Sleep Over

                Hayner sat for a long while in his room, thumbing through his history text. It took him a long while to read the assignment due for the next day. As for Leon, his trip was a little more eventful. Before he’d even stopped into the laundry mat, he stopped into a mattress store. There was absolutely no reason to leave the runt with a filthy mattress. Having arranged a delivery for the next day, he paid the man and wandered back to the laundry mat where he proceeded to wash Hayner’s clothes. There was one other stop on his list… a stop at a drug store to pick up a few interesting items to be sure Hayner made it through the night without watering another mattress. It took nearly three hours for Leon to return. By the time he had, the sun had long since gone down. Fighting a few rogue heartless that popped up here and there was awkward with clean bags of laundry, but Leon managed to make it home unscathed. Unlocking the door, he shouldered into the small dwelling and wandered back to the bedroom. “Hayner? I’m back,” he murmured.

                Hayner had since nodded off on his book, but glanced up from atop his stained bed. “Uhn… Welcome back,” he mumbled, wiping the sleep from his eyes. “What took you so long?” Hayner whined. Leon deposited the sacks from the drugs tore into Haner’s mother’s room and made his way into Hayner’s room.

                “There was a lot of laundry,” Leon concluded, depositing the laundry at the foot of Hayner’s bed. Shuffling away he glanced back to Hayner. “Bed time. We’ll do some more studying tomorrow. Come on,” Leon murmured.

                “But it’s only ten o’clock! You said I could stay up ‘til ten-thirty!” Hayner wheedled.

                Leon couldn’t help but smirk. “I did promise you that, didn’t I… I’m allowing you half an hour to get ready for bed and unwind,” he murmured.

                “I’m already dressed,” Hayner grunted, sliding down from his bed. “Where are we going?” he inquired, wandering after Leon.

                “We’re going to sleep in your mother’s room if that’s alright,” Leon edged awkwardly. A floral print bed-theme wasn’t really what he considered a good night’s rest, but… it was at least clean.

                Hayner cringed at the idea of sleeping in his mother’s bed for obvious reasons. “…Mama doesn’t let me sleep on her bed,” he hedged hesitantly.

                “You’re clean and I assure you, the reason she doesn’t approve of it will not be a problem tonight.” Leon pushed open the door and was relieved to find that Hayner’s mother was neat as a pin.

                “Well… I appreciate the confidences but…” Hayner edged awkwardly. Leon did not reply verbally, however he did remove a package of diapers from the drug store sack. Hayner gawked in disbelief for a moment before rage hit him. “What?! No! No way! Those’re for babies!”

                Leon lifted a brow. “They’re for protecting your mother’s mattress.”

                “I’ll sleep on my own before that!” Hayner shouted in return, his face scarlet with embarrassment.

                “You’re not sleeping on that filthy mattress,” Leon countered, shaking his head. Tearing the package open with his fingertip, he pulled out one of the nappies and dropped it on the bed.

                “No!” Hayner protested, folding his arms stubbornly.

                Leon sighed and mopped his palm across his face. “Hayner, I’m not giving you a choice. You’re not sleeping in that filthy bed and you’re not about to ruin your mother’s mattress. I’m going to step out of the room and put away your clothes… and if you’re not in one of those by the time I get back, I’m going to—“

                “But it’s the kind with tabs on the side! They’re not even pull-ups!” Hayner whined.

                “…You are used to this then,” Leon accused.

                Hayner blushed dark red and had begun to argue with the brunette but Leon turned and closed the door behind him as he left. He had thought to make Hayner put away his own laundry, but decided against it for the time being. Hayner had enough catching up to do. The least Leon could do was put away clothes. It didn’t take Leon too long to put away the boy’s clothes, but he was rather disappointed at the disorganized state of Hayner’s drawers. Leon did what he could to reorganize but finally wound up putting things away the best he could. By the time he had returned to the bedroom, he didn’t like what he saw!

                Hayner was bent halfway out the window, lowering a trail of tied bed sheets down the side of the house. Leon almost choked as the boy threaded one of his feet up out of the window. He hadn’t imagined the boy would have tried to crawl out of the window to escape a diaper! Leon acted quickly, dashing forward. Grabbing the back of the boy’s shirt, he pulled the boy away from the window. “GYAAH!” Hayner shouted, flapping as Leon yanked him backwards.

