Weiss Kreuz Fan Fiction ❯ Playing the Part ❯ Part Ten ( Chapter 10 )

~*~Part Ten~*~

The phone rang again.

Schuldich roughly shoved him forward. "Answer it, it's Brad!"

"No I don't want to," Ken cried, stumbling. "He'll eat me!"

"Oh for the love of...would you quit being such a shithead?"

"No, it's a natural quality!"

Schuldich rolled his eyes. He yanked up the phone and thrust it at Ken.

~Make him jealous goddammit otherwise I swear I'll have a chat with that Ran guy!~

Ken gave the German the dirtiest glare he could muster and yanked away the phone. "Hello?"

There was a silence.

Ken's stomach quaked. With great force he managed to repeat himself.

"Where the hell is Schuldich?"

There it was again, that cold, clipped, American accent. It gave Ken the creeps. "Erm..." He was mindful of Schuldich 'don't-mess-this-up' gaze and racked his brain for some appropriate excuse. "He's still sleeping," Ken said finally, after an embarrassingly lengthy pause. "He...uh kinda had a late night."

There was another silence, this one even more foreboding than the last. "And you were with him last night, I assume?"

The phrase 'don't assume because it makes an ASS out of U and ME' flit through Ken's mind as it always did when he heard the word but he figured that it wouldn't be wise to impart his insight to the likes of Brad Crawford. "Well yeah, we hung out for a bit. We're really close like that."

"Are you now?" The American's voice dropped a notch and Ken could find no words to describe it other than 'deadly'.

"L-look, can I take a message or something?"

"No, I think not." And with those curt words, he hung up.

"Shits above!" Ken shoved the cordless at Schuldich. "I am never, never, never doing that again, not for anything! I don't care if we have a deal or not because that guy is crazy! I swear he's gonna kill me and you don't even-"

"Stop worrying," Schuldich interrupted. "I'm gonna call him back in a bit."

"What?"

"This is exactly the perfect time," the redhead went on. "My dear Bradley's all jealous and moody."

Ken rolled his eyes. He didn't get why someone as nice and down-to-earth as Schuldich was so busy mooning after a jackass like Crawford. The guy sounded like a jerk of the first water!

"I'd rather you didn't insult my boyfriend," Schuldich spoke up. "So you want something to eat? To drink?"

"No," Ken grumbled. He sat down on the sofa and folded his arms across his chest. "I think now would be a good time to go over exactly what you want me to do."

The German sat down beside him. "Meaning?"

"Well you know!" Ken huffed. "You love Brad and all that but so far you've kissed me twice. Isn't that like cheating or something? Am I supposed to be all physical with you? I'm not really all that comfortable with public displays of affection. And besides, if your dear Brad ever did see us, you know, getting it on for fake, he'd kick my ass all the way to Malaysia!"

"Yeah he would," Schuldich sighed. "He's so cute like that."

Ken's eyes bugged. "Are you shitting me?!"

Schuldich laughed. "I'm just teasing you! Look Ken, I like you. You're a great guy. Whatever you don't wanna do, you don't have to. All I want is for you to hang around and play it by ear. Is that cool?"

"You're not so bad yourself," Ken said grudgingly. "I'll stick around and do what you want. Just promise me that you won't let your rabid boyfriend murder me."

"Hey I don't like to make promises that I can't keep."

Ken scowled. He went to belt the redhead a good one but Schuldich was off the couch in a flash.

"You can't hit a telepath," Schuldich said smirking.

~You're a shitty assgoblin!~

Schuldich shook his head as he sat down across from him. "You've really developed a potty-mouth, you know that?"

~Fuck you!~

One orange brow arched. "Got any condoms?"

Ken snorted but couldn't help from grinning. "You keep dreaming."

"Oh I will," Schuldich purred, leering at him. "At least then you'll be putting that big mouth of yours to better uses."

Ken was outraged, even as he reddened. "I don't have a big mouth! If anything you're the one with a yap the size of the Yellow River! No wonder your stupid boyfriend wants to break up with you!"

"Brad doesn't wanna break up with me."

"Yeah he does."

"What do you know? No he doesn't!"

"I know lots and yes he does!"

"You don't know anything and no he doesn't!"

"I know more than you! And oh yeah he does!"

There was laughter as Nagi walked into the living room. "Having another intellectual conversation are we? No wonder you guys get along so well, you both have the same IQ. Negative one point low."

"I happen to have a very high IQ," Schuldich bragged.

"Don't talk fiction," Ken contradicted. "You're not fooling anyone."

Nagi snickered as he dumped his schoolbag onto the floor. "Your boyfriend knows the real you, Schu."

Schuldich looked at Nagi's schoolbag and then back at the boy. "What the hell're you doing home so early? What happened to all your afternoon classes?"

