Elevator Love part 20
By Tralla
Contains: some naughty language
His father has been calling. I know this from conjecture. He’s doing it again, avoiding me, doing his hide-and-seek game. The fact that Catalonia is still frequenting his estate and probably his quarters when I’m not standing guard...
I’ve had it.
I’m in his lounge, interrupting his quiet time.
He’s sitting down and looking my way.
I’m standing and irked.
“What are you doing with her?”
He looks back at me. It takes a second for him to realize whom I’m referring to. “Heero, I should not have to answer that.”
He just dodged the question. He’s guilty.
“There’s nothing to be concerned about,” he finally says.
Apparently, that’s the end of the conversation and he wants me out because he’s still seated across the room. He’s looking at me as though I’m a paragraph that he has quickly skimmed and is ready to forget.
I just stand there.
It’s a strong and sudden feeling. It’s heavy in the air and in my chest. He’s going to get rid of me soon. But there’s something else, another hunch. I have a sneaking suspicion that he’s trying hard to be an asshole, and he’s doing a good job.
The words sound farcical coming from me, but I say them anyway. “You’re too detached.”
“If it’s troublesome,” he murmurs, “you can do something about it.”
We’re in a school yard. I’m in 4th grade and he’s in the 6th. He’s not meaty like the other bullies, but he doesn’t need to be. He doesn’t use his fists; it’s what’s in his pockets I need to worry about.
He’s pulling something.
He’s still staring, but his expression is different. It’s conciliatory. “How about a shower, Heero?”
He’s a fucking cock tease, a cock tease…who’s washing my hair. My hard-on is gone, a bitter memory. His is still there. He’s ignoring it, using geniality as a buffer.
“Shampoo,” he says from behind me. I pass it to him. This is ludicrous…showering together without any seedy intent.
He’s working up lather. Despite the noise of falling water, the steam, and the fact that I have to keep my eyes closed to avoid the foam, I know he’s enjoying himself. It could be my imagination, but he was just humming, a few bars. I think he caught himself and decided to sober up…somewhat.
There’s something wrong with him and there’s something wrong with me for putting up with this.
I’m drowning. He’s moved one of the shower heads directly over me. Apparently, I’m being de-soaped. The offending stream is gone.
There’s a sigh from him. It’s contented and immediately I’m put on guard.
“Ok, it’s my turn.”
He just said it’s his turn. I suppose standing stock still without a reply isn’t a good enough indication of my irritation because he’s standing in front of me, waiting for me to return the favor. There was no favor. I never asked—
He hands me the shampoo.
I take it. Damn him.
We’re going to be prunes if he keeps this up.
I give in.
The water is falling around us. I’ve got two soaped up hands in his hair. I’m getting him lathered up. I’m frowning, wet, and frustrated. I reach up to get the showerhead. Briefly, I consider drowning him.
I’ve got him rinsed off and now he wants to chit chat.
“Heero.”
“What?” I just snapped at him. I want out of here.
“How do you feel about celibacy?”
It’s the end of this shower.
I’m toweled off and dressed. I left his quarters and I’m leaving his floor. I’m taking the stairs back to my suite. I’m stupid and stubborn and he’s scheming.
He couldn’t get rid of me with discourtesy and now he’s trying to oust me with niceness, of the creepy variety.
If I weren’t suspicious, I would leave. A simple “get out” would do, but he’s working very hard to avoid taking direct responsibility for my departure.
I came here of my own “free will” and now he wants me to leave that way.
I won’t make it easy for him.
I’m back in my suite.
My hair is still wet and I smell like him. I park myself on the bed and lie back. The ceiling. It’s plain. It doesn’t want anything from me. It can’t fire me. It can’t jerk me off or around. I’m going to stare at it.
I didn’t fall asleep. I was immersed in mental overhaul. It was a waste of time. There’s still crap everywhere. Things are flaking, getting closer and closer to falling apart. I sit up. I look up at the clock. Two hours wasted. Then again, maybe I dozed off without realizing it.
I get up from the bed and shift the muscles in my shoulders and back. Something out the corner of my eye strikes me as strange. I cease my stretching and turn. It’s the door leading to the study.
It’s closed. I don’t remember closing it. I haven’t closed it in over two months. I stopped securing everything after the blonde found out about my spy guy escapades.
I head toward the door, open it, and walk into the study. I look in with mild interest. For the most part, I’d abandoned any extended use of it. It had become merely a path to and from the hidden elevator, to get to the blonde’s quarters without being seen. I scan the room. I take a step back and then another. My stuff has been moved around. The surveillance equipment has been cleaned and rearranged. I had piled it up in a corner and abandoned it. There was a thick layer of dust on everything. It’s gone and the equipment is now in an orderly stack, a smaller stack. I walk further in. On the desk to my left is the audio equipment...connected and ready to use
My eyes go to the elevator. Is this a game to him? Firing me for spying.....spying himself and now making it possible for me to spy again? My hand is on the desk. The realization is slow. I never removed the mics from his office. I’d dismantled the stuff on my end but never cleaned anything else up, and I don’t recall him mentioning that he did it himself. What is he up to?
