Time In

AN: Hello everyone! So, I know I’m probably cheating a little here, but since I have a lot of stories in plan, I decided to mix one of my personal projects with my entry for G/V Week 4.0. I don’t know if that’s allowed, but it said that it must be new, and this is definitely new. Heehee!

Anyway, this story is AU. You can find more information about it in my profile page description if you’d like to know more about it. For now, I will just be posting the prologue for G/V Week, and not the rest of the story until I finish What You Will. So, if you like it, sorry you might have to wait a bit for an update.

Distraction and attention are very funny things, and they like to play games with me.

The intricacy of the design on the ceiling is somewhat mesmerizing; at least it does enough to capture my attention away from the enveloping warmth of the blanket on my bare chest and arms and legs… my whole body in fact. I am too bothered by both my bareness and warmth to lie comfortably on my bed. And yet, I still do not know why I cannot keep my focus on these nuisances, or why they do not distract me from sensing her movements across the room.

My eyes dart fluidly over the plastered pattern once again above me; they are swirling curved lines with alternating thickness to mimic the attitude of vines that bear round fruits. I am already familiar with the design. Too familiar to be studiously dissecting it again, and I can no longer juice new observations from it. I have been hoping that I can.

Lines, thicker lines, thinner lines, circles. More circles. I can describe my ceiling to any one who wants to know about it with my eyes closed. So I close my eyes, and I start to pretend that someone is asking me to tell them what my room looks like. And I will tell them as zealously as I pretend to talk to the diplomats and politicians my mother has introduced to me as of lately. And I will ignore this woman by my bedside, unraveling her hair from its pony tail, and pulling her over sized t-shirt over her head…

My room is wide. Its largeness has overwhelmed me when I first found out it is mine. I have spent countless hours renovating, furnishing, and moving the furniture around to achieve the coziness that the old house in this mountain has radiated. The small house is gone now, vaporized into a capsule that is now stored among my mother’s many collections.

The woman folds her discarded shirt by the foot of my bed, a caring but somewhat impersonal gesture.

My room overlooks the mountain. What I mean is that it overlooks the small village by the foot of the mountain, because if I open up the double glass doors that bar my balcony and step onto it, I will be promising my life on only a foot-thick concrete. There is no mountain beneath my balcony. Only space: a cliff that spans thousands of feet. Mount Paozu is never reputed as a smooth mountain.

Of course that is only a threat to my life if I have not mastered the art of manipulating my energy so that thin air can sustain my large mass. In other words, if I can not fly.

I do not look to my side. I keep my eyes closed and yet I hear the woman unbuttoning her jeans and pulling the zipper down.

My room is located at the second highest level of the castle. With distraction gnawing at my nerves and my senses, I pretend that I am even more excited to describe the palace than my room. And I will detail every bit of what I know, so that it will take more concentration and more time.

She shuffles out of the jeans.

The castle has been built for two years now. It still smells like it is new, like fresh paint and freshly installed marbled tiles and newly polished silver and bronze.

She folds the jeans again by the foot of the bed.

The castle is tall and spacious, and if I have not known where North or East or West or South are, I am sure I would have gotten lost plenty of times.

She removes her undergarments.

But I am not listening to her. I am not allowed to look. So I will just talk about the vastness of my room, and the maze that is my castle, and my routine-like life here at Mount Paozu. Maybe I will also talk about my future, so planned out and meticulous like the blue prints that have once outlined the complications of an android.

She slips into the warm covers beside me, and I can no longer keep myself distracted from her presence.

She does not come near though.

I fear that the space between us that causes the blanket to hang loosely about our bodies will shrink. I hate shrinking things. Mom has twice told me that my confidence always shrinks just when I need it. My favorite primates that play hide and seek in the forests shrink away when I try to hold them. Not that my confidence or the primates have any significance in this matter right now.

Well… maybe my confidence does.

“Are you okay?” she asks me, and even through closed eyes and a hundred thousand different aspects of my castle flooding my mind, I can feel her warmth, and I can sense her closeness.

“We can always back out,” she says. “Not too late.”

