Weiss Kreuz Fan Fiction ❯ Crazy Sunday Mornings ❯ Scrabble It All (or How To Check If You're Still Straight, or This Ain't Love) ( Chapter 14 )

Six hours, four dozen hormone driven girls, three serious costumers, three bouquets and countless other single flowers plus one wreath later, Yohji and Aya stare at each other from across the mission room, each at the far end of the other. Both are terribly exhausted, as no other Saturday work can* make them, due to the fact that other than those four dozen hormone driven girls driving their patience to fringes, they had each other to goad it on. Just half a day and already they were sick of each other's faces. Not that there's anything to be sick about, we all know how these two look like and we know there's nothing to be sick about, just that they can't help it. There's this something they feel when they chance upon each other looking at them, and it certainly isn't love. Yohji had to flirt extra hard just to make sure it wasn't love (he's sure that he's straight, he checked it four times*).

 

“So…”

 

“Hn.”

 

Yohji sighed. He didn't like this much either, instead of long cigarette breaks and a lunch date with some hot woman, he had to spend all his time with Aya. Not that he was complaining, of course, it was his idea, he's just a bit annoyed because he knows Aya is deliberately making it harder for him. Sure, the terrible feeling goes away and he feels a wee bit safer from the voice, but he's bored as hell and Aya's not helping. Besides, his mind wanders off to things inexplicable when Aya's in his peripheral view for too long.

 

“You know I hate this as much as you do.”

 

“So why bother?”

 

Aya knows he just said it to annoy Yohji because he knows why they had to bother. He couldn't leave things just like that. He wants everything to be explained or at least, he wants to understand what the fuck is going on. Besides, he gave his word, and he's not about to go back on that. He just didn't like spending this much time with any other person, because he hasn't spent this much time with any other person since… since… well you know. Well, at least I know I'm not the only one hating this. The only thing he can't quite comprehend was how, just starting today, he felt that same slow fear he felt those Saturday nights when he hid under his covers with a katana, waiting for whoever was outside his window to attack. That very same feeling comes back every time he realizes Yohji is watching him.

 

But nothing can come from sitting and staring at each other and consequently feeling those feelings they feel when they stare at each other. Besides, it's already past lunchtime.

 

So they resolved their quarrels for the moment and decided to eat lunch at a corner deli in peace… okay, in truce. Because Yohji was still having trouble looking at Aya without thinking of that white exposed neck and how wonderful and warm it would feel beneath—STOP, Yohji bellows at himself in his mind. Again, because Yohji was still having trouble looking at Aya without his mind wandering off to things better left unmentioned, he watched everything else instead. A certain lady and her skirt shortage caught his eye, and he was delighted to see that the face was equally eye-catching, and more delighted to note that he still is straight. When he turned to Aya to share some honest male bonding over beautiful women on the street, he was surprised not at what his mind cooked up about Aya's neck or wrist (because it didn't have any) but at Aya—he was gazing right back at the woman, caught her eye, and gave her a very discrete wink.

 

What happened next amazed Yohji still- the woman instantly replied, boldly (and might Yohji add, sexily) walked over to them and wrote her number on Aya's table napkin. With only a few short words exchanged, Aya had a gorgeous date for tomorrow night in half the time it takes Yohji to get one. With the lady gone, Aya turned back to his salami sandwich nonchalant, giving Yohji a small cheeky smile when he noticed the very surprised look the blond had on his face.

 

“That woman didn't even give me another look when she saw you!”

 

Aya smirked a little at this, and Yohji's surprise mellowed a little as he felt his ego being challenged. Then he thought the better of it, because as much as he liked women he couldn't possibly think of them in his predicament. Besides, at least now he knows Aya's straight as well. So he just gave a hearty laugh, saying things like `you sneaky devil you!' and `so that's what you do when you're home alone!' To which Aya, soundlessly laughing himself, tells Yohji things like `mind your own business…' and `yeah, well…' Yohji never linked this to the delicious little blonde who was supposed to meet him at the shop and never came round***; but this is possibly for the best. Returning to their sandwiches, the both of them felt something diffuse and they feel the better for it. Opinions are revised, and somehow they feel better about the other than they were the moment they started hanging out with each other out of necessity. This lightened the mood significantly, that is until night came round.

 

* * *

 

All throughout the day Aya kept thinking: “when is all the crazy stuff going to happen?” because none happened so far. Well, just one single and constantly annoying thing anyway- Yohji wouldn't look his way. This normally would've been a welcome thing for him, but he's with the man all-day and still being ignored, and that annoyed him. There's a fine line between being given space for privacy and being ignored deliberately when you're within arm's length of the person, and the redhead is being shown just how fine that line can be. So he decides to be nice, on a given condition that if Yohji takes his niceness as a sign for more bear-hugs, then he would have to stop being nice, quickly and painfully^.

