The Lewd Beauty And The Grump [Rin&Hideki] (Private)

[♠[Rin]♠]

Surprise struck the brunette when William suddenly threw in a comment, well, it was a question. Daniel turned his head towards the blonde, visibly genuinely taken aback in that moment. He blinked once, twice, almost unbelievably until he understood the connection between the question and the thoughts behind it, exactly when the blonde brought up the example Daniel himself hadn’t even thought of. Roger found it extremely amusing, but William was quick to make him quiet and stated that he was genuinely interested in how Daniel meant what he had said, which was indeed, in retrospect, a little complicated.

The brunette stared into the sapphire eyes of his counterpart as the realisation downed on him like a bucket of cold water. He cleaned his throat and crossed his arms on the table, taking a moment to piece together his answers in his mind. “You are right,” he said, “but not in the same sense as I meant it. So, that makes it a little hard to explain. I actually mean what I said, I am not a sex-driven person at all, but I didn’t… how do I say this without it sounding weird and illogical?” He leaned back in his chair, his eyes skipping over to a random spot in the restaurant. After a moment, his gaze returned to the blonde. “I excluded you from the equation I was referring at.” Then, he tapped his chin. “That doesn’t make sense either, does it? Uhm.” Daniel reached out for the table’s edge, drumming his fingers on it. “Can we talk about this when we are alone?” Of all the people living in this district, he didn’t want Roger to hear anything more than that. He had already shut down the rumours in the brothel, so having somebody sitting next to him while he tried to explain why he had been flirting with William for a long time wasn’t exactly what he thought would be advantageous. But thinking that over, it wasn’t the real reason either. “It’s not that I think Roger is highly interested in this, but still.”

 

William didn’t seem like the kind of person to notice anybody else’s affection towards him. The things he usually smiled about were everything that had to do with Sebastian. It was obvious that his dead lover was still taking up a lot of space in the blonde’s head, thus after finding that out, Daniel had thought it would be easy to leave the blonde in the dark regarding his own feelings. Now that it had come up as a topic, he was unprepared as he had originally thought that chapter was finished. In fact, it was odd to see William being genuinely interested in Daniel’s intentions, which put more pressure on the situation and gave the brunette just another reason to push the confrontation into the future and buy himself a little time to think it over again for himself.

 

The waitress brought Daniel a toast a fried egg; a small dish, but enough for him in his opinion. He planned on having a snack before work at the brothel anyway. It would be a good idea to have extra, considering the fact that it was going to be a long night. Daniel’s eyes checked the clock once more before he picked up the plastic fork and knife to cut the fried egg into clean cubes.

[-Hideki-]

It seemed as though Rex had taken Daniel completely off guard now. He was taken aback, befuddled, like an actual history professor who heard Roger’s version of what supposedly was history and what wasn’t for the first time. The bewilderment however turned into nervousness, displayed by some helpless, quirky motions the other made before he finally started to talk. And what he said didn’t make much sense and was contradictory. Daniel said that Rex was right but that he wasn’t at the same time, that he had meant what he had said but that he excluded the former Major General form it. At least the other realised that he wasn’t making any sense and expressed so and the security guard, who had been staring at the other with a raised eyebrow nodded in agreement. “It definitely doesn’t make sense.”

 

He was surprised when the other then asked if they could talk about this another time when they were alone, asking himself what kind of revelation or confession this would be. Had he had ulterior motives after all? Some ill intend? And was ashamed of it now? It managed to spark even more curiosity within him but he shrugged and said:” Fine with me.”,

after the other had added that it wasn’t like he thought that it’d interest Roger much.

 

Roger seemed to disagree though. He smashed his disfigured, scarred hand onto Daniels shoulder and leaned over. “You’re mistaking sunshine!” he said with a cheeky grin on his face. “I’m dying to hear this. You know, I am a curious, insightful person. I always want to know what lies behind the curtain and beyond the fa?ade, I want to know the truth behind the things, I want to have every piece of the puzzle …” he told the brunette and then Rex was cutting him off. “So that you can always unerringly come to the wrong and most absurd conclusions most people couldn’t even imagine and that put fiction writers to shame.” The blond remarked and Roger crossed his arms in front of his chest. “Fuck you! Eat your damn burger!” Roger barked and then added:”Just because you are a blind sheep, easily manipulated and can’t see the evidence doesn’t mean that I haven’t got it all figured out and can’t see through their lies!”

 

It made Rex chuckle, shake his head as he was taking a bite of the burger, when Daniel already got the second meal because the kids menu with the few chicken nuggets he had ordered before apparently had not been enough after all. “You wouldn’t have had to order another time. You could have had some of all the stuff Roger’s ordered.” Rex told him. “What the hell are you talking about, don’t give away other people’s food. It’s mine. This food is my property.” Roger protested. “Sorry. You’re right. Although you’re not even gonna manage to eat half of all that.” Hutson commented. “Of course I will! I will eat all of this! I’m hungry.” The other man acted stubbornly and Rex sighed, this being one of the moments where he felt that he and David got a child together that they never had wanted to have and that was a troublemaker on top of that.

 

It didn’t take too long and Rex and Daniel had finished eating and the blond looked at Roger who was throwing food into himself although he looked as though the food would find a way out again anytime soon if he continued. “You’re gonna throw up.” Rex remarked and Roger muffled a “No” with his mouth stuffed. “Yes. And I got no time to get you to the hospital or home today. I have to go to work.” He let him know. “So how about we ask for a plastic bag and you take it home or to Harrison’s and eat it there?” he suggested. And Roger laid down the chicken wings he was eating almost relieved that he didn’t have to eat all that after all.

 

Hutson called over the waitress asked her for a plastic bag before he would pay for his burger and the stuff Daniel had ordered, looking at Roger with expectations, whose face had frozen when the woman had said how much he owed her. The youngest around the table was desperately shoving coins around and counting dollar notes in his wallet as if they’d replicate themselves and become more if he only did this long enough. The waitress was getting impatient and when the former military man decided that he couldn’t make the poor woman wait any longer he turned to her. “I’ll pay for his property.” Just as he had expected to from the start and raging Roger’s scars turned a weird colour as a blush was spreading out across his face to his ears and he was looking down onto the table.

 

He then left the restaurant together with Roger for Daniel to talk to the waitress about a potential job and Roger was unusually quiet and he also wasn’t looking up into the sky to find whatever signs that the government was poisoning them. He just stood there and sometimes the blond thought that the man was aware of how bad he often behaved. “And?” he then asked when Daniel was reappearing, not wasting another minute though but starting to walk. “Had any luck?” They could talk while walking after all.

 

When they arrived at a bus stop he said goodbye to Roger, who sat down on the bench immediately, stretching his leg that was apparently hurting. “What are your plans for the evening?” he asked. “I’ll go to Harrison’s first, see what David’s up to. And later, at night, I’ll be seeing….” He cut himself off and his face was turning a different colour again. “Not important.” He spoke and Rex grinned. “Does someone have a date with a certain ‘Chinese spy’?” the security guard teased. “Fuck you.” Roger mumbled but the colour on his face got more intense.

 

Amused Rex joined forced with Daniel again and they were walking the last miles to the brothel. The blond knew that he wasn’t wearing his usual attire and what he was wearing would certainly look weird combined with the bomber jacket but he could kick out scumbags wearing this just as well so it didn’t matter much. He also didn’t ask the other about what he had meant when he had said that he wasn’t seeking sex again because the way was too short for that and the other had seemed as though it’d be a more serious and longer conversation.

 

Upon arriving at the brothel he went into the dressing room and exchanged his fancy woollen coat with the jacket that said ‘Security’ on its back and then went towards the bar where Peter was smiling his usual wide smile and was approaching him, starting to make some conversation. “For two people who aren’t dating you’re suddenly spending a lot of time together. And you don’t seem like you’ve got much in common so that you’d hang out either.” He commented and Rex, who had put his sun-glasses back on was rolling his eyes behind them, hard. “None of your damn business Peter.” He gave the other his usual line and Peter just shrugged and came to the part he was actually dying to tell him, handing him a pamphlet.

 

Rex’s eyes only flew over it and he screwed up his nose. “My wife and I help to organise a protest against ICE and we made a petition to get rid of the agency. We think it is criminal and inhumane how they treat people at the borders and ….” Peter didn’t get any further. It was boiling inside of Rex’s gut, a feeling that he knew very well and that he had in common with Roger. “My cousin works for ICE. And do you want to know who the real criminals are? Those thugs who break the law and invade our nation illegally! They are illegal! Criminals! And ICE is doing their job, protecting our nation and they are doing it good and efficiently!” Rex barked at the other and sat down at the bar ordering a whiskey. Peter kept standing, looking at Rex now with the same screwed up nose and loathe that Rex had looked at the pamphlet with. “ You’re heartless. No human is illegal!” Peter insisted and Rex left out a snorting laugh.

“Please! That’s even a new low for you. How retarded can one get. If I break into your fucking apartment, shit into your toilet, eat your food, sleep in your bed, take your money, you’d not call the cops? You’d say: ‘Welcome my friend, my house is your house’ Would you? ‘That money was for my kids to go to college but I guess you can buy a new car and an i-phone with it!’” the blond mocked the brunette man whose eyes narrowed. “That is different! Borders are just artificial lines, drawn by humans, nations are social constructs.” He argued and Rex started to laugh, grinning widely, downing his whiskey. “The walls and doors of your apartment are human made too. Those kind of living arrangements and families are just social constructs.” The former soldier said and laughed again. “Fuck, you’re such a genius Peter. Whatever drugs you take, take less!” he suggested and now Peter, was getting angry but the meditation and yoga CD he had, had taught him not to let anger carry him away so he did some weird ass breathing techniques that made Rex bust out into a fit of laughter yet another time.

 

That was until Peter was turning to Daniel now. “How about you? Will you join our protest tomorrow!” he asked and pressed a pamphlet into the man’s hand. Now Rex was paying heed to the situation. He had turned around on the stool and was closely watching Daniel and Peter. And Peter who could feel the intense stares, turned back to Rex with a disapproving glare and then back to Daniel again. “Don’t pay any mind to him. He’s probably a registered Republican.” And the brunette got cut off by Rex. “Yes I am.” He confirmed, eyes still more on Daniel than on Peter, who was the one snorting now. “Great! A gay Republican. I always thought that was only a bad joke.” He commented. “You’re a joke.” Rex stated. And Peter shook his head, and then waved it off. “He’s probably from a conservative Republican family that’s why he’s like that now. Don’t let him influence….” But he was cut off again. “No, rather let this self-loathing little bleeding heart and his anti-American communist agenda influence you!” the blond remarked and took a sip of the new whiskey the barkeeper had given him. Peter shook his head again. “So, how about the protest tomorrow now?” he asked again, smiling warmly at Daniel.

[♠[Rin]♠]

While William and Roger left the restaurant, Daniel walked back to the counter to ask for a piece of the waitress’ time. The woman was friendly smiling at him, answering his questions about the wanted sign. She explained that they were going to be short on staff soon because two of the other waiters were retiring in only a few months and hardly anyone had applied for this job in the past two years. When Daniel asked for the requirements, she was kind enough to write them down for him, along with a number to call for an application. He folded the piece of paper, thanked her, put it in his trousers’ pocket and exited the building. Outside, William asked if he had had any luck. The brunette nodded, “The waitress said that they are indeed looking for someone, actually two people, because some are retiring. She gave me a number and listed me the application requirements. I’ll go over them when I have the time.”

 

William and Daniel returned to the brothel after leaving Roger at the bus station. During the walk they remained in silence, which the brunette found was fine for the time being. When they entered the brothel, they shortly split ways as the William put on his jacket and Daniel went straight through the entrance. Two of his colleagues were sitting at the other end of the bar, waving at him upon the moment they spotted him, and Daniel returned the gesture with a smile. Peter had already come here as well. William was soon to follow inside and apparently Peter couldn’t hold from commenting about them arriving together. The blonde followed his usual way, he sat down at the bar and told his colleague to mind his own business, but Peter went on to the topic he wanted to talk about. It was a protest against the ICE, apparently, and as expected, William reacted violently negatively. It was the same with both of them every night, so Daniel moved to pass them by, but unfortunately Peter turned his attention to him, pressing the pamphlet into his hands, and asking him if he was going to join the protest. Another fiery argument arose between them as they went on about influence and manipulation.

 

Daniel could feel his heartbeat slowing down, even if that wasn’t biologically possible because he wasn’t dying, but his motivation faded. He put the pamphlet on the counter. “You’re dragging me into your dick-size comparison contest?” This was mentally tiring, and it showed. “The ICE isn’t directly tasked with the borders, it’s their sister agency, the border patrol, but whatever. I don’t know today’s date right now, but I don’t remember trying to get rid of one of the most important organisations of the national security system which was founded because of a terrorist attack and created to detect and minimize threat against American people and violation of the law is an April Fools’ joke. If you are not pleased with their work, go and work there yourself and try to change it.” His glance skipped from Peter to William and back. “I like you both a lot, but you are arguing like two teenage girls PMSing and fighting over the last bottle of exclusive, limited edition, flower-scented shampoo. Nothing wrong with voicing your opinions and throwing insults at each other’s heads, but please, leave me alone.” He passed the two men by and walked over to Chen and Tom sitting at the bar on the other end. “Planning a roleplay in that?” Chen asked smiling, pointing at the suit. Daniel laughed, “No. Don’t even think about it.” The brunette walked upstairs and into his room, where he shut the door, took off the suit, packed it back into its plastic bag, hung it up in the closet and then dropped onto the bed, limbs spread out. He sighed, sinking into the cool, naked blanket. He remained there for a while, enjoying the peace of this small room, a room he might not get to ever see again soon. It depended on those people who had the choice to employ him or not. It felt like floating, not having a stable ground under his feet yet, but hopefully soon.

Daniel eventually stood up to leave and take a shower, wash his hair and shave. He returned to his room, picked lingerie and an outfit for the night, put the pieces on and then went to get his bed sheets from the old dryer next to the washing machine. Both machines looked and sounded like they had been bought in the last century, but they were still working, which was positively surprising. Daniel gathered his bed sheets, went back to his room and put them on the bed.

 

Time passed by. Although the brothel was already open, most costumers arrived an hour or two later, so Daniel chose to use the time to pack the things he would need beforehand. He hid the bag in his closet and then went downstairs to get to his work. When he came downstairs, everyone except for Tom was still there, though someone entered the brothel in the same moment and was immediately greeted by Chen. Daniel skipped to the counter, where he asked the barkeeper for a glass of water, which he got, and thanked him kindly, emptying the glass quickly. “You’re a life saver,” he said, smiling. The barkeeper laughed. “Always at your service.”

Two other people came in and Daniel linked eyes with one of them. It was time to get to work.

[-Hideki-]

Rex didn’t know what he had expected, he probably hadn’t expected much anything but had only wanted to see whether Daniel’s opinions were as moronic as Peter’s but the brunette snapping was something he definitely had not seen coming.

Apparently Peter hadn’t either because he stood there and stared at the shorter man like a pig into a clockwork while they were, amongst other things, accused of dragging the man into their dick-size comparison contest. Had Rex been raging Roger he’d have let out a snorting laugh, had wiggled his eyebrows and said:”Oh come on, I know that you’re dying to throw your cock into the ring with ours.”

 

But Rex wasn’t raging Roger. Thus his eyebrows narrowed instead and he left out a deep bark: “I didn’t drag you into anything.” His face looking rather displeased, displeased that the other after what he had done for him was acting as if he was a pain in the arse to him dragging him into shit he didn’t want to be a part of, exhausting him and it didn’t change much about this pissing him off that the other decided to argue against Peter’s political lunacy and to tell him to go do a better job than ICE then if he got an issue with the agency – what was admittedly rather badass - than against Rex’s side. It would have left a good impression on him had the other expressed his opinion without that attitude, plus putting him onto the same level as teenaged girls, what was kinda contradictory to the dick-size comparing comparison!

 

The brunette left them behind and walked over to his colleagues and Hutson looked to the side when the pamphlets got thrown next to him onto the counter, followed by Peter taking the seat next to him, letting himself fall onto it with a sigh, ordering a drink as well. “Am I right to assume you’ve got family working for the border patrol as well?” Peter asked in a more joking tone of voice. “No.”Rex grinned. “But friends.” He added and Peter laughed and with a “Cheers!” downed his drink. “Can I assume that being anti-borders, you’re anti-border patrol too?” the blond man asked. “Yes.” Peter said, hearing a deep chuckle from Rex.

 

After a while of silence, Daniel had left and disappeared into his room alone, Peter spoke again. “Do you think our political arguments are just some pissing contest? That we do that to let our muscles play?” he asked and Hutson shrugged. “No clue. But if it was a pissing contest, I’d win.” He said with a lopsided grin and the other security guard laughed once more but then said:” Nah, you wouldn’t.”

 

When Daniel returned there still wasn’t much to do in the brothel and the other got a drink at the bar, not looking at him, what irked the former soldier out and made him let out one of his disdainful, grumpy snorts. And Rex decided to pretty much ignore the man for the rest of the day for good now. If he decided to come along with him or not after work was his problem or the other would accuse him of dragging him into something again.

 

However although he wanted to ignore him for the rest of the shift it didn’t quite work. Because his stupid face sneaked itself into his thoughts and he found himself peeking over to him once in a while until he spotted the brunette making eye contact with some costumer and soon guiding the man upstairs. Hutson’s eyes narrowed and he turned his head back to the counter, listening to Peter telling him something about some new tea that was supposed to calm the nerves that he and his wife were trying because their life was so stressful. And while he usually tried to ignore that kind of stuff he tried to focus on every little word his leftist colleague had to tell him about that bloody tea now.

 

But it didn’t work. He couldn’t focus on the tea and it wasn’t a good distraction either. There were pictures running through his mind, pictures of that dude getting close to Daniel, touching him, fucking him in that moment and it created the urge to want to protect the other man and it made him furious. About as furious as Roger got when someone implied he shouldn’t own a gun due to his PTSD, that he denied having. Not only that. It seemed that there was a beast growing inside of his chest and it was running rampage. His grip tightened stronger and stronger around the glass, his muscles tensing and he only heard some letters of what Peter was saying by now until the glass in his hand was breaking, the whisky splashing over the counter and his arm, burning in the small cuts he had on his hand now.

 

Rex stood. He stood and the stool fell. “Man, you really should check out that tea! You totally need it!” Peter found but Hutson didn’t listen. He rushed up the stairs and kicked in the door to Daniels room with a tunnel vision. And next thing he did was pulling that scumbag off of him, his fist hitting the man’s face, bloody splashing across the floor and bones making an unholy cracking sound. “Piss off you swine!” he hissed at the guy who stammered something about having already paid and his money but when Rex formed a fist again, he twitched, grabbed his clothing and ran out of the room, cursing.

 

Wordlessly Hutson was about to take some of Daniels stuff and then found the bag. He took it, then grabbed Daniels wrist and pulled him out of the room and down the stairs with him, past the remaining whores at the bar, the barkeeper and a befuddled Peter who was looking at them calling “What are you doing?” after him, making Rex scream “None of your fucking business! When will you people learn to mind your own damn business, fuck, damn it!” and with this he went into the dressing room, threw his woollen coat over the barely clothed prostitute and headed out of the brothel.

 

This time he wasn’t drunk and this time he was heading a way that he could walk with closed eyes since he walked it every single day. “There is no way I can accept a friend of mine having to do this. Accept those disgusting people doing those things to them. I can’t deal with knowing that while I sit there some scumfuck is….” He growled an explanation and then fell silent again, marching through the dirty streets, not even paying any attention to the thugs, the kind of thugs he wanted to clean the district off of.

 

It didn’t take long and they arrived at the apartment building. And when he opened the door the floor was unusually silent. One could only hear the zoo of that crazy lady. All up to his floor there were no people lingering around what also had never happened prior to today. But once they had entered his floor they saw a man. He was short, bulky, had dark hair with a receding hairline and was wearing a white tank top from under which his chest hair was sticking out. The middle aged man was kicking against a door and cursing. He looked desperate. Nervous. At a loss.

