Many thanks to PfenixB for doing such a wonderful job with the betaing!

13

Groggily, Cid forced his eyes open, taking in the still dark room. Confused, his bloodshot eyes darted over to the clock on the nightstand and a groan escaped him at the sight. Two fucking a.m. in the damn night! He closed his eyes again, hoping the pressure in his bladder would just magically vanish, but after another agonizing minute he swung his legs out of the bed, muttering an exasperated "What the hell?!"

Grabbing for a washed out dressing gown, he stumbled through the dark room, avoiding some stacks of magazines and a pile of clothes and grumpily opened the door. He remembered just last minute that he couldn´t express his rage of waking up in the middle of the night for a piss by stomping his apartment and smashing doors, since he had a guest. Which made him even grumpier, but at least he took a deep breath and tiptoed to the bathroom.

After he had relieved himself, he gave the toilet a withering glare and then went back to the living room. He had to wait a moment for his eyes to adjust back to the darkness and tried to make out some shapes and that was when he noticed the small stripe of light coming from under the door to his office.

Narrowing his eyes Cid walked over, trying to hear something coming from the room, but it was utterly quiet, so he just pressed down the handle and stepped in.

"What the hell ya doin?" Cid frowned at Yazoo, who was sitting at the ground before the low table, hunched over some papers. "It´s fuckin´ 2 a.m.!"

The boy looked up at the man with sleepy eyes, pen resting still in his hand. "I cannot sleep… You are wearing a dressing gown with butterflies and a flower pattern."

The mechanic´s eye twitched at that calmly spoken observation, snapping "No shit Sherlock!" Then he rubbed over his grouchy face, trying to get his mood under control when he noticed Yazoo flinch just the slightest bit.

"Sorry," Cid mumbled, slowly shuffling over. "t´s an old one o´ma wife's…"

The youth simply nodded his head in understanding and took a sip from his cup. Sighing, the blond grabbed his own empty cup from his desk and held it into Yazoo´s direction. While the young man filled it, the mechanic sat down on the floor, head propped in one hand and had a quick, dizzy look over whatever Yazoo was writing.

"Here." The youth handed him back his cup and Cid took it with a slight nod of gratefulness. He wasn´t sure if drinking coffee now was the brightest of ideas but to hell with it, he was thirsty! The next moment he made a surprised face, which changed quickly to narrowed eyes and a sharp look at his apprentice "What the hell is that?"

"Chamomile tea," Yazoo replied, eyes again on his files. "I found it in one of the cupboards and thought it would help me sle-"

"Who the fucking hell allowed you to go through my things without permission?!" Cid suddenly interrupted harshly, putting the cup down with a bang, eyes blazing. Yazoo just stared at him open mouthed, totally surprised by the sudden outburst.

"Ya can´t just waltz in here like ya fuckin´own ma damn place!" the mechanic shouted, furiously dragged a hand through his hair.

"I am good enough to take care of your paperwork and your bills, to work my ass off at your shop for no money whatsoever but I am imposing on you if I make myself some tea?"

The question was spoken with obvious disbelief and not so much sarcasm, clearly not intended to upset but to get a grasp on what was going on.

Still, the mechanic seemed to be offended when he suddenly hit the table with his fist, making the cups jump and Yazoo flinch.

"SHUT THE FUCK UP!"

The room was utterly silent after that. Yazoo clung to his biro, fingers cramped around the slim item, knuckles turned white. He had unconsciously crawled back on the floor until he bumped with his back against the wall, round eyes fixated on the heavily breathing blond and his enraged expression.

That -the soft thud breaking the tense silence as Yazoo connected with the wall- made Cid come out of his choleric attack and his shoulders slumped down. He briefly closed his eyes, covering them with one hand and murmured "Shit."

Then he breathed a shuddering sigh and his hand fell back in his lap.

"Look, I´m sorry, I didn´t mean ta scream."

"It´s alright, it was my fault," Yazoo breathed tightly, still pressing himself against the wall and looking like a mouse at a cobra.

For a moment it seemed like Cid´s entire features were slipping down his face as he realised that the youth hadn´t even really heard him. He was just busy to appease Cid´s anger and get out of it alive…

"No really, please, jest… relax. I´m not angry or something, I certainly ain´t gonna hurt you," he said slowly, but all he got was a quick, consenting nod, without Yazoo giving up his tense state even one bit.

"I…I was jest…" the mechanic nervously licked his lips. The guilt was suddenly overwhelming and he felt so bloody shitty, because he´d just done the same he wanted to spare Yazoo from. He had frightened the shit out of him, and for no real reason at that. Well, maybe there was a reason… He took a deep breath and then explained,

"I´m sorry, really. I was jest surprised cos, ya know… Ma…-ma wife always made chamomile tea for me. The friggin' best, I tell ya!" He gave a short, hollow laugh that shrunk to a thin, bitter smile, but at least Yazoo relaxed a little, tilting his head.

"Yeah, an´ after she passed away… I haven´t drunk one damn cup o´that tea ever since. Jest…kept it in the cupboard an´…"

He paused, gulping down the lump that choked his throat, threatening to make his voice croaky.

