Time frame: Zone 14, weeks later

Rating: T (swearing)

Description: Angst warning. This whole chapter is basically a short lover's spat between Nick and Ellis.

"Hey Nick, did you mean it what you said this morning?" Ellis asked, looking through wrecked and abandoned cars with the rest of his group.

The Zone sent some of the braver guys out to search the nearby roads for anything useful in the cars left there. Only the guys (and Evie) that had experience with guns and self-defense were able to go.

"I said a lot this morning. What the hell do you mean?" Nick didn't like to play guessing games.

"That part where you were talkin to the guys and you said ya didn't want to be in a serious relationship again." Ellis replied. His tone made it sound like Nick should have known what he meant.

"I didn't say that."

"Yeah, yes you did too." The Mechanic insisted.

"I know what I said, Ellis. I didn't say that."

"It was just an hour or two ago. You were tellin a group of guys about your weddin day…"

:FLASHBACK:

"So we're at the reception and her cousin comes up to Carla, drunk, and says that I came onto her the morning of the wedding. Now keep in mind this broad looks like Mike Piazza with a long wig on, and I was nursing a hangover with more booze. There is no way that in my drunkest, horniest state I'd ever been in, I would have never taken a second look at her. She's just one of those women that get loud and annoying when everything isn't about her.

"Carla had a short fuse, and I mean short enough to where I had to lie several times where I got my most recent black eye. She could have let the whole thing go. She knew she was hot as hell and that this was still her special day. But she doesn't. They argue, loudly. They are both yelling and shoving moments later and before I can get in and pull her out, she's sporting a bloody nose and Patrice is out cold on the floor. It happened that fast.

"I take her into the bathroom and her wedding dress is a mess. Carla's so mad that it's stained and I'm trying to rub out some of the blood but it's an uphill battle with all of the detail along the bodice. This thing was beautiful, better fuckin be for being a $6000 piece, right?

"Someone yells through the door that the cops are coming. So we do the obvious thing, have sex in the handicapped stall until the pigs come. She gets arrested and I bail her out hours later. Her nose is broken, but her cousin has a concussion and two missing teeth. And THAT is how I know that blood doesn't come out of a wedding dress." Nick finishes, gathering some laughs from the guys listening.

"And this was your first wedding or your second?" Bud asked, passing Nick their shared cigarette.

"Second, Carla was my second wife. Shae was my first. As I grew older and wiser, my taste in long-term relationships evolves to steadily funner partners for shorter periods of time." He winked at Ellis.

"Sounds like it. That Carla sounds like my kinda girl." The old biker laughed.

"How many times you been married, old man?" Keith asked Bud, elbowing Nick for the cigarette. They were getting scarce so everybody shared without argument.

"I'm 70 years old, so I have had a lot longer to put notches in my belt than Nick, so…four."

"Goddamn, how are you still sane?" Keith laughed.

"How many times have you been married, Stubbs?" Nick asked.

"Me? Never, man. Almost once, but I didn't go through with it." Keith explained.

"I find that hard to believe. Strapping drink of water like you?" Nick was being sarcastic but Keith took it as a compliment. When it came to the way Nick talked to him, this was as good as it got.

"You're still young. You'll settle down, just like I did." Coach threw in, taking a bite out of a burger that was likely made out of rat or crow.

"No, nuh uh. Fuck that." Nick answered without a pause.

:END OF FLASHBACK:

Ellis stood there, looking at Nick expectantly.

"I didn't say anywhere that I didn't want a serious relationship again. I was talking about being married." Nick corrected, sighing and shaking his head as if Ellis just mistook the difference between Armani and Men's Warehouse.

"Same thing." Ellis shrugged, sifting through the glove box of an unlocked car.

"No it isn't. Marriage is like…okay it's like having a nice car. That's a serious relationship. Marriage is like taking a chain, hooking it around your ankle, hooking the other end to the car's undercarriage, putting a brick on the accelerator and driving that bitch off a cliff while it rips your leg off and takes it with her to Hell. Okay?"

"Nah, man. Marriage is…like the soft cushion of your favorite place to sit being there to catch ya if ever you need it."

"Tell me that again when you've been married." Nick was talking to his younger partner like he was gently trying to explain that Santa was not real.

"I guess I'm never gonna get married, so I can't!" His voice was a little more harsh than he intended.

Nick was taken back for a moment, and started to let it go, but instead he stood up, closed the car door and leaned against it.

"What the hell is wrong with you?" Nick asked, voice still casual.

"You tell me."

"Look, stop putting words into my mouth, kay? We've been over this before. I explained to you that I am not looking for that kind of shit anymore."

"Are you still… afraid of committing to me?" Ellis asked, not angry anymore.

"That's not what it's about. Kid, you know you're the best. Literally the best thing that has ever happened to me. I'm not going anywhere, you know I'm not. But I am not about to fuck up a good thing. We got it good, right?"

Ellis shrugged. Of course they had it good. Ellis was genuinely happy with Nick, but he didn't feel like supporting Nick's point.

"You know we do. You know who else did? Me and Shae. Before we tied the knot, she was a bitch but not to me. Well, sometimes. But the thing was, I could put up with it, with all of it. But after I was tied to her it got too real and she left me. Me and Carla. Same, shit was great. And then we got married and I 'got boring' so she fucked several other men."