 

And Rex who was boiling inside, whose whole body was like under electricity, saw that his mission had apparently gone just as he had planned. The security guard came to a halt and his grip around Daniels wrist got lighter. “Good evening Mister Graham.” He greeted his shady landlord. “What’s the matter?” Rex asked, exuding calm while the beast was still roaring in his chest. “What’s the matter?” Graham laughed cynically, chewed on his lip and then lit himself a cigarette. “Some jerk called ICE on me. They arrested almost half of my renters. I am absolutely fucked. And you know what’s worse, while your next door neighbours apparently have been clean, they found a fucking bomb vest in one apartment, a meth laboratory in another, a marijuana plantation in one entire room and a weapon stock in yet another of those illegal’s apartments. I mean I knew about the drug dealers but terrorists! Fuck this shit! This is insane!” he yelled through the floor and the former soldier thought the man was getting a nervous breakdown every minute, while Rex felt glad that his call had been of much greater help and was much more relevant than he had thought.

 

“Then you should thank the person who called ICE and learn your lesson from it.” He stated calmly. “And from now on only accept true, real Americans with a clean record as your renters.” Hutson told the man. “You can also view me as your saviour because it just so happens that I have the perfect new renter for the apartment opposite to mine.” He announced and pulled Daniel forward. “This is Daniel. He’s an American citizen and definitely not a terrorist or some other loathsome thug. And because the rent for this month is already paid he’ll move in right away and doesn’t have to sleep at my place until he finds something like we had originally planned.” Rex let him know. “And another fortunate coincidence! I am founding a security company. And if you want to hire us, we’ll do a sophisticated background check on all of your current and future renters and we’ll assure that law and order will be kept and the house rules obeyed in your apartment building.” The blond said and Graham looked at him and Daniel, considering what he had just heard.

 

“Fine. To both.” He then said. “But we don’t even have any house rules.” He realised and Rex smiled professionally. “Don’t worry, we’ll soon have them. I’ll write them down for free and I will ensure that they’ll be followed and obeyed since you hire my company. How does that sound?” the blond asked. “Good. Really good.” Graham said and threw the keys to Daniels new apartment to Rex, who caught them and watched after a tired out landlord who blabbered something about that he needed some sleep now and that he still couldn’t believe that while he was leaving.

 

Rex now walked over to the door normally. He opened it, stepped inside with the other and turned on the lights. It was rather trashy and a lot too oriental for Rex’s taste but he had thought that it’d have been worse. “It stinks but I thought it’d be a lot more run down.” The blond commented and it took him quite some discipline to speak normally because he was still electrified, on fire, inside. Looking around in the apartment he found some things that disgusted him so much, that he didn’t waste any second. He ripped some Arabic picture from the wall over the sofa, took some other stuff the people had used as decoration down and took that loathsome book with their barbaric ideology written into it, and some weird small carpets and threw all of the stuff out of the open window and then closed it again.

 

After he had cleared the apartment so that he could stay in it for a moment he turned back to Daniel, his body still tense, the beast still scratching at the walls of its cage, all those different kind of emotions making his lungs burn. “Sit!” he ordered and didn’t give the other any chance to obey because he was pushing him onto the large sofa that stood there already, before he put off his jacket and threw it over an armchair before sitting down next to the brunette shorter man on the sofa. He leaned back; let his arms lay on the backrest after he had taken off his sun glasses. His blue eyes were observing the prostitute for a while, gazing into those green eyes before he finally spoke. “You wanted to tell me why you were hitting on me if you aren’t seeking sex at all! So why?” he wanted to know.

[♠[Rin]♠]

Daniel wasn’t familiar with the client he had taken up to his room, but he appeared to be pretty easy to satisfy. Obviously just a lonely man who was in the need for company and intimacy. However, they didn’t get that far, barely taking off Daniel’s wine-red crop sweater and unbuttoning the man’s shirt and trousers, until suddenly the door was pushed open. Daniel, lying under the client on the bed, halted and tilted his head to see who was entering, but there was hardly any time to ask questions. It was William, the one person he had expected last, and he pulled the man off the brunette. Daniel sat up, alarmed, shocked even, as he witnessed how the blonde started to beat up the client. “Will! What’s wrong?! Will!” His questions remained unanswered. The security guard was visibly furious, but Daniel couldn’t put his finger on the reason why. He started to gather a few of Daniel’s belongings and found the bag in his closet, which he grabbed, along with Daniel’s wrist and dragged him along out of the room. It triggered memories of that one night back at the bar, but this time William appeared to be sober. Sober was a strong word for someone who had had two glasses of whiskey, but he knew that the blonde’s alcohol tolerance was high and thus wasn’t the reason as to why he was behaving like this. Peter shouted after the duo as they traversed the hall and vanished into the dressing room, where William put his coat over Daniel and then exited the building, still dragging him by the wrist. He started to finally explain himself, somewhat, though Daniel still narrowed his eyebrows in a worried manner. He knew that he himself talked quite contradictory, but hearing something like that out of William’s mouth was something different. The blonde had never reacted this violently, it was just a job after all, so even if Daniel appreciated the thought and was obviously in worry for the brunette’s well-being somehow, he couldn’t shake off the feeling that something didn’t add up.

 

They made their way to the building where William lived in and met the owner there. Daniel learned that many people had been arrested by the ICE and that also weapons had been found. William offered his soon-to-be company’s services to the man, who took a moment to think about it, but eventually agreed to it. He also accepted Daniel staying at the apartment opposite of his, which was surprising to him, but the man seemed emotionally worn down and desperate. Seeing as half of his renters were gone, he still had to pay taxes for the building and would need new renters to gather the money he needed.

 

William’s grip around Daniel’s wrist had softened upon their arrival and he could feel blood filling his veins again. After the owner left, they walked up to the apartment Daniel would be staying in. It was dirty, but at first sight he couldn’t spot anything that needed instant repair or couldn’t be cleaned by hand. The blonde now finally let go of the smaller one, who silently exhaled under his breath and closed the door. He was about to say something when William started to throw out the religious things of the previous owners, but he interrupted himself because he had long ago understood that the security guard was short-tempered and needed a break right now. The break Daniel was seeking didn’t come however, William told him to sit down, which was something he was already used to, but this time he didn’t get the time to react as he was pushed to sit on the couch. He shifted a little in position to get more comfortable and felt the additional weight when William sat down beside him. There was only a short pause until the blonde spoke again. Daniel looked up, staring into the azure eyes of the other, now that he had taken off the sunglasses.

 

So, he was sitting there in a new apartment with an oversized coat lingering on his shoulders, dressed in nothing but black shorts, boots and a fishnet crop top, looking onto the one man’s eyes who had somehow turned his life all around. Talk about unexpected turns. “You are expecting me to talk about that when you are furious?” Daniel counter-questioned. He rested his elbows on his knees and closed his eyes for a moment, rubbing over his forehead with his hand, before he straightened his back again and leaned back against the backrest of the couch, glancing up towards the ceiling. He thought about the structure of his answer for a while, seemingly unsure as to how to present it to the blonde, even if he didn’t think it was such big of a deal. Generally, while Daniel was the talkative and emotional type, he appeared to have problems with sharing his thoughts unconditionally as soon as it came to feelings deeper than the surface. “Okay, listen,” he said, lowering his glance again to look into the eyes of the security guard. “You were right, when I met you, I hit on you because I found you attractive and I thought I might get you to hook up with me. In the past few years two or three out of one hundred men were actually attractive to have sex with, let alone mannered or likeable, and I didn’t mean to force you into anything more than that because who would ever date a whore, and I respect that, because I, too, am not the type to share, so I understand that.” Daniel brought his arms up to cross them over his chest. “But then I got to know you and you were becoming likeable and all and even though you weren’t interested, it was still better than all the other things I usually do. And when you told me about Sebastian I started to feel bad. You were having such a hard time getting over it and I didn’t want to make it even harder for you, so I just stopped.” His gaze skipped over to a random chair standing far away from the dinner table. “I can only imagine what it feels like to wait for a person who isn’t coming back, and to have someone else trying to get your attention while you are trying to cope with your own feelings does not make it any better. If anything, it might be just annoying and hurtful. It doesn’t mean that I lied to you, I actually like all the things about you that I listed when we were at the hotel, but you are not interested and that is fine.” Finally, he looked up again. “That’s why I said I excluded you from the equation. I don’t want to be touched out of work, I don’t want to sleep with everyone who finds me appealing, and I find people disgusting as well, but I didn’t mean you when I said that. That’s it.” Daniel leaned forward, took the coat and brought it forward, folding it, then dropped back against the couch. “I am sorry if this is awkward. I know I owe you a lot, but you are more to me than someone I owe, you are a friend. I would do things for you because I want to be there for you and support you, not because of a one hand washes the other business deal. I don’t disagree with you on certain things or don’t take your side because I want to make you angry, it’s because I want to be honest with you. So, I know I was still hitting on you after giving up on hooking up with you, but that was simply to spend some time with you. And I know I acted like a whore when I did that, but I didn’t want the others to know my true intentions back then.” He explained, tilting his head a little to the side. “Does that suffice, or does it still sound weird to you?”

[-Hideki-]

“I’m not furious.” He grunted. “Not about you anyway.” Rex let the other man know who was apparently sceptical about the timing for this conversation. And he had a point. He definitely had but the blond just had to know. Not knowing himself why he needed to know this, now, right away. He couldn’t even explain why he suddenly had not been able to bear the other continuing to do what he had done for years. Yes, he had started to feel protective over Daniel having spent time with him and having gotten closer to him. Yes, he’d fight for him as he had demonstrated just now. But this pathetic, needy bloke in the brothel had certainly not posed an actual threat to the brunette man who had a completely different view about this prostitution thing than the conservative security guard had and the former soldier knew this. And yet…

 

The silence wasn’t doing him well. His thoughts circled around everything and nothing, through the whole puree of emotions, trying to track something down, getting pulled deeper into the spiral. But then Daniel finally spoke and Rex listened, he listened closely. And when the other basically told him that he liked him and had feelings for him, a surprised look crossed his face for a second and the beast that had grown inside of his chest was calming down, refraining from trying to break through and tear everything down, to riot.

 

And as Rex Hutson looked into the shorter man’s eyes, listened to what he said the shocking notion struck him that he had grown to like him as well… When he heard Daniel say Sebastian’s name, to talk about how he had not wanted to bother him with his feelings while he was still not over having lost his love, waiting for him to come back although he knew he never would, a sharp pain was overtaking him, his heart cramped and his muscles tensed and memories of Sebastian were rushing through his mind broken by the devastating images of his mutilated dead body and the pain was rising to a level where he wished he could abuse Roger’s medication or at least drown the feelings in alcohol as he usually did.

 

He tried to breathe again and concentrated on what the other man was saying. Trying to stay in the present, just where he was right now! When the other man ended his explanation and asked him whether it was sufficient or still weird, Rex stood from the sofa. “Weird.” He mumbled and went into the kitchen formally owned by that illegal family, searching for alcohol. He needed that. It would make this conversation go easier. But there was no alcohol, nowhere in the house. “These stupid goatfuckers of course got no alcohol!” he cursed and broke some oriental music box in anger.

 

The blond man then returned to Daniel as if he had not just punched something into bits and pieces and sat down onto the sofa again. He took a deep breath. Looked at Daniel and then away again, his eyes staring at the coffee table! “I will never get over what happened to Sebastian and I will always love him and miss him.” The man spoke with a heavy voice and it was true. It got a little easier over time but the scars would stay. What had happened had made Rex look on the inside like Roger on the outside! When people saw Roger they saw his pain, his wounds, that he was broken but no one saw how broken Rex was.

 

He paused. “But…” he started to speak again, looking over his shoulder to Daniel, blue meeting green, “I think I have grown to like you too.” The blond man admitted to himself and to the other man reluctantly. Taking another deep breath because he still felt like his lungs were an inferno and he let his hands run over his face and through his strictly slicked back hair.

 

Turning more towards Daniel, still looking into his eyes, examining him, before he spoke again. “ There is stuff that you should know: I don’t do half-assed things that lead nowhere. I am monogamous and my relationship values are traditional. If you want a little fun time or a polyamorous ponyboy or someone who would be fine with an open relationship and whoring around while calling it a partnership I am not your guy.” he started with the more obvious, that the other was probably aware of. “I am a vigilantist. I held a lot of power and I used it for vigilant justice. I am a right-wing conservative. I have an aggression problem ever since… well. I yell at the TV. Because the media lies… a lot and that pisses me off. I love America, America comes first for me. I am not exactly experienced when it comes to dating. And I won’t shave my bodyhair because I am not a sissy.” He threw his cards open onto the table, studying the other man’s reaction.

 

“If you know that and you still want me…” he started. “We could try it… together… I mean.” Rex made himself say through his teeth, a slight rosy colour appearing on his pale cheeks. “Or not if you don’t want to.” He was quick to add as it felt awkward and he turned his head to the side and then looked back at Daniel.

[♠[Rin]♠]

The surprise and shock growing in William’s face was honestly a little amusing. Daniel had known that the blonde wasn’t good at taking hints, but it was still funny to see the reaction now. He hadn’t expected a violent rejection or anything, in fact he had already accepted the usual rejection long ago. “Thanks,” Daniel said sarcastically, smiling, when the security guard said that it was still weird. He stood up and went into the kitchen. The brunette leaned forward, peaking into the open kitchen, to see what William was up to. Apparently, he was looking for alcohol, and he was angry enough to still shout at nobody for not finding any. Daniel shook his head when William went on to destroy a music box in anger, then casually returned to sit by his side on the couch. “I know you don’t like to hear this, but alcohol may not be what you need,” the brunette said, watching the blonde with a raised eyebrow. “Maybe you should try tea instead.”

William let him know that he would never be able to forget Sebastian, which was understandable to the brunette, because he wouldn’t be able to either if he was in a similar situation. He was blessed to easily forget and easily drown his feelings in nothingness below the surface without the help of a medium like alcohol or medicine. And he was also glad not to have suffered such an incredible loss, but that didn’t mean he wanted William to lose himself in his anger and sorrow. The ‘but’ in the next sentence however, captured the brunette’s attention. Upon hearing that the blonde had come to like him as well, Daniel wasn’t sure if he was talking about the same type of liking at first, but then the blonde suddenly presented all the facts about himself to him, making sure he understood that he wasn’t someone who went with an open relationship, which was something Daniel had been certain about. Taking into consideration that William was strictly conservative, he would have guessed that he didn’t do that, and to be fair, Daniel wouldn’t do that either, but it was probably an indirect message to tell him to stop selling his body for a living.

 

“Yeah, I know,” Daniel said, chuckling upon hearing the part with the body hair. “But I must admit, smooth legs are somehow nice to feel. Didn’t think I would think that one day back then. I don’t need my partner to shave, though, it’s fine.” But his expression turned into a surprised one on the next topic. William was offering to try a romantic relationship with him? “Wait.” He lifted a hand, staring into the other’s face, deep into the sapphire eyes, as if searching for something. “I am your type?” A mixture of disbelief and confusion glistened in his emerald eyes. “I thought… I mean…” He blinked, then crossed his arms again. “That is so unexpected.” And he couldn’t help but laugh lowly. “You are a little red in the face, but don’t worry, I won’t tell anyone,” he slightly teased the blonde, then leaned back. “I’ve come to know most of the things you told me, and I must say, they don’t bother me as much as you might think. I don’t think you are bad person, you are doing what you think is the best and that is something other people are too cowardly to do. Most I could do when I had the chance was to host a concert and give the money that came out of it to a charity or, well, most of the time, to an animal shelter. As you know, I don’t think vigitalism is a bad thing, just a thing to think about thoroughly. And the conservative part… well, I don’t think I follow any specific lifestyle, at least I haven’t found an official term for whatever I do yet, but Monique’s family was quite conservative too and I didn’t have any problems with them ever.” Daniel looked up to the ceiling, then back to the blonde. “What I am trying to say is that I know all that and I still feel attracted to you. So, if you are okay with it, I would like to try it.” It still felt awkward, but it would probably not be real if it didn’t. It had been a while since he had developed feelings for someone. After working as a whore for so long, he thought he wouldn’t fall in love anymore, felt disgust and emptiness, had accepted his fate that he had brought upon himself, and now there was this warmth in his chest, his heart pounding. And he was drumming his fingers on his arm nervously, like he had done at the restaurant earlier that day. If there was something he had been dying to do, it was being near the blonde, but now that it had become a real topic, he felt shy and a little helpless.

[-Hideki-]

Rex jumped onto the body hair topic because it bought him time before he had to say what he was planning to say and it distracted him from the tension that made his nerves start to flicker. He had never done something like that as an adult. Dated. Getting to know someone. Admitting that he liked him. And he wasn’t good at that stuff either. He never had been. Sebastian had been the one to make the first step back then, the one with the social skills and the emotional competence that Rex clearly had lacked. Thus he raised his eyebrows. “Shaven legs? Shit, I wasn’t even thinking about that. I was talking about my torso. What man shaves his legs? Not even Sebastian would have thought about that and he shaved his chest for reason. But a man without leg hair, that’d look weird as fuck. How does your mind even go to such absurd places?” he asked feeling a lot more confident with that kind of conversations.

 

Procrastinating to admit what he got to admit didn’t make it less true so eventually he just went there without further ado. And Daniel looked at him the same way he himself had looked at the other with sheer surprise. But unlike Rex the brunette didn’t keep silent nor did he answer him. Maybe he was a lot more surprised than Rex had been after all. Because he wanted to reassure himself if he was his type and expressed just how unexpected it was. It frustrated the former soldier quite a bit. “No, you’re not my type.” He answered. “I have no type.” he honestly said. “Sebastian isn... wasn’t a type. He was an individual. So if anything one could say that individuals are my type but that would be illogical.” The man explained. “I however wouldn’t have thought myself that I would... come to like someone like you...like this...or at all.” Hutson admitted as there was no denying that. And this whole thing was undeniably awkward and perfect fodder for Roger as well. Good thing that Daniel had made sure they were discussing that alone.

 

When he heard the other laugh though his eyebrows narrowed and they narrowed even further when the other teased him because his cheeks had reddened instead of finally responding to what he really wanted to have an answer for. The blond crossed his arms in front of his chest, examining the other with a disapproving gaze. Daniel then actually addressed what he had said, telling him that he didn’t have an issue with the things he had mentioned, that he had known most of them and the he was still attracted to him until he finally said that he would like to try it...try them.

 

The security man’s heart was beating rather fast and warmth was spreading through his still tense body. “Good.” He declared as though Daniel had accomplished some task he had given him, sitting there, not really knowing what he was supposed to do now, looking from one side to the other. The silence was lingering around between them, it was as though the air was getting thicker and thicker and the more time passed the more awkward it got. And the ticking from the clock with the symbol for Islam in the middle he had not realised when he had cleared the apartment, was sounding as loudly as if they were in a bell tower. It was making him more aware of the awkwardness and that he had no clue what to do and thus drove him nuts.

 

He took a ball, the one the little kids had loudly played with all the time, and threw it against the clock so that it fell down and broke. Then he sat back again, moving a little closer to the other in the process before silence was kicking back in. ‘Damn it’ he thought and turned to face the other again, his blue eyes looking into the green ones and then his strong hand reached out to the other man. His calloused palm and fingers brushed over the warm, pale skin of the other’s cheek gently, as he leaned over and pressed his thin lips against the other’s, giving him a quick peek, that was merely a brush. The beast inside of his chest was screaming inside as he had broken the connection again immediately, his chest felt tight, he held his breath, while his thumb brushed the other man’s cheek and their eyes were locked.

 

It was just a moment though and then Hutson laid his hand under Daniel’s chin and lifted up his head, his other hand grabbing the man by the waist, leaning in for a real kiss this time. At first a little hesitantly, closing his blue eyes, pulling the other closer towards himself and against his broader body, before he deepened the kiss, his tongue granting itself entrance into the other’s mouth, rolling around Daniel’s tongue in a wild dance, eager to taste the other and the beast inside of him purred now and the stinging, burning inferno turned into a warm summer breeze.

