"And your lemonade tastes like shit. Deal with it."

A/N Bleh, late update, I suck. Anyone following this, you have the patience of a god o-o

Don't own a thing but my own bad humour.

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After much effort to calm the maids down, Teito and Frau sat down to their own plates of stew, trying not to make eye contact. The prostitute felt… out of place, would be the best phrase. A strange place, strange people, and not to mention strange hair colors. Shaking the feeling off, the ever heavy silence began to grind on his nerves, and without thinking, said outwardly,

"So, I could give you a discount if it'l get rid of this silence."

What was that? The brunette didn't know himself, though it definitely was out of line. The blond parallel to Emerald stopped picking at his food.

He didn't look up, or even pretend that he didn't hear Teito he just kind of… stopped. The silence stretched out for a moment, an extremely long moment, at that, and finally Frau broke a smile, stifled a chuckle, and leaned back in his chair.

"Is that a joke?" The boat-hand said, his voice like velvet. Was it? The whore thought this to himself, and realized that he actually wouldn't mind giving Frau some of his services, even if it would crush what little dignity he had left. Then again, between the key incident and the whole, 'being a whore' thing, dignity was usually not his first priority, but with Frau he didn't want to be seen like that. Why? Not even Teito knew that, but a 'joke' was the perfect excuse to push that train of thought off the tracks, so all the prostitute could do was smirk and nod playfully.

"Duh, like I'd waste a discount on you!" To this, the blond laughed, leaning over the table and ruffling Teito's hair, much to the young adult's distress.

"Hey now, respect yourself a bit more then that, shrimp!"

"Don't call me that, pervert, I bet you love to have my time."

They both laughed this time, and for a moment, their eyes met and everything wasn't like it really was. Teito wasn't a filthy whore and Frau wasn't a poor boat-hand and it was just them, contrasting and contradicting each other. Perfect balance.

Teito now hates that feeling. He'd had it before, back when it was pleasant, back when he'd met Mikage. When they would talk, when they would not talk, when they would feel. Back before Mikage overdosed, before the drugs took his life, leaving Teito with all of the deceased lover's debt. No matter how nice his foster family was at the time, they wouldn't dare pay off all of that debt, forcing the teen into whoring.

"Funny, in a terrible and ironic and stupid way." He would say to himself early in the morning as he snuck out of a clientele's house, making sure to grab his pay from the table beside the door.

Snapped back into reality, Teito broke the gaze, standing and cleaning his plate.

"H-hey, what's up, shortie?" The blond said, confused as to why the brunette was being so cold all of a sudden. At first, Emerald didn't answer, but he simply put on the best smile he could and glanced over his shoulder to the other,

"Wouldn't you like to know?"

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The days went on, and Teito was becoming accustomed to the ways of the boat. He had developed a friendship with the other boat hands as well. Ouka was like a sister to him, a long lost one that actually cared and understood him, Labrador being more like a teacher, or even a mother (strange, considering his gender), and Castor being kind of like an uncle, someone to guide you even if they still withheld secrets from you. Although Teito was pretty sure that something as going on between Castor and Lab, seeing as they were always touching each other in some way, holding hands or an arm wrapped around the other's waist. Rather obvious, if the whore did say so himself.

There was just one downside. A certain blond boat-hand and Emerald were always having awkward run ins or the like. Sometimes it was a off set conversation about love, or sometimes it was another one of those gazes that sent Teito into a gut wrenching nostalgia.

It was hard to except that he may be getting that feeling again, the same one would get around Mikage. Pondering this in his room, about this strange feeling , hen a knock interrupted him.

"Come in!" Emerald called at the door, sighing heavily. Just as he did, a certain girl with pigtails walked in, a charming smile on her face.

"Hey, bro, what's got your head in a twist…?" She said a bit nervously, almost forcing the smile. Teito just shook his head, sitting up on his bed, to which he was until recently laying on.

"Your not going to leave me alone until I give you something, are you?" The brunette huffed knowingly, crossing his arms like the little bitch that he so sorely felt like being. Ouka just loosened up, giggling, sitting next to him and leaning on his shoulder.

"Oh, you read me like a book." She purred, smirking and nudging him slightly. "So, who is it?"

Just for a second, a left green eye twitched in slight annoyance, and Teito had the feeling of impending doom/ total loss if his man-badge.

"….what?"

She laughed at him again, saying cheerily, "I know when someone has a crush, or I guess in your case is head over heels in," she paused, most likely for dramatic effect, and kind of creeper-smiled at Teito, "L-O-V-E"

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A/N- I suck. Anyways, next chapter soon c: