Weiss Kreuz Fan Fiction ❯ Eternal or fleeting embraces leave the same marks ❯ Numbers ( Chapter 2 )

[ X - Adult: No readers under 18. Contains Graphic Adult Themes/Extreme violence. ]

Warnings- another strange one

"Pairings"- still Schu and Crawford

Author's Notes- Another actual conversation. It started out as a past conversation, but I mixed another conversation I had today with it. Hm, interesting, ne? Oh, and this was written at school, not this morning. Aren't you all proud of me? ^.^

Thank yous- I want to thank.. no one this time. *sniffle* No one helped me out with this one, except who I argued with of course. Thanks "Sheba". *cough cough*

Ch.2

"There is noting so taxing as our own insecurities and the insecurities another throws upon us." Anon.

There simply wasn't enough time to get everything he needed done, done. With that thought in mind, Crawford recommenced his calculations, letting the numbers of his records soothe him with their dignified order. There wasn't any room for mistakes in accounting. To him this was one of the allures of numbers. You couldn't allow yourself to make a mistake, and the restraint one had to apply to themselves to concentrate was appealing to him. The natural order was soothing, a balm to his constantly frazzled nerves. There were times when he would ask himself where he had acquired all of this tension from, and the answer was usually the same; Schuldig.
Making a face at the very thought of the redhead, Crawford leaned back in his chair and removed his glasses to rub his eyes. He hated, honestly hated, the tension that was constantly between them. Schuldig, on the other hand, seemed to thrive off of it. How he did this Crawford would never know. But he did, and while Crawford suffered, locking himself in his study more and staying up later to actually get some work done, Schuldig reveled in the energy and seemed to soak up more and more of the energy Crawford lost.
A smile stretched the corner of his mouth slightly when Crawford thought about the comparison of Schuldig and a leech. They seemed alike. The one sucking blood, therefore energy and life, from its victim, the other sucking energy, tolerance and happiness from his. It seemed like a logical comparison in the mood he was in.
The numbers weren't helping as much as they should have, or usually did. Going over the accounts wasn't soothing him, it was just postponing the inevitable, seeing Schuldig. The day was going well, sluggish but well, and he really didn't want to have to face the sly redhead. But at the same time, he wanted to see him, wanted to feel the attraction and the rush of infatuation Schuldig had for him. It was pleasing to be desired, event though he hated it.
"Whoever said it wasn't possible to love something and hate it at the same time was lying," Crawford whispered as he stretched in his chair, his pen falling to the desk beside the calculator.
The knock he saw coming was expected, deep in his mind he knew the knock was going to come and was dreading, and loving, it. Prescience wasn't always as useful as it should be. When you already expected something to happen, the vision wasn't very enlightening. Once again he counted down the seconds until the knock.
Five - four - three - two - one....
Just as he had foreseen and expected, the knock came to disturb him and his work. For a split second he considered not answering it, just pretending he had fallen asleep or was too infatuated with his work to hear. He knew how useless that would be, but how easy it would have been.
"Come in, Schuldig." He replaced his glasses before the door swung open.
"Bradykins, you look.. nice." the voice he hated and loved so much purred from the dark of the doorway.
"As do you," Crawford said out of as politeness that had been imprinted upon him since his younger years.
"I know. Thank you, though. It sounds so much nicer coming from you." The arrogance was shining through again, something that annoyed Crawford to no end.
Opting for silence, Crawford picked his pen back up and punched a few numbers into his calculator. He was trying to check on the debt/profit ratio, and had been spending quite a lot of time on the funds. Schuldig didn't appreciate not having the full attention of the American, and made himself known.
"Why don't you talk to me for awhile, Bradley? Put the pen down and come with me, we could got outside. It's a lovely day and I know how you like to take walks." While Schuldig was talking he was moving closer to the desk where Crawford sat, once again alluring in the way a snake was; you know it will bite you, still you can't help but look at it.
"Some smile who bite." The quote popped out of nowhere in Crawford's mind. He almost smiled for a moment, but looked back to his papers instead.
"You work too hard Brad. Take a break, come on. You know you want to," the sly redhead said as he drew closer, coming around behind the chair Crawford sat in.
His frustration level was rising quickly, and Crawford was unsure as to how he was going to react when pushed too far. He disliked not knowing what he was going to do, it meant he was out of control. He wanted to work, he needed to work. What he really needed was the numbers to soothe him, like they usually did. He needed them to be there for him, but they weren't. He was alone even though there was another person in the room. The thought saddened him terribly. He felt two hands rest possessively around his shoulders, and was immediately irritated. He had to work, the figures wouldn't complete themselves.
