Everyone Tends To Assume

"Wait! Where is he going?"

"I would expect back to his house."

"But... weren't you two supposed to kiss?"

"Brother, have you seen Maddox? Was he here? I just passed him on the road and... and I almost thought he was smiling!"

"I have no idea."

"You... didn't... oh! I am so sorry! I thought you already knew!"

Vash should have figured that was what had happened. Still, he was relieved all the same now that Heidi had said it. "It is not any of my business, I am sorry." He patted her on the arm as she tried to regain a hold on her blush.

"But it is! It just has not... been a big deal, I suppose." She placed her hands into her lap.

"There is no rush." Goodness knew that he certainly had not rushed into anything like that. He had already gone thru the mental stress of trying to accept the fact she was old enough for this. Really, there was nothing more for him to do other than support her decisions. And make certain that the people she was spending time with were not secretly criminals or had anything horrific in their pasts. That was all that was left for him.

He had basically raised her. He supposed this was how Arthur was feeling as Alfred wanted to move out. Not that Heidi was moving out! No, not for a long time. Not a problem.

Vash was beginning to wonder if he was a little overprotective. Just a little bit?

"Is that... you did not think I had a crush on Maddox, did you?" Heidi asked suddenly. Vash found himself rather stricken. Clearing his throat, he quickly shook his head.

"Of course not! That is ridiculous."

"Good," Heidi sighed, relaxing. "Even if I was not... even if I was straight, I would never ever look twice at your boyfriend! Whether we spend a lot of time together or not!"

"Boyfriend?" Vash asked, confused. "What do you mean?"

"I mean, if I was into men," Heidi clarified cheerfully, "you would not have to worry about whoever your boyfriend was being on the list of people I was attracted to! I would never want us to be in that situation!"

"No," Vash said blankly. "I meant how did you get to the word boyfriend from Maddox?"

Heidi blinked up at him and then covered her mouth again. "Oh! I am sorry! I thought– You are Maddox aren't going out?"

Vash was pretty certain his brain had just broke.

"I told you to pick up those tacks this morning," Arthur said as Maddox continued to collect the tacks off of the chairs before someone actually sat in them. It was a bit embarrassing, having to clean this up. He was so used to people just knowing about these things and so he could get rid of them when no one was paying attention. But now Matthew was going to come over...

He supposed it gave him something to do. Something to keep himself from smiling. Maddox had never had such an impulse to smile in his life. It was weird.

"It slipped my mind, I was busy making out with Vash," he lied, wondering how many times he had given that excuse to Arthur. Well, he was going to have to think of a new one when that started happening, because it would not be a funny if it was the truth.

"I am so glad you do that over there," Arthur responded, sipping at his tea, waiting for whatever was in the oven to be done cooking. Maddox would have looked, but he rather liked his eyes in his face.

"We always think of your comfort," Maddox bantered back. Arthur glanced over his shoulder.

"I cannot believe you are so settled while Alfred is still being such a git."

"Pardon?" Maddox asked, nearly piercing a finger with a tack.

"It isn't my place, but I find it remarkable that you have managed to get under Vash's skin and that Alfred cannot even see a mutual attraction when it stares him in the face. It would make me think he had failed chemistry if I had not graded his papers."

Maddox was trying to get what Arthur was meaning by this. There was the obvious, but as the obvious could not possibly be right... "How long do you think I have been going out with Vash, Dad?"

"God forbid that I start counting things like that," Arthur snorted.

It did not matter. It gave Maddox his answer. Arthur thought he and Vash were already dating.

He retreated into the basement.

"Zwingli, why are you here?"

Vash stood in the doorway, staring at the cake before he had managed to tear his attention away from it. His first impression was that it was a danger to whoever was in the vicinity. Then he remembered it was cake. What real harm could it do?

"What was your impression of Maddox when you came to Hearth?"

Roderich stared at him and (much to Vash's annoyance) appeared rather amused. "You really want my opinion on your boyfriend?"

And that was enough of that. Vash left the inn as quickly as possible.

"What do you mean, start going out with Vash?" Muhammad asked him incredulously.

Well, it was either ask him or Yao. Maddox was afraid that Yao's reaction would be some sort of contained explosion, whether it was affirmative or confused. Muhammad was always the safer bet between the both of them.

"As in beginning, not continuing," Maddox continued, the straightforwardness of this rather awkward to him. But he needed an answer.

Muhammad rose an eyebrow. "So you are only now boyfriends? Better not tell Yao, he'll make a big deal out of it. He always thought he had missed it."

Even Yao had thought they were?

Maddox left Muhammad's house as quickly has possible.

Maddox hid his bag of plastic fire ants under his firecrackers when Vash came down into his room. The basement. Whatever anyone wanted to call it. He and Alfred called it his base of operations, because it annoyed Arthur.

"Everyone thinks we are already an item," Vash said immediately, exasperated. Maddox froze in place before turning around to look at him.

"They think we are joking about just getting together."

"Precisely."

They both stood there. Maddox's mind worked overtime. He was not amused. So he would have to make himself amused.

"If we started making out right now, we could always pretend this has been going on for a long time," Maddox suggested.

Vash narrowed his eyes and returned up the stairs. Maddox went back to putting the rest of the plastic insects into the plastic bag which he would hide in his sleeve. For future use against Francis, whenever it worked out.

Everyone already thought it had happened. Okay.

Maddox found himself very irritated that he had had the biggest reaction out of everyone during this entire ordeal.

Notes:

I lied, there was another mention of fire ants. Then again, this did happen before the wedding. So it does not count, right?

A personal success for me is to make Maddox genuinely irritated. It is always so hard to do.