With or Without You Part 2

After I switched buses a few times, I went to an internet café and found a seat in the corner. It was one I had been to before. It catered to people who wanted to work in peace, so the workspaces were in cubbies and the servers only approached if you waved to them.

I pulled a small box out of my duffle, glad now that I hadn't thrown it away during the wars. I hooked it up to my laptop, and got to work.

A few hours later and I had a new ID and a new past. Something that would satisfy anyone doing a quick background check.

I walked out of the café and headed towards my next stop- the bank.

Several hours later I was in a new apartment- a tiny studio with a fold down bed- and was firmly established in my new identity. I had a home, a bank account, an ID card... all I needed now was a job. I could manage well enough on my savings for a few months, but I didn't want to do that.

But what could I do? It had to be something that I wasn't good at. Something that I had to learn, something that wouldn't let me inadvertently slip back into that attitude. Something that would help me to be a different- better person.

I sighed. I had no idea what that would be.

I leaned back on the bare mattress and felt a spring poke my back. Our... Duo's bed was more comfortable than this. I had slept in worse places, I reminded myself, just not for a long time...

And for even longer than that- not without Duo.

Not that long, I reminded myself. We hadn't even been together until after that mess with Mariemeia... and even then we had skirted the issue for a good year or so.

Only two years of sharing a bed with him... it wouldn't- it couldn't be that hard to get used to be alone again.

I missed him. If I weren't so sure this was the best thing for him, I would've given in and gone to beg him to take me back. But I had hurt him, made him feel inferior... I didn't like who I was, how could I expect him to keep liking me either?

That was just it, I admitted it to myself. I left before he left me. I couldn't keep a partner, how could I have expected to keep him?

I knew Duo had found my note by now. I'm sure he was looking...

Or maybe not. Maybe he'd realized I was right.

I closed my eyes and shifted, trying to avoid the spring.

It was a long night. The bed seemed too big. It was too quiet- I was used to Duo's snoring. The spring kept poking me in the back. I was using a jacket as a pillow and the zipper kept poking my ear. It was hours before I fell asleep, and even then I seemed to wake up every hour or so.

I missed Duo.

The next morning I staggered out of bed and headed towards the shower, before I realized I didn't have any towels. Or shampoo. Or soap.

There were still so many things to do- get towels, get sheets, get the essentials, get a telephone... find a job. It was enough to keep my mind focused and prevented me from finding the nearest payphone and calling Duo despite my good intentions.

I took a shower anyway and used one of my shirts to dry off with.

I got dressed and left the apartment. Maybe I'd be able to find coffee somewhere close and maybe even a newspaper to look at the job ads.

My apartment building was in a district of the city called 'Little Italy'. Half the signs were in both Italian and English, some didn't even bother with the English. Like every other part of town, small restaurants vied with markets and stores for space, the tables placed out on the sidewalks. Duo and I had been here once or twice. He preferred Chinatown and I liked the wharfs so it was still somewhat new territory for me.

I bought a newspaper from a stand and looked for a place to sit down and read it. I found one place open for breakfast, though no one was inside yet.

When I walked in, a young woman greeted me and took me to a table. "What would you like?" She asked. I blinked, since I hadn't seen a menu of any type.

"What do you have?"

"For breakfast? Anything!" She laughed. "You are new here?"

I nodded.

"Ah, well then, let me explain. We stick to the traditional Italian breakfast- which is usually coffee of some kind and maybe a pastry. Easy enough, and we don't need menus for that."

"That sounds fine."

"What kind of pastry?"

"Any kind is fine." I must've looked completely confused, because she laughed again.

"Why don't I bring you what the owner and I have for breakfast- and you can see if you like it?"

"All right."

She left, still chuckling, and I opened the paper to the help wanted ads. I figured anything that said 'no experience needed, will train" would fit into my parameters.

There weren't a lot of those.

The girl returned with a steaming cup of coffee and a plate with a flaky thing that was evidently the pastry.

She stood by me for a moment after she put them down, and it dawned on me that she was waiting for me to try them.

I took a bite of the pastry, and smiled at her expectant expression. "Very good," I told her and she grinned. She looked down at the paper as I took a sip of the coffee.

"Are you looking for a job?" She asked.

"Yes."

"What kind?"

"Anything that I'm not good at," I told her and she gave me a startled look.

"Why?"

"I left my last job because no one wanted to work with someone who knew it all- my attitude was wrong." I explained and wondered why I did so. "I wasn't even realizing that I was doing it until... a friend pointed it out to me. I don't want to be that type of person, so I'm looking for a job that I have to learn- that I'll give the people I work with the respect they deserve because I have to learn from them."

"That will be difficult," she blinked.

"I know- but I have to do it. My attitude cost me a lot of things I valued."

