[fic] Angel Mine
Angel Mine
Fandom: Gundam Wing
Rating: PG-13
Ship: Trowa/Quatre
Summary: While hunting for the perfect anniversary gift for Trowa, Quatre bumps into Dorothy again. Why is she being so helpful? Has she truly changed...or could she have an ulterior motive?
A/N: Set in the same universe as Misguided Angels and its sequels.
May, AC 199
He recognized the voice immediately: "What's a pretty boy like you doing in a place like this?"
"Slumming," he drawled before glancing up. When he did, he smiled--warily. "Dorothy Catalonia."
"Quatre Raberba Winner." Her smile was barbed, her smoke-blue eyes unreadable. "Fine comeback."
"Thank you," he said guardedly. Why was it, whenever he and this girl talked, he had the impression they were still dueling? "Sorry," he said quickly to the woman behind the counter, who had her thin brown eyebrows raised in surprise. "I didn't really mean..."
"He didn't mean it at all," Dorothy said as she came up beside him in three quick strides. "I just bring out the brat in him, what can I say?"
Quatre glanced at her out of the corner of his eye as she leaned on her elbows and peered at the glittering rings behind glass on the counter. Dorothy Catalonia had a tendency to appear unpredictably in his life, seemingly out of the air as though conjured. So he was not entirely surprised to see her here, now. Still, he was unsure of what to make of her, as he was each time they met. The first time had been four years ago in the Sanq Kingdom. He had been too preoccupied with his guilt to take much notice of the strange girl who followed Princess Relena like her shadow and baited her with every breath. And she had been too taken--or so it had seemed--with Heero Yuy to pay much attention to the pale, guilt-stricken boy who haunted the music room and hardly spoke. The second time they met, on the battleship Libra, he had recognized in her the person he would have become if not for Trowa's sacrifice--and she had seen in him the person she wanted to be, but could not...and tried to kill him. The third time, when she drifted wraithlike into his hospital room, they had been horrified by each other's wounds and achieved a tenuous friendship. Since then he had seen her a few other times, mostly at social functions and in Relena's presence. He did not know what she did with her time, how close she and Relena had become since the end of the war, how she had gotten her life back together, if she truly had.
Looking at her now, he found no answers. Even without the dark eyebrows that stuck out from her high forehead like moth's antennae, Dorothy would not have been beautiful. She was too pale, too angular, her gaze far too piercing for comfort. But in Quatre's opinion she was far from ugly, as his best friend Duo deemed her. He found her very Otherness striking. Though he felt no physical attraction whatsoever for her, he liked looking at her. Maybe it had to do with his desire to understand her better, as though he hoped that some time her countenance would betray her innermost thoughts. It did not now. All he could tell was that she had cut her hair since last December, and she looked somewhat thinner. He wondered how much he had changed in her eyes.
"Mister Winner," said the saleswoman, interrupting his thoughts, "shall I see what else we have downstairs?"
"Um, sure," he said, flustered.
Dorothy turned to him, one eyebrow raised. After the saleswoman had left she said, in a tone he found unnervingly inquisitive, "Popping the question already? How romantic. Did you really win the approval of all your sisters? I hope not. An elopement would be much more scandalous and exciting."
"That's not it," he said, annoyed. "We're not getting married. It's--" Why was he telling her this? "Next month will be our first anniversary. I have to find a present for him, and I'm running out of time."
"I didn't think Trowa Barton was the type to wear jewelry."
"He's not. But he gave me a ring the night of our first date." He rested his right hand on the glass and showed her the slender band of dark gold, then closed his fist protectively. "I want to do the same thing for him."
"Sort of a preview of things to come?"
He shrugged, feeling awkward. To avoid her gaze, he stared at his ring, which glinted in the bright sunlight streaming through the store's window. He had never thought about Trowa's gift to him in that way, and doubted that his lover ever had. Trowa had bought the ring for Sally Po initially, although he insisted later that in his heart he had never meant to give it to her. Quatre often thought about what it would be like to run away together and he could not imagine his life without Trowa, but marriage? He was nineteen years old.
Dorothy was regarding him curiously. "You're very much in love with him, aren't you? It has nothing to do with your family?"
He glared at her.
"No, how silly of me," she bubbled on, "you would never do that. Well, what's wrong with this one?" She pointed at a brilliant square-cut emerald surrounded by tiny diamonds, set in a platinum band. "He has green eyes, doesn't he? That one would go splendidly."
He had actually thought about that one. "It's a little bit...much. I don't want to scare him."
"Darling, you are in Tiffany's hunting for a gift for the boy you've been dating for less than a year. Moreover, the boy is Trowa. How can you NOT scare him?"
"I know, I know," he admitted with a groan. "He wouldn't wear anything here. When we first got our apartment he owned two pairs of jeans, one for everyday and one for going out. When the going-out jeans started to get threadbare I threw them out and went and bought him a new pair--from Rossi's. You should have seen his face when he saw the label. He didn't speak to me for half a day. When he did start speaking to me again the first thing he said was that what I had spent on the jeans could have fed us for a month. Which was true." He laughed at the memory, though at the time Trowa's reaction had frightened him. "I'm not looking for something glitzy. What I'd like to give him is something more like MY ring. Simple, but with a lot of meaning. I was actually hoping to find an identical ring, but no one seems to have this shade of gold."
She looked at him thoughtfully.
Just then the saleswoman returned, carrying a black-velvet-lined box, which she set in front of Quatre and opened to reveal a collection of gold rings. Most were set with jewels, some were intricately wrought filigrees. They were all beautiful. He fingered a few of them and tried to imagine how they would look on Trowa's long, slender fingers as they flashed over his flute or wove idly through his messy hair. All he saw was a ring like his own, plain but elegant, the color of sunlight on sunflower petals.
"You know," Dorothy's voice interrupted his frustrated pondering, "I know a man out in Brentwood who only deals in unusual jewelry. He might have what you're looking for."
The saleswoman looked at her with mild irritation, Quatre measuringly. He could usually detect duplicity in people, and she fairly radiated sincerity. But he wondered why she was being so helpful.
"It can't hurt to try anyway," she said, tossing her hair, a challenge in her tone. "If my friend doesn't have what you're looking for, I'm sure he'll know where you can find it."
It was the word friend that convinced him to trust her. It fell off her tongue easily, without inflection, without forethought. He felt no ripple of amusement from her, as he used to when she talked about Relena shortly after the war's end.
"All right."
He thanked the saleswoman and apologized, then hurried after Dorothy who was already halfway out the door, her hair trailing after her like a flaxen veil. He blinked as he stepped out onto Wilshire Boulevard, the brilliant sunlight striking his eyes, the afternoon heat assaulting his body, which had become accustomed to Tiffany's conditioned air.
"I'm parked up that way," Dorothy announced over her shoulder as she pushed between pedestrians, her high heels clacking against the concrete.
This is surreal, Quatre thought as he scurried after her, mumbling hasty apologies to the indignant people she left in her wake. This isn't something I repeat to Trowa. If Duo knew he'd make some crack about following a devil into Hell. He looked at the thin white shoulders ahead of him, the oversized, floppy straw hat, the stiletto-heels and thought, But she looks more like a little girl playing dress-up than something from Hell. And if she's a devil, so am I.
Dorothy's car was not the garishly gold limousine he'd used to see her tearing through the narrow, winding streets of the Sanq Kingdom in. He wondered where that car was now. The one waiting for them was a small, midnight-blue Star convertible. She opened the door for him, then kicked off her shoes, tossed them in the back, and slid into the driver's seat. Quatre hesitated only a moment before he climbed in beside her.
He barely had time to fasten his seatbelt before she had floored the pedal and they were screaming down the boulevard.
Though the wild ride through the winding Brentwood hills made Quatre wonder (when his brain wasn't cowering against the back of his skull) if Dorothy wasn't secretly out for his blood after all, the sight of her friend allayed his doubts. Tatu Thenashara looked more like a Buddha than any devil and Quatre detected nothing but benevolence and good humor in his chocolate-colored eyes.
He was one of the tallest people Quatre had ever seen, at least as tall as his former guardian Rashid Kurama, and twice as wide. He was enormously fat; Dorothy all but disappeared when he drew her into an embrace and rumbled "Hey there, duchess," in a voice like continental plates nudging one another beneath the earth. His skin was the color of molasses, his loose-fitting silk shirt and trousers bright topaz and teal. Standing before him in his vibrantly colored room--the walls were decorated with woven rugs and African masks, exotic flowering plants in brass and clay bowls were everywhere, and colored light poured in through the red, turquoise, emerald, indigo, and yellow stained glass windows--Quatre felt very drab.
"Tatu," Dorothy said, when the big man finally released her, "this is my friend Quatre. He's looking for something very special and you're the only one I could think of who might be able to help him."
