Stay

 

A brief song-fic to “Stay,” copyright of Lisa Loeb (Album: Tails, 1995).  Standard disclaimers apply.

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The phone was ringing.  Once.  Twice.  Three times.  Duo almost hung up; he was nervous enough as it was without having to draw this out any further.  He didn’t get scared often, but when he did, he would shake and stutter, making it awfully hard to get any words out, and it looked like this was going to be one of those times.

 

Duo had a very old phone.  The design originated from the pre-colony days, and unlike most of the phones these days, there was no way for him to see the person he was talking to—or vice versa.  Most of the time he was grateful for this, but it was times like this that he really wished he had a more modern phone.  One of the benefits they provided was knowing whether or not the person in question was alone or not.  Duo started to hang up, realizing this.  It would be damned embarrassing to go through all this just to discover that the other boy was—

 

“What?”  Heero’s voice came over the line, interrupting Duo’s thoughts.  Duo swallowed hard, putting on the speakerphone so he wouldn’t drop the phone with his shaking hands.

 

“Hey, Heero.  It’s me.  Duo.”  He summoned up all of his courage, finding that it was more difficult to talk to Heero over the phone than it was to face mobile suits in battle.  At this point, he wasn’t sure which one would be putting his life in more danger, but he wasn’t sure he cared to find out.

 

“What is it?”

 

Duo smiled weakly.  Same old Heero.  “You… you remember that question you asked me a little while back?  Just before I left Earth?”

 

“What about it?”  Heero sounded a little bit miffed and the slightest bit annoyed.  Their last conversation hadn’t exactly been a happy one, and Duo had little doubt that he was interrupting something important.  Everything was important to Heero when he didn’t want to be doing something else, although in this case, everything was more important.  He didn’t want to be talking to Duo at all.

 

“Well…  Uh…” Duo paused as Howard wandered into the room and started to fiddle with the radio they’d made out of spare junk parts and a lot of elbow grease.  It only picked up one station, but it was a radio nonetheless, which meant there was finally some music in the joint.  Duo heard the DJ’s voice fade away and a few stray notes of music found Duo’s ear.  His eyes lit up; he knew this song.

 

“Well what?”

 

“Listen to this.”  Duo turned to Howard.  “Turn that up!” he commanded the older man, who shrugged and did as Duo bid, cranking the song up to full volume.  A fragile melody filled the air.

 

You say I only hear what I want to

And you say I talk so all the time—so

 

And I thought what I felt was simple

And I thought that I don’t belong

And now that I am leaving

Now I know that I did something wrong cause I missed you

Yeah, I missed you

 

And you say I only hear what I want to

I don’t listen hard

I don't pay attention to the distance that you’re running or to

Anyone, anywhere

I don’t understand if you really care

I'm only hearing negative, no, no, no—bad

 

So I turned the radio on I turned the radio up

And this woman was singing my song

The lover’s in love and the other’s run away

The lover is crying cause the other won’t stay

And some of us hover when we weep for the other who was dying

Since the day they were born well

Well this is not that

I think that I’m throwing but I’m thrown

 

And I thought I’d live forever but now I’m not so sure

You try to tell me that I’m clever but that won’t take me anyhow

Or anywhere with you

 

And you said that I was naive

And I thought that I was strong

I thought, “hey I can leave, I can leave”

But now I know that I was wrong cause I missed you

Yeah I missed you

 

You said, “you caught me cause you want me

And one day I’ll let you go”

You try to give away a keeper or keep me

Cause you know you’re just too scared to lose

 

And you say, “stay”

 

You say I only hear what I want to…

 

Howard grinned and snapped the radio off as the song faded away, and there was a long pause before Heero spoke.

 

“Duo?”

 

“Yeah?”

 

There was another long pause, and Duo could hear Heero clear his throat nervously, something he never would have expected.  The Perfect Soldier—nervous!  “Is…  Is this still on speakerphone?”

 

Howard started to snort loudly, but when Duo shot the man a glare, he stopped and left the room, doing his best to hold back roars of laughter.  Duo rolled his eyes and picked up the receiver so he could have a one-on-one conversation again.  “Not anymore.”

 

Heero grunted, his confidence having returned intact.  “What are you trying to say?”

 

“Heero, I love you.  I know that I’ve been a complete pain in the ass, and I know that I’ve had some…  Well, some troubles with the idea of us getting together officially, but I think…  Would you mind extending that offer again?”

 

“The one you’ve refused twice?  Where you told me you didn’t want to ruin our friendship?”

 

“Yeah, that’s the one.”  Duo played nervously with the end of his braid, waiting for an answer.  Doubts ran though his mind—the most prominent being something along the lines of: ‘Why would he bother trying with you after you’ve blown him off twice?  Who cares about a lousy street orphan, anyway?  Sure, he never seemed to have too many problems with it, but it’s still no excuse for your behavior…’  The silence continued for a moment before Heero finally spoke.

 

“Sure.”

 

--Owari--