Distance - A Rituals Side Story by Maaya
Standard disclaimers apply

Duo POV

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We’re sharing a safe-house together, you know? It’s the first time we’ve done that before. We do it because we have to learn more about routines, personalities and things like that. That’s my start today.

Quatre never mentioned that ‘incident’ with the teacher, nor did Heero, though I would get the strangest looks directed to me sometimes. I don’t think that they ever told Wufei or Trowa about what happened but they certainly began to suspect something after seeing those small glances I got.

Heero. Somehow, I don’t get that guy. He agreed to stay with me in the dorm-room that day, and he agreed to share a room with me in this safe-house though I don’t really understand why. It’s not like he tries to socialize or anything like that because he rarely speaks; not until I say something to him first. Still, I like him. He’s like, steady somehow. Seems so sure of himself and yet not.

I can’t really explain it.

Come to think of it, I wonder what he thinks of me? I mean, he helped me to wrap my knee and he never said anything about it. He watched me sleep in Deathscythe. He agreed to play my little ‘game’ with me . . . Like I said, I don’t get him.

When he’s in the room, I feel like I have to talk . . . have to do anything to keep the silence away from us. It rests upon my shoulders like a heavy blanket that I can’t get away from and his presence in the room makes it hard to breathe. And when he went out of the room to finally fetch his goddamn laptop, it got lonely. I guess I can say that, how strange it might sound; Heero’s presence in the room comforted me, in a twisted sort of way. Jeez.

Let me tell you something; lying in a bed, alone, during the day without anything to do is not a fun thing to do. Luckily, Quatre came and we talked a bit. Out of all the guys, Quatre is the one I know the best. He’s friendly, talks almost as much as I do and likes to be close to people. I like to be close to people.

Now you might say that I should avoid physical contact and such after having that ‘incident’ but I can’t say I’ve had any more problems than usual with it. Maybe it has to go the whole way before you get ‘that’ scared.

I don’t really know why the ‘incident’ scared me so much. I mean, I have been through a lot of bad things – so why would I get so scared about such a small thing? Maybe it was because I thought I had been safe in that school. Maybe it was because of the fact that I *got* scared in the first place. It’s hard to explain but I think that my own fear scared me a lot. The knowledge of that I was as scared as a normal teenager would have been, if not worse.

I can tell you that I am *not* normal. Not even close. None of us are. God knows if I even want to be any more. A part of me says ‘yes’ and another ‘no’. An inner conflict about the subject. That’s bad.

Anyway, here we are, sharing a safe-house. Wufei was in a bad mood for some reason I didn’t know about, so I stayed out of his way as much as I could. I didn’t really want a fight with someone right then.

I guess our personalities just didn’t clash together.

So here I was, lying on my bed, staring up at the boring, white ceiling. There weren’t even spots enough to count, something that made it all even more boring. In the background, I could hear Heero typing away on his computer and for some reason, it annoyed me. What was he really doing, anyway?

Have you ever heard a sound that just continued and continued? A sound that you normally don’t even notice, but once you do, you can’t help but listen to it – how boring it may be able to be? It’s like sounds from traffic in a big city. When you’ve lived there for a while you get used to it but sometimes you can be very frustrated too. You get very tired of that sound, I tell you.

Right now, that sound was Heero’s fingers pushing the keys on the keyboard.

I felt I needed to put some distance between us right now.

Rather than saying something to Heero and earning a ‘baka’, I went out of my room and down the stairs with the plans to search through my jacket pockets after any kind of cigarettes that I might had forgotten there sometime. The bad thing about the safe-house was that you normally didn’t have any chance to go shopping. Talking about shopping, however, made me feel hungry. No one had wanted to go to buy supplies in the rain and I hadn’t eaten anything since yesterday morning. Not that it hurt me very much as I was used to go without food for long periods since living n the streets, but hey, it’s pleasant. And I guess that at least Quatre and Wufei needed food.

From what I had learnt about Wufei, he’s a descendant of the Dragon Clan or something like that and about Quatre . . .well. . . the Winner name is hard to miss.

I don’t usually smoke but sometimes, when I’m unusually bored or frustrated, I do. I don’t even think that the other guys know I smoke.

Luckily, I actually found a cigarette in my pocket and I lit it thoughtfully as I walked towards the living room. Wufei sat there, reading something that looked.. heavy. Literally and otherwise. It took a while before my brain seemed to grab the fact that it was *Wufei* who was sitting there. Wufei – who had been pissed, very pissed, at the world in general whenever I entered.

I knew there was something I had wanted to avoid since I had barricaded myself in mine and Heero’s room together with the no-speaking soldier.

