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A Stagnation of Love (rewrite)	By : shinigamiinochi Category: Gundam Wing/AC > AU - Alternate Universe Views: 2207 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Gundam Wing AC or the characters from it. I am making no money from this story

Chapter List
- 5
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- 7
A Stagnation of Love

Chapter 3

Part 1
　

April 3, 2004
　

I almost threw this out. I don't know why I didn't. I had no intention of writing in it anymore or even glancing at what I had written. I just wanted to forget everything, not relive it. But not even a week past since I shoved this journal in my secret place under the floor and I haven't looked at it since, before Mrs. Khushrenada demanded I write about what happened. I swear the woman is psychic, she knew I had stopped writing even though she had never seen my journal.

I punched Zechs today. I was walking out of my english class and he was there with the boys he was friendly with, or as close as a guy like him can get. He was talking about Quatre, saying these terrible and lewd things about him. Quatre isn't even around anymore and he still goes after him. It was a sucker punch, he didn't even see me before my fist connected with his face, but the way I see it, fair fighting doesn't amount to shit when your opponent is over a foot taller than you and never fights fair himself. I felt this intense satisfaction to see that smug face twist in pain. He even bit his tongue hard enough to bleed, which was a cherry on top of the whole thing. I would have hit him again while he had been stunned if a nearby teacher hadn't seen and pulled me away from him. It was also the only thing that saved me from a truly epic beating from Zechs and his friends.

The two of us got sent to the principal's office. Our parents were called. Zechs's mother and father showed up in record time and mine didn't show up at all. I didn't expect them to. It was in the middle of the day, they were both at work and weren't going to cut out early for my sake. The principal called Mrs. Khushrenada in from her classes. She had bounced around from class to class since I had met her in the fourth grade and she had somehow ended up as my homeroom teacher again this year. I guess the principal thought it was unfair having Zechs's folks there and not have an adult to speak for me or some shit.

To be fair, Mrs. Khushrenada did a bang up job of it, better than my own parents would have. I should have been at least suspended for striking a fellow student on school property. Mrs. and Mr. Dorlian were furious over the whole thing and there was some brief talk about expulsion, something that had been brought up by the principal to appease the Dorlians, but Mrs. Khushrenada was having none of it. She pulled out all the water works on my behalf, but as soon as she mentioned I had been friends with Quatre, Zechs's parents had shared a sympathetic look and had dropped any mention of expulsion. I was angry that Mrs. Khushrenada had brought Quatre up, like the absence of my best friend in my life was some kind of get out of jail free card, but there was nothing I could do about it.

The Dorlians even asked the principal not to suspend me when Mrs. Khushrenada vowed to get me into counseling, especially when she told them I had been having a hard time dealing with what had happened. Zechs had been suitably pissed that I had essentially gotten away with sneak attacking him, but I felt a small sense of justice. In the face of everything, it was pretty pointless, but how many times had he gotten away with going after Quatre or myself? It was time he knew what that felt like, even if it didn't end up changing anything.

I was honestly surprised his parents had been that understanding, even without knowing exactly why I had punched their son, but they seemed like the sort whom sympathy and empathy came very naturally. Too bad they hadn't passed that trait to their kids. I could have told them what Relena and Zechs had done to Quatre, but what would be the point? It wasn't enough to make Quatre come back.

The principal had given me a choice: go to detention for a month and be suspended for two days or go to counseling. I didn't have to be a genius to know the kind of deal I was being offered and how lucky I was. I don't want to see the school guidance councilor, but my father would have been furious if I got suspended and detention. Mrs. Khushrenada had tacked on an additional clause to the deal. I had to start writing in my journal again and I had to talk about what had happened a month ago.

So here I am again. She thinks this will help me and I still think it's a load of shit, but it beats detention and it'll keep her off my back. She still promised me no one will read it, so I guess I could just lie, but I just know she'll see through that. She's just as perceptive as Quatre was.

Where do I start? Just what the hell am I supposed to write? Every time I think about it, my mind goes blank. How can I possibly put how I've felt this last month into words? It seems impossible. And every time I try to write about it, I feel like I'm betraying him all over again. Starting from the day it happened wouldn't be fair because it really didn't start then. Technically, it started the first day Relena and Zechs picked on Quatre, but specifically, it started on my thirteenth birthday and it started because of me. Me and a boy named Trowa Barton.

I woke up late for school. Most of the time, my biological clock is perfect, I don't typically need an alarm clock because I almost always seem to wake up exactly when I need to. That day had not been one of those times. I had stayed up late studying for a basic chemistry test and I was fighting off the tail end of a cold I had had earlier than week. I had been so tired and heavy headed that even my parents' fighting hadn't roused me. I was just late enough waking up that I had to skip breakfast. A terrific start to another shitty day. Usually Quatre and I met in front of the town hall, but chem was both of our first periods and knowing Quatre, he had gotten early start to study a bit more before class. He always was smarter than me.

Sure enough, I found my best friend at his locker. I had run fast enough to have made it to school before the period one bell had rung at least. My friend was starting intently at his locker, his blue-green eyes cloudy with anxiety, hurt, and repulsion and he was clutching his books tightly to his chest.

"Hi, Quatre," I greeted and was rewarded with his usual bright smile, but there were still shadows of emotions I didn't like on his face, "what's wrong?" I asked before he could greet me and try to distract me from whatever was obviously bothering him.

"What? It's nothing," he said, but his eyes very briefly glanced at his locker.

I raised an eyebrow at him. We had been friends for nearly four years and saw each other almost every single day, I knew the difference between one of his insignificant anxieties and when it was something bigger. And Quatre was well aware of how stubborn I could be. He sighed and opened his locker. Looking inside, at first I thought it was mud that had been smeared and caked all over the walls and on the inside of the door. Relena and Zechs had done that before to both of us. Last summer Zechs had used honey and peanut butter. I had opened my locker to a sea of ants. I still get grossed out thinking about it. I hadn't used my locker since until this spring. Mud was a juvenile trick for them, especially Zechs, but then I got a whiff of Quatre's locker and took several staggering steps back.

"Ugh! That's foul!" I exclaimed and held my nose in van to ward off the pungent stench of dog shit, or at least that's what I really, really, really hoped it was.

Quatre closed his locker again in a hurry, and I was very grateful.

"That's extreme, even for them," I muttered.