 

When he had gone out of air and had to part his lips from the brunette’s he looked the other into his face and for a second there was no guard up at all. Then he straightened himself, coughed and combed back his orderly hair with his fingers.

[♠[Rin]♠]

Daniel gave the blonde a reprehended look when he brought down the clock with the kids’ ball. Yes, the ticking of the hands had been a little annoying, but it was still an early night’s hour and there may be people who could have heard the loud thud. At least he assumed that the walls weren’t as thick as they looked and might carry sounds to the next apartments. Though, he decided against saying anything now, breaking the silence with such a topic wouldn’t get them anywhere. The brunette himself was a little lost in that moment. He hadn’t ever just ‘agreed’ to a romantic relationship, it had just happened by itself, so now he wasn’t sure what to do. He was the type to make first moves if needed, but just the thought of getting any nearer to the blonde made him more nervous.

 

William decided to do the next move eventually. Daniel lifted his head when he noticed the movement from the corner of his eye. His crossed arms softened in gesture and subsequently uncrossed. The security guard brought a hand to his face and leaned down to him to ghost over the brunette’s lips with his own. Daniel automatically tilted his head to the side. He could hear the blood flow in his hears, his heart was pounding that much against his chest. The blonde leaned back a little afterwards and their eyes met again, though the pause didn’t remain for long as William raised the brunette’s head by the chin and connected their lips again, this time with the intention of a real kiss. Daniel closed his eyes along with their lips meeting. As he felt the other’s hand around his waist, he gently put the coat aside, behind them on the couch, and let the other pull him closer to himself. His right hand gripped a soft part of the couch to function as a halt, while his left hand carefully rose to the blonde’s neck, setting down on the spot right underneath the pars petrosa ossis temporalis and the jaw angle, his thumb gently lingering on the jaw bone.

 

Daniel took the other’s bottom lip in between his to get a minor taste of him at first, then opened up a to let the other’s tongue in. He drew over the foreign muscle with his own tongue, participating in the passionate little dance, though with a slight dominant note, pushing William’s tongue down twice in a playful manner. His heart’s pounding slowed down as the nervousness faded and although he noticed his blood going other ways, he didn’t make another move. The moment the oxygen was getting dangerously low, they broke the kiss. It was surprising to see William without his guard up, as if he had lowered an invisible shield that he had been carrying all the time. Daniel leaned back and re-drew his hand from the blonde, wiped a little saliva off the corners of his mouth and crossed his feet. “You’re a good kisser,” he said, trying to eliminate the bit of awkwardness that was still hovering above them. Then he stood up to walk over to his bag, open it and pull out a random sweater, which ended up being white with two black stripes going down on the left side. He put it on over the fishnet crop top and returned to the couch, sitting down close to the blonde, his shoulder leaning against the security guard’s. His glance went up towards the ceiling, where he spotted a spider web in a corner. This place definitely needed a clean-up before he could lay down and rest in peace for the night. Hopefully there were still some cleaning supplies here somewhere, otherwise he would have to wait until tomorrow to get some. In times like this he was glad that he had had to help out in the hotel during his teenage years, so he knew a lot about housekeeping, a little bit about how the electricity worked and also how to piece most furniture together. The apartment wasn’t big, but it was certainly more than he had been used to in the past years at the brothel, having had one room to himself only. Now he had to take care of a kitchen, a bathroom, a restroom and make sure things didn’t break. He wasn’t as talented as he would like it, doing laundry still didn’t always work out. He had accidently dyed a lot of his clothes and even though he had studied the colour charts on how to wash which colours and what not to do, things still didn’t always go as planned.

 

“Say, uh, this might sound a little odd,” Daniel spoke again after a moment of silence. “Do you have any specific expectations you’d like me to meet? Not the basic things, maybe personal preference. Things you like or don’t like.” Honesty, trust and loyalty were what a relationship needed anyway and Daniel wasn’t the type to cheat, he was also too nervous to cheat and a really bad liar. And now that he thought about it, questions concerning William’s preferences started to build inside the brunette’s head. Little things, but also bigger ones. What was his favourite documentary about? Did he like poker or jolly? What was his favourite colour? What was his least favourite colour? Did he prefer baths or showers? Long sleeves or short sleeves? Coat or jacket? Morning or evening? Lunch or Dinner? Vegetables or fruits? Summer or Winter? Autumn or Spring? Was he the cuddle type? Did he get easily hot or cold?

A guy he had once had a one-night-stand with had admitted that he liked kissing the evening better than in the morning, for whatever reason, and back then Daniel had found it weird, but he had soon discovered his own personal preferences which he had never taken notice of before thinking about it. A relationship, no matter if romantic or not, required compromises and he had learned to do compromises, even silly ones, because in the end little things that may not matter to him would make another person happy.

[-Hideki-]

A lopsided smile crossed Rex’s face and he let out an amused snort when the other told him that he was a great kisser. “Surprised?” he asked, knowing full well that most people assumed he was absolute trash when it came to showing any sorts of physical affection, much less passion and that kissing him would be like kissing an ice sculpture. The former Major General had been very aware of what some subordinates had joked behind his back and he had always made sure to make them suffer for it. They had been rather creative and graphic though, he had to give them that. One bloke had guessed that sleeping with Hutson must have been and felt like humping a soldier memorial for a woman and yet another one had assumed the blond would drill them and had tried to mimic his voice yelling “Down and give me 150.” In reference to riding his dick! What had made the former soldier appear in front of that clown and say:”On the ground and give me 150.” With a sardonic grin.

 

It was a misconception though; one of the many misconceptions about him such as the one that he wouldn’t be capable of feeling for anyone. Rex could be affectionate and passionate. He might have been a little domineering from time to time but he was at the same time caring and not cold and cruel. Well, he was not when he cared. Those two one night stands had been a travesty and a complete failure. Rex had undeniably not been affectionate or nice; he had been cruel to those men. And it hadn’t even been their fault. The man would have been like that to everyone at this point, it had been his internal suffering but the really shocking thing was that this one guy whom he had treated like garbage had actually enjoyed that and want him to repeat it.

 

His blue eyes followed the slim male when he stood from the sofa and walked towards his back. The blue gaze roamed over the other’s body as it had back in that motel room. And he could feel some heat pooling up in his crotch when the other was bending down to get something and he got to admire the shape of the other’s arse that was perfectly accentuated by those little pants. He didn’t like the fishnet top, it looked too lewd and too “punky, trashy” for him, but that man’s arse sent his blood on a trip downwards and while Daniel was putting on a sweater Rex was throwing a quick look down at his cock to check just how obvious it was at this point that his dick was in a semi-erect state. One thing was rather certain by now though, he’d probably not have an issue to get it up for the brunette, unlike with that first one night stand, although he was definitely not ready to just let loose and sleep with the other right there in that moment just like that, mentally, physically it seemed he was.

 

When Daniel sat down he sat down closely next to him, their shoulders touching. It left the skin on his shoulder tingling and it was spreading like virus throughout him, infecting him with wanting to feel more touch. A little hesitantly he was letting his hand sneak out, placing it on the other’s naked thigh, caressing the skin while looking at the shorter man.

 

 

The questions the other man asked him then was a little odd indeed, or at least unexpected. The brunette wanted him to tell him his expectations he should meet? Was that a normal question to ask someone? Or had Daniel served the desires of other men for too long? “No.” he said. “I expect certain things from a relationship. Honesty, trust, loyalty, faithfulness and togetherness, a real alliance! But I don’t expect you to be a certain way or to play a character.” The blond explained and sighed. “You aren’t Sebastian. I am not the same guy I was back then anymore either. I will not try to recreate or re-establish what I had. It’s gone. This will be something new assuming that it will work out. So what I want is for you to be authentic and to care about and invest into the relationship.” The security guard explained and patted the other’s thigh, studying the man’s green eyes before he decided to lay his arm around him and pull his slender body a little closer. “Well, maybe there is one thing.” He started and grinned. “Be punctual and reliable. I can’t handle unreliable people and I hate it when someone is unpunctual.” The blond said half jokingly. His mother had always said that punctuality was virtuous and that she would never accept her kids shining a bad light onto the family by being unpunctual. Thus, they had always ever been exactly 10 minutes early to every invitation they had gotten, even to those where the people had said “starting at about 5 pm” and hadn’t actually assumed that anyone would be there earlier than 5:15 or 5:30pm then.

 

Regarding the preferences it was a little more difficult. “I have a preference for concrete questions.” Hutson told the other because it really wasn’t sure what exactly the man meant by that. Preferences in cars brands? Or political preferences, food preferences, weather preferences, hair colour preferences, or preferences in bed? Could be everything! “How about you give me a few examples about your own preferences so that I see what you mean and can follow suit?” he suggested.

[♠[Rin]♠]

A chuckle escaped the brunette’s throat when William asked him if he was surprised that he was good at kissing. “I didn’t think you were bad at it to begin with, but you are certainly better than the average. At least the average I know.” Kissing had different meanings to different people; some didn’t need it, some valued it more than touches and some couldn’t even bring themselves to kiss someone else who they didn’t have an emotional bond with, while others didn’t feel a thing when kissing another person. It was also a question of practice and technique; it wasn’t just connecting lips, licking over someone’s mouth or biting them. Certainly, there was an amount of passion that had to be put into it and finding a person whose technique matched your own wasn’t easy, all in all it was one of the ‘little things’ that were underestimated by most people. When Daniel had slowly developed feelings for the security guard, he had of course fantasised about what they could do together, but now that he was sitting next to him, and William placing his hand on his thigh, he noticed that he hadn’t thought about what it might feel like to touch him or be touched, not necessarily in lewd way, also normal body contact. Maybe it was because he hadn’t seen a chance for it to happen, or maybe it was the human brain’s limits, but now that he could feel the rough insides of his palm, he wasn’t sure if it was very different from what he had expected or not.

 

William explained to him what he found important for a romantic relationship, which was what he had expected, but also that he wanted him to be authentic and put effort into it. The brunette wasn’t sure if that was what he had wanted to hear, or if that satisfied his curiosity for now. He nodded. “Okay.” He knew that he wasn’t Sebastian, he was far from Sebastian. He didn’t have an exact version of the dead man in his head, but he was certain that they didn’t have anything in common appearance-wise, let alone personality-wise. That was a good thing, because variety was a good thing, and he didn’t feel remorse or bad that he couldn’t compare, because he didn’t need to. In the end, it was William’s choice, and if it didn’t work out, it wasn’t meant to be. That didn’t mean that he wouldn’t invest any blood and sweat into the relationship, but he wasn’t someone to force it either. He was, to say it simple, the gentle type, who was good with rules and compromises, as long as they made sense. He didn’t need extra freedom and extra information just because they were a couple. He didn’t have to know every one of William’s friends and acquaintances, he wouldn’t stalk the blonde either, and if William wanted to go out with his friends only, Daniel wouldn’t be sour. Of course, he liked the attention, but he wouldn’t force it at the blonde’s expense.

 

Daniel leaned more against the other’s broader body when William laid the arm around his shoulders. He couldn’t help but laugh lowly at the punctuality point. “I figured as much. My mother was very thorough when it came to punctuality, to be honest, and I think it was because she is such a business person. I was late coming home from school once on a day where I was supposed to help clean a few rooms and she was extremely butthurt about it. She couldn’t really punish me for it, because she didn’t have the time to check if I would be following the punishment, so she went with the silent treatment for a few days. I learned sign language pretty fast back then. But I learned that reliability and punctuality are important because it is polite to be on time and that it is important to keep your things organized so you don’t forget them.”

 

He smiled apologizingly. “My bad. I could have guessed you liked concrete questions.” Daniel’s glance skipped over to the hand of the arm around his shoulders and he rose his own hand to tap William’s index finger. Thoughtfully, he tapped the knuckles as well, gathering a few of those ‘personal preferences’ and deciding which ones would serve as good examples. Eventually, he took the other’s hand into his own, moving the foreign fingers around in his light grip. “One of my personal preferences,” he said, looking up again, “is lying on the left side of a bigger bed. Or eating something cold after I wake up, no matter what time it is. Cleaning when the sun has already set. Driving with one hand on the wheel and the other on the gearstick. Things like that. I didn’t know I liked to do all those things before actively thinking about it, so it surprised me and it made me wonder what other people do and I think it helps to understand a person a little more. But I don’t think it’s entirely the same thing as a habit, because I could easily change those things consciously, but I would like it less that way.” He crossed his feet, resting his right foot’s back on the left one’s ankle. “Also, I wondered what your least favourite colour was?”

[-Hideki-]

A slight smile was playing around the security man’s face when he listened to the other’s story about his mother and how she too had valued punctuality and had even ignored him for a few days when he had been late for duty. “Sounds like your mother would have gotten along with mine when it comes to this at least.” Rex told him and thought about his mother. She had always been an elegant, graceful but painfully strict and arch-conservative lady. Sometimes he had even found her worse than the instructors in military school. “I never had to clean anything or do house-shores.” He told the other. “My mother would have never even let me or my dad do that, not that we had wanted to but she’d have understood it as an insult. Would I have been late for dinner though she’d have stormed towards me like a hurricane and would have slapped me across the face before barking:’You’re late! Now go wash yourself and get back down here.’ I know because she had done so with my sister Ginevra when she had once been late. Not to mention the interrogation as to where she had been and with whom she had been afterwards. Well, that my mother wouldn’t have done had I been late.” The blond laughed. “My virginity wasn’t on the line after all.” A snort followed. “Man, had my lady mother known that Ginny had long been no virgin at that point anymore and Sebastian and I weren’t just incredibly close friends, she’d have gotten a nervous break-down. She’d probably had slapped us until she’d have run out of stamina and collapsed from exhaustion.” He let the other know.

 

When Daniel apologised for the sloppy question and began to play with his fingers Rex’s blue eyes fell onto their hands. He felt the other man taking his hand into his and Hutson intertwined his fingers with the brunette’s, held his hand and let his thumb brush over the back of it. Looking at their hands he noticed that the shorter man had attractive hands. Sebastian had had too. Maybe it was odd to think of hands as attractive but he did. Some men had really attractive hands and forearms in his eyes. He particularly liked it when a vein would be visibly running over a sticking out wrist. “You’ve got beautiful hands.” He decided to say no matter how weird it might sound.

 

The focus went from the other man’s hand to what he spoke and the security man was looking him into his eyes again when he learned some of Daniel’s preferences while also learning what he had meant. “Little irrelevant things so to speak?” he commented and mused. “Never thought about it.” The man informed the other while he was thinking about it now. Some everyday quirks! Things that he saw as natural and wouldn’t even realise but that other people most likely would take notice of! “While I can sleep wherever, whenever…” it wasn’t an exaggeration. He could sleep on the ground in the mud, regardless of how loud it was, he could sleep sitting or lying, in the forest, as a passenger in vehicle, everywhere. “I like the right side of the bed, preferably next to the wall.” The man told him. He always had preferred the right side of the bed but the wall thing was relatively new. Before Sebastian had been murdered it had not mattered, he had been gravitated towards his boyfriend and had made body contact with him, now he made body contact with the wall, like rubbing his leg against it, what was the reason as to why there was a discolouration on the wall where he did that.

 

“While taking a shower in the morning I always listen to the same old CD. And after showering I like to rip the window open wide and let in the air in while I do my grooming routine, no matter if it’s summer or winter.” He let Daniel know. “I still like to drive with an open window like I did back then when I got my first car regardless of my current car having air condition. After warming up I always start with training my biceps in the gym. And while I am not a fan of sweets I always separate and sort them by colour or other criteria when I am given a bag of jelly bears for example. I hate that they are all chaotically mixed and thrown together. So I take different little bowls for each colour, separate them and then I eat the red ones first, then the green ones, then the white ones and I’ll leave the yellow and orange jelly bears because they are disgusting. I separate normal food too. Can’t look at it when people mush it all together. It’s obscene, somehow.” The blond told him. “Everything has its place and order for me. I always put stuff at the exact same place in my apartment.” He informed the man and that was all he could come up with spontaneously.

 

It surprised him when the other told him that he wondered what his least favourite colour was. Why was that important to know? And didn’t people normally care about what ones favourite colour was if they cared? With a raised eyebrow he looked at the brunette for a moment, before he shrugged. “Well, I don’t like bright colours in general.” He said. “But the one I absolutely hate would be pink. It’s a gross colour. An eyesore. I sometimes wish I could ban the colour pink from the public. Together with disgusting rap and hip-hop and abstract art!” Rex said and sighed. “I don't actually think that the government should ban those things of course. Personal liberty and freedom is what made this nation the greatest after all. It’s what I am fighting for. What I am defending.” He told him. “I still really hate the colour pink, rap music and abstract art though! It doesn’t deserve to be called a colour, music or art.” The blond insisted.

[♠[Rin]♠]

The brunette listened to William with mixed feelings. He wasn’t sure if he had expected a family like that or was surprised. He knew that every family had their own traditions and way of up-bringing, which had an effect on a child for a lifetime and would function as a base for decisions in the future. Seeing as Daniel had had a lot of free time on his own, brought up by a woman only, surrounded by strangers throughout most of the time of his childhood, he was used to different structures and held a gentle and open mindset towards changes and things unfamiliar to him. Whereas William seemed to have lived a life of rules and specific expectations and was now strict himself. Although children would always alter the lifestyles their parents offered them, a piece of everything always remained, and those people didn’t see it black and white, they didn’t see the good or bad in it, only those who stood beside and watched found something that would bother them, disgust them even. An acquaintance of Daniel’s mother had also had a son and a girl twin pair. She had often left the son alone to watch the younger siblings and the only souce of attention and affection had been presents and money access. There hadn’t been any birthdays or Christmas, family time, trips to the amusement park and certainly no support. And although Daniel’s friend Monique had found it outrageous, the son hadn’t had any problems with it. The simple fact that he hadn’t known what a children’s birthday looked or was like, was the reason why he hadn’t missed it. William had told Daniel that he didn’t agree with what his parents did either, that it had been a marriage out of financial reasons, and that he hadn’t had a father figure to look up to while growing up. Whilst Daniel understood the concerns of the blonde, he didn’t feel anything when thinking about it. He didn’t know what having a father was like, just like William didn’t know what it was like to do house chores, or following the arch-conservative situation, doing the women’s work. That was why there was no sense in trying to make other people feel bad for the way they had been brought up, and even less in trying to convince them to change everything overnight. If a person didn’t see a reason to change anything, they wouldn’t. So Daniel was rather surprised about the fact that William’s mother would have raised her hand against her children. It didn’t seem like she hadn’t loved them at all and it didn’t seem like William had a problem with it either in retrospect.

 

“I must say, my mother was kind, compared to other things I’ve heard throughout my life,” he said. “She liked to talk and work together, and we would go on trips and such. The moment she was making more money than we needed to come by, she wanted to do the things she couldn’t when she was little, and she took me with her. But I don’t know about my father. My brother has never told me anything, so I don’t know what it was like to live with him,” he told the security guard. “But it’s interesting to hear how you grew up. To see how your parents brought you and your sisters up, compared to my mother.” He couldn’t help but chuckle when William complimented his hands. “Thank you. I haven’t heard that yet. They could be bigger, though.” He rose his free hand to compare it to the blonde’s, which was visibly bigger than his own. “Especially after playing a lot of instruments instead of working or going to the gym, they became rather soft, to the point where Monique told me that I have girly hands, which fit eventually, because she also said that my handwriting was girly.” He dropped his arm over his belly and turned his head again to look up to the blonde, who followed his example of listing things he liked to do differently than other people.

 

“The same old CD… and I bet it’s none of those I sold,” Daniel joked. “The one with the gummy bears is pretty funny. But I always found they all taste the same somehow. I don’t like those sweets, though, so it might just be me.” He chuckled about William’s little rant about the colour pink, rap, hip-hop and abstract art. “Yes. Yes, of course,” he agreed half-heartedly that none of those things deserved to have a title, but it was more amusing to him than anything. He didn’t see most of the blonde’s points of view as provoking, it was easy to accept them. They didn’t hurt anyone and as William said, he did respect personal liberty, so there was nothing wrong with his opinions.

