A/N: Location: A cluttered bedroom full of posters and nerdy bric-a-brac. A girl is lying on the bed, sulking in an oversized red sweater with Edward's serpent cross on the back. A shorter girl with a black bob haircut enters.
Lacy: I thought you were going to post the Forgive and Forget chapter today.
Me: No, dude, it sucks.
Lacy: It doesn't suck as bad as the other ending you were going to do.
Me: It still sucks. The new ending is just the old one with the suck-ier part taken out. I'm still not happy with it.
Lacy: You swore you'd post this chapter a week ago. Just put it up, it's probably not as bad as you think it is, and some people will read anything (aside) how else do you explain "Don't Touch Me" getting favourited?
Me: I heard that. And fine, but if I get lynched for putting a sucky ending to a decent story, it's your fault.
Dawn had barely begun to peek over the rooftops of the city when the obnoxious ringing of an alarm forced Roy from sleep.
He glared death at the source of the disturbance before reaching out and tossing it against the wall, where it went silent with a worrying 'crack' sound.
Mumbling useless complaints, he shoved the covers off, swiveling to sit on the edge of the bed and rubbing his eyes on his palms for a minute until he felt awake enough to get dressed.
Tramping down the stairs as quietly as possible, he slowed as he reached the bottom, and leaned against the wall, a small smirk on his lips. Ah, so he hadn't been dreaming.
Edward lay fast asleep across the couch, a spare blanket tucked over his shoulders, where he'd crashed the night before. Under protest.
Roy chuckled to himself as he glanced at the clock on the wall and then proceeded toward the kitchen to start coffee.
It was beyond ironic, after everything, that he'd be the one turning Edward down, but for once he thought his cynical side was probably in the right. It would have been very, very easy to have gone much farther than kissing him the night before. Easy, if not for the nagging in the back of his mind that regardless of how much he wanted him, regardless of the fact that it was Edward who'd come to him, and regardless of how fucking LONG it had been since he'd gotten any action, this was not how it ought to be.
Edward had snapped, or so he'd phrased it, and essentially fled in search of some kind of validation that he could break out of it and still have a place and a person to go to. And while it had been gratifying to be the one he ran to, he wasn't about to kid himself into thinking if he had other friends who openly opposed the church, that there wasn't an equal or greater chance he would have gone to them – greater, if he was smart enough not to add hormones to his confusions for the night. No; sex, mindless, comfort, or otherwise, barely even qualified as a bandage solution, and certainly if he wanted anything more than carnal satisfaction from the blond, would have started them on a shaky left foot.
That didn't make it any easier to separate, of course, and staying where he'd chosen to stand remained difficult every time the thought crossed his mind that it would be one hell of a waste of a dream if he did not take the youth sitting on the counter to bed that instant.
That Edward had protested the separation didn't make it easier at all.
But in the end he thought it had turned out for the better, more or less. He'd gotten more of an explanation out of him once he calmed down a little, and listened.
There was a lot to talk about, though Roy barely needed to say more than "Uh-huh" and a few nods to keep the blond talking.
"I don't know what I'm doing here." Edward muttered, looking out the window at the darkening city behind him," I almost want to go home just to know where I am, but then I have to go back to a standard of behaviour I'll never be able to satisfy and I'll have to go back to trying to not want to be with you and being scared as anything any time I mess up and its making me so tired and I just can't deal with it and-"
"In the short term or the long term?"
"Huh?"
"Are you looking for a break and a place to crash for one night where nobody's going to yell at you if you don't feel like getting up at the crack of dawn to pray, or are you looking for a hide-out? You're welcome to use my home for either, but I'd like to know so I can know what to think. You've kind of thrown me off my equilibrium here"
"...honestly? I don't know. I might be jumping to conclusions – I do that a lot; stopping to think things through doesn't really come easy for me, and maybe I'm just being stubborn, but.."
Roy watched, and waited for him to finish his sentence as he fiddled with the end of his shirtsleeve and stared at his hands. When he did speak, he had to strain to hear.
"I meant it when I said I loved you." Edward half-whispered, still not looking up, "I mean... sheesh this is awkward."
He chuckled, risking the distance to lean against the wall nearer the counter Edward was sitting on to lay a hand on his head, letting it slide down along his hair over one ear. He leaned his head into his palm, and exhaled, slowly.
"I want you, y'know."
He swallowed, considered retracting his hand. Bad timing. Bad idea. Not now, not a good way to start anything-
"But if it was just that I think I could have stayed – y'know, convinced myself I'm just lonely and need to be more social or something. If it was just that, but it's not."
Roy was silent as Edward took a slow breath.
"Cause even though you made me stop, I still wanna be here."
Of course, that didn't stop him from nearly screaming in frustration once he'd bid an exhausted Edward goodnight and climbed the stairs by himself.
