It’s hard to believe, but Heero has cravings. I don’t mean he’s pregnant, not those kind of cravings. Nor do I mean he’s a nymphomaniac. Be interesting if he was, but no. I’m talking about midnight munchies. I’m talking middle-of-the-night-urge-to-splurge cravings.

You think he’s probably some kind of super human, because when you see his face on the television screens, fighting away, from your safe little houses, he seems to show no emotions. He seems to be confident; a ruthless terrorist against your happy system. I think you’re wrong, on two accounts. One, he’s not a terrorist, he’s fighting to help save you damn people. And two, I think you should take a closer look when watching his face on screen. You watch him try to protect a colony full of children and general people, random people who he knows nothing about, and you watch to see how his eyes become more and more determined to save them. Despite whatever rumours you may have heard, Heero is human, and he was a child once. A hellion, a mischievous child; no doubt. Maybe even with a fleck of brown hair that wouldn’t stay in place? I don’t know. I didn’t know him back then. When he was a child. When he was free, when he was taken care of.

How are these midnight munchies any connection to his emotions, though, I hear you cry. They’re everything to do with it. Every bite is a bite into his emotions. Every taste is a bittersweet reminder. And that’s how I got to know him. With every bite and swallow, I got to know that he’s nothing like what he appears. And it all starts with midnight munchies…

 

“Hey, we’re out of vanilla ice cream again.” Heero stared quizzically into the freezer, almost as if expecting it to appear before his very eyes. Or as if trying to determine why it wasn’t there in the first place.

“Well don’t look at me. You know I can’t stand the damn stuff.” He tapped his fingers against the door, as if debating this.

“Duo, only you and I live here. The layout of this place is deliberately made so if anyone tries to break into any room we’d either hear them or they’d fall into the bedroom. And you’re trying to convince me that you – who, by the way, only a few days ago teased me by telling me you could eat the world and still be hungry – you’re trying to tell me you had nothing to do with it?”

“Uh, yeah.” There was a pause, as if waiting for this sentence to explain itself. It didn’t, and Heero shut the freezer.

“I don’t believe you… but alright.”

“What is there not to believe? I didn’t do it.” My response was immediate, almost without thinking. I don’t eat ice cream anymore, and I definitely don’t lie. “Don’t you trust anyone for a goddamned second?” I guess the agitation in my voice was stronger than he’d expected, but really, he deserved it. Slowly, he shook his head.

“It’s not a case of I don’t trust you, Duo, but evidence shows”

“Goddamnit, evidence shows nothing! I don’t lie, you know that!” I interrupted him furiously. I don’t put faith in a lot of people, but Heero gets it automatically. He’s not a liability in the faith sense. He’d rather die than reveal sources- even if it was just where he bought Christmas presents. Maybe I looked hurt, I’m not sure, but he leant against the freezer with a rather apologetic look on his face.

“I’m sorry, Duo.” He meant it, too. I could tell. “It’s just, well, two tubs of vanilla ice cream don’t just eat themselves.”

“You sure they can’t have been stolen?”

“Just the ice cream?” Heero waved the empty tubs at me, and I shrugged.

“Ok. Well, how about you stay up tonight and watch out? Who knows, if it’s someone sneaking in, they must be pretty damned smart.”

“Hn…It’s…I don’t hear them. I should hear people breaking in or moving things even in my sleep. But I haven’t.” Besides, I added mentally, scanning his face, he was beyond tired. He needed sleep.

“Well, I’ll stay up instead.”

“You?” Incredulously, he raised his eyebrow. I raised mine right back at him.

“Yes, me. Or how about we both stay up, considering you seem to assume it’s me.” My voice held an icy edge, which even he could hear, because this was more a test of trust than anything, for me. I didn’t really care about Ice Cream. I probably should worry about breaching of security, but… having Heero trust me is pretty important.

“No, I think you can stay up.” He shrugged nonchalantly. “I trust you.”

“Good to know.” I replied, turning back to my magazine. I felt a sponge whiz past my head, and looked up again. “What?”

“It still hasn’t solved the problem of what I can eat for afters though.”

“Eat something healthy for a change.” I joked, knowing he always eats healthy food. I just about managed to duck the empty ice cream tub he threw at my head.