 

“But… what’s the plan?” Daniel suddenly asked. “You just stormed out of the brothel during your shift as well. Are you going to finish this month there or are you planning on not returning?” Sitting here and enjoying each other’s company was more than he could ask for, but reality would soon kick in again and while Daniel was still looking for a job, he didn’t know how far William had yet to go to reach his goal of founding his security company. “I don’t know your thoughts about Anderson, but is the reason why you don’t want her as your equal partner because you are afraid of her doing something wrong? Or betraying you? I don’t want to talk anything into you, I just thought you might want to talk to someone about it who isn’t against women taking high positions, or some women in general, I am not so sure.”

[-Hideki-]

He looked at the other when he told him that his mother was kind compared to other people’s parents, listing all the things they had done together and Rex got the notion that the other had been really close to his mother. That she had been something like a friend to him as well. Hutson had loved his mother and he had respected her but she had been an authority to him and not a friend nor had they been close in that way. The blond man had always thought that this liberal kind of pedagogy was the downfall of society, that it led to children not understanding discipline and having no respect. But maybe there were benefits to it as well which he couldn’t know. Maybe a balance was the best? It seemed to him at least that the other man had something that he had never had. “Do you miss her?” the former soldier asked as it appeared to him that Daniel would wish to have her back in his life.

 

“I can’t say my mother wasn’t kind.” He then told him. “She had her warm, caring and endearing moments. She loved us and cared for us and she was proud of motherhood and wanted to be the perfect mother with the perfect kids. But she was also strict and thought that discipline and respect were the foundation, some of the core things for children to learn. Hence she’d discipline us with a strong hand.” The man described. “My father was similar in values and mindset. And he took me under his guidance more, he was also the one who took me to hunting trips or to the shooting range while my mother would go into the city or cook with my sisters as she took my sisters under her wing more. But my dad could never bring himself to be warm towards me. He treasured my sisters, he hearted them, even spoiled them – my mother often disapproved - but not me. I think he thought it would corrupt me and soften me if he was too nice. When my first dog, Lucky, was injured and about to die, he slapped me across the face and yelled at me because I didn’t react appropriately and disgraced myself. I always had to achieve something, do something to make him proud, for him to praise me and smile at me. He’d punch my shoulder in a congratulating manner then but he never hugged me like he did my sisters or comforted me when I got hurt, he just told me to suck it up already and keep going and asked me if I was his son or if they had confused babies in the hospital or why I was still laying on the ground not moving.” The former Mayor General shrugged.

 

“My parents were also extremely concerned about the family name and I was their heir. I am from a prestigious family. And especially my mother wanted for our family to be seen as flawless, as ideal by the people in our area. Us acting out, my sister losing her virginity before being married and me being gay would have left a stain on our reputation and her as our caretaker and mother. As though she had failed. At least she would have seen it like that.” he explained and then he realised that the other didn’t even have a clue as to where he was from, that he wasn’t from that big liberal city they were in right now. “I am from a small town in the South. From the Bible belt. My parents are deeply religious evangelical Christians.” He told the other man. “My mum was obsessed with being the perfect wife and the perfect mother and wanted to be flawless in her role. She also told herself that she loved all about it.” He remembered. “But deep within she was always tired, a functioning alcoholic. I got to see that whenever I or my sisters would accidentally run into her in those minutes where she felt unobserved and had her mask off.” The blond man mused. “I think that in my family, we don’t truly know each other. We know images of each other but not who we truly are and what concerns us. It seems like this wasn’t the case for you and your mother when you say you talked a lot.” He concluded.

 

“Did your mother have certain expectations as to what partner she wanted you to have? Did she raise you in order to be the counterpart to that person?” he was curious. “My mother raised me to be the husband to a good Christian housewife.” He snorted. “Sebastian obviously fitted none of that. He wasn’t a woman, he was an Atheist and he refused to play the role.” Hutson smiled in amusement remembering that. “He wanted me to help him. To share household tasks. I refused to do it. I told him I’ve got the higher rank, I make more money, so he’ll do the household stuff. He said if I didn’t want to do it, fine, he’d not start nagging or begging and I thought I had won because he indeed didn’t say a word anymore. It was just that he stopped doing anything at all as well! He’d do as I did. And chaos and disorder was breaking lose in our home, stuff wasn’t working anymore as I had no clean clothes anymore at one point and I can’t stand chaos, what he knew very well … so I had to do something. I didn’t do well but I did.”

 

 

Upon voicing that he found the other man’s hands attractive he learned that the brunette wanted his hands to be bigger than they were and Rex couldn’t see how that would look better. “Why? You’re a small man as it is. If your hands would be as big as mine it would look disproportionate and ridiculous.” He found. With Rex being a tall guy and Daniel being much shorter and the skinny type comparing the size of their hands, feet and limbs was pretty senseless. The man chuckled though when the other mentioned that his former friend had found his hands girly. “They are soft. But I’ve known women whose hands were callused as fuck. I’d say that your hands say ‘Spoiled guy who hasn’t done any physical labour in his entire life’ rather than ‘girl’ since not all girls are spoiled.” He teased him. “No clue about your girly handwriting though. I have yet to see that. Maybe you write me a love letter, with stickers and a rosy fragrance then I can see your handwriting.” he jested but the fact that he liked the man’s hands remained.

 

A one sided grin was shown on his face when the other commented about the quirks he had just told him and guessed that the CD hadn’t been one of his. “Certainly isn’t.” Rex confirmed. “It’s a much older CD to start with.” The blond told him. It was an old country album, the one that reminded him of his childhood prior to military school. They had always listened to it in the car whenever his father and he had gone hunting, fishing and whatnot, even when they had gone on a vacation because the audio cassette had been stuck in the cars tape player and his father couldn’t have been bothered to get a new tape player much to his mothers dismay who had grown incredibly annoyed of it.

 

He didn’t say much anything in regards to the other telling him that to him the jelly bears all tasted the same even though he found that Daniel’s gustatory sense must have been really week then if he couldn’t tell them apart. Rex however raised his eyebrow at the ironic agreement he got when he expressed his disapproval of the colour pink, rap and abstract art. “You should take the cultural decay we’re facing more seriously. It’s appalling!” he remarked.

 

The brunette man soon got serious and the security man had not expected the other to ask him that now. It was a legitimate question though. To want to know what steps he’d take from there on. He had taken Daniel with him without giving him any explanation after all. And while it was clear that Rex would not accept the other working as a whore anymore, especially not when they were together, he hadn’t told him what he was planning on doing now. “I’m not going back. I’ll quit.” Hutson informed the prostitute, who now wasn’t a prostitute anymore but his boyfriend…. what was kind of absurd if one thought about it. “I have money. I’ll focus on building my company now. And if it takes longer than expected I’ll just get myself another job. Maybe I will regardless of how long it takes. It isn’t all too hard to get another job as a security guard or doorkeeper.” He explained to the other.

 

 

When the attention was brought to Wendy Anderson Rex looked at Daniel, then laid his head into his neck and then to the left and to the right, making that unholy cracking noise again. “Well…” he started. “Not exactly.” He said. “I originally didn’t want anyone as a partner because I like to be in full control and charge of things. I don’t like to share control and give away responsibility. It makes me uncomfortable when I am not in control.” He told him the very root of his scepticism. “Additionally, I don’t know her. I don’t know how loyal she is and how true she is to her values and principles.” The blond man added. It wasn’t that he wasn’t considering it but it was also a decision he couldn’t make lightly.

 

He left out a chuckle and shook his head. “And about Roger…” he said. “Be assured that I don’t take into consideration what he says for the most part. Sometimes he has a surprisingly good idea but usually, when it’s stuff like that, I disregard it. He’s not my source to seek advice from. He’s like mine and David’s kid we never wanted. I have a child by the way, he’s loud, vulgar and abuses his medication, I hope you’re alright with that.” Rex let the other man know with a cocky grin. “However I know where all of that bullshit and his issues with women comes from.” Hutson told the other. “He’s extremely hurt by and disappointed in women. His wife, whom he married before he got a foreign assignment to the frontlines, left him for some hippie after he got home, injured, after years of fighting in that hellhole, due to his looks and his trauma that he denies having. She told him he crept her out and she was disgusted by him and she couldn’t look at him. That he wasn’t who she had married and what she wanted in a husband anymore. It hurt him extremely. That many females are afraid of his looks or cover their kid’s eyes with their hands when he walks past them doesn’t help. Anyway, he tried to have his revenge on his wife ever since. David and I are constantly trying to get him to sign those divorce papers but he’s not listening so far. I hope now that he’s seeing someone, what he denies but at least he isn’t calling her a Chinese spy anymore, that he’ll be more fair and positive about women again and sign those damn papers.”

 

“I think she’s a good influence on him.” Hutson expressed. “You know, Roger wasn’t always like this. He’s actually from a rich liberal family and his mother definitely wasn’t a housewife like mine, she’s influential. She sits in Congress for the Democrats. And his father is an investment banker.” The former soldier told him. “Roger went to a fancy liberal private school on the other side of the bridge. He didn’t quite fit in though and he felt misunderstood by his parents. And while many kids rebel against their conservative parents by exploring liberal ideas and by forming a punk band, Roger became a patriotic Republican and joined the Army, refusing to go to that elite college his parents wanted him to go to. He was a normal, reasonable fiscal conservative back then with solid based in reality views. When he went to war the experiences he made and what he saw added to his political outlook and he got more unapologetic when it came to the preservation and protection of our liberty and western civilisation. He became a strong advocate against the threats against the free and civilised world and immigration and this was how I got to know him at an event and where David, he and I first connected. However when he went too far a few times in his rage and drunken head, his parents who were ashamed of him due to his views as it was, kicked him out and he fell into the shit he is stuck in now. And I don’t know how but the more time he spent in that ruin he calls an apartment with his laptop, suffering, making weird friends on weird platforms, the more radical and absurd his views got and he drifted off into this realm of conspiracy theories and alternate history. I couldn’t even tell you what to call his politics nowadays. Nothing fits entirely. I just know that he thinks that the government releases chemicals into the air to control our minds.” The blond man shrugged.

 

“Don’t tell him I told you any of that though. I don’t want the drama and him not talking to me for two weeks again like he did when David and I told him he should consider selling his gun.” Rex asked Daniel. “Anyway, I do care for your advice and opinion on the Wendy Anderson matter of course. I gave you my career advice too after all. So, what do you think about the Wendy Anderson situation?” he wanted to know from the brunette.

[♠[Rin]♠]

“Sometimes.” Daniel truthfully answered. “I’m not sure if it I feel that way because I never apologized to her for ruining everything that she built up for me and treating her like a disposable assistant instead of being grateful. In middle-school, there were a few classmates of mine who had huge problems with their parents, who would fight with them, who consciously said that they would be better off without them, but as soon as something happened to their mother or father, they would still feel sad. I guess it’s just the connection one has and on the other hand it is probably dependent on the personality of the individual. As a parent you can control how deep the connection between you and your child is and is going to be, but at some point, I imagine it being quite lonely knowing that your child doesn’t feel a lot when they look in your face. One of my mother’s lovers was a nursery school teacher and he told me that every child who isn’t psychologically different from the average, seeks attention and affection from a person from birth on. And if the relationship you have with your parents gets better or worse, your feelings do change when you leave them, and no matter what, you might feel emptiness inside for a while, depending on whether you liked your parents or didn’t, if they were around, of course. Even those who hate their parents feel something when they lose them. It might be relief for the most part, or happiness, but there is also a certain loneliness somewhere. Don’t ask me why he told all that to a twelve-year-old, but it was one AM back then and I think he was drunk. Anyway, I guess when the realisation hit me back then that I wouldn’t get to see her again, also because I was too ashamed, I did feel sorrowful for most of the time, and I would sometimes wish she was there to give me advice on what to do. Or just someone to talk to. She deserved better, she still does, and I am still sorry that I didn’t meet her expectations and take over the hotel, but when she’s angry, she starts seeing the world in black and white and there are no excuses. You should have seen that one manager who didn’t do his job well enough and wasted a lot of money we couldn’t get back. She was so furious that she, and I am not exaggerating, grabbed him by the tie, pulled him out of the room, whereas he tripped and fell, but she just dragged him across the floor, down the stairs, through the lobby, through the door and dropped him outside onto the pavement. Then she ripped temporary employment agreement into tiny pieces in front of his face and walked back into the building. I learned later that she talked to a few people she knew about it as well and that that guy apparently had a really hard time finding a new job.”

 

Daniel listened to William’s little family story with a growing worried look on his face. And he was a little disturbed about the dog story. “That’s terrible, I am sorry,” he said. “I mean I’ve never had a pet, but still.” Today such things were considered mental abuse, but back when both of them had been young, things had been different. Obviously, William and his sisters had both gotten their advantages and disadvantages dependent on their sex, which was something he hadn’t experienced. He had slowly learnt about it throughout childhood, but his mother hadn’t exactly been a typical woman, let alone housewife. Daniel then nodded, understanding the concerns about the family name. “That’s something your parents and mine have in common.”

 

Light surprise lit up on Daniel’s face when William asked if his mother had wanted him to meet specific expectations concerning his partner or if she had wanted him to be different from said partner. He couldn’t help but laugh when he heard about Sebastian dropping all the house chores because William had refused to help. “There’s a first time for everything,” he said with a friendly grin on his face. “House chores aren’t that bad when you think about it. Annoying, but you get used to it.” Then he thought about the question for a bit. “I don’t think she wanted me to be like an exact version she pictured in her head. She was… she wasn’t as much of a woman as she wanted people to think at first sight. She was indeed concerned with her appearance, went to the gym, did a lot of skin care, had a healthy diet, dressed in skirts and dresses which might and might not have been short for a thirty year old, married woman, but she knew how to handle everything. I remember being impressed to the core. No matter what I asked, she just knew the answer. It was like having a father and a mother at the same time, considering how the gender roles were split back then. She secretly did boxing, fixed holes in walls, cleaned whole rooms, did the laundry, checked the accounting, cooked, repaired my broken toys, made other people socially anxious and bossed around everyone while still lowkey flirting with those men who would come in handy at a certain time. I found out that I was gay at a pretty early age and she wasn’t stupid, so she quickly realized it, but primarily, she told me not to become a prick. I think she actually said that to my face when I was younger. She said that I had to do all those things on my own because no one else is going to do it. Laundry, cleaning, vacuuming, gluing something that was broken back together, being polite to other people, appearing awake when you are extremely exhausted and tired, all those things, and still going to the gym at five in the morning and joining that one business party in a decent outfit. She didn’t have specific expectations because I was a boy, and she didn’t ever say that she wanted a girl, but at the same time she did somehow sexualize herself while bossing around hundreds of employees. I didn’t realize it as a kid, but when I grew older, I understood that she was forcibly trying to live the life she wanted without having to rely on a man by being professional yet still sexually appealing in order to fool other people into thinking she wasn’t as powerful as she sought to be, and a few years after the marriage she did manage to have enough money on her own. She did expect me to live on my own as well. She never drove me to school or anything. She wanted me to earn my own money too. So, compared to what your mother wanted to teach you, I had no idea what I was going to do with a partner in general.” That might also have been one of the reasons why he hadn’t ever had a romantic relationship for a long time and easily went with one-night-stands. Of course, there had been one or two people he had liked a lot, but eventually it hadn’t worked out.

 

He snorted jokingly about the love letter. “You know, if it hadn’t sounded like you were one hundred percent joking and just teasing, I probably would have thought about it.” He answered with a smile, leaning his head back. He learned about Roger’s story next and he wasn’t sure what to think about it, though he wasn’t in the position to judge. He wasn’t Roger’s close friend, barely an acquaintance, and it had been and still was obvious that Roger and Daniel didn’t go so well together. They didn’t fight and the brunette was hard to provoke, but neither of them appeared to seek a deep friendship. “I won’t tell anyone, don’t worry,” he promised. Then he chuckled. “You are completely right, he is your and David’s child.”

When it came to Wendy, William told him that he didn’t like sharing control and responsibility, though he also asked for Daniel’s advice. The brunette’s glance skipped up to the ceiling within a blink of his eyes, then back to the blonde. He straightened his head and back a little. “I think that I understand both of your points of view, which makes it a little hard to form a stable opinion,” he truthfully replied. “It’s totally fine that you aren’t comfortable with the idea of sharing control when it was your idea and it’s going to be your company. And Anderson is someone who is, I believe, deeply hurt by what happened, which adds to the anger she is holding inside. She seeks change as much as you do, I guess, but you guys still don’t know each other well enough to share a trust basis, which makes it difficult to decide. She’s a professional, visibly intelligent and hasn’t … gone insane, to say it simply. But building a company is always full of risks and I don’t think that it’s a bad idea to give her a chance. She might be afraid of betrayal if she won’t be an equally high-ranked partner and probably wants a stable ground to stand on, which she achieves by forcing you to share control of the company. A lot of people already know her and she might help you building up the reputation you want to achieve. If you are successful, someone is going to ask you about your education, if you like it or not, and if you avoid that question, people might get suspicious or the newspapers might lie about it and come up with something else. That would be a point where Anderson would come in handy, being the academic she is. The audience does need someone to identify with and you were right when you said that a female presence will help your appearance positively, but I also think that what Roger said is a little relevant as she doesn’t look like someone who would go shopping on Saturday’s women’s sale day in New York and wear high-heels and a petticoat-dress. But if she were to lead a company on her own, men might also not take her seriously without your presence. You two look like a pretty rough team, if I may say so, and you might need a few softer counterparts, but the audience might like that later on. I am sure that it’s a risk, but I personally think that Anderson is a knowledgeable and intellectual person, who might be a lot of help. And judging by her temper… she is eager to help. I am certain that if you let her offer you ideas and work, she is going to be as efficient as she was destroying that boxing bag.”

 

Daniel’s lips curved into an encouraging smile, warmth and affection glistening in his emerald eyes. He rose his free hand to drive the back of his finger along the blonde hair. “It’s hard after the experiences you’ve gathered in the jobs you’ve done, but it’s your choice and your friends and I will support you no matter what you decide to do. I don’t think she would be pleased with just a temporary contract, but she would put a lot of effort into the work if you both really agree on everything. You already agreed on meeting you again, so she isn’t reluctant at all. You two should have a thorough conversation regarding the points of view both you have without any pressure or distraction and then you will be able to think much clearer and you’ll understand her even better. You are not one to share easily, but what a potential business partnership needs is motivation, sympathy, loyalty and trust and after talking in the middle of a gym for ten minutes there can’t be much of that. You are still in the process of founding your company and if – after that conversation with her – you think that Anderson is worth it, she will be worth it.”

[-Hideki-]

Rex listened intently to what Daniel, who as it turned out actually did miss his mother, had to tell him. About which thoughts created the feeling of sorrow within him and the security man even did well in holding back and not expressing his thoughts of disapproval when the other said ‘one of his mother’s lovers’. For him this was not how a mother should behave at all but it wasn’t the point of their conversation and by now the brunette could probably imagine that Hutson would take an issue with that sort of behaviour. He let a moment of silence settle in after the other had ended with the story of his mother’s judgements and consequent nature and just examined him. “Why don’t you go and tell her all that? What you told me now? How you feel about what you’ve done and that you know she deserved better than this?” he asked. “You are not a random guy she hired. It’s been years, she might have thought about it as much as you have. She might have closed the chapter.” The blond man guessed. “If you did that, told her that, you’d leave the ball in her playing field. She could decide if she’d let you back in or slam the door shut into your face. But you’d know that you have said what had bothered you since all those years and that you tried to fix things and make them right again. Maybe you go when you found a job and have worked in it for a while.” The security man suggested.

 

The irony of him, who couldn’t even bring himself to call Arthur, suggesting this was apparent and he was aware of it but then again Daniel hadn’t had to change his name, he hadn’t abused power of an office, power of a government institution. The other had disgraced and embarrassed himself, he had disappointed and let people down but it was a different dimension they were in. Not to mention that when it came to Hutson’s parents, his father - who didn’t even know what he really had done and just thought he had done something minor and had slept with a subordinate – had told him that he wasn’t his son anymore for disgracing the family’s name in the military, for ruining their perfect bloodline of elite soldiers, that he shall never bother them with his presence again. Rex had been disowned, casted out of his own family. Despite the fact that it was illegal to have a fake ID with a fake name, his father would probably approve, because that meant that Rex wasn’t to be associated with their family any further. Not to mention that he would certainly find the shithole the former Major General lived in now fitting for his son since to him Rex was a failure, weak in morale and mind. He’d say that this unholy, godforsaken place full of filth and decay was where his kind belonged. If he knew that Rex was gay and what really had happened his old man would want to see him go straight to hell and burn in purgatory for eternity for his sins, that was for sure too.

