Chapter 11
**********
Kirei slipped into the night as if she were part of it, and maybe she
was. It welcomed her with open arms.
A howl perked her ears, startling her. She whirled to see not a wolf,
but a man, his face raised to the sky with an expression of perfect
happiness as he hooked his arms over the roll bars of his Jeep to better
bask in the moonlight.
He dropped back into the Jeep, disappearing from even Kirei's night
vision. The Jeep turned in an achingly lovely tight curve before
jagging down the street, leaving only the winking brake lights to sting the
eyes.
Kirei loped off. It seemed the entire city felt the need to howl.
~~~~~
There was something about stumbling home in the wilted remains of an
evening ensemble. It dogged the feet and weighed down the eyelids.
As Dorothy slid out of her shoes, losing two inches of height but
feeling much more like herself, a rush of courage came over her. Time to
tell, to fall on her knees and beg Roger's forgiveness. But the light
shone harshly on an empty bedroom, and empty bed, leaving Dorothy rather
empty.
Frightened and heartsick, she ran down the hall to Kirei's room, hose
slipping on the floor. She needed to collapse in Snowy's lap and cry,
tell her packmate everything. Snowy would make everything all better.
Again, she was greeted by an empty room. She sighed, a single tear
slipping past her nose, and trudged slowly back to her own bedroom,
brushing it away. If she'd told Snowy the truth from the beginning,
everything would already be okay.
Back in her own bedroom, Dorothy suddenly realized that Roger and
Snowy were probably together. The realization chilled her with fear, not
of being replaced but of her own weakness, which frightened her even
more. If they were beginning to think that three wasn't company anymore,
it would make it that much easier to give in to Leon's advances.
Chilled to the bone, Dorothy slammed the door and locked it, as if
doing so would keep her safe from the outside world. She kicked off the
hose, not caring if she snagged it.
"You're trapped by your own lies is what it is," a voice declared,
startling her. She whirled to see the intruder, but only her own eyes
stared back, from the full-length mirror on the back of the locked door.
"I'm serious," her reflection continued. "If you'd been honest with
Snowy at the precinct, or honest with Roger about the flowers, or
honest with Roger about your past with Leon..."
"Stop it." Dorothy clamped her hands over her ears.
When she uncovered them, the reflection was silent. She stared at it,
her green eyes wide and shocky. The red dress hurt her eyes. How
pretty it was! How lovely she felt in it!
Roger's voice echoed in her head, amidst the screaming already there.
"If you live in this house, you wear black."
She felt the tears sting her eyes and heard Snowy: "You know Roger
won't let you wear it unless it's black."
She slid to her knees, covering her face, still hiding, still hiding,
but the voices wouldn't stop.
"I would never, ever share you," Leon vowed.
"Roger doesn't own us. He's not our spouse, not our boss," her own
voice said.
"No," Dorothy choked out weakly, uncovering one eye to glare at the
mirror.
Her reflection stared back, just as frightened, hiding, a vision in a
russet dress.
"Who's the fairest one of all?" Dorothy whispered with a little laugh,
twin tears sliding from her eyes.
"You are," the reflection seemed to promise, "you are."
With a tiny cry, Dorothy curled to the floor and shifted, the dress
voicing its pain in an unheard tearing. It shredded on the floor, bright
as blood.
Dorothy rose from the carnage, a she-wolf the color of cinnamon and
gold. With a leap that caused reality to shimmer, she jumped onto the bed
and sprawled out, bright as a wound amidst the sheets.
~~~~~
The first indication that the dream had begun was the falling.
It was slow, like Alice's tumble down the rabbit hole, but she didn't
believe the ground's promise to catch her. A golden flash beneath her
caught her eyes, made her reach out. Her arms locked around solid
warmth; a body braced her and took the impact of the fall, carrying her
safely away in a smooth gait. Smooth, everything about him was so
smooth...
She slid down from his broad back and buried her face in his soft,
thick fur.
(I had a dream I was your hero,) he told her, one huge paw stroking
down her back, claws safely sheathed.
"Why me?" she asked, a chill wind ruffling the tattered skirt of the
red dress she was wearing.
