Author notes: Not much. First serious Weiss ficcie, so please R & R! I will love you forever! ^_^ All you hentai's out there, you're gonna have to wait, 'cuz in this one, things are gonna go slowly. Like a normal relationship. As much as one of those can happen between an ice prince and a supposedly straight playboy who turn out to be. um. not so straight. Ehehehe. Anyways, read and review please! I bask in comments. Tell me if there are any inconsistencies at mailto:rosevickery@msn.com. I love you guys!

Warnings: a bit of shounen-ai, lemon, weird humour, some OOC.

Pairings: Aya X Youji, Youji X Aya. P'raps Ken X Omi, later.



Aya, on the other hand, was seriously in doubt of the goodness of French doors. They fought him as though alive, and it was a semi-exhausted Aya-kun that made his way to the kitchen. Head down, the redhead grabbed a towel from the clothes-drying rack and started to towel his hair dry. It had gotten pretty wet from that blast of snowy wind, and Aya was in no mood to be damp. He finished up the business with the hair, and dropped the now- soggy towel on a nearby chair. He still hadn't lifted his eyes farther from the ground than the leg of the table. Finally, getting disgusted at his hair's behavior, Aya glanced up at the clock. and down to the table. and a look of shock came over his face.

// A bundle of flowers? // thought Aya puzzledly. // Wonder what kind they are. //

Aya leaned over and picked up the bouquet. Before, when its contents were turned away from him, Aya had been in shock, but when he took one look at all his favorite flowers, most prominently among them roses and the image flowers of his friends, he was speechless. No one had ever given him a gift so perfectly suited to him in every way. It was as if he had unknowingly spilled his deepest, most dear feelings to someone and now he couldn't remember who or where or even when he had done such a thing.

The surprised look on his face never diminished, but also sharing the space was a look of thankfulness, to whatever and whoever had allowed him to have this very thoughtful gift.

Then he sniffed the flowers, at first almost tentatively, then with more pleasure as he realized that along with the delicious scents of orchids and roses mixing together, there was another scent, like. snow. The whole bouquet seemed permeated with the delicate, sharp scent of fresh snow, and it provoked memories of him and Aya-chan, laughing in the snow, or skiing down a floodlit trail at night, having snowball fights. and then he smelled something else. It was a half-forgotten scent, as though it was familiar, enticing, as though he was surrounded by this scent every day but was so used to it now that he half-ignored it. What was that scent? It plagued him as he sat there, holding the bouquet to his face and unconsciously sniffing deeper, as though he wanted more of that smoky perfume in his lungs. He rubbed his wet hair a little, as though that would bring back those memories that before now had been right there, whenever he wanted. suddenly he realized he couldn't remember leaving his door unlocked. Aya stood, and, holding the bunch of flowers in his hand, went to check on the door. It wasn't locked. Aya frowned prettily and opened the door to look out into the hall. He saw only three wet footprints heading away from his door, but there were no more after that, much to Aya's consternation. Who had been in his room? HE knew it had to be one of the other members of Weiß, no one else but Manx and Birman had access to the upper part of the apartment building unless brought in by one of the residents. Odd, that. Aya bent his head again to sniff at the flowers, not caring that any one of his fellow assassins could see him standing there, much more vulnerable than usual.



It was light, too light, on the back of Ken's eyelids. He groaned, half- asleep, and threw a sleep-heavy arm over his eyes, trying futilely to block the streams of sunlight that somehow pushed their way into his room. He had a terrible headache, and it wasn't just because of the sudden morning; Ken knew he had had much too much to drink last night, but who was to know that Birman had Youji had spiked the cider when no one was looking. Or maybe he had only spiked Ken's mug, and everyone else knew all about it. Ken grunted and made an attempt to open his eyes and sit up. The sitting-up part was accomplished with a minimum of pain and swirling sensations, but when the soccer player tried to pry his hurting eyes open, he yelled in pain and settled for cracking them open. Peering through slits of eyes, Ken made his way to the bathroom and splashed freezing water on his face and upper body. He stumbled rapidly out of the bathroom and over to the closet. What to wear? Ken shrugged his muscular shoulders and grabbed the first shirt and pants that sort of looked like they matched and didn't hurt his head with their colors. Struggling into his clothing, Ken hopped awkwardly over to the door into the hall and opened it, making sure first that no one was outside lurking for him, as Omi was apt to do in the mornings. Ken yawned hugely and began to pick his way down the hall, avoiding the various arrangements that someone had carelessly thrown up here in an effort to clean up for the party. He somehow made it down the stairs without being killed and ran straight into Aya, standing at the very bottom of the short staircase, sniffing flowers and looking sort of lost. Ken yelled in surprise for the second time that morning.

"Kuso, Aya! What the hell are you doing at the bottom of the stairs?! I nearly fell on top of you!" Ken was cursing and hopping up and down on one foot, also for the second time this morning, but for different reasons than the first time he had done it.

Aya merely Looked At Ken and walked away.