 

Then he realised that he had no idea where Daniel’s mother even lived. If it was easy to just go there in one day or if it was more like Rex’s situation who had hid himself at the other side of the nation! “Where are you even from? Far from here?” he asked.

 

Hutson sighed and then shook his head when the other told him how terrible the story with Lucky was and that he was sorry. “No.” the security man said. “Lucky was just not exactly lucky you see. He didn’t live long because he got hit by a car.” Rex told the other remembering the hunting dog with his broken bones, his limbs distorted, squashy flesh, lying in a puddle of his blood but still alive and breathing. “My father was right in a sense, you know. I should have acted responsibly and rationally and should have ended his pain without my father having to tell me. For Lucky! But I let my judgement be clouded by emotions and that should never happen and in this situation it meant that Lucky had to suffer while I was not acting to help him but selfishly being preoccupied with my emotions.” He told the other and this had been a skill incredibly necessary in Rex’s life and career that had ended when his emotions, his grief, his hate, his pain over the loss of Sebastian had swamped into and affected his actions and work as a Major General.

 

So no matter how cruel it might have seemed, how young he had been, or how Rex had wished for his father to at least be warm to him and treasure him, to get some comfort too sometimes, he was also thankful in a way. “You know, I lacked something but when I look at all those pathetic, spoiled soyboys with their safe spaces and trigger warnings and mental breakdowns over words and their vegan burgers and jute bags who can’t handle reality, I can’t help but to think that my father did everything right with me despite that.” Hutson expressed.

 

With a raised eyebrow and a surprised, interested look on his face he looked at the man next to him when he told him that the value their parents put onto the family name was something they got in common. He hadn’t thought that. He hadn’t thought that someone who’d marry for tax benefits, who’d sleep around would care about their family name or would be from a prestigious, tradition-rich family. “Your family is prestigious and well known where you’re from? What field does your tradition lie in?” the man from the military family wanted to know.

 

Hutson gave Daniel a look as if he thought he had lost it when he said that house chores weren’t that bad. There was no way in hell Rex would ever get used to them. He only forced himself to do them because he hated chaos and didn’t want his apartment to look like Roger’s. His gaze changed though when he learned that Daniel’s mother had had no picture in mind when it had come to the partner her son was supposed to have one day. It didn’t really surprise him that the other man’s mother had to fill two roles for her son at once because her marriage had been a hoax. That was what people got who didn’t actually care to form stable bonds and were treated marriage like a cow to milk for financial benefits, he thought.

 

An amused laugh came from him when Daniel told him that he had figured out that he was gay rather early on and that his mother had caught onto that fact because she was not stupid. “I guess my parents must have been incredibly stupid then.” he commented. “Sebastian and I were right there in front of their eyes and they still got no idea that I am gay to this day.” The blond told him. “My mum even used to introduce the daughters of her friends from church to me and when I was accompanying her somewhere as a young adult man she oftentimes expressed her disapproval of the behaviour and appearances of women my age and got worried that I’d bring one of those ‘hedonistic heathen sluts’ home and I had to ensure her that I wouldn’t.” Rex remembered and chuckled. “They also believe the reason I lost my career was me abusing my power for sexual affairs with female subordinates.” The blond man grinned.

 

What followed explained a lot of things rather well and it didn’t exactly help to better the impression the former soldier had of the other’s mother. The exploitation and use of sex in an opportunistic way, those games with men, it was loathsome in Rex’s opinion and to him it also explained how Daniel had gone down the road he had gone. And also why the brunette man had been ungrateful and hadn’t valued his mother and his friends and the people around him. Not to mention that prostitution had been what he had seen as a viable option to make money. His mother had in a sense, prostituted herself as well, maybe not quite as directly, with a direct exchange of money for sex, but most definitely indirectly. Daniel apparently had just repeated what he had learned. He didn’t say that though even though it was burning on his tongue. Calling the man’s mother a whore was probably not a good opening act for their relationship and he had also set the goal to himself to work on his anger issues and try to be more sociable.

 

A wide smirk was to see on his face when the brunette told him that if he had not sounded as though he was teasing him he would have considered writing him a love letter. “Ah, so you’re a little romantic? Cute.” He said in a tone that almost sounded playfully as far as he was capable of sounding that way. But the fact of the matter was that this was a trait he liked in another man. Sebastian had been romantic. Quite hopelessly so and he had done things and gotten Rex to do things that the blond had found incredibly cheesy and embarrassing at first and had been throwing him at a loss but at the same time he had appreciated it. Hutson had no romantic bone in his body, he didn’t really know how to create a romantic atmosphere and not look at stuff in a quite practical pragmatic way. Sebastian had been the reason there had been lived and expressed romance and warmth and dearness in their relationship, he had taught Rex how to show those things to him. Prior to that he had felt them for Sebastian but he had had no clue as to how to show him, he had even deemed it unnecessary to show them and that just saying he loved him once had been enough but it had not been and Sebastian had demonstrated it to him by living it himself and being quite expressive with him. He had felt warm and cosy when with him, while he had never felt that at home.

 

Rex laid his head to the side when Daniel emphasised that raging Roger was his and David’s child as to express distance, as though he wouldn’t really want to associate himself with the blond’s tinfoil hat friend. “What I am saying is that if we, the two of us, are a thing now, you’ll basically inherit him too like a new partner would a child from their partner’s divorced marriage. Roger will become a thing for you too, at least on my days when I have him.” The security man explained. “I won’t give up on him! He’s a comrade and my friend, even though he is….. special…. David and I, we’re hoping that when his life gets a direction again, when he has a purpose and a reason to get up in the morning again, he might gradually become more normal and stable again. Make Roger normal again is our motto but even if he will stay a mess, I will not kick him out of my life. If I have to get him from a police station or the hospital in the middle of the night while we’re together I will do it and I’d appreciate you being on board! Getting closer to me means getting closer to those I consider my family and that’s why I want you to understand Roger and why I even told you this.”

 

His new boyfriend – it was still weird to think in those terms to him – despite saying that he could see where he was coming from was quite obviously leaning to the positive side of the whole Anderson deal. A lot of those advantages Rex could see for himself but the scepticism remained. “If we get big enough and catch their attention the media will tear us apart no matter what! Whether it’s me alone, Anderson alone or us together! They will hate us, they will demonise, defame and butcher us. They already ripped her apart for one comment into that direction.” He reminded Daniel. “What matters is that the people will disregard the lies, see through it and will understand the necessity of what we want to offer them!” the blond man said. “It’s also not like I wouldn’t have had a decent education or credit.” Hutson stated. Having been in military school, military academy and having made it to a Major General certainly was presentable. The issue was that Rex Hutson had been a Major General, that he had all the credits and at the same time harboured a secret that had led to his discharge, a scandal attached to him even if they would only figure out the official reason as to why he had been discharged, that he had abused his power to have affairs with subordinates. William Brix on the other hand got nothing. No credits. They couldn’t dig out a scandal because they couldn’t dig out anything since prior to Rex making the name up and claiming this identity he had not existed. All there was to know about William Brix was that he had appeared in the city with more money than most ordinary people had while moving into a dump and working jobs such as petrol assistant and security guard in a club and a brothel. Hiding Rex Hutson also meant hiding his achievements. The only people who knew who he really was were David and Roger.

 

Looking into the other’s eyes he saw affection and warmth and it made his heard beat faster and wings beating in his gut. The slight touch and the other’s fingers brushing through his blond hair made his skin prickle where the other touched him that gently and the man realised just how touch starved he was. Incredibly touch starved. Since so many years! It wasn’t even sexual, although he probably was pent up in that department too, no he was starved off of closeness and affection. It was embarrassing to feel that way now. “I will keep an open mind, meet up with her a few times again and see what she got to offer and how we work out together and keep in mind what you said.” He told the other but he was really more focussed on the motion of the brunette’s hand, enjoying it, reaching out his own hand, letting his fingers brush over the man’s left cheek, then over the shoulder and down his arm, his face rather close to the other’s, staring into the green eyes as if he wanted to drown in them or if he was seeking the meaning of life in them.

[♠[Rin]♠]

William had a solid point, it wasn‘t like he and his mother had been just colleges or friends, they were family, and although she was short-tempered and walked her way seemingly without regrets, she wouldn‘t know that he felt remorse until he would tell her. „You are right, but I am quite the coward, too,“ he chuckled, admitting that flaw. Maybe one day he would feel strong enough to check her hotel‘s website for a number or actually go there himself. „I haven‘t kept track of her career, but I kept a photo of her which she asked me to take in front of her hotel after it became popular.“ Twelve years was a long time, a long time in whatever could have happened. Who knew if she had been successful after his disappearance or whether she had changed business ways after all. Maybe she had gotten in contact with his father as well and they had worked something out together. He could have simply googled her name and hotel in all those years to check on her, but he was too afraid of what he would see; of maybe seeing that she was happier without him.

 

The topic ‚Roger‘ was fairly important to William, obviously. Daniel could have figured. The blonde made sure to make him understand that he would do everything for the veteran and that he wanted the brunette‘s support. „I will help you,“ the former musician promised. „And I will come along at two AM when the police or the hospital call. Maybe with the girl he is seeing now, things will get better.“

 

Though he was rather surprised himself when William asked him about his family, obviously interested in the fact that Daniel‘s last name may be well-known. „I am from Orlando,“ he answered. „Both my mother and father are children of influential families. My mother lived in Miami before marrying my father and her maiden name was McCoover. My grandfather, Frederick McCoover, owned a big advertise company. He had shops at every big location in Florida, Alabama, South Carolina, North Carolina and eventually in New York; at airports, train stations, amusement parks, in shopping centers, you name it. The basic idea of his company was to advertise expensive perfumes. He would get samples from Chanel or Boss for example and give them out to try for people passing by his little shops. Those companies paid him a lot, really a lot of money. My grandmother, however, died of cancer very early on and my mother was an only child, who got involved in the business. My father is the son of Samuel and Sarina Sutton, who sold all the farmalnd they had inherited and used the money to buy and renovate old houses in Phoenix which they sold for a greater price afterwards. At some point they had a row of small houses built and became quite popular for selling them cheaply despite the average quality. The Suttons soon moved from Arizona to Florida where my mother met my father during a business trip. I didn‘t exactly know anyone personally, but a lot of people knew my family, especially after my mother built her hotel line and her father refused to support that.“

 

Daniel laughed when William told him that his parents must have been stupid not to see that he and Sebastian had been a couple after seeing them and having them right in front of their faces. „Maybe they really didn‘t expect it and that‘s why they didn‘t even think of you being gay for a moment,“ he guessed. My mother knew after we came home from one of her business meetings. She told me if I wanted people not to know that I am gay then I might want to stop staring at guys behind their back.“ He chuckled though when the blonde called him cute for being the romantic type. „Well, yes, I like romance, I think it strengthens a relationship outside of intercourse. But I also like flirting a lot. There needs to be a balance of all three. I like friendly teasing and defeating my partner in Poker but I also like bathing together with a glass of wine and some candles.“

 

He felt delighted when William told him that he considered giving Anderson a chance. He would talk to her, keep his mind open, keep in mind what other people said and listen to her and see what she could offer him. „That‘s good. I am excited to see the end result.“ He truthfully added. The security guard lifted his own hand to stroke over Daniel‘s cheek. The brunette leaned into the touch gently; his finger ghosted over the other‘s ear and neck and moved down to the shoulder before his hand found its way back to William‘s face, cupping his cheek, staring into the sapphire eyes, seemingly free of thought. He leaned in to place a kiss on the blonde‘s chin and jawline, feeling his heart skipping a beat before pounding against his chest. His blood rushed through his veins, warming up his body from the inside. He was in fact fighting the urge to touch the other more, though he feared accidently cornering him, if that was even possible at this point, sitting so close to him, leaning against him. Then he rose his hand a little, driving his thumb over the other‘s right eyebrow. „You got a single eyebrow hair sticking out of place there.“

[-Hideki-]

A quiet snort came from Rex when he heard Daniel tell him that he was right, that he should just go see his mother and tell her but that he was quite the cowards too. And he didn’t snort because of the brunette per se but because of himself. The former soldier had never thought of himself as a coward and if one looked at his career and his life it was pretty obvious that he wasn’t one, the opposite actually. He had survived and managed situations that had not only threatened his life but the life of other men as well. He had saved other people and himself. And yet he seemed to be just as cowardly when it came to calling Arthur, trying to get in contact with his cousin again. Or to face his sisters. The ones he had let down and disappointed. Whom he should have been there to protect and had left alone with his parents! He didn’t know how they were doing, where their lives were heading at. But while he did have an interest in all of them and their lives, he had absolutely no interest in them figuring out what he was doing and how low he had sunken and where he lived. “There’ll be a day when you’ll feel confident in visiting and facing her again.” he said, not so sure if he was trying to convince Daniel or himself. Or both of them.

 

He learned that Daniel was from Florida and that his family had been businessmen in advertisement and real estate and the brunette didn’t know any of them. The latter wasn’t a surprise. It was quite fitting and Rex wondered how they had gotten that morally corrupted as the man’s parents were. Maybe they had gotten greedy over time? It however also seemed that the other’s family didn’t really look back at a long standing family tradition and name like Rex had been talking about, but that the brunette’s grandparents had just been some new-rich people. “I see. It’s different after all.” The blond told the other. “I’m from a military family. Generations of men in my family have been soldiers and served the country. My ancestors already fought in the Revolutionary War and the Civil War for the Confederacy.” The former Major General told the other, leaning back.

 

“So Florida huh?” he then addressed the other’s home state. “I’d have guessed you were from California.” He admitted and he still thought that it would have been incredibly fitting. He could definitely see Daniel as one of those California guys but apparently it had not been the case. “Miami and Orlando don’t surprise me though. They are soulless. I’m sorry you had to grow up there and it might explain your former …. Mindset… spirit….whatever you wanna call it.” Rex found and he really was sorry. “I’m from Mississippi. But I got family and ancestors in South Carolina too. My cousin Arthur lives there.” He let Daniel know, not knowing where the other man had thought he had been from or if he had thought about it at all or simply assumed he’d just be from this city before he had told him he was from the deep South. Thinking about home he realised how much he actually missed it too though. He had never managed to feel at home in the city he now lived in. He was residing there but it was not his home. He missed the friendliness, familiarity and hospitality of the people, the tradition, the wide and endless landscapes and nature, the food of his home state. It would probably never happen that he’d get used to this place he lived in now even if he was still determined to make a good impact for the people in this city too.

 

“Maybe you’re right.” Rex shrugged when Daniel said that his parents might not have expected it and thus had never seen that he was gay. “I think they never even considered the opportunity. I am their son after all. And that which must not, cannot be.” he sighed but grinned again when the other told him how he liked romance but flirting too. “I am aware. You demonstrated that to me.” He commented and it so happened that Hutson absolutely had no idea how to flirt. He never had had. He had been incredibly awkward with Sebastian before the other had finally made the move, had confessed his feelings and had kissed him. Whenever he had tried to flirt or test the waters it had resulted in extremely blunt and direct statements that had made him seem weird but had had nothing to do with flirting. One time when they had spend summer vacation together as teens and they had been swimming in the lake near Rex’s parent’s mansion he had made a complement about the other’s body that had made him want to hang himself on the nearby tree with the rope that he had build a swing for Ginny with the other day afterwards because it had been so incredibly embarrassing that he had wanted to die in that moment, especially when Sebastian’s doe eyes had looked at him and then self-consciously at his own buttocks to see if it really did look like some round, plump fruits, luscious, as he had thought that Rex had been mocking him and not giving him a complement.

 

For a moment he held his breath when Daniel was touching him back more, feeling those lips on his stubbly chin and jaw, cockying his head to the side to grant the man better access, his lips starting to prickle in anticipation, wanting to kiss the brunette, touch him more than he had, have him touch him more. There was a longing in his gaze when their eyes met and Rex’s thoughts were taken over by wanting to feel the other, to get closer to him but the thumb stroking over his eyebrow and the other’s voice announcing that an eyebrow hair of his had been sticking out of line was throwing him out of that haze. He sat up straight and coughed. “Oh.” He made. “I did?” He said, not caring about the eyebrow hair much at all. His eyes were sliding over the other man’s body that was covered by only that sweater, taking his form and those attractive legs in.

 

Hutson turned his head away before his mind could go to weird places. “I … It’s late.” He said. “I can go get my car tomorrow and after I have talked to Wendy we can, uhm, go celebrate my business idea and you hopefully getting a job, in a nice restaurant at the other side of the bridge …” the former soldier stopped himself. “Ah fuck it.” He made. “It’s a date. I’ll take you on a date tomorrow so wear something that they let you into the restaurant with.” Rex told him. “If you want to go on a date with me that is. It wasn’t an order I am not forcing you to go out with me.” He clarified.

[♠[Rin]♠]

Daniel chuckled, nodding. “Yes, Florida. A vivid state.“ Vivid was a nice thing to say about Florida. Orlando was a pretty place with a lot to do and places to spend time at, but all in all he had enjoyed his time here. He wasn’t someone to say No to a party or a glass of rum. “Well, yeah, maybe I fit into the stereotype a little,” he admitted when William stated that his former actions did make sense somehow considering where he had grown up. “I didn’t actually put you into a box when I saw you,” the brunette answered. “I did think that you weren’t from here, that you are at least from the other side of the bridge, because you didn’t fit in here. Doesn’t mean you did a good job at fooling everyone else. Maybe I thought that because I myself am not from here originally.” It made sense in his eyes. “I took an interest in your former job, though. I thought you had been with the police or the like. You just … seemed like you had been. But I quickly gave up on that because I didn’t want to create some kind of false You in my head without knowing you. Sooo, I just let it be.”

 

He couldn’t help but smile apologizingly and a little embarrassed as well. “Yeah, I sure did. It was quite bad. But it’s different when you are flirting with a stranger. Flirting with your significant other is far more fun. But I haven’t seen you react to any hints whatsoever, no matter who threw them at you, so I guess you are not the flirting type, or at least that you don’t see it when other people try to get close to you decently.” He did in fact like to flirt decently as well, though back then it hadn’t had a huge effect on the blonde anyway and he had seen it instantly. He had known that he would receive a rejection every time, thus there was no sense in putting too much effort into it. Also, it had been a brothel. It had been both the wrong time and the wrong place. There had been nothing to do right.

 

That Daniel stroked down the eyebrow hair that had been in the wrong place seemed to throw William out of his train of thought, whatever he had been thinking about. The brunette did notice a slight empty look in the other’s sapphire eyes and seeing him come back to reality was a little amusing to him, making him chuckle under his breath. “Yeah,” he confirmed when the blonde awkwardly asked about the eyebrow hair. Then William straightened his back and Daniel followed suit, looking up at him with a shimmer of curiosity in his eyes as apparently he was going to say something or change the subject. It was fine with him, after all he didn’t want to take things too far. He did feel his fingertips twitching slightly in thirst of feeling more of the other’s warm skin. It was like taking shots of a really good alcohol. The more he would do, the less he would think about what he was doing, it was always like that, it had always been like that, and he knew that he had to keep control over it. William had had problems with two one-night-stands because of his feelings towards Sebastian, but Daniel was definitely not that ‘shy’. He didn’t take just anyone, but if he found a man attractive, there was room to explore. He understood that William was the emotional kind and he did have feelings for him, though he had learned to respect the fact that some people couldn’t just turn their thoughts off and go fully relaxed into the next level.