                The swordsman wasted no time in pulling the rowdy blonde over his knees. He could tolerate the boy’s refusal to put on a pull up for the sake of his pride, but to go as far as to endanger his life climbing out of a window at night? That was inexcusable. “Just where were you going to go?” Leon scolded. Pinching the boy’s pajama pants and boxers in one hand, he drug them down, exposing the boy’s bare behind.

                “Ua—NO!!” Hayner shouted, kicking his feet for all he was worth. “I don’t want—“

                The boy’s squealing was cut short as a strong “CLAP!” echoed across the room. The firm slap Leon offered the little runt this time was not mild as it had been earlier that night in the kitchen. Leon said nothing and allowed his hand to sail down in spank after spank. The boy’s chubby behind bounced and tensed with every slap. It didn’t take but a pair of swats until Hayner had begun screaming. A pair more and the boy felt tears streak his cheeks. After half a dozen smacks, the boy was bawling. Unintelligible “Hu—nuuuuh!!!” poured from the boy; it was the only way he could

                Once the boy’s body was racked with sobbing, Leon stopped and sighed, giving Hayner a moment to collect himself over Leon’s knees. The poor little one’s behind was glowing bright red. “I don’t ever want to see you sneaking out of anyone’s house again, is that clear?”

                “Baaawwh!” Hayner bawled in reply. It was all he could do to nod his head in reply.

                “You could have broken your neck, kid,” Leon added, feeling the weight of the runt’s tears. Hayner choked and nodded again. Leaving the boy’s pants pooled at his ankles, Leon shook open the nappy and laid it out on top of the bed. Laying the boy down atop it, he cringed as Hayner worked himself into more distress than he had been in before. Though the boy was not physically fighting the diaper, he certainly made a lot of noise. “…You’re going to wake your neighbors,” Leon cautioned as he pulled the front of the crinkly diaper between the boy’s legs. Sticking both of the tapes down, even Leon twitched at the sight of Winnie the Pooh printed on the front of the diaper. Really? The hundred acre woods was a separate world! It had to be a coincidence… or a fatal sign that the worlds were beginning to run together like wet paint. Once the boy was taped into the undergarment, he tugged up the bawling boy’s boxer shorts and pajama pants and sat down on the bed beside the runt again. Hayner wasted no time in rolling over onto his belly to hide his face and save his behind from the sting.

                Gruff as he was, the lone gunman picked up the distraught teen and seated Hayner atop his lap once again. Pulling the kid’s head into his shoulder, he let the boy cry out his frustration. “I- I ha-ate you!!” Hayner sobbed angrily.

                “Yeah, I know, kid,” Leon replied, stroking his larger palm up and down the runt’s back to soothe his anger away. “I’m sorry I had to do that too… I really didn’t think you’d try to run away…” To this Hayner sobbed louder. For some reason, Leon’s acknowledgement and apology did not make him feel better as he had hoped it would.

                “I want it off! Now!” Hayner howled.

                “I’ll strike a deal with you,” Leon sighed, patting the boy’s back down as he began to hiccup roughly. “Keep it dry two nights, and we’ll toss the sack of diapers and I’ll buy you another video game as apology for the false alarm, alright?”

                “Sta-arting toni-ight!” Hayner shouted angrily into Leon’s shoulder.

                “Shh. Tomorrow night. You’ve already made a mess of yourself today if I recall,” he reminded the runt.

                “I don’t want to wear it!” Hayner protested. This time, Leon ignored the poor boy and continued to bet the back of his head.

“…You’re going to have a headache in the morning,” he sighed. Crying did tend to do that. Hayner sucked in a few tears but drew his arms up around Leon’s shoulders reluctantly. Unfortunate as the gunman’s timing was, Leon had peeled the boy away the moment Hayner reached out to him. Patting the teen’s head he assured him that he would return. “I’ll be back in a minute. I’m going to take a bath and change into some night clothes. Try and get some sleep—and calm down. No one is going to know about this outside of you and me… unless you’d rather your mom know too—but no one else needs to know,” Leon groaned as he padded down the hall to the bathroom.

“I Do-on’t want my MOM to know!” Hayner shouted. He knew that his mother would have given Leon a pat on the back for wrestling her bed-wetting teen into night-trainers.

Hot steam poured out of the bathroom for a long while. It’d been a long time since Leon had been able to shower in a nice bathroom. True, in the end he came out smelling like Hayner’s MOM…. But it was a price worth the use of hot water that was not in the form of an outdoor hot spring. With a towel draped over his neck, Leon returned to the bedroom clad in his boxing shorts and a clean undershirt. Hayner had managed to curl up on his side and was still hiccupping to himself. The great relief to Leon was that the boy hadn’t torn off the plastic nappy. Leon could still see the white secret peeking up from the back of the boy’s pajama pants.

