Partners

Partners
Viva La Viveca

Disclaimer : I disclaim disclaimy things… again… as always…

Chapter VII :: Rest

After a shower, and some amazing sex during that shower, we pretty much spent the rest of the day lounging around his apartment and talking. Actually, we did more kissing than talking… It seemed like we would start a conversation and then all the sudden we were having tongue wars. We were having a really hard time keeping out hands off of each other.

We threw out our earlier comments about less sex and moving slower; less than twenty-four hours and we already needed the permanent physical contact with each other. I learned that he was actually really sweet and kind once you got past his rough exterior. He seemed most at ease when talking about school, work and sex (not that we really talked about it as much as we practiced it…) When it came to the subject of life, especially childhood, he seemed reluctant to even think about it. He believed it better to live in the present rather than delve in the past. I can’t say I actually agreed with him, but I could see his point.

I did manage to get out of him that he had spent most of his life in foster homes and that he had been working and saving money since he was thirteen, though he didn’t get his first real job until he was fifteen, working at a car wash part time.

“I didn’t get a job until last year and I only work once every two weeks now… They’re closed most of the week except for Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays, but there’s only two of us, plus the bosses, who work there. On the days we do actually work we get like… ten hours of work, plus an hour for lunch…” I told him when he asked about my job. “Catt knows the owners very well, which is why I got the job in the first place…”

“Must be nice to have a sister…” Lucia mumbled into my hair. He seemed to have an obsession with my hair. We were laying in his bed. Actually, he was leaning up against the head board and I was sitting in between his legs with my head against his chest.

I shrugged. “Not really. I mean, she was good at taking care of me and everything… She can be violent sometimes as well,” I shuddered, remembering her constant violence over the wedding. It hadn‘t been pleasant dealing with all of it, and we quickly learned not to argue. Or give our opinions really. “She’s getting married in two weeks so she’s been worse than usual…”

Lucia chuckled, seeming amused by the idea. “S’pose that would be a downfall,” he said, his hand caressing my stomach. I could feel myself starting to drift off the sleep. I was quite warm and comfortable, and still tired from all the sex and excitement during the day.

“Hey Haru,” my blond lover poked my stomach.

“Huh?” I was startled out of my half-sleep state.

“Didn’t you say something about a tuxedo fitting this evening or something?”

I sat up, looking around for a clock. “Fuck, yeah! Shit!” I was wide awake now.

“Almost six…”

I was supposed to be there before five… “Shit… I’m like an hour late!” I tried to get out of bed but our legs were all tangled up with each other and the sheets. I nearly fell out of the bed before Lucia grabbed me, laughing loudly and my clumsiness. I sighed, him holding me close to his chest and helping me untangle. “I’m dead… she’s going to rip me limb from limb and feed me piece by piece to a pack of rabid wolves…”

Lucia smiled, burying his face in my hair and then kissing my bare shoulder. “I better get you home, huh?”

I sighed and nodded, though I was far from ready to leave. “I love you,” I whispered absent-mindedly, feeling tired again as I kissed him. I heard his breath catch in his throat and it took me a minute to realize what I had just said. Funny enough, I knew that it was true in multiple ways. I grinned sheepishly though, feeling my face warm up. “Sorry… I didn’t mean to say that so soon…”

He smiled, giving me another gentle kiss before sighing and getting off the bed. “It’s okay… I’m just not sure I can repeat those words back to you yet. I know I want you, really badly too…” we both grinned at that because we both already knew it very well by now. My lips were a bit swollen and my ass a bit sore as proof of that. “I’ve never really known love, so I can’t really define this…”

He pulled me as close as possible when I stood up, kissing me passionately before letting his forehead rest against mine. “But it’s good to know how you feel about me… Makes me start thinking a little more.”

I laughed. “Oh no! Whatever shall we do, Lucia’s thinking again!” I grinned at him. “Guess I better go make a bomb shelter!”

“Ha, ha… very funny,” Lucia rolled his eyes trailing kisses across my neck and down to my collar bone.

“I don’t want to go home yet.” I sighed, draping my arms over his shoulders and looking up at him hopelessly. I was falling deeper in love with him with every simple kiss and touch. It was pathetic really, yet at the same time this is what I imagined love being. Of course that’s probably because I used to read Catt’s favorite romance novels… sad I know, but I was bored and there was nothing else to read.

“You can stay here tonight if you want,” he gave me a suggestive grin. I was sorely tempted to just pull him back in bed and go for another round, but I knew I couldn’t. It wouldn’t be smart for my health later on, in multiple ways. I shook my head.

