Not Like We Used To
Title: Not Like We Used To
Fandom: Dragon Ball Z
Pairing/Characters: Vegeta x Bulma, Yamcha, Mrs. Briefs
Word Count: 2,019
Rating: PG-13 for language
Summary: Yamcha notices a change in Bulma and realizes that she’s moved on. Takes place somewhere in those 3 mysterious years.
[--]
Dark clouds covered the sky like a bad omen. It had just stopped raining but he could tell the rain would come again. He sighed, looking at her huge dome shaped house before turning off the ignition. He got out of his car after parking it in her driveway, his shoes crunching the gravely paved road under his feet. His dress shoes needed to be cleaned he realized, frowning down at them.
Looking up he saw the skies were an opaque gray, sadly beautiful. There was fog covering the city, covering up most of the skyscrapers. Days
like the one today always made him feel depressed inside despite him thinking of how pretty the clouds looked. He stuffed his hands in his pockets and walked to her front door.
Yamcha had come over to visit Bulma. They broken up some months ago after she found out about his other girlfriends but they had gotten over their differences and the hurt that came along with breakups and decided to still be friends. He was really grateful for that, she was a person he didn't want to lose. After all they had a lot of history; he couldn't quite compare to Goku really, but he was close enough.
Mrs. Briefs was the one who answered the door. Sure enough her eyes were closed and she had that smile on her face that she was getting the greatest sex of her life. He couldn't imagine any other reason why Bulma's dad could nail a milf like her. That, or this money might have something to do with it.
"Hello dearest. How wonderful to see you!" she said in a way he couldn't figure out if it was genuine or not. Though he couldn't imagine her being mean to anyone.
"Nice to see you too Mrs. Briefs." He smiled. After a few moments he added, "May I come in?"
"Oh! How silly of me," she said, sounding like she had an epiphany. "Yes, please come in," she stepped back from the door and allowed him inside.
She walked him to the living room where she had told him Bulma and Vegeta were. From the hallway he could see the Bulma's big blue fro peeking out from the top of the couch. And who could miss Vegeta's sonic the hedgehog spikes?
Miss Briefs smiled at him before disappearing down the hallway. He shrugged, walking over to Bulma and Vegeta, announcing his presence with, "hey guys."
Vegeta didn't even acknowledge him, not even a grunt like he usually did, just continued staring ahead, looking at the T.V. screen. He had told him once that feeble things like him didn't deserve to be graced with his greeting. The bastard.
Bulma arched her neck to see him. "Oh hey Yamcha."
He bent down his head to kiss her cheek and she let him. She didn't kiss his cheek back, just went back to staring at the T.V. like Vegeta was doing. He went to sit on the love seat by himself, Bulma and Vegeta having taken up the space on the large couch.
He stared at the two of them for a moment, Bulma looked at him and smirked but Vegeta kept his eyes trained on the screen. It always surprised Yamcha that when he wasn't working out he was watching T.V. Bulma seemed to get a kick out it and watch it with him even when Yamcha knew she wasn't a fan of television herself.
She just loved seeing him study humans as Vegeta called it. He hated their race but enjoyed their sitcoms even if he never cracked a smile. And Lord forbid anything in existence ever heard him laugh. Surely that would mark the end of the world and not the androids to come.
Vegeta had his eyebrows scrunched together in the center, wrinkling his forehead as John Lithgow made a comment about humans. Old re-runs of Third Rock From The Sun were shown, and that seemed to be Vegeta's favorite. It seemed he agreed with the alien's confusion, though he always frowned at Dick's shenanigans.
Yamcha saw Bulma alternate from watching the show and to watching Vegeta's face, waiting hopefully to see if something could get a reaction out of him. Yamcha didn't know why she tried so hard to get Vegeta to laugh -or do anything but be angry- but she seemed to enjoy it. He shrugged; let her have her fun.
Footsteps were heard, the clink clank of high heels and they looked up to see Bulma’s mom come in, a tray of tea and sandwiches balanced in one hand. With a smile that made it seem like her cheeks were stapled high on her face she asked, “who wants a treat?”
Bulma looked up, “I’ll have one mom.”
Yamcha sat up straighter, leaning forward and reached over to get a roast beef sandwich, noticing how Bulma got two sandwiches. He sat back in his seat and watched as she looked at Vegeta, handing one over, “hey, do you want one?”
He took his attention away from the T.V. long enough to glare at her. “No.”
She ignored him and shoved it near his mouth until he opened it and allowed her to feed him. It was more a shoving down his throat than feeding to him but Vegeta didn’t seem to get more angry.
Yamcha stared a little until he saw Vegeta glaring in his direction and turned away to look at Mrs. Briefs, “thanks for the tea and sandwiches.”
“No problem dearest,” she beamed before walking away, swaying her hips and the tray in her hand swayed with her, spilling some of the tea over and staining the carpet.
Vegeta stared after her. “It’s a wonder she’s lived this long.”
Bulma, who had her legs tucked under her, extended a leg to kick his ribs. “That’s my mom asshole.”
