Well, the quarter is yet young, which means that I can still delude myself
into thinking that I have time to write (even though I really don't).
Disclaimers: Gundam Wing and its characters do not belong to me. Warnings: shounen ai, language in later parts, Relena bashing? (I'm not trying to, but some people will hate her anyway.)
Courtship Rituals
By Rapunzel
Part 2: The Flower Fiasco
Heero stood in front of the door to Relena's residence, well dressed and neat, nervously running over a checklist in his mind. Duo had told him that women often liked guys to make the first move, and so Heero had called Relena and asked if she wanted to go out to dinner with him (the suggestion of where to go also having been provided by Duo). She had agreed so promptly that Heero wondered if she had been waiting for some time for him to make such a suggestion. And now, there he was, not really sure what he was doing.
Dating Relena had not really been something that had occurred to him. Of course, dating anybody had never really occurred to him before, but that was natural, given the fact that he had lived most of his life in near isolation. Still, he couldn't quite believe he was here. Apparently, this was what normal people did, this whole ritual called dating. /What a lot of fuss to be normal,/ he thought sourly. Still, Duo assured him that this was what Relena expected of him, and he didn't want to disappoint her.
Taking a deep breath, Heero ran through the checklist Duo had given him again. Girls liked it when you were punctual; he was here a little bit early. Appearances were important; one must dress for the occasion. He was dressed in the suit he normally wore when required to attend formal affairs, which happened very rarely. He'd even asked Duo to help him with his hair, which never looked neat, but Duo had told him that he looked just fine with it as it was, and the Relena was probably attracted by the "wild" look. He had the restaurant all picked out, and he was feeling mildly pleased with himself. Punctual, well dressed, prepared, bringing flowers...
Shimatta! He'd forgotten the flowers!
Most people would not have considered this to be such a disaster, but Heero's war-trained mind had equated this outing to a mission, and it was unthinkable to go into a mission without all the proper materials. What was he to do? He hadn't arrived so early that he had time to run back and buy a bouquet. But how else was he supposed to get flowers in time?
The answer was right there, all around him. The garden, of course.
Heero turned away from the door to survey the garden. He had looked at it before with the eye of one doing reconnaissance, but now he paused, trying not to think about what cover various bushes might provide, but instead about what types of flowers growing in the beds would be considered most attractive by Relena. The front beds were mostly planted with pansies, which he quickly discarded as a flower choice. They were very pretty, but they didn't have the long stems needed for a bouquet. The same was true of the impatiens that surrounded a nearby tree. Leaving the front steps and trekking further into the garden, Heero found himself discarding more and more choices. The blossoms on the trees were too small. The daffodils might have worked, but they were already wilting. He found himself beginning to get discouraged.
Something nagged at his memory. Duo had told him a little about flowers and what ones were preferable. Heero paused, trying to remember. What was it he had said? Roses. Apparently, women found roses preferable to other flowers. He had no idea why, but that was what Duo had said. He trusted Duo not to give him misinformation, and Duo knew more about these things than he did.
With his mission firmly in mind, Heero strode through the garden, looking for roses.
~*~*~
"Heero! How good to see you!" Relena gushed as she opened the door to admit him. Heero decided that she must be very pleased to see him indeed, since she had opened the door herself instead of letting Pagan do it.
"Relena." He nodded politely to her. She looked a little disappointed at the greeting, but her smile brightened an instant later when Heero showed her the hand that he had kept behind his back, holding out the five roses he had cut.
"Oh, Heero, you shouldn't have!" She reached out a hand to take them, then recoiled slightly. "Ow!"
"What's wrong?" he asked.
"They've got thorns," she said, sounding rather surprised. "And they aren't wrapped in anything."
Heero frowned. Duo had neglected to mention how the flowers were to be done up when presented, so he hadn't done anything. Apparently, that was the wrong choice.
Relena caught sight of his face, and hurriedly gave him a reassuring smile. "It was very sweet of you," she said, reaching out to take the roses from him gingerly.
She had barely removed the flowers from his hands when a screeching sound broke out. Whirling around and reaching automatically for a gun, Heero was confronted with a woman wearing gloves and very dirty clothing, who was yelling at him furiously.
