keepingshop | ＩＮＥＶＩＴＡＢＬＥ

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MAKE A WISH.
( IF YOU CAN PAY THE PRICE ... )

[ They're older now but Kimihiro retains a level of density sometimes that would impress, well, anyone. Though even if he had caught the double meaning, the result might be vaguely the same as he narrows his eyes, ]

Laundry belonging to who? You--

[ Kimihiro is a certain percentage soft bluster in no time at all, but just as fast his words trail off, breath twisted out of him warm and bright. He ends up with both of his hands cradled at the back of Shizuka's head, a certain weakness for the path Shizuka is fond of laying across his jaw perhaps with reverent attention to his throat. Truth be known, he's still embarrassed of it and doesn't know why because it's not exactly new anymore, but one wouldn't know it the way he blushes and reacts to every single touch. A reasonable guess would have to do with his lack of contact with, well, almost anyone; how hyper sensitized he is to the weight of Shizuka's hand at the line of his spine or even the low hum of his voice that seems still to prefer 'hns' and 'ahs' to words. But maybe that's fine in these cases; every word is just another point of potential for Kimihiro to want to cover his own face but also half ask half demand that Shizuka never stop -- stop what? Touching? Yes. Seeing him? Yes. Being together? Yes.

All of it, yes. A thousand times, yes.

It's easy, self conscious or not, to let Shizuka lean into him until he feels himself backed against the counter, and Kimihiro slides one hand to the front of his shirt no longer neat at all, and pulls at the collar this time, more playful and enticing than he means to be but often is these days as he looks at Shizuka with the kind of openness no one else has seen in a long, long time. ] Didn't you say that you were going...to take this off?

[He smirked at that protest, lips trailing from jaw to the hollow beneath it: a favorite spot of his to leave marks at, on the rarest of occasions he was allowed to leave such obvious signs above the collar. His second favorite spot was two inches below Kimihiro's ear. This was where he lavished his attention on, shifting his grip to avoid the countertop, but otherwise pressing his fingers on Kimihiro's spine, an echo of how he's seen his partner settle on a chord on his shamisen.

Being reminded of his earlier words, too, made him huff in amusement. That was one leap from irritation to playfulness. When he was flustered, Kimihiro wasn't at all a smooth talker. Doumeki liked this side of him, too, this raw sincerity that he equally protected and wanted to covet.]

Hn.

[An agreement. Yet, he held off from actually unbuttoning his shirt.

Both his tone and the look he gave Kimihiro pointed to one question: what are you going to do about it?]

[ Kimihiro would protest, would tell him sometimes Not where it can be seen only to be met with Shizuka's eyes and then have to look away because of course no one would, not people anyway, and spirits had no care of such things. It was an empty protest anyway, Kimihiro liking it as much as Shizuka if not more so, kindled alive and present and real by the pressure that edged on the side of leaving a bruise that bloomed like a flower if Kimihiro let it. Tonight, he lets him, and tomorrow he'll touch his fingertips lightly to the discoloration and flush and feel young and strange and loved. He loves this: the play of Shizuka's touch along the notches of his spine and the attention to detail therein, and maybe it's not unlike how sometimes when Shizuka falls asleep first, Kimihiro will count his eyelashes or trace the lines of his dominant hand just because he can and because he wants to.

All that being true, he's still no good when Shizuka so effortlessly throws the ball into his court like that, so smug and self assured that it drives Kimihiro a little crazy but also out of his depth because the second he over-thinks something like this he's outpaced. But it's not like he'll admit such a thing. Ever. Rather, he draws both hands up to Shizuka's face -- a face that has no right to do the things it does to Kimihiro's heart both when he sees him and, conversely, when he hasn't seen him for too long usually due to a client -- and slots his mouth to his. He tries to convey stupid into his expression though his success is probably none. Shizuka tastes like the food they ate and the sake, of course, but beneath all that he's just Shizuka.]

Shizuka.

[ He says a great deal with just his name, and clumsily echoing a kiss to the corner of Shizuka's mouth, lets his hands slide down to deftly work at the buttons of his shirt -- a thing he has gotten better at overtime, practice making perfect and all that.

It's still startling to this day, how Shizuka chose him, how even given the possibility of a slightly more normal life with a woman who loved him and the promise of a family....he still chose Kimihiro. He doesn't bring it up, ever, because Shizuka did indeed make his choice and Kimihiro is too selfish to send him away by force -- though he could; could lock himself up in the shop and create a kekkai even Shizuka could not penetrate; he could.

But he doesn't want to.

He wants this: their home, Shizuka's hands on him like prayers, the unwritten tradition and promise of sharing meals.

For as long as he can have them; he wants them all.

Maybe they should move, he thinks, the kitchen not really being the place for this, but he gets the final button free of Shizuka's shirt and can't help but lean in to press a kiss to his collarbone, the pressure of his teeth a flirtation he can manage because he doesn't have to look Shizuka in the eyes when he does so. ]

[Any accusatory look Kimihiro might have were marred by his earnestness, bright and clear, down to the way he held Doumeki's face, kissing him first then and calling his name.

