Secrets Told

Thanks to Defiant Vixen for your review – Secret No More was actually an inspiration for this story, so it's pretty cool to see you reading this! Thanks also to Virgo Writer for reviewing!

Chapter Six: Accomplished

It was quiet, unusually so, Tracey observed vaguely. He'd heard the shower turn off well over an hour ago and had thought nothing of it until just now when he realized that he hadn't heard any noise of any sort since then. This was incredibly strange as the house was rarely quiet, not with the way Gary's stereo was always playing down the hall whenever the boy was home and not with the way May and her friends would talk and giggle loudly all the time. Certainly not with the way the two siblings he lived with constantly bickered.

He had been lying on his bed since leaving Gary alone in the bathroom, reading a book on water pokemon that Misty had gotten him for his last birthday while absentmindedly scratching his Marril behind the ears. With a quiet sigh he set down his book, turned his gaze the alarm clock on the nightstand next to the bed, and watched the minutes slowly pass. He wanted to track down his younger boyfriend and check on him at the very least but he knew Gary too well to do that – the boy was far too stubborn and proud to let others see him at an unusual low. Of course, Tracey had seen him upset before, but the way his entire body had responded so suddenly and completely to whatever thought had come into his head showed him that this time was different. Tracey knew that he had been fortunate in how accepting people had been of himself, but then again, he had to take into consideration the type of people he befriended – polite, caring, open-minded. He'd never had many friends, being far more interested in reading and watching pokemon to care much, and so he had never worried much about acceptance. Gary, on the other hand, had always been popular and had always had a good-sized group of friends. He had far more to lose than Tracey and the fact that he'd kept the relationship secret did not help his situation much.

He sat up as he contemplated whether to leave his bedroom or to simply stay and wait for something to happen. With a small groan, he pushed himself to his feet and walked to the door after leaving Marril with a final pat on the head. "This is probably going to annoy him…" he complained under his breath. Even if it did annoy Gary, Tracey knew that wouldn't be the case for long; they'd had their share of disagreements over the course of their relationship as well as during the many months of friendship before then. A mild annoyance would be little to deal with, especially in this situation.

Tracey pulled the bedroom door open and was slightly startled when he nearly walked into someone in the hallway. A set of familiar hands caught his shoulders before he could crash into the other person and a small smile curved his lips as dark brown eyes met his own. "Looking for someone?" Gary asked with a small smile of his own.

"You have the best timing," Tracey muttered in response as Gary squeezed past him into the room and sat on the bed.

"So I was right; you were looking for me. Hey, Marril," he greeted the blue aquatic mouse as it jumped into his lap with a cheerful squeak.

Tracey smiled again as he returned to his spot on his bed, leaving the door open as he did so. "I never said I was looking for you, I just said you have good timing," he replied while he leaned back against the pillows with a soft sigh.

Gary grinned and lay down next to Tracey, resting his head on his boyfriend's chest and draping an arm over his waist. "Maybe, but I know you too well; you can't stand being away from me."

"Don't be too cocky," Tracey laughed as he pushed Gary's shoulder roughly. "You're more of a pain in the ass than you realize –"

"In more ways than one," Gary teased, snuggling against the warm soft fabric of Tracey's t-shirt.

Tracey was quiet for a moment while shifting his weight to slip an arm around Gary's shoulders. "I would say something to that but you're being cuddly so I'm going to ignore you being your usual perverted self." He could feel the soft chuckle reverberate through Gary's chest and then through his own body as the slightly-husky sound made its way to his ears. This position was a definite reversal of what was normal for the young couple; not that Tracey was complaining, he greatly enjoyed the feeling of the younger boy wrapped in his arms.

They were silent for several long minutes, simply maintaining their comfortable positions as Gary traced his fingers lightly along the waistband of Tracey's shorts. Tracey only smiled in lazy contentment while slowly running his hand up and down Gary's back. He could by that certain tenseness in the teen's shoulders that he was deep in thought; to anyone else, Gary would seem relaxed but Tracey had, over time, learned to recognize even the most subtle clues to what was really going on in his head.

"What are you thinking of?" he finally asked after a long while had passed as they quietly lay there.

Gary stirred slightly against Tracey's shirt and raised his head to look at him. "A lot of things," he replied, meeting his eyes calmly.

"Such as?"

Gary remained quiet for several moments after the gentle prompt, clearly trying to put his thoughts in order before finally speaking. As much as Tracey wanted him to just say whatever it was, he was relishing the way it felt to be lying like this without worrying about being caught. The longer the silence, the longer they could maintain this position.

"I don't know why I let this get so far," Gary finally whispered as he rested his head against Tracey's chest once more. Tracey could feel his heart jump at the words – they sounded foreboding and he couldn't help but worry what the meaning behind them was. He couldn't find the breath to ask what exactly Gary meant by them but he soon carried on without needing any prompt from Tracey. "It's been over a year; don't you think that's a little too long to hide a relationship?"

Tracey let out a tiny sigh of relief at these words; though not entirely relieved, he at least sensed that this wasn't quite as bad as he originally thought. "Gary," he began softly, knowing his next words would likely sound more harsh than they were meant to be. "We kept it a secret because you wanted to, I've been willing to be open about it since the start."