(Why not?) was the answer.
She rose to her feet, and he walked alongside her. When she stopped,
so did he, his eyes fixed good-naturedly on her.
"What is it?" she asked.
(I don't want to walk behind you.) He twitched an ear.
She sighed. "Then you go in front."
(No, I don't want to lead.)
She squeezed her eyes shut tight. "What do you want?"
(My place is here.) He seemed to smile at her.
She started to walk again, and he stayed close beside her. She
tentatively reached a hand to touch his strong shoulder.
(Don't be afraid,) he told her, looking at her.
"No, I'm not, I...I just want to feel that you're there." She blushed,
trying not to meet his gaze, feeling the strength sliding beneath his
fur, his solid warmth.
(I am. I'll always be here. I want only to be here, beside you,
always.)
She relaxed, feeling suddenly safe.
(What are you thinking?) he asked, looking towards her.
She smiled. "That these dreams are not a stranger place than the one
I left behind."
~~~~~
She woke smiling.
She was cold, and realized suddenly it was because she was nude
beneath the sheets. She'd shifted back in the middle of the night. That it
had happened without her conscious control should have bothered her,
but for some reason it didn't.
The clock said 5:09. Psych class awaited. She groaned inwardly. It
had been stupid to go out on the date when she had to get up this
early.
She sat up, realizing she'd just called it a date.
~~~~~
Roger knocked on the doorjamb, eager to surprise Dorothy with the gift
he had for her before she left for class. But the redhead was already
gone. The clock said 6:06.
He smiled. What a little soldier. She'd gotten up even after she
hadn't been feeling well the night before. He was so proud of her...
~~~~~
"Colin."
A boy obediently raised his hand.
"Tova."
"Here." A girl looked up.
"Travis is here...Julie is here...Dorothy?"
Silence.
"Dorothy?"
Still no answer.
"Moving on. Jillian?..."
~~~~~
The week was shaping up to be one of the best of Leon S. Kennedy's
life. A date with his long-lost Dorothy, bleeding into a day off--could it
get any better than that?
Yes, it could, he realized upon taking a shortcut through the park.
She was sitting cross-legged on a bench, almost huddled in her
well-loved leather jacket. She had her elbows propped on her knees and her
chin propped on her hands. She was watching the penguins play, green
eyes intense but not smiling.
"RPD, put your hands where I can see 'em," he called, catching her
attention. She turned her head to look, her blood-bright hair moving as
if it had a life of its own, falling straight just above her shoulders.
"You're under arrest for being too damn good-looking," Leon continued,
reclining on the bench beside her.
It got a smile out of her. "This is why I hate you."
He cocked an eyebrow at her. "Oh?"
She explained: "I can never be in a bad mood when you're around. You
always jolly me out of it."
He grinned. "I live to serve. Why are you in a bad mood?"
"Oh." She waved a hand dismissively. "It's nothing you've got to
worry about. It's no big deal."
Everything concerning her was a big deal to him, but being a seasoned
observer of her, he knew that if he pushed her, she'd dig her claws in,
and they wouldn't get anywhere. He would wait for her to tell him.
"Say, don't you have class today?" he asked, arching a brow.
She turned back to the chunky flightless birds in front of them. "I
sort of skipped."
He shook his head. "Not a good habit."
"Oh, so now you're a truant officer as well?" she snapped.
Immediately her face fell and she turned toward him. "Oh, Leon, I'm sorry..."
"No worries, angel tears," he said, smiling gently. "It's okay."
The old nickname rang something in her, a little bell that she hadn't
realized had been silent for a while. She cocked her head to the side,
studying his face, waiting for things to go very wrong very fast, but
the comfortable feeling remained. Even the silence was warm and
familiar.
"What about you?" she asked, punching his arm lightly with a ghost of
a grin. "What are you up to today?"
He smiled beatifically. "It's my day off. And I'm thinking it should
be yours, too."
She looked the question at him, green eyes unsure.
"Really, Dorothy," he said, reaching to tip her chin up. "You deserve
a little fun."
She gave him a tiny smile. "Okay."