Here was a secret: just as he pretended to be asleep sometimes to enjoy the trailing of fingers on his palm, he equally kept quiet about the effect Kimihiro had on him in using his given name.

Perhaps it was a losing battle. Kimihiro, after all, was close enough to see the dilation of his eyes, hear his quiet exhale when the buttons of his collar and shirt were undone.

The cool air on his skin was fine. Chasing it away from his partner's bare chest was even better.

Wordlessly, he placed his hands on Kimihiro's hip, seeking out that spot again above the collar with his mouth as he led them to their room and to the bed, fingers questing to untie the obi keeping those robes together. There was no one else Doumeki could imagine loving this way, not with how Kimihiro meant everything to him beyond ties of shared sight and blood.]

Overdressed.

[Whether he meant himself or Kimihiro, he didn't specify.

His intention to take his time unwrapping Kimihiro, on the other hand, was obvious with the slide of his hand beneath silk.]

[ They fall into bed together more often than not whether or not entangled, but it never gets old and Kimihiro never lacks for the soft thrill of how easy it is to do so. The contrast of how soft the bed is beneath them and how solid Shizuka is makes for the kind of juxtaposition that lets Kimihiro open up beneath him with the ease of a second nature. Even when this was new and Kimihiro clung to him almost too much just to hide his face, that part was easy -- as if even though the mind's inhibitions elicit a blush or a protest, the body's honesty supersedes it and the heart confirms.

Some of it is how slow Shizuka takes it, takes him, the warm weight of his hand a thing Kimihiro melts under. Overdressed? Well. He doesn't know if Shizuka means himself or not, but he half laughs anyway, using one hand to slide his shirt back off of one shoulder, not bothering with the other because that hand is still warm against his skin. Some of it is how as close as they are even if Shizuka maintains a sometimes maddeningly cool veneer, Kimihiro can detect the tells whether it be his eyes or the catch of his breaths. In plainest terms, they know each other, and of course, as with many plainly stated things, there's nothing 'plain' about the meaning of it at all.

It's only when they kiss again like this, Shizuka's full weight on him if he has his way, easy enough to slip a leg out even before Shizuka has had time to unravel him, and hook it encouragingly at his waist -- too slow (not that Shizuka listens to him, not that he really needs him to in this case, some of it worth being made to wait for) --, that Kimihiro has to laugh again but this time at himself as his glasses make themselves more known and he gently slides a hand down to Shizuka's chest to press briefly as he moves his other to remove his glasses. It's not like he needs them honestly for this, the dark of their room cut clean through by the moon -- a waning gibbous -- and both of them intimately familiar with each other's bodies anyway. ]

[That laughter, with all the lightness of feathers dancing in the summer breeze, seeped into the fiber of Doumeki's being and trickled into his gaze, pulling his hand away from Kimihiro only to peel away his shirt before seeking out his partner's slender palm to kiss the sharp curve of his wrist.

That Kimihiro could still smile with such openness in spite of old regrets and fears that haunted him was something to be cherished.

For that reason, he kept his own steady pace, though he did give the thigh wrapped deliciously around his waist an appreciative squeeze, using that leverage to part and slide Kimihiro's kimono, fingers painting a heated trail up smooth skin with the same deliberateness inherent in pulling a bow string. Indeed, there were plenty of planes and lines on Kimihiro's body he'd rather he have more hands for: the hollow of his hip, the dips between rib, and he mapped out the space between easily now that the obi was untied.

He'd help Kimihiro place his glasses on the side table, if it was just out of reach for his partner. Without a reflective surface to obscure them, he let himself be drawn into Kimihiro's gaze, near hypnotic on their bed's chiaroscuro. Doumeki could, perhaps, be excused for sliding lower to adorn Kimihiro's chest with kisses and another bruise, keeping his rapt attention on his partner's expression.]

[ Sometimes, when Kimihiro has granted a wish that threatens to leave him empty, he might seem as if caught in some kind of hypnosis himself until he reaches for Shizuka and pulls him into a kiss that says everything he's been robbed of saying: I don't regret my choice but sometimes it's hard, I would make it again but I'm still scared sometimes, I am afraid of the day you are no longer with me. Sometimes, Kimihiro has no clients at all, and playfully wends himself back and forth through the house that day and when Shizuka is around makes sure to touch him as if by accident -- the bump of knees, the jostle of elbows, the whisper that almost is a kiss. Sometimes, it's a mix of things like today and the upcoming festivals, and everything else that makes up their life as theirs and no one else's.

This, for example, is no one else's: Shizuka's hand at his thigh, Shizuka's mouth the path of an unhurried arrow across his skin.

Without his glasses, it's easy for Kimihiro to raise his arm to cover his face, which he does even as his back bows and pushes his body forward as if desperate to be closer to him even though they are nearly as close as any two people can be. There is something to be said for hunger though, for the way every inch of his body that isn't real to anyone else but Shizuka keens under his touch -- the bruising purse of his lips to his skin, any errant drag of teeth or pathway made by fingertips that know him better than anyone ever would have even if Kimihiro hadn't disappeared as he did.

Each point of connection is a point of reality and Shizuka has a way of paying almost reverent attention to all of them; it makes Kimihiro flush uncontrollably, the pink spreading across his pale frame every time they do this, and when he covers his face it's not because it's new but because Shizuka always makes him feel so known it's overwhelming. It also helps to muffle the sounds he can't help but make -- the volume of his gasp that threads into stifled sighs too much because the rest of their home is so quiet. He reaches with the arm not covering his face so that he can tangle his hand in Shizuka's hair, tighten the curl of his fingers as if in encouragement, well versed by now in the fact that there is more than one way to say yes. ]

[On those days when Doumeki could see the faintest signs of distress, he kept close, wrapping his arms around Kimihiro, accepting and giving kisses, grounding him with touch, conversations with both silence and words, the sharing of meaning that both of them had grown accustomed to understanding.

The past could not be changed.

Or, more accurately, hitsuzen was unavoidable.

That reality settled uneasily with him, a hair's breadth away from fatalistic resignation, but Doumeki could set his own fears and misgivings aside, choosing to remain cautious and staving away everything else that would paralyze him, keep him from seeing the other side of the coin that was them and living in their present. In due time, if no solution was to be found that could free Kimihiro from limbo, Doumeki knew he'd have to prepare.

Kimihiro would never be alone. This, he'd vowed to himself.

A promise he'd keep even in the simplest of moments, hidden in the way he ran his tongue on reddening skin, closed his lips on a pert nipple and rubbed tantalizing circles on the hollow of Kimihiro's hip. His partner might cover his face, but Doumeki's attentiveness meant he caught everything else: the rise and fall of Kimihiro's chest, the flush spreading to the delicate curve of his ears and the dip of his slender neck, the strained restlessness of the fingers in his hair.

Pleased with his handiwork so far, Doumeki slipped further south, lightly dragging his short nails up Kimihiro's thigh for added sensation before hooking his thumb on the waistband of his underwear. He could still bear how his own pants constricted his growing arousal in favor of helping Kimihiro relax first. Later, he might be accused of lulling his partner into a false sense of security with the knowledge that those gasps wouldn't be muffled for long, and Doumeki would take it in stride.]

[ Given a choice, Kimihiro might decide to be alone rather than with anyone else than Shizuka; rather, he knows he would. No one can replace him, and no one can stand in, or at least, that is how he views it now. He dislikes greatly the notion and very real possibility that someday he will have to live such a life and it will all be his own doing. He won't be able to entangle with him like this, won't be able to softly moan half-starts of Shizuka's name when his mouth sucks at his nipple and Kimihiro's hands cradle the back of his head even as he writhes underneath him in askance for more even though he's so sensitive there it mortifies him as much as it undoes him -- catches of exhales that coil tight only to sharply unravel in small separated noises that make him blush. Then again, he's sensitive everywhere. Being touched took on a whole other depth of meaning when he faded from almost everyone else's existence and it's only increased in intensity the more years have passed. So that there's a day that he won't be able to be like this with him, it is as cruel as it is realistic. To shiver hot and so unmistakably real under Shizuka's nails and his tongue and the prompting pull of his fingers that has Kimihiro lifting his hips enough to let him slide them off with ease -- this is a privilege and a gift that Kimihiro takes with all of him until he no longer can.

And who knows? Maybe such a day won't come. That is what he hopes and is afraid to hope all at once.

That he might not undo his agreement -- because he cannot and would not -- but rather that there might be a way to make the agreement's price met in some other yet unfathomed way, that he might then live his life like this, gasping against the silence around them with his mouth pressed to his own forearm as if to bite himself to be mindful of his own voice, intimately inextricable from the person he loves so much it hurts. It's not a particularly warm night but everywhere Shizuka touches is as if an undercurrent of fever or night sun has taken to Kimihiro's skin. And he loves it, all of this, and even day to day -- a stolen kiss to his nape, the curl of Shizuka's fingers subtle and at home at his waist on the train, so on, so forth.

No one else will do; he will never let anyone even half as close, even if he has a future where his alternative becomes no one at all; Kimihiro can't help it.

Shizuka is his one and only.

"I'm not leaving." he once said and Kimihiro almost broke down because it felt like he was asking a terrible thing of Shizuka, as much as it was the only way of Kimihiro himself being saved.

His fingers trail down the side of Shizuka's face, assuming he can reach, and he can't ask Shizuka to keep going and also ask him for a kiss but he's tempted to anyway, wants what he always wants when they end up like this: everything. ]

[Staying with Kimihiro was far from the worst thing. Far from it when he loved him, that spirited youth that grew to encompass both compassion and selfishness, sensitive mindfulness and myopia rolled into one.

In plenty of ways, they matched each other, for all that neither of them expected it before they started getting along.

For that reason, Doumeki would ensure Kimihiro would be taken care of should the worst come to pass - not necessarily to the extent they were involved, no, not when neither of them were inclined to look any other way while they both lived, but he did worry that after his passing, Kimihiro would forget himself, sink further into that void between worlds until dream and reality were indistinguishable. That wasn't to say Kimihiro couldn't hold his own these days, but power alone wasn't enough to stave off the effects of weariness.

