Moving On (Coffee Cup Epiphanies) 3/7

[arabella-o.livejournal.com]

Title: Moving On (Coffee Cup Epiphanies)
Author: arabella_o (Arabella)
Chapter: 3 of 7
Rating:PG
Summary: Fishing for second chances when you don't even realise you've missed the first.
Disclaimer: Not real. Promise.
Notes: For Cai. *smoooooochies* Earlier installments can be found here: One and Two.

Three:

Dominic took his time as he pulled clothes from his closet and contemplated which ones to wear. It wasn't that it mattered, he wasn't going any farther than his front porch (and even that was just to kick Elijah out on his arse), but it gave Dominic time to rein in his urge to throttle the blue-eyed troublemaker downstairs. After several minutes, he settled on a pair of faded blue jeans and his Manchester United T-shirt. Taking a look at his reflection in the mirror and deciding that maybe the shower had been a good idea after all, Dominic tugged at the hem of his shirt and pushed open his bedroom door.

Elijah was sitting at the kitchen table, his hands wrapped around a steaming mug of coffee as he stared out the window. The curtains had been opened wide, and the small room was almost overwhelmingly bright. Dominic grunted, pulling a chair out from the table and fell heavily into it. There was a cup of coffee already set out for him, and for a moment Dominic considered not drinking it as a sort of protest. The thought was quickly pushed aside, however, as soon as the strong smell worked their magic and the heat from the cup seeped into his fingers, making him feel a little more human.

Elijah turned away from the window and watched as Dominic raised the cup to his lips. There was something like anticipation in his eyes, and Dominic made the mistake of brushing it off as Elijah's desire to pry into affairs that did not concern him. With the first mouthful of coffee, Dominic saw how wrong he was. He spit the coffee out, getting half of it in the cup and the other half on the laminate tabletop. There was a fine layer of grit on his tongue, and Dominic tried to sweep it off with his fingers. When that didn't work, he ran to the sink, cupping water between his hands so he could rinse his mouth.

"What did you do?" he demanded, hunching his shoulders and glaring at Elijah from his position by the sink.

"I didn't do anything," Elijah said, leaning back in his chair. There was a tiny smirk on his face, almost as though he felt Dominic had gotten exactly what he deserved for being such an idiot. "You're the one who made the coffee without a filter," he continued, far too smugly.

Dominic pulled the basket from the coffee maker and looked at his makeshift paper towel filter. Sure enough, it had ripped along the centre, dumping grinds into the coffee. With a sigh he jammed the basket back in place and reached into the cupboard for a glass. After pouring himself some orange juice he inched his chair away from the spilled coffee and sat back down.

Dominic and Elijah stared at each other expectantly for several minutes. Raising the glass of juice to his lips, Dominic watched as Elijah rolled his eyes and pushed his cup of coffee away.

"Why can't you just tell me what happened?" he asked. Elijah's tone of voice made it clear that this was his attempt at smoothing things over. "I'm not trying to be a bastard, Dom, but if the two of you can't even look at each other then there's a problem that has to be dealt with. It's not like you can avoid each other for the rest of our time here."

Dominic just stared across the table and wondered for a moment what Elijah would do if his 'reasonable' approach failed. Probably drag him back up to the shower just to be an arsehole.

"If I tell you will you leave it alone after?" Dominic asked once he'd tired of staring at Elijah. "And do I have your word that it will go no farther than this room?"

"Christ, Dom, was it really that bad?"

"Do I have your word or not?" Dominic asked, sidestepping the question. Elijah nodded immediately, the exaggerated movement reminding Dominic of a bobble head doll. Dominic turned away for a moment, fixing his gaze on a spot on the linoleum. He could see it so clearly. The images had only become sharper in his mind with the multitude of times he had replayed them. If he tried hard enough, Dominic was certain that he could even taste the bitterness of the alcohol he'd had with dinner.

Everyone else had backed out at the last minute, so it was only Billy and Dominic out for the usual Saturday night pub crawl. After the first few drinks, business at the pub started to drop off, and soon enough, it was only Billy, Dominic, and a table of giggling girls who legally shouldn’t have been allowed past the front door. Dominic hadn’t even eaten half of what was on his plate when Billy set his glass down with a flourish and announced that the pub was dead and he wanted to leave.

“C’mon, Dom, let’s get a video or something. Anything will be livelier than this.” Billy waved his hand around to illustrate his point. Behind them, the underage girls began arguing with the waitress, angry at having been cut off so early in the evening.

Dominic hadn’t been ready to leave, but staying in an empty pub by himself didn’t seem like a good idea. He was never one for drinking alone, and having his friends with him in spirit didn’t count. He allowed Billy to push him toward the exit after settling their bill and the two of them headed for the nearest video store.