Those might have been my words, but I honestly wasn't that surprised. Lately, Relena and Zechs's stupid pranks and bullying had gotten worse, more hateful.

"I'm sorry," I murmured, guilt filling me with every moment I smelled that horrible aroma, "I'm so sorry, Quatre."

"This isn't your fault," he insisted.

"Yes it is."

I knew full well that this wasn't an attack against Quatre. It had been against me.

Ever since the day Relena had kissed me and I had not only rejected her, I had shown her that I was repulsed by her, her and her brother's bullying had escalated. The tactics they had used at first that I had been so stressed over; putting a tack in my shoe, beating me up, now seemed almost playful and harmless. At first they had nearly stopped going after Quatre and had only focused on me. Then, they had started on him again, worse than before, and they had made it abundantly clear to me they weren't doing it because of their past history with him. They were doing it because he was my friend, because I had fought back against them.

I hadn't done anything like that since. Whenever I felt the urge, the memory of almost being drowned by Zechs flashed in my head. I might have tried again despite that if it had just been me. But how could I, when every action I made affected my friend? If it weren't for me, they wouldn't have done this to his locker. I just imagined them, and I just knew it had been Zechs who had done this one and not his sister, taking the time to set all this up, how methodical it was. The amount of effort was disturbing, the intent behind it.

"I need to wash it off," he said, his voice tight with worry and disgust, "It's already starting to dry..."

"Just get the janitor to do it," I said.

Quatre shook his head frantically.

"I don't want to bother him with it," he insisted, "It's gross and he shouldn't have to deal with something that isn't his fault."

"Don't be ridiculous," I snapped, "It's not your fault, either. You don't have the right tools, you don't even have gloves, and class is about to start. You going to miss the test because you don't want to bother to ask someone to do their job?"

He sighed and shot me an annoyed look but I could tell that he knew I was right.

"C'mon, we'll be late," he said as he shoved his books into his book bag, like it had been his idea all along.

I could tell that he was still upset about the whole thing and I didn't blame him. I affectionately bumped my shoulder with his, a weak substitute to hugging him in the crowded hallway.

"Just four more months, Quatre," I reminded him, "and then Zechs will go on to high school and we'll have a year away from him."

Quatre snorted at that even as I saw a glimmer of relief in his eyes.

"If we even survive four more months and he doesn't repeat another grade," he muttered unhappily, "and even then, it's just a year. Then we'll graduate and be in high school with him. Also we'll still have Relena."

I shrugged.

"A year is a long time," I said, "As far as I'm concerned, just a single day away from that asshole is worth it. Relena might be a bitch, but he's worse than she could ever hope to be."

We headed for our class together and right before we walked into the room, he stopped, making me stop with him.

"Happy birthday, Duo," he positively beamed at me, "Sorry, I got so distracted with my locker I almost forgot to say that."

I blinked at him like a confused owl.

"What? It's not my-" I paused.

It was my birthday. February 23rd. I was thirteen years old, finally a teenager. I had completely forgotten. I had known the date, but I had forgotten the significance. Who did that? Just forgot their own birthday? Apparently me. Quatre saw my expression and immediately lost his smile.

"Your parents forgot again, didn't they?" he asked softly.

That was my best friend, more concerned with my parents forgetting my birthday than me doing the same. It wasn't exactly shocking. They had forgotten my birthday last year, and the year before that. Or maybe they hadn't. Maybe they hadn't cared. They had forgotten my birthday before those times, but they had typically remembered a few days later. I had never really had a birthday party, at least not what regular kids would call one. My dad would buy me a cake and a present. Sometimes he would take me out to the movies or we'd all go out to a restaurant if we had the money. But lately, they had just done nothing. I wanted to be upset about it, but it was just one more thing in a long line of disappointments in my life.

"It's fine," I said, "I mean, I forgot about it, too, and it's not really important."

"Of course it's important," he scolded, "It's your birthday and they're your parents, they should remember," his expression softened a little, "You're working after school today, right?"

I nodded. I had work at the pizza joint all night.

"Mind if I hang out for a bit there?" he asked almost shyly.

"Sure, I'd like the company," I smiled.

My boss might be annoyed to have Quatre hanging around again, but he never said that he couldn't and I always enjoyed the company. Not much had changed for me in a year. I still had both of my jobs, but some of my responsibilities had chanted. I still had to make pizza boxes, which I didn't mind, and I still couldn't cook anything or wait on customers because I was still under aged, but my boss let me sweep the floor and keep all the food stations stocked. I even got to unload the delivery truck sometimes, so my days weren't as monotonous. Almost all of my paychecks were still going to my dad. I had grown a little over the summer but Quatre hadn't at all. He was pretty annoyed by it. My hair had gotten longer, too. Despite Zechs constantly pulling on it, I hadn't cut it and my hair reaches just below my shoulders now. Quatre knew how to braid from his sisters and showed me how to do it. It makes me look girlier, I guess, but it keeps it out of my face.

Zechs was always calling me a girl, but it never really bothered me enough to cut my hair off or stop braiding it. I told myself that it really didn't matter, Zechs was going to call me that whether I cut my hair or not and I had gotten used to having long hair. That was his recent thing, insinuating or outright saying that I was effeminate, a pansy, or a transsexual. I didn't play sports, wasn't strong, had long hair, and I had good grades in all of my writing and home economics courses. He often teased that I was more feminine than most queers and he felt offended I was wearing boys' clothes instead of a skirt.

Zechs still frequently called me Faggot. I think it's his favorite word or something. Also more crude things like fudge packer and pillow biter. After a year, that word should have stopped bothering me so much, especially since Relena and Zechs called Quatre that, too, but it hadn't. Every time I heard them call me a fag, it pierced my heart.

A year since that shit had started and I still couldn't figure it out. This year I found myself thinking about it more and more. My sexuality had nearly become an obsession for me. I found myself asking myself the same questions over and over. Am I straight? Am I normal, like everyone else and one day all of this shit would just go away, it would all just click into place for me? I still didn't like girls. I didn't even look at them like the other boys did, I just didn't care. I thought about sex because everyone was questioning my sexuality, but I never really thought about it. I just couldn't see myself falling in love with a girl and having a kid like my parents, like it was normal to.

