1-13-2006

Title: The Wrong Christmas
Author: Aureus Pairings: 1x2
Rating: R for language and intense mood swings
Warnings: shounen ai, angst, dark, language
Disclaimer: I don't own Gundam Wing or its characters
Authors Note: This story is a little more personal, as I've had several experiences with outrageous mood swings and mild bi-polar disorder. For those of you familiar with such feelings, may this be a story of brighter futures and promising second chances. Please read and review, share your own reactions to the story.

>

"Fine!" Duo screamed, louder than he meant to, "As if this day hasn't been shit enough already, why don't you just go for the fucking record?"

Duo loved Christmas. Who didn't like Christmas? Christmas was hot chocolate and frosty windows and fireplaces. Christmas was warm blankets. Christmas was toasty.

But Duo hadn't been feeling like himself lately. He'd been irritable, moody, and prone to intense bursts of anger and depression. Heero was lost in a world of confusion.

"Duo, what the fuck do you want me to do?" Heero yelled in exasperation. They were entering their third hour of fighting. Heero wasn't good at this kind of thing. He was built to kill people, to steal information, to be a thorn in the side of the largest military operation on the planet. He was not built to deal with pouting lovers and enigmatic feuds.

"I don't know, Heero. Maybe give a fuck about me? Maybe listen to a damn word I say? Maybe help make this day, the day I love more than any other day, a little special?"

As he heard the words come out of his mouth, Duo raged within his own mind. What was happening to him? How could he be so infantile, so self-centered, so mean? Since when did presents matter? Since when did he become so superficial he couldn't praise Heero for buying him a present at all?

The ever-smaller sane part of his mind ran over that little fact again. Heero. Had bought him, Duo, a present. For Christmas. And he couldn't be happy about it?

What the fuck was wrong with him? He watched helplessly from inside his own head as his body continued to pull away from Heero's reaches, form blazing retorts against Heero's words. He sat hopeless as if some evil demon had possessed him, draining away his sense of humor, his perspective, his rationality, and his laughter. He felt all of the things that made him Duo being carried off and locked in some chest in the far corner of his mind. All the while, a sinister, dark voice kept booming through his thoughts, becoming harder and harder to ignore.

Your first Christmas together. Ruined.

No! It wasn't ruined! It was far from ideal, but it wasn't awful! Heero had made an effort, and it wasn't bad for his first try. He tried hard to think back a few hours ago, when he sat in front of the fire opening his present, Heero sitting in a cushy orange chair. Seconds before, they were laughing and joking, but something inside of Duo broke when he unwrapped the paper and found a little crucifix necklace staring back at him from inside the box.

What the fuck?

The voice had immediately torn to the top of his thoughts and boomed.

"What is this?" Duo's voice cut like icy glass through the wrapping paper and the cinnamon coffee and the fuzzy holiday music.

Heero froze. He was suddenly pitched into a sea of uneasiness and dread. He thought he had done so well. Everything had been going so smoothly. Duo had been laughing joyfully up until now, playing in the ocean of paper, warming his back by the fireplace. Now, Duo's suddenly cold demeanor and frigid stare pinned Heero in his seat and instantly struck him dumb.

These were the only times when the Perfect Soldier felt true fear, and they had been happening more and more frequently. Duo was becoming like a time bomb, and it was only a matter of time before he would next explode. With little or no warning, suddenly Heero was helpless to watch as Duo systematically ruined whatever fun or enjoyment they were sharing. He was completely at the mercy of the braided pilot's fury and regardless of what he did, it was only a matter of time before Duo's tempest would die out.

It was a fear Heero detested. A fear born out of surprise and regret and inaction. He hated this power Duo had over him. The power to make him feel insignificant and useless. The power to spoil what precious little fun Heero had ever had in his entire life. But what he hated more was the power Duo had to make him stay. Despite how every particle of him despised such outrageous behavior, Duo's stranglehold on his heart made him stay, no matter how bad it got.

"I repeat, Yuy, what the fuck is this?" The words skidded harshly through the air.

Heero sighed and said in his calmest, most cheerful voice, "I thought it would be a nice reminder of Christmas all year long."

Duo stared at him as if he were made of stupid.

"A crucifix…"

"Well, Christmas doesn't really have any other symbol, does it?" Heero could already tell where the argument was heading.

"COULD YOU HAVE PICKED A MORE FUCKING INSENSITIVE GIFT, YOU ASSHOLE?" Duo's flaming words filled the small room with so much rage, the walls almost creaked and groaned under the strain.