Grief wasn't a mantle Kimihiro wore well - he kept it on too long, and there was a difference between self-condemnation and healing. Doumeki had intervened when it became too much, mere moments before Kimihiro offered himself on the altar that arose from the aftermath of a very, very long string of events. He couldn't ensure his own spirit would linger when his own time came - not yet, anyway, and that path might hurt Kimihiro - and so he needed to find a way to help Kimihiro stay grounded.

Kimihiro mourned because he loved. And because Doumeki loved him in return, the last thing he wanted was to become something like a second Yuuko in binding Kimihiro to the past.

These memories, the ones he left on skin, mouth to chest, hand to thigh, were meant to cherish, and not ensnare.

Words were far from the only way to express want. Kimihiro's breaths made the heat coil low and tight within Doumeki, urging him further down, and he tossed his partner's underwear to the same spot his own shirt landed.

Would Kimihiro object today if he was taken half-clothed? There was a pattern to how Doumeki decided such things: anything that was more in Kimihiro's predecessor's style was summarily stripped away. An extention of Kimihiro's elegance, however, was a different matter entirely.

With that thought in mind, he licked his lips and, holding Kimihiro's thighs steady, kissed and sucked the dip before the jut of a hipbone. If his partner had any objections in washing out any stains from his otherwise orderly clothing, Doumeki figured he'd hear them by now.]

[ The possibility of Kimihiro fading into the in-between is very real. Without an anchor, even someone less bound would disappear. Ame Warashi had criticized Kimihiro for making another human his anchor -- "They are here for an instant, and what then? You can't" -- and Kimihiro had inclined his head and smiled in a way that wouldn't let itself become sad just yet because Shizuka was still his still there still real and told her "I apologize for my selfishness." and that was that as she disappeared in an upward flurry of rain that echoed with the kind of displeasure only those who care can radiate. It moved him at the time, that the Ame Warashi would be compelled to speak to him about it at all, much less feel something on his behalf. Or perhaps, he had told himself, he imagined it. Either way, she was not wrong.

Without Shizuka, he would be gone already, in a sense; or at least, not himself so much.

Aware of the drag of fabric down his legs and off his ankles, aware of Shizuka's mouth as if in prayer on his skin in a way that might tether him that much more, aware of how it's only Shizuka's hands on his thighs that keep his lower body from arching up, it's almost funny how Kimihiro isn't aware of how stilted his own breathing is until he tries to speak, fails, catches his own voice up on a beveled sigh and tries again, peering down under the barely lifted shield of his own forearm, cheeks red and mouth equally so from biting so hard. The hand that had curled at Shizuka's temple plays with his hair, only to slide to tangle and pull just slightly the way Kimihiro does when he finally catches on that Shizuka has been taking his time on purpose. For all his protests when they were younger, it's Kimihiro who catches fire fastest, whose body becomes a place of unabashed want as if it knows what the heart denies -- that time is always running out, that he has it now but for how much longer this way of being Alive. Shizuka is always vexingly calm, and yet even in that calm Kimihiro can feel his love. Because that's how Shizuka is for him: the difference between resignation and actual peace, the difference between existing and living, the difference between knowing the shape of love and being a part of it.

Fingers still tight in his hair, arm still over his downcast eyes, mouth wet and parted and impatient, Kimihiro pushes against Shizuka's hands as he half murmurs half exhales scraped need and impatience,] Stop teasing.

[ A contradiction truly; he loves everything that leads into anything they do -- as much as this, as simple as looking at produce together that Shizuka has to hold just so in order that Kimihiro can assess it, as particular as the way Shizuka has this habit of curling his arm around him in crowded places because even if Kimihiro doesn't exist to anyone else, he does for Shizuka. So he says 'stop teasing' and Shizuka knows him well enough to hear it for what it is even if an older yet younger part of Kimihiro is too self conscious to say it yet: I need you, please, please, please. If he unravels enough to break into unintelligent broken words as he sometimes does, it will be with Shizuka's name threaded throughout. ]

[The key to reading the shades of Kimihiro's meaning lay in observing everything else: the quiet urgency in his tone, the restlessness of his hands, the strain of his limbs.

This wasn't just about the teasing.

Even the most indirect admission of need was still a confession, made all the more valuable when the one saying it already had a difficult time allowing himself to be cared for.]

Aa.

[Kimihiro might have to wait a while longer as Doumeki reached for a bottle of scented oil on their bedside table, popping open the cap and warming the liquid with his fingers. He no longer teased, but neither were his purposeful movements hasty: certain preparations were important to avoid injury and, more importantly, to make this pleasurable for the both of them.

Taking in the head of Kimihiro's cock in his mouth was a good way to start, while he slipped his fingers down south, past the perineum to seek out his partner's entrance. His other hand, he used to steady Kimihiro's hip. Really, Doumeki could accept that perhaps he'd wound up his lover a little too much.]

