Warren instantly regretted his move to fly because it was terribly cold and he was wearing no shirt. Even though he was part bird and his threshold for tolerating cold was greater than the average person, that threshold had been completely crossed, and Warren was freezing his ass off.
What made this all worse was that his body had been so hot from dancing with Thea, from kissing Thea…
Shit. He screwed everything up. No matter how hard he tried to be a great son or a great friend, his wings always screwed him up. He wanted to be normal so that his father could be proud of him and so that he could dance with Thea and not have his stupid fucking wings break out of the bindings because he had an orgasm. It wasn't too much to ask, was it?
And when that drunk bastard badgered him and Thea about his wings, who was the one who immediately stepped up and defended them? Thea. And where was Warren's head? Too consumed with all the embarrassment and fear from all those people staring at him, pointing their fingers at him, whispering at him, and laughing at him.
Hadn't he escaped all that already? Hadn't he matured enough to just fucking get over it? People would always stare and point and whisper and laugh, but the true test of character was brushing all of that off. Well, clearly, Warren's lacked that character. Instead he felt trapped, suffocated by people making fun of him and judging him and thinking he was less than human. It was an all too familiar and awful feeling.
And then the classic stupid guy thing to do is snap at the person who was just trying to help. None of this was Thea's fault and yet he cursed at her and purposely made her feel guilty for dancing with him so erotically, for making him feel what he felt. He was just trying to shift the blame from himself to her. He knew that, but he doubted she did. She probably thought he thought she was a whore.
Which he didn't. He had been really, really happy to see her and feel her lose her inhibitions around him. Although he had danced with other women, Thea was…different. Every touch, every look, every everything was so much more intense and meant so much more to Warren when it came from her because of the struggles their relationship had gone through. Warren never anticipated Thea would eventually be comfortable enough with him to grind her body so damn brilliantly against his.
But how was he supposed to know the heat and the friction and the pleasure from the dancing coupled by kissing her would make him lose control? He was a twenty-three year old man who had a decent amount of sexual experience. He never expected himself to just lose it while dancing of all things. That was something only young teenage boys did, right? Well, apparently not. And naturally his wings just had to shoot up like they always do whenever he lost it.
He could have prevented it from reaching that point. He knew she knew he had been fully aroused, but he doubted she knew how close he was to an orgasm. He could have pulled away, told her he needed to go to the bathroom or some other lame excuse like that, thus preventing the situation from escalating to embarrassment. But no. He didn't want to pull away, he only wanted more of Thea. He was a greedy bastard.
And to be honest, he had been worried that later on, Thea would purposely forget that the whole thing happened and they would go back to being just friends. Warren wanted to savor as much of the experience as possible because he didn't want them to be just friends. When did he make that realization? Hadn't he told Bobby just a few weeks ago that he didn't want a relationship with Thea? Well, that had been a blatant lie.
But lie or not, it didn't matter now. He had screwed up.
He hadn't anticipated actually losing control.
He hadn't anticipated feeling trapped and judged and laughed at by all those stupid people in the club.
And then he yelled at Thea, blamed Thea, and hurt Thea over his situation.
Damn it!
By the time Warren landed on the rooftop of the mansion, every part of his body was stiff and cold. He walked past Thea's room, a bit guiltily, and straight into the shower. He put the water on warm, which felt really hot to his frozen body, and let the water rush over him. The blood from his scraped stomach made the water run pink.
As his body warmed, the judgmental part of his mind that was scolding him quieted for a bit. He began to think about just the good stuff that happened between him and Thea before he had messed it all up.
She had looked so beautiful and Warren had found himself wanting to be with her very, very much. He had fleetingly entertained the thought of getting Thea piss ass drunk and then kissing her, knowing that the next day she wouldn't remember what happened but Warren would at least know what it was like to kiss her. But that was an awful idea that Warren knew he had only thought that because he was scared she didn't return his feelings. But when exactly did those feelings for Thea arise? Warren didn't even know. But upon entering the club after that confrontation with her in the parking lot, he had thought their relationship could go no further than friendship. So then he had entertained the thought of hooking up with Jubilee to forget his stupid angst, but as cute and flirtatious as Jubilee was, she wasn't the one he wanted, and it would be wrong to do that knowing he would be thinking of Thea.
