damned_institute | Day 27: Lunch

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Day 27: Lunch

Renji wasn't so certain what this grilled cheese thing was all about, but he liked the sound of some soup. Even if it was strange western soup, well... there wasn't anything bad people could do to soup, in his experience. His good mood was starting to fray at the edges, a little, from the strain of dealing with the Ichimaru issue, and even more from what had been on the bulletin board earlier.

He'd never had difficulty simply writing something before. But...

He shook his head as he entered the line. He didn't want to think about it. He wanted to hold on to the tenuous equilibrium he'd managed to find.

Renji got himself a large bowl of soup, water, and even one of those sandwiches, just to try it. Old habit, recently awakened, had him over to one side of the cafeteria, where the fewest people possible would have the chance to pass behind him. He sat there with his back toward the wall and started eating.

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The more Ed talked, the more Hughes wondered if maybe he should send him to Roy for this.

"Well, yeah, so did I," Hughes admitted. "In a general sense. But trust me, it didn't help me any. And... well... I only really knew about it with girls. Not.... the other. And even knowing the basics, it turns out that didn't matter much at all. There's a lot more to it than just... you know. Tab A into Slot B."

He cleared his throat, still flushing bright red himself. It wasn't that sex was a difficult subject for him to talk about, it was just that Ed's reactions were getting to him.

"Alright, look, there's no reason to be embarrassed about this."

Ed practically squirmed in his seat, squeezing his eyes shut as though hoping that if he couldn't see anything, it wasn't really happening. He'd have put his hands over his ears and started humming or something if it hadn't been an incredibly childish thing to do.

And yes, there was good reason to be embarrassed about it! Tabs and slots and while it might just be natural in the biological sense, it seemed like an entirely different subject now. "What more can there be?" he asked quietly.

And then blinked up at the older man. He... he knew about sex between men, or that's what he made it sound like? Huh? But... "But I'm not with a girl," he said suspiciously.

"Yeah, I know." Hughes cleared his throat. He had hoped Ed would have figured that out already. Girls were one thing. Everyone knew basically how it went with girls. But the other? Hell, he still was a little confused on some parts.

"That's... mainly why I wanted to talk to you. It can be confusing. Trust me," he said, giving Ed a long, measuring look. "I know."

Then why? Surely... Nah, couldn't be. That was a stupid idea. 'cause Hughes had Gracia and Ed's notions of relationships and adults were still fuzzy at best.

It was a good job that Ed hadn't been eating anything when Hughes next spoke, because he doubtless would have choked on it. "You... know?" he asked, voice coming out as a rather embarrassing squeak of shock. "From books... right?" Books, you could learn anything from books.

"Ed, I am a man of the world," Hughes said, chuckling some. Now he was going to lie. And he hated it, but he'd made a promise to Roy. And he couldn't very well expect Ed to trust his advice if he didn't have a solid basis for it. So...he was stuck.

"I wasn't always a married man, you know. And I don't there are books on that."

Ed looked at him, really looked, as though not quite trusting what he was saying. He did know, of course, that adults were once young like he was now, and must have had lives before they married and had children, but for so long his entire world had been focussed on Al and the stone, that it was difficult to even contemplate.

His eyes widened a little at the admission, taking him entirely off guard. "So... you've... uh... you know... with another man?"

"Well, I've done things," Hughes admitted. "Fooled around, fooled around a lot, but... I've never actually had sex with another guy. But I know how it works. Pretty much. I mean I've...."

He suddenly stopped clearing his throat and looking away. "Never mind that train of thought. But yeah, I've been with other guys. Another guy, anyway. And I can tell you from experience that it's weird and it's confusing at first. And that's okay."

For a moment, Ed could have laughed because speaking like that, Hughes sounded a lot like a teenager himself, all trying to show that he knew what he was talking about without quite saying that he was unclear on he details himself. It was amusing.

But honestly. Finding out that Hughes had been with other men was kind of a shock. What next? That he'd slept with Mustang or something?

"I'm not planning on sleeping with Tamaki any time soon, you know," he said, more a desperate attempt to not have this conversation than anything. He liked Tamaki, enjoyed kissing him and being with him, but this was more than he'd ever thought of doing as it was!

"Yeah... you say that," Hughes said, glancing upwards. "But in the heat of the moment, it's easy to get carried away. I can't count the times I planned on just some necking and the next thing I know I'm in the backseat with my pants around my ankles and... well, you get the point." He held up a hand. He wouldn't damage Ed's virgin psyche too much, if he could help it.

