INTO THE LIGHT – PART 3
“Duo, wake up! Jesus, please wake up!”
Being shaken, he made himself answer the sobbing voice, his tongue thick, “I’m ‘wake. Stop shakin’ me.”
“Oh, god. You’re alive.”
The relieved words had him blinking his eyes open, surprised at the effort it took to keep them that way. “Course I’m alive. Dyin’ sucks.”
“Let me get a towel.”
Trowa stood and grabbed a towel from a shelf, hurrying back to kneel beside the bathtub. Trying to sort out what had transpired, Duo stared down at the freezing cold pink-tinted water. His mind as thick as his tongue, he frowned at the other man. “Wha’ happened?”
Heedless of the silk shirt he wore, Trowa stuck his hand in the water and pulled the plug before helping Duo sit up so he could wrap the fluffy towel around his shivering body. “I don’t know. When I came home I couldn’t get you to answer me even though your lights were on, so I came in your room. I thought…” he shook his head and lifted Duo easily from the tub.
Hearing broken glass as it hit the floor, Duo groaned. “Didn’t try to kill m’self, Tro. Was tryin’ to get Josh to shut the fuck up. He’s a real asshole.” Feeling Trowa jerk, he thought about what he had said and how it had sounded. “I’m not crazy.”
“Crazy? No. Extremely drunk? Yes. What were you thinking, getting drunk and getting into the bath?” Trowa lay him down on the bed, putting a blanket over him from the closet. “You could have drowned.”
“Seemed like a good idea at the time.” Duo hissed as the other man touched his forehead. “That hurts.”
“That’s because you have a large cut on your head, Duo. You might need to go to the hospital for stitches.”
His prolonged stay in the hospital still haunted him at times, memories of Dewitt, one of the men that had raped him, standing over Trowa making him shake harder. “I don’t want to go to the hospital. Can you sew me up?” Moving his head, he met Trowa’s eyes. “Please?”
“All right. We need to get you to stop shaking first.”
“I’m cold.”
Without a word, Trowa lay beside him, wrapping long arms around the blanket. The heat immediately began to seep into his skin, making him sigh. He hadn’t realized how much he had missed the sensation of being held by the tall man.
His shivering was almost under control when he glanced at the clock that sat on his dresser. His heart sunk as he realized what time it was. “You just got home?” he asked softly.
“Hmmm? Oh, about a half-hour ago.”
“It’s almost one in the morning, Trowa.”
“Duo, I’m aware of what time it is. I have to go to work in the morning. I was planning to go to bed once I made sure you weren’t mad at me.”
“I was never mad at you,” Duo said softly, wishing he didn’t hurt so badly. “You can go to bed. I’ll deal with my head.”
Sitting up, Trowa turned him so he could assess the damage. “Don’t be an ass. You can’t deal with this yourself. You can barely stop shaking.”
A horrible thought struck Duo and he braced himself with his hands in order to sit up. “He’s not here, is he?”
Trowa went out of the room, coming back with a med-kit. Sitting beside Duo, he threaded a needle with practiced motions. After pushing Duo back down to the bed gently, the wounded area was carefully washed with alcohol. Bending over, Trowa narrowed his eyes, keeping his hands steady. “He isn’t here.”
“I guess dinner went pretty good, huh?” he couldn’t keep the bitterness from his voice.
Apparently, Trowa heard it as well, eyes flicking to Duo’s for an instant before returning back to his work. “It was nothing special.”
“He must have done something right.”
“I’m only human, Duo. I’m not perfect.”
“I know that. I just didn’t think you would…” he trailed off, unable to say the words.
“Sleep with someone on the first date?” supplied Trowa calmly. “Then I suppose your high opinion of me doesn’t have to change. I didn’t sleep with him and likely won’t. I don’t think there’s going to be a second date, not with Josh.”
Secretly elated, Duo had to ask, “Why not?”
“Because the man was so boring he made my bread look interesting,” Trowa replied with a heavy sigh. “After dinner I declined his offer of a nightcap and walked home. That’s why I was so late.”
The Greenery wasn’t very far, but to walk that distance at night… “That could have been dangerous. You could have called me.” Thinking of his inebriated state, he winced, “Or one of the other guys would have been better.”
Trowa paused in his work to tap his arm. Duo recognized the metallic clink. “I was armed. I just needed some time to think.”
Duo had discovered after moving in with Trowa that the tall man had a penchant for taking long walks if something was weighing on his mind. “Anything you want to talk about?”
“Maybe someday, but not tonight.”
“Oh. Okay.” While Trowa was busy, Duo took a moment to study the lean face, realizing how tired the green eyes were. “You almost done?”
“Nearly. Why? You have plans?”
Hearing the teasing note, Duo shrugged, stilling when the other man frowned down at him. “You look exhausted, Trowa.”
“It’s been a long day, with an especially terrifying ending.”
He could feel his face heat with embarrassment. “Sorry ‘bout that. I didn’t mean to scare you, or hurt myself,” he added with a grin.
