I'll apologise in advance for this chapter. You'll see why. *headdesks*
~o~o~
As usual on a Thursday, Abel dropped by to help Matthew with his Physics homework. Today, it was all about electricity, and Matthew, to tell the truth, didn't understand one single letter of it. He got the idea and all, but when they got to magnetic flux and induction, he lost it. Abel explained it through drawings, and despite the fact he was a shitty artist, the subject matter actually turned from complete bullocks into something comprehensible.
"Do my doodles make it any clearer?" Abel asked after having explained magnetic flux in a piece of looped wire when a magnet is inserted. What he'd drawn was just a sloppy spiral-tunnel with arrows pointing in at one side representing the magnetic field, and another set of arrows around the other magnet to show how they influenced one another.
"Surprisingly, yeah. But this looks a bit like…"
"Don't." Abel deadpanned.
Matthew held his breath as if he'd let it slip anyway if he were to breathe out. He was about to burst out laughing too, and Abel's perfectly straight face wasn't helping in any way.
"Yes, I know how much this looks like a diagram from Fucking for Dummies." Abel flatly said, and Matthew couldn't hold his laugh in anymore.
"I wanted to say a wiggly worm having a seizure, but that's-" He paused to laugh again. "That's pretty accurate."
"Thanks. Now I think I can sort of pretend I might have experience with that too." He paused drawing for a few seconds and looked back at Matthew with a questioning look. "So sex looks like a worm having a seizure?" He frowned, thinking about it. He shook his head as though that would make the most idiotic mental image he had go away. Since it didn't, he just tried to look not too disturbed.
Through snorts, sniggers and even giggles, Matthew managed to so a few exercises, just to get that finally over with. When he scribbled down the last letters, Abel yanked the notebook away from under his pen, and squinted to read it.
"Speaking of seizures; am I going blind or is your handwriting getting worse every second?"
"I think you should blame your eyes."
"No, really. Is this Chinese? You should become a doctor." He turned the notebook from left to right, and to the left again, turned it upside down, but still scratched behind his ear.
"I was going to."
"You've got the handwriting."
"That's rude."
"Oh, Doctor Jones." Abel said in a mocking high-pitched voice. "There seems to be a problem with this prescription. I can't read what the fuck it says."
Matthew snatched his notebook back and slapped Abel to the back of the head with it.
"I can't help it you write like an old man."
"Better than a spastic three-year-old."
"Look how slant it is." Matthew pointed at a few notes Abel had written down. "And it sometimes tilts to the left as well because you write with your left whenever it suits you."
"You would've been staring at my hand if I'd written with my right."
"It's not fair that you're ambidextrous and I am...indextrous."
"Yeah. You can't write for shit. I hope you're better at sewing than you are at writing, otherwise there'll be people with very interesting-looking stitches." Abel rubbed that in with a victorious smile on his face.
Matthew slapped him with the notebook again and put it in his bag.
"Don't worry, Matty." Abel said. He leaned against Matthew's back and cupped both his boyfriend's hands in his own. "I adore you and both your clumsy hands."
Matthew glanced over his shoulder back at Abel with what he hoped would look at least a bit like the frown he wanted. Unfortunately, his expression looked more like he was hiding the fact he was about to smile with a pout. No point in that, since he was.
He stood up from his chair and pulled Abel along to his bed. It turned out a bit awkwardly, with a deal of near-tripping and falling over each other because of Abel being too lazy to actually move his feet. The bear-hug Matthew got as a result of that was the best, though. He laughed and tried to turn around in Abel's arms, but that was made impossible by some skilled tickling.
Matthew was sure he had practised on that. He didn't know how, but he wasn't this good in Paris. Or his own non-existent immunity against tickling was just getting worse.
He hoped that wasn't the case.
In a few seconds, Abel stopped the teasing to let him turn around. He took Matthew's glasses off and put them on the bedside table. Matthew settled in a comfortable position against him, head resting on his boyfriend's shoulder and his arm around his chest. He stroked small circles, feeling the muscles and ribs.