Was I gay? I had just as much confusion on that topic as I did towards my possible heterosexuality. I wasn't even normal in that area. I didn't feel attracted to boys. I didn't have any urges to hold their hands or kiss them. All those stereotypes Zechs flung at me, I didn't fit into, either. Sure, I wasn't as masculine as he was, but I wasn't effeminate. I hated shopping, hated romance flicks and all that crap. If there was a gay culture, I felt no affinity towards it and that was worse somehow. Because if I knew I was gay, if I fit into those stereotypes, it would suck, but at least I would know my place.

Where did I fit? What was I supposed to do? I felt like I was stuck in this endless limbo. I had tried to do a search on homosexuality at the school library since we didn't have a computer at home, but the search was blocked. Was being gay so horrible that not even the school wanted us exposed to it? Last year in my World History class, I had to write a report on the Holocaust. I had to go on all these websites detailing the worst, darkest things humans had done to each other, there had even been these disgusting, graphic pictures. The school computers had let me look at that, but not even the most basic information on homosexuality.

I knew that a lot of people didn't like gays, they thought they were immoral, unnatural, and weird, and some religions were totally against them, but what was so awful about them? Seeing that 'website blocked due to inappropriate content' screen on the school computer, and not being able to find any books on the subject, terrified me. I was already an outcast, was there another thing, a much worse thing, wrong with me?

I couldn't even talk to anyone about my questions. I couldn't ask for help. Anyone I asked would automatically assume I was asking because I was gay, or they would doubt and even at thirteen years old, I understood that that doubt would be a permanent thing. My mother would just tell me to stop bothering her, probably the most impartial party. My father would beat me. I had heard him rant about queers before and the things he had said had been harsh enough to keep me quiet. My teachers would tell me to go to the school counselor and the counselor would tell me to go a therapist or worse, want to talk to my parents about it.

I guess I could ask Mrs. Khushrenada. I had no idea where she stood on the subject, but she had always been kind and patient with me. But I don't think she would understand. She was married and tended to be a bit naive and optimistic.

And Quatre... I couldn't even begin to consider talking to my best friend about this stuff. He wouldn't call me names or outwardly judge me. He would be supportive and understanding and that was exactly why I couldn't tell him. Even if it bothered him, disgusted him, he would keep it inside where I couldn't see and eventually, without even realizing it, I would lose my best friend. Quatre was all I had in the world. If I lost him, I would lose everything, even my life, as pathetic as it was.

What would it mean for my future, being gay? I had no clue. Was being gay something you could just stop? I didn't think so. If it were, why would anyone be gay? Why would anyone decide to deal with people hating you and thinking terrible things about you? I couldn't imagine myself marrying a girl, but at that point in my life, I had been just as incapable of seeing myself with another boy. Could I hide it? Did I even need to acknowledge it? Or would it destroy what little future I had? I was already poor and I would be for the rest of my life, so could being gay really make things worse? Would I even be denied what little work I might be able to find after I graduated high school because of it?

I didn't know what might be worse, being a homosexual and having urges towards other boys and being seen as a pervert, or not having any urges at all. My inability to figure out if I was gay or straight haunted me because I couldn't make that choice because I didn't feel desire towards anyone. Would it always be like that? Would my sexuality be like everything else in my life and I was just... stuck in place? I didn't know if I wanted any of it; romance, kissing, sex, desire, love, dating... but I did know that I didn't want to be anymore of a freak than I already was.

Again, I could have talked to Quatre about it. We were the same age and he had never told me he liked any of the girls in our class. Maybe we were just late bloomers, or maybe he was just being private and there was a girl he secretly liked. I could have talked to him about it because him accusing me of being gay seemed worse than him thinking I was asexual, but I never did. Being gay was terrifying, being asexual was embarrassing. Looking back, I wish I had talked to him about all of it. Maybe if I had, he would have opened up to me about his own issues and I would have had the time to think of a way to help him or spotted the problem.

I found myself looking at boys more and more. I wasn't even aware that I was doing it. I would just suddenly realize that I was staring when I shouldn't have been. It wasn't like it was when I found myself staring at girls. With girls, I was just curious, staring at them and wondering just what it was about them I was supposed to attracted to, what I was supposed to be looking for. With the boys, it was like I was subconsciously doing it and it made me fearful. Was I looking because I liked them or was I looking because I had become so obsessed with trying to figure out if there was something there that I liked that girls didn't have?

I could see some boys as handsome, but hadn't I thought before that Relena was pretty? I didn't know, but I was making myself sick over thinking it all the time. Was I just repulsed by Relena? What did other girls have that she didn't? And why was I incapable of seeing that? I had to put a stop to the terrible swirl of thoughts that were battering around in my skull as our history teacher handed out our tests. I was quickly giving myself a headache and school had only just started.

For once I was actually happy to be taking a test, even if it was Asian History. It was keeping my mind off of things I just didn't want to think about anymore. At least Asian History was more interesting than American History. There were all kinds of bloody battles and power struggles. Last year had been European history which had been much more interesting, but taking US History in the fifth grade had practically bored me to tears. And I had sucked at it.

We hadn't even gotten to learn about the civil war or the war of independence, that was for the eighth graders. It had all been politics and treaties and remembering which president ratified what and who had belonged to which party. I had had the hardest time remembering dates and statistics for that stuff. I didn't even really get why I needed to learn that crap. We just moved on to another subject the following year and I forgot everything I had learned anyway.

But for once, I hadn't approached this test with the same frustration that I usually did, probably because Quatre had spent that entire week helping me study. If it weren't for my best friend, I'd probably be in the same boat as Zechs. Quatre didn't think so. He always insisted that I was smarter than I thought I was and I would get along just fine without his help. All the same, I was glad that I had it.

I felt a deep sense of relief as I handed my test into the teacher. I didn't dare let myself succumb to hope, but with Quatre's help, I thought that I might just be able to pull my history grades up this semester. Now I just needed to do something about Math. Quatre couldn't do much to help me there since we were in different classes. He was still leagues above me in advanced placement and I was too embarrassed by my shitty test scores and how difficult it was for me to ask him.

All the same, I was eager when the bell finally rang. We had home economics next and we were learning how to make blueberry crisp from scratch. I liked cooking in that class because we got to eat whatever we made at the end of the period and at that point, I was starving.

Apparently, up until a few years ago, you had to learn how to do things like sew and stitch, but the school board eventually decided that that was all too old fashioned and had merged home ec with computer basics. Even though we had to use computers in our other classes, we had to learn how to speed type when our cooking lessons were done for the semester. I was going to miss it, mostly the free food.