“Hnm. Am I in the doghouse then? You wouldn’t make me sleep on the love seat would you?” Leon teased, climbing into bed contently. Hayner glanced up over his shoulder as though considering banishing the gunman. Instead, he scotched closer to the scarred gunner and wiped his nose on the back of his hand.

“I don’t want to go to school tomorrow,” Hayner sniveled.

Leon closed his eyes, sighing quietly. Tomorrow was going to be a very interesting affair. Not only did he have a mattress to dispose of, but he would also have to look in on the tutoring session Hayner had arranged with Seifer. It was going to be awkward to see the other teen again. He wondered how quickly Seifer would forget the spanking he’d been given.

The shrill BEEP BEEP BEEP!!! Of the alarm clock was Leon’s rude awakening. His eyes snapped open and he’d nearly sat up and launched Hayner out of the bed with him. How fortunate that Leon remembered where he was before he leapt out of bed .Glancing down to the boy who had half lopped over him in the middle of the night, he was taken aback. Hayner was rather actively suckling his thumb against the man, whimpering against the sound of the alarm. Dismissively, Leon reached up and pulled the teen’s thumb from his mouth. “Hayner. Get up.”

Hayner awoke amid whimper as his thumb was tugged from his mouth with a sticky smack of his lips. “Mmh?...Shut it up,” he whined, rubbing his eyes. “I want to go back to sleep…”

“No can do. You have to get dressed and get to school,” Leon groaned, slipping his feet out of the bed and onto the cold floor. Stretching as he got up, he paused. “...unless you’d rather have breakfast first?”

                Hayner sat up in the bed like a stiff and grinned. “What’s for breakfast?!!?” It was oh so easy to coax the kid into cooperation with food. Leon’s fish hadn’t been half bad last night.

                “…That depends on what’s in the ‘fridge,” Leon replied as he wandered into the bathroom to relieve himself.

                “Can we have eggs? I like sunny-side up,” Hayner mumbled groggily. Pacing down the hall, passed Leon who had left the bathroom door open, he tugged open the ‘fridge door and eyeballed the food. Eggs? Check! “…we have eggs!” he announced, tugging them out. The milk was next to follow. Once Squall had flushed, replaced the seat, and washed his hands, he followed after Hayner. The little runt was swilling milk from the carton.

                “Use a glass,” Leon groaned. “I don’t want brat-spit in my milk. I’m sure your mom doesn’t either.”

                Hayner frowned. “By the time mom gets back, this’ll be chunky milk.”

                Leon… did not want to meditate on the idea of chunky milk and dismissed the commentary. “Glass,” he repeated.

                “Alriiiight,” Hayner whined, yanking a glass down from the cupboard.

                Leon plopped a pan on the stove and heated it up. He was still pretty hung over from his decent night of sleep. He was all too used to sleeping under the stars—ie: on lumpy ground. The nice feel of a warm bed and a roof over one’s head did wonders for the body! The eggs soon sizzled, though the idea of sunny-side up soon became a batch of half-scrambled eggs, which he served up with a few sausages.

                Hayner was not shy about eating. He shoveled hot bits of egg into his mouth, blowing puffs of steam every time he took a bite that was too hot to handle. “Hayner… you eat like a two-year-old,” Leon complained.

                “I do not!” Hayner argued…with his mouth full.

                Leon set the coffee percolator to life and waited for the drip to begin. “I rest my case,” he concluded, sighing in relief as the black brew began to fill the plot.

                “Do I really have to go to school today? I’m tired… and sore!” Hayner whined, squirming in his chair.

                “Yes… I don’t want you to fall even more behind. You’d like to play your games again, I’m sure,” Leon added to twist the boy’s arm a little more.

                Hayner groaned in frustration and carried his empty plate to the sink. “Yes, I want to play them again… but I don’t want to feel like rearranging anyone’s face today either.”

                “Hn,” Leon commented flatly, taking a sip of coffee. Twisting the subject around on the boy quite suddenly, Leon lowered his eyes to the seat of the boy’s pajamas. “…And do you need any help?”
                “Uh- What?!!?” Hayner choked. He nearly dropped his plate.

                “Did you stay dry?” Leon concluded leveling his gaze with Hayner’s.

To be continued…