[ If questioned on it, Kimihiro would deny that he has trouble with such things as being cared for but he wouldn't explain why -- wouldn't be able to bring himself to articulate all the ways he thinks he has been saved or protected and therefore could never ask for more than that; indeed perhaps did not deserve what he has already been the privileged recipient of: life with friends, life with the one he loves, life...at all. It never occurred to him that beyond putting himself at risk recklessly when he was younger, there were the other subtler ways he refused such care and, perhaps Yuuko knew, because he couldn't bear to accept what never should have been his. He doesn't remember anymore when it changed, in fact, believes it must have been a few things and not all of them as dramatic as the last -- a broken window no less or more than a hand slapped away as if to say I'm not here, don't notice me, I'm not here or a hand intercepted on the contrary saying you may hurt me but not her -- never again.

With Shizuka, the ways he's been allowed to live are staggering.

He doesn't think Shizuka knows or might even understand if Kimihiro tried to say it to him in words how much it means to him that sometimes he wakes up with his partner curled around him and exhaling what he hopes are gentle dreams against his nape, how much it means that they've made space in this worldless world of his that makes it full again whether it's the sun glancing along the quarter profile of Shizuka's head turned away or the rain smoothing down his jacket and shirt in a way that has Kimihiro laughing at him and toweling him off with all the love he's always been afraid to have. He doesn't know, but maybe, he guesses, he must have an idea. Because Shizuka seems to see him even now in a way Kimihiro can never see himself.

And Shizuka truly could have picked another path and Kimihiro would have had to steel himself against inquiring its destination in dreams. But he didn't. Shizuka is here, with him; Shizuka is his.

For now.

So when Kimihiro jolts under him, hips sharp and pressing as Shizuka puts his mouth on him, it's confession as much as it is unbridled understanding; yours yours yours. He doesn't mean to be undone so fast but that's always the case with him, always thinking he's got more of his wherewithal only to be reminded that with Shizuka that's never been the case anyway. Shizuka's fingers begin to press and Kimihiro bites his own arm again cutting off what can only be described as a cry, razor edged and pitched high like a breath that's held in place. If not for Shizuka's hand at one of his hips, he would push against the heat of his mouth more, but as it is he can't focus, hot all over and aching almost painfully because he has this bad habit of playing down his own want until he can't and then he has no control at all -- falls apart a dozen times in the build-up only to climb again. And oh he'd never let himself imagine anything after he'd made his deal in contract with the shop itself, never allowed himself to even think his feelings would wear the shape of anything but something hidden. But perhaps he was stupid at that too; Shizuka is nothing if not stubborn, and much more than that besides.

Not for the first time, Kimihiro has beneath the heat that ripples in him like the reverberation of sound, like the water when a hand dips into its calm, he hopes desperately that he might be enough for Shizuka for as long as they have. Because it's so easy to see himself as not enough but he's also old enough or Kimihiro enough to know that that's not the kind of conversation that goes anywhere. He has to trust him.

And, well, he does. Has. For a long, long time.

Not a dance or a song but something their bodies know, beneath him he's aware of the slide of the silk and while he's too far gone to insist its complete removal, his legs parting as if to give Shizuka more of himself, maybe it's also true that part of him likes it when Shizuka manages to both take his time but also waste none of it; when Shizuka who pays attention to even the littlest hints of Kimihiro's staggered inhales and exhales, somehow makes him know that he'll give him everything he needs without saying anything at all. ]

['What should never be' was a futile argument. To someone informed by their own aptitude for the sciences, there were flaws in that logic: theories and hypotheses were but frameworks to understand reality, and not something meant to take its place.

The fact of the matter was that Kimihiro existed, and that was enough to argue that he should be.

So yes. In some ways, Doumeki couldn't grasp the full extent of how the very fabric of reality had to be warped to accommodate existential anomalies, when it was not those anomalies' fault they existed in the first place. He did know, however, that the universe wasn't a neutral non-entity as science framed it, and that the lengths Watanuki had subconsciously gone to erase himself had to be equally matched by those who wished to keep him alive.

Blood was important, his grandfather taught him, and not just for medical reasons. Blood was life, and it's shedding during acts of violence used to be understood as spiritual pollution. Doumeki had given his, a price he'd been willing to pay to protect the fool he'd fallen in love with, and while he hoped nothing as drastic befell Kimihiro again, he'd renew that same commitment out of love for him, and in defiance of a world that tried to erase him.

Kimihiro was his, for however much Kimihiro gave of himself for Doumeki to cherish. Doumeki would wind him up with pleasure and bring him to release, and after that Doumeki would check him over for anything that needed patching up in aftercare: sharp bite marks, strained hips, aching muscles, a beautiful man who finally allowed himself to be adorned with love.

Doumeki settled in easily between the welcoming spread of his partner's thighs and ended the bob of his head with a suck, timing it with the crook of his fingers. The thoroughness that he prepared his lover with, of course, doubled as an effort to get Kimihiro to relax and forget he was trying to be quiet.]

