twist. Although—All right, I will grant you that he may have set himself up to remain behind with Maxwell, but only to force the man to rest longer. With that ankle, he won't be up to much... activity."

"Uh, huh. You don't believe that yourself. Even a stiff like you has to admit that Maxwell's hot and Yuy lusts after his ass. And, no sprained ankle is going to come between Yuy and his goal."

"I'm not...stiff. I'm reserved, and I don't have to admit to anything."

"Remember that fight you broke up in the locker room?"

"That was inconsequential," Chang demurred. "Yuy could have handled the ten men fine. I didn't want it to turn into a bigger brawl."

"Yuy was defending his territory. He overheard some guys jacking off over a picture of Maxwell. He cleaned their clocks, and they had no idea Yuy wanted him just as bad. In fact, if anything it bolstered his perfect, straight male image. But I know better. You know better, too."

"These are our best friends you are gossiping about. I look the other way with you and Winner and I refuse to speculate about anyone. I don't find it seemly or titillating. My personal life is..."

"Non-existent."

"Full and complete! I have a date with Miss Po tomorrow, as a matter of fact."

"I knew it," Trowa said, his rumbling laughter covering Wufei's indignant noises. "Quatre bet me you'd never have the nerve to ask."

"Well, now you know." He added punctuation with an indignant sniff. "Oh, you will drive back today."

"Sure thing," Trowa said.

"To ensure the two of you behave honorably, I will take the front passenger seat."

"Oh, no you won't. I can keep two hands on the wheel at all times and entertain my boyfriend- I promise- as long as you meditate silently in the back seat."

"Humph!" I heard the irritated snort of an man about to give up the fight. "Agreed. Now, get out of my way; I have the car to load."

I replayed the words in my head, intent on remaining still, and was so focused on that task that I wasn't aware of Trowa until I felt his hot breath on my exposed ear.

"And if you don't believe me, you stubborn dipshit, take a look at what Yuy has hidden away in his beside table."

"Shit!" I jumped a foot off the couch, straight up, I think, but when I looked around, Trowa was gone.

"Ugh." I fell off the couch and onto the floor, banging my leg on the coffee table. My aches and bruises, unmasked by pain killers, knocked the stuffing out of me.

Trowa was gone, but he had left behind a glass of water and two pills for me. Not just any meds would work. These hailed from his medical kit. These were Maxwell-system-tolerant pain killers, not really "lion tranqs" as I liked to call them. Wonderful man, when he wasn't full of it. Of course, now all I wanted to do was check out the contents of Heero's bedside table! Condoms and lube? A gun? Dirty magazines?

I mean, hey, I had a normal, active, eighteen-year-old sex drive just like the rest of them, but that didn't translate into boinking my friends! I didn't even consider the submitting to the reverse. Okay, I had a few dreams, but a guy who acts on his desires for other men is dead meat. As I repeated my mantra, though, I felt half dead already.

Still, Quatre was right about changing times, conditions, and the fact that we weren't ordinary guys. We! We, yeah, that included me, too, but I wasn't gay or anything. I only liked Heero.

Yeah, I was back vacillating between wanting and rejecting. One good night's sleep and my insecurities reasserted themselves, especially since it was going to be just me and Heero holding down the fort. Trowa had even packed the Wii. What would we do to pass the time? What did Heero want to do? Man, a couple of those pills could help, if only I could reach them.

I never wanted anyone else. Since I didn't believe we had any future, I stuck to my mantra and ghost-walked through life. I took the most dangerous missions and tried not to think about the hopelessness of Heero Yuy. I wasn't making him an obsession, more of a repression, if that's a thing.

Who in my life could I compare Heero to?

As if in answer, Quatre appeared at my elbow, handing me the pills and water.

"Oh, thanks, Quatre. How did you know I needed these?" I loved the guy.

"Trowa mentioned you looked pained," Quatre said. "I'll leave more bottled water and pills here on the coffee table. We'll set up an appointment as soon as possible so we all can see the house. Now, have fun and don't hurry back."

"Yeah, drive carefully, break a leg, and all that!" I called to his retreating back.

No, I couldn't compare my feeling for Heero with my bud, Quatre, but who else had I spent any time with lately? I had been out with colleagues, friends, acquaintances. No real dates. Coffee shop, target practice, and lunch kind of dates. The others may have thought I was popular, but they were wrong if they thought I had a chance of heading into any relationships. I had warm tender feelings for my friends, but no idea how they actually felt about me. I could make a few educated guesses, though. To Hilda I must be pure old slippers; to Sally and Dorothy, I appeared to be a think tank, one extra tactician to bolster their egos; and to Miss Po, I was, clearly, Nothing.