I inhale, holding the breath while I pry my eyes open, and mustering enough courage to take a look at her. By this time, I am sure that she is fully covered by the woolen blanket, and she is not the type to want my attention unless I am fully committed to giving it to her anyway.

Before I can release the breath that I am cautiously holding, it catches in my throat at the expression she is wearing. I have probably been too caught up in my own self, my own nervousness in this activity that I have forgotten to consider her well-being. She mirrors the expression I’m sure I’m giving, and for a second I have to consider if she is still the same woman I have sealed the deal with. There is the same black hair, the same blue eyes… though the fire that usually resides within them is gone, now replaced only by barely glowing embers, unsure of the heat.

It is quite selfish of me to think that what I have asked of her will not affect her feelings. Maybe it should be me that must request a way out?

“What?” she snaps. “Never seen a naked lady before?”

Heat rises up to my cheeks, and I am only momentarily aware that I must have looked like the shade of Red Ribbon Army’s logo.

“As a matter of fact, I haven’t!” I confess sheepishly, rubbing the tension on my neck, and grasping desperately for a topic to replace the one that now surfaces.

She lowers her eyes, and once again she loses the fierceness she regularly flaunts. Her dainty fingers curve around the edge of the blanket and pull it up to her chin. She sighs and rolls around so that she is staring at the ceiling. A single beam of light that has escaped the barriers of the wooden-carved blinds on my windows land on a slant across her face, making her look different and a little surreal. Maybe even serene and vulnerable, two words that I am sure will cost me the bundle of hair on my head if she ever hears me speak of them about her.

Maybe we are being somewhat foolish, jumping into this deal without thinking it through too much. We are so hasty. Maybe that’s all we both really are: just hasty, impulsive kids.

“What time is he supposed to come?” she asks, her voice barely audible.

“By three,” I answer. “We can’t be like this by then. We have to be believable.” I do not know why I feel compelled to say that, as if I am readily pushing the issue of looking compromising with her without her will. But it is not like we have hurled ourselves into this deal without knowing the consequences. Our consent is both in it, and nothing is being done out of our liking. It’s just… at the time I have explained the plan to her, it sounded so simple and so easy. Even for two inexperienced teens.

She shudders. “I know.” And she leaves it at that.

By the time the man will come into my room, I know that we must look engaged in the arrangement. But I must also find a way to cover her face from the intruder so she will be unrecognizable. That is important. I think that is the hardest thing to carry out in the plan. Otherwise there will be no point of being caught in this circumstance.

I look back at her again, and she is still in the same position: curled up beneath the unrealistic affection of my blanket, hair splayed across her face, eyes down in a manner that seems to wonder what lay beneath the material. I can’t help but blush again at the thought. It has only been a few weeks since I have met her, a disheveled girl my brother has dragged out from out of the forest, weak and hungry but still strong at will. I have never imagined that in such a short time we will by lying together in bed, wearing nothing. And she is older than me too. Not by much, but enough that perhaps in another time and place, I might call her my big sister.

To ease the quietness of the room, I begin to chuckle wildly and joke around.

“You know, three o’clock is approaching really quickly, right? So, like… do we practice or something?”

Her eyes flicker up to me. Her expression does not change, still reserved and a little shy, but she does not show that through her eyes. Only her actions.

“What do you suppose we ‘practice’ then?” she whispers.

“Er… kissing?” I suggest.

“We did that last night,” she says, and the memory comes back to me like ice water. “But fine… if you want to do it again,” she adds, and crawls closer to me, dragging the sheets with her. My initial reaction is to retract and push myself to the same direction so we will not meet, but her brows furrow into a questioning look, and I stop my struggling.

I lean in to show that I am ready, and my lids snap shut. I feel her warmth come in closer before I feel her lips press on mine. It is an identical kiss that we have shared last night. Just two pairs of lips on top of each other with slight pressure… it must look boring compared to the passionate movements I see on television by actors so eager to display the feigned affection.

Then we part. I look at her and she looks at me.

Within moments, her face falls into uncertainty. “That’s not really a kiss, is it?”