I shoved my books into my book bag and followed Quatre out the door, my stomach already growling at the prospect of breakfast. Quatre turned to look at me as we walked out in the hallway.

"You'll help me, right?" he asked me sheepishly, his quick mind already on to our next class.

Quatre was better than me at pretty much everything except for cooking. He was fairly hopeless if he had to make anything other than sandwiches. His parents forgot to pack his lunches all the time, but no one had bothered to really teach him how to cook or bake. In the last few years, as things at home got worse, especially my mother's alcoholism, I'm typically the one making the dinners. My father isn't a picky eater, but I learned how to make the things he liked quickly. It's a cliche, the abusive man of the house beating on whoever was supposed to make his meals for not having them done on time, but my dad doesn't really care if dinner is ready when he gets home as long as it's something he likes. I've found over the years that making things for him, even things I don't like to eat, helps his mood towards me.

Quatre's plea made me smile, not because I felt any kind of superiority, but it made me feel good to have even one small thing I could help him with.

Suddenly, before I could warn him, Quatre walked right into someone that had been trying to get into the classroom we had just left. Quatre, obviously thinking that the person he had bumped into was Zechs, or that had just been conditioned into him by now, flinched. I recognized the person instantly.

Trowa Barton is in the same grade that Zechs is, but their paths seldom cross. They definitely aren't friends, at least. I may not have known if I was gay or not, but I could agree that Trowa was handsome with his cinnamon brown hair and green eyes that are even darker than mine are. He's pretty much the top dog in our school basket ball team, the sort of boy all the girls fawn over and idolize, but Trowa seemed to care more about basket ball and club activities than he did about girls.

Trowa is close with a lot of his teammates but while he seemed nice, he's also really quiet. If he isn't with his team mates, he seems to prefer solitude and always seems kind of panicked and shy when a girl approaches him. If it weren't for his good looks, athleticism, and the fact that he's one of the tallest kids in his grade, he'd probably be the sort of kid that never gets noticed. Because of him, we win games, and that had given him the same status of popularity that Relena and Zechs had, even if the Bartons are just a typical, middle class family, but I had never had any problems with Trowa. On the rare occasions that he did speak to me, which was about as rare as him speaking to anyone else, he hadn't exactly been overly friendly, but he hadn't been a jerk to me, either.

I watched in awe as my normally composed friend turned the brilliant color of a ripe tomato and gained all of the grace of a newborn deer.

"T-Trowa," Quatre stammered as though simple speech had suddenly deserted him, "I am so, so sorry!"

They were the same exact words he would only have spoken if he had bumped into Zechs, but he spoke them only with embarrassment and shyness, not fear with Trowa. It would have been outright bizarre if I hadn't witness this spectacle before. Sure enough, I looked at Trowa as he turned the exact shade of red that Quatre had, though it was less noticeable on Trowa's tanner skin. He rubbed nervously at the back of his head and seemed to lose all ability to speak coherently.

"It... it's ok," Trowa murmured shyly.

Feeling like a spectator, I watched as the two of them stumbled into a friendly, if awkward conversation.

"I saw your game Friday night," Quatre somehow managed to say without stuttering too badly, "that three pointer you made was really incredible. You've improved so much from last season and you were already so good."

I hadn't thought it possible, but the both of them flushed even darker at Quatre's praise.

"T-thank you," Trowa's speech became even more bumbling, "I've been training harder since you started coming to my games," I thought Quatre would literally combust at that statement, turning a red that was almost purple and a very strange and alien look coming into his eyes.

Even I blinked owlishly at the tall boy, his words bewildering me. Did Trowa mean that he had been training harder in that span of time, or did he mean he had started to train harder because of Quatre's presence? It had to be the former because I couldn't see why Quatre, the petit under classman that he happened to stop and talk to between classes every once in awhile, would spur him to improve his game anymore than his coach or his teammates would.

Really, watching the two of them interacting with each other was bewildering every time I saw it. Trowa was the only one besides me that Quatre talked to on a regular basis. They never seemed to talk about anything vastly important and they always acted so awkward at first, like they had to warm up to just talking to each other comfortably, like an old engine that hadn't been used in some time.

Quatre never acted scared of Trowa, despite the difference in their sizes, just unsure of himself. It was painful to watch, but once they got warmed up, they seemed to enjoy each other's small talk. At first I had thought that Trowa's shyness towards my friend was because he didn't want Zechs to see them talking and start bullying him, too, but Trowa didn't seem like that sort of person, and he was bigger than Zechs anyway. But he didn't do anything to intervene in the bullying, either.

The whole thing confused me. Quatre had never had any problems talking to me, and his behavior when around Trowa was just strange. No matter how many times I watched them, I couldn't figure it out. My friend just did not act like this, and I had never seen Trowa act like that around anyone either. I hadn't even known that Quatre had been going to Trowa's games. It wasn't something to be angry at him over, keeping that from me, I had just never seen my friend as the type that cared about sports and school spirit. He had never invited me to come along with him, but he knew that I didn't care about that stuff, so I couldn't be mad at him about that, either.

But when I watched the two of them together, bantering the way they were now, seeming so interested in what the other was saying even though none of it sounded very important to me, I felt jealous. I wasn't even sure why I felt that way exactly. I was Quatre's best friend, and it wasn't as though Quatre was replacing me or something. But when I saw them together, I knew there was something more there than two acquaintances chatting about the weather, I just couldn't understand what that something was.

It was different than what Quatre and I had, and it obviously affected him differently and made me feel more conscious of myself and my inadequacies.

I couldn't even begin to understand what was going on between the two of them, what Quatre liked about Trowa enough to talk to him, let alone my own screwed up feelings about it. Quatre liked someone other than me, I should have been happy and apart of me was.

"Oh, Trowa," a falsely sweet and familiar voice came from behind the tall boy, "You're always so charitable, giving trash the time of day, "Relena smiled girlishly at the older boy even as her cold, blue eyes regarded Quatre hatefully. She didn't so much as glance at me, recognizing that I was the outsider there, "but you really should be more cautious. If you aren't careful some of the fag might rub off on you. People already talk about the reason why the two of you are so friendly with each other," she sneered and even her tone sounded sinister and hateful to me.