~~~~~
The little bell in her was ringing furiously half an hour later. Leon
would have swam a thousand oceans for that laugh.
"Did you see her face when you ordered? She was wondering what the
hell you could possibly have been thinking!"
"I was thinking about the free toy, of course," Leon snorted, as if
she should have known that. To prove his point, he opened one of the
Happy Meals and searched it.
He grinned. "All right, the Command Wolf! If we come back next week,
I can get the Raynos and I'll have a whole set." He teased her with the
small plastic zoid until she giggled.
"Silly." Dorothy took a crescent-shaped bite of her cheeseburger.
"Silly? Oh yeah?" He grinned, digging for the hamburger in one of the
meals. "Somebody obviously doesn't remember eating here every weekend
one summer because she was trying to collect Beanie Babies."
Dorothy laughed, not a vapid giggle or an unattractive bray, just her
way of letting the world know she was happy. Leon thought it was
beautiful.
"I remember. I can't believe someone would elbow a mother of two in
order to get Zip, the cat."
Leon smirked. "But I did it anyway."
She smiled. "My hero."
"Hey, I didn't do all the work. YOU stepped on her hand." He winked
at her.
She laughed. "Yeah, I did do that, didn't I? But we got the cat. I
still have him!"
The laughter was giving way to something warmer, something that wasn't
trapped in the past. "We made a good team," he said.
"Yeah." Her eyes were green-grey, dreamy, as if she were listening to
inner music. "You were more than my boyfriend. You were my best
friend."
He smiled. She was sweet enough to melt in the rain.
She suddenly picked up her vanilla milkshake, sipping. "All this
serious talk is making me tired. Let's make fun of the other patrons."
He grinned, couldn't help it. "Okay, let's start with you."
She wrinkled her nose, sticking out her tongue at him.
"Hey, don't stick out your tongue unless you intend to use it!" he
warned.
She snorted. "Leon!" She shook her head, smiling. Happy Meals,
indeed!
~~~~~
"You awake over there?" Leon stretched a hand over the grass and found
the smoothness of her palm, the cool thin band of a claddagh ring.
"Yeah..." She sighed. "I shouldn't have eaten that last sugar cookie.
It made me drowsy."
"Serves you right for stealing it from me," he chuckled.
"Mou (Jeez)," she snickered back. "Always on the job!"
"Nah, not today," Leon sighed contentedly, looking over at her. She'd
taken off her leather jacket and used it as a pillow for her head,
exposing her long-sleeved midriff top. There was something about the long
sleeves that made her exposed stomach that much more sexy. Black jeans
and a chain belt completed the outfit. Her boots were kicked off to
the side, something comfortingly familiar--she was most comfortable
barefoot, and had never worn shoes if she could avoid it.
Her hair was very bright against the jacket, her green eyes at
half-mast. She looked content and sleepy. He somehow felt she was just as
beautiful now, if not more so, then she had been in the red cocktail
dress. She looked so comfortable, as if she could get up now and disappear
to places only she knew, and it would be all right. He had a fierce
desire to press his ear over her heart to feel it beating and fall asleep
against the sound in the arms he'd never forgotten.
He shook his head as if doing so would quell the desire. She belonged
to another man now. What he was doing was wrong.
But being with her felt so right. She felt it too-he could tell.
"What's wrong?" she asked, sitting up. "So quiet."
He sighed, telling her the truth before he realized what he was doing.
"Just wondering how I managed to let you get away from me."
She sighed, not angry, not judgmental. "It wasn't either of our
faults. I went to school, you were assigned in Raccoon. Things
just...changed."
"But why did we let it happen?" He sat up, to better see her face.
She smirked now, and her tone was amused and bitter, but mostly
amused. "That Wong woman you were seeing for a while had nothing to do with
it, of course."
His face was caught between frowning at her and smiling over the
jealous edge in her voice. "We were all wrong for each other."
"I saw that woman. There was nothing wrong with her." Now the edge in
her voice had upgraded to a full set of jealous teeth. "Dark hair,
cool clothes, nice complexion, legs than went on forever. And let's not
forget that amazing pneumatic chest."