"So that's what you're doing here on my day off. I should have guessed." He did not sound hurt or angry, just amused. Turning, "So you're Quatre." Tatu engulfed the boy's small hand in his own enormous one. His skin was warm and dry. As he looked down at him Quatre had the strange feeling that this man could see through his shirt, past his skin, straight to his heart. That measuring gaze reminded him of someone, but at the moment he could not think whom.
These were not evil spirits, Quatre thought, but they were spirits nonetheless. Tatu looked like a djinni; Quatre wanted to look around the room to see if there was a lamp resting on a mantel or a table somewhere, but the dark eyes held him. Dorothy was like an asrai--a water spirit--tiny, and translucent as moonlight.
It was a moment before Quatre realized what Tatu's words implied: Dorothy had spoken of him before. He wondered what she had said. He could discern nothing from Tatu's gaze.
Finally the big man said, "We'll have coffee on the deck, and we'll discuss Quatre's problem there."
The deck was enormous, and looked out over rolling green hills. Quatre could see the white specks of other houses between the trees, and the gleam of swimming pools. The cloudless sky shone like a polished tourmaline. The air tasted of wild flowers and ocean brine. A little iris-grey cat wove between the legs of the wicker chairs, pausing occasionally to rub against someone's leg. The coffee was some of the best he'd ever had.
"Let's see this ring, Quatre."
The boy set his coffee cup on the floor, leaned forward in his chair, and held out his hand to Tatu.
"I can't quite see it from there."
When he hesitated, Dorothy, perched on the arm of a chair chirped, "Quatre never takes his ring off. It's sacred to him."
"I DO take it off," he said, shooting her an irritated look. "When I do the dishes or when I swim. But it IS sacred." Looking at Tatu, avoiding Dorothy's intense gaze, "It's the most precious thing I own." That was true, but it was a half-truth he'd given Dorothy. He imagined he would have to take off the ring when he did swim, but he hadn't been anywhere near a pool since he'd moved in with Trowa. Once while washing dishes the ring had almost slipped off his soapy fingers, and then he'd removed it at once and placed it on the counter where he could see it. After that he'd invested in a pair of rubber gloves. The only time he had removed his ring voluntarily it had been in anger, and he did not like to think about that, only what had happened after the anger had passed.
Something glimmered in Tatu's eyes--understanding?--and again Quatre had the impression this man who had been a perfect stranger fifteen minutes ago could see straight through to his soul. He hesitated a moment longer, then began to twist the ring around his finger.
"Don't, don't." Tatu waved his flag-sized hand in dismissal. "Come over here and I'll see it."
Quatre rose and crossed the floor, held out his hand. Seated, Tatu still towered over the boy. He took the offered hand between his and held it close to his eyes, turning it this way and that as he inspected the ring.
"Such an unusual color," he murmured, almost to himself. "You say you found this in a random boutique in Vancouver?"
"Yes. It's engraved, too, but it was when Trowa bought it. It says 'for my sole desire.' In French." He shivered slightly, remembering how long it had taken him to realize his sole desire. His attraction to Trowa had been instantaneous, but it had taken him three long years to admit to it.
"Dorothy," said Tatu, his gaze still on the ring, "on my dresser is a small lacquer box in the shape of a star. On the cover is a picture of Prince Ivan and the firebird. Won't you bring it to me? And brew another pot of coffee."
Quatre looked at Dorothy. It was the first time he had ever witnessed anyone issue her a command. Oh, he phrased it as a request, but Quatre did not doubt its true nature.
Nor did Dorothy. The girl lifted her chin, pursed her lips against what might have been a retort, then rose without a word and entered the house, closing the French windows slowly behind her.
When she was gone Tatu lifted his gaze from the ring to Quatre's eyes and said gently, "Tell me about Trowa."
"I--"
Tatu squeezed his hand. "Tell me about him. Do you love him?"
Quatre looked from Tatu's hands, which engulfed his own completely, to his eyes, which were warm and wide--and compelling.
"Of course I love him."
"How do you love him?"
"I..." Again Quatre faltered. Who WAS this man? Why did he look at him that way, hold his hand in such a manner, stroking it with his thick fingers as though probing for some secret hidden between the delicate bones? "I love him," he stammered. "He's everything to me. He's..." He was floundering. Tatu smiled encouragingly, but he could not put his feelings into words. Trowa was a part of him. Though at the moment many miles separated them Quatre felt as though the other boy were right by his side, his thoughts and opinions coloring everything Quatre saw, heard, tasted, and touched. But how could he explain that?
"Just think about him. I need to know how you really feel."
"This is so weird."
"I know." Tatu was massaging his hand, his warm, smoky breath entreating, coaxing his secrets out.
Quatre wanted to sink into the warmth, wrap it around himself like a blanket and simply dissolve into pure feeling, no thought. It was the way he felt when he was slightly drunk at bars, in the company of his friends. Tired and happy and wanting to lean his head against someone's shoulder--anyone's--and just BE. Tatu was LISTENING, every part of him receptive. "You're like me, aren't you?" Quatre whispered, half-afraid of the answer. Suddenly Dorothy's friendship with this man made sense.
"Don't think about my Dorothy right now. And yes, I'm like you if by that you mean I can sometimes feel the intense emotions of people near me. But think about Trowa now. Trowa."
"I thought I was the only one." His legs trembled.
"Trowa."
Trowa.
If there were words for what he felt, he did not know them. He saw the word "love" on plastic keychains sold in kiosks at the mall. It was on patches sewn onto backpacks. It was in almost every song he heard on the radio. It was probably the best word he knew, but it was still a word that people used every day and did not mean. Trowa was...
Dancing on the roof of Duo and Hilde's apartment in the last rays of an Indian summer's day, all the sweetness and grace he had been born to flashing off his body as though he were made of water. Lifting his breathtaking green, green eyes to Quatre, the pure happiness in his gaze burning through the deepening blues and purples of dusk.
Sitting opposite him, cross-legged on their fire escape on the first warm day in April, eating persimmons, bare knees touching, the sweet sticky juice dribbling down their chins. Spook the cat bounding suddenly between them, jumping into Quatre's lap and putting his paws on the boy's chest as though it were the most natural thing for him to do. Then Trowa laughing his head off as Spook proceeded, not to nuzzle Quatre affectionately, but to lick the sweet, sticky juice from his chin, rubbing his skin red with his rough tongue.
Lying naked in his arms after making love, their bodies slick and glistening as dolphins. Too exhausted to do more than move their lips in the shapes of kisses and look at each other, completely open, vulnerable, trusting. Thinking, and knowing the other one understood, You're the one my heart cried out to when it was lonely. To deny you would be to deny the best part of me. How can we be anything except together?
"Ah."
Quatre was torn from his reverie by the rumbling affirmation. He blushed furiously, remembering Tatu.
"There, now. It's not as though I can read your mind. All I can feel is a distant echo of what you're feeling. But you really love him." He sounded...not amazed, and not quite relieved. "Don't look like that," he laughed, when Quatre frowned. "Why shouldn't I doubt you? You're a hormonal teenage boy. But I don't doubt you, anymore. It's a rare thing you have, young Quatre. Protect it. Where is Dorothy? Quatre, won't you fetch her?"
Still shaking slightly, Quatre backed away from Tatu and went to find Dorothy. He met her coming down a long mirror-lined hallway, a fresh pot of coffee in one hand, her other arm cradling a small, star-shaped box. He stopped when he saw her. Her expression was what it had been in Tiffany's: her mouth curled upward at one corner, the rest impassive. But something was different. In the bright light flashing off the mirrors she looked paler, smaller somehow.
Tired.
"Can I take something?" he asked, feeling awkward. His cheeks and the tips of his ears were still rosy from his Trowa-fantasy. Could she see?
"You're so gallant," she said with a smile. She tossed her hair and it splashed her shoulders and back, for an instant indiscernible from the sunlight. "I'm an independent woman, you know."
Her ice-blue gaze raked over his body and he felt his blush deepening. She had to know what he had been thinking. The knowledge was in the barb at the corner of her mouth. But why should that bother him? Still, he felt her gaze probing him, pushing between his ribs, scouring every chamber of his heart for...
Unsure of whom he sought to protect, he pressed his palm to his chest, said imploringly, "Dorothy."
She blinked and looked at him, startled. The connection was severed instantly. She seemed very far away from him now, though she had not moved.
"I'm sorry," she whispered. She looked at the box and the coffeepot, then back up at him and smiled wanly. "I said I was an independent woman. But I'm also an opportunist." She pushed the pot and the box into his hands, then hurried past him and out the French windows, leaving him once again to follow bewilderedly.
Tatu took the box from him and pawed through it while Dorothy refilled the coffee cups. Quatre tried to peer over his shoulder while he searched, but he wasn't tall enough.
"What are you looking for?"
"Something that came to me a long time ago. Ah." What he came up with was something tiny and swathed in plum-colored silk.