The deadly silence following Duo's outburst was peppered only by the snaps of the log on the fire. Heero was caught in a deadzone. He wanted to leave. Just get up and walk out the door and disappear for a week. Teach the son of a bitch a lesson. But he couldn't, because he might return to find an empty apartment, a blood-spattered note, or any number of other horrifying scenarios. There was no telling what Duo would do when he was like this. He couldn't attempt to comfort him or calm him. Any attempts to appeal to Duo's rationale would be taken as patronization or coddling and just add more fuel to the fire.

The list of what Heero couldn't do was endless. All he could do was sit there and prepare to take whatever horrible insults Duo had to fling at him for the next three hours.

As Duo sat there, holding the box in his shaking hands, he fought harder and harder against the icy black voice growing more and more restless in his head. He pressed hard to block it out, but it would not be silenced.

Fucking bastard…I bet he didn't even think twice about it.

It's not his job to remember my past! And even if it did cross his mind, he probably thought I could move past it.

Duo's protest was like a single garden hose against a forest fire.

Move past it? Your NAME is Shinigami! How could he expect you to throw Solo and Father Maxwell aside like that? How could he expect you to forget them?

He's not! He's not asking me to forget them! He would never be able to understand! He just doesn't know what it's like! I don't ever want him to know what it's like!

He grew more and more desperate to avoid slipping down that bleak and dismal path. He knew it would only end in misery. He knew it and yet he kept letting the voice win.

He won't ever know. He won't ever understand you.

As Duo battled with the damnable voice and lost, Heero prepared himself for the arduous fight that was now inevitable. It would take hours before Duo calmed down and until then, he had to try not to lose his temper, he just had to stick it out.

The first words Duo spoke since the outburst weren't promising.

"If you think for a second that I could just forget my ghosts so easily, you're dead wrong."

And thus the fight began. The cozy, decorated apartment room watched sadly as the two boys trampled the rest of the presents and knocked ornaments off of the small tree. Heero kept trying to apologize and ask Duo's forgiveness, but Duo's anger kept breaking anew and taunts and insults just kept coming. Eventually, even Heero's stonewall patience wore thin and he began yelling back, adding a fresh acidity to the fray. The same points being worn over and over until both of them were exhausted, scared, angry, and inconsolable.

"Fine!" Duo burst as he fought tears back "As if this day hasn't been shit enough already, why don't you just go for the fucking record?"

"Duo, what the fuck do you want me to do?" Heero screamed back at him

"I don't know, Heero. Maybe give a fuck about me? Maybe listen to a damn word I say? Maybe help make this day, the day I love more than any other day, a little special?" Duo's voice gave out with exhaustion and emotion.

Heero caught himself and bit his tongue before a retort could escape him. He did not respond immediately, but instead walked dejectedly towards his chair. He was tired. He was sad. He didn't want anymore.

"Duo," the change in his voice was so drastic, it stopped Duo right in his tracks. It had lost its defensive edge; it had lost the stinging ire of a few moments ago. Instead, it spilled over with worn grief, it bled.

"Duo, I don't know what to do anymore. I'm tired, I'm miserable, and I'm lonely. I'm lonely and you're in the same room as me. I could reach out my hand and touch you, but you're not there anymore. I don't want to do this anymore. I just…I don't know what to do. I'm scared. I'm lost. It's not easy for me to say these things, Duo."

Heero fell backwards into the chair where his body posture was slumped, defeated. He held his head in his hands, grabbing tufts of hair with his fingers. He began to tremble and shake as a new gushing river of pain seared upwards from his heart and into his throat. He felt like he was going to vomit.

"I just can't stand to see you like this, D-Duo. It hurts. It h-h-hurts to know what you used to b-be like." Heero began to stutter as he fought back hard against the tidal wave growing through his chest. "I w-want to know what happened to you, what's m-made you like this. I want to know where y-your smile w-went. What h-h-happened to the Duo I f-fell in l-l-love with?"

It was just too much. With his final words, silent tears began to flow softly out of the watery ocean-blue eyes. They weren't silent for long. As the tidal wave made its way upwards through Heero, he felt a pain-streaked cry tear through his throat, and it forced its way out of his mouth in sort of a garbled sob. For the first time in his life, his self-restraint had failed him as he allowed himself to be absorbed in the quintessential act of misery; Heero was crying. Heero was sobbing. Heero was bawling.

Duo was panicked. Things up until this point had been easy, just keep yelling, keep screaming, keep hating. He watched in horror as the strongest and most resolute person he had even known sat weeping before him, reduced to a shuddering ball.

"What have I done?"

The words seemed distant and vague, everything seemed too surreal all at once. The sound of muffled sobs, the biting smell of nutmeg, the shadows dancing from the fireplace, the sight of smashed presents and broken ornaments on the ground. All too suddenly, Duo realized what a nightmare the tiny room had become, how strange and twisted everything appeared in the dim glow from the fire.