"Villain!" she shrieked. "Vandal! How dare you touch my flowers!"
"Your flowers?" Heero and Relena both chorused.
"Yes!" the unknown woman cried. "Well, that is to say, _your_ flowers, Ms. Relena," she amended with a slight bow towards Relena. "But I'm the one who looks after them!"
/Ah,/ Heero thought, finally able to identify the woman. /This must be Relena's gardener./
There was no time to congratulate himself on discovering her identity, as she was already on him. Whirling around furiously to face him, she went into a rapid tirade. "What do you think you're doing, going out and cutting my flowers?! Do you have any idea how much work it takes to keep them perfect like that?! You didn't even clip them properly! Now they'll never bud the way I want them to!"
"You clipped these from my garden?" Relena asked, looking confused.
Heero nodded slightly, hoping that she would intervene and get this crazy woman away from him. However, she simply scowled at him. "I thought they looked familiar," she said, managing to sound both disappointed and disdainful at the same time.
"I should hope so," the gardener said. "I've spent years pruning and tending those roses! Do you have any idea how delicate that variety is?! If you've damaged them permanently, I'll-"
But she didn't get a chance to say what she would do to him, for Relena, who had been studying the roses closely, suddenly dropped them with a shriek and leapt back. "Bug!" she squealed. "There's bugs on them!"
The gardener stopped her verbal barrage and turned to look at her employer in disbelief. "What?"
"Little green bugs!" Relena cried, staring at the roses on the floor as if they were something slimy and disgusting.
The gardener's nostrils flared. "Aphids on _my_ roses?!" she cried furiously, striding over and seizing one of the unfortunate flowers from the floor. After inspecting them closely, she once again turned on Heero. "Did you plant them there?!"
"Why the hell would I do that?!" Heero demanded, rather fed up with the whole thing. "I'm sorry I cut your damn roses; take them back if you like!"
"There's no point now; they're already cut!" she responded furiously. "Aphids on my roses!" she repeated furiously to herself as she stalked towards the door. "Unheard-of! Something must be done!" And then she was gone, as suddenly as she'd appeared.
Sighing heavily, Heero reached down and collected the roses off the floor. He considered offering them to Relena again, but judging by her reaction to them already, he doubted that she'd take them. And the occasion for which they'd been collected was ruined. Even if he and Relena did straighten things out and decide to keep going, there was no way they could make it to the restaurant at the time he had specified in the reservation. The evening seemed to have been shot to hell anyway, so he simply straightened, roses in hand, and said, "Goodnight, Relena."
She made no move or gesture to stop him, just watched him walk out the door, roses still in hand.
~*~*~
"For future reference, Heero," Duo said, "it's bad form to give a girl roses that you cut from her garden. If you get them from your garden, it's fine, but not from hers." He looked up briefly from his task to give Heero a serious look.
Heero grunted and endured the slight pain as Duo bent back to work, swabbing the cuts made by the thorns on the roses with antiseptic. "You failed to mention that earlier," he muttered, feeling surly.
Duo gave him a wry smile as he dug around in the first aid kit for band aids. "It never even occurred to me that this might happen. But I guess it should have."
"Hn," Heero snorted, looking away. He was still in an exceedingly bad mood after the evening's events, and recounting the whole thing to Duo had only made things more embarrassing, even though Duo hadn't said much, but had simply gone and fetched the first aid kit to tend to his hands.
"Come on," Duo said, observing his distemper. "It's not so bad, really. I'm sure Relena will forgive you. Just make sure not to let that gardener come near you with any sharp objects."
It was meant to be a joke, but Heero simply scowled at his roommate. He was in no mood for humor, and he wanted Duo to know it. Apparently, Duo got the message, for he didn't speak again until his task was done.
"There," Duo said, applying the last band aid. "All done."
Heero pulled his hands back and studied them. Duo had used the minimum number of band aids to cover the cuts made by the thorns. "You didn't need to do this," Heero reminded him.
Duo waved that away. "I know a few cuts seem pretty minor, especially to people like us, but it can't hurt."