[ Some of Kimihiro's favorite moments with Shizuka are moments that many people don't think too much of except for when they are actually happening -- the lazy twine of limbs that's warm and home against the sound of the rain outside threading patterns across that day in preparation for the ones that follow, the opportunity to complain uselessly as Shizuka crowds behind him at just the right moment for Kimihiro to offer him the tasting dish and say 'Well?', the momentary happiness of saying good night or good morning with consistency. To this day he's not certain they are things he deserves, sometimes thinks that he's out of bounds in having accepted what Shizuka offers no matter how willingly. Selfish. And come to that, if he was going to be selfish, he finds he prefers Shizuka like this -- the heat of his mouth and the curl of his fingers and the unabashed transparency of how much he cares. He never wants blood shed or given for himself again and he'll do most anything to avoid it; has done so, has learned, and is at least these years better equipped to make choices that don't put them in such situations in the first place.

I value the time you have given me, he thinks and he means it of everyone he loves in different ways.

When this was newer, it was mortifying to Kimihiro how fast Shizuka could bring him to the edge and because it's Kimihiro, that newness was new for much longer than it would have been for someone else. Even now, the arm he's been hiding behind fallen to the side, his face turned half against the bedding as if that might help, he blushes; and even if it's not as visible given the heat of his body that climbs and climbs, it's there and if anyone else is able to discern it, it's Shizuka. The night is clear outside, no ambient sound to interfere with how Kimihiro's voice bends and breaks out of him the longer Shizuka takes to prepare him, intimately embarrassingly knowing of even the slightest shift of his fingers. He knows it's because of all people in the world, Shizuka will never take a risk in hurting him, but he grasps blindly with one hand to tangle in his hair or just curve at his temple clumsy with something desperate and carnal and human in a way that makes Kimihiro very real, ] Shizuka...

[ Enough. The truth is the same it's been for a while now: Kimihiro who is just Kimihiro wants Shizuka to be his human world anchor for as long as he doesn't mind.

It's worth noting that the marks that Kimihiro fusses over are the self same marks he actually values being able to see -- like some kind of proof of being alive, so later when Shizuka soothes them over however he sees fit, Kimihiro will tell him And whose fault is this and mean simply: you are really here, aren't you. ]

Man.

[Taking what one was given wasn't selfish, not when both giver and receiver knew the value of what was being gifted, and as far as he was concerned, Kimihiro was meant to be loved. These were thoughts he wouldn't voice, of course, preferring as he did to show instead of tell; in listening to a hundred and one complaints, even if he's heard all of it before. In drawing Kimihiro baths when he was home and tired after dealing with difficult customers, in kissing the center and back of his palm on idle weekend mornings.

In kissing Kimihiro's inner thigh after he drew back his mouth and fingers, before lifting himself up to loom over his partner, and pressing his mouth on Kimihiro's cheeks, beneath his eyes, taking a moment to undo his own belt and zip with intense urgency and letting the fabric unceremoniously pool to his knees. One more breathless kiss he left on Kimihiro's jaw, a silent apology for the wait while he applied more oil on his own length, hissing at the touch.

In some ways, he didn't think this through in his eagerness to pleasure Kimihiro. Any teasing he might get later, between mapping out the marks he left behind, was deserved.

With a broad hand, he spread a slender thigh, encouraging Kimihiro to hook his calf around his waist. His partner was strong, he knew, but Doumeki entered him carefully anyway, his breath growing ragged, sweat rolling now his temple as he kept his eyes on Kimihiro's expression. He would never tire of this, the moment of their joining, his arousal coiling with the heat surrounding him, and the questioning kiss he left on Kimihiro's mouth was a little sloppy: did he need a moment more to adjust, or could Doumeki begin to move?]

[ If Kimihiro pays too much attention to the details of Shizuka's love, it hurts; if he doesn't pay enough attention, that also hurts because it feels ungrateful to treat someone's heart like that, especially the heart of this person. It isn't a simple thing, to balance the things he memorizes with the things he does his best to just let exist as parts of themselves while they are themselves; and he constantly even now finds himself toeing the lines of bad habits: the delusion of rejecting people for their own good or, in this case, distancing himself prematurely to when they need to, should that day come. Shizuka is not, he knows, the sort of person to just accept such backwards handling of things anyway; it's one reason he's with him now, still, and from the beginning of what felt like the end and then, shockingly, was not.

So Shizuka kisses him all over his face like the indiscriminate nature of the sun, and Kimihiro lets him because even if after all these years he's still not sure he deserves to be loved, Shizuka shows him that he is -- loved, alive, and very very real. The kiss to his jaw is the timbre of a low whisper and it makes him sigh even as that sigh twists into a light intonation of ah as he follows Shizuka's direction, bends his leg and shifts the arch of his body in a way that makes it that much easier -- or as easy as it can be. Once they passed the unmarked threshold of Kimihiro denying he had any more human desires at all, they fell together more often than not -- at first some sense of urgency, like it couldn't possibly last and what if he forgot, what if?, and then a sense of gratitude and wanting to not take it for granted because even if they weren't going to be parted as soon as Kimihiro had feared, someday, they surely would be. So it's not that he doesn't know by instinct now how best to bend and curve and arc underneath Shizuka to tell him all the thing she cannot possibly say, but Kimihiro is Kimihiro and so the kiss Shizuka grants him in pause is not misplaced.

