Okay, so I was recently invited into a fanfiction group on Facebook by the awesome JenesisX, and aside from being full of awesome fanfic authors, they have some cool activities for each day of the week. Sunday is a one-hour challenge with a random word given as a prompt. This week's word was Overwhelmed.
While I know it took me over an hour to complete, it was my first challenge, and my focus hasn't been all that good lately, but I once I started, I wanted to finish regardless of how long it took. So here it is. Be warned, you may be seeing more of these from me in the future.
As always, read and review. I want to know what everyone thinks.
"Tell me you didn't bring that shit from the office..."
Sephiroth stood in the threshold of his door and blinked in bemusement at the tone of Zack's voice. Glancing into the living room, he saw his lover sitting on the couch, arms crossed over his chest, a slightly disdainful look on his face.
"What do you mean?" he asked.
He watched his lover scoff and jab a finger in his direction.
"That," Zack repeated. "That came from your office didn't it?"
Sephiroth glanced down at the seemingly innocent stack of papers in his hands no less confused. What about a few documents would be cause for agitation?
"Well, yes, Zack—"
"Why?"
His gaze left the papers and went back to the younger First. "What do you mean?"
Zack rolled his eyes and shook his head. "I mean, why did you bring documents from your office? That's work."
"I am aware of that, Zack," he said with a tilt of his head.
Why would Zack feel the need to point out the obvious? Yes it was work. He always made a habit out of bringing some of his office work back to his apartment with him. Whatever he could not finish when curfew started, he brought back with him to finish before the next day. It wouldn't do for him to fall behind...
Zack turned and flopped across the arm of the couch, looking at him with disbelief.
"You're home, Seph," he said. "Work time is over. You're supposed to come home and relax after working hard, not work hard all day and then come home and keep working."
"But... I bring my remaining work back with me all of the time. Curfew prevents me from finishing all of my work within my office, so I bring what remains home to finish before the next day."
The look that Zack continued to give him was unsettling. Was it really so abnormal that he wanted to keep from falling behind? He always found what he did to be very beneficial. If he remained on schedule, it made things so much easier.
He moved away from the front door and into the living room, placing the stack on his coffee table. He ignored the way Zack glowered at it as if it were some sort of vermin and sat down on the couch as he always did, ready to continue as if he'd never had to leave the office. His fingers just barely brushed the first document in the stack before a slightly smaller, slightly darker toned hand was slapped down over it. It took everything he had not to flinch before he looked up the connecting arm and finally into a pair of stern blue eyes.
"There's no way you're looking at any of that garbage tonight. Not while I'm here," Zack said.
"Zack, the sooner I complete it, the sooner I can devote my time to you."
Zack shook his head at that. "That isn't the point. It's fine if you want to deal with that stuff in your office; that's your work space. This is home, not your workspace, so there's no reason for you to be working anymore tonight."
"Zack, I do not wish to fall behind..."
There was another scoff.
"I've seen the crap they shovel on you. For every one mission report that is your actual responsibility to look over, there's ten times more crap that someone else didn't feel like doing, so they decided to dump it on you."
"How it became my responsibility does not matter—"
"It isn't your responsibility!" Zack growled. "Doing someone's work just because they don't want to do it is not your job."
Sephiroth sighed. He was finding it a bit hard to keep his agitation down. All he wanted to do was finish the work so he wouldn't have to worry about it anymore. While a part of him wanted to agree with Zack, he couldn't let himself fall behind, no matter how trivial the work was. There wasn't even that much to do! Why couldn't Zack just let him work one more hour and be done with it?
"Zack, there isn't even that much t—"
"Don't even try that with me, Seph," Zack interrupted. "There may not be 'that much' here, but I've seen how much you have to do during the day."
"Zack, please, just allow me one hour's time and I'll have this finished—"
"No."
Sephiroth couldn't hold back the exasperated growl that left him, and he glared at his lover. Zack just stared back evenly for a moment before his expression softened. He felt the hand that was atop his own gently move up his arm to rub his shoulder.
"Seph, I don't think you even notice how stressed all this work is making you."
Sephiroth's expression changed back to one of confusion. Of course he noticed the stress his work caused, but it wasn't as if he were going to let a bit of stress keep him from seeing to his duties. He would never be able to even fight if he allowed such a thing. Zack seemed to be able to tell exactly what he was thinking and sighed.
"You really need to let yourself relax," he said softly. "You're way too tense, and don't think I haven't seen the way your hands have been shaking lately."
Damn. No matter how well he could keep stress from showing on his face and out of his body language, the subtle trembling of his hands was always a dead giveaway. He'd tried many times to keep his hands steady when his stress levels rose, but he never succeeded, so he did his best to just hide the trembling as best he could... but it seemed Zack had caught on.
He was too caught up in his thoughts to really notice the way Zack wrapped an arm around his shoulders and pulled him closer. The moment his body rested against Zack's however, was when the tension he wasn't aware of decided to ease, and it was as if his body went limp. He felt the way Zack's chest vibrated as his chuckled quietly, a hand rubbing along his back.
"Yeah, there's no way I'm letting you touch those papers," Zack said. "You really need to let yourself relax every once in a while... you've looked close to snapping all week."
Sephiroth said nothing. Zack was perceptive, and if he'd come to notice his stress, there was no way Sephiroth could deny it. Admittedly, he had been stressed for quite a few days, but he'd kept it from showing so much that he just... failed to notice the constant tension that failed to go away. He was so used to it, that he didn't even notice the way it overwhelmed even his own enhanced body. He'd just go through his routine, working hard without complaint, return home only to continue working before he went to bed too tense to actually sleep. Then he'd wake in the morning, barely rested, and continue his routine again.
Zack's soothing touch seemed to remind his body just how weary it was, and he had to consciously hold back a yawn.
"I think we should sleep in tomorrow," Zack said.
Sephiroth instinctively went to protest... but he couldn't bring himself to actually say a word. The younger First only chuckled at his silence.
"Yeah we'll sleep in tomorrow... maybe have breakfast at noon... then just head right back to bed."
"I would like to get something done during the day, Zack..."
"Well, I'll tell you one thing you won't be doing and that's office work. We can either go out into the city or stay in here... but you are not goig anywhere near that office until you've had some time to relax."
Sephiroth just sighed in resignation. Zack had made up his mind, and there was no way he was going to be swayed. But if he were honest with himself, Sephiroth wasn't really up to protesting... if anything, he looked forward to sleeping in.