He shook his head and smiled. "Maybe Ada was beautiful, and maybe she
was built, but she did have flaws."
She arched a brow skeptically. "Oh yeah? Name one."
His eyes were drowning blue. "She wasn't you."
She drew back the smallest bit, her green eyes suspicious, searching
his face. The suspicion bled away, slowly being replaced by awe.
"I'm sorry, angel tears," he said, just above a whisper.
"For what?" she asked, just as softly.
"For this. Please forgive me," he said, drawing her close and
pressing his lips to hers.
She gasped softly against his mouth, her hands rising to push at him
gently, to say her usual, no. But something stopped her. It wasn't
quite the running-stag clamor of his heart beneath her hand, or the
almost-chastity of the kiss, just the warmth of his lips trembling against
hers, or the safe feeling that wrapped itself around her heart when he
was near-more like all of those things together. There was nothing but a
spring sky in his eyes-no secrets, no lies, no Machiavellian plots, and
something in her was tired of saying no.
He released her quickly, didn't try to hold her. He turned his face
away, ashamed of himself, of his weakness, of enjoying it. "I'm sorry,"
he repeated.
She reached for him, turning his face toward hers. "Thank you," she
said softly, her eyes twinkling.
"For what?" he asked, trying to smile.
"This has been the most perfect day off for me," she said softly.
"Just perfect."
He suddenly didn't have to try anymore.
~~~~~
"Grr!" Dorothy giggled, chomping the tiny plastic Gunsniper with the
tiny plastic Command Wolf. "Grr."
Roger smiled as he watched her, kissing the top of her head. "How was
class today?"
"Sucked, as usual," she said cheerfully. She positioned the gunsniper
on top of a nearby tissue box and made gun sounds before knocking over
the command wolf. Then she giggled.
Roger chuckled. "Where'd you get the toys?"
"Went to McDonald's on my break."
"Oh, that's right, today's your long break," Roger said, passing a
hand through her hair before heading into the study.
(You have no idea,) Dorothy thought, then went back to her battle.
**********
Kirei slipped into the night as if she were part of it, and maybe she
was. It welcomed her with open arms.
A howl perked her ears, startling her. She whirled to see not a wolf,
but a man, his face raised to the sky with an expression of perfect
happiness as he hooked his arms over the roll bars of his Jeep to better
bask in the moonlight.
He dropped back into the Jeep, disappearing from even Kirei's night
vision. The Jeep turned in an achingly lovely tight curve before
jagging down the street, leaving only the winking brake lights to sting the
eyes.
Kirei loped off. It seemed the entire city felt the need to howl.
~~~~~
There was something about stumbling home in the wilted remains of an
evening ensemble. It dogged the feet and weighed down the eyelids.
As Dorothy slid out of her shoes, losing two inches of height but
feeling much more like herself, a rush of courage came over her. Time to
tell, to fall on her knees and beg Roger's forgiveness. But the light
shone harshly on an empty bedroom, and empty bed, leaving Dorothy rather
empty.
Frightened and heartsick, she ran down the hall to Kirei's room, hose
slipping on the floor. She needed to collapse in Snowy's lap and cry,
tell her packmate everything. Snowy would make everything all better.
Again, she was greeted by an empty room. She sighed, a single tear
slipping past her nose, and trudged slowly back to her own bedroom,
brushing it away. If she'd told Snowy the truth from the beginning,
everything would already be okay.
Back in her own bedroom, Dorothy suddenly realized that Roger and
Snowy were probably together. The realization chilled her with fear, not
of being replaced but of her own weakness, which frightened her even
more. If they were beginning to think that three wasn't company anymore,
it would make it that much easier to give in to Leon's advances.
Chilled to the bone, Dorothy slammed the door and locked it, as if
doing so would keep her safe from the outside world. She kicked off the
hose, not caring if she snagged it.
"You're trapped by your own lies is what it is," a voice declared,
startling her. She whirled to see the intruder, but only her own eyes
stared back, from the full-length mirror on the back of the locked door.