"What's that, Tatu?" Dorothy asked as she set the coffeepot down and drew closer.
The big man turned to Quatre, took his hand, and placed the silk-swathed thing on his palm.
It was so light. Quatre knew that it was a ring, but he hesitated to unwrap it. He did not believe in magic, did not believe in God. But Tatu was an angel, the answer to his unspoken prayers.
"Let's see it, silly," said Dorothy. "Come on."
"I can't."
Tatu had to unwrap the ring for him and when he had, and the deepening afternoon light fell upon it, Quatre's breath stopped.
Sunlight on sunflower petals. Delicate, perfect. His eyes burned. "How...?" How far away his voice sounded!
"How did I find it? The usual way, for me. I travel. I see things that are not where they belong and acquire them in the hope of delivering them to where they're meant to be. I found that ring at a street fair in Copenhagen. The man who was selling it told me that his brother had found it mixed in with a shipment of tealeaves from China. I thought coming from the Middle East originally it would prefer Los Angeles to Denmark. But if its mate lives in Canada, what can I do?"
Quatre fingered the ring. Yes, there was an inscription on the inside of the band. To my one desire. In Arabic, the language of his ancestors. His lips parted, but his mouth was too dry to get the word out.
"I have no idea why," Tatu answered his unspoken question. "Sometimes I make up stories about it, where it really came from, who made it. It could have been a wedding ring, I suppose. My favorite story is about a young goldsmith who came upon this lump of gold that no one wanted because the color was unfashionable. So he--or she--made this ring and sent it off into the world like a message in a bottle. I never knew it had a mate, but I'm glad to see it does. I'll have to change my story, now."
Quatre closed his hand around the ring, squeezed it, then opened his hand again. The ring was still there.
"You're not dreaming," Dorothy laughed. "You should see your face. Well, was I right? Is it what you're looking for?"
"It's perfect!" He tried to look at her, but her face was in shadow. "Thank you so much." He thought she smiled again, but he could not tell. He turned to Tatu. "I'll take it! Um...you ARE willing to sell it, right?"
"I'm giving it to you." His white teeth flashed against his face like a crescent moon.
"But I can pay you. Anything you want, it doesn't matter."
"That would cheapen it. I'm sure of your love. To ask that you pay...would diminish the story I'm making up for it, now."
"But..."
Tatu took his hand and folded it closed over the ring. "Just remember what I said to you earlier. Protect each other."
"I will." He wanted to throw his arms around this man, this angel, this djinni. He felt shy about it, though. Spontaneous displays of affection, especially with new acquaintances, were not things his family had encouraged.
The man understood. He pulled the boy into his arms, surprising him with his gentleness. "You can do something for me," he murmured in Quatre's ear.
"What's that?"
With a mischievous ripple in his voice, "You can take my Dorothy out to dinner."
My Dorothy. Again that odd feeling that there was something familiar about Tatu Thenashara. He pulled away and nodded, searching the man's face for the answer. Tatu looked at the girl who still wavered in the shadows, his eyes at the same time full of love and concern.
Quatre did not understand the look, but he was aware finally, of whom the man reminded him. He had seen Cathy Bloom look at her adoptive brother Trowa in that same way.
They made it to Farmer's Market in one piece and bought sushi, dried apple slices and yogurt-covered raisins, cherry coke, and iced green tea. Then they drove to Venice Beach, parked the car in a lot, and walked along the boardwalk until they found an empty picnic table.
Small pink and grey clouds dotted the sky. The air tasted of flowers and citrus fruits, sunscreen, hotdogs from the stand across the street, incense, and of course the ocean. Quatre inhaled deeply, letting all the scents, incongruent as they were, fill his lungs. He was happy. He was satisfied. He had found what he wanted and he could not wait to see Trowa's face when he presented him with the ring.
For my sole desire. My soul's desire. The only thing I want, ever.
His happiness and the hazy coppery glow of early evening after such a long, hectic day made him more talkative than usual. He found himself telling Dorothy things about his life with Trowa, about his friends. She sipped her coke through a purple plastic straw and smiled faintly.
"A few months ago Duo had this idea we should make a rock band," he told her at one point. "I mean us. Be in a band. We're not pilots anymore, but he wants us to stay a team."
Dorothy set her coke down, picked up her chopsticks, and began to slather wasabi on her unagi maki. "Can you sing?"
"Heero got up and left as soon as Duo announced he had a brilliant idea, so we don't know about him. I can. Duo can't. Trowa won't. I mean, he's great in the shower. At singing. Oh, God." His cheeks burned.
Her smile deepened. "My dear, do you have sex on the brain?"
"I think it's always in the back of my mind," he admitted, blushing brighter still. How nice the breeze felt against his cheeks and the back of his neck. He wanted to dive into the ocean.
"Don't be embarrassed, darling. If I had a boyfriend who looked the way yours does, believe me it would be on my mind constantly too. Tell me more about your band. I know you play the violin and the piano. What about the others?"
"Oh, it's not going to happen. Trowa has his flute. Duo doesn't play anything, but he swears he'd be a natural on the drums. Anyway, he says it doesn't matter whether we can play and sing or not because we're all pretty enough no one will notice. That was when Hilde got up and left." He grimaced. "Duo wanted to call us Vlad and the Impalers. You know, like the vampire."
Dorothy thought it over while she chewed on her maki and winced slightly as the wasabi burned her throat and nasal passage. She grabbed her coke, took a long sip, then said in a weak voice, "That makes sense. I mean it's in accordance with Duo's obsession with death and destruction. I like it. A nod to the pop bands of the pre-war 1950s, with a 1990s metal twist. And a little sexual innuendo never hurt."
"What!" He looked at her, shocked.
"Impalers?"
It took a moment. Then, "Oh." Once again his face went red. "I didn't get that at ALL. But no wonder Trowa was laughing his head off."
"Do you want the last hamachi maki? No? Well," taking it up with her chopsticks, "I'm glad Trowa hasn't managed to strip you of your innocence completely."
"He gave it back to me, Dorothy." His voice was low, his smile at her look of surprise gentle. "Really, the war almost destroyed me. I'm not even talking about my life. I mean... I don't believe in God or Heaven and I'm not sure I believe in souls. But he saved...more than just my life." He bit his lip, wondering if he had gone too far. Trowa had saved him from Dorothy in more than one way. Quatre wondered now if she would have finished him off or helped him to safety had Trowa not shown up when he did. At the time, floating limp in the low gravity of the room, watching his blood drip slowly off the tip of Dorothy's rapier, he had been certain she really meant to kill him.
"He saved your spirit," the girl said, apparently oblivious to Quatre's consternation. "The part of you that's essentially you. I'm glad he did. I wish..." She looked away.
They walked along the shore. Dorothy took off her shoes again and swung them by their straps. Quatre took off his linen shirt and slung it over his shoulder. The breeze and the waning sunlight felt good against his back and neck. Trowa had told him early that morning that he had better come back from LA tanned, but he had forgotten until now.
He watched the little kids on the beach still shrieking and splashing in the waves and building sandcastles, while their parents tried to round them up. He watched people begin to gather around hibachis and soon the smell of burning charcoal and grilling meats came to him. He wondered what Trowa was doing for dinner. Just a few more hours and he'd be back in Vancouver. Trowa had promised to pick him up at the airport and from there they would catch a late movie at the cinema.
"How's Relena?" he asked, when Dorothy's silence became noticeable.
"Oh." She smiled and shrugged. "I don't know. I haven't heard from her in a while. I mean I haven't seen her since she ran off with Heero. I got a postcard from her a couple of weeks ago. From Arizona. She sounded very happy. Have you heard from Heero?"
"Are you kidding? Can you imagine Heero sending postcards? Or calling to tell us he's okay? I've seen him ONCE since he left the Preventers in February and I haven't heard from him since last month when he was running around interviewing all of us, trying to figure out if he was really in love with her."
"Do you think he is?"
It was something Quatre had wondered about, too. "He cares about her more than he cares about anyone else," he said. "He wants to protect her. Not just her life, but her happiness, too. And she makes him happy. Duo had to practically twist his arm--which almost cost him his life!--to get him to admit it, but he does. And he's so fascinated with the fact that he CAN be happy after everything he's been through, so he wants to protect that, too." He drew a deep breath and look at the wet sand that clumped between his toes as he walked. "I don't think he WAS in love with her the last time I saw him, but I think he was more than halfway there. I hope he falls for her."
"I do, too."
"I'm glad you're friends with Relena." He looked at her and smiled warmly.
"Ms. Darlian is big on forgiveness."
"She's big on understanding."
"That too. Unfortunately." She cast her gaze skyward. "Sometimes I wish she would be angry with me. If for no other reason than that it would be amusing to watch."