"Good luck," she told me and vanished towards the back again. I ate my pastry and drank my coffee slowly as I went through the paper. There were a few places I could go today and submit applications for... that would keep me busy.

I folded up my paper and looked for the waitress. She was at another table, talking to the customers there, so I let my gaze wander around the room. An older man stood by the counter in the front, and as I looked in his direction, he smiled at me.

He walked over to the table and pulled out the chair across from me. "Did you like your breakfast?"

"It was very good, thank you."

"Sofia tells me you're looking for a job that you will have to learn from the ground up."

"Yes sir." I replied, wondering where this was going.

"My niece- Sofia there, is a good girl. She's going to college soon. Her younger sister works for me too- my Isabella. Their mother died a long time ago- and their father died in the war." He shook his head sadly. "She is a very nice girl. I wouldn't want anything distracting her from her school plans."

"School is important," I agreed, feeling lost.

"She's worried I won't be able to get any help here- it looks slow now, but in the afternoon and evening we get very busy. Isabella comes home from school and works hard because we have so many customers."

"I can believe it." Was the guy just looking for someone to talk to?

"Sofia wants me to take on some more help so that when she starts school it won't be so hard for Isabella. But I don't want to hire anyone that might be tempted to distract my girls from their schooling."

He leaned over the table and eyed me.

I finally got it.

I thought about it for a moment. I sure as hell didn't know a damn thing about waiting on tables- or anything to do with a restaurant.

I started to open my mouth, but then I realized something. He wasn't being direct- so I shouldn't be either.

"School is very important," I said. "Nothing should interfere with school. Anyone you brought in would have to treat those girls as if they were his sisters."

"Exactly," the glare vanished. "I'm Vittorio Medici. Who are you?" Ah, apparently the interview was beginning now that I had passed the screening.

"Heero Maxwell," I told him, and his eyebrows rose.

"Japanese and Scottish?"

I smiled. "I'm an orphan. Someone that took me in called me 'Heero', the 'Maxwell' I got from a friend. I don't know what my real name was."

"That's a terrible thing- not to know your family. These wars have done that to so many." He looked at Sofia again. "I'm glad my girls had me at least."

"They are very lucky."

"So, do you live around here?"

"Just moved in down the street- at the Villa."

"Ah, Mia runs those! She is a tightfisted woman! No doubt she is overcharging you. I would speak to her about that."

"She seemed very nice. She let me move in right away."

"You moved in right away? No waiting?" His eyebrow went up.

"I... needed to move."

Vittorio leaned over the table. "Are you in trouble, boy?"

I shook my head. "No. No trouble. Just- wasn't able to stay where I was."

He nodded, leaning back. "Fight with your girlfriend? She'll calm down- they always do."

I shook my head. "We didn't fight. I just- well, kind of like I told Sofia- I realized my attitude was doing him more harm than good. So I left."

His eyebrow arched up at the pronoun.

I wondered if I had blown it.

Then he laughed.

"You should've said something right away." He patted my shoulder. "I wouldn't have given you that lecture about sniffing around my girls. So, Heero, when can you start working for me?"

~*~

I guess there was still a part of me that thought that I could do anything well that I set my mind to- and that part did not last past my first night of work.

I had been to restaurants lots of times, always tried to be nice to my servers of course, but I never thought about what they did.

Damn, it was hard.

Maybe it was because it was a family run restaurant- there weren't very many of us working, and Medici's was always crowded. Maybe it was the fact that most of the customers liked giving their orders in rapid fire Italian.

Maybe it was just a really hard job.

My feet ached for weeks. I knew I was spending way too much time with the back and forth stuff than Sofia or Isabella did, simply because I wasn't practiced enough. I made mistakes. I dropped things. I messed up orders. I brought the wrong food to the wrong table. I got cursed at and didn't understand a word. I got hit on and teased.

It wasn't all bad. Vittorio and his girls were very patient with me. So were the 'regulars' who thought it was hysterically funny that Medici had hired on some poor boy that couldn't speak a word of the language and couldn't tell the difference between fettuccini and penne. They set out to educate me.

I learned a lot those first few months. I learned the right way to carry a tray. I learned how to get to all my tables quickly. I learned to prioritize. Thanks to Isabella taking pity on me, I learned enough Italian to cope- she'd give me lessons in the lull between lunch and dinner.

Once it became known that she was teaching me, everyone felt the need to join in. No one seemed to pronounce things the same...

My landlord turned out to be an old friend of Vittorio's. She dropped my rent much lower than she had originally set it, telling me that she was glad Vittorio finally had gotten some more help in there for those girls. She helped me find sheets and towels; she even let the phone guy into my apartment when I couldn't get away from the restaurant to meet him. In return I brought her leftovers from the restaurant and helped her fix little things around the complex.

Things slowly got better. My feet still ached occasionally, but only on the weekends when the tourists came down and we were really busy. I was able to joke with the customers in Italian and laugh with them about my awful accent. Sofia started school and I was able to repay some of my debt to her family by helping her with her physics homework.

