"You're kidding me!" Euphemia gasped as she put a hand up to her mouth, the expression on her face not merely shock but also considerable embarrassment as well. "You were the one who wrecked her car? Oh, god, Lelouch, and I've been making fun of Cornelia for three years now and she hasn't said a word..."
Lelouch, looking just as mortified, would glance off to the side. "Well, she didn't want me to get in trouble, I guess..."
"You didn't get in trouble for that?" Euphemia inquired, tilting her head.
"... Well, uh, if you'll remember, for most of the next few months I wasn't available in the afternoons..."
"... you weren't going to Clovis's?" Euphemia leaned in, a broad grin showing on her face as if she was being let in on some conspiracy.
"Sometimes I was, but, ah, it wasn't to play chess. Commander Gottwald put a disguise on me and had me do some different chore every week...! Like a servant boy! Cornelia apparently thought it would be educational." Lelouch grumbled, crossing his arms.
"Ah, no wonder you started going to bed so early! You must have been exhausted every night." Euphemia leaned over to pull Lelouch's head to her shoulder and ruffle his hair, prompting a protesting cry from the teenager.
"Hey! Euphie, you can't lean over like that in here, you're gonna tip the-" And all too quickly, the boat's balance shifted, and with scarcely a "Whoa!" the two of them were upside-down and underwater, in the shallow lake at the center of one of the villa's elaborately landscaped gardens.
As Lelouch's shoes found the sandy bottom and his head broke the surface of the water, he would wipe the lake water from his eyelids and bat aside a lily pad, opening his eyes to come face-to-face with a soaked, and still grinning, Euphemia, though a slight blush tinged her cheeks. "Sorry, Lelouch, I guess we've both grown a bit..."
With nearly anyone else, Lelouch would have been raging at their negligence despite his warning, but with Euphemia, any notion of being angry with her even for something that was clearly her fault was inconceivable- it fled from his mind before a spark of anger even appeared. "You really are hopeless, Euphie... You know Cornelia's going to be furious with us for ruining these clothes."
"Well then, maybe this time I can join you for your punishment!" Euphie replied, sticking her tongue out and reaching over with an arm, the filmy fabric of her dress sending cascades of water down onto Lelouch's shoulder as she combed back some soaked raven locks from his face. "Won't that be romantic, Lelouch...?"
"Romantic, nothing..." Lelouch grumbled, glancing down and off to the side, though he wasn't entirely dismissing the notion... "You try breaking down rotten fences and cleaning out stables and milking cows for a few weeks and you won't think so afterward..." He couldn't help but wonder why his gaze seemed to keep flicking back toward the way Euphemia's soaked dress clung to the slight swell of her chest... Was this what he'd read about...? What Cornelia had warned him about...? How his feelings toward girls would start to change...?
"Well, whatever's going to happen, it'll be worse if we don't get a bath and get changed quickly, so c'mon..." Euphie reached under the water to close a hand around Lelouch's wrist, leading the bewildered boy up out of the lake and striding, soaked, up to the patio... Once upon the rocky surface, she would bunch as much of her dress up into her arms as she could grab and begin to wring it out, while Lelouch watched and glanced down at his own clothing, realizing that his wasn't nearly loose enough for him to wring out without removing it, and he certainly wasn't about to do that in front of-
oh god.
"What's that look on your face for, Lelouch? You act like you've never seen me in my underwear before." Euphemia chided, placing her hands on her hips.
"G... Guh... B... Uh... E-... Euphie, I..." His face crimson, his mind blank, his vision flooded with stars, his eyes as wide as dinner plates for a moment before he flung an arm up over them. "You shouldn't be... outside like that...!"
"Well, I'm waiting for you, so hurry up! At least hang your shirt up to dry!" Euphemia reached over to fiddle with his buttons. "Here, I'll help you."
This prompted an explosive movement from Lelouch's arms to simultaneously stop Euphemia's hands and cover himself, but after a moment of meeting her annoyed stare with a shocked one of his own, the young man would sputter, "U-uhm, I can do it myself, okay!?"
"Fine! Well, let me go get my towel and my hairbrushes..." Euphemia flicked her sopping wet hair saucily over one shoulder as she strode off into the house, Lelouch's eyes glued to the sight until he remembered that his lungs required another breath, and he sucked it in like a fish out of water.