Quatre watched her curiously as she spoke. She was revealing more to him than usual. Was she aware of it? He wondered if it was a ploy and if so, to what end. He immediately chastised himself for the thought. It was unkind, and she had shown him so much charity today. Because he wanted to change the subject and because he was curious he asked, "So how did you meet Tatu?"
"Through my grandfather." She said it flippantly. He stared. She burst into laughter. "That look on your face! What, you don't think His Grace, the late Duke Dermaile would be friends with someone as kind and generous as Tatu Thenashara? Well, you'd be right. Indirectly though, that's sort of how we met." She ran a hand through her hair. It was a gesture he had never seen her make. Was she nervous about something?
"Well you see," she went on, "what happened was, I couldn't go back to my grandfather's estate immediately after the war. I wanted to be alone. So I traveled a good deal. To the Colonies, mostly. The most remote, undeveloped places I could get to. I was tired of the Earth and almost everything on it. It was nice being away from everything. Very calming. When I came back home, though, I hated everything I saw. Everything about my grandfather's estate reminded me of the war and why I...did the things that I did." She paused. He waited in encouraging silence. Finally she said, slowly, "I started...getting rid of things. I would go into rooms, tear pictures off the walls, throw books off shelves. I wanted it bare. I wanted to start again. I could do whatever I wanted with the property; it was mine. Grandfather's only male relative was Cousin Treize, so he named me as his heir to keep him from inheriting the property. I gave away most of the stuff to servants. I would have sent THEM away, but many of them had worked for the Dermailes for generations and asked to stay. Why, I don't know. Anyway, Tatu found me when I tried to auction off some of my mother's jewelry. My grandfather never forgave my mother for marrying my father, but he held onto her things after she'd gone off. There was this enormous fire opal pendant, shaped like a teardrop, surrounded by tiny diamonds. I remembered my mother wearing it when I was very young, but I wanted it gone. So I tried to get rid of it. But Tatu wouldn't let me. He called me and LECTURED me and told me that I had to keep it. Isn't that crazy?"
"Tatu is empathic," Quatre said.
"I know THAT."
"Well, he must have known how you really felt about the pendant and couldn't let you get rid of it."
"But why would he CARE? Because he's Tatu, that's why. Quatre, I love that man. I spent days cursing him and now I'm so glad he's the nosy, pompous, fat-ass that he is."
Nothing about Dorothy ought to have surprised him, but her candor and her ardency managed to. "Umm..." he replied.
"Oh, I don't love him like THAT, silly," she said quickly, tossing her hair. "He's fifty-two, nearly three times my weight, and he's gay. His boyfriend lives in Malibu. They have amazing parties sometimes with all these fantastic people. I seem to be establishing a pattern, though." She rubbed her brow as though her head hurt or as though she were tired, and sighed.
Quatre had no idea what to do. Instinct told him to reach out to her, but a cool voice of reason in his head told him that to become more involved in her healing than he already was might be a bad idea. He put out a hand to touch her shoulder, but she tossed her hair again and it whipped his hand aside. He was glad, secretly. If he touched her he might feel her pain, and that frightened him. Watching her now he had a glimpse of what his life might have been like without Trowa's love. He did not want to touch that.
They walked in silence after that. The sand retained its heat from the day, but the air cooled. The sun disappeared beneath the ocean except for a few ruddy wispy rays, and the sky became purple. There were no stars. Somewhere up the beach someone had lit a bonfire. Quatre could see its reflection flickering against the black waves. Chinese lanterns strung between telephone poles made pockets of air glow red, green, yellow, and blue. He heard the faint rat-tat beat of bongo drums, then a flute, lonely and high.
He thought about Trowa sitting on their fire escape at home, wrapped in the bulky cedar-green sweater Catherine had knitted for him last autumn, eating cold pizza, counting the minutes before it was time to get Quatre at the airport.
He thought about holding hands in the cinema and much later that night cuddling under their quilt, legs entwined, the other boy's heart beating steadily beneath his cheek.
He thought about Dorothy and a wave of sadness and emptiness hit him. But there's nothing for me to do. There's nothing I can do.
Finally he said, "I have to go. I promised Trowa I'd be on the nine o'clock shuttle and I have to leave now if I'm going to make it."
"We'd better start walking back then," she said softly.
"Actually, I think I'll take a taxi. You've been chauffeuring me around all day."
"All right. I like the beach at night, anyway." She smiled again. The wind blew her hair around her face. In the sapphire light from the Chinese lantern she looked more like a water spirit than ever before.
"I'm sorry," Quatre said.
"For what?"
"I'm not sure," he answered truthfully. He shook his head.
"Go home to Trowa," Dorothy said. She lifted a hand, touched his bare chest as though to push him away, but instead pulled her hand back quickly as though she had been stung. "Go already. He's waiting for you. He loves you. I'm so glad."
"Dorothy..." He was reluctant to leave her, for some reason, in the swimming faerie lights. She might disappear or dissolve the way asrais do. But she has Tatu. He is like an uncle to her. And she has Relena. And I'm her friend, too. He told her so.
"I know you are, you idiot. What are you worried about? I'm hardly the delicate kind that needs constant attention. Go on. GO."
"I'm your friend, Dorothy. Thank you so much for everything."
"GO."
Don't go, she thought, but he was already going. His good, pure heart was already on a shuttle flying north to the arms of the boy who waited on a fire escape for him, scanning the stars, anxious but trusting. The rest of him hesitated for an instant, as though it knew, somehow, that something was being left behind. Inevitably, though, he turned and followed his heart. Dorothy watched him until he disappeared entirely and she could no longer feel the pulse of his love for Trowa beating inside her skull.
When he was gone completely she unclenched herself, lowered her shields, and finally allowed herself to feel.
Her heart felt like seaglass, transparent, worn, and pounded smooth. Her body felt like one big bruise.
She wanted to run after him. She wanted to clasp him in her arms and kiss every freckle on his pale shoulders. She wanted to let him go. She wanted him to come back looking for the thing he had left behind just so she could say what she really meant, which was, Look at the dilemma I'm in, my dear. I can't even wish for you to love me because then I would have to hate you for destroying the most perfect, beautiful bond I've ever seen.
She wanted to cast herself into the Pacific and dissolve into sea foam like the soulless little mermaid in the old tale.
The night was beautiful; she wanted to stay a part of it.
"I'm just a bundle of contradictions tonight," she said to no one in particular. She picked up a shell, hurled it into the waves, then she turned and began to walk back up the beach toward her car.
A boy stopped her. He was a little younger than she was, pimply, and drunk. "Boy are you ugly," he commented and belched loudly.
Dorothy sighed. "Wouldn't it be better if you just let everyone THINK you're a cretin, rather than open your mouth and prove them right?" It was lame, but she was too tired for anything more stinging. Anyway, it worked. The boy gawped at her ability to string together such a complex sentence, and she pushed past him.
She had not gone four yards when another boy came bounding toward her, annoyingly sober and eager. "Hey," he said friendlily, ignoring her scowl, "you're Dorothy Catalonia, aren't you? I saw you before talking to that guy. That was Quatre Winner, wasn't he? So what's the deal? I heard he was gay, that he rejected Winner Enterprises or whatever and was shacking up with some guy in Canada. So does he swing both ways or what?"
Dorothy looked at him. She saw the reporter's notebook and felt electricity shoot through her veins. "Listen to me carefully," she said in a cold, even voice. "You print one word about me and Quatre Winner, or anything about Quatre Winner period, and I will personally nail your balls to a telephone pole. You've heard of The Weekly, The Chatterbox, Gossip's Choice? No? Well, there's a reason you haven't. Got it?"
He gulped at her, wide-eyed. He swallowed two or three times, then nodded vigorously. He got it. There had been no hint of teasing or mercy in those eyes. She meant it.
She felt sorry as soon as she realized how thoroughly she had frightened him. His fear clutched her heart like a vise. He was young, she thought. He did not deserve this. He hadn't even done anything, yet.
"Sorry," she said, feeling awkward. "That was a warning. There's a reason no one prints trash about Quatre Winner. I'm the reason."
"So you're really in love with him, huh? Must suck that he's--"
"You get one warning!" she snapped. "You've already had it. I'm his guardian angel," she said in a gentler tone to empty space--the boy had bolted. "Or his guardian devil. Whichever serves the purpose better."
Alone again, she felt the beach teeming with love and lust, with life. There was pain, too, and fear, but not as much as she remembered feeling as a girl. Emotions danced around her, sparkling, soothing, agitating. Everything. She wanted to plug into it, to fall into the rhythm of the drums, to dive into the waves and not dissolve but savor the freedom of movement. And to think, she might once have destroyed all of this, the children, the drummers, the cretin reporters, the lovers, and the reckless surfers out to catch one last wave. She might have, if not for Quatre.
She wanted to walk up to them and shyly ask their forgiveness. But she was not ready yet.
So instead, she sat down in the sand in a pool of golden light, rested her chin against her knee and watched and felt. Thank you, Quatre, she thought.