Trowa went white as a sheet and quickly pushed past her into the classroom. Quatre looked absolutely horrified as he watched the other boy's reaction. He looked as hurt as if Relena had plunged a knife into his gut, his blue-green eyes filling up with tears. I had never seen such a look of... heartbreak and shame on his face before and I almost punched Relena in the face. I didn't know exactly why what she had said had hurt him so much. It really wasn't anything different than she said to him all the time, but that it had been directed at Trowa seemed to have made all the difference in the world.

Relena flicked her long hair over her shoulder and continued on her way down the hallway, looking incredibly proud of herself. I glanced back at Quatre and saw that he was watching her, too. For the very first time in our friendship, there was pure, raw hatred on his face.
*****
I tried to get Quatre to talk to me about it, but nothing would draw him out of his shell. For the rest of the school day, he was quiet, frighteningly so. I couldn't even get him to smile, something that had always come so naturally to him. It scared me, that I couldn't reach him or figure out what was hurting him so badly. Quatre always seemed to know what just to say to me to make me feel at least a little bit better. But as usual, I was bumbling and inadequate. I felt like a shitty friend. Even Relena's further attempts to mess with him seemed to not reach whatever place his mind was, must to her annoyance. I regretted not hitting her.

I went to work feeling incredibly depressed by the whole thing. I tried to push it out of my mind and concentrate on my work, as mindless as it was, but I kept seeing Quatre's horrified expression in my head and that hate he had directed at Relena's departing back. And I kept thinking of how disgusted I was in myself for being unable to make anything better. I was so useless...

"Duo," I stopped scrubbing at the current dish I was working on when one of our servers, Carol, called for me.

"What is it?" I asked her, barely even turning around to regard her. Carol has been working at this shitty restaurant since it had opened thirty years ago and in all of the time I had been working there, she had said maybe two words to me, the sort of woman that always had a gripe and nothing anyone did was ever good enough for her.

"Someone here for you," she grumbled and strode back out onto the floor.

Who the hell would be here for me, I thought, washing my hands to get the smell of dirty dish washer and pizza sauce off my skin.

I walked out onto the floor and was met by Quatre, wearing the same soft smile he always had when we were together.

"Hi, Duo," he practically beamed.

I blinked like an idiot at him. I hadn't forgotten our plans, but I honestly hadn't thought I would be seeing him tonight after what had happened. And he was smiling again, as if none of it had happened. I could almost pretend that it hadn't. Well, if Quatre wanted to pretend that everything was ok, I wasn't going to push him to be depressed and quiet again.

"Hi," I greeted, still surprised.

"It's almost time for your dinner break, right?" he asked.

I looked over at my boss who was going over some paperwork by the registers. He gave me a gruff nod.

"Take yer time," he said in that rough way of his that was constant no matter what he was feeling, his voice raw from years of heavy smoking, "It's dead in here anyway."

"Thanks, Sal," I said.

Sal could be an asshole sometimes, and he had some kind of problem with Quatre always showing up here for some reason, but he was a pretty nice guy otherwise. At least, he had never given me any grief. I think when my dad had forced me on him, my boss had thought I was just going to slack off, but when he saw I got my tasks done without a complaint, he had started to respect me a bit.

I followed Quatre to a booth way in the back of the restaurant where no one would be able to see us. I stopped when I saw the soft glow of candle light coming from the table. On it was a wrapped box and a cake with thirteen lit candles in it. It wasn't fancy, just a white frosted cake with green and blue edges, 'Happy 13th Birthday, Duo!' written with similar green and blue frosting.

"I know it isn't much," Quatre said sheepishly, "but it took awhile to get your present, I wanted to make sure you would like it. And I made the cake myself! Well, Jane told me what to do and how to make it," he babbled nervously, "I tried to make a marble cake, I know how much you like those, but it was just too hard, so I made it a two layer cake instead, white cake and chocolate cake. The frosting is butter cream, like you like."

He finally stopped rambling and peered at me through pale blonde bangs, trying to gauge my reaction. I felt like I was going to cry. Quatre had given me presents on my birthday before, but this was beyond... not even my parents had ever taken the time to bake me a cake before, or care if it was something I liked. I hugged Quatre tightly, startling him a little.

"Thank you so much, Quatre," my voice cracked a little, but I managed not to cry, "No one's done anything this nice before."

I felt intensely happy as he hugged me back.

"Happy birthday, Duo," I heard him say into my shoulder and I did feel a tear or two escape then.

He didn't say anything about my tears as he let me go and I was grateful. I wiped at them hastily, feeling stupid for crying over something like this. We sat down in the booth together and I blew out the candles on my cake. One of the servers came by our table with food that Quatre had obviously ordered ahead of time, lasagna for him, spaghetti and meatballs for me, plus fries, breadsticks, and salads for the both of us. Normally I would be annoyed at him spending so much money on me, but I ate it all happily, deciding to just let it go for today.

I was full by the time we got to the cake, but when I took my first bite, I found that I had plenty of appetite to spare. We must have sat there for hours, eating the cake Quatre had made and talking about nothing, but a pleasant nothing, yet Sal didn't come over once to tell me to go back to work. Suddenly, we were down to one slice of cake left and it was almost the end of my shift. I felt guilty about it, but only because Sal was being nice for once and I didn't want to take advantage of him like that. Still, this had probably been the nicest birthday I'd had.

"Open your present," my best friend urged excitedly.

I had to smile at his eagerness and did as I was ordered. I pulled out a black hoodie jacket with silver highlights and patters here and there on the sleeves, hem, and drawstrings. The inside of it was made of some incredibly soft material. It was thicker than the jacket I was wearing then because I hadn't had a new jacket in years and it was getting small on me.

"I got it a bit big," Quatre told me, "You've been growing lately and I wanted to get you something you could grow into. Do you like it?"

I hugged it to my chest. It was so soft and not some cheap knock off like my parents usually got me. I was scared to ask him how much it cost but decided that for once I wasn't going to make it an issue. I didn't care about fashion, though even to me the jacket looked nice, it would keep me warm and dry.

"I love it," I said honestly.

"The black and silver really bring out your eyes," he said with a soft, musing smile.

I felt my face go warm and felt shy all of a sudden. I had no clue why, but it made me feel pleased and embarrassed all at once, that praise. I didn't care about stuff like that, so why did it make me happy?