I shake my head slightly and recline back on the mattress. The clock on the wall opposite to my bed has its long arm at eleven. So, five minutes before the planned event. But we cannot look like we have just jumped into action right when the door opens. It will be too… suspicious. And this has to work.

I begin to tire of the silence that once again accompanies the two of us in the room. It really isn’t like that when I am with her. Usually we will have things to say each other. Most of the time it is her that initiates conversations and keeps them going, but I never fail to help the cycle moving. I always think that she is not the type of girl to lose her words.

Out of uneasiness, I begin to laugh again and crack stupid jokes again.

“So, yeah! If we’re going to get caught like this, which spot would you like to take? Top or bottom?”

My face meets a pillow with substantial force behind it, and when it withdraws back under her head, I notice the furious frown she wears. Okay, I think I might have taken it a little bit far with my joke this time. That department is definitely not my forte.

“Sorry,” I apologize. “Look, it’s just… I have never risked anything this big before, and if I’m a little edgy, I don’t mean it to offend you. I’m just… nervous,” I explain to her.

She seems to take that as a rightful excuse, but I’m sure that she does so only because she also feels the same way. And only after stillness covers us again does she advance towards me, and motions for me to sit up. Supporting myself with both of my elbows, she squeezes herself to mold by my side, all the while telling me not to look at her. Once she is almost under me, she tells me to come back down gently.

I roll over to my stomach and descend on top of her gingerly. I definitely didn’t expect the softness of her flesh; in the previous weeks when impish fantasies have entered my mind about her body, I only have thought of how firm it must be due to all the training she has undergone. I have never expected for her to feel like… a real woman.

I shift a little, trying to be at ease, and finding a way so that her curves fit right against my more angular body comfortably. Every single part of her feels luscious and smooth, characteristics not ordinarily associated with a fighter. And there’s the fact that she’s beautiful too. I don’t mean to imply that everyone swoons at the sight of her. Beauty, after all, really is subjective. Maybe it’s just me, just my eyes. Yes, I am sure it is just me.

She does not say anything at all, but I can feel how tense her muscles have become at our position, and she keeps her glance away from mine. When I am satisfied with where I am, I lay my head beside her after looking behind me at the clock. There is only a minute or so left. There is no doubt in my head that he will be coming any time now.

When I turn my head back on the pillow, I feel a soft kiss against my cheek.

“Just trying,” I hear her say to me, and her eyes look so wary as if a kiss will set me off on a rampage. I bit my lip; there is no more time left to dry up. And in the hallway outside of my room, I can already hear the echoes of a distant set of footfalls heading my way. I look at her, and she gulps but nods.

I dip my head to catch her lips in a full kiss, extremely unlike the one we just shared minutes ago and the one from last night. I am lying if I say that I feel forced doing that, because there is an undeniable pleasure in kissing her. I doubt any man will ever feel reluctant to devour an opportunity like this, and though I have too much respect for this woman to openly divulge that I am enjoying this moment, I can only admit the truth that it tastes wonderful to me.

The footsteps are coming closer and closer. My heart pounds in my chest, but I just concentrate on the task at hand, and the immediate technique of hiding my acquaintance’s identity as soon as the door opens.

The footsteps stop at the front of my door, and the knob clicks.

Hello. My name is Son Gohan, and I am the prince of Mount Paozu. My partner in crime is Videl, daughter of the overthrown fraud and previously named World Champion.

And we are trying to create a scandal.

AN: So there you go! I hope you’ve enjoyed that little bit of prologue, I know it’s pretty short, but it’s really only supposed to get you curious about the story anyway. Hehe. Well, if you’re confused, by some of the things I’ve described here, just wait for the story to come out and I’m sure everything will be straightened out.

As for G/V Week, if you feel that you really liked this story, please vote for me on Monday, August 23 in the SweetestIrony site : http :// forum. Fanfiction . net /forum /SweetestIrony /46290/ (without spaces). But only if you feel like it deserves the vote, of course. The members are dueling against each other. Thankie!

But if you don’t feel like voting, you don’t need to. Heehee, reviews are just as welcomed!