 

“Oh, it’s late, yes? Did you read that off the clock?” Daniel asked him teasingly, pointing towards the ruined clock on the ground with a grin. However, he was about to agree to William’s offer to celebrate his company, even though it seemed a little early, when the blonde suddenly changed it into a two-people-party i.e. a date so unexpectedly. Daniel titled his head in surprise, then smiled up at the security guard. “That sounds really good, I’d love to go on a date with you. And don’t worry about sounding like you are forcing me to do anything, I’ve already gotten used to your military-standard-voice and commands.” Even though he was generally a yea-sayer, he did know William a lot better now and there was no need to thoughtlessly and carelessly follow him all the time anymore. There was courage to speak his mind because they were friends, which made Daniel more comfortable. His mother had been quite dominant as well, which had had quite the effect on him as a child, eventually making friends who would choose where they would go, what they would eat and et cetera. He had found that it was easier that way, avoiding discussions and heaty conversations, though he understood William’s fondness of hearing someone’s opinion. Conversations and actions made more sense if both parties participated fully. “How about I’ll let you know before noon about the time? I’ll have to call the restaurant because of the application and look through the apartment and check if anything’s broken or needs urgent reparation or clean-up and all that.” Daniel leaned forward a little, letting his glance move through the living room and the open kitchen area. “I won’t be able to sleep tight in this chaos, that’s for sure. I know the brothel is disgusting, but the rooms were okay to live in, and a clean room can perform miracles.” Upon remembering that William hated house chores, he turned his head to look back into the other’s eyes. “I could help you with your house chores from time to time. If you want me to, that is.”

[-Hideki-]

He rolled his eyes, hard. Rex hadn’t even known that he could roll his eyes that far as he did when he heard Daniel tell him that he hadn’t put him into a box. That he had deemed him to be from the other side of the bridge was a little funny though and the fact that he had guessed he would have been a policeman made him chuckle. “It’s not far-fetched but still false. “ he said. “I sure think our police force could definitely use me. If I were the police Commander I’d do a deep cleaning starting with this rotten district, believe me.” The blond expressed amused.

 

A sigh escaped him. A deep sigh. “I never flirted with anyone except for Sebastian. I never felt like I wanted to with anyone else. And even with him I wasn’t exactly good at flirting.” That was an understatement; he had been terrible at it. Flirting was a playful act and Rex was not a playful man for the most part. Flirting felt and seemed out of character for him to do and only Sebastian had ever made him want to act like that. It was questionable whether he would ever get to that level of trust, intimacy and comfort with another human being ever again, where he felt like fooling and playing around even though he was definitely bad at it.

 

After he had pleaded time to keep himself from losing self-control and eating Daniel up like he would a delicious steak, he was teased for it right away. “No, this one.” He answered dryly, showing the other his wristwatch that he never looked at anymore because he had a phone and that he was just wearing because Sebastian had given it to him once. “That terrorist clock is unworthy to look at.” He mumbled looking at the trashed clock still offended by the existence of its broken pieces in his homeland.

 

There was a pleased feeling within him when Daniel told him that he’d love to go on a date with him and that he’d get in contact with him to arrange the time of their date. “Good.” He said and got up from the sofa. “I’ll call the restaurant though.” the former soldier decided, stretching himself while the brunette told him that he would start to clean the apartment because he wouldn’t be able to sleep in that chaos and that he wanted the place to be clean. The former Major General looked around in the apartment. He had seen worse. And in terms of chaos Roger definitely would have won. But that wasn’t what bugged him about this apartment. It was decoration and most of all the smell. The smell of the weird seasonings and foods! The smell that reminded him of his operations abroad, of danger, of the enemy. “You should do something about their stink too.” The man recommended.

 

Nearly everything fell out of his face when Daniel voluntarily offered him to do his house chores or at least help him with them. Everything within him felt like he had won a jackpot and wanted to scream “Yes! You can have all my house chores and do my house hold!” as this would have been a dream come true. Then again a home was a really personal thing and they weren’t quite there yet. “I’ll probably resort to that offer later.” He said and it was a promise, it would definitely happen if it was going to work out with the both of them it was.

 

For a moment he looked at the other sitting on the sofa, then he leaned down, grabbed him by his neck and kissed him ‘goodnight’ in a way that was most definitely not the common understanding of a goodnight kiss. His lips were greedy, his tongue adventurous, his heart racing and his body growing hot. When he forced himself to part lips his breath felt heated and a string of saliva was connecting them, ripping apart when he stood back straight again. “Have a good night. Sleep well in your new home.” The blond told the other and out of the door he was, leaving the bomber jacket as well as the coat he had lent Daniel behind.

 

 

 

Back in his apartment he was letting himself fall onto the sofa. He couldn’t really believe or grasp what had happened there now. It felt surreal. Like a really weird kind of dream he’d wake up from every minute. But it had not been. The taste of the other’s lips still lingered on his own, his heart was beating loudly and he could feel that strange tingling sensation in his gut and a burning, a yearning in his crotch. The blond took a deep breath and laid himself back. His eyes suddenly meeting the doe eyes looking at him from all the pictures that his apartment was stuffed full with and a stinging pain and guilt was mixing itself into the wings that were beating in his chest.

 

His blue eyes looked at Sebastian on the photos and he felt like he was betraying him, asking himself what he’d think of this. Would he condemn him, feel hurt by it? Would he want him to move on and see someone else? He’d like to ask him but he couldn’t. He could just look at the pictures of past memories they had together. A smile was playing around his lips when he saw a photograph of Sebastian standing in front of the bathroom mirror, naked. He loved the picture. Not because it showed the other man’s nude body but because of the memory. How he had sneaked into the bathroom and had taken a picture and how Sebastian had looked right into the camera unknowingly when he had turned around and how he had chased Rex through the apartment to get the camera. How they had ended up jumping over the furniture, how the other had jumped at him and how they had landed on the floor, kissing and fucking, forgetting about the camera and the nude picture.

 

With a smile tugging at the side of his lips he was laying down on the sofa, thinking that Sebastian probably wanted him to just be happy since that was what he would have wanted the other man to be if situations would have been reverse. Rex turned on the TV but he was not paying any attention to it, he was just closing his eyes, listening to the mumbling voices from the reporter until he fell asleep.

 

 

 

 

Rex felt oddly light when he awoke in the morning and surprisingly motivated. More motivated than he had been in years. So as soon as he had showered, shaved and dressed himself he was taking the bus that would drive him over the bridge. It was a quiet, nice neighbourhood where he had rented the garage to park his Jeep in and he enjoyed the drive back to Harrison’s where Wendy Anderson would wait for him. He had always enjoyed driving. Rex had taken Sebastian onto seemingly endless road trips throughout the nation. Sometimes he had even liked to get into his car and drive without any destination. Just driving around through the night and then returning home. If that neighbourhood wasn’t such a shithole, he’d park his car right in front of his house and never take the bus ever. He hated public transportation. Was there anything worse than public transportation?

 

Entering Harrison’s bar he couldn’t see Anderson yet but David was there… or rather still there. He looked wracked. He was severely drunk, his face looked like that of a zombie because he hadn’t slept and he was staring at an empty spot, his hand holding an equally empty glass. Rex raised an eyebrow and Harrison who caught up on that didn’t waste his time with a greeting but said: “He never went home. I asked him to but he wouldn’t move. And because I trust him enough I let him stay. And when I came back he was still sitting there like that. Doesn’t talk either.” The old bar owner informed Rex who was sighing.

 

He sat down opposite to the policeman who had just lost his job for doing his job. Rex was giving him a punch against his shoulder. “Hey!” he said and David looked at him, still saying nothing. “You should go home. Drink some water. Sleep. Get some rest. And when you’re clearer, we’ll see what we’re gonna do now.” he suggested and David snorted. “I will join your stupid vigilant company. What do I have to lose?” the man expressed. “Or I’ll move to South Korea where my wife and kids are hiding from that terrorist rioting anti-police mob who threatened my family. But I don’t speak Korean and I don’t want to live there either!” He yelled and slammed his fist onto the table hard enough for it to nearly break. “And now they have basically agreed with those criminal pieces of shit by practically convicting me! By firing me!” he screamed so loudly that all other people were looking at them. “They should arrest the criminal rioters and punish them.” It broke out of the man with the red beard. “I know.” Rex said, stood and then made David stand up from his chair too.

 

“But you really need to stop drinking and go home now.” he insisted and turned around to one of the regulars, who was an abstinent alcoholic who now ordered non-alcoholic bear all day instead. “Ronny, drive him home.” Rex told him. “Would you.” He added and Ronny stood. “Yeah.” He said. “Come on man. We get ya home. You can tell me all about those thugs threatening your family. My son and his friends can get them a real good beating. Will teach them.” The man said and normally David would have disapproved, but he didn’t, he just let the man move him along.

 

 

The former Major General had just gotten seated and had checked his phone to see whether Daniel had texted him when Wendy Anderson was entering the country style bar, looking around for him, punctual like a clockwork. Not early like Rex used to be but spot on. The woman looked different than she had looked in the gym the other day. She was wearing a black women’s suit, her ridiculously long hair was open and falling down on her body in smooth strands and she had put some natural make-up on, making her appear less harsh.

 

She was carrying a large document file and smiled friendly when she spotted him. “Good afternoon! Nice little bar. I wouldn’t have suspected something this rural and traditional out here.” Wendy commented let the heavy file drop onto the plate of the table. “What is in there?” Rex was curious. “My basic ideas for a possible business model I worked out after I got home from the gym yesterday. I had to do an all-nighter but caffeine is your friend.” She informed him and Hutson raised his eyebrows not unimpressed and definitely approving of her working morale.

 

He pulled the file towards himself and read over a few headlines and pages and it was clear that she knew a lot more about economics and business than he ever had. “You can take your time. Read through it and decide what you think about my work and a partnership. I also….” She started and pulled out her phone. “Have the perfect location. My friend Thomas Miller founded an IT Start-Up a few years back, it went incredibly well, it expanded and now he is a billionaire. Anyway, he recently closed down the former headquarters in this area and moved it to the other side of the bridge as well and wanted to sale the rooms of the old headquarters as living space to make the most money out of it. However the headquarters would be perfect for us for a start. Not to mention that it is equipped with the newest technology and if it was arranged for our purpose it would be fantastic. So I called him and told him about the idea and that I would be interested in it and he agreed to give it to us. He’s even set up the technology how we need it. He’d just want to be our official sponsor in return.” The woman informed him, showing him pictures of the location and the rooms.

 

It sounded great. The location looked indeed perfect but there was one thing. Thomas Miller! He knew about him. He had read about the guy. His business. His success. His politics. “Thomas Miller has no morale. He advocated for the legalisation of drugs! Do you understand, drugs! Why would someone like him even do that?” Rex stated and Wendy looked at him. “Well, he is a libertarian. His morale and values are freedom and individual liberty.” The woman told him. “And he is rather concerned with ideologies and cultures being flooded into our nation that are authoritarian and don’t respect individual liberty and human rights.” Wendy explained. “Anyway! He probably is as generous because we are friends and were lovers once.” Anderson told him and Rex looked at her incredibly confused. “But he’s gay. And you, aren’t you a dyke?” the blond had read about Miller that he had married a man and had made a way too overblown wedding celebration out of it and Wendy, well, she just had to be a lesbian the way she was. Or was he just thinking like Roger now?

 

“No! Why does everyone always think that! I am not a dyke. I have six children. And had three divorces but that’s not the point. I’m not a lesbian.” She made that very clear. “Thomas and I grew up together in Vermont. We’re childhood friends. And we were a couple in high-school, we went to prom together but when we went to different colleges he admitted being gay to himself and broke up with me.” Wendy told him and at least he learned more about her now but Rex had gotten caught up on one fact. “Six children! Six! How did you become a member of an execution board, come up with something like this…”he pointed at the file. “… in one day and be a mother of six?” it sounded impossible. Like Anderson had to be some kind of superhero if she wanted to manage that! “Well, I love being a mother and I think that children are our future and that we should have more children again. But my career always was important to me too. And with the help of their grandma and a fulltime nanny who lives in our house it’s absolutely no problem whatsoever.” she let him know.

[♠[Rin]♠]

„Oh.“ The brunette narrowed his eyebrows slightly at the answer of the blonde, glancing down at the watch around the other‘s wrist. He had forgotten for a second that the other wasn‘t so good with humour twenty-four-seven. It was unusual for people to still wear watches today, though it somehow suited the serious appearance William had. Then the security stood up, seemingly to say good-bye. He said he thought think about the offer of him to help with the house chores, which was more than Daniel had expected since he had thought the other would decline out of discipline. Judging by that, he still had a pretty strict picture of William apparently, whose frames were slowly losing up, whose paint was softening with every moment they shared. It didn‘t make William more or less appealing, it was just a confirmation that the blonde was seriously trying to lower the walls he had built up long ago. Daniel‘s feelings didn‘t waver by slight movements, he was too stubborn by nature to let things go easily, even if he wanted to, so there was little he could complain about. It was no wonder that he still looked at the security guard with no doubt in his eyes about the attractiveness of him.

 

When William leaned down to connect their lips, Daniel was pulled out of his train of thought. Unexpectedly, the kiss turned passionate and wild, and the brunette leaned up to get a better grip of William‘s lips to return it. However, when they parted and Daniel wiped off the saliva stuck to his lips with the back of his hand, the security guard was ready to go. Apparently, it had been a good-night kiss, though other people would understand it as an invitation instead. „Sure. Thanks. You sleep well too,“ Daniel answered smiling, and before he could grasp it, the blonde was out of ‚his‘ apartment and the door shut close, leaving the room in silence and suddenly much colder. Daniel dropped back against the couch, his back meeting the soft backrest, his head lying on the backrest‘s top. He exhaled through his nose. He couldn‘t put his finger on what he was feeling right now, everything mixed up inside his chest. He hadn‘t thought that he would feel something like that so easily again after abandoning everyone in his life, though he figured that William didn‘t either. Daniel hadn‘t lost someone he had loved, he couldn‘t possibly fathom what the blonde was feeling, and yet there was still some guilt in the mixture. He tried to convince himself that William had wanted to start the relationship, to kiss him, but had he wanted it for his own good or just to feel anything after such a long time besides sorrow and pain?

 

Daniel‘s eyes rolled to the side, his tired gaze meeting the jacket and the coat William had left behind. His glance moved back up to the spiderwebs in the corner, before he closed his eyes for a moment. Then he stood up and checked the kitchen for cleaning supplies, softly looking through the drawers and the armoires because he was aware that other renters were already asleep. He found cloths, windex and a bathroom cleaner, which was enough to work with at the moment. He used the wet the cloth and cleaned the fragile-looking hallstand next to the door, before hanging William‘s jacket and coat on its branches. Daniel opened the windows to let the airflow do its work on the scents in the rooms. As per usual, the bathroom was always the worst place to neglect and to see in how bad of a condition the apartment really was, checking it was the best option. Before that he quickly got rid of the spiderwebs and the spiders, then went into the bathroom. It was a little small, but it had a shower, a toilet and a sink. The little boxes on the dresser next to the shower and the dresser itself looked messy searched and were opened and empty, except for some towels and toilet paper lying on the ground. The tiles looked fine and most of the dirt was located in the corners. The sink was alright, the shower definitely needed some thorough cleaning and he spotted two sliverfish in it, which he quickly got rid of. „God damn it,“ he mumbled. Silverfish were nothing to joke about. Apparently they had been hiding under the shower‘s plug, which was standing up a little so the water would flow down the drain. The last thing he wanted as a colony of those things. Daniel went back into the kitchen to look for honey or sugar and baking powder. He mixed the sugar and baking powder that he found in a bowl, returned to the bathroom and spread the mixture around the plug. Then the closed the shower and checked other possible places where silverfish liked to gather; like the kitchen, behind the armoires, but luckily couldn‘t find any. Daniel put most of the things and belongings he didn‘t need into a trash bag, including the destroyed clock, and decided to only clean the bathroom for now. It took him a fair amount of time to make the grey-ish looking sink and the inside of the toilet white again, but at last he was satisfied with the work, and threw away the gloves he had been wearing.

 

The bed wasn‘t ready yet to sleep in for him as he hadn‘t had a chance to wash the sheets, so Daniel decided to sleep on the couch instead. He had changed into comfortable sweat pants, a pair of socks, a t-shirt and a sweater on top, and yet it was cold, severely cold, despite having closed every window and the doors. The sofa wasn‘t big enough to roll to any side as one could in a bed, yet he turned around multiple times and yet couldn‘t find a right position to fall asleep in. At some point he opened his eyes, not knowing what time it was, though it was probably really later, or really early in the morning. The sun still hadn‘t risen, which was a good sign. Being up all night for his job as a whore was kicking in. He didn‘t feel energetic, but was apparently not tired enough either. The idea of looking for tea and making some hit his head, but he knew that if he stood up, he wouldn‘t get to lay down again so soon, so he just stayed put and closed his eyes, hiding his face in his arms. Time passed by without him noticing. By the time the sun was close to rising, exhaustion finally pulled him into the land of dreams.

 

- - -

 

In the morning, or rather, around noon, Daniel woke up. He sat up on the couch, stretching his limbs and back, arms over his head, feeling the tense spots from sleeping on a new surface other than his bed at the brothel. He yawned into his palm and dragged himself off the couch. He wanted to go to the bathroom and accidently entered the kids‘ room instead at first before finding the right door. He washed his face and looked into the mirror. He didn‘t look as bad as he had thought he would, which made the day a little bit better. Then the realisation that he still had to text William about the time of their date hit him almost as hard as the smell of the baking powder coming from the closed shower, reminding him of his little silverfish-kill-experiment. Curiously, he opened the shower doors and could indeed see a fair amount of dead silverfish lying in the mixture around the shower drain. Quickly he got a plastic bag from the kitchen, put on a pair of gloves and proceeded to get rid of the little corpses and most of the baking powder and sugar. The remains he then washed down the drain and the bag‘s inside he flushed down the toilet, then threw the it into the trash. One look at his phone‘s clock told him that it was five minutes past twelve. „Talk about responsibility,“ he sighed to himself for waking up this late. Though, if he hasted, there was time to clean the shower and actually take a shower too, which he did right after after planning that in his head. A warm shower was what really woke him up and made his tense muscles relax a little. Though he didn‘t waste much time in it as he left the shower right after cleaning himself to brush his teeth and comb his wet hair. He changed into another pair of sweatpants and a black tanktop, before he got the paper of information about the job application at the restaurant they had visited the day prior.

 

The requirements weren‘t that hard to meet. He did have experience in working as a waiter, just without a contract of course because he had been a teenager working at his mother‘s hotel, but it was better than nothing. They didn‘t even expect a highschool degree, apparently it was only ‚advantageous‘ to have one, but they did demand good English competence. Knowing an European language was advantageous as well, though a full B2 competence level wasn‘t a requirement either. Daniel did know French on a B2 level and a Italian and Russian on an A2 level, whereas Russian had been very difficult to learn and Italian had never sparked his interest. Languages were the basics of every business, or so his mother had told him. If one was able to communicate with others well, there were more and better deals to make. Daniel would have been supposed to improve those languages to a C2 speaking competence level, but his career of a singer and songwriter had been in the way and he hadn‘t used a lot of those competences throughout the few years of being a celebrity, because he had stayed in the states most of the time anyway. A few of his singles had been in the charts in Europe, but otherwise he hadn‘t ever gotten in contact with anyone of the other side of the world. Another requirement was the experience of one year of being a cashier, which was the only one he couldn‘t meet entirely, since he had worked as... well, he had had many jobs at once at the hotel throughout his childhood and teenage years. Cleaning, cooking, cashiering, accounting… It would probably depend on if the boss of the restaurant approved of all that, minus the mild child labour, and would count it as valuable experience.

 

Daniel checked his e-mail, though the other places he had applied to hadn‘t answered him yet. He then called the restaurant by the number the waitress had written down for him and got through to a secretary. The person had a husky voice and sounded like an elderly woman, but she was being polite and friendly when he asked about the wanted sign on the restaurant‘s windows. She told him she would send him a paper to fill and sign via e-mail and that he was supposed to send it back along with his r?sum?, afterwards they would get back to him. Seemingly the restaurant was in need of new workers, though they were thorough about whom they were choosing. Daniel gave her his personal information and thanked her before hanging up. A growl coming from his stomach made him check the fridge for something to eat while he waited for arrival of the promised e-mail. It was full of vegetables and fruits, but at least most of them were still edible, the rest… was ready for the biowaste. Daniel threw the expired food away and ate a banana and some tomatoes to satisfy his stomach for the time being.