Abel kissed his forehead, letting his hands wandered off to Matthew's waist and back. His hands were quite big and warm, the slow, circular strokes very gentle and relaxing. Matthew hummed, starting to feel a bit mellow, like he was about to doze off.
"Hey guys, di-Oh, god!" Alfred slapped his hand in front of his eyes within a second after bursting into the room. "Ow, my brain. My poor eyes. I didn't need to see that. I'm blind. Oh, my god." He complained.
"What were you trying to say?" Matthew asked.
"Dinner's ready. Get downstairs, you two." Alfred managed to force out, still covering his eyes. "Oh, man. I'm not hungry anymore. Buaaah." He whined as he walked away with the cold shivers running up and down his spine.
"Well, that's off to a good start." Matthew put his glasses back on and got up, but got yanked straight back by two arms tightly around his waist. He was only released after getting nuzzled into the neck, which had him once again hoping that no one had heard the very un-manly noises he'd just made.
As they rushed downstairs, Matthew started to worry. Something out of the ordinary about today, was the fact that Ellen had invited Abel to stay for dinner. She had done so quite reluctantly, after Jonathan had managed to convince her that it would be a good idea for her to open up and get to know their sons' boyfriends a little better.
Arthur had been over two days before that, since he was probably the smoothest start. He was well-mannered, kind when he had to, and everything had gone as expected. With Arthur being the perfect son-in-law any mother could wish for, the bar had been set very high, and Alfred had scored a good deal of points with his mother.
And Matthew knew that all too well. There wasn't a chance that Abel would suddenly make a 180 degree turn and become a well-spoken, friendly young man. True, he'd promised he'd do his best to behave, but that was probably bullshit. Big fat chance he'd kept his fingers crossed when he said that.
And that was all Matthew could do, really: Keep his fingers crossed and hope for the best.
Everyone sat down at the dinner table, and the first thing Ellen noticed was Alfred glaring daggers and poison at Matthew and Abel from across the table. She looked back and forth between the three, and gave Jonathan a questioning look to see if he had a clue of what was going on. He didn't, judging by the shrug he gave in response.
"Ew." Alfred said dryly without changing his irritated expression.
"Don't be a baby." Abel responded.
"Alfred. Stop it." Ellen said immediately. "And you two: behave. I won't have you making Alfred scream."
"But we didn't even-" Matthew started.
"And no playing footsies under the table." Ellen warned.
Like they had had even considered that. What was she thinking? Whatever it was, the level of suspicion in his mother's head did absolutely nothing to calm Matthew's worries. Nevertheless, everything was going well so far. Nothing to worry about. It was just the same as always: Everyone was quietly eating and listening to Alfred's uncontrollable chattering about last Saturday's baseball game.
"How much we enjoy listening to how you were the hero of the field again," Ellen interrupted Alfred's baseball-story. "I think that's about enough of your hobbies."
"Speaking of which; what are your hobbies, Abel?" Jonathan awkwardly asked, at the sheer lack of anything better too ask. Everyone knew a thing or two about Abel already since he and Matthew had been friends for a long time already. Strangely enough, they had never asked about his hobbies to date, and neither had he mentioned them himself.
"I play football. You know, the kind with the round ball." He empathised for Alfred. "And I do gymnastics."
"Gymnastics? Really?" Alfred asked. "What are you? A girl? Do you also wear a leotard then?"
"In competitions, yeah. Wanna try one on?" Abel asked. There was his smirk surfacing already. Bad sign.
"What? No!"
"I mean, you can't have mine because you're too much of a chubby little shortstack, but Judithe has a few that will look great on you." He said with a sly and outright mean grin.
Matthew sighed desperately and slapped his forehead. He could already see where this was going, and it wasn't going the right way.
"I'm not wearing a leo! Piss off!"
"Who knows, maybe that's Arthur's secret kink."
"Dude! Ew!"
"Although I think teal and green aren't really your colours."
"Maybe yours. Oh, no wait. Your leos should all be hot pink."
"Al, cut it out." Matthew hissed.
"Piss off, shut up."
"Now, guys." Jonathan interrupted the conversation. "Mind the language. We've got a guest."