5/07/02
Fandom: Gundam Wing
Rating: PG-13
Ship: Trowa/Quatre
Summary: While hunting for the perfect anniversary gift for Trowa, Quatre bumps into Dorothy again. Why is she being so helpful? Has she truly changed...or could she have an ulterior motive?
A/N: Set in the same universe as Misguided Angels and its sequels.
May, AC 199
He recognized the voice immediately: "What's a pretty boy like you doing in a place like this?"
"Slumming," he drawled before glancing up. When he did, he smiled--warily. "Dorothy Catalonia."
"Quatre Raberba Winner." Her smile was barbed, her smoke-blue eyes unreadable. "Fine comeback."
"Thank you," he said guardedly. Why was it, whenever he and this girl talked, he had the impression they were still dueling? "Sorry," he said quickly to the woman behind the counter, who had her thin brown eyebrows raised in surprise. "I didn't really mean..."
"He didn't mean it at all," Dorothy said as she came up beside him in three quick strides. "I just bring out the brat in him, what can I say?"
Quatre glanced at her out of the corner of his eye as she leaned on her elbows and peered at the glittering rings behind glass on the counter. Dorothy Catalonia had a tendency to appear unpredictably in his life, seemingly out of the air as though conjured. So he was not entirely surprised to see her here, now. Still, he was unsure of what to make of her, as he was each time they met. The first time had been four years ago in the Sanq Kingdom. He had been too preoccupied with his guilt to take much notice of the strange girl who followed Princess Relena like her shadow and baited her with every breath. And she had been too taken--or so it had seemed--with Heero Yuy to pay much attention to the pale, guilt-stricken boy who haunted the music room and hardly spoke. The second time they met, on the battleship Libra, he had recognized in her the person he would have become if not for Trowa's sacrifice--and she had seen in him the person she wanted to be, but could not...and tried to kill him. The third time, when she drifted wraithlike into his hospital room, they had been horrified by each other's wounds and achieved a tenuous friendship. Since then he had seen her a few other times, mostly at social functions and in Relena's presence. He did not know what she did with her time, how close she and Relena had become since the end of the war, how she had gotten her life back together, if she truly had.
Looking at her now, he found no answers. Even without the dark eyebrows that stuck out from her high forehead like moth's antennae, Dorothy would not have been beautiful. She was too pale, too angular, her gaze far too piercing for comfort. But in Quatre's opinion she was far from ugly, as his best friend Duo deemed her. He found her very Otherness striking. Though he felt no physical attraction whatsoever for her, he liked looking at her. Maybe it had to do with his desire to understand her better, as though he hoped that some time her countenance would betray her innermost thoughts. It did not now. All he could tell was that she had cut her hair since last December, and she looked somewhat thinner. He wondered how much he had changed in her eyes.
"Mister Winner," said the saleswoman, interrupting his thoughts, "shall I see what else we have downstairs?"
"Um, sure," he said, flustered.
Dorothy turned to him, one eyebrow raised. After the saleswoman had left she said, in a tone he found unnervingly inquisitive, "Popping the question already? How romantic. Did you really win the approval of all your sisters? I hope not. An elopement would be much more scandalous and exciting."
"That's not it," he said, annoyed. "We're not getting married. It's--" Why was he telling her this? "Next month will be our first anniversary. I have to find a present for him, and I'm running out of time."
"I didn't think Trowa Barton was the type to wear jewelry."
"He's not. But he gave me a ring the night of our first date." He rested his right hand on the glass and showed her the slender band of dark gold, then closed his fist protectively. "I want to do the same thing for him."
"Sort of a preview of things to come?"
He shrugged, feeling awkward. To avoid her gaze, he stared at his ring, which glinted in the bright sunlight streaming through the store's window. He had never thought about Trowa's gift to him in that way, and doubted that his lover ever had. Trowa had bought the ring for Sally Po initially, although he insisted later that in his heart he had never meant to give it to her. Quatre often thought about what it would be like to run away together and he could not imagine his life without Trowa, but marriage? He was nineteen years old.
Dorothy was regarding him curiously. "You're very much in love with him, aren't you? It has nothing to do with your family?"
He glared at her.
"No, how silly of me," she bubbled on, "you would never do that. Well, what's wrong with this one?" She pointed at a brilliant square-cut emerald surrounded by tiny diamonds, set in a platinum band. "He has green eyes, doesn't he? That one would go splendidly."
He had actually thought about that one. "It's a little bit...much. I don't want to scare him."
"Darling, you are in Tiffany's hunting for a gift for the boy you've been dating for less than a year. Moreover, the boy is Trowa. How can you NOT scare him?"
"I know, I know," he admitted with a groan. "He wouldn't wear anything here. When we first got our apartment he owned two pairs of jeans, one for everyday and one for going out. When the going-out jeans started to get threadbare I threw them out and went and bought him a new pair--from Rossi's. You should have seen his face when he saw the label. He didn't speak to me for half a day. When he did start speaking to me again the first thing he said was that what I had spent on the jeans could have fed us for a month. Which was true." He laughed at the memory, though at the time Trowa's reaction had frightened him. "I'm not looking for something glitzy. What I'd like to give him is something more like MY ring. Simple, but with a lot of meaning. I was actually hoping to find an identical ring, but no one seems to have this shade of gold."
She looked at him thoughtfully.
Just then the saleswoman returned, carrying a black-velvet-lined box, which she set in front of Quatre and opened to reveal a collection of gold rings. Most were set with jewels, some were intricately wrought filigrees. They were all beautiful. He fingered a few of them and tried to imagine how they would look on Trowa's long, slender fingers as they flashed over his flute or wove idly through his messy hair. All he saw was a ring like his own, plain but elegant, the color of sunlight on sunflower petals.
"You know," Dorothy's voice interrupted his frustrated pondering, "I know a man out in Brentwood who only deals in unusual jewelry. He might have what you're looking for."
The saleswoman looked at her with mild irritation, Quatre measuringly. He could usually detect duplicity in people, and she fairly radiated sincerity. But he wondered why she was being so helpful.
"It can't hurt to try anyway," she said, tossing her hair, a challenge in her tone. "If my friend doesn't have what you're looking for, I'm sure he'll know where you can find it."
It was the word friend that convinced him to trust her. It fell off her tongue easily, without inflection, without forethought. He felt no ripple of amusement from her, as he used to when she talked about Relena shortly after the war's end.
"All right."
He thanked the saleswoman and apologized, then hurried after Dorothy who was already halfway out the door, her hair trailing after her like a flaxen veil. He blinked as he stepped out onto Wilshire Boulevard, the brilliant sunlight striking his eyes, the afternoon heat assaulting his body, which had become accustomed to Tiffany's conditioned air.
"I'm parked up that way," Dorothy announced over her shoulder as she pushed between pedestrians, her high heels clacking against the concrete.
This is surreal, Quatre thought as he scurried after her, mumbling hasty apologies to the indignant people she left in her wake. This isn't something I repeat to Trowa. If Duo knew he'd make some crack about following a devil into Hell. He looked at the thin white shoulders ahead of him, the oversized, floppy straw hat, the stiletto-heels and thought, But she looks more like a little girl playing dress-up than something from Hell. And if she's a devil, so am I.
Dorothy's car was not the garishly gold limousine he'd used to see her tearing through the narrow, winding streets of the Sanq Kingdom in. He wondered where that car was now. The one waiting for them was a small, midnight-blue Star convertible. She opened the door for him, then kicked off her shoes, tossed them in the back, and slid into the driver's seat. Quatre hesitated only a moment before he climbed in beside her.
He barely had time to fasten his seatbelt before she had floored the pedal and they were screaming down the boulevard.
Though the wild ride through the winding Brentwood hills made Quatre wonder (when his brain wasn't cowering against the back of his skull) if Dorothy wasn't secretly out for his blood after all, the sight of her friend allayed his doubts. Tatu Thenashara looked more like a Buddha than any devil and Quatre detected nothing but benevolence and good humor in his chocolate-colored eyes.
He was one of the tallest people Quatre had ever seen, at least as tall as his former guardian Rashid Kurama, and twice as wide. He was enormously fat; Dorothy all but disappeared when he drew her into an embrace and rumbled "Hey there, duchess," in a voice like continental plates nudging one another beneath the earth. His skin was the color of molasses, his loose-fitting silk shirt and trousers bright topaz and teal. Standing before him in his vibrantly colored room--the walls were decorated with woven rugs and African masks, exotic flowering plants in brass and clay bowls were everywhere, and colored light poured in through the red, turquoise, emerald, indigo, and yellow stained glass windows--Quatre felt very drab.
"Tatu," Dorothy said, when the big man finally released her, "this is my friend Quatre. He's looking for something very special and you're the only one I could think of who might be able to help him."
