She counted the cracks in his wall, and promptly stopped at fifty-seven due to lack of interest.
After this brief and lengthy moment in time, Rouge found that she no longer had anything left to distract her. Her head craned back to him, who was promptly counting the crevices in his ceiling; arguably more tedious.
"Vector."
He answered with a blink at the crevices. More of a shudder, but a blink made her feel better.
"Hey, um..." she sat up, peering down at her suit, "I should-"
"Wait."
She shielded her chest like she had something to hide from him at this point. Like she was a firefighter with hose at the ready in the middle of a crematorium.
He fiddled with his chain, (a nervous tick, she quickly noted,) as he spoke.
"I, uh..." he mused, "I hope ya don't feel...ya know."
"I don't, actually."
"Weird. Ya know." he chuckled softly, as he was far more gentle than she could dream of a person being. "'Bout this."
She had nothing to say.
This was, in fact, supposed to happen. Casual texting, like any young and innocent affair starts. Compliments ping-ponged across the few miles between the shabby apartment and the detective agency that so happened to be vacant for the night. You're pretty, he said. You're not too shabby yourself big boy, she replied. Banter.
And like any two trains on the same track, they collided. Messy, sure, but the collision was accomplished.
I've never been on a train, he said.
"I...haha," her eyes flicked around the room. Scattered vinyl records in one corner, a picture of the rest of the sordid crew on the side table. She was in the back left corner, second from Cream. "No. Not at all."
He was a detective. A good one.
He traced one of the scratches on his chest, a trace of chipped, pink nail polish running part-way with it. He chuckled again.
"Don't lie to a detective."
Her fists tensed up, wings flexing and spine coiling down to her stomach.
"Look, you're a nice guy." Rouge started, scraping her thumb against her nail polish on her index finger. Hadn't she rehearsed this in front of a mirror before? "I just...I don't know."
"Ya feel bad, don'tcha?"
"Of course. I feel terrible."
"Why?"
Rouge felt her face melting.
"This was your first time doing this, wasn't it?"
"Yeah." he added, like it was necessary, "Yeah."
"I..." she muttered, "I just feel like this was..."
"A mistake?"
"You're a great detective, you know."
He grinned, scratching the back of his scalp. Biting the bottom lip, he turned away from her.
"I mean, we never really talked much before that one night when we were just...you know. Texting randomly. You asked me if I knew of any good Thai in Westopolis."
"And it spiraled."
"Yeah." Rouge shook her head, mustering, "I just felt that...I ruined something."
He turned back to her and couldn't look away.
"Ruined what, exactly?"
"...You know."
"I don't."
"Your...your thoughts on what this is supposed to be."
The room got cold. Faulty air-conditioning, he said.
"Like, of romance?"
She nodded, the air from the vent right next to his bed swiftly crawling up her matted hair.
He shrugged.
"I mean, I asked girls out before. Got rejected most of the time. Pined after a lady older than me that I knew I could never have." he added, "So yeah. I never had...the product."
They had talked about this the night before. Girlfriends never seemed to be in Vector's cards. Had his first kiss during the high school play when he was forced to do it on-stage, and didn't know a peck on the lips for roughly two seconds wasn't the boundary. There's an entire world beyond that, honey. I'm surprised a man like you has yet to see it.
"And what did you think falling for someone would be like?" Rouge felt her lip gloss vanish, as Vector tasted apple pie.
"I mean, I dunno. The movies, I guess." Vector giggled. "Like a shitty rom-com."
"You aren't far off." she added.
"But like...I dunno. They usually don't show this in rom-coms."
"The sex?"
"The talking."
The talking stopped for a moment to let the vent wheeze like it always seemed to do.
"I dunno, I..." he shook his head, yellow eyes squinting into her blue, dying ones. "I like to talk to ya, Rouge. You...you're interesting."
"I'm sorry."
"For what?"
"For decieving you. There's nothing interesting that you would want to know about me." she flung herself off of his bed, sweeping her suit off of the floor. "I should really get-"
"When did it stop feeling fine to you?"
She paused, his voice playfully dancing around her shoulders and slithering around her throat.
"I've made my own fair share of mistakes."
"When was the first?"
Her eyes melted.
"A boy. Just like you. Not a man," she clarified, "A boy. He was a really nice and gentle guy that I had class with at the academy. Sat in the far left corner of the room with me. We'd pass notes, the cheesy bullshit you've heard about a thousand times. He liked records. I liked my MP3 player. We both loved Thai."
"His name?"
"Gordon."
"Marcus?"
"Right. He hated his dad, but loved his brothers to pieces. Would do anything for them. It was just the four of them in that house, where the youngest was tossed around by the dad like he was just a ball. As Tyler would talk about the cigar burns on his arms he would hold my hand like it would have changed anything."
He reached out for her hand and clung to it. Tears fell.
"I thought it did back then. I was fucking vain enough to think that I was the best thing in Robert's life."
"You probably were." he softly stated.
"But I wasn't. I was the worst thing to ever happen to Richard. We ended up talking more and I saw this one show where the guy cried about something and his best platonic female friend smacked her lips against his. Suddenly, the tears were gone. The clothes were off. Everyone was fine. So one night, Derek cried, and I tried it. Guess what happened."
"What happened?"
"I felt nothing."
"And they felt everything."
She shook her quivering head at the correct answer.
"I hate doing things like this, you know."
"So stop."
"I-"
"Make yourself happy for a change. Ya owe that to Rouge."
"I can't feel anything. My heart's a brick."
"I felt it, though."
"It's a brick."
"It's something.
He placed his hands on her shoulders, tracing his thumbs across her collarbones. The whisper danced.
"Tell me things ya love."
She paused for a moment. The wheezing.
"Having things to myself."
"Like?"
"Jewels. Criminals." she muttered, "Stability."
He laughed. Your laugh gets me every time, she said.
"Nothing about us was ever stable."
Rouge reached towards Vector's chest, feeling the brick and tracing the scratches.
They fell back into each other, words shooting across the table. Life is interesting, he said. You're right, she said.
I'm unstable.
I'm a mess.
I want to be happy.
I want to leave this damn house.
I'm confused.
I'm so tired.
But.
But?
I'm glad we talked.
They ordered Thai.
"...Me too, Vector."
Garlic and guilt lurched from her throat the next morning.