And so, as Warren watched Thea dance from their table upstairs, he knew he was stuck, but at least they were in a club. He could ask her to dance and it wouldn't have to really be anything more than friendly. So that's what he did. But their dancing was certainly more than friendly. What had caught Warren so off guard was that Thea wanted to dance with him so intimately. That gave him confidence.
Maybe she did have deeper feelings for him after all.
As the hormones kicked in and the music raged on, all Warren wanted to do was kiss her. But the prospect of kissing Thea was rather scary considering their friendship. So, he did what every self-respecting young man in his situation would do. He kissed her shoulder in such a way that if she pulled back enraged, he could just say it was an accident as he was resting his head against her shoulder. Okay, so it was cowardly, but he had no desire to risk their friendship because of his hormones and possibly one-sided desires.
But instead of being enraged, she encouraged him. So hell, he went to town. He didn't know if her actions were just a byproduct of the atmosphere and come tomorrow she wouldn't want anything to do with his lips, so he was going to take advantage of it now. He wanted her to feel pleasure because of what he did, to show her how the chemistry that was evident between them could translate into more than just flirtation.
They could be good together. But since when did he want them to be together? He didn't know that either.
And soon enough he was aroused and she wasn't disgusted. If anything, she was encouraging that too. And as he found himself feeling such pleasure from her, he knew that this wasn't something they could just say was because they were in a club.
He wanted more. He was almost positive she wanted more. And then there was more.
When Thea kissed him, it was like a huge sigh of relief - an exhale, a "Finally!", an "Oh Thank God". He hadn't known how much he wanted to kiss her until their lips actually met. And then all he could think of was kissing her more.
And then with the grinding and the kissing and the elation he felt at the entire experience, Warren just had to lose it and…he didn't want to think about that embarrassing episode anymore. He had already lambasted himself for it.
Turning off the water, Warren stepped out of the steamy shower and wiped the foggy mirror to take a look at the scrape on his chest. It wasn't deep, but he should have let Thea heal it because it hurt like hell even after it was clean. Every movement of his torso stung. He rummaged through the first aid kit in the bathroom and found a big gauzy bandage and some tape. He placed it over the wound to cover most of it.
He thought about going to see Thea right then, but decided against it. She would probably cause him bodily harm, and although he deserved it, he wouldn't be able to apologize with a broken jaw.
When he was finally in his bedroom, he looked at his clock to see that it was 12:31am, New Year's Day. This wasn't the best way to start off the New Year.
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After getting up from a very uncomfortable sleep on his back because he didn't want to sleep on his wound, Warren's first order of business was finding Thea to apologize. He scoured her bedroom, the living room, the kitchen, the classrooms, outside in the garden, everywhere he could possibly think she would be, and yet he could not find her.
Warren came across Kitty and Peter cuddled close on the couch and talking quietly in the living room as Warren made yet another circuit around the mansion looking for Thea.
"Kitty, do you know where Althea is?" Warren asked.
Kitty glared at him and shot up from her seat. "Stay away from her," she growled.
Warren was taken aback. "Look, I know I screwed up…"
"Screwed up? That's what you call it? No, you royally FUCKED up," Kitty cursed angrily.
"Kitty…" Peter said calmly, getting up from the couch and touching her shoulder gently.
"No, don't baby me," she snapped at Peter. "I trusted you not to hurt her," she said turning her attention to Warren.
"I'm sorry. I need to talk to Althea and fix this," Warren said. He had no idea Kitty could get so upset. She was always such a happy girl.
"You know what she did after you flew off? Acted like nothing happened. We all saw you guys kissing, but she just acted like it was nothing. On the way back home, she just stayed quiet and stared out the window. She didn't curse or yell, she didn't do any of those things someone would normally do. When we got home, I tried to get her to talk, but she just smiled at me and said goodnight. Do you know how much effort faking all of that must have been for her? She wouldn't have done any of that unless she was so deeply hurt that she didn't even understand how hurt she was. And Thea understands everything! So I'll get mad for her, I'll yell for her, and I'll tell you to fuck off!" Kitty screamed.
Warren was very shocked. It looked like at any moment, Kitty would pounce on him. Kitty's reaction to seeing him was sobering. He knew he had hurt Thea, but he had no idea to what degree. Judging by Kitty's reaction, he had hurt Thea very badly. And he felt like shit for that.
"Kitty…I just…I want to talk to her. I want to apologize. I want her to yell at me and beat the crap out of me…I just…want her," Warren said ineloquently.
"Oh, so now you want her…" Kitty spat out.