At first, he didn’t look up when I entered but I could see exactly when he started to smell the smoke from my cig. I can admit that he looked rather funny, sniffing in the air like that, a moment before looking up and spotting me. I fought the urge to wave and grin like a maniac. I think I grinned anyway.

It’s strange, isn’t it? I grin too much. Don’t laugh at me, because I mean it. I grin too much.

I know that people think that I’m stupid, that I’m too positive and happy. They can’t be more wrong than that. Okay, maybe I’m stupid - I wouldn’t be a soldier otherwise, but positive? Naw.

I just never realized that I grinned when I was sad, or angry. Sometimes I do, in attempts to hide my emotions, but I do it even when I’m not trying. In a way, it scares me.

Now, back to Wufei again. I think I spaced out for a while, thinking about this, so when I returned to the present, we were staring at each other. He looked.. thoughtful. Yup, thoughtful. Don’t ask me why.

“You’re a smoker.” He stated, simply.

“Not really.” I replied and tried not to chew on the cigarette. I don’t know why I try to do so all the time, but I guess I’m not a born smoker. I should have started with chewing gums instead. Sue me.

He didn’t seem confused by my answer, just shrugged and returned to his book. I glanced at the title and felt need to faint. The Complete Works of William Shakespeare. . . in English. Hot damn. Was he still reading that godforsaken thing? Didn’t he ever get tired of it?

I was going to sit down on the table, but before I had a chance to do so, Wufei said something again.

“Go out.” He was scowling at me. Jeez, and I who thought we could be friendly to each other for once.

“Why?”

He sniffed in the air again. “It stinks.”

Looking back at it like this, I guess it was stupid ever to assume that he meant that it was *I* who stank. It was rather obvious that he meant the cigarette, not me.

Still, I just *had* to take it the wrong way. It’s not like I hadn’t heard that before anyway. Those brats at school used to say it. And when you lived at the streets, it was something you got a lot from strangers who happened to see you. Hey, even one of the first things Dr. G ever said to me after our introduction was that I smelled. So it wasn’t like I was unfamiliar with the fact.

“What did you say?”

He repeated his earlier statement. “It stinks.”

“Well, sooorrry, but I didn’t shower this morning.”

“Excuse me?”

I was about to reply something sourly, but it was just as I opened my mouth as the realization dawned upon me and I figured that he was talking about the cigarette, not me. I felt how my cheeks grew red. A veeery red shade. Redder than blood, but now I am being stupid.

“Never mind. I’ll go.” I slid out of the room quickly, so he wouldn’t have time to see my red face.

Jeez, I felt embarrassed. I just hoped that he didn’t understood what I had believed. I escaped around the corner, just to almost run into Quatre, who came walking in the opposite direction. I had my palm against my cheek by that time, in a half-hearted attempt of trying to rub the redness away, but I let my hands fall as he looked at me curiously – probably wondering what the hell I was doing. Double jeez. Luckily, the cigarette was hidden in my left hand.

“Hello, Duo.” He said, in slightly broken English, looking at me. I couldn’t help but grin at the attempt.

“Hi, Quat.” I drawled back to him, in the wonderful, very cozy American dialect. You don’t know how wonderful it is to speak in your own tongue after talking and hearing Japanese most of the time. Ever been in a foreign country, alone, for a month or two? It makes you feel dizzy when you’re forced to hear people speak in other languages around you constantly. I assume that all of the others feel like that too, minus Heero of course, who is Japanese. Or at least on one of his parents’ side of the family. One of them was most definitely *not* Asian, as I’ve never seen a Japanese with blue eyes before. It’s too bad that Japanese is the only language we five pilots have in common.

Quatre stroked a too long blonde bang out of his eyes and it was only then I saw the thin sheaf of papers he held in the hand. It was money, rather much to be not so exact. He must have noticed my curious look (hey, we usually save the money we have with us so it wasn’t all that strange, but I found it surprising to see Quatre running around with it) because he explained himself quickly.

“I was planning on going shopping now . . .it seems like it stopped raining. Want to come?” He had once again reverted into Japanese and inwardly, I sighed. Before I realized what he had said, that will say.

When I did, I brightened. “Can I? I’m dying from boredom here.”

“Sure, get ready. We’ll take Wufei’s bike.” He stepped past me to reach the stairs, probably to go and tell Heero where we were going.

I stared at his back in surprise. Wufei’s bike? Of course *Quatre* would be allowed to borrow it. My Chinese fellow pilot did probably not know that I was going too, since he wouldn’t let me near that pretty lil’ thing of his. I know that it was a childish thought (damn it!) but I couldn’t help but feel slightly, very slightly jealous. Damn him, damn me, and damn Quatre.

I’m not sure how he got the bike here but I suspect that he has some kind of space in his gundam to place it during our fights. Makes me wish I had that kind of space too.

I went to put my jacket on anyway, and I only had to wait for a short minute before Quatre arrived. Ha was carrying a big backpack in one hand, and he took his jacket before putting the bag on afterwards.

We went outside without a word, and the coldness hit me like a strong wall of ice. It was grey outside, as the sun couldn’t force itself through the thick clouds and the wind was blowing enough to go right trough my thin jacket. Great. Why did I ever agree to follow? It was probably going to be even windier on the bike.

*******

Of course, I had to be right about that. It *was* windier on the bike, and I pressed myself tighter to Quatre’s back in front of me, in an useless attempt of stealing some warmth from him. Ever seen the movie, ‘Dumb and Dumber’? where the main-guys freeze on to each other for a while after riding their motorcycle? It didn’t seem all that funny right now, but I can vaguely remember myself laughing at it back then. I’m so stupid.

“Can’t this thing go any faster?” I yelled over the sound of the wind. “It’s getting rather chilly back here!”

Quatre’s yell back made me realize that ‘chilly’ was this year’s understatement. Apparently, he felt as cold as I did.

It took a while but finally, we arrived to the town. It was really small and didn’t have many houses more than some little shops. We entered the one that seemed to sell food first and found that it was bigger inside than expected. I nudged Quatre with an elbow. “Well, what do we need?”

“Food.” He replied and I guess he was as clueless as I felt.

Don’t go away laughing at us – we were two fifteen year old guys going on a shopping trip for the first time ever. It’s not like any of us ever had done that before. I pointed towards the fridges standing in a line against one wall. “Milk? Juice? Or.” I paused, with a small grin before continuing with my finger towards some shelves. “Coffee?” My voice was hopeful.

“Milk should do fine, I hope.” was his reply. Then. “Do you like coffee?”

I couldn’t come up with anything else to do than nod. He thought for a while before answering to that.

“Guess coffee could be fine too; it’ll keep us awake if needed. What about orange juice . . . ?”

“Don’t know. Never drank it before.” I shrugged at the strange look he gave me.

“How did you manage not to do *that*?” was what he asked, horrified. I shrugged again and nodded towards the bread-shelf.

“Should we buy some of that?”

We ended up buying milk, coffee and also juice for the mere reason of letting me try it. Actually, I haven’t eaten oranges at all. I got my vitamin C doses from pills only, and Prof. G wasn’t very fond of fruits since they were too expensive. So there I was, uneducated in tastes of more exotic fruits. I’m so pathetic.

We also bought bread (whole meal), cheese, butter, meat, salt, rice, vegetables, and various other things that sounded good. I think we did rather good considering it was our first time, like mentioned.

When we reached the bike, we were met by yet another problem. I stared at it. “How the hell are we going to get everything back on *that*?”

Quatre’s backpack suddenly felt a very, very small acquaintance.

He shrugged and took it off, studying it with what I wanted to describe as ‘trained eyes’, though I’m not sure why. “It might even work.” was all he said.

“Put the milk in there.” I suggested and so we did, finding that the juice went in there, as well as a bag of rice. We stuffed the chocolate bars into the smaller outside pocket and ended up deciding to put the remaining bags beside the two of us on the bike. I had to scuff very close to Quatre to make it work but heck, everything for a little warmth. Just as we were in position, however, I realized two things. The first was that I had forgotten to buy cigarettes and the second . . .

“Quatre, do you know anything about cooking?” I asked.

There was a pause and even though I couldn’t see his face, I was sure he had that small frown from surprise scarring his face. When I didn’t receive an answer, I sighed.

“Well then, we have to buy a cookbook.” I started to move, but was stopped by Quatre’s calm voice.

“If you move, everything will fall.”

I had to argue. “Let’s put the things down then.”

“If I move, you can keep the things in place while I run off to buy one.” His voice held everything; politeness, calm, friendliness and no-nonsense. I’d had to ask exactly how he did that some day. I couldn’t help but sigh again.

“Well then. Don’t take too long.”

“No, I won’t.”

And then he was gone.

I sat there for a while, holding the bags tightly, looking in the display windows and slowly freezing my ass off. Where the hell was he anyway? It couldn’t possible take that long to buy one mere book, could it?