"Hn," Heero muttered again. Crossing to the table where he had dropped the unfortunate bunch of flowers, he picked them up, careful of the thorns this time, and threw them on the couch next to Duo. "Here," he said.
Duo looked surprised. "You're giving them to me?"
"Well, no one else seems to want them!" Heero snapped, then regretted it almost instantly as a flash of hurt disappointment crossed Duo's face. It was gone in an instant, but it made Heero's night seem like even more of a failure. "I'm going to bed," he said shortly, and stalked out of the room, leaving Duo still sitting on the couch next to the first aid kit and five rather battered looking roses.
Tbc...
Alright, I've never done this before, but I've seen other people do it, so I'm taking a shot at it. So many people reviewed and gave me great feedback that I couldn't just let it pass. So, I'll attempt to address the reviews individually.
Mazza2869: Thank you for the critical feedback. Yes, I know description is my weak point. It always has been. I'll try better, I promise!
ally127: I'm afraid that I'm a die hard 1x2x1 fan, so yes, this is definitely going to be shounen ai. There are very few of my Gundam Wing fics that aren't. I hope you'll like it in spite of that, and I am not at all offended. Everyone has their preferred pairings.
Camillian: Thank you for the comments. I admit that I'm not much of a 1xR fan either, though I don't loath Relena the way some fans do. And I hope you'll find the next parts at least somewhat amusing, since I think there's plenty of opportunity for comedy in this story.
Chibi-libra810: I didn't think Relena was so bad in that chapter, and I'm trying not to write her as completely evil, but of course, the inner 2x1 fangirl has a slightly different perspective. I'm sorry you didn't like the chapter length. I put the chapter breaks where the muse tells me to, but I'll try to keep the chapters at least four pages in length.
Regina: Thanks for the feedback. I think this one's pretty much taken off, so I shouldn't be abandoning it any time soon.
noire: If only it worked that way... If I paid as much attention to the muse as she demands, I would never get anything done. Still, work induces her to write, so hopefully I'll be able to update fairly often.
Thanks to everyone else who reviewed. I didn't have time to get to all of you, but I do appreciate your comments, and I hope you liked this chapter.
Disclaimers: Gundam Wing and its characters do not belong to me. Warnings: shounen ai, language in later parts, Relena bashing? (I'm not trying to, but some people will hate her anyway.)
Courtship Rituals
By Rapunzel
Part 2: The Flower Fiasco
Heero stood in front of the door to Relena's residence, well dressed and neat, nervously running over a checklist in his mind. Duo had told him that women often liked guys to make the first move, and so Heero had called Relena and asked if she wanted to go out to dinner with him (the suggestion of where to go also having been provided by Duo). She had agreed so promptly that Heero wondered if she had been waiting for some time for him to make such a suggestion. And now, there he was, not really sure what he was doing.
Dating Relena had not really been something that had occurred to him. Of course, dating anybody had never really occurred to him before, but that was natural, given the fact that he had lived most of his life in near isolation. Still, he couldn't quite believe he was here. Apparently, this was what normal people did, this whole ritual called dating. /What a lot of fuss to be normal,/ he thought sourly. Still, Duo assured him that this was what Relena expected of him, and he didn't want to disappoint her.
Taking a deep breath, Heero ran through the checklist Duo had given him again. Girls liked it when you were punctual; he was here a little bit early. Appearances were important; one must dress for the occasion. He was dressed in the suit he normally wore when required to attend formal affairs, which happened very rarely. He'd even asked Duo to help him with his hair, which never looked neat, but Duo had told him that he looked just fine with it as it was, and the Relena was probably attracted by the "wild" look. He had the restaurant all picked out, and he was feeling mildly pleased with himself. Punctual, well dressed, prepared, bringing flowers...
Shimatta! He'd forgotten the flowers!
Most people would not have considered this to be such a disaster, but Heero's war-trained mind had equated this outing to a mission, and it was unthinkable to go into a mission without all the proper materials. What was he to do? He hadn't arrived so early that he had time to run back and buy a bouquet. But how else was he supposed to get flowers in time?
The answer was right there, all around him. The garden, of course.