Abel snorted, hanging a little bit too relaxed in his chair. "You've never seen Judithe boiling. Compared to what she flaps out sometimes, this is suitable for toddlers."
"Do you do that at school as well, because that'll drive your teachers nuts." Ellen said.
"They don't notice a thing if you wave it in front of their faces." Alfred huffed. "Like when half the class is obviously dating."
Oh, no. That had some alarm bells ringing in Matthew's head. Paris was a dangerous subject.
"So they didn't notice a thing in Paris either?" She asked, hooking into the subject.
"Nope." Abel replied.
"Only when we were an hour or so away from home." Matthew added.
Ellen raised an eyebrow. "Really? What are they, brain-dead?"
Abel sniggered. "Beats me. There was some stuff they really shouldn't have missed."
"Such as?"
"Antonio and Romano were walking around holding hands half the time. And they weren't really keeping the flirting to a minimum either."
Alfred sniggered. "Yeah, and then Trouillefou didn't want Elizabetha and Roderich to share a room because 'imagine what could happen'. Yeah right. Those two are as innocent as a human can get."
"That was pretty stupid, yeah." Abel admitted. "Oh, or that action Ludwig and Feliciano pulled off."
"Have I missed something?" Matthew asked.
"Nah, not really. Remember that Italian restaurant we went to? They did the cliché-thing with the spaghetti."
"Oh, important detail:" Alfred added. "They were almost right in front of Knox and Bennett."
"Okay, I get it. Your teachers need glasses." Jonathan pushed his own glasses back up his nose right after he said this.
"Or a seeing-eye dog, for that matter. Knox' glasses can't get a stronger perception, but he still has mole-vision." Abel replied, remembering another evidence of their inattention. "And that just a small portion that was smashed into their face which they still managed to miss. Some of our classmates bought themselves co-"
"Don't you dare." Alfred spat.
"Okay, I won't." Abel said, innocently raising his hands.
"What do I not know?" Ellen asked. It was quite obvious that it had something to do with Alfred, and she wanted to know.
"Nothing!" Alfred shouted.
In response to a mouthed 'what?' Abel whispered something to Matthew, whose mouth fell open. He turned slightly red, and covered his face in his hands with a great sense of dread.
"What?! Can I just un-hear that?" Matthew said, very uncomfortable. He briefly looked at Alfred, and tried to get the thought out of his head. Apparently, his oh, so innocent younger twin had been so clever to buy some...supplies for the night in Paris that Matthew had experienced as slightly traumatising. The only comfort he found in knowing this was that at least they had been doing it safe. And that they weren't the only ones in their class who'd been 'busy' after returning to their rooms.
Alfred managed his foulest look to date, and shot it right at his older twin. "Like you've got nothing to hide."
"Actually...I don't."
"Oh, yeah right. With that guy? Come on." Alfred retorted, pointing at Abel.
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"Hey, you're even older than me! How do you expect me to believe you haven't-."
"Unlike you, I'm not a slut!" Matthew blurted out right before his younger brother could finish that sentence.
"Slut?! What the hell, Matt? You're just a nun." Alfred defended himself.
"Wait a minute." Ellen butted in again. "Alfred? You and Arthur have what?!"
Accompanied with a pissed-off growl, Alfred smashed his fists onto the table. "We had sex! In case the entire world didn't know yet!" He shouted at his mother.
"You what?!" Ellen shrieked again. "You're not even 18!"
"Ellen, you've got absolutely no room to talk in any way." Jonathan said, probably a little louder than he'd hoped as the only thing that brought was another very awkward silence. Not a very long one at that, because it took the three teenagers only seconds to get very, very disturbed. Parent-sex. Great. Perfect.
Gross.
"Oh, man. That's disgusting! I'm just gonna have to pretend I didn't just hear that! Oh, blegh! I wanna puke." Alfred rattled with his ears covered.
"Ew. Ewewewewew. Ew. Too much info." Matthew whispered while shuddering like a chihuahua.
"Aaaand, there goes my appetite." Abel waved into the general direction of the window. "Oh, Christ I'm gonna heave." He mumbled right after that.