"Come on, Brad. Take a break. I can give you a massage, and from the tension I am feeling you need it. Come relax with me."
There would be no relaxing around him, this Crawford knew as a cement truth. He would not relax around Schuldig, he could not. The reason he was so tense was because of the redhead, so how could he relax around him?
"I need to finish. These numbers won't complete themselves," Crawford whispered, despising the hands on his shoulders and the voice in his ear.
The hands slipped further down to rest across his chest, earning a flinch from him, and he felt Schuldig's chest press against the back and top of his chair. "You work too hard. It's bad for you to work so hard. You'll give yourself an early grave."
There was a fine line between caring and being obnoxious, and the German had crossed it a long time ago. Grinding his teeth together, Crawford once again opted for silence. If he said something, it couldn't be taken back later. He bit the inside of his lip and prayed for some control over his situation, any control would do.
"Brad..." the nasal voice whined in his ear, breath hot and tempting despite the annoying presence.
One breath, two breaths, three breaths, four breaths and he was in control again. Crawford sighed and dropped his pen, the metal crashing against the calculator, loud in the still air of his study. The press of Schuldig's arms relaxed slightly in surprise. He hadn't expected his chosen infatuation to drop the pen so quickly. Usually he really had to press hard to get the stubborn American to take a break and do things like eat or sleep. With great satisfaction, he felt Brad lean backwards into the chair. He tightened his embrace around the dark haired bishounen, not noticing the rise in tension in the man he was holding.
Damn how Crawford hated this. He hated the satisfaction he got from being held, despite who was holding him, and he especially hated the content feeling that mixed seductively with his anxious energy. He wanted this, but he knew he couldn't have it. There was nothing to be gained from this except disaster. Disaster, however alluring, was exactly what he was trying to avoid. If he was shaken from his pillar as the leader of the group, the results would be unpredictably disastrous. The friendship, however tentative in the beginning, he had built with the redhead was not supposed to go this way. It was supposed to stay friendship and only friendship, nothing else.
The arms across his chest slid upward and hands began an untrained, slow circular rubbing motion. It was halfway pleasurable, had the motions not been clumsy and untrained. Crawford bit back a growling sigh, letting the unhappy noise out in a simple little whoosh of air from his lungs, a bubble of nothingness. Schuldig took this as a pleasured sound and continued, whispering to Crawford the whole time.
"See, you need to take a break and relax. Just relax for a moment and breathe. You work too hard, all of the time. If you don't stop doing that you'll have a heart attack from the stress. Your shoulders are tight, very tight. See what happens? You'll feel better when you come out with me today. How about a walk? We can go to the park and walk for a little while, relax and talk about us. We do have some things to talk about, ne? Hn, I think so."
Crawford was waiting for the redhead to stop long enough to breath, but his words were a never-ending stream from his mouth in an evenly paced tempo. How Schuldig could talk, and talk, and talk was beyond him, but the German seemed to be able to do it just fine, not even pausing for a breath. Crawford supposed it was better than the brooding silence, where he had to guess what the German was thinking and try to work around it.
"Schu... please. I have work to do, a great amount of it. I need to get this done, and as much as I appreciate your attempts at helping me, I need to do this now. I don't have time to relax right now. Maybe later," Crawford sighed when he could handle no more of the torment.
"Later? You always say later, and then you do things like forget to eat or sleep."
"I don't forget to sleep, I just don't sleep. Why sleep when I could be doing something productive with my time? Look, as much as I appreciate this," Crawford said carefully as he gently removed the hands from his shoulders. " I really, really need to get this done."
Schuldig stepped out from behind his chair and slid to stand in front of him, leaning against the desk. He pouted and looked at Crawford pleadingly. "Come on Bradley, lets go for a walk."
"Schu.." Crawford said softly, removing his glasses and rubbing his eyes, trying to remove the stress from them unsuccessfully. "Please...."
"Why are you always brushing me away, Brad? I want you to be happy, but you keep pushing me away. How can I help if you don't let me?" The pout was gone, replaced by an intense look that Crawford refused to meet. It was even worse than the brooding, moody stare
"I'm not, Schu. I need to do some work is all. Can you understand that? I just need to work," his reply was soft, too soft to hold any real meaning or authority.
Schuldig pounced upon the answer, misunderstanding what Crawford was trying to impress upon him. "Your work is more important than me? Or do you just not want me around?"