"I know, I was just thinking… Maybe the reason it all went over so badly is because we kept it a secret for as long as we did."

"It's only been a day, these things take time; you know that."

"Yeah, but –"

"What's really bothering you, Gary?"

Gary groaned and buried his face in Tracey's shirt for a moment as he once more recognized defeat – only Tracey was capable of seeing through him that easily, granted, his grandfather was rather good at this as well. Still, Tracey managed to pick up on everything that anyone else would miss, likely due to his experience as a pokemon watcher. "I want to be open with it, Trace, but I hate putting my friendships on the line because of it! I hate this entire fucking situation!"

"Calm down," Tracey intoned gently before Gary could continue on his tangent.

"Do you think it's too late to tell them it was just a joke?" Gary asked suddenly.

Tracey sighed loudly at this and wrapped his arms around Gary's frame more tightly. "Don't be so negative, Gary; don't you realize how much it means to me for us to be open about this? I've been waiting on you for over a year and for you to even think about passing it off as a joke –"

"I was just kidding, Tracey! Give it a rest. I just wasn't entirely ready to come out to everyone all at once… I don't want to deal with this right now."

"I love you, you know," Tracey whispered soothingly as he ran his fingers through Gary's hair. "Just give it some time."

"I love you too," Gary muttered, his voice muffled slightly by the way he was still laying with his head on Tracey's chest.

Tracey didn't reply, choosing instead to relax as he easily realized that this was likely to be as calm as his boyfriend was going to get today. Regardless of whatever was on Gary's mind, he himself was rather complacent with spending hours just lying around together. Though they had always managed to spend time doing exactly this, the current situation was different; for starters, they didn't have to worry about anyone catching them as they had always done before. Secondly, May was out with friends and had no way of interrupting them. Even Professor Oak was far too preoccupied to bother them and, with Gary's friends out of the picture for once, they had the whole afternoon to themselves. It may have been a bit selfish on his part, but Tracey simply couldn't resist taking advantage of the day's events to lay back and unwind for a bit. His hands tenderly toyed with Gary's hair for a long while until he felt him slowly relax into the gentle embrace.

He smiled slightly to himself sometime later as he realized that his boyfriend's muscles were completely free of tension. "Sleeping or skulking?" he asked lazily when Gary tiredly nuzzled against his chest.

"Neither," was the quiet response.

"Relaxing?" Gary nodded. "Maybe we can start doing this more often then?"

"Yeah…"

Tracey reached over, retrieved his book from the nightstand, and resumed his reading from earlier that afternoon. He felt more content than he had ever before as he glanced down at the way his Marril was curled up between himself and Gary. The only thing, he thought, that could make the picture more perfect would be if Gary's Umbreon were curled at the foot of the bed as well. It was truly comfortable – to the point that he could feel his eyes fluttering shut after a fairly short amount of time.

He hadn't even realized that he had fallen asleep until he heard the professor calling them; the room was dark when he opened his eyes. Marril was no longer napping on the bed though a glance around the room revealed a black and yellow canine curled next to the bed as though guarding her trainer and his lover.

"Boys?" the professor's voice asked from a short distance down the hallway.

Gary stirred against him and groaned quietly. "Pretend to be asleep so he'll leave us alone," he muttered drowsily.

"I heard that, Gary." Tracey laughed quietly when Professor Oak appeared in the doorway and took in the sight of his grandson and his young assistant lying on the rather small bed together with a small smile. "I got off the phone with Ash a few minutes ago, it turns out he's having some problems with Pikachu so he'll be coming by whenever he gets into town next week."

Tracey grinned and lightly ruffled Gary's hair as he groaned again and buried his face against him with a dark mutter. "It'll be nice to see him again," he said to the professor, ignoring the scoff that came from Gary's direction.

Professor Oak nodded in response. "I just wanted to let you know before I forget about it. Come on, Umbreon, let's leave them alone." He waited for the dark pokemon to stretch and head into the hallway ahead of him before closing the door behind them.

The dark room was silent for a moment before Gary spoke up. "Think Ash could've picked a worse time to come home?"

"He could've shown up today," Tracey pointed out. He sat up as Gary complained quietly, forcing the taller boy to move so that he was no longer cuddled against his chest.

"Tracey!"

"I know how to cheer you up," Tracey replied, letting a mischievous grin slowly spread across his face. Gary grinned in response and sat up as well, pushing Tracey back against the pillows as he leaned closer and pressed his lips against Tracey's. The kiss deepened quickly, as they always seemed to, and Gary soon slipped into Tracey's lap as he straddled the other boy's waist and let his fingers twine in his dark hair. They pulled apart ever so slightly, still close enough to feel each other's breath against their lips. "See, I always know how to cheer you up," Tracey said as he gave Gary an impish smirk that only seemed to cross his features during select encounters between the couple.

"Trace?" Gary murmured as he placed his lips against Tracey's neck.

"Mmm?"

"Shut up."

Tracey gasped slightly as Gary's teeth nipped at his flesh but forced himself to respond. "Make me," he whispered, sighing softly as he felt Gary's hands fumble slightly at his waist.

He couldn't help but feel at least a little accomplished knowing that he had managed to salvage what had started off as a lousy day for the person that mattered most to him.