An old pop-tune began to him, like by itself, from my throat and I tapped my feet in attempts to get warmer. It was, as already stated, really damn cold. The street was small and thin but I figured it still had to be one of the longest in town as there were many shops and boutiques here and less apartments. Most houses were painted in grey or a boring, darkish kind of green. Only a few people were walking around this day; a middle aged woman in blue skirt (I didn’t even want to think about how cold it had to be), a mother with her young daughter, two teenage girls, and I guy I guessed was about eighteen. That was all.

The girls wandered down the street towards me, slowly getting closer and closer. I think they were about my age and only fifteen metres away from me when they spotted something, more precisely; me.

Damn. Where the hell was Quatre?

The girls . . . giggled.

I . . . blew a sigh up into my bangs.

They . . . watched me, ‘seducing’.

I . . . looked.

They . . . came closer.

‘Warning, waning; rabid females three o’clock!’ My mind screamed but I was stuck in the same position, not daring to move as the bags could fall.

The result? I was sitting down, feeling very little as they had to bend their necks to see me, and being very, very embarrassed.

I felt stupid, end of story.

“Hi.” One of the girls, the red-haired one, winked at me. “Want some . . .company?”

Okay, now I was embarrassed on her behalf too. The last word had been panted out in a badly played need and lust. Even her friend seemed to realize this because she began to snicker wildly instead of giggling like before.

Our eyes met and she blushed, still snickering.

“Sorry, gotta leave soon.” My grin felt more strained than usual and was apologizing as I hoped they would just leave me alone.

“Room for us?”

“Don’t think so.” My under-breath mutter wasn’t aloud enough for them to hear. But aloud I said, “Sorry . . .”

“Sandra!” A male voice could be heard behind us, shouting.

Before even I, a trained soldier, had a chance to react, the red-head sat down in front on me and . . . kissed me. Fully, on the lips. My eyes widened in surprise, pure shock, and I couldn’t even move. It didn’t seem to discourage her. Far from it.

It was stupid of me to remember, okay? I think it was the fact that this was the first kiss after the incident but I should still not be affected that much. I mean, this was a young girl who I could get away from easily. And still, I remembered.

//Flashback Begins//

Before I had a chance to react, he reached out with his hand and caressed my cheek roughly. What the fuck did he think he was doing?! I could feel my cheeks heat in embarrassment and humiliation, but he didn’t stop. I shrank away from the touch, but he continued, and leaned towards me.

At first, I didn’t understand that he would kiss me, but he certainly did. A wet tongue forced my mouth open, and tasted me, drank, almost drank my saliva.

“You’re pretty.” He whispered and his breath tickled my ear. I shivered as he bit my ear lobe.

Suddenly, I found myself being turned around and pressed against the wall again, with one of his hands on my back. I managed to turn my head to the left so my chin wouldn’t be crushed against the hard wall. Another hand found its way down my back and tugged at the waistband of my pants.

I didn’t know what to do, and I choked back a dry sob of pure fear. A memory of seeing a little girl being raped, at the time when I was still living on the streets together with Solo, flashed in front of my eyes and I desperately tried not to panic. How bad could it actually be? I asked myself, but it didn’t reassure me much. The girl had screamed and screamed, until she couldn’t do that anymore. The man killed her when he was done.

Suddenly, in the corner of my eye, I saw the doorknob shake slightly, as if someone tried to open the door. I didn’t dare to hope, but even when I tried not to, a small glint of the annoying emotion woke my body up again, and my brain seemed to be able to think clearly again. I didn’t realize until now that I had sunk into a dazed state of fear.

A big hand managed to slide under my waistband and I tried to wiggle myself free again. The hand only pressed harder against my back.

Suddenly, I heard a loud crash, and I saw as the door opened, the lock broken. At first, Mr. Fool didn’t seem to react; he just stood there, with me pressed against the wall and with a hand in my pants. It wasn’t before when Heero stalked into the room, followed by Quatre, as he let go of me, and I felt my legs give away and I sunk down on the grey floor. . .

//Flashback Ends//

Suddenly I was back in present time again and the gasp I let out went into lips tasting faintly of pineapples. It wasn’t unpleasant, I guess, just wet and very, very unwelcome.

I broke away from her, only to feel my shoulders being grabbed by a big and . . . muscular guy.

Suddenly, I felt so very small.

Why can’t I ever have a lucky day? Is that too much to ask for? A little unhelpful voice in my head answered yes. Fuck it anyway.

“What the hell are ya doing?” The guy bellowed and shook me by my shoulders like if I was a kid who had done something stupid. I just gripped the bags closer to my chest in a sick wish to keep them from falling. Why I thought about that right then, I don’t know.

“Keep your paws away from her!” He shouted again.