 

The procedure of filling in the paper on his phone, - as he didn‘t own a laptop - photographing his r?sum? and sending it all packaged back to the restaurant took him another hour. The day had hit two pm already. Going back to cleaning the apartment, Daniel wondered how William‘s talk with Anderson was going or whether they had already come to a conclusion, depending on when they had met. He was really interested in hearing whether or not they would be become business partners.

 

When the time stroke 3 pm, Daniel checked his e-mail again to see if the restaurant had responded, and really, there was an unread e-mail. They were interested as he met some of the qualifications, seemingly enough enough to offer him for a job interview for the next today at 6.15 am. A great amount of pressure that he hadn‘t even known about fell off his shoulders as he read that. He knew that there was still a chance they would find someone better or that the interviewer would find him unqualified eventually, but it was a step forward. Apparently, he was not so bad at being invited to interviews, but if he would get the jobs he had applied for was still unclear.

 

‚I was just invited to a job interview at the restaurant for tomorrow morning, so you are free to choose the time for going out tonight,‘ he texted William, then got back to cleaning without wasting time. He could feel satisfaction growing within as more and more of the few rooms were stripped off their dirt and dust. The kids‘ room was still full of toys and had two cheap mattresses on the floor which served as beds. There was a chance he could donate the toys after cleaning and washing them to an orphanage, so he packed them up in a separate bag, but the mattresses were useless as there were stains of urine on them, so he decided to stack them for now in the corner and get rid of them later. In the kitchen there was the list for the washing machine rooms, who got to use the machines on which days, and apparently his apartment number‘s turn was tomorrow and on Sundays, so tomorrow he would get to wash the bedsheets. Since he didn‘t have a mob, he decided to wipe most of the floor by hand with the cloths and then used the small vacuum cleaner to get rid of most of the remaining dust. At some point, he would need to wash the cloths in a washing machine as well, as the smell wouldn‘t leave just by handwashing them, so he decided to stop the cleaning for the day and do the rest tomorrow. He also moved some of the furniture around; for example the table and the chairs to the right side of the room next to the windows, and the TV and the couch to the left corner so they would be out of the way.

 

At last, he threw the plastic one-use gloves away as well, closed the trash bags with some knots and dropped on the sofa, looking at his reflection in the TV display. There was some dust on his tanktop and the sweatpants, as expected, and the skin of his hands and fingers had become soft because of the water and the cleaning liquids, despite wearing gloves. He was just about to rest; his eyelids becoming a little heavy, when he remembered that William wanted him to ‚wear something a restaurant would let him enter in‘. That also reminded him that he still had to unpack his clothes. The brunette stood up, looking around. Where had he left his phone? And what time was it? „I seriously need a clock in every room from now on.“

[♠[Rin]♠]

„Oh.“ The brunette narrowed his eyebrows slightly at the answer of the blonde, glancing down at the watch around the other‘s wrist. He had forgotten for a second that the other wasn‘t so good with humour twenty-four-seven. It was unusual for people to still wear watches today, though it somehow suited the serious appearance William had. Then the security stood up, seemingly to say good-bye. He said he thought think about the offer of him to help with the house chores, which was more than Daniel had expected since he had thought the other would decline out of discipline. Judging by that, he still had a pretty strict picture of William apparently, whose frames were slowly losing up, whose paint was softening with every moment they shared. It didn‘t make William more or less appealing, it was just a confirmation that the blonde was seriously trying to lower the walls he had built up long ago. Daniel‘s feelings didn‘t waver by slight movements, he was too stubborn by nature to let things go easily, even if he wanted to, so there was little he could complain about. It was no wonder that he still looked at the security guard with no doubt in his eyes about the attractiveness of him.

 

When William leaned down to connect their lips, Daniel was pulled out of his train of thought. Unexpectedly, the kiss turned passionate and wild, and the brunette leaned up to get a better grip of William‘s lips to return it. However, when they parted and Daniel wiped off the saliva stuck to his lips with the back of his hand, the security guard was ready to go. Apparently, it had been a good-night kiss, though other people would understand it as an invitation instead. „Sure. Thanks. You sleep well too,“ Daniel answered smiling, and before he could grasp it, the blonde was out of ‚his‘ apartment and the door shut close, leaving the room in silence and suddenly much colder. Daniel dropped back against the couch, his back meeting the soft backrest, his head lying on the backrest‘s top. He exhaled through his nose. He couldn‘t put his finger on what he was feeling right now, everything mixed up inside his chest. He hadn‘t thought that he would feel something like that so easily again after abandoning everyone in his life, though he figured that William didn‘t either. Daniel hadn‘t lost someone he had loved, he couldn‘t possibly fathom what the blonde was feeling, and yet there was still some guilt in the mixture. He tried to convince himself that William had wanted to start the relationship, to kiss him, but had he wanted it for his own good or just to feel anything after such a long time besides sorrow and pain?

 

Daniel‘s eyes rolled to the side, his tired gaze meeting the jacket and the coat William had left behind. His glance moved back up to the spiderwebs in the corner, before he closed his eyes for a moment. Then he stood up and checked the kitchen for cleaning supplies, softly looking through the drawers and the armoires because he was aware that other renters were already asleep. He found cloths, windex and a bathroom cleaner, which was enough to work with at the moment. He used the wet the cloth and cleaned the fragile-looking hallstand next to the door, before hanging William‘s jacket and coat on its branches. Daniel opened the windows to let the airflow do its work on the scents in the rooms. As per usual, the bathroom was always the worst place to neglect and to see in how bad of a condition the apartment really was, checking it was the best option. Before that he quickly got rid of the spiderwebs and the spiders, then went into the bathroom. It was a little small, but it had a shower, a toilet and a sink. The little boxes on the dresser next to the shower and the dresser itself looked messy searched and were opened and empty, except for some towels and toilet paper lying on the ground. The tiles looked fine and most of the dirt was located in the corners. The sink was alright, the shower definitely needed some thorough cleaning and he spotted two sliverfish in it, which he quickly got rid of. „God damn it,“ he mumbled. Silverfish were nothing to joke about. Apparently they had been hiding under the shower‘s plug, which was standing up a little so the water would flow down the drain. The last thing he wanted as a colony of those things. Daniel went back into the kitchen to look for honey or sugar and baking powder. He mixed the sugar and baking powder that he found in a bowl, returned to the bathroom and spread the mixture around the plug. Then the closed the shower and checked other possible places where silverfish liked to gather; like the kitchen, behind the armoires, but luckily couldn‘t find any. Daniel put most of the things and belongings he didn‘t need into a trash bag, including the destroyed clock, and decided to only clean the bathroom for now. It took him a fair amount of time to make the grey-ish looking sink and the inside of the toilet white again, but at last he was satisfied with the work, and threw away the gloves he had been wearing.

 

The bed wasn‘t ready yet to sleep in for him as he hadn‘t had a chance to wash the sheets, so Daniel decided to sleep on the couch instead. He had changed into comfortable sweat pants, a pair of socks, a t-shirt and a sweater on top, and yet it was cold, severely cold, despite having closed every window and the doors. The sofa wasn‘t big enough to roll to any side as one could in a bed, yet he turned around multiple times and yet couldn‘t find a right position to fall asleep in. At some point he opened his eyes, not knowing what time it was, though it was probably really later, or really early in the morning. The sun still hadn‘t risen, which was a good sign. Being up all night for his job as a whore was kicking in. He didn‘t feel energetic, but was apparently not tired enough either. The idea of looking for tea and making some hit his head, but he knew that if he stood up, he wouldn‘t get to lay down again so soon, so he just stayed put and closed his eyes, hiding his face in his arms. Time passed by without him noticing. By the time the sun was close to rising, exhaustion finally pulled him into the land of dreams.

 

- - -

 

In the morning, or rather, around noon, Daniel woke up. He sat up on the couch, stretching his limbs and back, arms over his head, feeling the tense spots from sleeping on a new surface other than his bed at the brothel. He yawned into his palm and dragged himself off the couch. He wanted to go to the bathroom and accidently entered the kids‘ room instead at first before finding the right door. He washed his face and looked into the mirror. He didn‘t look as bad as he had thought he would, which made the day a little bit better. Then the realisation that he still had to text William about the time of their date hit him almost as hard as the smell of the baking powder coming from the closed shower, reminding him of his little silverfish-kill-experiment. Curiously, he opened the shower doors and could indeed see a fair amount of dead silverfish lying in the mixture around the shower drain. Quickly he got a plastic bag from the kitchen, put on a pair of gloves and proceeded to get rid of the little corpses and most of the baking powder and sugar. The remains he then washed down the drain and the bag‘s inside he flushed down the toilet, then threw the it into the trash. One look at his phone‘s clock told him that it was five minutes past twelve. „Talk about responsibility,“ he sighed to himself for waking up this late. Though, if he hasted, there was time to clean the shower and actually take a shower too, which he did right after after planning that in his head. A warm shower was what really woke him up and made his tense muscles relax a little. Though he didn‘t waste much time in it as he left the shower right after cleaning himself to brush his teeth and comb his wet hair. He changed into another pair of sweatpants and a black tanktop, before he got the paper of information about the job application at the restaurant they had visited the day prior.

 

The requirements weren‘t that hard to meet. He did have experience in working as a waiter, just without a contract of course because he had been a teenager working at his mother‘s hotel, but it was better than nothing. They didn‘t even expect a highschool degree, apparently it was only ‚advantageous‘ to have one, but they did demand good English competence. Knowing an European language was advantageous as well, though a full B2 competence level wasn‘t a requirement either. Daniel did know French on a B2 level and a Italian and Russian on an A2 level, whereas Russian had been very difficult to learn and Italian had never sparked his interest. Languages were the basics of every business, or so his mother had told him. If one was able to communicate with others well, there were more and better deals to make. Daniel would have been supposed to improve those languages to a C2 speaking competence level, but his career of a singer and songwriter had been in the way and he hadn‘t used a lot of those competences throughout the few years of being a celebrity, because he had stayed in the states most of the time anyway. A few of his singles had been in the charts in Europe, but otherwise he hadn‘t ever gotten in contact with anyone of the other side of the world. Another requirement was the experience of one year of being a cashier, which was the only one he couldn‘t meet entirely, since he had worked as... well, he had had many jobs at once at the hotel throughout his childhood and teenage years. Cleaning, cooking, cashiering, accounting… It would probably depend on if the boss of the restaurant approved of all that, minus the mild child labour, and would count it as valuable experience.

 

Daniel checked his e-mail, though the other places he had applied to hadn‘t answered him yet. He then called the restaurant by the number the waitress had written down for him and got through to a secretary. The person had a husky voice and sounded like an elderly woman, but she was being polite and friendly when he asked about the wanted sign on the restaurant‘s windows. She told him she would send him a paper to fill and sign via e-mail and that he was supposed to send it back along with his r?sum?, afterwards they would get back to him. Seemingly the restaurant was in need of new workers, though they were thorough about whom they were choosing. Daniel gave her his personal information and thanked her before hanging up. A growl coming from his stomach made him check the fridge for something to eat while he waited for arrival of the promised e-mail. It was full of vegetables and fruits, but at least most of them were still edible, the rest… was ready for the biowaste. Daniel threw the expired food away and ate a banana and some tomatoes to satisfy his stomach for the time being.

 

The procedure of filling in the paper on his phone, - as he didn‘t own a laptop - photographing his r?sum? and sending it all packaged back to the restaurant took him another hour. The day had hit two pm already. Going back to cleaning the apartment, Daniel wondered how William‘s talk with Anderson was going or whether they had already come to a conclusion, depending on when they had met. He was really interested in hearing whether or not they would be become business partners.

 

When the time stroke 3 pm, Daniel checked his e-mail again to see if the restaurant had responded, and really, there was an unread e-mail. They were interested as he met some of the qualifications, seemingly enough enough to offer him for a job interview for the next Monday at 6.15 am. A great amount of pressure that he hadn‘t even known about fell off his shoulders as he read that. He knew that there was still a chance they would find someone better or that the interviewer would find him unqualified eventually, but it was a step forward. Apparently, he was not so bad at being invited to interviews, but if he would get the jobs he had applied for was still unclear.

 

‚I was just invited to a job interview at the restaurant for next week, so you are free to choose the time for going out tonight,‘ he texted William, then got back to cleaning without wasting time. He could feel satisfaction growing within as more and more of the few rooms were stripped off their dirt and dust. The kids‘ room was still full of toys and had two cheap mattresses on the floor which served as beds. There was a chance he could donate the toys after cleaning and washing them to an orphanage, so he packed them up in a separate bag, but the mattresses were useless as there were stains of urine on them, so he decided to stack them for now in the corner and get rid of them later. In the kitchen there was the list for the washing machine rooms, who got to use the machines on which days, and apparently his apartment number‘s turn was tomorrow and on Sundays, so tomorrow he would get to wash the bedsheets. Since he didn‘t have a mob, he decided to wipe most of the floor by hand with the cloths and then used the small vacuum cleaner to get rid of most of the remaining dust. At some point, he would need to wash the cloths in a washing machine as well, as the smell wouldn‘t leave just by handwashing them, so he decided to stop the cleaning for the day and do the rest tomorrow. He also moved some of the furniture around; for example the table and the chairs to the right side of the room next to the windows, and the TV and the couch to the left corner so they would be out of the way.

 

At last, he threw the plastic one-use gloves away as well, closed the trash bags with some knots and dropped on the sofa, looking at his reflection in the TV display. There was some dust on his tanktop and the sweatpants, as expected, and the skin of his hands and fingers had become soft because of the water and the cleaning liquids, despite wearing gloves. He was just about to rest; his eyelids becoming a little heavy, when he remembered that William wanted him to ‚wear something a restaurant would let him enter in‘. That also reminded him that he still had to unpack his clothes. The brunette stood up, looking around. Where had he left his phone? And what time was it? „I seriously need a clock in every room from now on.“

[-Hideki-]

Rex wasn’t exactly a fan of the idea of kids getting shoved onto their grandparents and even worse on nannies. To him a mother had to be there for her children and raise them and he thought that motherhood should be the priority over a career for a woman if she was a mother. Then again he didn’t think that women shouldn’t work at all or couldn’t juggle family and work when the kids had reached a certain age like his own mother thought. Hutson’s mum had picked women to pieces who had worked or decided to not want to be a mother or housewife, she had even gone so far as to deny them their womanhood since to Rex’s mum womanhood was equating motherhood.

 

He had just wanted to say something when his phone buzzed and normally he would have ignored it but because he was waiting for Daniels message he was pulling it out and read that the brunette was free the entire day and that he could freely choose the time. ‘Alright! I will pick you up after I am done with Anderson. Be ready!’ he typed back and the peroxide blond woman looked at him curiously. “Something important?” she asked. And Rex put back the phone immediately. “Sorry.” He apologised. “Something private?” she concluded. “Yeah.” The former Major General coughed. “I got a … I kind of have a date.” He admitted and the woman grinned. “What a lucky lady! You like her a lot?” Wendy commented. “No. I mean, it’s not a lady. It’s a man.”

 

Surprise stood written on Anderson’s face and she examined him as to find a hint, a cue she had been overlooking there. “I wouldn’t have guessed that you were gay!” she commented. “Why not?” the blond asked and Wendy thought about it. “You just don’t seem gay.” The lady then said. “So probably for the same reason as to why everyone thinks that I am a dyke although I am not.” She admitted and Rex let out a snorting laugh, grinning.

 

 

 

Hutson had agreed to read through her whole business idea and plan and to let her know whether he was making her his equal partner or not soon. And when she was gone he didn’t stay at Harrison’s for a drink, he left and got into his car, throwing the massive file onto the passenger’s seat feeling mild excitement to seeing Daniel again, to go out with him, although he’d never admit this. Instead he called the restaurant.

 

When he reached his apartment he was taking another shower, doing his hair and getting dressed in a black suit. He was even wearing a tie and dress-shoes. Checking whether he looked dashing enough and finding that it probably wouldn’t get better than this – the last time he had cared how he looked had been as a teenager when he had wanted Sebastian to notice him in a different way than just as his friend – he got on his way to pick up Daniel, what meant out of the door and across the floor.

 

He knocked three times and then waited in front of the apartment door where the illegals had lived previously and where, thanks to him, Daniel lived now. His boyfriend. He had a boyfriend. It was still surreal. He had never thought that he’d ever have a boyfriend again after Sebastian. But there he was going on a date wearing a suit, feeling excited. He wanted to punch himself for feeling excited like some bloody high-school boy. Jeez, he’d never tell anyone. Roger would mock him for eternity if he knew that Rex was excited to see the brunette, a former prostitute, whom he was falling for and going on a date with him.

 

When the door opened and his blue gaze met the green eyes of the shorter man he reached out his arms and his hands grabbed the other by the hip, bending down, pressing a kiss onto the man’s lips to say ‘Hello’, the whole thing escalating again as he wanted to taste those lips more, deepening the kiss and he stepped inside of the apartment and slammed the door shut behind them, his hormones and blood raging.

 

“I’m good to go.” He then said when they parted lips, only getting aware of the ambiguousness of that statement in that situation after he had said it, a slight rosy flush appearing on his pale face again. “To the restaurant, I mean.”

[♠[Rin]♠]

His phone vibrated on the kitchen counter. Daniel reached over to pick it up while with his other hand he was sorting the seasonings out. It was a text from William, letting him know that he would be picking him up after the meeting with Anderson had ended. Now, he wasn’t sure how far they had gotten already and how much time exactly he had. It was probably better to slowly start getting ready, he thought, so he finished his little sorting task and closed the cabinet door gently. He walked into the bedroom, remembering that he still hadn’t unpacked his clothes. Sighing, he knelt in front of the big bag and unzipped it, carefully taking out the folded piles of clothes. While Daniel looked through the colours available, he pieced together a few outfits that might be fitting for a restaurant visit. He didn’t know the restaurant William was planning to go to, yet alone the dress code, if they had one. The blonde had implied that it had to be something elegant at least.

 

The brunette crossed his legs on the floor and stared at the pile in front of him for a minute thoughtfully before he got up and started to transfer everything into the wardrobe the former owners had left behind. The clothes that had been in there he had already gotten rid of, plus cleaning the inside of some minor dust and the scent of old clothing. After he was done, Daniel crossed his arms, trying to decide on what to wear. He was getting nervous minute by minute as he was just standing there, until he once again sighed to him as well. “It’s been too long, god damn it.” He had been good with fashion back then, but partly only because his mother had always kept track of the model magazines. Needless to say, he had been in his early twenties and most of the clothes he had worn had been fitting for people his age. Nowadays, twelve years later, as a thirty-six-year-old, he couldn’t pull off tight black jeans, a one-sided tanktop, a leather jacket and a chain necklace. It had to be something subtle yet not a Dad-outfit.

 

In the end Daniel went for wine-red trousers, a blue shirt and the grey blazer. He combed his hair again and brushed his teeth once more, then looked at himself in the bathroom mirror. To him his appearance was acceptable, and he was certain that if William didn’t agree, the blonde would let him know.

