I Know Who I Want... + Part 9 (cont)

"It was…" Trowa reddens, and pushes a hand through his hair. "Well, it was Une."

There's an immediate chorus of disbelieving shouts from all of us. Quatre throws a handful of pretzels from an almost-empty bowl at him.

"You have got to be kidding!" I shout over everyone else.

Trowa grimaces. "I'm not kidding," he insists.

"You slept with Une," I say aloud, hoping that if I speak the words, they'll make sense.

He nods.

"When?" I demand in horrified fascination.

"During the war," he admits. "When I infiltrated OZ. She was Lady Une at the time. She…" he stops. "She cried," he blurts out. "When she thought I was going to say no. Besides, it wasn't a good idea to cross the Lady. It pissed off the Colonel."

"I can't believe it," Heero says flatly.

"You banged Commander Une," Wufei says, equally flatly.

"That's awesome!" Quatre shouts gleefully. "Does she remember?"

"Noone forgets Trowa Barton," Trowa tells him a deep voice, waggling his eyebrows up and down.

"Tell me about it," Quatre replies in an equally seductive tone, leering at him.

I peer at them through narrowed eyes, as my next question formulates.

"But does she remember?" Heero asks seriously, that look of concentration back on his face.

"Yeah." Trowa shakes his head, grinning. "We had a…conversation…about it about a year ago. She wanted to make sure that everything was ok. She was worried that I don't want to join the Preventers because of that. It was a really fun talk, let me tell you."

"I bet," Wufei replies. The Wu-man still looks stunned. I think he sees Une like some kids see their schoolteacher - someone who has no life outside of their job. I imagine it's hard for him to imagine her trying to seduce Trowa. Hell, it's hard for me to imagine her trying to seduce Trowa!

Quatre is still chuckling. "I can't believe it," he marvels gleefully. "Une."

"Ok, Q-man, I have a question for you," I interrupt. I think, observing them, that for once I'm the least drunk of the group. Quatre and Heero are obviously gone, Wufei wouldn't even stay in the room for this conversation without the intervention of strong chemicals, and I shudder to think what Trowa's blood alcohol level must be for him to have shared that last tidbit with us. Looking around, they all appear happy and relaxed. Trowa is lying on his side, braced up on one elbow, clutching his drink in the other hand. Heero's sitting cross-legged near his head, still frowning as he attempts to concentrate on both the conversation and the different types of alcohol he's carefully pouring in his cup, and mixing with his index finger. Quatre's curled up against Wufei's side, his hand slowly drifting further and further into the Chinese man's lap.

I grin as Quatre looks up at me, his blue eyes innocently wide, as his hand continues its slow trek up Wufei's thigh.

"Why'd you and Trowa break up?" I ask artlessly.

Everyone's head jerks up, and they stare at me, amazed. The other stuff we've discussed involves other people, not others of our own. Everyone's amazed I brought it up.

Well, Hell. Why shouldn't I?

"Well…" Quatre begins slowly, "It was a lot of things I guess."

Trowa pulls himself into a sitting position, and leans against Heero. "Mostly my bad attitude," he says, remarkably candidly.

"No!" Quatre assures him, turning wide blue eyes in his direction. "I wanted to play house…"

"And I was determined not to be ‘trapped'…"

"And I wanted you to be like some kind of corporate spouse…"

"And I refused to even consider stopping travelling with the circus…"

"And I…"

"Whoa!" I interrupt, lifting my hand. "I just always wondered," I admit. "You seem to really…get along well, still."

"We'll always be friends," Quatre assures me. "It wasn't an ugly break-up."

I cock an eyebrow at him. I remember a few nights with a tearful, drunken Quatre crying on my shoulder.

"Well, not very ugly," he corrects sheepishly. He pauses, and smiles at Trowa. "It's not that we stopped loving each other…" he says slowly.

"Because we didn't…" Trowa finishes for him. I get the idea that this is the first time that they've actually revealed this information to each other.

"Not at all," Quatre says softly, his aqua gaze locked with Trowa's emerald one. "We just…work better as friends than we did as lovers."

"Mostly, we just wanted different things out of a relationship at the time," Trowa says. "We realized that, so we saved what we could, and moved on." I frown at him. He sounds remarkably sober.

"You know what?" Heero interrupts. He swishes his glass around and I see that half of the bizarre creation he'd been concocting is gone.

"What?" Trowa asks, pulling back a little to look at Heero.

"Relena cut her hair," he announces.

We all groan at the sound of her name. At least, I think it's the sound of her name that we're all groaning at. Wufei's face is all red, and Quatre's hand is still in his lap.