“No… Sis would probably panic if I wasn’t home when she came to kill me tomorrow morning,” I replied sadly. If she hasn’t already been there, the thought crossed my mind. That was even more scary than just the thought of her killing me. A panicky Catt was worse that a pissed off one from my previous nineteen-years of experience with it.

“I can stay with you if you want?” he offered. My heart ached, telling me to say yes, but I shook my head.

“I don’t want you caught up in the middle of Catt’s wrath, especially not when she figures out that you’re the reason I didn’t show up…” I sighed softly, kissing him again.

Lucia sighed with a small smile on his face. “Well we can just sit here a little longer and talk before you actually go home… Does that work?” he asked, and I knew he didn’t want me to go anymore than I wanted to go. That made me happy. I nodded, and we laid back down for a little while. Second biggest mistake of the night.

I must have drifted off to sleep again because the next thing I knew I was being shaken awake. “Hey, wake up…” Lucia mumbled, looking as if he had just woken up as well, not that I really looked. I barely even opened my eyes at all. “It’s eight o’clock… I should probably get you home.”

I groaned, rolling over and curling up in a ball. “’Nother five minutes…” I mumbled, getting cozy and ready to fall back to sleep. He shook me again, then gave me a low blow: he started tickling me in the sides. I yelped, sitting up and trying to fight his hands away.

He laughed, shaking his head as he stood up and grabbed his shirt off of the dresser where he had thrown it earlier. I sat up slowly, stretching and glaring at him like it was his fault. I could have kept sleeping, easily. I almost did actually, but he kept urging me until I was up on my feet and searching for my clothes.

It took us almost an hour to get ready and get out the door, between the complaining (mostly on my part) and the kisses (hell we were half-way out the door and he nearly raped me saying something about my hair being messy and me being so sexy). Finally, by a little after nine we were in his car heading toward my apartment. I realized how hungry I was, not eating since before we had left to go to his place. I guess that was the only good reason for going home.

“Hey, Haru?”

I looked up at him, my reverie of the food I was going to eat when I got home now disturbed. “Yeah?” I smiled at him glancing at me from the corner of his eye. At least he was paying most of his attention to the road. Better than Elie had ever done.

“Is your sister really that scary?”

I laughed, not because it was funny necessarily but because the truth was, it was probably just me that thought of her as the Warrior Goddess of the World. “Yeah, though I guess I’m not really afraid of her per se… I just know how much damage she can do and that she’s not afraid to hurt someone, even me. I’ve been beat up by her more than a few times for not listening to her,” I told him, staring at the road in front of us. “She’s just a really passionate person. Unfortunately if that passion and concern means that she thinks someone needs a beating, then she gives it to them. I love her to death though, and she’s always been good to me. She just worries a lot and panics a lot when I don’t call her like every day, unless she knows I’m at school or working. For most of our lives all we had was each other, and she pretty much raised me…”

“So it’s more like maternal instinct more than anything that makes her worry so much,” he said in conclusion.

“I guess… I don’t know, I never really understood it myself…… shit…” we pulled up to the curb next to my building. I knew that dark blue truck any day… it had been the first truck I had ever learned to drive, and it had stayed with Catt when I left to go to college, mostly because I figured if I actually needed to drive anywhere I’d just borrow Musica’s car.

“What?” Lucia looked at me, worried.

“My sister’s already here…” it occurred to me to check my cell phone quickly. I pulled it out of my pocket, flipping it open and turning it on… Thirteen missed calls and at least five text messages. The calls were Catt, but the text messages were from Shuda warning me to get down to the fitting before Catt got there and decided to start headhunting. At least he was nice enough to attempt to save me, even if it hadn’t worked so well. “Great… I’m dead…”

Lucia sighed. “I’ll walk you to your door… just in case,” he said, getting out of the car. I followed sluggishly, already hearing Catt’s lecture in my mind… Of course, as what seemed the trend the past week, I was never prepared for what was really going to happen. Lucia stayed by the door, promising to stay outside until he knew it was safe to come in. I opened the door slowly, entering the living room cautiously before nearly getting knocked on my back by Catt tackle-hugging me.

“Oh my God Haru!!! I thought you had been kidnapped or something! Didn’t you get any of my calls?! Shuda said he even texted you and that you never replied?” Catt checked every inch of my body that she could reach for injury, love and concern in her eyes. “When you didn’t show up we just went ahead but then we went searching for you! You weren’t here, and Musica said he had no idea where you were! Elie said she hasn’t spoken to you in a few days and she was trying to get a hold of you and we were all worried!”