"You were just talkin this mornin about how your ex used to load you in the face out of anger." Ellis's fists were clenching now, upset that he was noting an abusive relationship as good. Somehow a trashy, slutty woman was good enough to marry and that was it.

"That was between her and me. I accepted her hitting me because I didn't feel threatened by her. A punch in the face always equaled great make-up sex hours later when-"

"That's enough, man." Ellis cut him off, throwing up a hand in annoyance and turning around to fiddle with the door of the next car up the road.

"Right, come back to me when you're off your damn period, shithead." Nick shouted.

Yeah, it was uncalled for, but Nick warned him several times to let it go. Sure, it had been years and it didn't bother him anymore, but it wasn't his idea of fun to bring up shitty memories involving any time in his life that he'd been vulnerable to another person.

"How about you stop yelling at him, you jerk." Keith called from a couple of cars down.

"Mind your business, Slingblade, this doesn't concern you."

"You're treatin my best friend like garbage while I'm standin right here. That concerns me plenty." Keith shot back.

"Right, because it's always my fault. Ellis is a saint."

"A saint for puttin up with you, I'll say so." The redhead continued, not backing down.

"Listen, shut up or I'm gonna take this pry bar and knock a few more teeth out of your head, you fucking inbred!"

Tensions were high lately. The group made it to the new zone but everyone had that "what next" feeling looming overhead at any given time. They were safe as could be expected for now, but how long would that last? This zone has already been torn apart. Sure they had food, and some degree of clean water, but security was of a low-level and ammunition was steadily running out. They all felt stuck, and that sensation of being trapped in an endless, hopeless maze had everyone's trigger a little sensitive.

The two men were now face to face, throwing idle threats back and forth and Francis stepped in before any punches could be thrown, hefting Keith up from about the waist with one arm while Ellis pulled at the back of Nick's shirt.

"Alright, break it up lovebirds. We're all not doing so hot. Besides…I hate fighting, unless I'm in it. And I'm too tired for this shit. Your noise is about two seconds from drawing a horde and we don't have the fire power to fend them off."

The lot of them headed back to the zone, which was basically a small camp, in a sour mood. Nick was more mad at Keith than he was at Ellis. Why couldn't that shit-for-brains mind his own damn business? Ellis was a grown man and if he didn't like the way Nick treated him, the door was always open for him to walk his happy ass up out of it.

I have never needed a person in my life, and I am never going to. I don't give a shit if it's my mother, my best friend, or someone I've given my heart to. I can take it right back whenever I feel like it and I don't owe the kid shit.

But deep down, Nick knew that Ellis was different. He knew that he was full of shit and that he'd never even known people like this kid existed, much less met anyone that even compared to him. Everyone he'd ever been with in the past, no matter how hot or how fun or how into him they'd ever been, was always looking out for number one, and number one was not Nick.

Ellis had never been like that once. He acted like Nick walked on water. The kid went out of his way to help other people and though he was a little dim and a lot irritating, he was a good guy. Sure he told too many stories, sure he got pounced on by every jockey and every hunter in his path. Sure, his neck was going to have scars from all the smoker tongues that had been around it. Sure, the kid pissed off witches all the time. Sure, he was so goddamn naïve that he made Nick want to jump off a building. But he was Ellis. He was one of a kind and Nick was an asshole and as far as anyone else was concerned, a real piece of shit. What did he expect? Perfection?

I'm really in no place to be choosy, he thought to himself. I'm almost 40 years old, an alcoholic with a bad heart and a nervous disorder. I nitpick about everything. I'm mean. I've spend my whole life ripping people off. I'm a convict, a reformed drug addict, and a fucking murderer. My own mother looked into my eyes months before she died and told me she wished that she and my dad paid for the abortion instead of making their rent payment because being homeless would have been less of a shame than having me for a son. I've hurt people, lied, cheated, broke more laws than I can name, and I did all of that for myself. And this fucking idiot, Ellis, still gives a shit about me. I'm lucky to have him. I sure as shit don't deserve him.

Though they were in the same bed, they didn't touch. The two laid there, staring up into the dark, minds racing a mile a minute and Ellis was every bit as conflicted as his partner.

I shouldn't have pushed him. I knew what he meant, Ellis recalled. I mean, I kinda know why he don't want to get married but I'm not like those exes of his. I love the guy. I'm young. Just about to be 24 years old and all I ever wanted was to run my shop, get drunk on the weekends with my buds, and come home from a hard day to a family that loves me. I mean, I wanted a wife and kids. But instead I got a Nick and no kids. But that's how love works. It just happens and sometimes there is no rhyme or reason why. I just want a way to show Nick that I really do love him and that I'm willin to stay with him no matter what anyone says. I'd kill to be Mrs. Nick whatever-his-long-and-complicated-ass-Italian-surname-is. Is that how it works with guys? No, damn I'm dumb. I'd just be Mr. Nick Last-Name-#2.

I have been tossing around some ideas for how to expand on the next chapters in this story, and I'm kind of leaving it open to suggestion. What would you guys like to see between Nick and Ellis? Or other characters? Should Nick bite the bullet and make Ellis happy? Should Ellis quit acting like an old maid? Ideas are very welcome, both as reviews or PMs.