"So that's what you're doing here on my day off. I should have guessed." He did not sound hurt or angry, just amused. Turning, "So you're Quatre." Tatu engulfed the boy's small hand in his own enormous one. His skin was warm and dry. As he looked down at him Quatre had the strange feeling that this man could see through his shirt, past his skin, straight to his heart. That measuring gaze reminded him of someone, but at the moment he could not think whom.
These were not evil spirits, Quatre thought, but they were spirits nonetheless. Tatu looked like a djinni; Quatre wanted to look around the room to see if there was a lamp resting on a mantel or a table somewhere, but the dark eyes held him. Dorothy was like an asrai--a water spirit--tiny, and translucent as moonlight.
It was a moment before Quatre realized what Tatu's words implied: Dorothy had spoken of him before. He wondered what she had said. He could discern nothing from Tatu's gaze.
Finally the big man said, "We'll have coffee on the deck, and we'll discuss Quatre's problem there."
The deck was enormous, and looked out over rolling green hills. Quatre could see the white specks of other houses between the trees, and the gleam of swimming pools. The cloudless sky shone like a polished tourmaline. The air tasted of wild flowers and ocean brine. A little iris-grey cat wove between the legs of the wicker chairs, pausing occasionally to rub against someone's leg. The coffee was some of the best he'd ever had.
"Let's see this ring, Quatre."
The boy set his coffee cup on the floor, leaned forward in his chair, and held out his hand to Tatu.
"I can't quite see it from there."
When he hesitated, Dorothy, perched on the arm of a chair chirped, "Quatre never takes his ring off. It's sacred to him."
"I DO take it off," he said, shooting her an irritated look. "When I do the dishes or when I swim. But it IS sacred." Looking at Tatu, avoiding Dorothy's intense gaze, "It's the most precious thing I own." That was true, but it was a half-truth he'd given Dorothy. He imagined he would have to take off the ring when he did swim, but he hadn't been anywhere near a pool since he'd moved in with Trowa. Once while washing dishes the ring had almost slipped off his soapy fingers, and then he'd removed it at once and placed it on the counter where he could see it. After that he'd invested in a pair of rubber gloves. The only time he had removed his ring voluntarily it had been in anger, and he did not like to think about that, only what had happened after the anger had passed.
Something glimmered in Tatu's eyes--understanding?--and again Quatre had the impression this man who had been a perfect stranger fifteen minutes ago could see straight through to his soul. He hesitated a moment longer, then began to twist the ring around his finger.
"Don't, don't." Tatu waved his flag-sized hand in dismissal. "Come over here and I'll see it."
Quatre rose and crossed the floor, held out his hand. Seated, Tatu still towered over the boy. He took the offered hand between his and held it close to his eyes, turning it this way and that as he inspected the ring.
"Such an unusual color," he murmured, almost to himself. "You say you found this in a random boutique in Vancouver?"
"Yes. It's engraved, too, but it was when Trowa bought it. It says 'for my sole desire.' In French." He shivered slightly, remembering how long it had taken him to realize his sole desire. His attraction to Trowa had been instantaneous, but it had taken him three long years to admit to it.
"Dorothy," said Tatu, his gaze still on the ring, "on my dresser is a small lacquer box in the shape of a star. On the cover is a picture of Prince Ivan and the firebird. Won't you bring it to me? And brew another pot of coffee."
Quatre looked at Dorothy. It was the first time he had ever witnessed anyone issue her a command. Oh, he phrased it as a request, but Quatre did not doubt its true nature.
Nor did Dorothy. The girl lifted her chin, pursed her lips against what might have been a retort, then rose without a word and entered the house, closing the French windows slowly behind her.
When she was gone Tatu lifted his gaze from the ring to Quatre's eyes and said gently, "Tell me about Trowa."
"I--"
Tatu squeezed his hand. "Tell me about him. Do you love him?"
Quatre looked from Tatu's hands, which engulfed his own completely, to his eyes, which were warm and wide--and compelling.
"Of course I love him."
"How do you love him?"
"I..." Again Quatre faltered. Who WAS this man? Why did he look at him that way, hold his hand in such a manner, stroking it with his thick fingers as though probing for some secret hidden between the delicate bones? "I love him," he stammered. "He's everything to me. He's..." He was floundering. Tatu smiled encouragingly, but he could not put his feelings into words. Trowa was a part of him. Though at the moment many miles separated them Quatre felt as though the other boy were right by his side, his thoughts and opinions coloring everything Quatre saw, heard, tasted, and touched. But how could he explain that?
"Just think about him. I need to know how you really feel."
"This is so weird."
"I know." Tatu was massaging his hand, his warm, smoky breath entreating, coaxing his secrets out.
Quatre wanted to sink into the warmth, wrap it around himself like a blanket and simply dissolve into pure feeling, no thought. It was the way he felt when he was slightly drunk at bars, in the company of his friends. Tired and happy and wanting to lean his head against someone's shoulder--anyone's--and just BE. Tatu was LISTENING, every part of him receptive. "You're like me, aren't you?" Quatre whispered, half-afraid of the answer. Suddenly Dorothy's friendship with this man made sense.
"Don't think about my Dorothy right now. And yes, I'm like you if by that you mean I can sometimes feel the intense emotions of people near me. But think about Trowa now. Trowa."
"I thought I was the only one." His legs trembled.
"Trowa."
Trowa.
If there were words for what he felt, he did not know them. He saw the word "love" on plastic keychains sold in kiosks at the mall. It was on patches sewn onto backpacks. It was in almost every song he heard on the radio. It was probably the best word he knew, but it was still a word that people used every day and did not mean. Trowa was...
Dancing on the roof of Duo and Hilde's apartment in the last rays of an Indian summer's day, all the sweetness and grace he had been born to flashing off his body as though he were made of water. Lifting his breathtaking green, green eyes to Quatre, the pure happiness in his gaze burning through the deepening blues and purples of dusk.
Sitting opposite him, cross-legged on their fire escape on the first warm day in April, eating persimmons, bare knees touching, the sweet sticky juice dribbling down their chins. Spook the cat bounding suddenly between them, jumping into Quatre's lap and putting his paws on the boy's chest as though it were the most natural thing for him to do. Then Trowa laughing his head off as Spook proceeded, not to nuzzle Quatre affectionately, but to lick the sweet, sticky juice from his chin, rubbing his skin red with his rough tongue.
Lying naked in his arms after making love, their bodies slick and glistening as dolphins. Too exhausted to do more than move their lips in the shapes of kisses and look at each other, completely open, vulnerable, trusting. Thinking, and knowing the other one understood, You're the one my heart cried out to when it was lonely. To deny you would be to deny the best part of me. How can we be anything except together?
"Ah."
Quatre was torn from his reverie by the rumbling affirmation. He blushed furiously, remembering Tatu.
"There, now. It's not as though I can read your mind. All I can feel is a distant echo of what you're feeling. But you really love him." He sounded...not amazed, and not quite relieved. "Don't look like that," he laughed, when Quatre frowned. "Why shouldn't I doubt you? You're a hormonal teenage boy. But I don't doubt you, anymore. It's a rare thing you have, young Quatre. Protect it. Where is Dorothy? Quatre, won't you fetch her?"
Still shaking slightly, Quatre backed away from Tatu and went to find Dorothy. He met her coming down a long mirror-lined hallway, a fresh pot of coffee in one hand, her other arm cradling a small, star-shaped box. He stopped when he saw her. Her expression was what it had been in Tiffany's: her mouth curled upward at one corner, the rest impassive. But something was different. In the bright light flashing off the mirrors she looked paler, smaller somehow.
Tired.
"Can I take something?" he asked, feeling awkward. His cheeks and the tips of his ears were still rosy from his Trowa-fantasy. Could she see?
"You're so gallant," she said with a smile. She tossed her hair and it splashed her shoulders and back, for an instant indiscernible from the sunlight. "I'm an independent woman, you know."
Her ice-blue gaze raked over his body and he felt his blush deepening. She had to know what he had been thinking. The knowledge was in the barb at the corner of her mouth. But why should that bother him? Still, he felt her gaze probing him, pushing between his ribs, scouring every chamber of his heart for...
Unsure of whom he sought to protect, he pressed his palm to his chest, said imploringly, "Dorothy."
She blinked and looked at him, startled. The connection was severed instantly. She seemed very far away from him now, though she had not moved.
"I'm sorry," she whispered. She looked at the box and the coffeepot, then back up at him and smiled wanly. "I said I was an independent woman. But I'm also an opportunist." She pushed the pot and the box into his hands, then hurried past him and out the French windows, leaving him once again to follow bewilderedly.
Tatu took the box from him and pawed through it while Dorothy refilled the coffee cups. Quatre tried to peer over his shoulder while he searched, but he wasn't tall enough.
"What are you looking for?"
"Something that came to me a long time ago. Ah." What he came up with was something tiny and swathed in plum-colored silk.