Elie’s name caused a little pain. I didn’t really care to talk to her anyways now. “Sorry, Sis, I got a little busy and forgot to turn my phone on, you know how that is,” I said with a sheepish smile. It was true, for the most part. “I forgot about the fitting until just a little while ago.”

Catt’s anger suddenly flared up. “You should have been there! I told you what time it was, I even called and reminded you a couple days ago! Don’t you care about this wedding?!” she shouted suddenly, throwing me off-guard a little, both with the question and her furious look on her face. “We were so worried about you! The least you could have done is called one of us to tell us you were okay! Where the hell were you anyways?!”

I backed up a little bit, trying to give her a little space. The door was wide open and I was 90% sure that the neighbors could hear her shouting. Sadly, I found I really didn’t care whether they heard or not. “Hey, I said I’m sorry, I didn’t even turn my cell phone on until I was heading up the stairs! I didn’t mean to forget or be late or anything like that,” I said, trying to calm her down a little. Which, as always, just made everything worse. Boy did I suck at this.

“You should always have your cell phone on in case of an emergency! If I knew you were going to be like this I never would have asked you to be in the wedding!”

It was this comment that got my temper flaring. I knew I should have held my tongue, but then again I was known for the same stubbornness she was and I had always been the good little brother and held my tongue. ‘“I never wanted to be in this stupid wedding anyways! I don’t even like Shuda! And you didn’t ask, you told me that I was part of the wedding party, I didn’t have a choice in the matter!! You always do this, make me do something and then yell at me and act like I made the choice to do it and then attempt to back out of it… I don’t even know why you’re in such a hurry to get married anyways!” I wasn’t to the point of yelling like she was, but I raised my voice and was glaring at her. I was pissed, and after 19 years of dealing with her, I was finally on the verge of actually getting mad at her.

Catt glared back at me, though I could see the hurt in her eyes. “I wanted you to be a part of this because you’re my only family! If you didn’t want to be a part of it you should have said something before!”

“Why so you can be mad at me for the rest of the year?! You don’t exactly give people choices in these things. It’s either we do it or you don’t speak to us for weeks because you’re pissed off! You‘re such a bitch sometimes, it‘s almost unreal!” I felt bad as soon as it came out of my mouth, but I wasn’t going to back down. I get that way when I get angry, though I regret my words for weeks afterwards.

“You know, you’re as bad as Dad! You don’t care who you hurt as long as you get to do your own thing, don’t you?!” she spit out the one insult that could really tear anyone down, well at least if they were the son of Gale Glory. I just stared at her flabbergasted. I was nothing like our dad… I didn’t disappear for months at a time, only to come back for a day and then leave again. I loved and protected what was left of our tiny family as much as I could, even going along with Catt’s wishes no matter how opposed I was to them.

“I’d give everything up to change the way we grew up… I’ve sacrificed a lot of the things I wanted to be and wanted to do to help you out around the house and try to protect you… I’m nothing like dad,” I said through clenched teeth, looking at her in a mixture of anger and sadness. “I care about your feelings more than I care about myself, and I was willing to be a part of the stupid wedding I didn’t want to be involved in because it’s what you seemed to want more than anything in the world!”

“Well then you don’t have to be a part of the damn wedding! There, it’s done! Are you happy!? I’m sure Shuda has other friends that would be more than happy to be a part of the wedding!” Catt shouted. “We don’t need you anyways! You’re just some stupid kid anyways!”

I turned and walked out the door before I could say any more to hurt her feelings. I could hear her calling me back, but I didn’t want to fight with her, I didn’t want to do anything. For a second time in twenty four hours I started to cry and nearly ran right into Lucia, who, as promised, had stayed right there waiting for me. He wrapped his arms around me, starting to lead me away.

“Who the hell are you?!” I heard Catt ask Lucia angrily.

“His boyfriend,” Lucia replied, stopping and looking at her for a moment. I froze, not exactly prepared for her to know I was seeing a guy. I avoided looking at her, staring at Lucia’s chest with a blush on my face and tears still running down my face. I tugged on his shirt, just wanting to leave and avoid any more fighting. This was going much farther than I wanted it to and I wasn’t sure how much more I could honestly take.