Apparently done with the stitches, Trowa sat back and helped Duo sit up. “You have glass in your hair,” he commented with a sigh. “Do you want me to brush it out for you?”
“That’d be nice. I’m gonna have to take a shower to get clean from my bath.”
He frowned again as Trowa got his brush, remembering what mini-Josh had said to him. “Do you think you can teach me what makes wine so dang special?”
Trowa’s hands stilled in the process of unbraiding his hair. It had never been discussed, but Duo thought Trowa knew his missing hair had become a trophy for a rapist. Though it had grown substantially in the last two year, it still made Duo wince and concentrate that much harder on what the other man said. “Why do you ask? You’ve never been interested before.”
“Just because I’m simple doesn’t mean I can’t learn. You can teach me why everyone does that whole routine thing, you know, sniffing the cork, swirling the wine, that junk. I can appreciate more than just a beer.”
“Don’t let the things Josh said get to you. I need your towel.”
The abrupt change had Duo turning to blink at Trowa. “Huh?”
Rolling his eyes, Trowa pointed to the edges of the towel that stuck up out of the blanket. “I’m going to lay it on the bed to catch the glass from your hair.”
Suddenly hyper-aware he was naked while Trowa was fully dressed had Duo blushing and gripping the blanket to him harder. Seeing the move, the tall man snickered, “I’ve seen you naked before. You still have the blanket.”
Keeping the blanket up, he wiggled and wriggled until he worked the towel out and gave it to the tall man. “When did you see me naked?”
“When I was getting you out of the ice-cold bath and when you were in the hospital. I didn’t think you’d want anyone else bathing you.” Trowa must have misinterpreted it Duo’s silence, “I didn’t do…anything weird, okay? I washed you and that was it.”
The hurt in Trowa’s voice had Duo turning. Green eyes were focused on separating hair and not pulling, but it was easy to see the very real pain in them. “I didn’t think you did anything, Trowa. You wouldn’t.” He didn’t explain his sudden silence had been from imagining the tall man’s large hands on him. The idea had been strange…and exciting.
Trowa gave a small smile of relief. “I didn’t want you to think anything wrong. If our positions had been switched, I would have preferred you bathing me than some stranger.” Starting at the bottom of Duo’s hair, Trowa gently worked a comb through it. “As for the wine, I don’t understand the routine, either. I like how certain wines taste, that’s all. To me, a cork smells like a cork.”
Duo had to laugh at the other man and himself. Relaxing under the gentle tugs on his hair, he let out a sigh. “You know, I don’t think Tro-ducky liked Josh, either. He looked cute with his little glasses on.”
“Josh doesn’t have glasses.”
“Not Josh. Tro-ducky. He was wearing glasses when we talked.” He snickered, wondering what his roommate was thinking. “I’m not bonkers. I was having drunken conversations with Tro-ducky when Josh poofed in out of nowhere and ruined an interesting dialogue.”
There was a moment of silence before Trowa spoke, his tone baffled, “Duo, who in the world is Tro-ducky?”
“The rubber duck you got for me when I mentioned I liked baths. I named him Tro-ducky after you, so you can take a bath too.”
Trowa didn’t say anything, but the comb’s progress slowed for a few seconds. Duo let the conversation lag for a long time, listening to the radio while relaxing under the other’s man’s gentle brushing. His curiosity didn’t allow him to be quiet for long, swallowing hard as he worked up the courage to ask the next thing he wanted to know. Before he could lose his nerve, he blurted, “What’s it like to be gay?”
A husky, low laugh answered his query. “I imagine in a lot of ways it’s just like being straight. I don’t have a natural predilection towards frilly things or need to speak with grand gestures of my hands. I happen to be attracted to other men instead of women. Does that answer your question?”
“Yes and no. I want to know what sex is like.” The strangled sound Trowa made had him grimacing and pushing ahead in spite of his embarrassment. “The only experience I had with that…type of thing wasn’t…normal.”
“That wasn’t sex, Duo. That was a show of power and a violation. When it’s consensual, it’s completely different.” The hands in his hair remained steady while Trowa’s voice shook with some unnamed emotion. “It’s hard to describe the differences, but they make things easier and better.”
“Doesn’t it hurt?”
“It can if your partner isn’t very careful. There are…ways…to make it easier. Some enjoy the pain. I am not one of those people.”
This piece of insight made Duo feel somewhat better, although he was still uncomfortable asking. Assuming Trowa wouldn’t answer if he didn’t want to, Duo continued his inquiries, aware they were getting more and more personal. “Do you prefer to…” he floundered, trying to phrase the question right.
Fortunately, Trowa understood what he was asking. “I don’t have a preference, Duo. I enjoy being both top and bottom, depending on my partner.”
“What’s the difference? Why one way with one person and different with another?”
“It takes a large amount of trust to let someone…do that. You have to be sure they won’t hurt you.”