The movie they rented ended up being the worst thing ever committed to film. It was fitting, really, since they had ignored the clerk's long list of recommendations. Dominic and Billy spent more time making fun of it than they did actually trying to follow the convoluted plot. When even that became tedious, Billy had resorted to flinging pieces of popcorn at Dominic for amusement. Stray pieces of popcorn bouncing off shoulders and heads quickly became handfuls shoved down T-shirts, ending only when Dominic tackled Billy and the two of them fell to the floor in a tangle of flailing limbs. They missed the coffee table by sheer luck

The change in position did nothing to stop the match and Billy quickly regained his wits, taking advantage of the situation. He rolled Dominic onto his back and straddled his waist. Ginning, Billy triumphantly threw his arms in the air. Not to be outdone, Dominic pushed Billy backwards, scrambling out from beneath him so he could throw his weight over his friend and pin his wrists to the carpet.

“Say it, Boyd!” Dominic demanded, tightening his hold on Billy’s wrists. He smiled down at his friend. “Say it!” When Billy saw that he could not wriggle away, he sighed and gave up trying.

“If I say it, will you get your fat arse off of me?” Billy asked.

“Don’t antagonise me, Boyd,” Dominic growled, pressing down against Billy’s wrists.

“Fine,” Billy said with a long-suffering sigh. “Dom Monaghan is king of the world.”

“And?” Dominic prodded.

“And I am but a lowly peasant,” Billy supplied. “Now get off me!” He pushed up against Dominic’s hands and was surprised when he encountered little resistance. Dominic flopped onto the floor beside him, laughing a little as he took deep breaths. He and Billy just looked at each other for a long moment as everything fell quiet, and instinctively, Dominic knew that things were different.

“And then what happened?” Elijah asked. His voice broke the spell, and Dominic jerked his head up to fix Elijah with a withering glare. Sensing that he’d tread on Dominic’s toes yet again, Elijah raised his hands in an offer of surrender and pursed his lips.

“Then I kissed him,” Dominic said shortly, looking once again at the spot on the floor that had become such a wonderful, trustworthy, quiet friend during the telling of his story. He couldn’t figure out if it was part of the overall design of the floor or if it was dirt. More than likely it was the latter.

“You … kissed him,” Elijah said slowly, as though he were testing out the words. When Dominic fixed him with another glare, he raised his hands once more. “Why did you do it?”

“It was one of those moments,” Dominic said with a sad shrug of his shoulders. “I couldn’t not kiss him. Haven’t you ever felt like that?” The question was asked with an undercurrent of desperation that made Dominic sick to his stomach.

Elijah shook his head slowly. “No, I haven’t,” he said with a sad smile. “How did Billy take it?”

“You mean after he ran to the other side of the room?" Dominic asked mockingly. "He told me to get out.” Dom slouched sullenly in his seat and looked at his spot on the floor.

“I’m sure it wasn’t that bad,” Elijah protested. One look from Dom cut him off and he fell silent for a moment. “It can’t have been that bad,” he said again. Dominic had to give him credit for his misplaced optimism. “What were his exact words?”

Dominic didn’t look up. “I think you’d best leave, Dominic,” he said in the best Billy-esque tone he could summon. “He called me Dominic. Not Dom, Dommie, or one of the hundred other stupid nicknames he always uses. Dominic. Three syllables.”

“And what did you say?” Elijah asked softly. He drew his chair around to the other side of the table and sat in front of Dom, trying to offer what comfort he could. All he did was obscure Dom's view of his spot.

Dominic didn’t reply. He drew circles on the floor with his sock and did his best not to think about the way he’d tried to stammer an explanation. He’d never in his life tripped over his words like he had that night. And while he was at it, he did his best to erase the pained look on Billy’s face from his memory. And the edge to his voice as he asked Dom to leave.

“I couldn’t say anything,” Dominic said after several moments. “Not the right things, anyway.” Elijah reached out and laced their fingers together, squeezing them a little before releasing his hand.

“And that’s why you hid from all of us?” Elijah asked. “You didn’t want us dragging it all back up?”

“How many times do I have to tell you that I didn’t hide?” Dominic scowled, though he knew the expression wasn’t very convincing. He could feel it breaking up. He was tired, physically and emotionally, and the only thing he wanted was to lie down, curl around his pillow, and go back to pretending that the last two days had never happened.

“Need I remind you about the rosebush, Dom?” Elijah asked in a mock stern tone of voice. Dominic looked up to see Elijah’s playful scowl and he couldn’t help but crack a small smile. “Shall I tell you a little story to refresh your memory? I was coming out of my trailer, minding my own business because that’s the sort of person I am….” Elijah’s story was interrupted by a snort from Dominic. Ignoring him, Elijah continued. “And what do I see? But one Dominic Monaghan flinging himself behind the nearest thing large enough to hide that big ass of his. Pity for you that it was a fucking rosebush.”

Elijah grabbed Dominic’s hand again and ran his fingertip across a two-inch scratch on the back of it. Dominic laughed softly.

“Not my most graceful move, was it?” he asked.

“No,” Elijah said, shaking his head. “It wasn’t.”

There was a moment where both men realised that there was a finality to the conversation. Neither spoke again after that; they just sat in Dominic’s kitchen, lost in thought, for the next half-hour.

Dominic was glad of the company.