"I'm serious," her reflection continued. "If you'd been honest with
Snowy at the precinct, or honest with Roger about the flowers, or
honest with Roger about your past with Leon..."
"Stop it." Dorothy clamped her hands over her ears.
When she uncovered them, the reflection was silent. She stared at it,
her green eyes wide and shocky. The red dress hurt her eyes. How
pretty it was! How lovely she felt in it!
Roger's voice echoed in her head, amidst the screaming already there.
"If you live in this house, you wear black."
She felt the tears sting her eyes and heard Snowy: "You know Roger
won't let you wear it unless it's black."
She slid to her knees, covering her face, still hiding, still hiding,
but the voices wouldn't stop.
"I would never, ever share you," Leon vowed.
"Roger doesn't own us. He's not our spouse, not our boss," her own
voice said.
"No," Dorothy choked out weakly, uncovering one eye to glare at the
mirror.
Her reflection stared back, just as frightened, hiding, a vision in a
russet dress.
"Who's the fairest one of all?" Dorothy whispered with a little laugh,
twin tears sliding from her eyes.
"You are," the reflection seemed to promise, "you are."
With a tiny cry, Dorothy curled to the floor and shifted, the dress
voicing its pain in an unheard tearing. It shredded on the floor, bright
as blood.
Dorothy rose from the carnage, a she-wolf the color of cinnamon and
gold. With a leap that caused reality to shimmer, she jumped onto the bed
and sprawled out, bright as a wound amidst the sheets.
~~~~~
The first indication that the dream had begun was the falling.
It was slow, like Alice's tumble down the rabbit hole, but she didn't
believe the ground's promise to catch her. A golden flash beneath her
caught her eyes, made her reach out. Her arms locked around solid
warmth; a body braced her and took the impact of the fall, carrying her
safely away in a smooth gait. Smooth, everything about him was so
smooth...
She slid down from his broad back and buried her face in his soft,
thick fur.
(I had a dream I was your hero,) he told her, one huge paw stroking
down her back, claws safely sheathed.
"Why me?" she asked, a chill wind ruffling the tattered skirt of the
red dress she was wearing.
(Why not?) was the answer.
She rose to her feet, and he walked alongside her. When she stopped,
so did he, his eyes fixed good-naturedly on her.
"What is it?" she asked.
(I don't want to walk behind you.) He twitched an ear.
She sighed. "Then you go in front."
(No, I don't want to lead.)
She squeezed her eyes shut tight. "What do you want?"
(My place is here.) He seemed to smile at her.
She started to walk again, and he stayed close beside her. She
tentatively reached a hand to touch his strong shoulder.
(Don't be afraid,) he told her, looking at her.
"No, I'm not, I...I just want to feel that you're there." She blushed,
trying not to meet his gaze, feeling the strength sliding beneath his
fur, his solid warmth.
(I am. I'll always be here. I want only to be here, beside you,
always.)
She relaxed, feeling suddenly safe.
(What are you thinking?) he asked, looking towards her.
She smiled. "That these dreams are not a stranger place than the one
I left behind."
~~~~~
She woke smiling.
She was cold, and realized suddenly it was because she was nude
beneath the sheets. She'd shifted back in the middle of the night. That it
had happened without her conscious control should have bothered her,
but for some reason it didn't.
The clock said 5:09. Psych class awaited. She groaned inwardly. It
had been stupid to go out on the date when she had to get up this
early.
She sat up, realizing she'd just called it a date.
~~~~~
Roger knocked on the doorjamb, eager to surprise Dorothy with the gift
he had for her before she left for class. But the redhead was already
gone. The clock said 6:06.
He smiled. What a little soldier. She'd gotten up even after she
hadn't been feeling well the night before. He was so proud of her...
~~~~~
"Colin."
A boy obediently raised his hand.
"Tova."
"Here." A girl looked up.
"Travis is here...Julie is here...Dorothy?"
Silence.
"Dorothy?"
Still no answer.
"Moving on. Jillian?..."
~~~~~
The week was shaping up to be one of the best of Leon S. Kennedy's
life. A date with his long-lost Dorothy, bleeding into a day off--could it
get any better than that?