Heero turned away from the door to survey the garden. He had looked at it before with the eye of one doing reconnaissance, but now he paused, trying not to think about what cover various bushes might provide, but instead about what types of flowers growing in the beds would be considered most attractive by Relena. The front beds were mostly planted with pansies, which he quickly discarded as a flower choice. They were very pretty, but they didn't have the long stems needed for a bouquet. The same was true of the impatiens that surrounded a nearby tree. Leaving the front steps and trekking further into the garden, Heero found himself discarding more and more choices. The blossoms on the trees were too small. The daffodils might have worked, but they were already wilting. He found himself beginning to get discouraged.
Something nagged at his memory. Duo had told him a little about flowers and what ones were preferable. Heero paused, trying to remember. What was it he had said? Roses. Apparently, women found roses preferable to other flowers. He had no idea why, but that was what Duo had said. He trusted Duo not to give him misinformation, and Duo knew more about these things than he did.
With his mission firmly in mind, Heero strode through the garden, looking for roses.
~*~*~
"Heero! How good to see you!" Relena gushed as she opened the door to admit him. Heero decided that she must be very pleased to see him indeed, since she had opened the door herself instead of letting Pagan do it.
"Relena." He nodded politely to her. She looked a little disappointed at the greeting, but her smile brightened an instant later when Heero showed her the hand that he had kept behind his back, holding out the five roses he had cut.
"Oh, Heero, you shouldn't have!" She reached out a hand to take them, then recoiled slightly. "Ow!"
"What's wrong?" he asked.
"They've got thorns," she said, sounding rather surprised. "And they aren't wrapped in anything."
Heero frowned. Duo had neglected to mention how the flowers were to be done up when presented, so he hadn't done anything. Apparently, that was the wrong choice.
Relena caught sight of his face, and hurriedly gave him a reassuring smile. "It was very sweet of you," she said, reaching out to take the roses from him gingerly.
She had barely removed the flowers from his hands when a screeching sound broke out. Whirling around and reaching automatically for a gun, Heero was confronted with a woman wearing gloves and very dirty clothing, who was yelling at him furiously.
"Villain!" she shrieked. "Vandal! How dare you touch my flowers!"
"Your flowers?" Heero and Relena both chorused.
"Yes!" the unknown woman cried. "Well, that is to say, _your_ flowers, Ms. Relena," she amended with a slight bow towards Relena. "But I'm the one who looks after them!"
/Ah,/ Heero thought, finally able to identify the woman. /This must be Relena's gardener./
There was no time to congratulate himself on discovering her identity, as she was already on him. Whirling around furiously to face him, she went into a rapid tirade. "What do you think you're doing, going out and cutting my flowers?! Do you have any idea how much work it takes to keep them perfect like that?! You didn't even clip them properly! Now they'll never bud the way I want them to!"
"You clipped these from my garden?" Relena asked, looking confused.
Heero nodded slightly, hoping that she would intervene and get this crazy woman away from him. However, she simply scowled at him. "I thought they looked familiar," she said, managing to sound both disappointed and disdainful at the same time.
"I should hope so," the gardener said. "I've spent years pruning and tending those roses! Do you have any idea how delicate that variety is?! If you've damaged them permanently, I'll-"
But she didn't get a chance to say what she would do to him, for Relena, who had been studying the roses closely, suddenly dropped them with a shriek and leapt back. "Bug!" she squealed. "There's bugs on them!"
The gardener stopped her verbal barrage and turned to look at her employer in disbelief. "What?"
"Little green bugs!" Relena cried, staring at the roses on the floor as if they were something slimy and disgusting.
The gardener's nostrils flared. "Aphids on _my_ roses?!" she cried furiously, striding over and seizing one of the unfortunate flowers from the floor. After inspecting them closely, she once again turned on Heero. "Did you plant them there?!"
"Why the hell would I do that?!" Heero demanded, rather fed up with the whole thing. "I'm sorry I cut your damn roses; take them back if you like!"
"There's no point now; they're already cut!" she responded furiously. "Aphids on my roses!" she repeated furiously to herself as she stalked towards the door. "Unheard-of! Something must be done!" And then she was gone, as suddenly as she'd appeared.