 

~~~~~~~~

 

“Night Duo.” I heard him getting changed for bed, as I sat on the landing, in the dark, pretending not to be there. I don’t loathe night watch. I might despise and abhor it, but I don’t loathe it. Several hours of silence, when I could be sleeping. I know he sits there all night, when it’s his turn, and plays solitaire on the computer. With the monitor down on it’s darkest setting. And wins. I don’t know how he can sit there for more than four hours playing the damn thing over and over, not actually being able to see it, and still winning. Ain’t nobody who can play solitaire like he does, I suppose. It would kill me, it really would. So. I’m sitting there, trying to pretend to be an inanimate object - practicing to be a clock, without the insane ticking, of course – and trying not to fall into the deepest sleep ever known to man, when I hear this almost soothing humming coming from the kitchen. Which, as I’ve mentioned, is damn near impossible to get to without making a lot of noise or going through our room. Yes, we share a room. Nothing more. It’s just more convenient. If anyone had gotten in that way, though, they’d have awoken Heero.

“ice cream, ice cream…” I heard the mutter before I recognised the voice, and from my spot – a blind spot behind a doorframe – I saw the light from the kitchen flicker on. I’ve noticed it only does this at night. At night, all lights just seem to flicker on. What’s the deal with that? Anyway, I saw this light flicker on, and moved closer to the doorframe, watching our “intruder” look for the new ice cream. Finally, he found the tub, grabbed a spoon off the cutlery stacker on the table and starts to literally dig into it, eating spoonful after spoonful as if there’s no tomorrow. Watching him gobble down the ice cream at the table made me wonder if it was a wind up. Then, slowly, he put the spoon down and covered his face, fingers lacing themselves into his fringe. I thought that he was ashamed, or knew I was there, but he made no implication that he did. I started to walk away, but then I heard a soft, quiet sound. I thought maybe he was calling me, and turned around. But he wasn’t. He hadn’t noticed me. His back was shaking, and I gathered form the low sounds that he was crying. Like a child, slow, quiet defeatist sobs.

Now, eating ice cream at god knows what time in the morning, I can let go. Ok, it’s a bit weird, but hey, everyone has his or her quirks. But the crying? I couldn’t. Could you turn your back on someone’s tears, when they sound like they’re lost and defeated? It would take a hard person to do that, especially if it were their friend.

“Heero?” I wondered if he was actually still asleep. “Heero?” If he were, would I wake him up by calling him? “Heero,  ‘s me.” I whispered, edging into a seat next to him. He looked up, and I saw his vague, horrific stare cloud his eyes. Tears melted into his cheeks, and I could tell he was contemplating changing his mood, become like the soldier he had been trained to be.

“Heero, what’s wrong?” Still, that blank, clouded stare. I took a spoon from the rack and pointed to his ice cream, talking as if I were talking to a child. “Can I have some?” He nodded, and I took a hesitant spoonful. I really hate the stuff, but hell, in that moment, I would’ve eaten poisoned lead bars, if only to get him to respond.

“It’s kinda funny. You eating this and accusing me in the morning.”

“’s just so you talk to me.” If anything, that was really not the reply I had expected.  He seemed to have folded in on himself, crumpled into a hunched figure. I had to lean in to hear what he’d said.

“Heero, I’d talk to you anyway.”

“I don’t like it.” He commented, pointing to the tub that was resting now unattended on the table. “but… sometimes, in films, and things? I’ve heard people say that it makes things better.” I imagined he was talking about Relena filling his head with garbage from those chick flicks she watches.

“I want it all to be better, Duo. I don’t want to have to keep fighting. I want to go to school. I want to go out for pizza with a few friends, drink cola and laugh over the latest comedy. I want to have a normal life, where my parents argue over my taste in music. I want parents, Duo.” He looked over to me, the haunted stare filling his eyes, behind fresh tears. “I want my mum.”

I wanted, just then, to hug him, make it better, tell him it would be better. Maybe like his mother would; but all I could do was take his hand across the table and squeeze it tightly.

“She was pretty… like Relena, almost…but she never got on my nerves. She loved me.” He pauses, stroking my wrist, lost in a memory. “She had long brown hair, deep blue eyes… And she always wore her blue jeans for everything… I loved her more than anything, Duo.  When they found me… it was …too late…”

“You were lost?”

“I… no, I was taken. Odin took me, made me lost. I…” He let go of my hand and got up, fully awake again and realising what he was saying. “I need to sleep.”

There are times in a person’s life that can change everything in their attitudes towards another person. If I’d have made him stay, reveal more to me, he would resent me and it would’ve been harder for him in the long run. But if I let him go to bed, did I know that he would ever come back – would I ever see this side of Heero again?

“Heero,” I called, and he stared at me, analysing the look on my face, as if waiting for my decision on his life and our friendship. “Wait for me, I’m tired too.” I dropped my spoon on the side, ready for the next day, and followed him to our room.

 

That night, we pushed out beds together and held onto each other’s memories as we slept.