Duo POV, attempted humor, probably some language, and suggestive situation.
Breathe in through the nose and out through the mouth. Simple enough, except
the damn bath salts were making me want to sneeze. In through the nose…
out through the mouth. In through the nose…
There was a sudden harsh knock on the bathroom door. ‘Damn it, Duo; how much longer are you going to be in there? I have to pee!’
‘So pee already,’ I snapped back. ‘Who the hell is stopping you?’
The door opened and there was a moment of stunned silence before Heero said, almost reverently. ‘What in the name of God are you doing?’
I cracked an eyelid open and looked around as though just noticing the candle-light and bubbles. ‘Relaxation therapy,’ I informed him, and then closed the eye again.
It took him a moment and then he snorted, going over to relieve himself. I heard the zipper, heard the rush of water, heard the zipper again and then expected to hear him leave. He didn’t. Instead, he put the toilet lid down and I heard the creak as he sat on it.
‘So what’d you do?’ he finally asked, and I opened my eyes again to catch the smirk I thought I’d heard in his voice.
‘Almost killed a cadet who grabbed my hair without warning,’ I said.
He chuckled, though there was little of amusement in it. ‘’Almost killed’ as in…?’ he queried.
I sighed. ‘As in… it’s just a sprain, not a break.’
Heero winced and took a longer look around at my candles and scented bathwater. ‘So… is it helping?’
‘Dunno,’ I grudgingly admitted. ‘I’m not sure I’m doing it right.’
He blinked at me, looking like he honestly wanted to know, and not like he was just making fun. ‘Where on earth did you get the… technique in the first place?’
‘My therapist,’ I muttered and closed my eyes again.
‘You have a therapist?’ he asked, sounding surprised.
‘I do now,’ I growled and reached up with my foot to kick the hot water back on. I’d been in long enough that it was starting to cool.
Heero managed to turn what sounded suspiciously like a chuckle into a cough. ‘Ah,’ he said. ‘You got Dr. Harkness.’
‘Yeah,’ I sighed, sinking down a little further into the water. ‘I have to see her at least three times a week. And keep a journal of my ‘thoughts’. I have this squishy ball too, but I already… uh… squished it.’
‘Squished?’ Heero asked, and I could hear the raised eyebrow look.
‘It didn’t survive my first session,’ I grumbled sheepishly. ‘It was either kill the ball or strangle the woman when she suggested my hair was somehow a sign that I doubted my masculinity.’
Heero couldn’t contain the laugh that time, and I opened my eyes again to look at him. When he’d settled down to a dry chuckle, he said, ‘We need to get you switched over to Dr. Jarvis with me.’
It was my turn to do the raised eyebrow thing. ‘With you? Since when?’ I asked.
He took a deep breath but managed to abort the sigh. ‘Since last week.’
‘What for?’ I asked carefully. I don’t normally like to pry, but he’d asked first, after all.
He ducked his head a little, the last of his mirth dying away as he said. ‘Uh… introducing a trainee’s face to the bathroom wall.’
I pushed the faucet back to the off position, sat up and leaned on the edge of the tub, eyeing Heero a little closer. ‘Oh?’ I prompted and he looked a bit dejected.
‘He tried to snap the waist-band on my shorts in the locker room,’ was all he said. All he needed to say.
‘Ouch,’ I winced, imagining the scene. ‘So… what makes you think I’d do better with this Dr. Jarvis?’
Heero lost the faintly guilty look and quirked a grin. ‘He’s not into all this… new age crap. Much more sensible and down to earth.’
I cocked my head and looked him up and down. ‘Yeah? And what’s your ‘sentence’?’
Heero smirked. ‘I only have to go in twice a week and I don’t have any little squishy ball.’
I scowled. ‘Technically, I don’t have a squishy ball any more either. But that’s it? You don’t have to do anything else? No Hail Mary’s? No nothin’?’
That smirk got just a little bit self-satisfied and Heero slipped off the toilet to kneel on the floor by the tub, practically eye to eye with me. ‘Well… he did tell me I just needed to get laid.’
I blinked at him for a long moment while the sudden, slightly calculating look on his face told me just where his thoughts were straying. My eyes got rather wide, but I couldn’t help comparing the notion with squishy balls and scented candles.
‘Hell,’ I murmured. ‘Sounds like better therapy than this shit.’
‘There’s just one drawback,’ Heero said, sounding anything but bad about it. ‘I can’t do it alone.’
‘Ah, group therapy, so to speak,’ I managed, pleased that my voice didn’t hitch, but not able to add anything more coherent. I thought about pinching my own thigh under the water, just to make sure it wasn’t all some kind of bizarre dream, but I’ve never gotten that theory. If you dream the pinch… won’t you just dream the pain?
‘Well, I wouldn’t go that far,’ Heero said, his little smirk growing wider. ‘I’m not really into orgies.’
‘How do you know for sure?’ I prodded, not sure why. Maybe I just didn’t want to look like the blushing virgin in the room.
He snorted. ‘Just hypothesizing. I’m pretty sure I’d prefer one on one therapy sessions.’ It was kind of amazing how kinky he managed to make that sound.
I suppose there really wasn’t much question, considering, but I still couldn’t quite help going for a bit more clarification. ‘And in this therapy… you sure you wouldn’t be more interested in… blondes?’
His weird little smirk grew in direct proportion with the angle I found myself sinking into the water. He seemed to be following me. ‘I’m rather partial to brunettes, thank you. Brunettes with more… plains than curves.’
‘Oh,’ I managed. Right before the water crept up and covered my chin. He followed me there too, his mouth suddenly closing over mine. Water went everywhere, and I think a couple of the candles got put out in the resultant spray of scented bath water.
‘Oh,’ he echoed when he drew back, sounding amused, and it kind of bugged me, so I grabbed a handful of his shirt and brought him the rest of the way in the water. ‘Oh shit!’ he said then and I smirked back.
‘You sure you can handle that kind of intensive analysis?’ I grinned, feeling the water wicking up his shirt and thoroughly soaking him.
‘Is that a challenge?’ he asked, his shock giving way to something else.
‘Maybe,’ I murmured, because when you challenge Heero Yuy, you always get a hundred and twenty percent.
‘Analyze this,’ he purred and as his mouth came back to shut me up, his hand was going elsewhere. More water ended up on the floor.
I made a mental note to call the office as soon as we were
done and get my therapy appointments switched to Dr. Jarvis… I was
feeling better already.