And it really didn't help that he had to force himself up so early, when the city was still mostly dark.
The coffee pot boiling interrupted his thoughts, and he snapped back to the present, pulling two mugs from the cabinet and filling them before venturing back into the living room.
Edward was still asleep, and looking at him, Roy felt a twinge of guilt for waking him this early, but... well, couldn't be helped. Setting the drinks down, he took hold of one shoulder, and shook him, none too gently.
"Oi, sleeping beauty, wake up."
"MmMMPHnn.." he retreated under the blanket.
"Up, or I'm getting a bucket."
"You always this mean?" Edward mumbled, looking out from under the cover, messy hair hiding most of his face.
"Only in the morning." He reassured with a smirk, sitting down on the arm of the couch and offering one of the coffee mugs. "So wake up; you've got two options."
"Two?" he accepted the drink carefully, cradling it between his hands as he shifted to sit up.
"Two." Roy repeated, nodding once. "You can grab your coat and run back up the hill now before anyone notices you're gone, I'll play nice and serve the rest of my sentence, but we can't be anything other than friends."
He tried to breathe while he waited for the sleepily disheveled youth on his couch to reply, but it wasn't very easy.
"I thought that was my only option." Edward muttered. "And I don't like it much, it leaves the distinct possibility I'll go insane and a near certainty of being miserable again."
The stranglehold fell off of his lungs, and he exhaled, slowly, choosing his next words with care. "Well, there's that, or we can see if I have any clothes you could change into, and get the hell out of this ironically god-forsaken country on a cliché fool's gamble."
Edward froze halfway through taking a drink of the coffee, and set it down to turn and face him, incredulous.
"Are you being serious?"
"If I was joking, I would come up with something more original." He assured solemnly.
The blond youth was silent for a long moment, reading his face before he spoke again.
"...where would we go?"
Roy swallowed a sigh of relief. "Drachma has pretty loose border laws – the side effect being that it's an unstable country that swings from uprising to uprising every other week."
"No alternatives?" he cringed, drumming his fingers along the mug in his hands.
"Well, Xing, but the only places there isn't tight border security is where only fools try to cross – and I don't speak Xingese, do you?"
"No, I could learn, though." A peal of laughter broke suddenly from his lips "I can't believe we're talking seriously about this." He said with a grin, and Roy couldn't resist a chuckle, himself.
"Crazy, huh?" He moved his arm out of the way as Edward swivelled sideways on the couch and leaned backward against his side. "But I can't find any other alternatives, and, well, honestly I think I'll go nuts if I have to watch you walk away again."
"Yeah." The youth relaxed against him, his weight warm and welcome against the older man's side. "You've discounted what happens if we get caught, though" he added, worry lining his voice.
"I have thought of that, to a great extent, actually. And I've come up with a very simple solution."
"What's that?"
"Don't get caught."
Silence reigned for another long minute before-
"Heh. Well that's simple enough." Edward grinned up at him, mischief sparkling in gold eyes, and he felt his heart skip a beat or ten. "Where do we start?"
The room was cold, at that hour of the morning, but just then, a supernova crashed into the atmosphere and sank behind his chest to pulse warmth through his veins. Because that was it – somehow, impossibly, he'd agreed. A flame of possession flickered to life and whispered 'mine', and a smile – a real one, not his usual mask of a smirk, broke across his face as he drew breath to answer.
"With caffeine." He said, "And a walk to the bus station – I just hope they haven't put surveillance back on my house for skipping work these past two days."
"I said you weren't feeling well, it should be fine."
"Oh, did you? Thanks."
"Any risk is worth it though, isn't it?" he looked down again to find Edward twisted to look up, still leaning comfortably encircled by one arm. "To go somewhere where we could make something of this, and not have to fear for it?"
"'this' is frowned on everywhere" Roy pointed out soberly, smoothing the tangles out of his hair with his free hand. "You realise that, don't you? This isn't a cure, it's barely a vaccine."
"I said, any risk. I'm not stopping now." Edward replied, stubbornly.
"Prejudice? Discrimination? Prison? Death penalty?" A voice in Roy's head was yelling at him not to give the youth more reasons to back out, but if they were going to do this crazy thing, he wanted no holes.
Edward swallowed, hard. "If we don't get caught, we won't get caught." he said, slowly, sifting his words, "And, well, here's hoping someday we won't have to worry about that anymore. Meantime, shouldn't we get going?"
"After you."
A/N: It is over now! I feel a little sad, but hopefully you had as much fun reading as I had writing it, and it looks like those two fools will be all right, so that's something n_n
Thank you for all your wonderful reviews - please to author-alert and/or read my other stories? Thanks and happy holidays to the lot 'o ye!
And don't forget to lynch Lacy, not me, if you thought this ending sucked (see first authors note)