He grunted, but paid her no mind. He turned his head back to the T.V. and resumed his glowering at the screen like it had offended him. Yamcha turned his head towards the screen but could still see them from the corner of his eyes.
Bulma was bothering Vegeta, kicking his side and he did nothing. Again. He suddenly remembered that time they had been outside having BBQ and she made him wear that eye burning pink shirt. Her let her get away with a lot of things he realized.
He saw Bulma frown since she wasn’t getting attention, something he realized about her when they dated, she liked stirring up men, getting them riled up. She kicked him again. He finally unglued his eyes from the T.V. and frowned at her, gripping her ankle at the same time. She frowned, but he could tell she wasn’t all that upset with him.
She kicked his ribs again; apparently his hold on her ankle hadn’t been as strong as he first thought. He glared a little harder, then, his hand still holding her ankle, brought his free hand to pinch the skin of her calf.
She winced and exclaimed, “ouch! Vegeta that hurt!”
He grinned shark-like at her, a cruel twist of the lips. He had seen Vegeta smirk like that in battle, but he might as well have done nothing, Bulma not reacting to him at all. And thus, it went on, for a few minutes. She would kick his ribs and he would pinch her skin in return.
She would flinch and whine when he pinched her then kick him harder than the last time, Vegeta would grunt or growl and pinch her skin harder. And the sound of Bulma’s whines and Vegeta’s growling filled the room as they engaged in something Yamcha had trouble finding the words for.
Yamcha stared in disbelief; they were like children, with the way they acted with each other. He coughed to get their attention. When he finally got it, they stopped, mid pinch and kick to stare at Yamcha, looking like they had completely forgotten he was there.
Vegeta let go of Bulma’s leg, and Bulma nestled herself a little deeper into the couch and they resumed to watching T.V. like nothing happened.
Yamcha followed suit, not really having anything else to do but felt the overwhelming silence fill the room. He wished he hadn’t stopped them. Almost.
He started to get mad that it was Vegeta who was sitting next to Bulma, and it was all his attention she was trying to get, not even bothering to talk to him like she usually did. He remembered when it had been them sitting on the couch and flirting, fussing with each other and enjoying the time spent together. He sighed, leaning and slumping further down on the couch.
Bulma shifted in her seat, and the legs that had been tucked under her stretched out until she rested them on Vegeta’s lap.
Yamcha’s body tensed for the hell storm that would likely come from touching the Prince. He expected Vegeta to throw her legs off of him, yell at her, maybe flare up like a firecracker and throw a tantrum like he usually did, threatening to end her life.
Instead, Vegeta didn’t move, just asked, “what are you doing?”
“My legs are falling asleep.”
And that was the end of their conversation.
Yamcha felt confused and a little hurt that Vegeta didn’t seem to mind. It hurt that they had gotten close enough where contact like that no longer bothered Vegeta. Before, no one could even touch his shoulder to get his attention without him threatening to destroy the planet.
But now, he was sitting right next to a human woman, watching human television, with a human woman’s legs on him. And he didn’t look ashamed or angry. Well, more angry than usual. Despite him always having a fuck off face, there were different levels to his pissed off face.
Today it wasn’t as bad as the others. As to, per say, the days when he addressed Yamcha.
Yamcha pretended to be watching the T.V. and be interested in what was going on with Joseph Gordon-Levitt high school problems. What he was doing was growing tense and his neck grew hard from tension and stress as he saw Vegeta bring a hand and rest it on Bulma’s calf. He placed his hand on her leg and kept it there for some time until he eventually started moving it up and down, gently caressing her skin.
He kept stroking her leg, moving his thick bruised and calloused hand, bumpy knuckles, for once not covered in gloves, up and down her much paler skin. Vegeta still had his eyes on the T.V and when Yamcha saw, Bulma did too.
She was staring at the screen like nothing interesting, and possibly dangerous thing was going on. It was then Yamcha realized, this kind of interaction between them might not be so new to them, and maybe not so strange. The way they carried on certainly gave no hint to that.
Yamcha felt something die inside of him. He had thought he still had a chance of getting back with Bulma. Seeing the way she acted with Vegeta, he didn’t think he stood a chance. He might have felt happy for her if not of who she was replacing him with.
He saw Bulma smirk a little from the attention she was getting. Yamcha’s realization that things would never be the same between them hit him in the face hard, it might as well have been Goku punching his face in.
He saw Vegeta, who had gone back to pinching her skin, albeit more gently this time, get a smirk on his face too. It seemed he liked riling her up almost as much as she did him.
Yamcha smiled, shaking his head and looking at the screen and actually paid attention this time.
Suddenly, Vegeta spoke, startling them both. “Woman.”
“What?” Bulma asked. It wasn’t often that Vegeta spoke first. Or spoke at all really.
“You didn’t shave your legs this morning, did you?” he smirked.
And their kicking and pinching resumed once again like Yamcha wasn’t there.
[--]
END
Vegeta might be OOC here, but you can just ignore that.