"She's in the gym," Peter said, cutting in.
Kitty turned to her boyfriend ready start a fight with him for telling Warren.
"Thanks, man," Warren said appreciatively.
"Don't screw this up," Peter warned, his eyes fierce.
Warren ran out of the living room and headed towards the elevator. The gym was located downstairs next to the Danger Room for X-Men training. It was a large facility with different kinds of fitness equipment ranging from treadmills to yoga balls to free weights.
As Warren approached, he heard very loud grunting. When he arrived at the doorway of the gym, he saw Thea attacking a punching bag. She was wearing a tight black t-shirt, blue shorts, and red punching gloves. She would punch and grunt, kick and grunt, spin kick and grunt, uppercut and grunt…there was lots of attacking and grunting. She was quite good in form, and Warren only then truly understood that she had been groomed to be an X-Man. She even did one of those two-footed jump kicks that Warren could only do because he had wings that would help him out. Wow, she wasn't joking when she said she could beat him up.
She paused from her attack and took off her gloves to drink some water. Perspiration was dripping from her forehead and neck onto the shirt, and Warren found it oddly attractive. He was truly a lost cause, finding a sweaty girl attractive.
She looked towards the doorway and saw him standing there.
He smiled sheepishly. "You were seriously beating the shit out of that bag."
"Yeah. Well, it helps that I was imagining it was you," Thea deadpanned, dropping the water bottle.
Warren gulped. He deserved that. "Look, about what happened, I'm sorry."
"Whatever," she said simply.
"I shouldn't have just snapped at you and left like that," Warren continued.
"Whatever."
"I'm sorry for ruining your New Year's Eve."
"Whatever."
Warren sighed with frustration. He hated when she just shut down like this. "You're not making this any easier," he mumbled irritably.
"And why the fuck should I?" Thea spat out angrily, finally showing some type of emotion. "You give me this," she said tugging the collar of her shirt to the side to expose a very sizeable hickey on her neck, "and then talk to me like I'm some sort of skank when I try to help you. You don't deserve a break."
"You're right," he said, walking towards her slowly. "I just…I'm sorry. I'm sorry for everything," he blurted out.
Thea was silent for a long time. Her breathing evened out as she thought about what he said. "You're sorry for everything?" she asked carefully.
Trust Thea to ask such a loaded question.
"No, no, I'm not sorry for everything…"
"Then what the hell are you sorry for, Warren?" Thea cut in impatiently.
She was quite bossy when she was pissed.
Warren wasn't sure how much he should reveal at that moment. Should he just spill his guts to her and hope she just didn't laugh at the mess? Should he hold back and bring up the topic of their relationship another day? What the hell, around her he was an expert at gut-spilling.
"I'm sorry for hurting you. I never meant to hurt your feelings and I didn't mean any of those things I said to you by the car. I was upset and I lashed out at the most convenient thing, and that was stupid and wrong and I'm sorry for that. But that's it. I'm not sorry for the dancing or the kissing. And I am damn proud of that hickey," Warren said assertively.
Thea looked at him sternly. "Okay," she said simply. She moved to walk around him, but he blocked her path.
"Okay? That's it?" he asked. The casual way she was dealing with this whole thing was disconcerting. She wasn't even acknowledging the mess of his guts that had spilled out.
Thea shrugged. "I'm over it."
"Then can we talk about us?" Warren asked.
"There is no 'us'," she said, her forceful tone faltering ever so slightly towards the end.
Warren frowned. He should have expected her to react like this. She gave him a chance, he flopped, and now she was backing away from everything.
"Althea..." he said in a panicked tone.
"What Warren?" Thea asked tiredly. "It doesn't matter."
"Of course it matters. There is an 'us'. 'Us' consists of you rolling your eyes at me and me making flirtatious comments that you just shoot down. 'Us' is me trying to get you to tell me secrets and you showing me how much of an asshole I am for pressuring you. There's always been an 'us', it just all came to a head yesterday and I screwed it all up. And I'm sure you'll hold it over my head forever, and I'll apologize for it forever, but there is an 'us'," he said passionately.
In a life filled with regret, uncertainty and the continual and unhealthy desire to please others (particularly his father), Warren never felt so sure of himself than he did just after his rather corny monologue. He wanted Thea – pure and simple. Well, it wasn't very simple because Thea would probably fight him on this, and his thoughts regarding Thea weren't very pure, but regardless, he knew what he wanted.