 

So now, night came.

 

Somewhere, a sinister, disembodied voice whispered, though the two didn't notice it. This is what it said.

 

This is it.

 

Now is the time.

 

Nighttime inside Yojhi's room at unnamed apartment no. 1 in undisclosed area, Tokyo, Japan usually consists of creaking noises, loud moaning and rollicking good fun to any woman of a legal age. Aya, though of legal age, is not a woman. Which must explain why he isn't having any fun at all. So there they were, him and Yohji, camped out on the bed with a large festivity of ropes, handcuffs, dragnets, the occasional straight jacket in passing, a semi-lethal stun gun taken from god knows where, a box of pilfered Omi's darts (the kind that can put a very angry rhinoceros to sleep and leave it in a spinning world the moment it wakes up three days after), and a handkerchief beside a large bottle of ammonia which would make any kidnapper or date raping person cry with bliss^^. And, after a moment's hesitation, a pile of garlic and a cross hurriedly made out of barbecue sticks and generous sticky tape. Aya thinks Yohji is being melodramatic about everything, and he cannot imagine how a straight jacket would come in handy. And though he rolled his eyes at the barbecue stick cross, he patted his pocket to check for the rosary he secretly carried, just in case. They've made sure they're ready as hell for any mirror defying the laws of physics.

 

Anytime now.

 

…

 

Anytime.

 

…

 

Yep… anytime now.

 

…

 

An hour of staring at the wall (because, remember, Yohji can't look at Aya without disturbing thoughts entering his mind), they were ready to go kill a building full of badly dressed villains. Okay, forget villains, as long as they're badly dressed. Okay, forget their fashion choices, they just want to kill. Now. Or else.

 

For all the things Yohji got ready, he forgot to get something to help pass the time. Fortunately they found, or more appropriately, fished, a pack of cards from Yohji's bountiful nightstand^^^ and started to play poker (after Aya gingerly wiped the questionable grease coating the pack on the bed's unresisting coverlet). But Yohji kept losing because he couldn't and wouldn't look at Aya, so he didn't know whether the younger Assassin was bluffing or not. They tried `Go Fish', then, but Yohji kept jumping whenever their hands accidentally brushed each other that it added to Aya's increasing annoyance (`I'm not a damned leper, asshole'-Aya) so they stopped after two rounds. Besides, it was a boring game to begin with. After that they couldn't agree on one card game, so Yohji tossed the unfortunate (or fortunate) pack of cards over his shoulder and looked about his room for some other board game, because they were that bored. All the while, the clock kept ticking.

 

With a shout of triumph, Yohji pulled out an old, battered box that contained, much to Aya's surprise, a much-used Scrabble game. Yohji wouldn't give any explanation, except that it was something Mumsy liked. As to Aya's comment on whether whom he thought this Mumsy was, he tactfully kept it to himself. They set up the game and started to play.

 

* * *

 

Aya couldn't believe it, but Yohji was winning. `Who'd have thought that the blond moron could actually spell?' Aya thought, bitterly, and he frowned at his pieces, one of which was a Z. Hmm. What to do with a Z? As Aya pondered on what word contains a Z, U and a possible W, Yohji struggled with something not connected with Scrabble, which he was winning largely to the fact that he spent many a childhood afternoon losing to his Mumsy. There was something odd here, something he couldn't quite put his finger on. He hazarded a look at Aya, and quickly looked away as a very strong feeling of longing and an impossible urge to grab at the redhead's neck hit him like a ton of bricks. He felt bewildered. He never wanted Aya before, and he's pretty sure he's never wanted Aya at all. So why this sudden…? His thoughts stopped dead when a voice came so clearly in his head that made his skin crawl.

 

My, my, my, you've figured me out. How terribly clever.

 

Realization dawned finale and so suddenly that Yohji lost his equilibrium and almost fell on his back (which would have surely ended with him executing a most awkward back flip/roll to the floor behind him since he's sitting on the edge of the bed).

 

Yohji almost cried out the thought in his head. `That's it! I'm not the one who wants Aya, it's… OH SHIT!'

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

*As I've said in a previous fic, Saturdays are what Aya hate the most because it means all those horrid girls are released from the gates of schools earlier than they are on weekends, prolonging their suffering.

 

** How he checked it, I'll leave it to your prodigious imagination.

 

***Check chapter 10 “Feelings and Half-truths” if you can't remember this one.

 

^That is, painfully for Yohji.

 

^^ Not to suggest that any of the two are the sort of person to do such things… well, they are Assassins.

 

^^^ Full of all the things you'd expect Yohji to have handy beside the bed at night.

 

 

 

 

Whew. Give me at the most, 5 more chapters and this whole thing is over with.