As his bare feet padded carefully on the tile floor, trying not to slip, Lelouch would eventually move into one of Aries villa's more simple but elegantly designed bathrooms, with a distinctly white motif, scarcely a shade of any other color to be seen anywhere within. Shutting the door behind him, he eventually calmed his thudding heart and rapid breaths, and felt the tingle on his cheeks begin to fade as the hot water poured into the tub. Once his wet clothing was hanging on the towel rack, he sunk down to his nose in the nearly still water of the tub, blowing a few bubbles as he rolled his eyes.
What the hell was that all about...?
He'd have just a moment of peace to meditate on that thought before the bathroom door burst open, and Euphemia, her body tightly wrapped in an electric pink bath towel that seemed far too small for the budding curves it contained, would cheerfully swing her hip to throw it shut, then let out a shrill squeak as she was splashed with a torrent of water. "Lelouch, what are you doing?!"
"Wh-" The teenage prince's blush had returned in full force, and his hands had shot down between his thighs as he once again stared at Euphemia, who stared back at him with an indignant frown. "What am I doing!? What are you doing? This is - this isn't - You need to take a bath somewhere else!"
"What's with this all of a sudden? Too good to share a bath with dumb ol' Euphie, now?" the girl frowned, crossing her arms beneath her chest in just such a manner to make Lelouch's blush deepen even further, crossing the line from cherry to scarlet.
"No, it's just... we're... Uhm..."
"Besides, we've gotta get clean quick, and you know I can't wash my hair very good by myself." Indeed, Euphemia's hair was almost down to her knees now, and when it was wet it weighed nearly half as much as she did...! "I usually need Cornelia to help me but she's not here, and we'd better get done before she gets back...! So c'mon, help me out...?" Euphemia pleaded, placing both hands on the edge of the tub and looking down at Lelouch with those irresistible puppy-dog eyes, and irresistible...
No! Why are you looking down there!?
"Fine, fine, hurry up!" Lelouch relented, if only to be spared that look, quickly swishing his head to stare intently at the space between the tiles on the wall, and within moments the water level rose and an infinitely pleasant, familiar humming filled the air as Euphie scrubbed along her arms. .
...
"Gah! What are you doing!?" Lelouch jumped, barely avoiding splashing Euphemia, who responded as he turned to look at her with a dismissive roll of her eyes, moving that sponge back and forth over Lelouch's shoulder blades.
"You missed a spot on your back, silly!" She leaned in further, pulling his ear aside and frowning. "Oh, and behind your ears, too! Gosh, Lelouch, you better not be turning into a slob!"
"Well I'm a little bit distracted..." Lelouch murmured, turning away as his blush returned and he fiddled with his fingers.
"Are you saying I'm weird-looking?" Euphemia scowled. "Is that why you keep sneaking looks at me like that?"
"N-No! That's not w-" Lelouch gulped. "You're very pretty, Euphemia, it's... um, it's hard for me to focus on what I'm-"
"Aw, you're so sweet, Lelouch." She wrapped his arms around him from behind and squeezed.
Okay, now that was just way too much...
"What's with this? You're acting all weird like that just from a hug? I hug you all the time and you never look like that." Euphemia pulled on his cheeks, stretching them wide to either side, but Lelouch was barely able to speak through it.
"I t-thawt we were duppowsed doo be in a huwwy... I think I just hewd the dooww..."
"Oh, right!" Euphemia quickly shifted in the bathtub, water sloshing as she moved.
"Quick, you wash my leg, I'll wash yours...!"
Lelouch fainted.
"Ahh! Lelouch! Lelouch, wake up! Lelouch... Somebody help!"
The door opened.
"Euphemia?! Is everything what the hell." Cornelia's expression changed with near light-speed from panic to hollow disbelief.
"Um... is something wrong, Cornelia...?" Euphemia tilted her head.
...
Lelouch's next few minutes would fly by in a daze, where he wasn't entirely sure if he'd been conscious or not, certainly after what he'd seen a moment ago... He did his best to blank the image from his mind when he finally came to his senses, realized that he was holding an icepack to his head, and that Cornelia was sitting across from his bed on a stool, her legs crossed, a small box on her lap, and the faintest hint of a blush on her face.