I still hated going home to my empty apartment. I still hated sleeping alone. I was sure Duo had moved on by now. Why wouldn't he? I hoped whomever he was with appreciated and took care of him. I got a few date offers, a few more offers of set-ups, but I turned them all down. I just couldn't date anyone else. I still loved Duo.

Six months after I had started, when I realized that I hadn't dropped anything for about a month, I asked Sofia if she noticed that I was developing an attitude.

She laughed at me.

"Attitude? You? Hardly. You are so deferential to the customers and Uncle- even to Isa and me. Such a nice boy!" And she patted my cheek like some ancient lady. "I think you managed to train yourself out of it." She added, in her own tone. "Truly! But don't let it go to your head! You still have lots to learn. Uncle wants to teach you how to cook now too, you know!"

"I think I'd end up poisoning our customers!" I laughed and continued rolling silverware up into napkins.

She grinned. "So... now that I told you that you conquered your fault- are you going to go back to your lover? I'm sure he misses you."

I blinked at her. It didn't surprise me that much- nothing stays a secret here I had learned.

"No." I shook my head. "I'm sure he's moved on. I hope he has."

The dinner crowd began to come in and conversation halted for a while.

It was a Friday night, a very busy time between the regulars and the tourists. Our restaurants' tables were packed; Sofia, Isabella and I were running around like we always did on the weekends.

I was ringing out a check, Isabella waiting for me to finish, when Sofia joined us briefly at the counter. "Lucky you, Heero!" she grinned. "Four gorgeous boys just came and sat in your section! I don't suppose I could get you to trade with me?"

I looked towards my section- I had the booths along the back wall. It was dimly lit back there and I couldn't make out anything from my position.

"I'll take your word for it." I finished and went to drop off the change.

I worked my way down the row of booths, checking, taking orders, and then found myself in front of Sofia's 'four gorgeous boys'. My heart nearly stopped. Luckily, they were bent over their menus, so I had a minute to adjust my expression.

"Welcome to Medici's, gentlemen. May I get you something to drink while you look at the menu?"

Duo's head snapped up and I watched him turn pale. The guy seated next to him was someone I had seen occasionally around the office- I wondered if he was Duo's new partner, or something else.

Then I squashed that thought. It wasn't important.

"I'd like a glass of red wine," the guy said, either not recognizing me or not giving a damn. "The house is fine." He put an arm along the back of the booth, close to Duo's shoulders. "What do you want Duo?"

I made a note on the pad, hoping my hands weren't shaking.

"Just water..." Duo managed. I turned to look at the other couple. Quatre and Trowa were blinking at me. Maybe this was a double date?

"For you sirs?" I asked.

"Heero!" One of my regulars bellowed across the room at me. I turned to look and he grinned at me. In Italian, he added: "Hurry up with the tourists! I'm starving!"

I waved a hand at him. "A moment!" I replied in Italian and he laughed.

"Red wine for me too please." Quatre added and nudged Trowa.

"Same," he said.

"Excellent. I will be right back with those. Our special tonight is the marsala- it's very good." I quickly turned my back and headed for the regular's table.

I took his order, letting him tease me about being too nice to the tourists and then I headed back to the kitchen.

Sofia was in there with Vittorio, going over an order. I put the order on the carousel and took a deep breath.

"Heero- you okay? You're pale? Are you ill?" Sofia looked at me.

"Just saw a ghost." I shook my head. "Sofia, I will do anything for you if you will take over table 12 for me. I can't serve them."

"Why?" Vittorio leaned over the counter. "Who are they?"

"Old friends of mine." I took a breath. "One in particular..."

Sofia nodded. "Fill their drink order for me. I'll take it." She exchanged a look with her uncle and headed out with her tray of food.

I filled up the tray for her, grabbed another and filled it with things for the other tables. Sofia came back and we went out together.

I did my best to ignore table 12. It wasn't that hard. We were really busy. I got orders, served and joked with my customers and did my job.

At the same time, I knew I was being watched. It was that familiar itch between the shoulder blades...

I was near the register when I saw the guys get up and head for the door, where they would pass uncomfortably close to me. I let my fingers fly over the register, trying to move faster, focusing my attention on it, trying to ignore the fact they were getting closer.

Sofia, bless her, came and hung over my shoulder. "Hurry Heero! I have a check to ring!" She looked at the guys as they walked past. "Thank you for coming! We hope to see you again soon!"

"Thank you," Duo answered her, and I couldn't help lifting my eyes for a brief moment. "We will be back soon." His eyes were narrowed and cold. The guy's hand was on Duo's arm. I suppressed a shiver and dropped my gaze. I heard the door close behind them and sighed in relief.

Sofia nudged me. "You gave up a good tip."

TBC...

 

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