It didn’t take a lot of time for William to appear, or at least Daniel expected it to be him when he heard the knocks on his door. He drove his fingers through his hair and cleaned his throat, then walked up to the door and opened it. Upon seeing the blonde, his lips curled into a smile. “He-” He was cut off by William leaning down and connecting their lips. Daniel felt the other’s hands on his hips and brought his own hands up to cup his face. William took a step into the apartment and shut the door quickly, deepening the kiss. Daniel could feel his heart pounding against his chest, going from zero to a hundred within a moment, blood rushing through his veins, a tingling sensation spreading in the tips of his fingers. As soon as they broke the kiss, Daniel looked back up into the blue ocean of the other’s eyes, and narrowed his eyebrows slightly at the first statement, before he chuckled at the second one. “Okay. It’s nice to see you again.” He said, leaning in to touch William’s nose tip with his own in an affectionate manner. Then he let go of the blonde’s cheeks and picked up his wallet and the keys off the TV table. “How did the little meeting go? I am so curious,” he admitted. “Also, I hang up your jacket and coat,” he added, pointing towards the hallstand next to the door. “I am a little excited to see you drive, too.” He hadn’t sat in a car in years, though it had always been fun to him to see other people’s driving style. Monique had been quite the relaxed driver, too relaxed even, almost careless, though she had been lucky every time to avoid a car accident. His mother had been a strictly law-bound driver, but also a very impatient one. Daniel had become a patient driver over the years. As a teenager he had often exceeded the speed limits and nothing too bad had happened aside from a ticket or two, but he had grown out of that phase quickly after high-school.

 

The duo exited the apartment and Daniel locked the door, putting the key chain into the right pocket and his wallet into the left back pocket. Now that they were going to a restaurant, he would get to see a few of William’s eating preferences. As he had learnt, the blonde didn’t care a lot for cooking, oftentimes heating up pre-made food from the store, and a visit at a restaurant would show what he actually liked. It wasn’t necessarily a bad thing to consume prepared frozen meals, though six years of a healthy and strict diet had taught him that some foods were responsible for bad moods or even mood swings and a feeling of sluggishness if consumed too often.

[-Hideki-]

It was such a simple statement, nothing too special really but it made his heart race in his chest when he was told that Daniel was glad to see him again. This was something he hadn’t heard someone say to him in years in this manner. He hadn’t felt wanted and embraced in years and the slight, affectionate touch of their noses made a slight hum escape him. It had been as though Rex’s life had been a cold, dark, grey, moist room, without wallpapers, carpet and a broken heater. A freezing lifeless mess and now someone had repaired the heater and warmth was streaming through it for the first time in an eternity.

 

When the other man grabbed his wallet and his keys he asked how the meeting with Anderson had gone and told him that he had hung up his jacket and coat he had forgotten when Rex had practically fled from his own desire that had grown louder and louder within him the other night and that he was excite to see him drive. “Thanks.” He said about the coat and the jacket but raised an eyebrow at the expression that he was excited to see him drive. “Why?” he asked. Did he expect him to drive a certain way? “What do you think how I drive?” he asked. Rex applied common sense and logic while driving. He had a remarkable understanding of the technology – he could theoretically dissect the whole thing and put it back together again – and of physics and he had proven that he could drive at all kinds of territory and even under shelling. He had even driven where there had been no actual roads and no traffic regulations. So one could say he was a decent driver and knew a thing or two about vehicles.

 

After they had exited the apartment and where walking the long way down the stairs – now that he was basically in charge here, he’d urge that rat of a landlord to have the elevator repaired – he answered the other man’s question concerning Wendy. “My meeting with her was good. Interesting! I learned some surprising things about her.” He told the brunette. “That she is not a dyke for one.” He let the other know what had surprised him the most first. “And that she has six kids.” The former Major General added and then went over to the business related stuff. “She also showed up with a large file with a full fetched business concept that I will have to read through – you can take a look at it, I put it on the passenger’s seat – and she’s already found the perfect location for the company that we’d actually get for free if we’d make the owner’s business our sponsor.” He told Daniel. “The catch is that the bloke is some new rich libertarian billionaire without decent social conservative values.” The blond male let the other know. “He is Anderson’s friend. They dated in high-school. He’s gay. I don’t know why I find it so fitting that he had dated her when he had been unsure of this.” Hutson added. This whole Anderson not being a dyke thing and having dated Thomas Miller was really quite unbelievable to him.

 

When they arrived at his white Jeep he held Daniel the door to the passenger’s seat open after taking the large file onto the backseat. As soon as the other man was seated he got into the car himself and started his drive through the city and over the bridge, some country songs sounding from the car’s sound system.

 

 

The restaurant was located in the luxurious part of the city. The buildings as well as the people were most glamorous and a red carpet was lying in front of the establishment, leading the way inside. Rex was rushing around the car after he had gotten out to hold the door open for Daniel again just like he had been raised and when he had pressed the button on the key and had locked the car he was battling himself on his mind, feeling awkward but then decided to just go for it and he took Daniel’s hand into his own, his blue eyes looking somewhere up in the sky while entering the location.

 

Classical music was underlined the quiet, discrete and upscale atmosphere in the elegant restaurant. Its decoration was expensive and classy. They had a koi aquarium and one filled with lobsters where the guests could choose the lobster they’d like to eat. The soldier had never understood the fuss about lobsters though; he had never cared for sea food, or salad for that matter.

 

A handsome waiter was leading them to their table and handing them the menu card with a neat leather cover. The whole atmosphere surrounding it gave him a feeling of having time travelled and being back in his old life where he got invited to such places and invited other people there. The waiter soon returned for their orders and Rex ordered a bottle of good whisky and a meat plate with beef, lamb and other delicious steaks on it answering: “Don’t care, just something” when the waiter had asked him what accompaniment he wished to have to the meat, before asking Daniel what he wanted.

 

For a few minutes after the waiter had disappeared Rex didn’t say anything and just looked at the other, not sure what to say. He wasn’t good at starting conversations. “So, have you gone to places like this one often back when you’d been in the entertainment industry?” he asked. “I have been here in this restaurant before. It’s been over a decade ago and I got invited by a superior from work who was from this area back then, he died from old age quite some years ago I have heard. I remembered the place though because the meat was incredible. I wouldn’t have thought that one would get any decent food in this city so I was surprised.” He told the other man, liking that he had chosen a place outside of the dump they lived in for their date, granting them to feel like normal members of society again or at least he wasn’t constantly reminded of what he had lost and how he had ended up there.

 

The only disadvantage of this place was that they needed an eternity to get the food ready and he was hungry but he was being patient. The truly bad news hit him when he suddenly heard a familiar voice, calling out a familiar name. “Rex!” a cold shudder was running down his neck but he made no motion. He continued to talk to Daniel, his face seemingly unaffected. “Rex!” the voice called out again and this time it was closer. “It can’t be him.” Another familiar voice sounded. “And even if it was him, why would we care.” The other voice added and Hutson dared not to look even though he was feeling a sting in his heart. “It is him.” The other voice said determined. “Rex!” she said again and this time she stood right next to their table.

 

Hutson closed his blue eyes and then he turned his head to the side, looking into the sky blue eyes of a tall woman with long blond hair that was even longer than Anderson’s. She was thin, long legged, wore a black hat with a large curvated brim and a body suit that was not covering much of her body since it was just black strings in different patterns wrapping around her white skin, her small breasts and her privates and little arse the only thing that was really fully covered along with her calves, the fabric smoothly going over into shoes that looked like murder weapons. Seeing that outfit Rex wanted to immediately yell at her, pull the tablecloth off and throw it over her but he couldn’t even bring himself to say anything.

 

His eyes went to the person next to her and he saw a short woman with ashen hair that had been trimmed short into a pixie cut. She had a round face, grey eyes, a button nose and was wearing a long, conservative looking dress that didn’t do the bulky, muscular figure she had developed due to the military training any favour. His sisters Ginevra and Hannah looked at him. Ginvera with surprise and Hannah in condemnation and when he saw the man whose hand his youngest sister Hannah was holding rage and hate was starting to form within Hutson and his blue eyes narrowed when he was staring into the eyes of the hulk next to the small woman with his green pig-eyes and the chiselled jaw, being even taller than Rex was.

 

He involuntarily crunched his teeth seeing Ted standing there. They had always hated each other. Had been rivals since the day they had met in town as young boys. And unfortunately the other had also attended military school and he had been the one running in on Sebastian and him in the equipment room after gym class where Sebastian and him had hid to make out. It had gotten worse after that and during school and academy they had gotten into several fist fights, beating each other up real bad.

 

“What are you doing here?” Ginevra expressed her surprise, looking at her brother whom she hadn’t seen in years and about whom she hadn’t had any information or possibility to contact him, not to mention that she knew that her brother hated this city almost as much as San Francisco. “Nothing.” Rex answered. “The real question is, what are you doing here?” the blond man wanted to know looking at them unbelieving, wishing he had never chosen that restaurant. Had he only as much as considered that there had been a possibility of running into his family members he had never come here.

 

“We wanted to celebrate and have fun today before Hannah will have to go on her first foreign assignment.” The blond lady who looked like the female version of Rex said with an undertone that showed that she couldn’t hide her disapproval about her younger sister serving in the Army. And hearing this surly made a shiver run over the former Major General’s spine. Hannah was not Army material, she would either die or come home as a mental wrack. She was neither physiologically nor psychologically cut out to be a soldier. She’d break. She’d break and crumble and it’d be his fault. His father took her as his successor because Rex had failed him, failed the family by having broken with the family tradition by getting discharged.

 

“Why are you telling him this? He surely doesn’t care about the mess he’s made in our lives! How he has disgraced the family! He doesn’t give a rats ass about you and I. He’s a coward. A spineless, egotistical coward! He’s got no honour and no dignity! Look at him, sitting here, having fancy dinner with a business friend, living a hedonist life in this city. He’s probably got a discharge on purpose, so that he could do what he wanted without having to take responsibility anymore.” Hannah barked and each word was cutting Rex like a knife, it was hurtful how lowly she thought about him. She surely detested him and she blamed him. Blamed him because their father had urged her to fill in his footsteps that were completely unfitting for her! She had wanted to be a kindergarten teacher; she had always wanted to do that. She had wanted to be a mother, living in a nice house in their home town, working with kids and raising her own and now she had to fight Muslim terror organisations in some shithole.

 

Ginevra opened her mouth but she didn’t know what to say to her younger sister. Ted however was grinning widely and he looked down on Rex with triumph in his eyes. “You’re giving him too much credit darling.” He said. “He’s always compromised everything for his own low instincts and desires.” Hannah looked at her husband confused, she had never mentioned Rex to him and she had cut him off every time he had made a comment telling him that she had no brother no more. “He’s a sick pervert! He’s always been a sick pervert and his perversion is the reason he got kicked out of the Army. I always said that faggots like him are not supposed to be in the military, he proves me right. He and his sissy boyfriend, this Sebastian, worst kinds of sodomites you can think of.” Ted stated and Rex’s hands clenched down on the plate of the table.

 

“Sebastian? His deceased friend? They weren’t a couple. He’s not a faggot.” Hannah expressed finding that her husband was going too far. She knew they had hated each other but painting her useless brother like a pervert was definitely a far stretch.

“They weren’t friends Hannah. I have seen them together in the equipment room. His perversion is the reason he got his discharge. Because he couldn’t refrain from committing those abominable acts with this Sebastian, even when they had been superior and inferior in the Army! And when this fag got murdered, his little, fragile queer heart broke, he couldn’t take it and he freaked, he went nuts! So much so that he wasn’t bearable for the Army anymore and they finally discharged him.”

 

Ted had only done so much as to finish the sentence when Rex basically jumped from his seat. “Shut your mouth! I warn you if you say one bad word against Sebastian another time I’m…” the blond threatened and his youngest sister looked at him with her grey eyes. “So it’s true.” She was shocked. Had Hutson thought she couldn’t look at him more spiteful he had been mistaken! Now she looked at him with utter disgust in her eyes, as if he was something repulsive. “You’re reprehensible Rex! You’re an insult to our family.” She said and Ted wouldn’t take his advice either. “What shall I not say about you and this pathetic fairy? That people like him are a disgrace for the Army? That the Lord’s rightful justice came upon him and you for your abhorrent si….” He couldn’t finish the sentence because Rex’s fist had hit him right in the face, an unholy cracking sound sounding as his nose cracked.

 

Hutson jumped him and threw him down, thrashing onto Ted’s face like a berserker. The other man, who had had the same training as him started to fight back after he had realised that he had been attacked and they were rolling around on the floor fighting, getting off the ground, beating onto each other further, hitting the aquarium with the lobsters, before one of the waiters who had run to get security and the restaurant manager returned. “Stop fighting immediately!” a loud voice yelled, all the guests already stretching their backs or standing to get a view at the scene.

 

“Sir, you and your company have to leave immediately!” the manager told Rex because the waiter had told him he had physically attacked Ted first. Rex’s right eye was starting to swell, his lips had bursted, blood was running out of his nose and his mouth, onto his white shirt, his tie was hanging somewhere on his back, buttons of his shirt had been ripped off and Ted didn’t look any better either. Rex screwed up his nose what wasn’t a good idea because his entire face hurt. “I leave.” He growled, threw some money onto the table, for the whisky and Daniel’s drink only because they hadn’t eaten anything yet, took the bottle and turned to go. But before he walked to the exit with a slight limp now, he spat a load of blood right into Ted’s face.

 

Rex was boiling with anger, with pure rage but he was also hurt. The cold wind outside was cooling him down a bit and when he saw his Jeep he realised the original reason for being there and he turned to Daniel, looked at him, opened his mouth to say something but just as Ginevra a moment ago he couldn’t find any words. What could he possibly say to him? ‘My name is Rex Hutson not William Brix and I am sorry I ruined our date’, or what ?

 

Instead he wordlessly opened the other the door to the passenger’s seat again but slammed it shut in surprise again without noticing when he heard Ginevra’s voice calling his name again followed by the clicking of the stuff she called shoes as she ran towards him. “Wait!” she said and came to halt in front of Daniel and Rex. She looked at him with a sorry and sad expression and touched his wracked face, wiping away a drop of blood that was running down from his eyebrow. “Shoot.” She expressed and then sighed. “Despite all this, I, I was happy to see you again.” she told him. “I don’t know what you’re doing in this city, since you always told me you hated it but I moved here a few years ago, I have opened my own fashion label here and I would love to meet you for a coffee sometime.” She said and pressed her business card with her number on into his hand.

 

“You live here? What? Why would you open your fashion business here? Why not at home? They have enough businesses here.” Hutson complained feeling like she had abandoned their home town and Mississippi and their state needed some economic growth and boost. She smiled and shook her head at the same time, feeling like that was his brother how she knew him. “Yeah, right! Opening up my business and selling high-fashion clothing like this,” she pointed at what she wore “in our little home town would definitely be a huge success story. I probably couldn’t hide from all the costumers and all the designers who’d like to work for me and absolutely no one would stone me to death by throwing Bibles at my head on my way to work.” She answered sarcastically. “Besides, you were the first one who left our town and went to Jackson to live with ‘your friend’ Sebastian.” Ginny reminded him and this was very true. They couldn’t possibly have lived together in the small town Rex had grown up in and also not in the neighbouring town Sebastian had lived in before without everyone knowing that they were romantically involved right away. Hence, they had moved into their states capital but Hutson would have never voluntarily left his home state. “Move to Jackson then!” he told his sister. “No, I don’t wanna live in Jackson. Compared to this city it’s a village too.” She pointed out. “Besides, my girlfriend lives here.”

 

Rex looked at her in bewilderment and it was not because she didn’t want to live in Jackson, but because she had said girlfriend. “Girlfriend? You got a … what? You’re a lesbian?” he asked staring at her and she couldn’t hold back a chuckle. “Technically I am bisexual. But yes, I am in a lesbian relationship since years and I am planning to get married soon and I’d love to have my older brother at my wedding. Please don’t say ‘No’ right away, think about it, alright.” She said and Rex nodded although he had wanted to say ‘No’ at first. “Our parents… do they know?” he asked instead.

 

And Ginevra sighed. “They should. I mean I don’t go back to our hometown often. Just on their birthdays and over the holidays. I told them and they know her too.” The blond woman said pursing her lips, a huge ‘But’ written all over her face. “When I first brought her – without them even knowing we were a couple – they wouldn’t let her into the house because they thought she was a terrorist. When I pointed out that she was Indian and not a Muslim they would let her enter and we had dinner during which mum was interrogating her about her religious beliefs and I panicked and told her she was very Christian. She’s actually not religious but she wasn’t mad at me for telling mum she was. I then told them that she was my girlfriend but they deliberately misunderstood and kept on referring to her as my friend and roommate.” The woman explained.

 

“I tried it again when I visited alone. I told them I was bisexual but neither of them took it seriously. Mum laughed and said I had some crazy ideas and this delusion would pass and that it was just some girly affection and I was misreading our friendship and that I’d soon find a nice man. It’s been years, I am still with her and mum and dad still don’t take it seriously.” She let him know and Rex thought about how lucky she was that they didn’t take it seriously and didn’t seem to see a threat. If he had told them he was gay they’d have acted completely differently, they’d have either send him to conversion therapy camp or they’d have immediately called the exorcist. Just another example of how the world and life was never fair!

 

“Anyhow, I don’t know if they’ll finally get it if they get the invitation to the wedding and if they’ll be there or cut all ties with me.” She said and it was obvious that her mind went to other matters because her face gradually darkened before worry and concern was clearly displayed.

 

“I have a favour to ask…” she began and Rex raised an eyebrow. “Hannah is supposed to be sent abroad in two weeks. You have to prevent this from happening. You know her. She’s not made for this. She’ll not survive it. This is her death sentence. I tried to talk her out of it but she won’t listen to me. She feels like she has to do this, she doesn’t want to disappoint our father.” Ginny told him and Hutson got it but he couldn’t see how he could help. “I know. But how can I help you there? She hates me! Have you seen how she looked at me? And now she thinks of me as a pervert. She obviously doesn’t think about gay men better than our parents do. She obviously won’t listen to anything I’d say to her.” Rex told his younger sister. “Besides, if she has enlisted and signed a contract with the Armed forces she’s practically the property of the Army for the time she signed up for and I don’t see why they would let her out of the contract.” He added.

 

“She won’t listen to anyone. Except for our father. He has to tell her that she shouldn’t go. That he doesn’t want her to. That he won’t be disappointed and that he won’t think less of her. He also has the influence in the Army to get her put into another field, to let her do another job within the Army instead of the frontlines.” Ginny pointed out. “I tried to talk to him multiple times but he told me to stay out of this, that I didn’t know what I was talking about and it wasn’t my place.” She let him know. “You are a man, his son and you’ve been a Major General you just have to talk to him.” The woman pleaded and Rex snorted. “Our father disinherited me and told me that I was no longer part of the family, that I was dead to him!” he said. “He won’t listen to a word I say. Maybe he’d encourage her more just to do the opposite.” Hutson figured that was possible but Ginny’s blue eyes peered into his similar ones. “Please! You have to try! Please!” she begged.

 

Then she took a deep breath and turned to Daniel. “Hello, I’m Ginevra Hutson! I’m sorry I didn’t want to seem rude.” She introduced herself to him. The woman was about as tall as the brunette without her shoes and with her shoes she stood taller than him for about 10cm. “Are you guys a couple?” she asked curiously. “Yes.” Rex answered ‘Or we were for about 24 horus’ he added on his mind. “Sweet.” She winked at Daniel and turned back to Rex again, looking into his eyes another time. “Please.” She whispered, rubbed his arm, gave him a hug and said:” I hope that you’ll call me. If not I’ll kick your arse if I’ll run into you ever again! I have to go back inside now though, they are waiting for me.” She stated and off she went.

 

Rex sighed and took a deep breath, realising that his rib cage hurt too. He hadn’t had to fight someone equal in strength since a long time. It seemed like he had no chance other than to go. To go and face his father! To take him on and tell him to stop this madness in the name of their family tradition and not sacrifice his daughters life because Rex had failed him as a son! This had all started with him and he had to at least try to stop this. One thing was for sure, he could hardly forgive himself already but he’d not be able to ever forgive himself if his baby sister died trying to fill his place in the family.

 

“I’m sorry. This was not what I had in mind for our date.” He told Daniel and opened the door for him again. “My real name is Rex Hutson, these were my sisters Hannah and Ginevra. And I’ll have to go home and see my father. I’ll go immediately, it’s a long drive.” He told him. “You can join me if you want. Or I’ll drive you to your apartment, you decide. Regardless, if you come with me or stay I’d like to get the chance to take you out another time.” He told him and went to sit into the car forgetting to wait for the other to get into the car and close his door. Sitting on the driver’s seat he was throwing the messed up tie and jacket down onto the backseat, waiting for Daniel’s answer.