Yes, it could, he realized upon taking a shortcut through the park.
She was sitting cross-legged on a bench, almost huddled in her
well-loved leather jacket. She had her elbows propped on her knees and her
chin propped on her hands. She was watching the penguins play, green
eyes intense but not smiling.
"RPD, put your hands where I can see 'em," he called, catching her
attention. She turned her head to look, her blood-bright hair moving as
if it had a life of its own, falling straight just above her shoulders.
"You're under arrest for being too damn good-looking," Leon continued,
reclining on the bench beside her.
It got a smile out of her. "This is why I hate you."
He cocked an eyebrow at her. "Oh?"
She explained: "I can never be in a bad mood when you're around. You
always jolly me out of it."
He grinned. "I live to serve. Why are you in a bad mood?"
"Oh." She waved a hand dismissively. "It's nothing you've got to
worry about. It's no big deal."
Everything concerning her was a big deal to him, but being a seasoned
observer of her, he knew that if he pushed her, she'd dig her claws in,
and they wouldn't get anywhere. He would wait for her to tell him.
"Say, don't you have class today?" he asked, arching a brow.
She turned back to the chunky flightless birds in front of them. "I
sort of skipped."
He shook his head. "Not a good habit."
"Oh, so now you're a truant officer as well?" she snapped.
Immediately her face fell and she turned toward him. "Oh, Leon, I'm sorry..."
"No worries, angel tears," he said, smiling gently. "It's okay."
The old nickname rang something in her, a little bell that she hadn't
realized had been silent for a while. She cocked her head to the side,
studying his face, waiting for things to go very wrong very fast, but
the comfortable feeling remained. Even the silence was warm and
familiar.
"What about you?" she asked, punching his arm lightly with a ghost of
a grin. "What are you up to today?"
He smiled beatifically. "It's my day off. And I'm thinking it should
be yours, too."
She looked the question at him, green eyes unsure.
"Really, Dorothy," he said, reaching to tip her chin up. "You deserve
a little fun."
She gave him a tiny smile. "Okay."
~~~~~
The little bell in her was ringing furiously half an hour later. Leon
would have swam a thousand oceans for that laugh.
"Did you see her face when you ordered? She was wondering what the
hell you could possibly have been thinking!"
"I was thinking about the free toy, of course," Leon snorted, as if
she should have known that. To prove his point, he opened one of the
Happy Meals and searched it.
He grinned. "All right, the Command Wolf! If we come back next week,
I can get the Raynos and I'll have a whole set." He teased her with the
small plastic zoid until she giggled.
"Silly." Dorothy took a crescent-shaped bite of her cheeseburger.
"Silly? Oh yeah?" He grinned, digging for the hamburger in one of the
meals. "Somebody obviously doesn't remember eating here every weekend
one summer because she was trying to collect Beanie Babies."
Dorothy laughed, not a vapid giggle or an unattractive bray, just her
way of letting the world know she was happy. Leon thought it was
beautiful.
"I remember. I can't believe someone would elbow a mother of two in
order to get Zip, the cat."
Leon smirked. "But I did it anyway."
She smiled. "My hero."
"Hey, I didn't do all the work. YOU stepped on her hand." He winked
at her.
She laughed. "Yeah, I did do that, didn't I? But we got the cat. I
still have him!"
The laughter was giving way to something warmer, something that wasn't
trapped in the past. "We made a good team," he said.
"Yeah." Her eyes were green-grey, dreamy, as if she were listening to
inner music. "You were more than my boyfriend. You were my best
friend."
He smiled. She was sweet enough to melt in the rain.
She suddenly picked up her vanilla milkshake, sipping. "All this
serious talk is making me tired. Let's make fun of the other patrons."
He grinned, couldn't help it. "Okay, let's start with you."
She wrinkled her nose, sticking out her tongue at him.
"Hey, don't stick out your tongue unless you intend to use it!" he
warned.
She snorted. "Leon!" She shook her head, smiling. Happy Meals,
indeed!
~~~~~
"You awake over there?" Leon stretched a hand over the grass and found
the smoothness of her palm, the cool thin band of a claddagh ring.