Sitting there and staring at him for a long while, the longer she stared, the redder her cheeks became, until finally she pulled a fist to her lips and cleared her throat.... and just kept sitting in silence, her face getting even redder now.
"Is... Um, is everything all right, Cornelia....?" Lelouch finally croaked. "Am I in trouble...?"
"Oh! Uh... No." Cornelia stammered, showing panic on her face yet again, and once again, Lelouch was certain that he did not like seeing Cornelia this way. She began talking a mile a minute, barely leaving pause for breath... "No, Lelouch, you're not in trouble, please understand that this is every bit as awkward for me as it is for you, I just... um... I... Uh... Well, you're getting older now, and, well, Euphemia's getting older, too, and, well, what happened today was... mostly my fault I suppose, for not, uh, having this talk with you sooner." She continued to speak rapidly, barely leaving herself a pause, beginning to gesture to herself as she spoke and looked down at her hands- anywhere but into his eyes.
"Euphie should have known better really though because I've already had this kind of talk with her, I just... kind of didn't know whether I should have, with you, since I figured Euphie would be responsible enough on her own and I figured that-" Cornelia's hands suddenly stopped moving, clenching into tight fists, as she barked, "STUPID I WAS SO STUPID WHY DIDN'T I SEE IT BEFORE?" Her face suddenly shifted from an expression of nervous but benevolent patience to one of abject, soul-crushing grief, suddenly snapping her gaze back up to Lelouch and clearing her throat loudly. "AHEM!" Her face once agan trembled its way back into that patently false expression of calm, patient instruction, as she forced a nervous smile to wiggle its way onto her lips.
"Look... Boys are supposed to get this talk from their fathers, but, uh... obviously that's not going to happen..." she stated with a wavering gulp. "So it's going to have to be me. I hope you can live with that, I think you'd rather it be me than him anyway..."
Despite herself, Cornelia briefly imagined what it would have been like if Charles had done his fatherly duty...
...
"You see, Lelouch, there are birds, and there are bees, and, well, the birds fuck the bees. Wear a condom."
"What's a condom, father?"
"Just wear one. I'm done here."
...
Shaking the image from her head, she'd meet Lelouch's expression, which was growing more confused by the minute.
"I don't understand, Cornelia. If I'm not in trouble then why are you so angry?"
Cornelia forced herself to try and smile, though it came out as more of an insane leer, and Lelouch winced at the sight. "Angry? No, no, I'm really not. I'm glad that this happened, really, it means you're growing to be a normal, healthy young man, just like Euphemia's growing to be a normal, healthy young lady. But, ah, as a young man, there are things you need to... um... know. About growing up. And about young ladies."
Gradually, a realization dawned on him. "... Cornelia, does this have anything to do with sexual intercourse?" Lelouch stammered, as a lightbulb flicked on over his head. "... You think that's what Euphie and I were doing? ... It's not!"
Cornelia's heart stopped, and though a small trickle of relief flooded through her at Lelouch's fervent confirmation of Euphemia's story, the fact that he knew full well about the mechanics of the act as well as the fact that he seemed to know a bit about the facts of life already not only drew her suspicion but put the image that she was so desperately trying to avoid picturing in her head clear as day.
Trying desperately to rid herself of the image, Cornelia would momentarily pursue her curiosity. "What do you know about it, then? I mean, I'm sure you've read about it in the encyclopedia, but..."
"... I saw... one night, in the library, when I was... I must have been five or six, it was when Nunnally was still a baby, but... Father, and Mother were... I thought he was hurting her... god, those screams, but then later-"
"Oh, God, Lelouch, EWWWW, PLEASE!"
"she told me it actually felt good and I-"
"PLEASE! LELOUCH!" Cornelia groaned, covering her eyes and wincing as if she'd been branded by a hot iron. Lelouch's elder sister seemed patently disgusted with the idea of Charles and Marianne ever having sex- of Marianne ever allowing Charles to have sex with her- though beforehand, Lelouch hadn't though it possible for anyone to be more disgusted by the thought than he'd been. The very fact, when he'd learned it, that his parents had had sex in order to create him made him want to be buried alive.