"What's that, Tatu?" Dorothy asked as she set the coffeepot down and drew closer.
The big man turned to Quatre, took his hand, and placed the silk-swathed thing on his palm.
It was so light. Quatre knew that it was a ring, but he hesitated to unwrap it. He did not believe in magic, did not believe in God. But Tatu was an angel, the answer to his unspoken prayers.
"Let's see it, silly," said Dorothy. "Come on."
"I can't."
Tatu had to unwrap the ring for him and when he had, and the deepening afternoon light fell upon it, Quatre's breath stopped.
Sunlight on sunflower petals. Delicate, perfect. His eyes burned. "How...?" How far away his voice sounded!
"How did I find it? The usual way, for me. I travel. I see things that are not where they belong and acquire them in the hope of delivering them to where they're meant to be. I found that ring at a street fair in Copenhagen. The man who was selling it told me that his brother had found it mixed in with a shipment of tealeaves from China. I thought coming from the Middle East originally it would prefer Los Angeles to Denmark. But if its mate lives in Canada, what can I do?"
Quatre fingered the ring. Yes, there was an inscription on the inside of the band. To my one desire. In Arabic, the language of his ancestors. His lips parted, but his mouth was too dry to get the word out.
"I have no idea why," Tatu answered his unspoken question. "Sometimes I make up stories about it, where it really came from, who made it. It could have been a wedding ring, I suppose. My favorite story is about a young goldsmith who came upon this lump of gold that no one wanted because the color was unfashionable. So he--or she--made this ring and sent it off into the world like a message in a bottle. I never knew it had a mate, but I'm glad to see it does. I'll have to change my story, now."
Quatre closed his hand around the ring, squeezed it, then opened his hand again. The ring was still there.
"You're not dreaming," Dorothy laughed. "You should see your face. Well, was I right? Is it what you're looking for?"
"It's perfect!" He tried to look at her, but her face was in shadow. "Thank you so much." He thought she smiled again, but he could not tell. He turned to Tatu. "I'll take it! Um...you ARE willing to sell it, right?"
"I'm giving it to you." His white teeth flashed against his face like a crescent moon.
"But I can pay you. Anything you want, it doesn't matter."
"That would cheapen it. I'm sure of your love. To ask that you pay...would diminish the story I'm making up for it, now."
"But..."
Tatu took his hand and folded it closed over the ring. "Just remember what I said to you earlier. Protect each other."
"I will." He wanted to throw his arms around this man, this angel, this djinni. He felt shy about it, though. Spontaneous displays of affection, especially with new acquaintances, were not things his family had encouraged.
The man understood. He pulled the boy into his arms, surprising him with his gentleness. "You can do something for me," he murmured in Quatre's ear.
"What's that?"
With a mischievous ripple in his voice, "You can take my Dorothy out to dinner."
My Dorothy. Again that odd feeling that there was something familiar about Tatu Thenashara. He pulled away and nodded, searching the man's face for the answer. Tatu looked at the girl who still wavered in the shadows, his eyes at the same time full of love and concern.
Quatre did not understand the look, but he was aware finally, of whom the man reminded him. He had seen Cathy Bloom look at her adoptive brother Trowa in that same way.
They made it to Farmer's Market in one piece and bought sushi, dried apple slices and yogurt-covered raisins, cherry coke, and iced green tea. Then they drove to Venice Beach, parked the car in a lot, and walked along the boardwalk until they found an empty picnic table.
Small pink and grey clouds dotted the sky. The air tasted of flowers and citrus fruits, sunscreen, hotdogs from the stand across the street, incense, and of course the ocean. Quatre inhaled deeply, letting all the scents, incongruent as they were, fill his lungs. He was happy. He was satisfied. He had found what he wanted and he could not wait to see Trowa's face when he presented him with the ring.
For my sole desire. My soul's desire. The only thing I want, ever.
His happiness and the hazy coppery glow of early evening after such a long, hectic day made him more talkative than usual. He found himself telling Dorothy things about his life with Trowa, about his friends. She sipped her coke through a purple plastic straw and smiled faintly.
"A few months ago Duo had this idea we should make a rock band," he told her at one point. "I mean us. Be in a band. We're not pilots anymore, but he wants us to stay a team."
Dorothy set her coke down, picked up her chopsticks, and began to slather wasabi on her unagi maki. "Can you sing?"
"Heero got up and left as soon as Duo announced he had a brilliant idea, so we don't know about him. I can. Duo can't. Trowa won't. I mean, he's great in the shower. At singing. Oh, God." His cheeks burned.
Her smile deepened. "My dear, do you have sex on the brain?"
"I think it's always in the back of my mind," he admitted, blushing brighter still. How nice the breeze felt against his cheeks and the back of his neck. He wanted to dive into the ocean.
"Don't be embarrassed, darling. If I had a boyfriend who looked the way yours does, believe me it would be on my mind constantly too. Tell me more about your band. I know you play the violin and the piano. What about the others?"
"Oh, it's not going to happen. Trowa has his flute. Duo doesn't play anything, but he swears he'd be a natural on the drums. Anyway, he says it doesn't matter whether we can play and sing or not because we're all pretty enough no one will notice. That was when Hilde got up and left." He grimaced. "Duo wanted to call us Vlad and the Impalers. You know, like the vampire."
Dorothy thought it over while she chewed on her maki and winced slightly as the wasabi burned her throat and nasal passage. She grabbed her coke, took a long sip, then said in a weak voice, "That makes sense. I mean it's in accordance with Duo's obsession with death and destruction. I like it. A nod to the pop bands of the pre-war 1950s, with a 1990s metal twist. And a little sexual innuendo never hurt."
"What!" He looked at her, shocked.
"Impalers?"
It took a moment. Then, "Oh." Once again his face went red. "I didn't get that at ALL. But no wonder Trowa was laughing his head off."
"Do you want the last hamachi maki? No? Well," taking it up with her chopsticks, "I'm glad Trowa hasn't managed to strip you of your innocence completely."
"He gave it back to me, Dorothy." His voice was low, his smile at her look of surprise gentle. "Really, the war almost destroyed me. I'm not even talking about my life. I mean... I don't believe in God or Heaven and I'm not sure I believe in souls. But he saved...more than just my life." He bit his lip, wondering if he had gone too far. Trowa had saved him from Dorothy in more than one way. Quatre wondered now if she would have finished him off or helped him to safety had Trowa not shown up when he did. At the time, floating limp in the low gravity of the room, watching his blood drip slowly off the tip of Dorothy's rapier, he had been certain she really meant to kill him.
"He saved your spirit," the girl said, apparently oblivious to Quatre's consternation. "The part of you that's essentially you. I'm glad he did. I wish..." She looked away.
They walked along the shore. Dorothy took off her shoes again and swung them by their straps. Quatre took off his linen shirt and slung it over his shoulder. The breeze and the waning sunlight felt good against his back and neck. Trowa had told him early that morning that he had better come back from LA tanned, but he had forgotten until now.
He watched the little kids on the beach still shrieking and splashing in the waves and building sandcastles, while their parents tried to round them up. He watched people begin to gather around hibachis and soon the smell of burning charcoal and grilling meats came to him. He wondered what Trowa was doing for dinner. Just a few more hours and he'd be back in Vancouver. Trowa had promised to pick him up at the airport and from there they would catch a late movie at the cinema.
"How's Relena?" he asked, when Dorothy's silence became noticeable.
"Oh." She smiled and shrugged. "I don't know. I haven't heard from her in a while. I mean I haven't seen her since she ran off with Heero. I got a postcard from her a couple of weeks ago. From Arizona. She sounded very happy. Have you heard from Heero?"
"Are you kidding? Can you imagine Heero sending postcards? Or calling to tell us he's okay? I've seen him ONCE since he left the Preventers in February and I haven't heard from him since last month when he was running around interviewing all of us, trying to figure out if he was really in love with her."
"Do you think he is?"
It was something Quatre had wondered about, too. "He cares about her more than he cares about anyone else," he said. "He wants to protect her. Not just her life, but her happiness, too. And she makes him happy. Duo had to practically twist his arm--which almost cost him his life!--to get him to admit it, but he does. And he's so fascinated with the fact that he CAN be happy after everything he's been through, so he wants to protect that, too." He drew a deep breath and look at the wet sand that clumped between his toes as he walked. "I don't think he WAS in love with her the last time I saw him, but I think he was more than halfway there. I hope he falls for her."
"I do, too."
"I'm glad you're friends with Relena." He looked at her and smiled warmly.
"Ms. Darlian is big on forgiveness."
"She's big on understanding."
"That too. Unfortunately." She cast her gaze skyward. "Sometimes I wish she would be angry with me. If for no other reason than that it would be amusing to watch."
Quatre watched her curiously as she spoke. She was revealing more to him than usual. Was she aware of it? He wondered if it was a ploy and if so, to what end. He immediately chastised himself for the thought. It was unkind, and she had shown him so much charity today. Because he wanted to change the subject and because he was curious he asked, "So how did you meet Tatu?"