Sighing heavily, Heero reached down and collected the roses off the floor. He considered offering them to Relena again, but judging by her reaction to them already, he doubted that she'd take them. And the occasion for which they'd been collected was ruined. Even if he and Relena did straighten things out and decide to keep going, there was no way they could make it to the restaurant at the time he had specified in the reservation. The evening seemed to have been shot to hell anyway, so he simply straightened, roses in hand, and said, "Goodnight, Relena."
She made no move or gesture to stop him, just watched him walk out the door, roses still in hand.
~*~*~
"For future reference, Heero," Duo said, "it's bad form to give a girl roses that you cut from her garden. If you get them from your garden, it's fine, but not from hers." He looked up briefly from his task to give Heero a serious look.
Heero grunted and endured the slight pain as Duo bent back to work, swabbing the cuts made by the thorns on the roses with antiseptic. "You failed to mention that earlier," he muttered, feeling surly.
Duo gave him a wry smile as he dug around in the first aid kit for band aids. "It never even occurred to me that this might happen. But I guess it should have."
"Hn," Heero snorted, looking away. He was still in an exceedingly bad mood after the evening's events, and recounting the whole thing to Duo had only made things more embarrassing, even though Duo hadn't said much, but had simply gone and fetched the first aid kit to tend to his hands.
"Come on," Duo said, observing his distemper. "It's not so bad, really. I'm sure Relena will forgive you. Just make sure not to let that gardener come near you with any sharp objects."
It was meant to be a joke, but Heero simply scowled at his roommate. He was in no mood for humor, and he wanted Duo to know it. Apparently, Duo got the message, for he didn't speak again until his task was done.
"There," Duo said, applying the last band aid. "All done."
Heero pulled his hands back and studied them. Duo had used the minimum number of band aids to cover the cuts made by the thorns. "You didn't need to do this," Heero reminded him.
Duo waved that away. "I know a few cuts seem pretty minor, especially to people like us, but it can't hurt."
"Hn," Heero muttered again. Crossing to the table where he had dropped the unfortunate bunch of flowers, he picked them up, careful of the thorns this time, and threw them on the couch next to Duo. "Here," he said.
Duo looked surprised. "You're giving them to me?"
"Well, no one else seems to want them!" Heero snapped, then regretted it almost instantly as a flash of hurt disappointment crossed Duo's face. It was gone in an instant, but it made Heero's night seem like even more of a failure. "I'm going to bed," he said shortly, and stalked out of the room, leaving Duo still sitting on the couch next to the first aid kit and five rather battered looking roses.
Tbc...
Alright, I've never done this before, but I've seen other people do it, so I'm taking a shot at it. So many people reviewed and gave me great feedback that I couldn't just let it pass. So, I'll attempt to address the reviews individually.
Mazza2869: Thank you for the critical feedback. Yes, I know description is my weak point. It always has been. I'll try better, I promise!
ally127: I'm afraid that I'm a die hard 1x2x1 fan, so yes, this is definitely going to be shounen ai. There are very few of my Gundam Wing fics that aren't. I hope you'll like it in spite of that, and I am not at all offended. Everyone has their preferred pairings.
Camillian: Thank you for the comments. I admit that I'm not much of a 1xR fan either, though I don't loath Relena the way some fans do. And I hope you'll find the next parts at least somewhat amusing, since I think there's plenty of opportunity for comedy in this story.
Chibi-libra810: I didn't think Relena was so bad in that chapter, and I'm trying not to write her as completely evil, but of course, the inner 2x1 fangirl has a slightly different perspective. I'm sorry you didn't like the chapter length. I put the chapter breaks where the muse tells me to, but I'll try to keep the chapters at least four pages in length.
Regina: Thanks for the feedback. I think this one's pretty much taken off, so I shouldn't be abandoning it any time soon.
noire: If only it worked that way... If I paid as much attention to the muse as she demands, I would never get anything done. Still, work induces her to write, so hopefully I'll be able to update fairly often.
Thanks to everyone else who reviewed. I didn't have time to get to all of you, but I do appreciate your comments, and I hope you liked this chapter.