"I'm not that old." Ellen hissed. This time it was her who was stuck embarrassed. On the other hand, now that that was out there, it was another barrier out of the way. It surprised her how much Alfred was actually like her. Whether she liked it or not, he was like her at that age. She didn't know about Matthew yet, but she was quite sure he was just the same. There were a few other things she wanted to know, the first one being...
"How do you guys even do that with sex anyway?" She asked, out of the blue.
Abel's eyes instantly grew wide as dinner plates and had the toughest time not spewing his drink all over the place. Matthew, as well as the others, nearly choked on their food.
"Mom!" He shouted, feeling like melting through the ground instantly.
Abel cleared his throat a few times, repressing the shock a little. "The 'how' is not really a subject for at the dinner table. Or a subject at all, for that matter."
"I only asked." Ellen said, mildly offended.
"Well, what do you think of, you know, erm…not?" Abel replied to the question.
"So you two haven't ever…?"
Matthew was coloured bright red as the embarrassing conversation had proceeded. How many more people did he have to convince they hadn't had sex?! Francis, Alfred, and now even his mother was questioning it. In what way could this get any worse?
Since he wasn't about to answer, Abel took over with a little more cool and collected air than before. "If he's monogamous, I can assure you he's a virgin." He said blankly.
Okay, that was how. "Too direct." Matthew hissed.
"Hm." Abel shrugged, not exactly seeing what was wrong about his comment, or otherwise ignoring it.
"Are you?" Alfred asked Abel.
"As far as I know, yes."
"Okay, change of subject, please. Alfred, you too." Jonathan interrupted before anyone else could say anything.
"What did I do?" He sneered, more than annoyed. "You actually believe that?"
The urge to slam his face into the table became harder and harder to resist. Matthew had mentally prepared for a conversation going into the wrong direction, but this was going into the worst direction possible. The only thing missing to make the disaster complete was a food-fight.
When Abel sneaked his dessert spoon under the table, Matthew wanted to drop unconscious at the spot.
Alfred was still chattering on about how it wasn't fair that he always got blamed for everything, until..."I think you guys need some new glasses too, because there's no way in hell those two haven't fu-"-Splat! A small clot of mashed potato was shot clean against his forehead. It slowly dripped down, and while Alfred was steaming with rage, the rest held their breaths. Save for Abel, who was sniggering.
Devoid of any hesitation or rational thinking, Alfred took a full dinner spoon of mashed potato and shot it into Abel's face. "Gotcha!"
Without a second thought, he repeated Alfred's action and hit him straight in the nose this time, having some trail down his glasses to boot. And Alfred did the same thing again.
Matthew knew he shouldn't even have thought about it. He regretted it so much. He knew those thoughts were dangerous. The only hiding place he had were his hands, which was exactly where he hid his face in utter misery. This wasn't happening. This was not happening!
He looked at his father with an ultimately lost expression, but got the exact same look back. The both of them stood up from their chairs and at the exact same moment, bear-hugged the two infantile food-fighters from behind in such a way that their arms were restrained against their sides.
"Whah! Dad! Lemme go!" Alfred tried to wiggle out, but failed ultimately.
"Matty?" Abel was luckily a lot calmer than Alfred. "I can't say this is particularly convenient."
"You flinging food at my brother isn't particularly convenient either." Matthew scolded in a rather bitter tone.
In a few seconds, the two were ready to be released, and got a smack on the back of the head before Jonathan and Matthew sat back down.
"Get cleaned up, you two." Ellen scolded Alfred and Abel. Both had clots of each other's dinner on their face.
While they were gone and Ellen brought the plates to the kitchen, Matthew dropped his head onto the table in pure misery. Why did things always have to go wrong with Abel and Alfred in one room? Just why?
His father patted him on the shoulder, but somehow, that gesture made him feel even worse.
"For what it's worth, Matthew."
"Hm?"
"It was worse when your mother took me home for the first time."
"Geez, thanks." He moaned and dropped his head back onto the table.
~o~o~
This is going to kill Matthew one day. Sorry, Matty, but you're just too adorable when you're awkward.
Please review if you like. Or not. Please just...forget you ever read this. Please.