I didn't remember dreams about the male population, unless they involved Heero, and that was rare. I really, really didn't want to go there. I worked to forget.

Work. Didn't have that to fall back on now, did I? Counseling didn't sound so appealing right now, either. What possessed me to change my life, just like that, all of a sudden, just up and decide to take a sabbatical!? I must have really needed this break.

Wufei left us his shovel. I could see it resting aside the door. Nice of him. Didn't have to do that. Without me in the car there was more room for their personal stuff previously carried in Heero's vehicle, even the shovel. I was going to be alone with Heero. What was he going to do this time? If I died, he could bury me in the snow with that shovel and no one would find my body for months. He could deny it all. I decided that maybe I should tell Wufei to pack the shovel.

I was thinking about the stupidest things. Luckily, I was keeping my mouth shut at the same time so none of it leaked out. I blamed it all on the pain killers like everyone else.

"Bye!"

Heero saw them off from the stairs, declaring he would be taking a shower. Trowa waved and headed out the door with a bag over each shoulder, but not before casting his smirk over me and Heero. Quatre dipped his head to hide his smile and wished us well, and Wufei nodded curtly, while closing the door behind him. Wufei, Quatre, and Trowa took off, chain-encased tires creaking over the icy road, leaving me, the shovel, and Heero to our own devices.

In spite of my restricted mobility, I was in Heero's room an instant after I heard the water blasting from the shower, managing not to thump the splint on anything and make noise. I'd be paying for the activity later with more throbbing, but better than letting curiosity kill the poor, street-ratty, Duo-tomcatty. There were two tables, one on either side of the headboard. It took me twenty seconds to discover both drawers were empty.

"What are you doing here?"

"Ahhhh." I spun like a top, a wobbly, unstable one, while surreptitiously ripping the rubber band from the end of my braid before facing a towel-wrapped Heero. "Looking for my hair band. I, ah, shot it and it flew someplace in here. Oh, yeah here it is." I dipped to the floor and snatched it, overbalancing and falling on my ass. I didn't ordinarily lie to my friends, because I was really bad at it. "I thought you were going to shower."

"Hn," he said, meaning: "No, you didn't, but you are so pathetic I will let it pass this time." He pulled a bottle of shampoo out of a paper bag on the closet floor. "I needed this."

I strained to keep my eyes on his face and off the exposed hip where the towel parted at the side. His chest was really cut and smooth, with only the finest trail of dark hairs leading from his bellybutton down past the edge of the towel.

Shit, I had to retrain my brain. Ah... Okay, his Japanese genes left him relatively hairless. I'll bet he never had to shave, lucky bastard. I imagined the cherubic Quatre would grow up to be a bear, a gold Viking bear, despite the fact that his gene pool hailed from someplace in Arabia. A Viking, Lawrence of Arabia grizzly bear. That terrible image centered my thoughts. "Your shampoo. Oh. Right."

"Stay here. I'll be done shortly."

If that wasn't heart-stopping enough, he reached out and offered me a hand up. I used it to stand, even though I didn't need to. I had one good leg, which was more than I'd had once during the war and I still managed to crawl two miles past an enemy encampment and pilot my Gundam to safety. Ah, and then he touched my braid. He gave it a little shake, loosening the strands. "It's softer than it looks."

"Oh? Yeah, heh, heh... Ah, that's the conditioner I use now."

"Conditioner." He probably added that term to his list of "things Duo uses."

"Yeah. I didn't always keep my hair this nice. Heck, it was braided to avoid having to wash and comb it out. Sometimes it would get pretty nasty. I remember after a particularly rough go during the war, Quatre invited me to his family's island spread to recuperate. You've been there, right? Pretty awesome, huh? Well, we were just new friends at the time and it was like a palace. Anyway, I met a couple of his sisters and they went gaga over my hair and trimmed it and that's when they showed me how to use conditioner to make it easier to comb out. I was mortified at the time, but Quatre was cool about it all. He was used to gushing females, I guess."

"You and Winner are... close."

And there you have it. He was insecure.

"Yeah. Best buds. Like the brother I never had, but nothing more. If you haven't noticed, he's got a pretty dedicated boyfriend. Besides, I'm not, ah, interested. Um, I'm not...ah..." Able to lie through my teeth, apparently. So just fill in the blanks as you think appropriate.

Heero nodded. "This conditioner, would it make my hair lay flat?"

I grinned. "Might! I'll get it for you."

I hobbled to my room, eager for something do besides ogle my friend's near-naked body and hide my own arousal. I was not immune, no matter how hard I tried.