I ran to get my stuff and clock out as Quatre took care of the bill. Sal didn't yell at me about pretty much skipping all of the rest of my shift, so I guess it was ok with him, maybe because it was my birthday. I felt a pain in my chest realizing that my boss had known it was my birthday, but my parents hadn't. I shoved that thought away. I should be used to stuff like this by now. They didn't do it maliciously, they had just... forgotten. But that made it hurt even more. If they had ignored my birthday on purpose, at least I would matter enough to them that they would remember the date. I wasn't even an afterthought in their minds.

I put on my new jacket and met Quatre outside. We walked to his house like we always did and hugged before we parted. He said happy birthday to me again and I thanked him for all he had done again. I felt a rare happiness fill me up and resolved to not let it leave me until I went to sleep that night, no matter what happened between then and now. I decided to forget all about the shit in Quatre's locker and what Relena had said to him.

When I got home, my mother was in her bedroom already asleep and my father was sitting at the kitchen table, reading the newspaper.

"Hi, Dad," I said.

I waited for him to acknowledge what day it was, to do something to prove to me that it mattered at all to him. It was Quatre's fault for getting my hopes up when they had already been so little, but I was still happy that at least someone in my life gave a shit.

"Hi," he grunted, not so much as taking his eyes off what he was reading, "You need to take the garbage out tonight and your mother is making stew tomorrow, she left you a list of things to get at the supermarket after school."

"Ok," I said obediently.

Today must have been a good day, he hadn't even raised his voice at me. While he was distracted with his paper, I snuck the last piece of birthday cake into the freezer behind some bags of frozen vegetables. My parents wouldn't see it in there, so they wouldn't be able to steal it. I might have it for a snack tomorrow or maybe I would save it for a shitty day. My more important task done, I grabbed the garbage bags by the basement door and struggled to get them out on the curb. My father didn't say anything to me about my new jacket, but I was sure he hadn't noticed.
*****
Three days later, I had already forgotten all about my parents forgetting my birthday, but not about Quatre and Trowa. Neither of them had spoken to each other since Relena had teased them for speaking to each other, but the avoidance was all one sided. Trowa had become a ninja, they didn't even seem to pass each other in the hall anymore. Quatre seemed so depressed, but I wasn't sure if it was over that or something else. Trowa quickly became one of those things we didn't talk about. If it was, it solidified my suspicions that the two of them were more than just acquaintances. I wanted to yell at Quatre that if he wanted to be friends with the upper classman, he should just ask him to hang out or something and fuck what Relena and Zechs did about it, but even if Quatre took my advice, he couldn't force Trowa to be friends with him if the tall boy was going to be chicken shit about his reputation. At least I didn't have to worry about those things with Quatre.

It was at the end of the school day. I didn't have work afterwards, and after discovering I had gotten a B on my history test, the best grade I had gotten in that class all year, I was in a good mood for once. Or at least I had been up until I opened my locker, and then promptly slammed it shut again. I stared at the outside of my locker door like if I glared at it long enough, what I had just seen would magically disappear that next time I opened it. I wished it had been shit.

"What's wrong?" Quatre asked me in concern when he saw my expression.

I felt too disgusted to tell him. Suddenly a hand slammed on the locker between the two of us, making violent, metallic sound that had both Quatre and I jumping. I looked up at Zechs's smirking face and wasn't at all surprised.

"What's the matter, Maxwell?" he jeered at me, "Don't you like the new decorations to your locker? I was up all night making them especially for you," he mock pouted when he saw that I closed my locker door, "What's the matter?" he flung the door open.

Again I caught a glimpse of what that asshole had taped to the inside of my locker and looked away. Zechs had made a collage out of some skin mag. Cut out pictures of naked women were spread out of the inside of the locker door and the walls, graphic shots of naked breasts and vaginas, something that I had never seen before. I gasped out in pain as the older boy grabbed my hair and held my head in place.

"You can't tell me this doesn't turn you on," he sneered, "C'mon, open your eyes, faggot!"

I did as he ordered me to, his lessons from a year ago permanently etched into my brain.

"Take a good, long look. You can't tell me that this actually repulses you. Look at all these gorgeous women," he tightened his grip even more and I tried to let the images he was forcing me to look at become a white haze, just looking threw them, "What sort of freak wouldn't be turned on by that?"

I heard harsh laughter from behind us.

"I don't know, Zechs, he doesn't look like he's enjoying it very much," one of his friends teased, "maybe you should make sure he's really enjoying himself and he isn't a fag after all."

"Good idea," Zechs laughed.

I felt his grip on my hair shift and his other hand grip at my shirt. Pure horror filled me as I realized he really was going to check to see if I had a hard on. I had the same feeling of surrealness that I had had when he had pulled my pants down to check my underwear in gym class, like this couldn't possibly be happening.

I should have fought against him somehow, but I was just so frozen and sick to my stomach. I don't know what I was thinking then. I kept seeing those pictures he had put in my locker and this question repeated over and over in my head. Was I horrified because he was going to actually do something that repulsive... or was I horrified because I wasn't even slightly aroused or interested in those photos?

"Zechs," Quatre said coldly with a tinge of panic to his tone, but to me it was a voice from the heavens, "I just saw Mrs. Khushrenada coming down the hall."

"Shit," he grumbled and immediately released me. I felt like I was going to cry with joy.

His friends hurried to disperse, but Zechs shot me one last superior look.

"Don't even think about taking those down, got that, midget? I'll know if you do," and with that threat, he followed his friends down the hallway.

I didn't even need to look around the hall for Mrs. Khushrenada. I knew she had literary club duties and was on the other side of the school by now.

"Thank you," I whispered to Quatre and tried to regain control over myself, feeling a powerful mix of the remains of my fear and disgust coiling in my stomach.

He rubbed my back trying to comfort me.

"It's ok," he soothed, "Zechs is all hot air, he probably wouldn't have really done it."

I swallowed roughly and nodded, but I heard the doubt in his voice and I saw the fear in his eyes. He had almost been as scared as I had been. I didn't know what to do, how far I had come from him doing something that probably qualified as sexual harassment, if nothing else. Telling a teacher about it wouldn't do me any more good than telling one about the bullying would and that helplessness had me shaking. I hastily closed my locker door again. The worst thing about this was the sickness I felt. Was this repulsion from those photos or just from what Zechs had almost done?

