Sunlight slowly crept up the tangled covers and the couple on the grand four poster bed. Quatre woke as it slanted into his eyes through the drawn but not completely shut curtains. For a moment his sleep shrouded brain wondered where he was. In the corner of his vision, Relena's ribcage rose and fell in a serene rhythm. As the sleep cleared from his mind Quatre's lips broke into a smile. She was so peaceful in sleep. He did not give a thought to the tangle her hair had become, or the cute way her legs were hopelessly twisted in the sheets. Quatre simply watched her. He watched her draw deep breaths through slightly parted lips. He watched her eyelids flicker as she dreamed. He watched as she buried the side of her face slightly deeper into the pillow and the way her body tightened just a little right before she sighed in her sleep. A deep feeling of love, and an over whelming contentment took hold of Quatre. 'This is what I was missing. This right here...waking with her in the morning...sharing our days and nights...her, just her.'

Quatre continued to watch until her eyes opened. She was laying on her side, facing him and he had rolled up onto his elbow. Relena stiffened, but relaxed quickly. Looking down, Relena gave small kicks until her legs were untangled and she could modestly pull the sheet up to cover her nakedness. Sensing that Relena was just a little uncomfortable, Quatre rolled onto his back, breaking his vigil.

"Good morning, Relena."

"Morning...I uh,..."

"Go ahead and take a shower if you want. I'm gonna head back to my room and take one myself. Meet you at breakfast?"

The way relief spread through his senses, and the fact that she nearly scurried to the bathroom wrapped firmly in whatever had been closest to hand made Quatre nervous. He had never been with a woman before, but if he was not feeling self-conscious why would she. 'Maybe it's normal for women? Or am I just weird because of the training and conditioning? Modesty aside, why would she hurry to the bathroom. It's like she feels guilty...Allah, please don't let her feel guilty about the most wonderful thing that's happened to me in my life. Wouldn't I sense if it was guilt? Maybe...Is something wrong? Was I...was it not good for her? Ah, I'm so confused...'

Quatre stared at the bathroom door where Relena had disappeared. While his mind had been spinning with doubt and worry the shower had come on and had now been running several minutes. He moved in a daze, still puzzling over what he was sure was strange behavior on Relena's part, slowly gathering his clothes and pulling them on. Quatre had no word for the emotion that surged through him as he stepped out of Relena's room. The door seemed to echo in his mind as it clicked closed. Something was telling him not to leave, to go back in and talk with her, to do something, anything, as long as it was not what Quatre was actually doing. Quatre shook the feeling away. ' It's not like my room is far away...Now I'm just being ridiculous. We'll talk at breakfast. By then she'll have had time to...do whatever it is females do about whatever it is she's being...whatever she's being...geez...that wasn't confusing at all. Crystal clear.'

-oOoOo-

He had taken longer in the shower than he had planned. Quatre's mind had tripped all over itself and refused to allow him to relax. Rationalizing only seemed to make things worse. Telling himself he would talk to Relena at breakfast should have made him feel better, but Quatre's mind kept replaying the scene from her bedroom. Each time it played behind his eyes her reaction to waking in bed with him seemed more and more distorted by Quatre's own doubts and fears.

Worry and doubt had slowly given way to annoyance. Last night had been sublime, a reward for years of patience and weeks of understanding. It had not even been his idea! Quatre had not considered that being with Relena that way would happen last night. He had been happy. Happy with the way things were going between them and wanted to shar that happiness with Relena. Okay, so maybe he had had small doubts, but it was supposed to be a product of over-analyzing. Still, even without the unplanned intimacy, last night had been special for him and her less than appealing reaction this morning was ruining it.

The thought that maybe Quatre should have declined on the grounds that it was happening maybe a bit too soon conflicted him even more. As a gentleman he could have possibly handled the situation a little better. Like the time that drunken heiress had come on to him at a business associate's wedding. He had been a gentleman then, but Relena was no drunken heiress. She was the woman he loved. Quatre was simply a man in love. He would not change what had happened between he and Relena last night for anything. Knowing that and thinking he should have declined anyway made Quatre feel dirty somehow. Hence the extra long shower.