“Boyfriend?! But he’s seeing Elie! Why the fuck would he ever have a boyfriend?” Catt spat back at him, coming closer and grabbing for my arm. Personally I was shocked by her swearing. She never used words like that and hated when anyone else used them. “Come on Haru, get back in the house and away from this freak.”

Lucia kept his grip on my other arm and pulled me away slightly, standing in front of me protectively. “Haru’s old enough to make his own decisions on where he wants to go and who he wants to go with,” he said evenly, sounding emotionless. I could feel his anger at Catt, and I started to pull his arm, trying to get down the hall and the stairs. He wouldn’t move though. “And for your information Elie is a lying, cheating bitch that doesn’t deserve Haru’s time or energy.”

“What the hell?! Haru, are you just going to let him talk about Elie like that?!” Catt shouted at me, staring at disbelief when once again I avoided her gaze. It was true, even though I would never say it out loud. Catt made to reach around Lucia and grabbed me, but he stopped her before she could even come close. “Haru, what’s wrong with you?! This guy’s just using you!”

“Shut up Catt,” I said before I could stop myself. “You don’t know anything about this situation… just stop making judgments on people you don’t even know. Come on Lucia, let’s go.”

I shouldn’t have said his name at the time. She was always good at figuring things out and making connections, and this was one connection I didn’t want her to make when she was already angry at me as it was. “Lucia? Lucia Raregroove?” she said the name like it was poison. “Haru! He’s a lying bastard! What about all those mean things he did to you in high school?! And his fathers a-”

“Shut up.” Lucia said coldly before she could finish that statement. “We’ve worked out our differences, and the past doesn’t matter anymore.”

“Lucia, please let’s just leave.”

“Haru? Catt?” Musica looked at us from the top of the stairs, coming closer to see what was going on. He was the last person I wanted to see right now, knowing he would go off the deep end if Catt started saying the same things she was trying to convince me were true. He glared at Lucia. “What the hell is he doing here?”

I looked at him pleadingly. “Please get Catt in the apartment and calm her down so we can leave,” I said quietly, trying to tug at Lucia’s arm again. He actually started to follow me this time, still glaring at Catt like she was the devil.

“Musica don’t let them go! This bastard’s got Haru convinced he’s gay and that Elie’s cheating on him!” Catt looked at him in disbelief. Musica thought for a minute before looking at him.

“You mean you didn’t know he was bisexual?” he looked at me confusedly and then looked at Lucia and the arm I was holding on to for dear life. He made the connection. “Haru, why? I thought you hated him?”

He didn’t sound angry, just a bit confused and concerned. Catt looked furious on the other hand, not only at me and Lucia but she was now glaring Musica. I just stared at Musica. “Things change, I’m sure you understand, now if you’ll excuse us,” I tried moving past Musica before Catt could say anything else.

“Hary Glory get back here right now! You’re being a child about this! You can’t trust him, he’s just going to hurt you!” Catt shouted. Then Lucia did the last thing I was expecting him to ever do especially in front of other people. He grabbed my arm and pulled me to him, giving a searing kiss, ten times more passionate than the others he had given me earlier that day. Then he lifted me up bridal style and started to carry me away.

“I could never hurt him, I could never say the things you said just because I was angry at him. I doubt I could even be angry at him for anything… I love him,” he glared at Catt before turning around and walking right pass Musica, who moved to the side, looking just as shocked as I felt. I stared up at Lucia’s face as he carried me back down to the car and helped me get in. Just earlier he had said that he wasn’t ready to say those words yet… and now… how had everything changed so quickly?

He was quiet as he whipped around, just barely missing Catt’s truck and sped back to his apartment. I took a quick glance out the rear view mirror only to see Catt standing there looking shocked and mad as hell. I curled up in the seat after a minute or two and started to cry. This was not how I had wanted everything to go. I didn’t want to find out Lucia loved me while he was yelling at my sister, I didn’t want my best friend to find out I was dating Lucia when my sister was trying to stop me from leaving with him, and I didn’t want Catt to be angry at me at all.

Lucia pulled over on a random side street, and held me comfortingly for a moment. “Shh, baby it’s okay… I’m here…” he said quietly, rubbing my back before pulling me away and kissing my tears away. I needed the comfort more than anything right now. Everything was so warped from what it had been days ago, like I fell down the hole to Wonderland and everything got flipped. “You can stay with me tonight… I’m sure she won’t be there in the morning…”

I honestly didn’t know what she would do, because she had never been this mad at me before. I never wanted to hurt her like this, but she had been just as cruel. All I knew at the time was for the second night in a row I turned to Lucia for comfort.