"Man, he can be so cold sometimes," Ken grumbled, but his heart wasn't really in it. Aya looked. different. Changed, somehow. That was odd; just yesterday afternoon, the red-haired leader had stalked out a couple hours before the party had started, and hadn't even come down for dinner. That was Aya for you. Ken's musings at an end, he walked warily into the kitchen, to discover Aya cooking breakfast just as he usually did, and humming a Gackt song. Wait a minute! A GACKT SONG - AYA - it was just too much for Ken-kun's poor, hung-over brain to take, especially paired with the racy romance novel of yesterday. The normally genki soccer player keeled over in a dead faint. As his head hit the ground, it made a soft clunking sound, drawing the previously cooking Aya's attention from the food and to his teammate. Aya checked him over, saw nothing wrong with Ken aside from a terrible hangover (what HAD those three gotten themselves into while he was gone?) and left Ken there for a bit, while he finished cooking. Finally, with a cup of tea and a newspaper in hand, Aya sat down at the table and began to read his paper, as he did every morning. When his recently-fainted friend groaned, Aya looked down at Ken and told him that there was a hangover remedy in the little blue bag near the green tea. Ken groaned again, in agreement, and made his feeble way over to the cabinet to find the medicine. Ken's hand closed around the bag, and Youji came padding into the kitchen. He paused for a moment to look at Ken's state and glance at the newspaper, before asking Aya a question that he knew perfectly well the answer to.

"So, oh great leader of the flower crew, who gave you the lovely bouquet?" Youji picked up the vase that his offering had been placed in and sniffed deeply, smiling teasingly at the calm leader of the group. Or, at least he was calm until Youji it one of the rose petals off and ate it, all the while studiously looking straight into Aya's violet eyes. Aya blushed, just a light tinge of pink at the base of his neck and along the cheekbones, and Youji chuckled lasciviously. "Just playing with your head, Aya darling. Nothing else. But who did bring you these wonderful flowers? I couldn't have picked them better to match you had I done it myself," Youji said, trying to act nonchalant. Aya shook his head, saying, "I have no idea. They appeared on my kitchen table last night just after I had a battle with those horrible French doors again. Can't imagine who left them for me, but they're very nice. I especially like the mix of roses and cattleyas. they have a nice scent when put together," Aya commented, apparently not realizing what he had just said. (Youji's image flower is cattleyas. It's a kind of orchid. Aya's is the rose.) Youji's sleep-washed eyes widened just a little bit, but then sagged down again to being half-lidded. Ken gulped orange juice and ate toast, now that Aya's very effective remedy had kicked in. "Arigatou, Aya-kun," he sighed, as the pain and dizziness went away. Youji shot an amused glance at Ken, interpreting correctly that Ken's cider had been a bit too.

umm. alcoholic. Aya looked up at Ken with a scowl. "Just don't get drunk next time, okay? I have a limited amount of those things, and if I assume correctly that Youji and you went to a bar or something, he'll be needing one too." Aya glared at Youji, who winked at him roguishly and said that he actually didn't need one, he was fine since he hadn't drunk anything last night but a bit of un-spiked hot cider. Aya looked a bit annoyed to be showed up, but Ken was already gone, going to meet the soccer team he coached on the weekends and during holidays.

Youji smiled a little wider and stretched, lazy like a cat, his long legs ending up on the other side of the table. Aya went pointedly back to his paper, and it was fairly obvious that it had been read several times, cover- to-cover. Youji got up from his languorous posing and went to find some breakfast somewhere in the kitchen. Aya gestured towards the stove, where a cup of Youji's favorite tea and a bowl of rice lay. Youji was a bit surprised that he got breakfast, too, since normally Aya wouldn't bother to cook it for anyone but himself and the younger members of Weiß. He usually left Youji on his own as far as breakfast. Puzzled, Youji ate his breakfast and drank his tea, aware that a pair of violet-colored eyes watched him over the top of the newspaper. He went as slowly as possible, enjoying the company and the quiet while it lasted. Finally, to Youji's deep regret, he could no longer pretend to be eating. The lanky blonde got up and put his dishes in the sink, turned around as thought o push in his chair before leaving, but found himself sinking back down into his chair to watch Aya read. The leader of Weiß was so tense sometimes, thought Youji. He needed to loosen up. Aya looked at Youji sharply. Youji blanched and stuttered, "I just said tat out loud, didn't I." It wasn't a question. Then, for no reason at all, Youji began to grin.

"What's so funny, Yo-tan? You want to enlighten me as to the joke?" Aya asked, with one perfect eyebrow raised at Youji.

"Nothing, my friend, just thought you need to lighten up a bit. Be less tense." As Youji said this, he stood and walked around to Aya's side of the table. Aya tensed even further when Youji's long-fingered hands went to work on his shoulders, but after the initial touch, he began to relax. He sighed contentedly and pointed out the most tense muscles in his back, guiding his friend's strong hands to the spot. Nobody had given Aya a back massage since. well, since before he had joined Weiß. Unconsciously, Aya pushed up into Youji's hands, letting his head hang down to stretch sore muscles. Youji saw that Aya really needed this, and kept going. Aya let out a small yelp as Youji's kneading found a particularly tense knot of muscle and started to smooth it out. Finally, Youji was done. He patted Aya's shoulder awkwardly, and was startled to find that the redhead had fallen asleep in his seat. Though surprised, Youji picked up Aya in his arms and carried the limp figure of the previously tense Aya up the stairs and into Youji's room. Youji would have put Aya in his own room, but it was locked, and Youji didn't want to invade on Aya's privacy. The tall man laid Aya carefully under the covers and tucked him in, tucking a few stray strands of red hair behind Aya's ear. Almost all the bitter lines of unhappiness and of just living life were gone, smoothed away by relaxation.

// He looks so beautiful when he sleeps. // thought Youji, stepping carefully away from the bed and turning away, looking back at the sleeping redhead over his shoulder as he closed the door. Aya shifted gently in his sleep, smiling slightly.

~owari~

Hehehe a bit of a twist in the plot. Chapter 3 and possibly 4 to be uploaded soon. Please don't be mad at me for not uploading sooner! Tell me how it is at rosevickery@msn.com. *_* ~~