"I decided to give myself a break," Nagi replied breezily. "Why do I have to keep learning useless information? I'm happy with myself just the way I am."

"You skipped class again?" Schuldich groaned loudly. "You stupid bastard! You know how much Bard hates when you do that."

"Bard?" Ken tried hard not to laugh. "You call the guy Bard? Bard as in a travelling minstrel?"

"Yeah and he hates it," Nagi piped up. "Well I think I'm gonna go play some PS2 so I'll be-"

"Video games!" Ken jumped to his feet. "Can I play with you?"

"No fucking video games!" Schuldich thundered. "You do your homework right now! If you get shitty marks then Bard'll cut off my friggin' balls!"

"Quit worrying mom, I'll do it later. Yeah, you can play Ken. You ever play Smackdown?"

"Hell yeah." He waved amicably to Schuldich as he followed Nagi from the room. "See ya later honey bunches!"

Schuldich rolled his eyes. Nagi and Ken, two dumbos in a pod. Both of them were like stupid little kids, all enthralled over video games like that. He shook his head and had to smile. Ken was awfully endearing though.

He got himself a drink before hunting down one of Farfarello's sketch books. On the inside cover, he'd jotted down the phone number of Brad's hotel in Halifax, Canada. Now that he was alone, he could finally make the long, overdue phone call to his stupid boyfriend.

Schuldich went his bedroom, sat down on his bed and dialled. After the hotel clerk connected him to Rm. 1108, the phone rang three times before Brad answered.

His no-nonsense, cool voice was even sexier then Schuldich remembered. A great weakness came over him and he realized then how much he'd missed the American man. "Hey," he said softly, leaning against the headboard. "It's me."

"Schuldich." Brad's voice also softened, for just a fleeting moment before sharpening again. "Where the hell have you been? You know I don't like to be kept waiting."

Schuldich rolled his eyes at Brad's lofty arrogance. The spell between them was broken. It was now time for him to put his plan into action. "Why? Is something wrong?"

"Of course nothing's wrong," Brad bit out impatiently. "I want to know why you're avoiding me."

"Avoiding you?" Schuldich laughed and knew that it must have annoyed Brad beyond bearing. He desperately wished he could read minds across long distances. Brad's mind must have been swimming. "Why would I avoid you? I swear you need to relax more or de-stress yourself. Before you left didn't you say that you had a whole shitload of work to do and didn't want to be disturbed? Remember that? I thought this business trip was super important."

"Since when have you decided to concern yourself about my work?" Brad demanded curtly.

That stung. In his mind's eye, images flashed like neon lights. All the meetings he'd attended with and for Brad, the piles of paperwork and research he'd done, the business lunches and pretentious parties he'd attended, the countless number of minds he'd scanned...he hadn't done any of that for himself. He didn't care about investing and clients and all that financial shit. He only cared about Bradley Crawford!

And suddenly the truth, that which had always stood before him, became glass-clear.

Could it be that whether he slaved over business ventures eternally or met with dozen different partners a week, none of it would matter? That everything he did was in vain because he was just a possession to one who couldn't bear to ever lose?

"And since when do you actually inquire after me?" Schuldich knew he sounded bitter but he couldn't help himself.

Brad chose to ignore that. "Who's this Ken person? What's he doing in my apartment?"

"Why are-" And then Schuldich stopped. He could hear a soft, accented voice talking to Brad, telling him that their table was waiting. The time difference between Tokyo and Halifax was twelve hours, making it exactly one o'clock in the morning in Nova Scotia. One o'clock and Brad was with a lady that sounded uncannily like Emilia, all the while questioning him about being with someone...

"You're with Emilia," he remarked as evenly as he could.

"She's also here on business," Brad ground out in a low, irritated voice. "If you're going to start acting like-"

"Give her my regards," he interrupted and hung up. He disconnected the phone and contemplated hurling the whole device across the room but when was the last time throwing stuff had ever helped anyone? Maybe if Brad was right in front of him...

Schuldich let his head fall back against the wall with an audible thump. It hurt. "Fuck," he hissed, staring up at the ceiling.

Even from across the world, Crawford had a hold on him.

~*~*~*~*~

Ken was surprised to find that he actually liked Nagi. The kid was sharp, witty and sarcastic. Strangely enough, he made Ken feel at ease, as they bonded over beating the blood out of each other playing WWE Smackdown III. Nagi talked about both Crawford and Schuldich and Ken found his opinion of Crawford sinking to new depths. There was no getting around the fact that the guy was a complete jackass. Schuldich, on the other hand, was pretty much as he appeared but even Nagi didn't know a whole lot about the German, only that he'd inherited a whole estate here in Tokyo from an estranged great Uncle.