I look at the audio equipment and turn up the volume.
I hear him. He’s talking to someone, but I can only make out his voice. It’s very faint. He must in another room, possibly on the phone. He sounds pissed off, on the verge of being livid. It’s not a tone I’m familiar with.
“--3 weeks to tell me he was spying… I won’t take any more excuses…I can’t….This is not the first time I’ve caught you…you’re not supposed—…I never said that…You were the one who said he was…He’s not--- He has to leave…I can’t trust--- because you’re sabotaging—you want him to find out about us--”
The phone rings. By the sound, it’s the one in his office. I hear footsteps.
He’s heading to the phone. He sounds flustered but closer to normal as he says, “Hello—Dorothy. No…no…. Heero has nothing to do with this. I need you to stay—no— at your estate. I’m sorry. I can’t have this conversation right now...”
I’m not the only one he’s trying to oust. I don’t get a chance to linger on the thought. Something has just happened to the mic. There’s static. It goes dead, as though someone had ripped it from its hiding spot. He wasn’t the one who did it. I hadn’t heard him move closer to the mic. It was killed in the middle of his explanation, in the middle of his weaseling.
I’m leaning on the desk.
She isn’t with him and he wasn’t on another phone in a different room. There’s someone else there with him, and the person knows I’m listening. I look at my equipment. And this person has made it possible for me to hear whatever she or he wanted me to hear.
My mind reiterates the obvious. He didn’t set this up. He was betrayed.
My mind backtracks.
The vehemence in his voice was charged… it was the kind of anger only someone close to you, or who had been close to you, could provoke. Then I remember what the braid said about there being other people involved in the med tech research who I wouldn’t meet. I correct his assertion in my head. There are people who I am not supposed to meet, and one of them is breaking the rules by making his or her presence known. But for what end?
I’m still staring at my surveillance equipment. It’s someone with no fear. To break into my suite, while I’m around, via the hidden elevator takes balls. I wonder if the perpetrator actually has any.
My mind is stringing together assumptions. His cell phone. “Love”. Catalonia may not be the one. I look to the elevator. My mind is once again reliving what I overheard, what I was prompted to overhear. This “Love”…it’s time to make contact. It’s only fair to return the gesture. Contact begets contact, or so I’m telling myself.
I leave the desk and the study. I need to grab my shoes, wallet, and keys. To a payphone. I’m heading out to a pay phone to dial that number, the number I should have dialed over a month ago, when it started to matter.
It took a half an hour of driving around to find a phone. Apparently, public telephones are a thing of the past. This one is partially hidden behind an overgrown bush and attached to the remains of a brick wall, like a forgotten relic.
I frown. If it were a booth, I would have found some measure of escape from the change in weather. It’s cooler than usual. I manage not to shudder from the chill. I reach out. I pick up the receiver, drop my quarter in, and begin dialing. It’s a strange feeling keying in a number for the first time, keying in a number that I’ve known for over three months. I get over it, quickly.
There is no ringing. Voicemail picks up: “This is Quatre Winner. I’m unavailable at the moment. Please leave a message at the tone.”
I hang up.
The number is his.
From his cell phone to himself. I’m still holding onto the receiver. He’s “Love”... stored on his own phone.
I’m back in my suite, in the study, sitting in front of the desk, sitting in front of the equipment, holding a knife, peeling and cutting...
One apple and now two apples are out of the way. The third is in my hand. I look at the peelings. I haven’t eaten any of the apples. I’m just peeling them and then cutting them up. It’s an old habit. I haven’t done it in years. It’s a bad sign. I’m shaken up, more than ever, and I can’t come up with a credible reason why. Having his voicemail pick up isn’t enough. Having his voicemail pick up paired with an overheard conversation is still not enough. I start cutting up the apple. I’m just cutting and cutting and then there’s nothing left to cut. I get up. There are more fruit in the kitchen.
My hands are sticky and the handle of the blade seems to have a high affinity with my skin because of it. I take the knife with me as I leave the study and cross my bedroom.
With my free hand, I open the door, but I’m prevented from heading out. He’s there, standing just outside my door.
He doesn’t give me a chance to be surprised. He walks forward, causing me to take steps backwards into the room. After closing the door, he faces me.
“You’re going to get hurt if you stay here, Heero. I’ll put you up in a hotel, and we can make arrangements to meet later. Please, pack up your things.”
I open my mouth to speak, but he interrupts me.
“I can’t answer questions right now.”
I’m stunned but I respond, “I can’t move everything--”
He isn’t paying attention.
He’d gone rigid. I watch him turn. I follow his gaze and stiffen as well. He’s in the doorway of my study…but he’s not. He’s in front of me, but he’s in the…
There are two of him, one in front of me and one walking into my bedroom from the study.
Two of him.
Two of him...
It’s the one from the study who says, “No matter how much I tried
to avoid this…the three of us, we’re in the same room.”