His feelings were slipping closer and closer to the realm of anger as Quatre walked toward the breakfast nook off his dining room. He slipped completely into anger as Relena refused to meet his eyes. Unable to help the small bits of emotion that leaked out, Quatre jerked the chair out sharply and clanked his silverware together when he picked up his fork. Because he was watching, he saw Relena flinch slightly at the sharp ringing sound. Helping himself to a stack of pancakes, Quatre decided to see how long the unusual silence would stretch between them. Relena ate slowly, not lost in thought if Quatre was any judge of such things, but still only looking down at her plate. What small hold Quatre did have over his present anger continued to stretch until it was paper thin. Relena was done eating and simply sitting there, staring into her coffee cup. She raised it for a sip and looked out the window. She was looking anywhere, but at him. His hold finally snapped.

"That's enough. Something happened between last night and this morning to make you uncomfortable with me and I want to know what it is."

It was a demand, not a statement, not a question, but a bald demand with the anger he was feeling coloring every word. Relena flinched and her eyes went wide at his tone. Very few people had ever heard Quatre speak as he just had to her. His own eyes were sparking, lightning over the sea, but Relena could not see it. Still, even startled, she would not meet his gaze.

"I'm waiting, Relena. I deserve an explanation."

"What do you want me to say, Quatre?" Relena queried, her own voice holding a hint of heat and a lot of embarrassment. "I like you, but I don't think this is working? It's not you, it's me? I can't help feeling that last night was a mistake? I honestly wish that I could love you, and I've been trying to, but I can't? It's all true but none of it makes me feel any better. I'm hurting you, and I hate it because you don't deserve it. How am I supposed to tell you that I'm not happy being with you, that I can't seem to let go of my feelings for Heero, as unfounded as they logically are, even though you are doing everything right? How am I supposed to explain that I feel horrible about last night, because somewhere inside me it feels like I've cheated on my own heart? Is that what you want to hear, Quatre? You tell me."

Relena's voice and anger had risen in crescendo until now they were a match for his own. The anger, anger at himself, for allowing this situation, at her for deceiving him all this time, it all boiled under the surface of his skin. Violence, so unlike Quatre, turned the edges of his vision red.

"I don't believe you. I don't believe it was all a lie. You seemed, no, you were happy enough until this morning."

"I wasn't happy! I was content. You're easy to be with Quatre, we're good friends, and I was trying so hard. I told you from the beginning. I was up front with you about my feelings then, and at first I thought it was working, but I just...gods I don't know. All I really know is I don't want to be doing this. I don't want to fight with you."

"So, what? That's it? You aren't happy but invite me into your room anyway and then..." Quatre choked on his anger and pain. He could not. Could not say aloud what he knew was inevitable now. Skipping over the phrase, he grit his teeth and forced himself to continue. "Maybe you should book a hotel room for the rest of your stay on the colony."

"I already have."

Hurt and anger were raging through Quatre, blinding him. Both he and Relena had stopped shouting at this point having both clamped tightly a hold of themselves. Her words were barely whispers and tear streaks ran from her eyes to her chin, leaving just the faintest track in whatever cosmetics she had applied. They were both standing, but Relena was holding her arms against her chest as though to protect herself. She was also hunched over a little, as though she was the ancient god Atlas, trying to shoulder the weight of the world. Quatre, on the other hand, was nearly vibrating with the need to either loose his pain in a piercing keen or utterly destroy something with his bare hands. His whole body was tight, straining, his hands tight fists and his muscles screaming in protest at having to remain rigidly by his sides. Even the relief of grinding his teeth together was denied.

"I'm leaving. Quatre, I'm..."

"DON'T!" It came out shouted. Relena took an involuntary step away from him. Quatre gathered what was left of his pride and used it to center himself. A colossal effort of will blended with the pain and served to moderate his voice. A few minutes. That was all he needed. Then, when she was gone, he could explode then. Minutes. "Just go, please. I don't want to hear it. I can't hear it."

He had not been able to say it with his eyes open and so had closed them. Quatre had never liked watching her walk away from him, and now the sight would hurt in a whole new way. Maybe it was cowardly, but he could not deal with anymore pain right now. For a few seconds there was silence, then a sob and the swishing of Relena's dress as she turned to walk away. The measured footsteps never came. Instead Quatre heard the quick, staccato beat of Relena's heels as she ran. She fled from him, from the pain inside of him they both knew she had caused. That he had allowed. Violence, barely contained, still boiling under his skin, rage and hurt, crippling, consuming, it was all eating away at him. His heart was a crushed, throbbing center of some emotion beyond pain. Quatre's mind could not supply an adequate word to describe it. Quatre's mind supplied nothing at all, his higher, rational thought unable to function through the pure intensity of his feelings. So stood there, frozen, eyes closed, vibrating, throbbing, unable to even pray for guidance or relief. A prisoner of his shattered heart.