“I don’t think I could trust anyone that much,” admitted the long-haired man with a frown.
Trowa was already at the top of his head, fingers picking out glass in between strokes of the comb. “After what you went through, I’m surprised you can even question the possibility. For me, it took a number of years before I could think about it without getting sick. My first time, I was very drunk or I couldn’t have gone through with it. I was lucky enough to have a gentle partner that was able to soothe any fears I had.”
Forgetting the comb in his hair, Duo whipped his head around to stare at Trowa. “You? It happened to you?”
“Many years ago, when I still traveled with mercenaries. You were able to bounce back better than I was. It could be because I was always attracted to males and you weren’t.”
Remembering he had forced the tall man to relive his own trauma, Duo grabbed one of Trowa’s hands and stared at it. “If I had known, I wouldn’t have done that to you. You shouldn’t have had to see that. I’m so sorry. Why didn’t you say something?”
“Because it was necessary, just as I told Howard. You had to show me what you had seen. If you hadn’t, you would have been killed.”
The knowledge that Trowa had been raped was as shocking as learning he hadn’t imagined the conversations that had taken place in his own mind. “You’ve never brought up anything we talked about then. Why not?”
“You were…uncomfortable with some of the things we discussed. I promised I wouldn’t bring it up again.”
“And I promised to forget about it,” Duo remembered abruptly. “Honestly, I forgot about that part. I wouldn’t have said anything about it if I had remembered.”
Standing, Trowa balled up the towel until he got over the trashcan, shaking the cloth out carefully. “Why are you asking, Duo? Why the sudden interest in things you’ve always refused to discuss?”
“Curiosity, I guess.” Duo shrugged his shoulders, not prepared to admit he had been thinking of things like this for a while. “I need a shower to get the rest of this off me,” he commented ruefully. “Why don’t you go to bed?”
“I’ll wait and make sure all the glass is out,” replied Trowa, face unreadable. “Be careful of the glass in the floor. I’ll try to get any shards off the bed while you’re in there.”
Duo took the time to sweep the bathroom floor and the bottom of the tub before he got in the shower, carefully watching where his feet were placed. Tiny slivers of glass were still in the floor and he hoped they washed down the drain or his next bath would be more than a little uncomfortable. Trusting Trowa had gotten the glass from his hair, he washed it quickly before scrubbing his skin, frowning at the scent of whiskey. “I smell like a bar,” he mused, then aimed a glare at Tro-ducky. “You brought that jerk here, didn’t you? Was that the only way you could think of to get me to confront how I feel?” The duck was unsurprisingly quiet as it stared back at him with large blue eyes. “You should be glad to hear you did a good job. I feel something for him; I just don’t know what for sure yet.” Tro-ducky’s eyes seemed to mock him, drawing out a resigned sigh, “Okay, so I know what I feel. I just don’t know if I could…do that. I don’t even know if I’m attracted to him that way.”
Getting no response from the duck, he finished up his shower, quickly drying off and pulling on a pair of clean boxers before opening the door to the bedroom, prepared to make a silly comment about his own choice of clothing. Words died in his throat when he realized Trowa was sound asleep, breathing steady and even. Looking at the dark smudges under the closed eyes, Duo decided to let the man sleep, knowing Trowa’s internal clock would wake him in the morning.
In minutes he had his hair brushed and loosely braided, the task taking half the time it would have when it was longer. Carefully, he removed Trowa’s shoes and socks, setting them beside the door where they would be easily seen. He contemplated removing the rest of Trowa’s clothes, out of curiosity and assuming his roommate would be more comfortable until admitting it would likely wake Trowa up.
Since Trowa was lying on top of the blankets, Duo retrieved two more from the closet, positive the other blanket he had been wrapped up in was full of glass. At first he put a blanket over Trowa, taking the other for himself, quickly realizing he was still cold from his prolonged exposure to cool water, the chill seemingly in his bones. Hoping Trowa wouldn’t get angry with him, he combined the blankets and scooted close to his roommate, basking in the heat that seemed to emanate in waves from the sleeping man. His back to Trowa’s side, he pondered how to get closer without waking him, but couldn’t figure out a way.
Closing his eyes, he began to count, an exercise he used when unable to sleep. His breathing stopped when Trowa shifted, turning over and wrapping an arm around Duo’s body the way he had earlier. His breath started again as warm air floated over his bare shoulder, making him shiver. For a moment he stared at the hand resting innocuously on the bed until he worked his own under it, awed when Trowa’s fingers threaded through his almost instantly.
Holding himself still, he eventually realized he was only partially comfortable. In a conscious decision, he moved even closer to Trowa, lining up their bodies from back to butt, amazed how good it felt to be that close. Moving one last time he shifted again, placing one of his legs slightly behind him, between Trowa’s and sighing in pure contentment.
Feeling the heat he needed, the steady heartbeat against his back and the steady breathing that wafted across the back of his neck, Duo closed his eyes and drifted off to sleep.