"Jest surprised me." Cid finished quietly. He grabbed for the pack of cigs lying on the table and lit it with slightly trembling hands, glad that he had something to cling to.

"I am sorry," Yazoo said again, but this time it sounded like he was fully aware of what he was saying. The pen was laxly hanging between his fingers.

"Ya couldn´t know," Cid replied, brushing the cig against the ashtray and then adding with a wry smile "Ya tea ain´t that shitty either, though."

The youth remained quiet for a moment, before giving a monosyllabic "Thanks".

Feeling uncomfortable in the heavy silence that followed, Cid nodded at the papers and asked interestedly, to distract from their little dispute, "Lookin´good?"

"Well," Yazoo quietly said, coming a bit nearer and reaching for one of the papers. "I am not done yet, but I would say it could look far better. You are wasting large amounts of money for nothing, simply because you do not keep track of your stocks. You do not have fixed prices, as far as I can see…"

"Yeah, I charge by like whateva I feel ´s right. If it´s a friend it´s less." Cid frowned, shrugging, and expectant eyes lingering on the youth in his sleeping shirt.

"I suppose your clients must all be rather close friends to you then," Yazoo muttered, but continued in his normal, calm voice, "Then there is this thing with the tabs you lost, which costs you, as far as I reckoned, over 1000 per year."

"Oh." Cid looked at his apprentice with big, round eyes, trying to digest the number.

"That is the lost money from the tabs alone," Yazoo informed him with an arched eyebrow, looking through the papers. "I would advise you from now on to just stick to better bookkeeping. Think about some fixed prices, or you will lose track. If you have them, it will be easier to anticipate what you will gain at the end of the month. And just… abandon this tab thing. If they really are your friends they will pay for their stuff."

"Errr," Cid cleared his throat, threw the papers a worried look, but then with some effort dared to ask in a small voice, "I ain´t havin´ any debts, have I?"

Yazoo shook his head, inwardly cringing that the man didn´t even know that!

"Great," the mechanic exhaled, a huge, cocky grin spreading on his face as he folded his arms over his chest in self satisfaction.

"But over the years you lost approximately 20.000 that could have been easily avoided," the youth continued wryly, lying the paper aside and looking at his employer with a bittersweet smile. "That´s a new truck, an assistant, an air conditioning system, a -"

"Shit," Cid mumbled, not looking so happy anymore as he rubbed his hand over his chin and took another drag from his cig. "A´right. A´right ya can stop I get the point… Shit."

Shaking his head in disbelief, he took a distracted sip from his tea, gulped it down and shook his head again. "´kay, I think we better talk ´bout that tamorrow, I ain´t feelin´ like I can deal with that right now…"

Yazoo just gave an indifferent shrug and sipped at his own tea.

"So…" the mechanic spoke up again to distract from another unpleasant matter (he just seemed to have a special talent to get himself into shitty situations at 2 a.m.), "Ya couldn´t sleep?"

He received another curt nod and frowned. "Ya know after all the work-out an´ stress ya should sleep like a friggin log... Ya still thinkin' or what?"

Turning the cup in his hand for no apparent reason, Yazoo let his gaze glide over the various papers again, answering "Not really… I am tired, but I just can´t sleep." He paused, tilting his head and drawing his knees closer to his chest, murmuring. "I´m not used to sleeping alone."

"I see," the blond nodded, exhaling some smoke and stubbing the cigarette out. "Had exactly the same problem after she-" He stopped, frowning again. He usually didn´t talk about such things or her, and he had no idea why he was doing so now. Must be because he was tired or because of the tea or something, so he left the sentence unfinished and instead simply said "I understand that."

The silver haired youth gave the man a scrutinizing look over the rim of his cup. "What did you do to overcome it?"

The blond gave a shrug. "Dunno, it went away after a few years."

"A… few years?" Yazoo echoed somewhat crestfallen.

"Eh… jest… ya know, doesn´t have ta be the same with ya, I´m an old man…" Cid scratched his head, finished his tea with one last gulp, and rose from the ground.

"A´right kiddo, time ta go ta bed. Ya too," he threw the boy a stern look and the youth rose as well.

After a last look through the room, the mechanic turned out the light and closed the door behind him to get another round of much needed sleep.

TBC

I might take a little pause, since college just re-started and I am relatively busy.

Valitiel: Hehe, Cid may think that Yazoo isskinny (too much for his liking, that´s why he tries to stuff him with food), but he doesn´t think he is dumb! Especially not after Yazoo took care of all the paperwork XD

kiki-slasha: Alright, there will be lusty thoughts in the next chapter^^ Having thoughts and doing things are two very different things, so I think I can get away with it... It´s about time something happens anyway, otherwise I´ll get bored. I am happy you like it, sometimes I think I drag things on for too long because I´m a bit of a pendant with plot and making everything realistic, so that I forget about the actual main story :)

sareyva: Oh hahaha, yes, he is! But I think that´s because he´s just too lazy to clean up anything, therefore everything is messy^^ I think Yazoo´s cowering might surprise the attacker for a moment, but then he´ll be at a disadvantage again, so Yazoo should better learn to defend himself... And I am glad Cid does teach those techniques to him!

Thanks everyone for reading and reviewing, happy Easter!