"Through my grandfather." She said it flippantly. He stared. She burst into laughter. "That look on your face! What, you don't think His Grace, the late Duke Dermaile would be friends with someone as kind and generous as Tatu Thenashara? Well, you'd be right. Indirectly though, that's sort of how we met." She ran a hand through her hair. It was a gesture he had never seen her make. Was she nervous about something?
"Well you see," she went on, "what happened was, I couldn't go back to my grandfather's estate immediately after the war. I wanted to be alone. So I traveled a good deal. To the Colonies, mostly. The most remote, undeveloped places I could get to. I was tired of the Earth and almost everything on it. It was nice being away from everything. Very calming. When I came back home, though, I hated everything I saw. Everything about my grandfather's estate reminded me of the war and why I...did the things that I did." She paused. He waited in encouraging silence. Finally she said, slowly, "I started...getting rid of things. I would go into rooms, tear pictures off the walls, throw books off shelves. I wanted it bare. I wanted to start again. I could do whatever I wanted with the property; it was mine. Grandfather's only male relative was Cousin Treize, so he named me as his heir to keep him from inheriting the property. I gave away most of the stuff to servants. I would have sent THEM away, but many of them had worked for the Dermailes for generations and asked to stay. Why, I don't know. Anyway, Tatu found me when I tried to auction off some of my mother's jewelry. My grandfather never forgave my mother for marrying my father, but he held onto her things after she'd gone off. There was this enormous fire opal pendant, shaped like a teardrop, surrounded by tiny diamonds. I remembered my mother wearing it when I was very young, but I wanted it gone. So I tried to get rid of it. But Tatu wouldn't let me. He called me and LECTURED me and told me that I had to keep it. Isn't that crazy?"
"Tatu is empathic," Quatre said.
"I know THAT."
"Well, he must have known how you really felt about the pendant and couldn't let you get rid of it."
"But why would he CARE? Because he's Tatu, that's why. Quatre, I love that man. I spent days cursing him and now I'm so glad he's the nosy, pompous, fat-ass that he is."
Nothing about Dorothy ought to have surprised him, but her candor and her ardency managed to. "Umm..." he replied.
"Oh, I don't love him like THAT, silly," she said quickly, tossing her hair. "He's fifty-two, nearly three times my weight, and he's gay. His boyfriend lives in Malibu. They have amazing parties sometimes with all these fantastic people. I seem to be establishing a pattern, though." She rubbed her brow as though her head hurt or as though she were tired, and sighed.
Quatre had no idea what to do. Instinct told him to reach out to her, but a cool voice of reason in his head told him that to become more involved in her healing than he already was might be a bad idea. He put out a hand to touch her shoulder, but she tossed her hair again and it whipped his hand aside. He was glad, secretly. If he touched her he might feel her pain, and that frightened him. Watching her now he had a glimpse of what his life might have been like without Trowa's love. He did not want to touch that.
They walked in silence after that. The sand retained its heat from the day, but the air cooled. The sun disappeared beneath the ocean except for a few ruddy wispy rays, and the sky became purple. There were no stars. Somewhere up the beach someone had lit a bonfire. Quatre could see its reflection flickering against the black waves. Chinese lanterns strung between telephone poles made pockets of air glow red, green, yellow, and blue. He heard the faint rat-tat beat of bongo drums, then a flute, lonely and high.
He thought about Trowa sitting on their fire escape at home, wrapped in the bulky cedar-green sweater Catherine had knitted for him last autumn, eating cold pizza, counting the minutes before it was time to get Quatre at the airport.
He thought about holding hands in the cinema and much later that night cuddling under their quilt, legs entwined, the other boy's heart beating steadily beneath his cheek.
He thought about Dorothy and a wave of sadness and emptiness hit him. But there's nothing for me to do. There's nothing I can do.
Finally he said, "I have to go. I promised Trowa I'd be on the nine o'clock shuttle and I have to leave now if I'm going to make it."
"We'd better start walking back then," she said softly.
"Actually, I think I'll take a taxi. You've been chauffeuring me around all day."
"All right. I like the beach at night, anyway." She smiled again. The wind blew her hair around her face. In the sapphire light from the Chinese lantern she looked more like a water spirit than ever before.
"I'm sorry," Quatre said.
"For what?"
"I'm not sure," he answered truthfully. He shook his head.
"Go home to Trowa," Dorothy said. She lifted a hand, touched his bare chest as though to push him away, but instead pulled her hand back quickly as though she had been stung. "Go already. He's waiting for you. He loves you. I'm so glad."
"Dorothy..." He was reluctant to leave her, for some reason, in the swimming faerie lights. She might disappear or dissolve the way asrais do. But she has Tatu. He is like an uncle to her. And she has Relena. And I'm her friend, too. He told her so.
"I know you are, you idiot. What are you worried about? I'm hardly the delicate kind that needs constant attention. Go on. GO."
"I'm your friend, Dorothy. Thank you so much for everything."
"GO."
Don't go, she thought, but he was already going. His good, pure heart was already on a shuttle flying north to the arms of the boy who waited on a fire escape for him, scanning the stars, anxious but trusting. The rest of him hesitated for an instant, as though it knew, somehow, that something was being left behind. Inevitably, though, he turned and followed his heart. Dorothy watched him until he disappeared entirely and she could no longer feel the pulse of his love for Trowa beating inside her skull.
When he was gone completely she unclenched herself, lowered her shields, and finally allowed herself to feel.
Her heart felt like seaglass, transparent, worn, and pounded smooth. Her body felt like one big bruise.
She wanted to run after him. She wanted to clasp him in her arms and kiss every freckle on his pale shoulders. She wanted to let him go. She wanted him to come back looking for the thing he had left behind just so she could say what she really meant, which was, Look at the dilemma I'm in, my dear. I can't even wish for you to love me because then I would have to hate you for destroying the most perfect, beautiful bond I've ever seen.
She wanted to cast herself into the Pacific and dissolve into sea foam like the soulless little mermaid in the old tale.
The night was beautiful; she wanted to stay a part of it.
"I'm just a bundle of contradictions tonight," she said to no one in particular. She picked up a shell, hurled it into the waves, then she turned and began to walk back up the beach toward her car.
A boy stopped her. He was a little younger than she was, pimply, and drunk. "Boy are you ugly," he commented and belched loudly.
Dorothy sighed. "Wouldn't it be better if you just let everyone THINK you're a cretin, rather than open your mouth and prove them right?" It was lame, but she was too tired for anything more stinging. Anyway, it worked. The boy gawped at her ability to string together such a complex sentence, and she pushed past him.
She had not gone four yards when another boy came bounding toward her, annoyingly sober and eager. "Hey," he said friendlily, ignoring her scowl, "you're Dorothy Catalonia, aren't you? I saw you before talking to that guy. That was Quatre Winner, wasn't he? So what's the deal? I heard he was gay, that he rejected Winner Enterprises or whatever and was shacking up with some guy in Canada. So does he swing both ways or what?"
Dorothy looked at him. She saw the reporter's notebook and felt electricity shoot through her veins. "Listen to me carefully," she said in a cold, even voice. "You print one word about me and Quatre Winner, or anything about Quatre Winner period, and I will personally nail your balls to a telephone pole. You've heard of The Weekly, The Chatterbox, Gossip's Choice? No? Well, there's a reason you haven't. Got it?"
He gulped at her, wide-eyed. He swallowed two or three times, then nodded vigorously. He got it. There had been no hint of teasing or mercy in those eyes. She meant it.
She felt sorry as soon as she realized how thoroughly she had frightened him. His fear clutched her heart like a vise. He was young, she thought. He did not deserve this. He hadn't even done anything, yet.
"Sorry," she said, feeling awkward. "That was a warning. There's a reason no one prints trash about Quatre Winner. I'm the reason."
"So you're really in love with him, huh? Must suck that he's--"
"You get one warning!" she snapped. "You've already had it. I'm his guardian angel," she said in a gentler tone to empty space--the boy had bolted. "Or his guardian devil. Whichever serves the purpose better."
Alone again, she felt the beach teeming with love and lust, with life. There was pain, too, and fear, but not as much as she remembered feeling as a girl. Emotions danced around her, sparkling, soothing, agitating. Everything. She wanted to plug into it, to fall into the rhythm of the drums, to dive into the waves and not dissolve but savor the freedom of movement. And to think, she might once have destroyed all of this, the children, the drummers, the cretin reporters, the lovers, and the reckless surfers out to catch one last wave. She might have, if not for Quatre.
She wanted to walk up to them and shyly ask their forgiveness. But she was not ready yet.
So instead, she sat down in the sand in a pool of golden light, rested her chin against her knee and watched and felt. Thank you, Quatre, she thought.
5/07/02