Disclaimers: Don't own any part of Gundam Wing nor it's characters. Merely borrowing them for a little fun.

Warnings: Shounen-ai and nothing much besides that, I think. Heero's POV. Post anime.

Coming Home

Part 2

Today was just not meant to be Heero Yuy's day. The moment he got onto the road leading up to Preventor's HQ, he got caught in a snarl of slow moving traffic. As a result, he pulled into the parking lot over half an hour after work hours officially stated and this was from Mr Always-On-Time-If-Not-An-Hour-Early-At-Least. As he walked into the office, everyone saw Death in his eyes and wisely gave him a wide berth. At least, he reached his desk intact.

"Talk to me and die, Chang!" Heero growled, turning on his computer and started working.

Chang Wufei stared as his friend, completely speechless at this unprecedented loss of temper. Stifling a soft laugh, Wufei sat back and returned to work.

Thankfully for them all, working hours was good to Heero and as the day progress, his temper improved. Wufei had tried a few times during the day to ask why his partner was in such a rare mood but a glacial glare told him that backing off would be the best recourse. After all, Wufei enjoyed living.

As the day drew to a close, Heero closed his case files, finally reducing his backlogged paperwork. Commander Une had threatened the pair of them to be restricted to desk duty unless they cleared out their In-trays. Heero and Wufei were excellent field agents, though only on the field. While they did write reports during their Gundam pilot days, it was nothing like the endless form filling and bureaucracy the Preventors had. There were days, and mostly like this one, Heero wondered if he should have kept his Gundam and taken off on it.

His phone started beeping approximately five minutes before closing time. Since being 'humanised' he had learned that work wasn't everything, though still a large part of his life but after being thrown out of the office a few times by his own boss for staying too late, he began to relish his 'personal time' after work.

"This had better not be someone asking me to do something!" Heero snarled picking up the phone. "Yuy."

There was a startled silence before a breezy feminine voice filtered through the line. "Well, hello to you too, Yuy," Relena Darlian-Peacecraft greeted rather peevishly.

"Relena," Heero greeted, his tone softening. "I just had to worst day ever. Sorry." His lifted his mug of coffee, his tenth for the day, and took a sip.

Relena giggled. "You so need to get laid, Heero."

Heero nearly spit his coffee all over the receiver. "Relena!" He stuttered, scandalised. He didn't expect something like this from the once prim and proper princess. Yes, that was right, once prim and proper.

While for all outward appearances Relena was still the same well mannered girl, despite her tendencies for reading another's mail, Heero had met when he was fifteen. However, she had been corrupted. The first was, of course, by Duo Maxwell. Heero had found them one day standing in front of one of the many safe houses they had stayed in during war. Duo was teaching Relena how to spit. Heero cringed at the memory, realising Relena was a fantastic student. The braided teen was going on about lesson two: lighting a fart when Heero had prudently removed her from Duo's corrupting presence.

Then last year, she acquired another corrupting presence. It came in the form of her boyfriend, Aaron. He was a very nice young man and fortunately for him, he didn't set off any one of Heero's internal alarms. He had thought Relena many things, once of which was life as a commoner. So, thanks to Aaron's influence, the idealistic princess had given way to a grounded young lady.

Relena giggled. "Hey, want to join us for dinner?"

Heero winced. He was famous amongst his friend for skipping dinner and generally not taking care of himself. He had seen through their conspiracy once when his friends had taken turns calling him and inviting him out for dinner for an entire month. "I am eating!"

"I know," Relena answered in the same indignant tone. "Can't a girl ask a good friend, whom she once stalked to the ends of the earth out for dinner with the love of her life?"

Heero couldn't resist annoying her a little. "I thought I was the love of your life?"

"Well, maybe my first, but I got over that obsession rather quickly," she said airily. "So, want to join us?"

"Are you cooking?" Heero asked cautiously.

He almost choked with laughter when Relena made a noise of discontentment. "You put a man in the hospital once for food poisoning and you are eternally branded a bad cook."

"Are you cooking?" He pressed.

"No," Relena huffed. "Aaron's wearing the apron tonight. So, are you coming?"

Heero nodded, even though he knew Relena couldn't see. "Want me to bring anything over?"

"Just your gorgeous ass," Relena laughed.

Heero disconnected the line, a smile on his face. Well, seeing Relena and Aaron was always a pleasant thing. It got his mind off things, and recently, it was on damn Duo Maxwell again.

"Looks like someone's feeling better," Wufei teased.

Heero shot him a half hearted glare. He had to admit, he was being rather childish this morning, and torturing a newspaper as well. "Well, things happen."

"You want to join Sally and me for dinner?" Wufei asked, trying to be as nonchalant as possible.

This time, Heero couldn't suppress a groan. "I can take care of myself."

Wufei smirked. "Sure you can, but Sally is trying her hand at cooking a new dish, and misery loves company."

Heero resisted the urge to throw something at his partner. "Good bye, Chang."

xxXXxx

Dinner at Aaron's was as always, delicious. Relena's boyfriend was several years their senior and a junior chef at one of the restaurants that she frequented. Junior chef also meant bus boy and dishwasher in many other cultures and unfortunately, in this one as well.

"Aren't you glad I didn't make Relena cook for us?" Aaron grinned over his shoulder at girlfriend and former Gundam pilot as he washed the dishes.

"I thank God everyday," Heero deadpanned and got a sharp slap on the back of his head for his efforts. "Between you and Sally's constant attempts at pretending to cook, I don't think my medical benefits cover it anymore."

"It is gang up on poor former Queen of the World day?" Relena pouted, crossing her arms in front of her.