So, why was I trying to fight it? Convention, intense fear, and ignorance. What do two guys do when they like each other? Heero was not the hand-holding-strolling-through-the-mall type. Something private then. I couldn't see myself snuggling on the couch with him, well, I could, but we hadn't. He was so rigid. Quatre and Trowa kissed, but Quatre was so approachable; Heero wasn't. I would have said he was nervous, but he was about as composed as they come. He didn't waffle; he acted. What I'd seen or heard men doing in bathrooms, dark alleys, porn shops, both disgusted and fascinated me. I wanted no part of it, unless Heero did. I was confused and battling a wild mix of desires.

I found Heero just outside his room when I returned, tossing him the bottle. "You'll only need a small glob, leave it in a couple minutes, rinse, and you're good."

He nodded and we stood and stared at each other. He looked tense enough to bash his fist through the wall.

"Okay?" I asked. "Need me to show you?"

His pause gave me pause. He was actually considering it! I had tagged that on as a joke.

"No, I'll be faster alone. Wait in here."

Man, he was adamant about me waiting for him in his room, and I have to say it got me curious. Several explicit sex scenes played in my mind, all at once. Fuck! I was going to need a shower!

I wanted to sit and chose to use the chair by the wall with the small bookcase. I settled on reading while I waited, lifted my splinted leg onto the middle bookshelf, and picked out a book. "Fly Fishing" looked entertaining. I was, in fact, entranced until I heard the shower shut off and knew Heero would be back in a minute. Would he use his towel on his hair, or as a body wrap again?

I pictured both, which was why my face was red when he came in, towel-drying his hair, wearing a loose pair of jeans, hanging low enough that I could tell he wasn't wearing underwear. My mouth went on overdrive.

"This looks like fun," I cried out, showing him a picture of some shitfaced ancient mariner fishing by a river. "Rod, reels, a little technique, nothing much, except the bait's kinda complicated. Guess different food for different fish, huh? These pros make their own." I flipped a few pages where close up pictures demonstrated how to tie a "fly." "Think I could make these?"

His bare chest brushed the hairs on my forearm. I could feel his warmth and dampness and forgot to breathe a few counts. But that was nothing. He cradled one of my hands in his, stroking, feeling out the calluses, tickling the sensitive tips, but totally oblivious of what he was doing to me. Well, maybe not.

"Yes. You can build anything."

We just sat there, me holding a book, him holding my hand, and both staring at our hands as if they were an unwelcome third party; at least, he was scowling. I moved to get up and again, he braced himself to support some of my weight. I didn't need his help, exactly. I wasn't feeble, but still, it was nice of him. Then our eyes locked. His wet hair brushed the towel draped around his neck. I dropped the book and reached up to caress a lock over his ear.

"Did the trick. The conditioner, you know? Man, your hair is really heavy, but it isn't sticking out. It- Oof!"

That was the sound of my breath escaping after Heero rammed my back against the wall.

He ironed into me from face to thighs. Our teeth clattered and skidded, rough, chapped lips scraped, noses bent and flattened. I was trapped, surrounded by Heero's weight, his steamy heat, and his male scent. Instinctively, I leveraged an arm between us and shoved hard.

"Damn it! I'm flesh and blood here!"

Heero stumbled backwards a couple steps, breathing harder than the effort justified. His body was sharply delineated against the faint light of the window. I could not guess what he might be thinking. He wiped his flushed face awkwardly, pushing his bangs aside.

"Heero?" I whispered, barely audible as I regained my one-footed balance.

I wasn't mad or not mad. Pushing him off me had been a knee-jerk reaction. He jolted straight as if I had startled him. He must have been intent on his thoughts, whatever they were.

Our eyes made contact, he relaxed fractionally, and he said, "I can't seem to do this right."

His voice was controlled. He remained standing in the middle of the room, again not moving, head down. I hopped closer and would have touched him, a gesture which would have been acceptable fully clothed, but seeing him standing there in only his pants it suddenly took on a new dimension, so I folded my surplus arms across my chest instead.

I recognized from those indefinable gestures of body language that he was aroused: the heat seemed to radiate from his body, his lips were parted, his eyes unfocussed, his nipples now visible in the light from the window, hard. His arms were hanging loosely by his side, fingers half curled. I swallowed. I could feel my own body responding, the blood redirected again to parts unwanted.

I did not know quite how to handle this situation, to say the least.

"Depends on what the hell you're trying to do." I said harshly and stupidly. If he was mad and lost control I would be dead, and there was the matter of that shovel, still. "Um, I didn't mean that like it came out. Umm. Are you all right?"

He turned half away from me. I stood, fixed, waiting. "Heero? You don't seem all right."