Their conversation and PS2 playing came to an end when Nagi received a call on his cell from his Biology partner. Apparently their term project had been stepped on by a plumber and then eaten by the partner's dog.

Ken had to laugh at the look of acute agony on the boy's face.

"Why'd you let Yanagimachi near the damn thing!" Nagi shrieked. He caught sight of Ken sniggering and threw the Parasite Eve game cover at him.

Ken took the hint and left Nagi's room. He looked around through the common rooms for Schuldich but couldn't find him anywhere. He headed back into the vast hallway that led to the bedrooms. He could hear Nagi agreeing to come over and help salvage the remains of the project. Ken turned right and saw that the door to Schuldich's bedroom was ajar. He shuffled to the end of the corridor before sticking his head into the room.

Schuldich was standing before the enormous picture window that dominated most of the right wall, looking out at the city.

"Hey," Ken said, venturing a few steps into the room vast bedroom. "You mind if I come in? Nagi's gotta leave. Something about a ruined Bio project."

The redhead didn't turn around. "You're free to go."

"What?"

"You're free to go," Schuldich repeated and his tone was flat. "The deal's off. This whole idea was stupid. You were right, Nagi was right. I don't know what I was thinking. I'll pay you what I promised but everything else is done."

Ken stared at the German. Done? How could their charade be done? They had barely even started! A huge and entirely unexpected wave of disappointment washed over him. "You can't stop now," he blurted out. "Brad's already jealous!"

"That's not enough. Isn't that what you told me?"

"Since when do I know anything?" Ken couldn't believe what he was hearing. Schuldich had always been so confident! "Jealousy's a start. That's what you said, right? Besides, you love him! You can't just give up. That's stupid!"

Schuldich turned around and his jade-colored eyes bore into Ken. "Why are so are adamant all of a sudden? You never wanted to do this. You knew it was pointless from the beginning."

Ken crossed the room and came to stand beside Schuldich. If the truth be known, he didn't know why exactly he was so adamant, only that he didn't like seeing Schuldich like this. He was the hopeless, clueless one, not Schuldich. "I like you," Ken replied honestly. "You've given me a lot of good advice and we've become friends haven't we?"

Schuldich didn't say anything for a while. Then, rather abruptly, he asked, "Do you know what a catharsis is?"

"You mean like a cathartic release or something?"

"Exactly." Schuldich touched his finger to the windowpane and make squiggles upon the glass. "That's what I had when I spoke to Brad a little while ago." He glanced at Ken. "When your relationship to that Ran guy got to be too much to handle, you quit. You knew you were just wasting your time. Sometimes you have to know whether there's something left to hold onto or if what you're clinging to is withered."

"And sometimes what looks like it's withered really isn't." Ken shuffled uncomfortably. He wasn't good at this sort of thing. "I never, ever expected Ran to tell me what he did yesterday."

"I highly doubt that Brad is going to suddenly confess his undying love to me," Schuldich muttered disgustedly. "Either now or in a few years down the road."

"I don't get it. You were so optimistic and convinced before. What did Brad say to you to make you change your mind? You can't just go from one side to the other for no apparent reason."

"I'd rather not talk about it."

"But if you told me then maybe I could help," Ken persisted. "It's the least I could do."

There was another silence before the German suddenly spoke up. "He was with that Italian model Emilia."

Ken's eyes widened. "With with?"

"Does it make a difference?" Schuldich spat acrimoniously. "He was giving me the third degree about you while she was there the whole time!"

"You deserve better than him," Ken said firmly. "He's a jerk. Just like Yohji."

"I thought I could deal with him," the redhead murmured. "I thought I could make him love me."

"You can't really make someone love you," Ken ventured hesitantly. "You do know that, don't you?"

"Well yeah but I just wanted him to..." Schuldich trailed off and sighed. "What does it matter? I need to get outta here."

"Out? You're not leaving Brad are you?"

"I'm not that smart," he muttered wryly. "Most likely I'll angst and complain for a few hours and the I'll be back here tomorrow, ready to start again. I'm such a fucking idiot."

"Join the club," Ken grumbled and he also sighed. "Remember what you told me that day? The nicest guys always fall for the biggest jerks. I guess that applies for the both of us, huh?"

Schuldich turned away. "I need to be alone."

"But..." Ken was torn. He didn't want to leave Schuldich alone, not after everything the older man had done for him but at the same time he probably did need to be alone, just for a little while at least. "We'll still see each other right?"

"I don't know if still need you."

Ken swallowed, struggling to press down the hurt that swelled at Schuldich's casual words. He hoped Schuldich was too preoccupied to read into his mind. "Okay," he said in a surprisingly even tone of voice. His eyes stung. "I won't bother you."

Just another person who doesn't need me.

Ken walked out of the room, closing the door behind him.