title: A Romance Story (Kinda)

rating: pg-13

pairings: xanxus/squalo. in a roundabout way.

warnings: OOC, lots of cussing, violence, man-crying. bad attempts at humour.

Summary: The one where Squalo's biological man-clock starts to tick, and Xanxus is freaking out.

AN: I was obviously smoking something.

...this isn't serious, just so you know.

__________

-love," she said mournfully, wiping a juicy tear from the corner of her eye, her delicate fingers trembling and white. "I just cannot, I can't afford it."

"But my love," the man enthused throatily, enraptured in his love's despair. "Any risk is worth it, for our love to survive!"

"Oh, Antonio!"

"Oh, Catalina!"

Oh, Jesus Christ.

Not again.

Xanxus had enough problems in his life. For one thing, his life sucked. For another thing, someone had started to water down his fucking booze (like he wouldn't notice), and for another thing-

A sniffle sounded from the couch in front of the television, a gloved hand reaching for a tissue.

Fucking bullshit, seriously.

Elite assasin squad, his ass.

"Get the fuck out of my seat, shitface," Xanxus said loudly, watching with satisfaction as Squalo jumped, eyes wide as he whipped around.

Holy son of a bitch, the fucker had been crying. again.

"There are a thousand lousy ass fucking televisions in this rathole," Squalo yelled, voice cracking a bit. "Go fuck yourself."

On the television, the couple began to make out in a freakishly romantic manner. Xanxus sneered.

"I like this television," He said in the most asshole-y voice he could muster, smirking.

Squalo sputtered for a moment, face red and white hair sticking to his damp cheeks here and there. In a split-second the swordsman was up and marching out of the room, past Xanxus and into the cold hallway, leaving behind him a whipcord of hair, a trail of explicitives and a tissue.

Xanxus let the smirk melt from his face, a deep frown replacing it.

This was getting old.

__________

It had started a few months ago. At first it had been the cause for a lot of mockery and a reason to throw a lot of shit at Squalo's face, but then it just kind of got...

Sad.

Pathetic, even.

Xanxus didn't know what the fuck the shark was doing, the first time he had walked in on it. 'It' happened to be Squalo curled on a plump, leather loveseat, remote in hand, lovey dovey romance fuckery on the television, and the most frightening of all-

Squalo had been sniffling. Crying. Being a goddamn fucking woman.

Xanxus, for the first time in his life, had been shocked out of words. Even four letter words.

Squalo didn't cry. He killed shit and yelled.

Eventually, he had just settled for kicking Squalo in the gut and throwing the tv out the window. That should have solved it right there, but the Varia mansion was full of nothing if not televisions, for some reason.

Something about idle hands and psychopaths.

Anyway, Xanxus would have thought that would have been settled. No more crying, no more Sound of Music or whatever the fuck Squalo had been watching, no more weirdness.

Except he had been wrong.

After he had accidentally stumbled into Squalo's little nights of patheticism one too many times, Xanxus had started to become a little freaked out, and freaked out was just something Xanxus didn't do, in general. Squalo had always been a top-notch weirdo, what with his loyalty-hair and yelling and propensity to have random fits of slicing-up-really-nice-furniture, but this....

This was over the top.

And as Xanxus was soon to learn, the crying over movies was just the beginning.

Fuck.

__________

"Boss," Levi murmured, "Squalo's staring at you again." He sounded a little jealous. Xanxus withheld the urge to tell him to shut the fuck up.

"Shut the fuck up and eat your breakfast," Xanxus snarled.

Or not.

It wasn't as if he hadn't noticed that Squalo had been staring at his not-so-discreetly over his untouched plate of bacon and eggs. In fact, he had been trying his best to ignore it, because kicking the table at the asshole so early in the meal would disrupt his own breakfast.

And anyways, Squalo had been staring at him a lot lately.

And kicking/punching/dousing him with vodka wasn't helping.

Xanxus took a savage bite of his toast, jelly slipping down his chin like blood down a wolf's muzzle.

__________

"Bossu~" Lussuria sang, "Squalo's been writing your name in the margins of his mission reports~"

"Motherfuck," Xanxus swore, snatching the stack of papers from Lussuria's claw-like fingernails, eyebrows knitting together.

"Look at the little hearts," Lussuria noted.

A pause.

"So he has," Xanxus said tonelessly, the report combusting in his hand with an afterthought. "Get your faggot ass out of my office."

"Kay~" Lussuria chirruped after blowing a kiss at Xanxus, green, sparkly boa trailing behind him.

The door shut.