He moved toward me again and I had an overwhelming impulse, not to seize him, or molest him, but just to reach out and touch his arm and connect where words seemed to be failing. The heat radiating from him was even more powerful now.

"It's..." he stopped.

"It's what?"

He shook his head, and murmured, "Nothing."

"It sure the hell's gotta be something!"

He clenched his fists, the veins popping on his arms then slowly opened his hands, staring at them blankly. His eyes closed a moment, as if drawing on all his resources to say what he had to say. "Correct, not nothing. I-I conveyed my feelings to you. I was attentive. I felt the time was right."

Jeez, spit it out, man!

"The time was right for what?" I asked, suspecting I knew what he'd say.

"To seduce you." Heero looked away. "I misinterpreted your actions. It's hard to know what's okay. Sorry."

I swayed and leaned backwards, luckily, against the closed door, the wood hard and cold against my back. I shivered, but not from the cold; I could barely sense the temperature. I needed that contact! The reaction of my own body was leaving me shaking. The attraction of Heero was easy to rationalize - he was pleasing almost in an aesthetic sense, as a work of inhuman art, the Holy Grail of manhood- but Heero Yuy, standing there in his room, had a raw sexual appeal that I had never experienced before. Not like this. He thought he failed to seduce me! Gods, I was nearly crazy with lust I didn't want to have. I couldn't stand it!

"You mean you didn't read the addendum to the Gundam training manual: 'Finding and Securing Your Special Fuck-Buddy - For Idiotic Flyboys'?"

I wasn't sure if Heero would punch me or laugh.

"No, that was omitted from my manual," he said in a toneless voice, but then he smiled. The smile widened, reaching his eyes, and then we both laughed.

Whoa little doggies! The tense moment passed, but we needed to put some space between this contact and any future encounter; at least, I did and I assumed his glare agreed. I left him to dress, while I thumpety-thumped back to my room.

Hey, I could be as indecisive as I wanted! I could change my mind about the facts of life and how they applied to me as much and as often I needed to figure stuff out. Sally Po told me so. She said teenage boys do that; course, how would she know? Yeah, and when I'd say that to her she'd tell me, "Because I'm a doctor, Agent Maxwell."

But for all her credentials, she couldn't sort out the thoughts in my head or make me feel better about them—not that I shared any personal ones with her, mind you. Because as much as I was hot for Heero, I didn't want to come off as hot for Heero. I really, really had it ingrained in me that homosexually was a bad thing and I knew I could fight it if I tried, or bury myself in work, or roll it into a tight, little ball of guilt and stuff it way, way back into the deepest, darkest crevasse of my gray matter.

Yeah, like a license to buy drugs made Sally Po the know-it-all about my head. Let her examine someone else's head—Wufei's, for instance. He liked those bossy, older women types. Anyway, so I had this tornado in my brain, stirring up every thought and emotion possible, in order to not think about Heero's cock. I was the master of stealth, but, again, I was so distracted that I missed Heero stepping into my room.

"Duo."

His hand came out to touch my arm once more. He practically levitated me to my feet. His eyes were filled with, what? Deadly intent? Oh, shit. I had seen him weak, vulnerable, and now he had to kill me.

Again, we stood there, very close, the only sound being the sound of our breathing. I didn't want to make him react impulsively and call him to action, so I tensed, freezing every muscle into a kind of rictus. See? You don't need to kill me. I'm already dead. I'm more than dead; I'm Death itself!

He closed the distance and nestled his body against mine, touching almost from head to toe, his breath warm against my ear.

We were both trembling a little—or just me, a lot.

I think it was just about that time that my resolve took a detour and vanished. I guess I decided that if I was going to die because I was a fag, I'd die a happy one. I wanted to hold Heero again, hear his heartbeat, and know that he was real and solid.

I was first to embrace him, my hands on his back, relishing the feel of his warm, bare skin. That seemed to electrify him. His hands gripped my shoulders, crushing his hard chest into mine. His breath was faster, more ragged. Then he took his hands away, and I could feel him tugging at his pants. In an instant he pressed against me again, and there was only the rough cotton of my sweatpants between us. Not believing what I was doing, I put my arms round him, feeling the smooth skin of his back, and pulled him closer. Heero, nude, holding me like this. And me holding him. The substance of my dreams - made flesh.

"Oh, gods," Heero gasped.

I was totally non-verbal in my response. His hands reached for my pants, clumsily, and pulled them down as he effortlessly lowered me down onto the rug on the hardwood floor of my room. I winced, trying to keep my bum leg out of the way of his knees, but noticed his eyes widen at the sight of my very large hard-on. He sank on top of me, almost panting. His hands, rigid as his body, clutched at my mangled hair, half unbraided, and fanned out over the floor. His erection felt enormous against my belly, hot and rigid. He started moving up and down, and I gripped him, moving in response.