Heero shared a look with Aaron and laughed. He was glad he and Aaron got a long. He was very close to Relena and would hate it if her boyfriend was suspicious of him. After all, it was still consensus that a male and a female can't have a platonic friendship.

"What happened to you today?" Relena asked, taking a small bite of dessert. She had glared at Aaron for taking out something that looked out of chocolate heaven a while ago but as she savoured the taste on her tongue, she decided she could still kill her boyfriend later if she put on any weight.

"What do you mean?" Heero asked. He sipped his fifteenth cup of coffee for the day.

"Yuy," Relena imitated Heero's gruff greeting over the phone earlier. "You didn't even sound like that during the war."

Heero shrugged, remaining silent. How was he to explain what happened to Relena his confusion about his best friend, or who he thought was his best friend?

"Come on, Heero," she reached over and touched his arm lightly. "You can tell me."

"I… I found myself thinking about Duo again. After all this time."

Relena brightened, a huge smile creasing her face. She clapped excitedly. "That's great! Have you finally found out you are gay?"

Heero choked, spewing his mouthful of coffee all over the table and missing Relena by inches. He continued to cough for a long while as Aaron came over to slap him on the back. "I… I'm… what?" He sputtered when he got his lungs under control.

The girl looked at Heero uncertainly, almost realising too late that she had said something wrong. She exchanged a look with her boyfriend and swiftly tried to cover up her mistake. "Gay… happy, ecstatic, bubbly, you know…" She trailed off laughing weakly at the feral look in Heero's eyes.

"That's not what you meant," Heero said in a tone that usually meant death for the person who heard it. "Explain."

Aaron, even though knowing fully well Heero wouldn't hurt his girlfriend, sidled closer, hoping to provide her with any protection from those cold blue eyes.

Relena sighed, taking strength in the warm hand on her shoulder. How was she supposed to do this, to say this? If Heero was to realise it wouldn't be so bad, but to actually spell it out to him… She was just glad he didn't carry a gun… Oh shit, he was a Preventor's agent, of course he carried a gun. She was so dead!

"Uhm," she played with the folds of her skirt, unable to meeting Heero's glacial stare. "Well, why did you think I lost interest in you?"

Heero shrugged. "You grew up?"

Her ice blue eyes flashed indignantly. "Excuse me, the only reason I 'grew up' as you succinctly put is was the way you kept staring at Duo Maxwell!" Relena gasped, her hands flying to her mouth, realising she had said something wrong.

Heero felt like his brain had just shut down. What was she talking about? Staring at Duo? Of course he had, they were fighting in a war together, they had to look out for each other. It was only normal, wasn't it? Something stirred inside him when he realised the details in which he could remember Duo, the way the sun reflected the mixture of gold and red in his chestnut braid, he way his expression violet eyes sparkled with excitement, the way his body moved with corded strength, the way he walked out of the bathroom… His mind stuttered to a complete stop. Oh hell!

"You're… you're saying I'm in love with Duo Maxwell?" Heero demanded, his face changing to an odd shade of red.

Relena shook her head sadly. "I can't answer that question for you. I just know how you look at him. And, then he left. You didn't even say anything to him!" She cut off the rest of her tirade when Aaron gave a warning squeeze on her shoulder. She could see from Heero's expression, she had said enough and there was more than her friend could process right now.

Was Relena right? Was all that confusion, that loss of control, that feeling that made him want to throw up, the worry, the fear, every turmoil he experienced around the braided teen, that was love? If that was love it was sure painful and he wasn't sure if it was all a good idea. Gnawing emptiness worked just as well as the remembered turmoil.

He stood up abruptly, overturning the chair and shocking both Aaron and Relena. "I have to go," he mumbled and practically ran out of the apartment.

xxXXxx

He had been walking for the past hour, having left his car still parked at Aaron's apartment. He thought a late night walk might help him clear his mind. He had known he was at least marginally attracted to Duo. He didn't hate the boy as much as he pretended he did. He had spent a lot of time studying the American, under the cover of tapping away at his laptop. At that time he had told himself it was to see what made him tick. It was in the middle of a bloody war and yet Duo found the time and the inclination to smile. People were dying and yet he had found something to be cheerful about. It would be weeks later before he realised that the smiles and the jokes were a way of hiding himself. Reflecting back on it, Heero realised he didn't know much about Duo. He only saw what the braided boy showed him, what Duo wanted all of them to see. There were times he saw a glimpse of the mysterious person beneath the smiles and that person intrigued him greatly. But was that love? Interest? Did that amount to love?

Heero really didn't know. All he knew was how angry he was that Duo left without saying goodbye, his best friend, abandoning him without any news or warning. There was just a tiny twinge in his heart. At first he had thought it was betrayal more than anything, but the more he had dwelled on it, he realised it was something more. It was then he decided to put the entire Duo episode out of his mind. And now, the entire Duo 'episode' was back, and in full swing.

Now, there was an even bigger question. Was he gay? How did one tell? He had always been unemotional at best and cold at worst. He didn't look at women or men in particular. He didn't have many emotional attachments other than platonic ones that involved Relena, and his fellow former pilots. So, who can he ask? How can he tell? It was a very private matter and he doubt Aaron would appreciate him asking his girlfriend for that matter. Wufei would rupture something laughing, Trowa would raise one of his eyebrows in amusement and Quatre would try to set him up with everyone that the blond would deem him to 'look cute together with'. No, none of his friends would do.

Where was Duo when he needed him? He sighed. It was always Duo, wasn't it? Why had he been slow to catch up on things? Duo had always been there to help him, always been there to make him smile, or smirk as the case may be, always there to help him be more human. So why had Duo left? Weren't they friends anymore?

Tbc…