She dry-heaved a couple of times, but eventually cleared her throat, yet again. "Ahemmmm! Look, I'm sure you're already aware of the... mechanics of the act, but that's not what I'm here to talk about. I'm here to talk to you about... changes you're starting to go through, and, well, uh, changes Euphie already is going through, and more importantly, how you can protect yourself, and especially Euphie, from, uh... unintended consequences. Your, uh, your body... is going to change a lot in the next few years, so..." Cornelia coughed into her fist again before opening the shoebox and pulling out a booklet she'd retrieved from a parenting center on the subject that had to have been at least twenty years old.
Using vastly outdated terms for certain body parts and actions, and obviously reading very awkwardly through the more graphic sections, she gave a detailed account of what the book seemed to indicate was the typical male experience of puberty. She then gave a brief run-through of what women went through, as well- "which is why you've probably begun to notice that Euphie acts a bit strangely every month, which I'll admit happens to me from time to time as well..." - and finally came to the last and most obviously awkward part.
Contraception.
"Now, you see, far more treacherous than menstruation is what happens beforehand, ovulation, which is when her body releases a fertile ovum, and it's then that a young lady's body begins to betray her in the very worst possible way..." Cornelia added, glancing up to Lelouch, with a dour, ominous expression, "because it floods her brain with hormones that demand that she try and become a mother as soon as possible, and whenever Euphie tries to get you into situations like... the situation you were in when I found the two of you today... that's not her behaving like that, that's her ovaries making her do it. Her body wants her to become a mother at as young an age as possible, because that's the way humans used to reproduce, back before civilized times...
"But OBVIOUSLY we do NOT live in those times anymore, and neither of you are anywhere NEAR ready to be parents yet, and I'm CERTAINLY not ready to be an aunt." Cornelia groaned as she unloaded her little speech, before approaching the bed and opening up another packet inside of the shoebox, as well as a banana she'd brought along... for demonstration.
"Now, look, Lelouch, I'm absolutely not condoning you USING this, with Euphie or with ANYONE. On the contrary, if I hear about you doing anything like this with Euphie, with a condom or not, you're fucking dead meat." It was the first time in quite a long time Lelouch had heard Cornelia swear, much less in a casual manner.
"But you're a teenager now," Cornelia added, reaching over to pat his shoulder. "And teenagers tend to do a lot of stupid things."
Her fingernails squeezed his shoulder painfully.
"REALLY stupid things."
They squeezed even more tightly, breaking the skin a bit as her eyes narrowed and her voice suddenly became an icy hiss.
"SUICIDALLY STUPID THINGS. ... do you catch my drift...?"
"Y-... Yes, ma'am..." Lelouch swallowed firmly, his voice quavering in terror.
"Seriously, Lelouch, I do love you dearly but if you impregnate my sister I will rip it off and throw it in the blender."
"I s-swear, Cornelia, I wouldn't even think of it...!"
Cornelia's demonic expression suddenly shifted back to one that was surprisingly cheerful and chipper. "Good. I'm glad we understand each other. See you at dinner, Lelouch, and don't be afraid to ask me any questions about all that stuff!"
Five minutes later, when Lelouch could work up the courage to move a muscle, he realized that the banana- still encased in a prophylactic- was still lying on his lap.
...
"Look, Lelouch, Nunnally and I made dessert!" Euphemia smiled sweetly as she guided her half-sister's wheelchair to the table, where Nunnally quickly placed a silver dish.
"Oh, thanks, Nunnally, but really, I'm stuffed, I couldn't eat another bite..." Lelouch protested, having barely nibbled at his dinner- he couldn't imagine eating with those images fresh in his head...
"Oh, but you've gotta try this one, big brother...!" Nunnally added, removing the covering.
"Banana splits!"
...
"Ah, Lelouch must be really sick today! First fainting in the bathtub and then throwing up all over the table! I hope you take good care of him, Cornelia!" Nunnally stated with concern as Cornelia tucked her in.
"Oh, I already did...." Cornelia murmured softly to herself.
"What was that, big sister...?"
"I said, I sure will, Nunnally. Goodnight!"
Well, I didn't get to start that arc I've been waiting to start after all, but this chapter was just too much fun to write. Next time, for sure, though!