"But on that subject, you know sex isn't the only thing you can do. Hell, it's not even the most fun thing you can do. And being with another guy has this going for it: you already know what works. Women... god, it took me years to figure out what worked. And they never tell you what they want. They make you guess. But the point is, you shouldn't be shy or nervous about it. It feels good, it's fun, it brings people closer together, and I'm more concerned with you being safe and educated than whether or not you're doing it. I don't care what you're doing or if you don't plan on doing anything for years, it'd just put my mind at ease if I knew you knew all the important stuff."

Ed actually cringed at that. Not something he really wanted to think about, Hughes with some girl (or man, a treacherous little voice in the back of his mind whispered) doing... stuff. Even that small mentioned made him want to curl up and die to escape.

Besides, he couldn't really imagine Tamaki ever getting that caught up in the moment. it seemed a very un-Tamaki like thing to do.

His eyes widened in mingled fascination and mortification as Hughes continued. Other things than sex? Better things than sex? It was a lot for Ed to take in and morbid curiosity forced him to stay and listen. He supposed he could see the point about knowing what men wanted better than women, but now he was thinking terrible things like maybe how Tamaki's hands would feel...

He shook his head violently to dispel that image. Not what he needed! "So," he asked in a tiny voice, wondering if he really wanted to ask this. "What's the important stuff?"

"Alright." Hughes leaned forward. "Protection, obviously. If you're in a committed relationship and you're not doing anything else with anybody else, and you can't get pregnant, you can do without. But other than that, you always want to use it. Because of diseases and pregnancy and stuff. But it's not a hundred percent effective, even protection slips up sometimes." It happened, it was an unfortunate fact of life. But at least there wasn't any risk of pregnancy in this case. Which was a huge relief to Hughes.

Though he wondered about the other kids running around....

No, he couldn't be worried about that right now. Better to just finish discussing these things with Ed.

"Make sure you're both on the same page about things, you know? And don't be afraid to talk about it. I know it's awkward as all hell, but it's important. And you get over the embarrassment pretty quickly. Oh, and start out slow, you know? There's no need to rush into the finale, if you get my drift. Friction...friction is your friend. Any kind of friction, at your age. Hell, even at my age. Uh... make sure you've got something to clean up with, afterwards. I won't lie, it's messy. No matter what you do, if you do it right, it's messy. You know, double the messy than when you're just... having your private time."

This was honestly going better than Hughes had thought it would.

Pregnant? Unless something was going very very wrong with biology, then he really doubted that either he or Tamaki could get pregnant. That wouldn't happen, not even here... right? "Wait, you can get sick from it?" he asked quickly, staring at the older man and forgetting his embarrassment for a second. It was sounding more dangerous by the second! No-one ever said that you could get ill from it!

He did squirm then when Hughes continued, moving onto things that even Ed couldn't convince himself were to do with science or protection. He hunched up on his chair, face going bright bright pink as the older man spoke. He hoped no-one was looking too closely. He was sure he'd remember every word as part of the most mortifying experience of his life. ""Fine. Friction and it's messy," Ed said quickly, wanting to get it over with but not holding out much hope that that would be all. Hughes could be disturbingly thorough when he wanted to be.

"Well...yeah." Hughes shrugged. "You know...social diseases. I mean, it's not like you or your little boyfriend have one, so you don't need to worry about that. But if you sleep with someone and you don't know their sexual history, you could end up with something. And from what I've heard, it's really unpleasant. That's why you use a glove." So Ed did need this talk, after all.

"Ed, stop blushing. It really isn't something to get so flustered about. Everybody does it. And they do it because it's natural and it's fun. And we're both guys, so knock it off and stop acting like a twelve year old kid over this stuff."

If Ed kept squirming and blushing, Hughes was going to start getting embarrassed again.

Why did Hughes assume that Ed was going to be sleeping with anyone, let alone several someones? He wished he knew why suddenly, kissing one person equated to sex. "Glove?" Ed said in surprise, giving Hughes a baffled look. He had no idea where that came into the equation.

He scowled darkly at the mild reprimand, but forced himself to meet Hughes' eyes. He wasn't some stupid kid! This was just stuff he didn't want to talk about, was that so hard to understand? "It's awkward!"

"You know. A condom." Hughes shrugged. He'd thought Ed said he already knew everything. Clearly not.

"It doesn't have to be awkward. It's not like this conversation is going to go any further than you and me. It's between us, and there's nothing you could say or ask that'd make me uncomfortable. So just calm down and relax, alright?"

Oh, that! Ed nodded. "Okay." He knew what one of those was at least, just not the more... colourful names for them. He dreaded to think what would have happened if he'd had to ask about that one. Didn't bear thinking about.

"It's nothing I've ever talked about," Ed muttered, sounding a little more like his usual self now that the topic wasn't quite on the same embarrassing level as it had been. "Was never interested."

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Day 27: Lunch

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