Ah. I got it; at least I think I did. It was this stereo-typical boyfriend whose gal kissed someone else in order to make him jealous.

And now this jealous, big . . .muscular boyfriend was after my guts. Hooray.

I let my eyes wander for a couple of seconds to take in the girls’ expressions. The red-head, Sandra, had gotten up from the bike and looked annoyingly . . . pleased. Her friend stood close by, looking faintly confused.

“Hey, dude --” I tried and frenetically wondered where Quatre was. “Nothing happened, we . . . she just. . . ”

But just like any stereo-typical jealous, dumb bully, this one didn’t take his time to listen to explanations. His fist came up and I barely had time to duck as it suddenly came rushing towards me with admirable speed.

Fortunately, I managed to keep my hold on the bags. But when the second fist however came, I wasn’t able to do so. Out of sheer reaction I let go of the bags and managed to roll off the bike, landing on the ground in an ungraceful heap before getting on my feet. All this took about five seconds – I’m so good.

“Hey, buddy --” I said with a hand raised in front of me that served two purposes. One – to show him I wasn’t about to hit. Two – to block him if *he* wanted to hit. “Nothing happened, ‘kay? She kissed me, not the other way around. Got it?”

I was tempted to add an ‘asshole’ to the statement but resisted. I don’t like to eat my own guts, thank you very much.

“He’s right, you know.” The girl, whose name was still unbeknownst to me, said quietly, “He didn’t do a thing.”

I wanted to kiss her. Well, maybe not, but certainly thank her.

“Duo?”

I know for a fact that I grinned in relief as I heard the well-known voice say my name. “Quatre!”

He looked confused; staring at me, the guy, and finally the bags lying on the ground in unattractive heaps. “What’s going on here, Duo?” He looked at me.

Before I had a chance to say something, the friend spoke up, sounding rushed and oddly embarrassed. “We had a . . . misunderstanding.” I snorted at the understatement but she ignored me. “But it is all cleared up now, right?”

She gave her two friends a glare that rivaled Heero’s and they subdued, how strange that might sound. Quatre’s voice felt like an adult’s who had walked in on two kids fighting. He acted so . . . old, sometimes.

When I realized the girl was looking at me questioning, I nodded. “Yeah, everything’s okay.”

“Fine then . . . uh . . . bye.”

And then they disappeared, probably to argue, solve their problems, or break up. I wasn’t too sure what sounded like the most plausible in my ears.

I gave them the finger towards their backs. Petty, I know – but mildly satisfying in a childish sort of way. Quatre just stood there, looking at me until I was beginning to feel embarrassed.

I noted all of a sudden that he was carrying a thick book under his right arm. A *very* thick book to be exact – it looked more like the holy bible Father Maxwell kept in the church than a simple cookbook. I wondered what the hell we would do with so many recipes. It’s not like any of the guys would ever decide to become gourmet-cooks, though it would have been a funny sight. But I shouldn’t think so much.

“What was that about?” He asked and bent down to gather some things that had fallen out of the bags on the ground. Thank God the milk and juice had been in the backpack or otherwise things would have been rather sticky by now, especially considering we kept most of the bread and vegetables in those bags. Somehow, milk and bread . . . ‘goo’ didn’t appeal very much to me. And I am used to eat a little bit of everything.

I told him my story when we filled the bags again, feeling more than a little embarrassed now afterwards. It’s only I who can get into those messes on a regular basis. I did, however, wrap it up a little (not lying, mind you, just giving it a more humorous light) and he laughed while I played indignant. When I mock growled at him, he only laughed even harder.

When I proceeded to lift the bags again, I caught him looking at me, strange light in his eyes. Unable to help myself, I squirmed under his stare. Following his eyes, my head bent down until I sighted my cross resting outside my shirt. It must have fallen out from where I had tucked it in when I rolled off the bike. Oh well.

Without saying anything, I geared it by its chain and tucked it into my black shirt again, feeling uncomfortable once again. The cross belonged to the serious part of me, a side that people usually didn’t like or know very much.

“Are you religious?” Quatre asked at length.

I shrugged and kept my tone casual. “Not really. I keep it for . . . a friend.” Yeah, a friend. A very dead friend, but a friend nonetheless. I blinked to keep betraying warmth out of my eyes.

I could tell he was curious now. “Who?”

“A . . . very good friend.”

“Girlfriend?” Interest was clear in his voice and I choked, partly because of surprise, partly because of the lump in my throat.

“Excuse me?” Then I shrugged and said simply. “Just a friend.”

“Oh. Why?”

I tried to grin his question away. “Just because. Can’t we go back now?”

And we did.

*******

The End

*******

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