Title: China Shop
Author: phemonoe
Fandom: Gundam Wing
Pairings: implied 1xOC, 1+2+1 if you wish
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Post-EW, switching tenses, short as hell, highly disjointed and most likely confusing.
It took three years and four months for Heero Yuy to wake up.
When he did, it wasn't because of another war, or a threat to the peace he had fought so diligently to preserve.
When he wakes, he is standing in the kitchen with a knife in one hand, and a stalk of celery in the other.
The change is immediate, and he does not hesitate. Crossing to the cutting board, he sets the knife and vegetable down carefully.
A quick stop in their bedroom, and he pauses only briefly before the dresser, gaze drawn to a small frame and the picture wherein.
It is enough.
"One-way, please."
"Destination?" The ticket clerk stares at him through the glass barrier, weary and resigned.
He glances once at the departure list, sliding his card through the designated slot with a shrug. "Surprise me."
It has been a year since Duo Maxwell last saw Heero Yuy. The apartment Heero had shared with Adam has been empty for at least eleven months, the young man accepting his abandonment with grace and only a faint sense of bitterness.
A year to the day, and suddenly Heero is sliding into the chair opposite him at his favourite café, waving a nearby waiter over with one hand.
"It's been a while."
Duo gapes as their server sets a cup of coffee before his long-lost comrade. Heero always was the king of understatements.
"You look good." He manages to stammer, nearly spilling his own drink with an all too tremulous gesture. Heero quirks an eyebrow, then returns his gaze to his mug.
"Thank you. So do you."
"Thanks. Why'd you leave?"
Best to get straight to the point, lest he vanish again. Duo chances a look around, noting the crowd bustling to and fro, and smiles. Figures he'd pick this time of day, and this location.
"I realised that things weren't going as well as they should have. Or rather, that they wouldn't at some point in the near future."
He looks up, and Duo is pinned in his seat by the bluest eyes he's ever seen.
"It was inevitable, you know." His voice is careful, moderated. "Living that way, it was like…standing in the middle of a china shop."
A bull. An accident waiting to happen. You don't wait for him to finish the analogy.
"Relena's looking for you." You blurt out. Anything to shake him up, to wipe that blank carelessness off his face.
"I figured that." He takes a sip of coffee before setting it back down on the counter, fingers curled loosely around the mug's handle.
"I can't remember the last time I felt this free." He says conversationally, as though numbers of agents aren't at this very moment scurrying to the end of known space, all for him.
'Try never,' you want to say, and laugh, but the look on his face stops you. Try never. He knows. Try never. Yeah, he definitely knows.
"What will you do now?"
It seems you've managed to catch him off-guard, as the cup of coffee halts midair. Finally, it continues its smooth arc to his lips, and he takes another long sip. You know somehow that he's thinking it over.
You also know that this is the first time he's had to do so in a long while.
"Whatever I want, I suppose." He smiles, eyes bright, and your breath catches. You've never, in all of the years you've known him, witnessed such an honest display of emotion. You wonder, briefly, if that meant you'd never truly known him.
"It's not easy, Duo," he begins, and you resist the urge to lean closer, to see just what has changed in such a short while. "But it's different than anything that came before, or what may have come after."
"It's been nice seeing you Duo." He stands, setting an unmarked credit beside his empty cup. "We should do it again sometime." And with that, he is gone, vanishing back into the crowd. You stare at his empty chair for a long moment, and then take another sip.
The next morning, as you brush your teeth and prepare to go to work, you look into the mirror. And freeze.
There is something there that wasn't there yesterday, an awareness brought on by none other than Heero Yuy. You don't know whether to be thankful or not. You suppose it doesn't matter.
You finish your morning ritual and walk back to your living room, watching the play of shadows as the light sweeps slowly from one corner to another.
It's enough. You've decided.
One foot off the stoop, and after a moment's hesitation, the other follows. Taking one last deep breath, you begin to walk.
AN: Just in case you've never heard the phrase, it's like this: "A bull in a china shop." Basically it means an accident waiting to happen…kind of what I imagine Heero to be after the wars, potentially. I believe that on some level that the Heero in the series is very much damaged, and while he has the potential to heal, there's also the chance that he'd break. This is what would happen if he did what I think he would, and leave before anything gets out of hand. Silly, no?