He gasped and moaned and the motion of his body quickened. A hot wetness spread between us as an orgasm like I had never experienced before overwhelmed my senses, blinding me. It was awesome and terrible at the same time. He collapsed onto me, gasping for air, his whole body limp across mine.

And I lay there under him, my own muscles unable to respond after such relief. I don't know when it was that Heero stirred again - we must both have fallen asleep.

He muttered, by way of an apology, "You must be squashed flat."

"No, it'sallright," I said in a slurry murmur.

Parts of me ached intensely at being pinned down, but I wasn't going to let him move until I had to. I moved my arm up, nearly resting my hand on the back of his neck, but then I froze. That was too intimate a gesture to make. That sounded stupid, with our two bodies pressed together as they were, but as I knew, sex and love were two different things. And sex was what had compelled Heero - me, too, if I were honest. He might understand what we had just been doing; we might both share this infatuation with each other, but not a lover's caress.

It was he that stirred, and winced.

I chuckled, "We're probably stuck together now."

"Hnn."

I could feel his organ, limp now against my belly. We had certainly both come hard enough to cement us together for life. He rolled off me, and put his hand down to his belly and I to mine. I was no longer sticky, but I could feel the stiffness of our dried emissions.

"That was immense," I said.

"Yeah." There was a touch of awe in his voice.

It sure was for a novice like me, but for him? He must have done all this before. Or...maybe not. I had no idea.

"I'm sorry about earlier," he whispered.

"I told you before - don't be. You couldn't help it."

"But I wanted to do this. I needed to."

Okay. "So did I."

He was silent for some minutes, and then sat up. "You were starting dinner?"

I knew when it was time to go. "Barely." I stumbled to my feet, groping for my pants. "What happened to them?"

"Here," Heero laughed softly. "I was ready to rip them off you."

"You nearly did." I barked a laugh. I rested on the edge of my bed and pulled the sweats carefully over the brace, while he dressed in another silence.

He flung my arm over his bare shoulders, which felt like an iron joist, and wrapped his muscled, braided-steel-cabling arm around my waist. "No more hopping." Acting as my support structure, he assisted me downstairs to stir up the campfire and rustle up some grub.

What to eat? Soup, that's easy. Can opener, pot, water? I tipped back, I thought, to prop myself against a counter, but there was nothing there. The air was cool against my back. I was rattled, thinking there had been a kitchen counter there, but finding I was turned around. My concentration was shot.

"Are you all right?" Heero asked, standing a little ways off, uncertainty in his voice.

Role reversal. I fought to keep my balance as I swung around and looked a bit off to the side. I could just make out his features as he moved out of the shadows and into a pool of light from the single, dim, under-counter light.

"Yeah, I'm okay." Absolutely. Yeah, right.

"You were standing there for a long time."

"Was I? Oh, well. Forgot where I was, you know?" Shoot me.

"Your spatial orientation may be affected by the pain killers."

We both stood there, a few paces apart, staring at each other, neither of us moving, neither of us speaking, and time seemed meaningless. Then I sighed, "Yeah. Weird, huh?" My innate talent gone? Yeah, I'd say that's odd.

"Sure you're okay?" he asked again.

I touched my leg. "Other than that? Well, actually, not really," I admitted finally. "Maybe the pain killers."

I wasn't "okay." I was reeling from him, my feelings, my excitement, my...him.

"Go back to your room; I'll help you with this later."

"No, gotta eat now that I'm down here."

Soup was in the can still and I had not turned on the burner.

"Hn," he agreed. "It is my night to cook, actually." Heero looked at a loss as to what he should do.

"Need me to walk you through toasted cheese sandwiches?"

"No. I can make those," he said with stoic seriousness.

I smiled encouragingly. Then he smiled.

Dinner progressed fine. We ate in companionable silence. Neither of us wanting to discuss what had happened, although it was obviously the only thing either of us was thinking about. We shared cleaning up the dishes duty; scrubbing, rinsing, drying. An itching in my groin pulled my body out of a stretch and I looked down, remembering what we'd done. I needed a bath badly. And some space. I wanted my hands on him and he wouldn't understand that. I mean, with the sex over he wouldn't want more contact. But I did. I really didn't want to hear him ask me what I was doing holding him. Yeah, I needed to put a few rooms between us before I did something stupid.

"I need a shower," I told him.

"Use these." He handed over the crutches I'd been ignoring.

"Hn," I grunted. Let him decipher my meaning for a change.

Chapter 6

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