Thea was silent and she refused to look at him. She closed her eyes and clenched her jaw. "I hate how good that sounds," she confessed.
"Us?" he asked eagerly.
She opened her eyes and smirked. "No, you trying to get back on my good side," she said wryly.
Disappointment filled Warren. She was taking this all as a joke.
She looked at him critically until he felt like he was squirming under her scrutiny. "I'm just giving you a hard time. Payback," Thea said with a dry smile.
Warren exhaled audibly.
"I do like the sound," she revealed. "But the sound and the execution are two completely different things."
"Nothing much would change. We'd just throw in lots of kissing," Warren said with a charming smile.
Thea's very severe expression crumbled beginning with her eyes. Her eyes glittered with suppressed laughter, then her face broke out into a grin and she began to laugh.
He smiled at finally getting to hear that sound. It was a husky, light kind of laugh, if that made any sense.
"I also hate how I can't stay mad at you."
"And I'm quite relieved," Warren said.
"I should be kicking your ass right now," Thea said.
Warren stepped towards her. "Please do."
Thea rolled her eyes with annoyance. "Don't tempt me. If you ever talk to me again like you did yesterday, I will, you have my word," Thea threatened.
He knew that threat would never come to fruition because there was no way he would ever treat Thea like that again. "Agreed." He moved so that he was right in front of her, clearly in her personal space. "So, what do you think about us?"
Thea looked everywhere but at Warren.
"Okay, let's try a different question. Did you like my kissing?" he asked flirtatiously.
"No fishing, Warren."
Warren laughed. Shot down, once again. Yep, that was their relationship.
"Aw, c'mon. It's good to stroke a guy's ego once in a while," he said.
"You got plenty of stroking last night," Thea retorted cheekily.
Warren blushed at her bold comment. "Touché."
Thea smiled as she stepped a bit closer to him, so that she could rest her forehead on his chest.
"So…what do you want, Thea?" Warren asked. It was the first time he ever called her Thea, and for some reason, it felt much more intimate than when he called her by her full name.
"It's not a matter of what I want. It's a matter of what the consequences are," she explained.
"What would be the consequences of me kissing you right now?" he asked.
Thea looked at him skeptically. "Who said I wanted that?" she asked.
"If you didn't want that, you would have pushed me away, called me a pervert, and proceeded to use some of those fancy kicks on my groin area," Warren said knowingly.
"Good point," she conceded.
"So, what would be the consequences?" Warren pressed on, his voice lowering and in the process. He wondered if that was a good thing.
She tensed as she thought about his question. "I don't know, that's the problem. I…shit Warren, I miss that time when I knew what I was doing."
"When did that end?"
"The moment I healed you the first time," she replied.
"In the kitchen?" Warren asked. That was so long ago.
"You're so brilliant," she said sarcastically.
"So you haven't known what you've been doing this whole time with me?"
She was always so sure of herself, or at least that was how she seemed. He affected her that much so that she didn't know what she was doing when she was around him? That was a very odd compliment, but also very unnerving. He had no idea he had that type of power over her.
Thea was clearly flustered. "No…I mean…no. You just waltz in and want to be my friend and make me…feel," she finished lamely.
"And that's bad?" Warren asked.
"No, but it makes things more complicated."
"You're the queen of complexity though. Shouldn't be anything you can't handle," he jested.
She snorted.
He held her gently against him, not caring that she was wet with sweat. He suspected he would have found it rather gross, but he didn't. He was a goner when it came to her.
"What do you want, Thea?" he asked again.
Thea inhaled deeply but was silent for a while. "This," she finally said.
Warren felt a surge of confidence at her answer.
"But I would suck at any semblance of a relationship, and that wouldn't be fair for you," she said.
"What do you call what we're in? I wasn't really joking when I said it would sort of be like how we are now but with lots of kissing. We're in a relationship now and it's going well, I think. Confusing, but good."
"What we're in right now is a friendship. If we just add kissing, it would be friends with benefits…"
He squeezed her tightly as warning bells sounded in his mind. "I don't want friends with benefits," he said adamantly. "That's not what I meant." Friends with benefits rarely ended well. One friend would get emotionally invested and wind up getting hurt. Also, it didn't apply to them because he was already emotionally invested, and it seemed she was too.
Thea smiled weakly. "I know. I'm being difficult. But I can't do all those mushy, gushy things that girlfriends should do."
"What makes you think I want that?"