Xanxus buried his face in his hands and took a deep breath. He snapped open his desk drawer and reached for the first thing that came to hand- a bottle of whiskey, nice and refreshing and-

A swig.

Fucking watered down.

He threw it at the wall as hard as he could.

__________

"Boss~" Bel sang, looping his arm around Xanxus', catching him offguard as he stalked down the hall. "Squalo's been so lonely while you've been away~"

"Get the fuck off of me." Xanxus closed his eyes. Counted to ten.

"He's been sleeping with your jacket~"

Xanxus got to six.

__________

Bel grumbled, a month later and finally allowed to leave the hospital wing, that Xanxus was an ungrateful mongrel and that he was lucky a prince would stoop so low as to help him with matters relating to love.

Xanxus punched him in the eye for good measure.

__________

It was a Thursday night some weeks later that Xanxus finally, finally put an end to all of this Squalo-being-a-fucking-freak nonsense, once and for all.

This time it was Enchanted.

Xanxus had expressly stated that there was never to be any Disney in the castle. Ever. Especially after the whole Bambi event.

Something abour psychopaths and children cartoons.

(There hadn't been a single deer around the castle in years since.)

__________

Squalo didn't notice Xanxus' presence until his presence was throwing the tv out the window, the system making a spectacular crashing noise when it hit the ground twenty stories below.

"What the fuck is wrong with you?!" Squalo bellowed, on his feet instantly and teeth bared. "I was in the fucking middle of that movie, you asshole!"

"I'm sick of your shit!" Xanxus roared, kicking what was left of the entertainment system to pieces. "Stop being a fucking girl!"

Squalo joined in on the angry kicking-things-while-yelling tangent, sending the couch he had been sitting on at Xanxus. "Why don't you fucking mind your business?" He screeched, eyes sharp and teeth flashing. Xanxus felt a fire alight in his stomach- or maybe that was the couch hitting it. Either way, if Squalo wanted a fight, he was getting a fucking fight.

Maybe Xanxus could beat his newly-acquired freak-ass tendencies out of him, with any luck.

"You made it my business when you cried all over my fucking castle," Xanxus retorted, hefting the couch out of the way. He threw a punch at Squalo, missed. He forgot that Squalo was actually pretty fast. "What kind of fucking piece of trash cries, anyway?"

"Maybe I wouldn't have to cry over a fucking movie if some dumb shit could show a little fucking romance around here!" Squalo had found the bookshelf. Xanxus dodged a tome ungracefully, eyes narrowed to slits and teeth bared.

"If you want romance you're in the wrong fucking place," Xanxus informed Squalo, punching a copy of Moby Dick that had been attempting to brain him. "If I want a screw I'll let you know, don't expect a fucking bouquet of roses."

Squalo screamed and threw the bookcase itself at Xanxus.

__________

"I don't think this is going to end well," Bel noted giddily, ear the the wall.

Lussuria, who stood beside him, winced at the sound of another heirloom crashing into the wall. A gigantic woosh indicated that something, somewhere had caught on fire.

And then, suddenly, all went quiet.

__________

Xanxus had never known fear in his life.

He feared nothing.

He was the manliest man in the history of men.

He answered to no one, feared nothing, was feared by all, etc.

But somewhere in his tiny heart, a spark of fear let itself be known.

"My fucking hair," Squalo said softly. He held his hair in his hands, gingerly, as if it were capable of feeling pain. "You burnt half of my fucking hair off."

Xanxus had witnessed Squalo this calm and silent few times in his life. People had died horribly, he remembered. Horrible, slicy deaths.

Xanxus didn't want to die a bite-sized death. Not like Squalo was strong enough to inflict such a fate upon him, but still. He had to sleep sometime.

"I'm sorry," he said, the words falling from his lips without so much as asking his permission. Him? Sorry?! What was this shit?!

Squalo looked up, eyes wide. "What?"

"I said get the fuck over it, it's just girly-ass hair. It needed a trim, anyway," Xanxus recovered, shoving his hands in his pockets haughtily. In truth, he was a little regretful. He liked Squalo's hair long. Girly or not, it suited him. Sort of. Hard to ignore.

Squalo looked angry, his hair falling from his fists in a smoky, ashy swirl.

"I hate you," He grated, turning to walk from the room.

Xanxus sighed.

"Trash," he called, halting Squalo's footsteps. "Meet me for dinner tomorrow. Don't be late or I'll go to the fucking restaraunt without you. And stop fucking watering down my liquor or I'll kill you."

There. If the retard wanted romance, that's what he got. And Xanxus sure as hell wasn't paying.

__________

And they all lived happily after.

__________

The end.