He hooks his leg tighter at Shizuka's waist and has to close his eyes, still embarrassed after all of the sounds he's making even if, by all rights, they're nothing so worth noting: intonations that hitch on half ahs that melt into ahns as he adjusts and demands that Shizuka stop waiting all in one. His hair mats to his skin and it's a heat that's run and re-run the course of his body, skin fevered and bright in a way only Shizuka will ever see or feel. His arms come up over his partner's shoulders to hold onto him as if to say closer even if such a thing is almost physically impossible.

But that's what Kimihiro is the definition of isn't he? ]

[Perhaps Doumeki was being overly careful, but he never did quite forget how Kimihiro's body language was more honest than his words. And so he watched, and learned, and was rewarded with knowing the difference between a hitched breath and a low sigh, the press of a leg, the dig of fingers on his shoulder.

Closer, indeed, he'd go, spreading kisses on lips, eyelids, cheeks like wisteria petals drifting to water. Kimihiro's sighs were a siren's call, their hips flush before Doumeki began to move, filling his beloved as the heat between them swelled.

Before he knew it, the corners of his mouth were tipped up in a smile, affectionate in a way that roots ran deep into the earth. It was ridiculous how shy Kimihiro continued to be when it came to expressing himself, and later Doumeki would be smug. At the moment, however, he was more invested in bringing Kimihiro out of that shell: fingers wrapping around Kimihiro's arousal once their pace was set, lips and teeth grazing the bruises he'd left earlier on that slender neck.]

[ There's always a line that once crossed Kimihiro's body supersedes his mind. Depending on whether Shizuka gathers him up just because they can and want to be together, or if he pulls Kimihiro close to make him remember he's human still even with all the trappings and locks and keys of everything else, that line is closer or farther sometimes. Tonight it doesn't feel like it takes long, Shizuka setting a pace that he meets without thinking, raising the hitch of his legs against Shizuka's sides a little higher as his body arcs -- the drawn string to the archer's fingers.

If not for Shizuka, even without the deal he made with the shop, Kimihiro thinks he may not have ever let anyone in so close. There's a certain degree of stubborn care that Shizuka is expert in, a stalwartness that over time became so natural to Kimihiro he realized what its loss would mean what he thought was too late. Shizuka truly is his friend. And his partner. There isn't anyone else who's been allowed as close -- anyone who could get as close -- and now there probably will never be but years of having Shizuka are what Kimihiro focuses on -- his own personal brand of obstinacy. Anyway, it doesn't suit Kimihiro to think too much on what he doesn't have or has lost; he feels, even now, either that it's all his own responsibility -- the better version truly -- or that it is simply his fault, subtle whispers against his wishes and his life so bled into him that even if his existence has been argued and won, the shadows tease regardless.

Shizuka's fingers are familiar both in how they curl around him and in how they drag Kimihiro's voice out louder, breathier, his hands clutching at his shoulders instinctively even as he lets his head tilt back, as if he could offer the prominence of his throat the way one might show the unconscious, vulnerable kind of trust. The moans Shizuka elicits are for him only, signified by the gasps of his name on Kimihiro's swollen lips, indelible, the break of the syllables a plea because Kimihiro becomes nothing if not needy underneath him every time. ]

[The shadows might tease, and Doumeki would chase them away with a touch, a syllable, drawing Kimihiro back to the present, staving away his own worries in the process with the clarity of watchfulness. It was such a natural extension of himself, the decisiveness inherent in the draw of a bow, the distillation of thought and action into a singular moment of existence, and there was no where else he'd rather be than with Kimihiro.

To suggest he'd be satisfied with another, indeed, was cause for deep outrage, when inevitability - hitsuzen - was a consequence.

He chose to be here, to take Kimihiro to his childhood house, and later to their own home, to their bed, desiring and to be desired in return, Kimihiro's cries drowning out his breaths, a show of intensity reserved for only the two of them.]

Kimihiro.

[Both a reply to and encouragement of those pleas, the roughness of his voice undeniable as his movements became more erratic as he chased after completion - his, Kimihiro's, theirs, and he surged forward, bending Kimihiro in half to better hit that spot with a change of angle, ignoring the strain on his wrist.]

[ For all the time he spends moving around the people who cannot see him, Kimihiro isn't sure if he gets out more, the same, or less than he used to as an errand boy himself. Distinctly, Yuuko took most of her clients from within the Shop's boundaries, but provided the difference in the agreement between himself and the Shop, this has not carried over. Indeed, many of his clients cannot come to the Shop not because they cannot see it but for other outstanding reasons. Perhaps it also has something to do with Shizuka -- his inability to See never having really been a problem because if anything it's only gotten better over time, the generosity of a shared eye when Kimihiro is especially anxious or distressed, and the bone deep intuition and practice of things when it comes to Understanding what needs to be done, sight or not.