The dark and vitriolic anger had abandoned him, had left him stranded in a disorienting wash of guilt and misery and regret. He looked once more at the crumpled figure before him, quivering and lonely, and he too felt the gates burst and the tears flow.

He staggered forward, attempting to reach out to Heero, grabbing at his clothes, pleading to re-connect with him. He felt himself being pulled down; he wrapped his arms around the soggy, deflated boy and they both fell off the chair and sat on the floor, holding each other and trying to collect themselves.

It was a moment no one could have predicted. Two Gundam pilots, the most lethal and intimidating war machines ever imagined, clasped desperately together in an attempt to piece together the ragged edges of a shattered Christmas. Two boys held tight to one another, terrified that if they let go, they would be flung into the ravages of a miserable and unforgiving night. Two boys held each other in a way that tries to stem the flow of a three-hour torrent of hostility and anger. Two boys, catching each other's breath in a steady rhythm of in and out, in and out, just trying to remember why they ever loved each other to begin with.

Duo was the first to break the fragile vignette, "Heero, I am so – "

"It's over now, Duo." Heero whispered, his throat raw and tired. He placed his head on Duo's shoulder and began to slowly rock them back and forth.

"I never wanted this…" Duo's chest threatened to collapse into quickened breaths again, Heero's arms grew firmer across his back and waist.

"Please, let's just be done," Heero pleaded, unsure of whether he was comforting or needed comfort, "Can we please be done?"

"I would very much like to be done." Duo's voice was small and scared.

They sat for a few minutes in silence, rocking back and forth, slowly gaining more sense and resolve. Duo promised himself over and over to never collapse back into that dark place. Duo's thoughts were stuck in a mire of ways to make it up to Heero, of ways to keep that voice from ever coming back again. More than once he opened his mouth as if to apologize, to reassure Heero it wouldn't happen again, to suggest a better tomorrow, but he couldn't say any of it. He didn't believe it.

"Duo, I've had my share of voices," Heero's words were mercifully strong, something solid and sure, something Duo could grab onto and hold.

"I know what it's like to wonder what's wrong with you. To feel as if some outside force has taken control of you and to wonder if you'll ever be the same again. I know how hard it is to fight those horrible thoughts forcing you downwards. I've been to the bottom, Duo, where your life is a self-destruct button and a flashing mission screen."

Heero's voice wasn't harsh, but soft and hurt, as if reliving his battle days was a painful but necessary step in understanding Duo's current condition.

"Don't do that to yourself now. Not when you've shown me the way out. Not when you've brought me here, and we're almost as normal as we'll ever get. Don't take me back to the war, Duo. Let's stay here. Where it's Christmas."

Duo was almost on the verge of tears again, a claw was raking at his heart. Heero was opening himself up and begging to stay with him. Begging was not something Heero did. Crying was not something Heero did. But here it was all happening; it was ferociously and frighteningly real. Duo felt a gradual change in his heart from the heavy weight of guilt to the solid drive of protection. Heero needed a second chance at Christmas.

"Heero," Duo whispered softly in the boy's ear. He pulled his head back and looked at Heero's tear-streaked face, his puffy eyes, his runny nose. He knew he looked exactly the same. "Heero, we both look like shit."

The Japanese boy laughed wetly, letting out a couple awkward gasps of air. Despite his disheveled appearance, his eyes were already stronger, already returning to the confident Perfect Soldier. Duo wiped both of their eyes with his sleeve.

"You know what tomorrow is, right?" Duo asked, taking a stab at his usual perky voice.

"What?" Heero answered more enthusiastically than normal.

"Boxing Day. It's like Christmas 2." Duo declared, hoping Heero would understand his wordless apology, his silent plan to give him a better tomorrow.

Heero smiled and nodded. "I'm looking forward to it."

Duo sat looking at Heero for another moment, hoping they would be able to move beyond this. He had just witnessed a part of Heero he had never known existed, and it had just spilled out all over the floor of their apartment. He never wanted to put Heero through that again. He never wanted to see the Perfect Soldier cry as long as he lived. He wanted to beat this awful thing that had somehow infected him. He wanted to be as strong as Heero.

"I'll start tidying up, then. If we're gonna try this again tomorrow," Duo said brightly, jumping to his feet and beginning to roll up the crinkled paper.

Heero watched him silently for a few minutes. He thought for a moment about what had just happened, how terrifying it had been to lose all control, to succumb absolutely to that maelstrom of emotion and forget himself entirely. He wished it to never happen again, But he was glad that when it had happened, Duo had been there. When the walls came crashing down, Duo had witnessed the most terrifyingly human thing Heero had ever done, and now it was over. And now they were cleaning up the apartment. And now they were fine.

And now they were fine.

And tomorrow was Boxing Day.

END