"But that's a bad thing," Heero insists.

"Why's that a bad thing?" Trowa demands, taking Heero's glass. He pours most of what remains of Heero's masterpiece into his own glass, and hands the almost-empty receptacle back to Heero.

"Hey," Heero protests mildly, frowning at the bare splash of liquid that remains. Trowa puts his hand on Heero's knee and pats it consolingly.

"Girls do that," Quatre tells Heero. "They have guy trouble and they cut their hair."

"How do you know?" I ask curiously.

Quatre rolls his eyes. "I have twenty-nine sisters, Duo," he reminds me. "That's a lot of girls."

Trowa gulps down the contents of his glass, and chokes. His face turns bright red, and his eyes water. I look at him curiously.

"What the hell was in that, Heero?" he gasps.

Heero shrugs vaguely. "Stuff," he replies.

"But why do you think her hair is a signal of bad things to come?" Wufei asks. His voice is a little strangled. I look at Quatre. His eyes widen innocently as he stares back at me. I grin.

"It's all…" Heero waves his hands vaguely. "Short…and…floofy."

"Floofy?" Trowa repeats, laughing. "Sounds like a cat. Here, Floofy," he yells, leaning back to peer behind Heero. "C'mere, Floofy. Good kitty."

"It floofs over," Heero explains. He pulls Trowa forward, and grabs hold of his bangs. Trowa yelps, but Heero ignores him, feathering the mass over to the side of Trowa's head. "Like that," Heero explains. He frowns at Trowa. "Sort of," he amends. "And then the ends curl in," he pinches the ends of Trowa's hair, trying to get them to fall correctly. "It's weird," he finishes, shaking his head. "She looks like…like a weatherwoman or something."

"Like a weatherwoman," I repeat, perplexed.

"Like news anchors," Quatre explains. "It's a real executive, power-cut."

"Well, good riddance," I say in a bored voice. "It was about time she got over that weird braid thing she had going."

"I don't want to talk about Relena," Trowa announces in a loud voice. "She is a boring topic of conversation. Any time spent talking about her is wasted time."

"Oh!" shouts Wufei. We all look at him curiously, and he turns, if possible, even redder.

"Yeah, Wu?" I ask, grinning maliciously.

"I just…remembered something," he lies desperately.

"And what was that?" I press. I'm a dick sometimes.

"He remembered what it feels like when I do this," Quatre tells me mischievously, his hand moving in Wufei's lap again.

Wufei jumps as though burned. "Gods! Quatre! Don't do that here…" he manages.

Trowa chuckles and lays down, his head in Heero's lap.

Hmm. Maybe the night's going to get more interesting.

"So, Tro," I say casually, angling my body so that I'm facing my two lovers, "if you don't want to talk about Relena, what do you want to talk about?"

Trowa stretches languidly, arching his lean length off the floor. "You're the one that's always talking," he reminds me with a grin. "You think of topics."

"You were talking plenty before," I remind him, grinning. "About who you would and wouldn't share us with."

"Oh, that," he yawns, waving his hand dismissively. "Just reminding people. You're mine."

"Oh yeah?" Heero asks, grinning down at him.

"Absolutely!" Trowa declares cheerfully. "Like I said, both of you, all mine, noone else, just us…"

"It seemed to really bug Relena that there's two of you," Heero observes, that concentrated expression crossing his face again.

Trowa groans. "No more Relena!" he reminds Heero firmly.

"She's kind of on my mind," Heero admits gloomily. I frown at him. Heero has a tendency to become a morose drunk. I hope that he's not headed in that direction. That could put a damper on my plans for the evening.

"Forget her, Hee-chan," I advise. "What can she do to you?"

"She's gonna tell the papers about us," he predicts dolefully. "She's gonna say bad things about you guys. She's gonna…"

"No more Relena!" Trowa chants, glaring up at Heero.

"I don't want her to talk about you guys, though," Heero protests. "I feel bad that…"

"Hee-chan. It's not your fault if Relena is bitchy," I tell him firmly. "Trowa and I can deal with whatever she says about us. We've heard worse."

He looks unhappy. "Yes, but…"

"Noone listens to me," Trowa informs the world at large. "I say, ‘Don't talk about Relena,' and they talk about Relena. La la la, Relena, Relena, Relena," he croons aimlessly. "I don't want to talk about Relena. She's boring. I don't think there's ever been one time in my whole life when I actually wanted to talk about Relena. She pisses me off, usually. Don't like her. Never did. Don't wanna talk about her…"

"Ok, Tro-chan," I interrupt, laughing. "What do you want to talk about?"