So yes, Shizuka understands on many levels the person who is Watanuki Kimihiro and some ways are for the world to acknowledge: how he protects him, how he verifies his reality by making it true in habit and form, how he is always there. And some ways are just for them: how he says Kimihiro's name, how he plays to the pliable nature of Kimihiro's body that bends easily for him knowing he will not break, how even as Kimihiro tries to tug at his wrist to say enough or I don't need it there's no relenting. Because for each time Kimihiro claims he doesn't need something -- to be seen, to be heard, to be loved -- Shizuka doesn't let him get away with it. ]

Shi-- [ The twist of his name is explicit and loud in a way that makes Kimihiro flush deeper even now, though he has little time to pay it mind. His body is a deep arc, heels pressed against Shizuka to feel him deeper, always taken a little off guard by how almost excruciating it is; how much he wants to be like this, how much he wants Shizuka to be the one who makes him this way and the sweet aching reality of it. He loves Shizuka -- everything of him, and revels in these private aspects that belong to no one else either -- his voice and his hands like this, the bracket of his body a comfort rather than a cage.

He's shaking even as he encourages to Shizuka to keep going as he needs or wants or both, clings to him and sighs his name, whole and in pieces, over and over, one hand tangling in his hair again only to slide down to thumb warmly at the back of his neck, transparently fond. ]

[He loved this, the press of heels on his back, the way their bodies moulded together, the way Kimihiro fit around him, hot and needy, desperate as a man in need of water, suddenly arching into him, deepening their connection in a way that took Doumeki's breath away.]

Good.

[His gasp, a hair's breadth away from his partner's lips, was prayer and praise: Kimihiro was good, beautiful, endearingly overwhelmed, alive and well in his arms, and Doumeki rocked into him, pressing his forehead on Kimihiro's shoulder when the coil of pleasure within him snapped and he grunted his release.

Kimihiro calling his name was still an echo lingering in his ears when he came to himself, shifting to the side so he wouldn't crush the man when he sank into the bed facing him, still half-covering the other.]

...mmn. [He blinked slowly, still catching his breath. His arms and hips would ache, and in a while he'd have to wipe both of them down before carrying his partner to the bath because he still could, but first -] Kimihiro.

[How are you feeling, he meant to ask.]

[ There's a certain level of undone that Kimihiro finds himself in each time, a way that hasn't anything to do with the literal disrobing though it feels always as if he's been as stripped bare and raw as anyone can be, like he's simultaneously almost nothing and definitively everything. Shizuka tells him good and it takes both of them a while to come down enough to themselves, Kimihiro a grasping loving cacophony of hands and hips and soft heated sounds that borders on something almost panicked -- like he's never not afraid in some deep quiet part of him that this isn't real. But it's not panic, not really; more so urgency, that every second be mutually experienced. He wants the deep groan of Shizuka's voice in his mouth or the skin of his throat, he wants the framing of his body over him as he blinks and lets him come back into the soft half focus he possesses these days. He wants: to card his fingers back through Shizuka's hair, to trail those fingertips down his jaw almost coy despite the blush he still wears patently deep and self conscious, to touch his mouth without quite pressing, to answer Shizuka by leaning up to kiss him soft and honest. ]

I'm...I'm good. [ A shorter touch of his lips to the corner of Shizuka's mouth and then he has to fall back against the bed, a very light shaking something he's not sure he's doing or just feeling under his skin the way he does sometimes afterward, tingling and still fading heat like even his body is loathe to lose how Shizuka makes him feel. It's a thought that has him turning his face half into the bedding. There's really no point feeling self conscious anymore but one doesn't always have a choice; especially if one is Kimihiro who can't hide how he feels even if he were to bury his face entirely in the sheets -- a thing he does not do, thankfully, instead saying, quiet and still breathy, ]

You?

Good.

[He'd tuck Kimihiro's head under his chin while they recovered, nuzzling the top in return for the kiss. In his arms, he could feel the rise and fall of Kimihiro's chest, the tickle of breath against his throat: if his partner must hide his face, he was welcome to do so on Doumeki's chest.

Here was a secret that Kimihiro might've noticed in their years together: most of the time, Doumeki waited long after the sweat on their bodies cooled, or until a certain someone began prodding him to get up. There was a lot to be relished in their sated contentedness, and he enjoyed just holding Kimihiro and breathing in his scent.]

[ It takes a while to cool down, for Kimihiro's body ordinarily a default resting calm once torqued into a frenzy something like a wildfire that needs both time and quiet. So they lay like that for a longer while than perhaps most would, and even past that. It's not lost on Kimihiro that Shizuka never hurries to the parts that come next even though he always makes sure to see them through. Close as they are, when Kimihiro blinks, his eyelashes drag against the skin of Shizuka's neck, and it's easy to kiss him on his throat sweetly just once, nosing there a little not unlike how Shizuka nuzzled his hair earlier, breathing him in.

He doesn't know how long it is when he reaches that point wherein he nips briefly at Shizuka's pulse point, a milder nudge than others he could offer, pleased to be in his arms but thinking they need to clean -- themselves and the rest, his blush creeping to his ears. ]

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