The anger that had been festering was boiling over, and Crawford felt the uncontrollable response he had been trying to tamp down come closer to the surface, like a serpent slowly lifting its head from murky water. "Schuldig, please. I can't deal with this right now. This is work I have to do. It has to be done before tomorrow. You said you didn't like it when I stay up all night, then let me get this done, okay?" Crawford gestured to the papers that were hidden from view by Schuldig's body.
The look on Schuldig's face could have corroded metal. "Someone's grouchy today. Is this really so important that you have to brush me off?"
That was it, Crawford couldn't tolerate anymore. The serpent reared out of the water, teeth bared and ready to rip into its tormentor. He stood from his chair, looking eye to eye with the man who tormented him to no end. "Dammit, Schuldig. This is important! I need to get this done. I can't handle you right now."
"Handle me? You have to handle me?"
Giving up and letting the frustration poison him, Crawford slumped back into his chair, laying a hand over his eyes to try and shut the world out. It didn't work, he could still hear the German.
"Why are you acting like this?"
With a defeated sigh, Crawford mumbled, "Like what?"
"Like this. You aren't even listening to me, are you?"
God how Crawford hated this. He should never have gone out with the possessive redhead in the first place. He couldn't breathe, he didn't have any room to breathe. He didn't have any room to do anything, even the work he needed to get done. There was so much he needed to do, but he could never finish it because Schuldig was always popping up and demanding attention from him, all the attention. It wouldn't have been so bad if it didn't happen every day, over and over again.
"You aren't listening to me are you? I'm important too, Brad. Why are these numbers more important to you than I am?" Schuldig's voice shook with anger and he looked poison darts at Crawford.
"The numbers have to be done, Schuldig. And they have to be done now, not later. I'm not trying to avoid you or downplay your importance to the group, but I have to get this done!"
"Downplay my importance to the group? What about my importance to you? I don't care what the group thinks, I care what you think."
The look Crawford directed at his calculations could have melted a ten thousand year old glacier. He was unhappy, so unhappy. Schuldig should have been able to see that, but he only saw what he wanted. That did nothing to help Crawford. He was still stuck with the crap he had gotten himself into, and there was nothing he could do, no end he could see.
"You know where you stand with me Schuldig."
"Do I? I don't sense any consistency in what you say."
Choosing to ignore what the redhead had said, Crawford once again tried to reassert his dominance, something they both struggled to have. "The work needs to be done Schuldig. I have to do it. Let me get back to work."
They stared at each other, their eyes, slate blue and jade green, fighting for control over the other. The colors feuded with each other, the sea against the sky. Crawford was the first to look away, his blue eyes watering with a layer of unshed tears. He made sure Schuldig didn't see them. God knows he would thrive off of that, as he did everything else.
"Fine. I'll let you get back to work, since work is so much more important than I am," Schuldig growled loosely. His eyes flashed with angry fire when the cool, and secretly tortured, blue gaze met his.
"Work isn't more important than you. I just have to finish this. Can't you understand?" Crawford said desperately, trying to make sure Schuldig was not in pain because of him.
"Sure, whatever Brad. I understand. I'll see you later then."
Schuldig slid away from the desk and towards the door, yearning for Brad to call him back, and dreading that he wouldn't.
The words to call the German back and soothe him caught low in Crawford's throat, and he let that which tortured him leave the room, the door slamming behind him. The echo was powerful, making the sound-sensitive Crawford flinch again. While only two people on the earth could make him violently angry, there was one that could frustrate him beyond any boundaries.
Running his hands through his already disheveled hair, Crawford mentally cursed himself and the lot he had earned. If he had only said no in the beginning there never would have been a problem. But no, he had said yes, had been pressured into saying yes. No matter how Schuldig had pressured him, or to what extent, it was really his own fault, and he knew it, deep down he knew it.
The muted light slid across his face, casting the lower half in shadow and illuminating the rest. His eyes sparkled brightly, a fine sheen of tears covering the blue orbs. The color vied for attention against the midnight of his hair and the calm color of his skin. He wanted nothing more than to curl into a ball and sleep, but the numbers stared back at him from his papers, and he knew what had to be done. Picking up his pen once again, Crawford punched in a few numbers, looking from paper to calculator and calculator to print-out. There was a lot to be done, and he had been postponed enough. As usual, sleep would have to wait.


"Whoever has loved knows all that life contains of sorrow and of joy."