12-Feb-2001
revised: 02-Aug-2002
title: Need Some Distraction
author: Dan
timeline: After EW
genre: epic
disclaimer: not mine, don't sue
notes: sequel to 'Prices Paid'
Hilde spent the elevator ride up the innumerable floors to my apartment half asleep, her head resting against the glass, her breath leaving little mist marks. I worried about her as she rested there. She seemed like she was at the edge of an emotion chasm and didn't even seem aware of it. I sighed and continued to stare determinedly out the glass.
"Your knuckles have gone white, you know." I hadn't realized she was watching me.
"I dislike small places." Which was an understatement, but I prefer to keep my weakness to myself whenever possible.
Hilde murmured something that got lost in her sleep-fogged voice. I ended up hauling both her and her two bags out the elevator and down the hall to my door. Dorothy opened up the door after I kicked at it repeatedly. She was in cut-off shorts and a t-shirt, looking far too comfortable for my taste. She raised one funky eyebrow as she surveyed me, arms laden with a half-asleep Hilde and all her baggage.
"New roommate?" She purred with the subtle undertones of innuendo playing in her voice. I wondered if she was aware of it. Probably.
"Don't start." I blew one strand of uncooperative hair out of my eyes and glared at her. She crossed her arms over her chest and leaned against the doorframe. "Help me, dammit."
Dorothy shook her head in wry amusement, sending her hair flowing around her like a waterfall. She hefted Hilde in a surprisingly graceful movement and looked down at her sleeping face. "This is going to be my boss?"
I grunted in what could be construed as an affirmative manner as I pushed, kicked, and dragged Hilde's two bags through the doorway. Hilde had made carrying the two look so easy it was unbelievable. I kicked the door shut behind me and breathed a sigh of relief when I finally got the bags into the hall closet.
Hilde was awake and looking between Dorothy and I with the question clearly stamped on her face.
"No." We said in unison. Hilde's eyebrow went up.
Dorothy leaned against the bar the kitchen that was all the separated it from the entertaining area. Her amusement curled through her voice, "Even though I do occasionally prefer the company of women to men, I prefer women with more ... ah... feistiness to their character than Relena."
"Kiss off, Catalonia," I snapped at her. "We're just friends." I explained to Hilde as she eyed us incredulously. "I try not to bring homicidal psychopaths into my bed."
"And that's why you spent how many years trying to seduce Yuy? Because he was just so normal?" She purred to me. At one time I would have ripped her eyes out for that catty little comment, and it did still hurt, but now I just laughed at it. Either you laughed or you screamed; I always preferred to laugh. Besides, sometimes she saw things far more clearly than I.
I put one finger in my mouth and then drew a line in the air with it like I was making a tally on a score sheet. "Point for Catalonia. But don't push it, I still don't want to talk about it."
Dorothy shrugged and nodded. One of the few things that she never understood about me was my love for Heero. And I did love him, too much maybe, but I could never be with him, or him with me, because we never really saw each other beyond our idealizations of each other. I wanted, needed, a prince to rescue me from my fear and he needed an angel to redeem him. It took us both a long time to realize that we couldn't make each other into some sort of fantasy. Took us longer to realize that we couldn't make ourselves into something we weren't. And God knows we both tried.
"Is he that easy for you to get over, to toss aside?" Hilde's question was more like a hissing accusation. I could hear the anger in her voice and the protectiveness. I smiled to myself, pleased with what I heard.
"No." I just looked at her as she stared at me. A thousand questions rushed through her cornflower blue eyes before that bone-aching sadness settled into them.
"I'm sorry. What is it about them that manage to fuck up a woman's life so badly?" She scrubbed her eyes with the palms of her hands. Dorothy looked at the two of us and just shook her head in wry amusement.
"You let them. I never did understand why Relena took to that raging sociopath. And you, Hilde, you seem like such a sensible person. Why let them upset your balance so much?" Dorothy shrugged one shoulder. "They're only men."
I thought about making a pithy comment about her and Quatre, but swallowed it. That subject was still too close to the surface to touch. She still left the room every time he was mentioned or came on the vid. Dorothy never cried, but she still hurt, and I was too much of a wimp to push her into talking about it.
Hilde muttered something in German before answering. "It's the man part that's screwing me over. I can handle the pilot part; it's all the rest that's fucking my shit up." She shot me a guilt look. "Forgive my language."
"I will not. It's fucking disgusting." I said as I eyed the coffee sitting in the pot before deciding against it. It was probably cold. But I needed to stay up and finish the last of that damned trade treaty between L4 and the Martian colony.
Hilde snickered. Dorothy leaned over the counter and beckoned Hilde closer to her. Hilde complied, settling next to the platinum blonde like an old confidant. I guess that little gesture should have warned me about the way things were going to be, but no one has ever accused me of being the most observant of people.
"Don't worry about it. She likes it when you swear around her, shows that you're willing to treat her like a human being and not a paper doll. Tell you another little secret, she likes it even more when you swear at her," Dorothy confined in a mock whisper. She smiled at Hilde's peel of laughter. In her own perverse way, she was a nice person. Well, nicer than most people thought she was.
She gave me an amused look as she watched me start at the cold coffee. "The coffee is warm. I just made it, and you only have two more paragraphs left on that treaty. I'll proof it for you."
I wondered if it would undermine everything I had just been telling Hilde if I jumped the counter and kissed Dorothy. And people wonder why I'm so fond of her. "Thank you."
"Just keeping my hand in. I don't want to go back to doing that full time, thanks much. I think I'd rather exchange nasty comments with Hilde. She seems better at it than you." Dorothy gave me a long considering look from under her lashes. "Besides, I hear that you and Wufei have been having rather... stimulating... fights."
I was going to kill her. Pacifism be damned.
I was up and over the slender dividing counter before Hilde had the chance to give a sleep squeak. Dorothy laughed and shot around the corner and down the hallway towards her room before I had time to land. I swore for a little bit before taking it philosophically and going back to the coffee.
"Well, living here is going to be exciting isn't it?" Hilde commented from the floor where she had landed in her slightly frantic attempt to get out of my way. Her eyes were a little too round. I think Dorothy and I had been upsetting some of the preconceptions she had about us. I'd been doing that more often lately, destroying people's preconceptions about me, that is. I kinda liked it.
"It's the sleep deprivation talking in all three of us. Dorothy just got in three days ago. Right after divorcing Quatre. She's not talking about it, but I think it's getting to her." I helped Hilde up and steadied her when she swayed.
"So we're three women currently pissed off with men." Hilde eyed the coffee with a speculative gleam in her eye. I poured her a cup.
"Just you and Dorothy. I'm handling myself just fine."
"Are you?" Hilde gave me another of those long assessing looks. "No one gets over Heero Yuy that quick. And from what Dorothy just said I'd say there's something going on between you and Chang. So you're having issues with two gundam pilots. That's enough to seriously mess with any woman."
My cheeks went pink. Damn Dorothy, she just had to see innuendo everywhere and of course it was in her perverse nature to share. "There is nothing inappropriate between me and Mr.Chang."
"Uh-huh." Hilde was definitely amused. "We've got a jilt, a divorcee, and one in denial."
I snorted at her; Wufei was having the most disturbing affects on me. "If you are quite finished, I'll see you to your room." I gave her a softer look as she rubbed at her eyes with the back of her fist like a five-year-old. "You need to sleep before you can say anything sensible anyway."
End of Part 2
(:./dan/distraction2)