I felt that insecurity again, that doubt about my sexuality. Zechs was an ass, but he had a point. Most boys, even at my age, would at least feel curious about those pictures, maybe enjoy looking at the breasts if nothing else. I hadn't just felt nothing. I had felt repulsed and disinterested. Had he been right about me all along?

"C-can I have a moment?" I begged Quatre.

To my relief, he didn't ask me why, he just nodded.

"I'll be out in the parking lot," he said and left me at my locker.

I waited for the amount of people in the hallway to diminish before I opened my locker again. I pulled all of the photos off of the locker walls and door and shoved them into my backpack. I suddenly didn't care if Zechs found out I had taken them down, all I could care about in that moment where the fearful questions swirling around in my brain. If I was lucky, I could sneak them back into my locker tomorrow morning and Zechs would never

even know.
*****
"I'm home!"'called as l walked into my house after walking Quatre to his.

No one answered me, but I hadn't expected anyone to. My dad was still had work so only my mother was home. I didn't see her when I walked through the kitchen. I immediately thought of

the photos that were stashed in my book bag. I hoped, for once, that she was passed out in her bedroom. Even if she wasn't, she wasn't going to come looking for me. This was the best time to

do this, if I could muster up the courage at all. I walked up the attic stairs as quietly as I could manage, feeling like an intruder in my own house. I felt more doubt about this, like worms in my

stomach. What if my mother came looking for me for some reason? Or worse, I thought in horror, what if my father came home early? But it was unavoidable. I had to do this, I decided. I debated locking the attic door or pushing my dresser infant of the door, but decided to risk it. I would get in just as much trouble for locking the door any way.

I sat on my mattress and stared at my back pack like it was a demon in disguise. More doubts. Just what, exactly, was I supposed to do? Back at school, it had seemed so clear and obvious to me, here I felt confused and oblivious. It was so stupid. I was a teenager, not a child, but right then, I felt like one. This was something I needed to do, something normal that boys were supposed to do, not some kind of Boogieman waiting to jump out and devour me. Or maybe it was.

I pulled out the nude photos from my backpack with trepidation instead of excitement. I had hoped that my revulsion at school had just been because of my shock and the knowledge that Zechs was fucking with me again, jeering and prodding at my sexuality. I had hoped desperately that once I had gotten home, to the privacy of my bedroom, I would feel something that any normal thirteen year old boy would towards those photos. But as I placed them down on the floor in front of me, I just felt scared and sick to my stomach.

I told myself that I was just over thinking things. Zechs just had me twisted in knots over this, so something that should be coming naturally to me was only making me anxious. But no matter how much I tried to calm myself and rationalize everything, I was still scared. I stared down at the photos intensely. I forced myself to study every last curve, every nipple, every sultry look, every breast, every inch of the naked women laid out in front of me.

They were all beautiful with flawless skin and what I was certain would be considered sexy bodies by any other boy. Boys my age... normal boys... they would be turned on by this, they would be curious, they would want to look. I felt nothing. No, I felt worse than nothing. All of those women were supposed to be attractive to me and I wanted nothing to do with those images of their named bodies. I felt... not disgusted exactly, repulsed, like I wanted to look anywhere else.

I unzipped my jeans and pulled down my boxers to make absolutely sure, but my biggest fear was realized. My penis looked like it always had, limp and lifeless. Equal parts frustration, desperation, and anger consumed me. I stared at the photos even more intensely, trying to sear them into my head. I reached into my pants and wrapped my hand around my member. Some part of me asked me what I was doing, and I didn't have any kind of real answer. I moved my hand up and down myself, feeling incredibly awkward. I had never done anything remotely like that in my life. I knew how thanks to colorful euphemisms and lurid stories from upper classmen, but I had never had urges so I hadn't seen the point.

'Please, please, please!' I pleaded in frustration as I stroked myself.

I didn't want to be gay. I didn't want to be asexual. I just wanted to be straight and normal, just like everyone else for once in my life! But it was useless. It felt kind of good, in a mechanical sort of way, but whatever was supposed to happen in moments like that didn't. I didn't get an erection and that sick feeling in my stomach just grew. I let go of myself, my hand shaking a little. Hot tears spilled down my face. I heard my breath hitch and my chest felt like it was on fire. Why... why did this have to happen?! Why couldn't I like girls? Why did I have to be like this?!

I laid down on my side on my mattress and cried. I wanted to call Quatre and ask him what to do, but in reality it was the very last thing I wanted to do, to let my best friend to know about this. I wasn't straight. I couldn't deny that anymore. I didn't know what I was. Gay, asexual... no matter which it was, it wasn't anything I wanted. I felt lost and confused. But most of all, I felt completely alone.

I cried for hours. I cried until I could barely breathe, until my eyes were raw and red. I cried until I literally had not a single tear left to cry and I felt weak and hollow from all of it. I sat up, not because I wanted to, but because all that crying had made my throat hurt. I wish we had tea. Quatre always came to school with tea in his thermos, but my dad hated the stuff. All we had was beer, water, coffee, and kool aid, but it was better than nothing. I buttoned up my jeans, got to my feet and walked down the stairs with all of the energy of a zombie, my mind a thousand miles away.

I felt like I had just stumbled into this world of grey horror where nothing made sense and everything I had ever thought I had known about myself and the world had turned out to be a

terrible lie. I felt numb and dead. Nothing mattered. But most of all, I felt shame. Was this my fault? How could I change this fate when I didn't have any hope of changing anything else in my

pathetic life?

In the kitchen, I washed my hands and poured myself a glass of Kool aid. I drank it like I was dying of thirst. I felt dirty, and that I had touched myself for the first time was only one reason for it. Even though I had done this adult thing, I just felt like a child. I washed my glass and went to head back upstairs. I couldn't think about this anymore, it was almost literally tearing me up inside. It was making me sick, even worse than those photos had. At that point, I just wanted to do my homework and pretend none of it had ever happened, that nothing had changed. As l neared the bathroom, l heard loud, violent retching sounds coming from inside.

'Mom,' I realized. she had drank too much again.

But the sound was strange, muffled and strained and I realized that she wasn't vomiting into the toilet. I knocked on the door and immediately felt like an idiot. I didn't consider that the

best thing for me to do was to just go back to my room. She wouldn't want my help any way, but listening to her vomiting, I felt worried. Even though she never talked to me or seemed to give a shit about me, she was my mother and I loved her. I didn't understand it any more than I understood how I could still love my father after everything he had done to me, but I did, and it

always worried me when she got like this.