"Yeah..." She sighed. "I shouldn't have eaten that last sugar cookie.
It made me drowsy."
"Serves you right for stealing it from me," he chuckled.
"Mou (Jeez)," she snickered back. "Always on the job!"
"Nah, not today," Leon sighed contentedly, looking over at her. She'd
taken off her leather jacket and used it as a pillow for her head,
exposing her long-sleeved midriff top. There was something about the long
sleeves that made her exposed stomach that much more sexy. Black jeans
and a chain belt completed the outfit. Her boots were kicked off to
the side, something comfortingly familiar--she was most comfortable
barefoot, and had never worn shoes if she could avoid it.
Her hair was very bright against the jacket, her green eyes at
half-mast. She looked content and sleepy. He somehow felt she was just as
beautiful now, if not more so, then she had been in the red cocktail
dress. She looked so comfortable, as if she could get up now and disappear
to places only she knew, and it would be all right. He had a fierce
desire to press his ear over her heart to feel it beating and fall asleep
against the sound in the arms he'd never forgotten.
He shook his head as if doing so would quell the desire. She belonged
to another man now. What he was doing was wrong.
But being with her felt so right. She felt it too-he could tell.
"What's wrong?" she asked, sitting up. "So quiet."
He sighed, telling her the truth before he realized what he was doing.
"Just wondering how I managed to let you get away from me."
She sighed, not angry, not judgmental. "It wasn't either of our
faults. I went to school, you were assigned in Raccoon. Things
just...changed."
"But why did we let it happen?" He sat up, to better see her face.
She smirked now, and her tone was amused and bitter, but mostly
amused. "That Wong woman you were seeing for a while had nothing to do with
it, of course."
His face was caught between frowning at her and smiling over the
jealous edge in her voice. "We were all wrong for each other."
"I saw that woman. There was nothing wrong with her." Now the edge in
her voice had upgraded to a full set of jealous teeth. "Dark hair,
cool clothes, nice complexion, legs than went on forever. And let's not
forget that amazing pneumatic chest."
He shook his head and smiled. "Maybe Ada was beautiful, and maybe she
was built, but she did have flaws."
She arched a brow skeptically. "Oh yeah? Name one."
His eyes were drowning blue. "She wasn't you."
She drew back the smallest bit, her green eyes suspicious, searching
his face. The suspicion bled away, slowly being replaced by awe.
"I'm sorry, angel tears," he said, just above a whisper.
"For what?" she asked, just as softly.
"For this. Please forgive me," he said, drawing her close and
pressing his lips to hers.
She gasped softly against his mouth, her hands rising to push at him
gently, to say her usual, no. But something stopped her. It wasn't
quite the running-stag clamor of his heart beneath her hand, or the
almost-chastity of the kiss, just the warmth of his lips trembling against
hers, or the safe feeling that wrapped itself around her heart when he
was near-more like all of those things together. There was nothing but a
spring sky in his eyes-no secrets, no lies, no Machiavellian plots, and
something in her was tired of saying no.
He released her quickly, didn't try to hold her. He turned his face
away, ashamed of himself, of his weakness, of enjoying it. "I'm sorry,"
he repeated.
She reached for him, turning his face toward hers. "Thank you," she
said softly, her eyes twinkling.
"For what?" he asked, trying to smile.
"This has been the most perfect day off for me," she said softly.
"Just perfect."
He suddenly didn't have to try anymore.
~~~~~
"Grr!" Dorothy giggled, chomping the tiny plastic Gunsniper with the
tiny plastic Command Wolf. "Grr."
Roger smiled as he watched her, kissing the top of her head. "How was
class today?"
"Sucked, as usual," she said cheerfully. She positioned the gunsniper
on top of a nearby tissue box and made gun sounds before knocking over
the command wolf. Then she giggled.
Roger chuckled. "Where'd you get the toys?"
"Went to McDonald's on my break."
"Oh, that's right, today's your long break," Roger said, passing a
hand through her hair before heading into the study.
(You have no idea,) Dorothy thought, then went back to her battle.