You Know You Wanna

Athrun/Kira; platonic Kira/Fllay?

Rating: M

a/n Hello again. First off, thank you all for your comments, and I am completely sorry if this story gets too confusing or OOC. It's part of my specialty…uh…I think. Haha. Secondly, I like these little dots… … … …! Thirdly, where's my cookie? Fourthy……I'm jacked up on green AMP and CocaCola. XD Nothing like a good sugar OD to fire up your muse and kill your need to rest!

4: Drip, Drip, Drop Little Raindrops Falling

So far: Athrun and Kira had an original, silly bet that if Kira would dress up like a girl for a week, then Athrun would forfeit his expensive comic book collection for Kira's humiliation. Kira also agreed to help Athrun score a date with one of Cagalli's foreign friends to even the balance. Kira was only losing a bit of his pride. However, Athrun complicated things by extending his bet to Cagalli herself, who agreed that they could watch Kira make a fool of himself in public, at her school, in her place…on the condition that Athrun would sleep with her. He agreed, but in the time the two boys have spent together, they seem to be forming a mutual bond that they both refuse to admit exists…

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"Fuck," he said again, very quietly this time.

Kira didn't notice when it started to rain. He just sat there, feeling like someone had punched him in the stomach. He could cry no more. His eyes, despite the rain, were red-rimmed yet dry. He didn't feel the chilly edge in the night—as if the season couldn't decide whether it was winter or spring. He didn't feel the water cascading down the back of his neck.

He also didn't notice when a girl his age, wearing khaki cargo pants and a light, baby pink blouse with ruffles, stopped walking just as she reached the point in front of him. Her hair stood out as painfully crimson against the backdrop of the gray city, cut medium length in several layers, the longest reaching just below her shoulders. She was holding a plain black umbrella, which she held farther out to shield Kira from the rain as well. When the boy did not look up at her, she frowned and leaned down to his level.

"Helloooo! Anybody in there?"

Kira blinked. It took him a moment to realize someone in reality had actually acknowledged his existence. "What did you say?" he asked. His voice rasped more than spoke. How long had he been sitting there?

"I asked if you were currently on this planet, because right now you seem to be floating in space on auto-pilot." Her smile was jeering, but easy as well. She seemed to mean well, trying to cheer him up. "Are you all right?"

"Yeah, fine." Kira stood up, ducking out from under the umbrella. He didn't want to ruin her evening like he had Athrun's; she was probably on her way to some extravagant party. Maybe she was a snob who would stub up and leave him alone like everyone else. It wasn't very polite of him, to just get up and leave like that, but Kira wasn't in the mood for ethics. He was in the mood to find a nice building to jump off of. He started to walk away.

"Where are you going?" the red-haired girl called.

"Home."

"But we just met!"

Kira stopped. "Isn't it awfully late to be making friends? I think it's around—"

"Nonsense. There's never a time too late to say hello."

Her last sentence sounded symbolic to Kira, but he really didn't have the energy for this…

He turned around anyway, and tried to smile back. "Where are you headed?"

"South, past the New York School for Girls. I live a few streets down from there."

Kira brightened. He and Athrun also lived a few streets from Cagalli's school. But why had he asked her where she was going and not her name? He'd meant to ask what to call her… "Great, me too," he murmured, trying to sound happier than before. He couldn't tell a difference, but apparently the girl could. She nodded her approval and said,

"Let's walk together, then. No sense in you going that far alone in the rain."

She must have also failed to notice that when Kira had started to walk away, it was in the opposite direction as their new destination. The poor brunette was obviously delusional. The girl grabbed Kira's wrist in one dainty, pale hand and led him away from the once-again empty bus bench.

Kira was floating through a dream—rain drops patting against the umbrella, feet splashing in the puddles on the sidewalk, warmth in his left hand that seemed to stream up his arm and throughout his entire body. His eyes fell in and out of focus as he let this stranger lead him wherever she would go. She could have taken him down some alley and killed him, if she'd wanted to.

But she didn't.

She softly asked Kira where he lived, and took him home.

Athrun was nearly asleep when he heard the main door to the apartment open and close downstairs. Then he heard two sets of feet clogging up the metal stairwell, and a quiet rap on the door he had left unlocked and ajar. He had still been debating whether to go find Kira or wait for him to come home when he'd dozed off on the couch. "Come in," he said groggily, "S'open."

He did not receive a reply, but first saw a blur of red hair, followed by a soaking wet Kira, enter the room.

"I'm going to bed," Kira said matter-of-factly. Athrun started to say something, but was interrupted by the giggling of the red-head standing front and center in their living room. Her clothes appeared to be mostly dry.

"Who are you?" Athrun asked. Kira stopped in the doorway leading to their bedroom, listening. Athrun noted that he looked extremely tired. He was wobbling from side to side like the Leaning Tower of Pisa.

"Me?" she asked, pointing to herself and still giggling. "Why don't you tell me who you are. Your friend here didn't bother to say his name either."

"Well, you're the one in our apartment. You first."

She giggled even louder. Kira started shaking his head and fully entered the bedroom, where he flopped down on the mattress and snuggled under the dry sheets.

Athrun hadn't said a word meant to be a joke. He could stand those snickers no longer. "Okay, fine, you don't have to say who you are, but at least tell me what, pray tell, is so funny?"

"I was glancing in the other room over there…and, um…do you two share a bed?"

"Yes," Athrun said, his cheeks flushing a bright pink.

"Oh. Are you gay then?"

"No. We're just good friends."

"Are you homophobes?"

"No, we're just two regular guys. What's with the gay questions?"

"Nothing. I'm a lesbian, though. That's all." She smiled in a way that reminded Athrun of someone… He couldn't quite place his thoughts on where he'd seen that smile before. He was too sleepy.

"Uh, thanks for bringing Kira home. I appreciate it."

"Kira, huh?" she mumbled to herself, "That explains a lot…" Then, speaking to Athrun again, she asked, "Does he get lost at all hours of the morning often?"

"No." Did she know Kira? Athrun had never seen this girl before in his life. "But I'm indebted to you nonetheless. Anything I can do to even the score?"

"Tell me your name first."

Athrun sighed. Women and their mind games… It was a way of getting him to give in first. He was too tired to care. "Athrun. Athrun Zala. And you?"

There was a slight hesitation before she replied…

"…Fiona Apple."

"Oh, come on," Athrun said, covering his mouth with his fist to stifle a yawn.

"Come on? Is that the best you could come up with?" Her gray eyes glittered with excitement over this mental battle. Athrun was outmatched in his current condition. He might have been outmatched anyway.

"How about, 'Oh, and I'm Kurt Cobain'?"

"Better, if only slightly."

Athrun scoffed. "You're about as friendly as a viper, you know that?"

"And you already told me your real name, Kurt."

"Do you need help on your way out?" he asked, his energy now depleted to near nothing. He could barely hold his eyes open, and the mind games were zapping him into zombie stupid.

"Nope. I think we're good."

"Good," Athrun repeated. He gratefully watched her leave through the door she came in, and then looked at the big, bright, red digital numbers on alarm clock next to him. Two fifty-six a.m. Half-heartedly setting the alarm for six-thirty, Athrun sighed. He didn't know if Kira was asleep or not, but either way he dreaded the conversing they would have to do, eventually. Maybe not tonight… Hopefully not tonight…

He grudgingly made his way into the bedroom.

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