By Twelve du Lac-deFamine
Notes from Suchan: Silver's changed her name to Twelve du Lac-deFamine, so Twelve it shall be. Not a big deal, I suppose, it could have been worse. She could have changed it to Rhodekill. Or something obnoxiously punny. Anyway.
The real note is: Our apologies for the shortish chapter and the long wait for an update. The next one will (hopefully) be longer. I just didn't want to ruin it by forcing it to be longer. I felt like the best place to break off was the last bit there, before, well, before the next part. Anyway. I guess this will make more sense at the end.
Hats off to: Ayanami, ShayaCatalyst, you guys make writing worthwhile. For this you have my undying gratitude. D
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Chapter 4.
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It was getting harder and harder to keep his mind off the new boy, Maurice. Jesus, even his name was sexy. He caught himself as he said it under his breath, caught himself smirking, relishing the feel of it on his tongue. He frowned immediately. NO.
Manfred looked at him oddly. "Alright, Asa?"
"Yeah, fine," Asa mumbled, sleepily warm in Manfred's arms in the giant, carved chair. They were sitting up in the tower at five o'clock in the morning, watching the sun's first feeble rays poke up over the windowsill. "Peaceful," he said. "Nice way to start off a Saturday."
"You know what else is a good way to start a Saturday," Manfred mumbled into Asa's neck, biting him quickly, gently. Asa smirked.
"It's not a good way to start a Saturday when you're having brunch with your boyfriend and his mother. Grandma Florence will probably be there, too." Manfred stuck out his bottom lip dramatically. Asa casually ran a fingertip down the side of Manfred's face.
"It's also a good way to end a Saturday," he breathed, grinning like the devil. "If you catch my meaning, darling."
Manfred's eyebrow raised. "Oh. Well. I'll hold you to that, then."
"I wouldn't expect anything less," Asa purred, reaching up to kiss him as the dawn broke most spectacularly over the tops of the trees and flooded the old study with golden, pinkish light. Asa leaned against Manfred's lean yet slightly scrawny bare chest, placed his hand over Manfred's slowly thudding heart. "Not from you."
:P
"No, no, not all black, Grandma Flo will have a stroke and it will be all your fault."
"Asa," Manfred drawled, pulling off the black button-down, and shaking his head at the rest of his closet (which was mostly black). "If she's seen anything of your wardrobe aside from your uniform, she'll probably think I'm a saint."
"Fine saint you'll make, what with your exclusively homosexual tendencies and all." Asa dodged the hanger Manfred threw, laughing, and walked over to where Manfred stood, frowning at himself in the mirror. "Your eyes are almost blue. Why don't you go with the blue?" Asa stared at Manfred's irises, trying to detect any speck of colour and failing spectacularly.
"My eyes are black, Asa, you know that. Black like my twisted, evil soul."
"Oh, don't say that in front of Mum, she'll never let me see you again," Asa pouted.
"You'd find a way," Manfred muttered, tucking the end bit of the tie in place. "There. Better?"
"You look delicious," said Asa, pulling on his tweed cap and winking at Manfred's reflection in the mirror. "Let's go."
:P
"Sooo," said Grandma Florence, "Manfred, you said you were going to St. Peregrine's next year. What are you studying?" Manfred shot a glance at Asa before looking directly at Grandma Florence, who, bless her, saw only a blackish smudge where Manfred's head was.
"Drama. I'd like to be a stage actor."
"Ohhh," said Grandma Florence, halfway to herself.
"Don't quite have the face for movies. And I'm not quite shallow enough, I'm afraid," Manfred continued. Asa laughed.
"Well, I couldn't tell about your face, dearie, everything's a bit of a blur now, even with my new prescription…" Celia and Asa smiled helplessly at the ceiling. "These potatoes are fantastic, Celia, I don't know how you do it," she warbled.
Manfred raised his eyebrows at Asa, but said nothing. Merely smiled. Celia was aglow with pride. "Oh, they're nothing, Mom, you know, your old recipe."
"Mine! Really! Hm. Couldn't even tell." Asa muttered something and Celia shot him a dark look. Manfred cleared his throat.
"Um. Can someone pass the potatoes? I think I'll go for another helping," he said. Celia smiled warmly at him.
"Of course, Manfred, you're such a dear. Salt?"
Asa rolled his eyes and Manfred kicked him under the table.
"Yes, thank you, Mrs. Pike. That would be just lovely."
:P
Asa wriggled his butt in the leather seat of Manfred's hot, black sporty car. "Nice ride, Manfred. Asswarmers in 'em, I expect?" he asked innocently.
"You know it," Manfred laughed. "Nice, though, in the winter. But it's not like I really need them, seeing as I've got you." He loved the way Asa's mouth dropped open in disbelief. The way both of their minds never really ever left the gutter. The way Asa's volatile blush flamed in his cheeks when he'd heard a particularly smutty comment, like it did now.
The way his passionate emotions were always quick to flare…
"Manfred Ignatius Bloor!" Manfred grabbed the hand that came up to playfully smack him.
"You did not." Asa smirked at him, mildly unconcerned.
"Did what?"
"You did not just use the middle name." Manfred glowered down at Asa, whose smirk was slowly sliding off his face. "You know I hate that."
"I don't suppose 'sorry' would cut it?" Asa said hopefully. Manfred sighed angrily.
"We'll see," he growled, turning the key in the ignition.
:P
They walked, hand in hand, inhaling the crisp, dry fall air and watching the leaves bursting in firey colours, finally falling dead and brown to the ground. Asa had wrapped a dark orange scarf around his neck, and was watching the blue sky, seemingly miles and leagues and light years away from this tiny piece of the crust of the earth, as meaningless in the greater scheme of things as dust.
He started as Manfred growled suddenly. A lone figure was approaching them on the sidewalk, tall, lanky and smiling gorgeously. "Fancy meeting you two here today."
"Maurice."
Asa looked at Manfred. "You've met?"
Maurice smiled gently at Asa. "'Course we've met, Asa. We're brothers." The nasty look on Manfred's face told him he wasn't at all happy about that.
"You've met?" Manfred inquired, looking lethal beneath his black, knee-length coat. Asa suddenly dreaded telling Manfred that—
"Oh, yeah," said Maurice airily. "Same dorm, right next to each other. Ever so kind, Asa was," he continued, staring at Asa as though wishing to reach out and just absolutely ravish him, even with Manfred standing there next to them, "ever so polite, just introduced himself to the new kid with no friends."
"Well that's great," said Manfred, who sounded like it wasn't at all great in any way, shape or form, "then we'll all be best chums, won't we? Asa and I have to be somewhere, so you'll excuse us."
"Of course." With a slight incline of the head, the merest of sarcastic bows, he dismissed them and strode gracefully away. Asa watched him walk away, resisting Manfred's measures to make him walk faster.
"Manfred, you're hurting my arm—" Manfred finally released him. Asa stared at him accusingly as he sat down on a rock ledge outside a shop. "You never told me you had a brother."
"Well..." Manfred looked away at the warm fingers of the setting sun alighting on the tops of the buildings on the street. "I forgot."
Asa looked at him, saying wordlessly that that was the biggest load of rot he'd ever heard. "Manfred, people don't 'forget' things like that." Manfred glared at him savagely.
"I suppressed the memory of him, is that what you want me to say?" he yelled. People walking past turned around and gave them looks. Asa glared at them, then looked back at Manfred, who was becoming increasingly moodier. "And why shouldn't I? I haven't seen him in seven years, why should he crop back up now? Just when everything was going so well," he finished quietly, to himself.
Asa approached him carefully, grasping his hand and turning it over in his own hands. "What do you mean?" Manfred said nothing for a while, let his black gaze roam the windows of the shops, the cars and busses hurrying past. He finally turned back to Asa and wrapped an arm around the shivering boy. The sun was setting.
"I don't like people who are supposed to be dead showing up and overshadowing me, having the past repeat itself, having everything I love stripped away from me again." Manfred looked at Asa's shocked face and smiled bitterly. "That's what I mean." His face softened. "But don't worry about it right now, Asa. This is you and me time."
"People who are supposed to be dead?" Asa whispered. Manfred placed a finger on the boy's lips, and shook his head.
"Shh. Stop worrying about it. Let's go hit the Blue Moon before they close." As they got up to head for the coffee shop, Asa found himself worrying intensely about what Manfred had said, those loaded words spoken so carelessly. People who are supposed to be dead… Was he talking about Maurice? Worst of all, why was he supposed to be dead?
But he wouldn't bring it up with Manfred again unless he absolutely had to. And definitely not tonight. Manfred's iced pumpkin mocha with whipped cream would perk him up, and then they could celebrate surviving the first half of the semester the way they liked to celebrate...
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End Ch 4
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Decent? Let me know…… I know it's kind of short, but the muses forced me to stop there for fear of ruining the chapter.