"It not a matter of what you want, it's a matter of what I should be capable of doing if I were in a relationship with a guy. I should be able to be affectionate like Kitty or Marie. I should be able to open up to you and tell you all my embarrassing shit. I should…"
"Althea," Warren said sternly. "Don't do this."
He didn't want her to start with the whole self-deprecating thing. He was a pro at it, and it never led anywhere.
"You deserve someone who isn't so screwed up," Thea said.
"Stop this. You're being stupid. That makes it sound like I'm better than you or some other fucked up shit like that, but that's not true. I'm screwed up too," Warren pointed out. "My behavior yesterday when I snapped at you is testament to that."
Thea was silent.
"We're both dysfunctional. I think that's why we're so good together," Warren said.
Thea snorted. "I don't want you to settle," she said, turning serious once again.
"I'm not settling," Warren said adamantly.
"Yeah, you are. You're settling for whatever I'm capable of being rather than what I should be," Thea pointed out.
How could she think she wasn't good enough for him? Granted she was closed off and she had problems and she wanted to be "better" than she was, but honestly, she was so great just as she was. He would gladly take her with all her idiosyncrasies and weird mood swings and occasional snappy attitude…all of it.
"Then you're settling too. So we'll settle together and live happily ever after, okay?" Warren said easily.
"Warren, I'm serious."
"I am too."
Thea had no response to that.
"Let's try it out, okay? We can even promise that no matter what happens, we'll always be friends, or something else equally cliché out of a chick flick," Warren said.
Thea laughed. He really did love how it sounded.
Things quieted down and Warren waited for her to say something. She had a thoughtful and tentative expression on her face. Finally, she looked him straight in the eye.
"Okay," she said softly.
Warren felt like jumping up and down in celebration, but that would look stupid and give Thea too much ammunition to make fun of him with later on.
"Okay then," he mumbled with suppressed glee before dipping his head so that their lips met in a soft kiss. When Warren broke the kiss, Thea immediately kissed him and then there was just a lot of wonderful kissing. Things weren't frenzied like before. Their kissing was languid but passionate at the same time.
He tried to think of kissing techniques that would impress Thea, but honestly, his brain wasn't functioning very much. Luckily, Thea didn't seem to mind.
Her warm hand snaked under his shirt and Warren moaned in delight as he felt the cool air of the gym hit his exposed skin. She broke away from the kiss to examine his chest. Warren groaned in annoyance because they were not kissing anymore.
"You did a really bad job fixing this up," Thea said, peeling the bandage off of his chest.
"I really didn't care at the moment," Warren said. "I still don't. Can we go back to kissing?"
Thea rolled her eyes. "You've already turned into a hormonal beast," she muttered irritably.
"I'll take that as a compliment."
She ignored his comment. "I want to fix this," she said bending down to examine the streaks of red on his chest.
"Okay, but then can we kiss?" Warren asked impishly.
Thea gave him a rather devilish look before placing her lips near an area of his chest that was scraped.
"Oh, whoa," Warren gasped out at the sight of Thea's lips on his chest. Then he felt a tingly sensation spread through him from Thea's lips. Thea kissed another spot and that spot felt tingly too. He watched as the places she put her lips were no longer red. She was healing him with her lips. It was definitely one of the more erotic things he had ever seen and felt.
When she was done, she wrapped her arms around his neck and smiled. "Not as effective as the hands but…"
She couldn't finish what she wanted to say because Warren was kissing her passionately.
"That…what so hot," Warren said appreciatively.
She grinned. "I know," she said arrogantly.
Warren just laughed.
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Author's Note: I have great reviewers. Thank you! The last chapter was very difficult to write, and so I'm really glad that you guys received it so warmly. I'm also glad you thought it was realistic. Stuff like the lesbian comment actually happened to me in real life. Go figure.
Specifically, to the reviewer who goes by sadi: I totally did not mean you when I was addressing my resentment towards feeling the pressure to update. I was addressing a specific review that was asking where the update was because it had been four days already. Hoping for "updates soon" I completely understand assuming reviewers understand that the writer may not be able to provide. So, sadi, don't feel bad, your grasp of English is fantastic and I appreciate your continual support and reviews.
To all my reviewers, I am off to Japan soon. I don't know if I'll have internet, but I'll be thinking of what to write next and so when I return I'll try to post asap. I want to thank you guys so much for all your support and patience. I hope you like this chapter. Please let me know what you think!
