Me: So apparently, I've had this fic laying around for a while, and I just found it again today. Funny how that works, isn't it?
Disclaimer: If I owned wonderful things like GW of Dave Mathews, I wouldn't be a poor fanfiction writer trying to find solace in the handful of reviews I get for a handful of my stories.
Warnings: lime, TWO MC deaths (I apologize to all) 1x2, unrequitted 1+R, song fic
Enjoy!
Nobody Knows
The moon shown brightly on the tiny village as a frigid gale pierced the still night. As the winds echoed and wailed off the tall mountains, a lone, dark figure walked through dirt laid roads toward the village graveyard. The man trudged silently passed the tombstones painted silver by the moon's kiss. Finally he stopped at one grave. Dark cobalt eyes glanced through dark chocolate bangs and read the moonlit inscription:
Duo Maxwell, Age 21
Father: Unknown Mother: Unknown
Rest in Peace
The man knelt beside the grave and placed a single wild flower upon the grave. As he sat beside the grave of the one called Duo Maxwell, the man remembered that night. It had been cold that night too, but that lively boy with the long chestnut locks had kept the lonely man warm. Only Duo had had that power over the man; his smile had always been lively and infectious, the sunlight in a town full of gloom. Duo had never had much in the way of worldly possessions, but he never seemed to let that get to him. He had worked, and he had slaved over earning enough to keep some food before him, and he never complained more than the occasional back pains that came with the seasons.
The man could still hear his friends smooth baritone calling his name, inviting him out, soothing his anger or fears.
Yet, ten years was a long time, and the world had all but forgotten that a boy named Duo Maxwell even lived…
Ten years ago,
On a cold dark night
Someone was killed
Beneath the town hall light
It had been windy that night, ten years ago, and the air had a biting chill through the air. Duo had been over at Heero's and Relena's house sharing in the heat that his own little hut didn't have. They had been talking and drinking some, catching up on all that they had missed of each other. Relena told Duo of her engagement to Heero and Duo offered his congratulations, laughing at Heero's seeming embarrassment.
At some point in the night, the fire grew low, and the wood pile had been all used up. Relena stood up to get more from their neighbors. As soon as the door shut with a quiet click, Duo looked down at his nearly empty glass of hard cider. "You and Relena?" he asked quietly after a moment of uncomfortable silence.
Heero nodded, his hands fiddling with his own glass. He couldn't bring himself to look up at his dearest friend; couldn't bear to see the hurt Heero knew he would see reflected in the braided boy's beautiful purple eyes.
"Why?"
"She asked."
"Do you love her?"
"Not really," Heero admitted quietly.
"Then why?"
Heero raised his eyes to look into the face that he had admitted he had fallen into sin over. He shivered slightly. "Because I…I can't have you," he whispered in admittance to the beautiful youth sitting across from him.
Duo's eyes widened. Heero saw pain and understanding spark behind those ever so expressive eyes, along with some other unnamable emotion.
Suddenly, Duo pushed away from the table. Heero jumped a bit, afraid he had just admitted the wrong thing, when Duo pressed his face close to Heero's and sealed their lips together. For a moment, Heero sat dumbly, not able to believe what was happening right then, before his eyes involuntarily closed and his arms came around the lithe body leaning over his own.
The kiss continued blissfully as Duo straddled Heero's lap to get a better angle. They separated only to breathe, wanting nothing more than to shut the world out forever. Shirts were quickly discarded, hands began to wander, and soon both men were panting, straining towards each other.
Duo gasped as Heero cupped his crotch gently. "Relena—"
"It's a two mile walk from here to town. She won't be back for a while still," Heero murmured, nibbling Duo's collar bone gently, and his hand began to rub over Duo's erection. Duo gasped in pleasure, and arched into Heero's touch, all other coherent thoughts flying out the window.
Heero smirked, "Like that?"
Duo groaned and simply kissed Heero in response, the heat rising in the room as the passion between the two men grew to unbearable proportions.
Both men were close…so very close…the friction between them both was such pleasurable torture and had them both gasping as together they came.
Duo slumped over, resting his head against Heero's shoulder. Heero, in turn, wrapped his arms loosely around his new, forbidden lover, both simply opting to breathe as both came down from their post-orgasmic high.
Finally, Duo sighed. "I should probably go."
Trying not to be disappointed, Heero nodded.
With a quick kiss to Heero's neck, Duo stood up. After he had put his shirt back on, Duo turned and leaned over to kiss Heero once more, his thumbs rubbing small circles over Heero's chest.
Heero felt his passion begin to rise again and whispered, "Keep that up, and you might not make it out the door."
Duo pulled away, revealing a smirk that lit his eyes up in a way that Heero's heart ache with want. "Maybe I don't want to," he whispered back.
Heero stood up quickly and grabbed the braided youth, pulling him through to his bed. The night would be a long one, and Heero welcomed it.
Sometime around midnight, Heero woke with a start as a shot rang out through the small town. Looking over at his lover, Heero noted with some small relief that Duo was asleep. After a quick kiss to Duo's temple, he scrambled to get into his clothes and headed out the door to see what had happened. After a minute to think, he noted with worry that Relena still hadn't come back.
She's fine. She probably went home, that's all…
Heero still felt cold dread well up within him as he rode his horse down the two mile, dirt road that lay between his home and the previously quiet, little town.
Heero found many of the townspeople grouped around a lamppost, all muttering, but otherwise not moving.
"What happened?" he called out. The baker, Mueller, lifted his head and called back, "The lass's been shot dead, she has."
Heero frowned, his dread growing. He dropped off his horse, and pushed through the crowd.
At the centre of the ring of townsfolk lay Relena, her dress stained dark with blood and her expression wide eyed in surprise.
Numbly, Heero kneeled down beside his fiancée's corpse, his own face frozen in shock and a deep, dark dread. A guilt he had never known rushed over him; Relena was dead, while he and Duo had been…had been…!
Heero felt positively sick, and the sickening dread became ten times worse as a smooth baritone asked out in innocence, "What's going on?"
There were few at the scene,
But they all agree
That the slayer who ran
Looked a lot like me…
The townsfolk fell silent again as Duo walked over. Heero gulped, his face paling. He saw Duo's eyes widen in shock as he took in Relena's limp body.
"Wh-who…who killed her?" the braided boy asked.
The town's people glanced at one another, none of them sure, before a high voice rang out. "You did it! I saw it! I saw a guy with braid shoot the girl with a pistol and then run off towards the woods!"
Murmurs began again, and Duo's face paled as whispers of "You know, I think he's right," flitted across the town square.
"He always did seem to envy the girl…"
"He must have done it! It makes complete sense!"
"He came from Yuy's house. Always pinned the kid for a sinner. Kills the girl and then tries to take her fiancée…"
Soon, the people of the town were calling for the braided boy to be locked up and executed. The fact that Duo had never been very popular with the townsfolk while Relena had been greatly loved did not help him at all.
Heero sat holding the body of his fiancée as his newly made lover was dragged none too softly away. He wanted to cry out, he wanted to save the boy he had shared himself with from the rough sheriff and town's people, but his body would not respond to his heart's demands, for he knew what would happen were he to call out and stop them.
Tears rolled silently down his face as he sat unable to move and helpless.
She walks these hills in a long black veil
She visits my grave when the night winds wail
Nobody knows…nobody sees…
Nobody knows, but me…
As Heero kneeled before his best friend's grave, a shadow of the night sat upon the tiny headstone, watching the man before him silently. He knew the man would look up and see him sitting there with him, but he felt the need to sit with the man he had loved once upon a time. Nobody knew of these little trips Heero took out to Duo's grave.
Nobody but Duo Maxwell, himself.
He remembered the night he had been taken away to await trial for a murder he hadn't commited.
The judge said, "Son, what is your alibi?
"If you were somewhere else, then you won't have to die."
"Kid, if you can tell me where you were last night, I don't have to put through the noose."
"What good would it do? You already think I did it."
"If you can prove you didn't—"
Well, I said not a word, though it meant my life,
For I'd been in the arms of my best friend's wife.
"I can't."
Oh, now the scaffold is high; eternity is near
She stood in the crowd and shed not a tear
Duo stood before the wall, blind fold and hand cuffs in place as the sheriff took aim. Heero stood among the crowd, trying to remain visibly calm.
"Any last words, kid?" the sheriff grumbled.
Duo looked up a bit in some small surprise, before smiling quietly, "Yeah. Heero?" he called, "I'm sorry."
Heero's composure nearly broke as Duo's words rang through the square just before the crack of the sheriff's gun followed them.
Sometimes at night, when the cold winds blow
In a long black veil she cries over my bones.
The wind picked up, carrying a chill and ruffling Heero's hair just a bit. He looked up some, just over the top of the headstone. The wind carried the silver clouds away from the moon's face. In her light, Heero's tears were revealed as he grieved for the deaths of the two people dearest to him.
"I'm sorry, Duo," he whispered. "You deserve much more than this." He gestured to his sad little offering. "You always did.
"And I'm sorry again that I'm such a coward. I should have spoken up, said something in your defense, but I let them take you away. I'm so sorry…"
No answer came to the grieving man, no solace could be given to lance his guilt infected heart.
The ghost of a boy with a long braid and expressive violet eyes looked at the man kneeling before his grave, a mixture of sadness and longing coloring his eyes. He brought his hand forward as though to brush away the tears that spilled down the man's cheeks.
Oh, She walks these hills in a long black veil
She visits my grave when the night winds wail
Nobody knows…nobody sees…
Nobody knows, but me…
"I never blamed you, Heero…" Duo wanted to tell his lover. "I knew what they would do if they knew…"
His reassurances would fall on deaf ears, just as they always did. He and Heero were from separate worlds now, and couldn't be together even if they wanted to.
Ghostly tears stained Duo's cheeks as he and his unknowing lover sat together in the silver light of the moon and the wailing wind.
Nobody knows…nobody sees…
Nobody knows, but me…
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