"Lions," he announces promptly. "One of the lionesses had a cub. They named it Blanca, because it doesn't have any markings and some moron thought that "Blanca" meant blank. It actually means white, and why you'd name a lion blank anyway I don't know, but that's what it's named. It was born two months ago. I'm going to train it into the act eventually, but for now it just…"

"Relena said she could get the circus' lease revoked," Heero interrupts direfully.

Trowa growls. I glance over at Quatre and Wufei. Their heads are close together, and they're whispering. As I watch them, Wufei cups the back of Quatre's head in one hand and pulls him toward him. They kiss, lightly at first, then more deeply.

If I were a sensitive guy, I'd suggest we leave now.

Fortunately, I'm me.

"I think, Hee-chan, that we'll have to punish you if you keep talking about Relena," I tell him seriously.

"Yeah!" Trowa chimes in.

I grin down at him before raising my glance to Heero again. He tries to lift one brow at me, but he still can't manage that.

"Yeah?" he challenges, but he's grinning. "What're you going to do?"

"Whenever you mention Relena…" I begin slowly.

"Relena," he interrupts promptly.

I lean forward, and, without preamble, press my lips firmly to his. His lips part, and my tongue takes full advantage, sliding into his mouth to twine with his. After a moment I pull abruptly away.

"Whenever you mention Relena, I'll ensure you can't speak," I finish, only a little breathless.

"That's supposed to be punishment?" Heero manages after a moment. I notice, smugly, that he's more than a little breathless.

"It's punishment when I stop," I tell him teasingly.

He grins at me. "It's worth it for a taste," he decides after a moment. "You know, Relena said…"

I lean forward and kiss him again. This time the kiss is longer, and I take him at his word and taste him, tasting the sharp, bittersweet taste of alcohol on his tongue and in his mouth…

After a few moments I jump slightly as I feel a hand sliding up my bare chest, under my shirt. Trowa. His long fingers linger over my nipple and I groan into Heero's mouth. At the same moment Heero jumps, crying out harshly, inadvertently pulling away from me. I glance down and see Trowa's head turned in Heero's lap, and Trowa's lips closing over the bulge in Heero's jeans. I shiver myself, imagining the feel of the coarse cloth of two layers of clothing providing both a barrier and a source of friction between me and Trowa's mouth…

I lean in closer to Heero, also getting closer to Trowa, whose fingers are still roaming over my chest. I press my lips to Heero's again, and his arm comes around me. He kisses me furiously, occasionally moaning and starting as Trowa continues to tease him through the thick denim of his pants. My hand moves to stroke down Trowa's chest, and I carefully begin to work my fingers beneath the waistband of his jeans.

Trowa lifts his hips toward my hand, and the while continuing to tease both Heero and me.

Suddenly, a loud cough breaks the spell, followed by Wufei's voice.

"Sorry to break up the party here…"

We all jump, pulling away from each other in a confusing tangle of limbs and blinking confusedly at Wufei.

He's standing in the middle of the room, swaying, grinning down at us. Yeah, he must be rocked. Normally he'd be screaming at us from the next room. Quatre is standing next to him, his normally pale face flushed. I notice that the top button of his pants is undone, and I grin.

"This is our house, so we're going to our room," Wufei announces. "You should go to your room," he advises, pointing at the connecting wall that separates this apartment from ours. "We'll call you tomorrow for breakfast…or something…" he calls over his shoulder as he pushes Quatre out of the room.

I sigh deeply, then push myself to my feet. "He's right…our room will be much more comfortable," I concede, glancing around the wreck of the normally pristine living room. The cushions are off the furniture, there's partially empty bowls of food everywhere (the dip bowls look particularly nasty), discarded plastic cups and glasses litter the floor, and there's more empty bottles than I want to count, some of which have deposited some of their contents onto the carpet.

"It's too far," Trowa murmurs, turning his head back toward Heero. Heero groans and leans backwards, his hands coming helplessly to rest on Trowa's torso.

I grin at them, despite the almost painful stirring of my own body.

"To the bed," I demand firmly, reaching down to tug on Trowa's arm.

They both groan petulantly, but I'm adamant. I remind them of the dangers of carpet burns, and they reluctantly concede that I have a point.

There's a dangerous moment when we finally get Trowa to his feet - he sways wildly, and I have to grab him around the waist and pull him to me, or he'd fall rather spectacularly on his face.

"Too much booze for you, my friend," I laugh, trying to hold him upright. "I hope you can make it next door."

"Don't worry," he murmurs, his tongue running around the outside of my ear. "I won't need to stand for what we're going to do."

With promises like that, can you blame me for not wanting to linger in the living room?

We definitely need to do this more often.

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