"Mom?" I called softly in case her head was hurting her.

It wasn't just hangovers, my mother got terrible headaches all the time. Dad often accused her of making excuses to not do anything, or called her pathetic whenever she claimed to have

one, but Quatre said it was probably stress migraines and I agreed with him. When I didn't hear her respond, I risked opening the door. My mom was on the bathroom floor, laying on her side and

clutching at her stomach. Her grey eyes were heavily bloodshot and clouded over with pain, sickness, and drunkenness. Her auburn hair was caked with vomit and sweat. There was a sizeable pool of vomit near her head on the floor and her face was red and covered with sweat. I kneeled down at her side and gently grasped her arm.

"Come on, Mom," I said in what I hoped was a soothing tone, "you can't fall asleep here. I'll help you get into bed. We don't have any ginger ale, but I think there's a can of coke in the fridge. It'll help settle your stomach."

I started to help her to her feet when she lashed out and shoved me away from her. I was completely unprepared for it, though I really shouldn't have been, and I slammed my head against the wall behind me. For a brief, disjointed, and frightening second as I looked at my mother's enraged face, she, my father, and Zechs all blurred together into the same person.

"I don't need your fucking help!" she shrieked at me, stumbling to her feet and almost falling down again, the most that she had said to me in long time, "I don't ever want your help!"

She swayed on her feet before finally gripping the sink to steady herself. If her sudden rage hadn't been so frightening, it would have looked comical. Her reddened grey eyes, like hard

stones, found mine, and the naked hatred there almost brought me to tears again. It drove the breath right out of me.

"You're so goddamn useless," she hissed at me like an angry cat, "What did I give up my body for?" she demanded me, like she believed I had some secret answer for her, "What did I give

up my life for?!" she hastily looked away from me and down at the sink as though she couldn't even bare to look at me, not even relishing in the pain each, single one of her words gave me, like

poisoned arrows directly shot through my heart, "If you had never been born, I wouldn't be stuck with that bastard for the rest of my life!"

She pushed her mussed and wild hair out of her face and I saw she was crying hard. Every emotion she was feeling was etched on her tired and worn face and the knowledge that I had put that pain and frustration, anger and tiredness on that familiar face killed me. The hate in her eyes grew like a tidal wave, black and intense as she stared at me and I felt frozen by her emotions.

"I wish I had gotten that abortion your father," she spit out that word like it was a bitter poison, "had wanted me to get. He's right. I'm pathetic and I'm an idiot."

She swayed and stumbled past me, still more drunk than sober. I heard her move to the front door, opening it and slamming it closed so hard that the windows shook. I sat there on the bathroom floor, stunned and paralyzed. Her words rung in my head, screeching sirens.
"What did I give up my life for?!"
I looked down at my hands. The hands of a faggot. The hands of a loser. The hands of the baby that my mother had destroyed her body to bring into this world, the baby that had become this stupid, useless person. I felt incredibly ashamed. I felt like dying. What had my mother fought and suffered for? I didn't know. There was nothing about me that deserved her sacrifices. I wasn't doing anything with my life and I never would. I was stuck with my father because he was my father, and I loved him. My mother was stuck with him because of me, even though she clearly hated him.

All this time I had been feeling sorry for myself because I was being bullied and abused. I had felt sad for my mother because of her alcoholism, shitty job, and the constant fights my parents had, but I had never truly thought about their relationship. She couldn't even bare to be touched by him, but she was married to him. Because she had sacrificed for me. My father had wanted to end the mere possibility of me, and she had gone against him. She had given me life... why? Had she had some... some kind of hope about me? If she had, then I was a complete failure.

My father had wanted to end me. That knowledge made my hands shake. I shouldn't let me affect me that much, I knew that. I was well aware that my parents had gotten pregnant with me out of high school and the both of them had dropped out because of it. The only job my mother could get was as a waitress. My dad got his GED eventually and he had gotten a job as a cop thanks to a family friend, but I was sure that it wasn't what he had wanted as a teenager. I knew I made him angry a lot of times, but as a child, I had chosen to believe that deep down, my father still loved me. Taking me with him on car trips, taking me to the beach, the train yard, buying me new clothes... I had thought that those were signs that even through the blows, he loved me. I had been lying to myself.

I had destroyed their lives. Of course my father had wanted to abort me, he had never wanted me in the first place. I should find it miraculous that my mother had wanted me, but it hurt. It hurt in ways I can't possibly describe in writing.

Learning that I wasn't straight, wasn't ever going to be normal or have some kind of normal life, had made me feel like the bottom had dropped out of my world. That hadn't held a candle to hearing those things from my mother. I felt worse than useless, worse than unloved. What I felt, there are no words in the human language for. I had always known, deep down, that I was an unwanted child, but to actually hear my mother say it... She had vouched for me once, she had wanted me once, at least enough to let me be born and not put me up for adoption, but now... now she wished that she hadn't. How could I possibly survive that?

'No one is ever going to love me.'

The thought hit me like a train, right in my chest. I actually gasped for breath, it shocked me so much. I stumbled to my feet, looking I'm sure very much like mother had. I felt bile in my mouth, but instead of rushing to the toilet to throw up, I nearly ran to the kitchen. I walked to the refrigerator like a drug addict would go to their drug of choice. My steps were born out pure, desperate need.

I flung open the freezer door and dug through the bags of ice and frozen vegetables until I found what I needed more than air. There, still sitting in the very back, was the piece of birthday cake Quatre had made for me three days ago.
"Happy Birthday, Duo!"
So real it might as well have been a hallucination instead of a memory, I saw my best friend's face. I saw his brilliant smile. That smile... a smile of friendship and love, a smile I had never seen from either of my parents and I knew, despite all of my childish dreams that I had tried to bury as I had gotten older, I would never see from them. Fresh, hot tears burst out of me and I started to sob in front of the freezer door. I had thought that I had been incapable of anymore tears, but I was wrong.
　

End part 1
Author's Note: Sorry for the delay. I'm preparing to go see my girlfriend in florida in a few days, so I've been busy with that.
Thanks to those who took the time to review and thanks as always for reading <3
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A Stagnation of Love (rewrite)