Fic - Cherish (part 1)
Title: Cherish
Group: Nightmare
Pairing: Ruka x Sakito
Rating: NC-17
Warnings: non-safe sex, mild violence, excessive bitching
Summary: The trials and tribulations of being a pet.
Well, I've written Sakito with everyone else in the past. So now it's Ruka's turn XD
As promised, it's full of sex, violence, and people being total and absolute bitches...
This fic is loosely based on the Naito song Cherish, which I love because it sounds adorable but is actually really dark and creepy.
If you haven't heard it, you can see a pretty good English translation here on YouTube.
I also did some fanart to go with it. Enjoy!
(link to fic is under the pic)
I was going to start the whole thing with one of our lyrics. But screw it, it's a good song and I don't want to spoil it for myself by making it all about me. So to kick this off, here's some Elvis, which explains things almost as well:
You look like an angel
Walk like an angel
Talk like an angel
But I got wise: You're the Devil in disguise
CHERISH
I'm just like his dog.
No, wait. While I'm being honest let's at least call things by their proper names. I'm his bitch, with all the humiliation and gratification it entails.
And if I'm the bitch then who's the master?
He's looking at me right now, bewitching body angled towards me enquiringly.
“Ruka-san?”
I blink and quit staring at his legs, and remember where I am: in the middle of a Shoxx interview, my other bandmates regarding me with amusement as I wake sulkily from my reverie. Oh yeah. Should I be speaking now? There's a warning edge in his voice that's pitched for my ear alone, and like a good dog I come to heel. He raises his fine head on his elegant little neck, and watches me appraisingly as I reply to whatever the hell question the interviewer asked me. My muscles relax as he tilts his chin in approval.
And there you have it. There he is, in all his glory, geeky and beautiful and cruel: Edokawa Sakito. My master.
How did this come about? you may wonder. This frankly unlikely combination. How did I, legendary 'S', end up at Sakito's feet?
You know, I'm sometimes as mystified as you.
Okay. Being honest: I'm a bully, and I know it. But like most of my kind, I only bully down (in effect that means Yomi, and Hitsu-kun sometimes, in the gentlest way possible; Ni~ya-chan just laughs and ignores me). Somehow, Sakito has always been above me. Not on a pedestal or anything. Just...untouchable.
Until suddenly he wasn't.
It all started with sex. Well, actually, it started with an argument, and at the time I had no idea where it was headed. But he made it clear soon enough.
Now, for Nightmare - we happy few (except Hitsu-kun, who gets spoiled rotten) - Sakito has always basically filled the role of nagging wife; okay, so he doesn't cook our dinner and we don't get an obligatory once-a-week shag, but in most other respects the comparison works: if we're late or hungover or not getting our drum fills just right, we all know to expect a wrinkle of that pretty nose and a subtle stream of criticism until we finally get our asses in gear out of sheer vexation.
So I wasn't at all surprised, much less perturbed, when he glided up to me in the studio storage room after work, wearing the miss-priss-librarian look that told me I was in for a scolding. I just slid a cymbal into its bag and gave him my routine glare.
“Spit it out.”
“I wanted to talk to you about the new song,” Sakito said innocently. Ah. My new song.
“Yes?”
“How to put it.” I waited; you don't interrupt Sakito when he's cracking the whip, there's literally no point. He doesn't listen and he always gets his way. “The pre-chorus hook, it needs an extra something, don't you think?” He wasn't actually asking, so I kept quiet. He ran a thoughtful finger along the voluptuous body of one of his guitars in its rack. “Let me do something with it.”
“Oh.” It was entirely possible he was right. But I had a good feeling about this song, and he never said a thing when we were sorting out the primary instrument parts. Now it was this far along in its development, now I'd got attached to it, saying he wanted to change it was kind of like telling someone their girlfriend is ugly and you want to give her a facelift. Just not done. Sakito knew this perfectly well, and had chosen to ignore it. Of course I know why, now; but at the time it set my teeth on edge.
“The thing is...” he began, “when it comes to transitions you have a bit of a blind spot. Musically.” Whoa now. This was all getting rather personal rather quickly. Sakito was usually a lot more roundabout in his run-up to criticism, and the words stung.
“A fine time to tell me, after a decade.” Sakito shrugged apologetically.
“I didn't like to say. You get so grouchy.”
“I do not.” I was getting nettled.
“You do.” He looked at me warily. “And once you start sulking it's a lot of extra work for us, mediating between you and the rest of the world until we can get you to snap out of it.” I gaped at him: there's a line of politeness you don't cross, not even with your friends, and Sakito used to be more aware of it than anyone. But he was skirting dangerously close to it right now.
“Thanks a lot, Saki.”
“I'm telling you this for your benefit,” he said, with a little toss of his graceful head. “As well as ours.”
“Oh really.”
“I'm just saying that if you had better control over your moods, we wouldn't be so nervous of coming to you with problems. And your musicianship might improve.”
“At least I'm not such a goddam perfectionist that I drive all my colleagues crazy.” Oh. Oh no, what was I doing? You did not criticise Sakito back. You just didn't.
“There's nothing wrong with attention to detail,” he said coolly, tilting his head back to look down his nose at me. He can act so superior when he wants to.
“Not in itself,” I countered, feeling myself flush darkly with annoyance under that stare. “But when it gets to the point where everyone in the studio cringes when you open your mouth and say 'yeah, but...', you know you've got a problem.” I saw his eyes narrow at that, but I didn't care; I was getting genuinely angry, because this was rapidly devolving from constructive nagging into a mud-slinging match.
“It beats being a slacker.” Slacker! If anyone knew how hard I worked it was Sakito, both of us songwriters, both of us leaders.
“And better to be a slacker than a pedantic bastard.” He breathed in sharply, lovely eyes flashing, but never raised his voice.
“You are an arrogant son of a bitch, Ruka.” Oh, we were way off base now. I looked him up and down, my incensed gaze running over his skin-tight jeans, the low, swooping neck of his tshirt that bared the smooth skin of his sternum, his unnecessarily beautiful face, and spat out the first thing that came into my head.
“And you're an egotistical little slut!” Bad. Bad, bad, bad, and it felt good.
Sakito sighed through his nose at the insult, raised a pale hand with a calculating expression, and slapped me hard across the face. And for a minute, just a minute, everything went dark.
No, I didn't swoon or have a fainting fit (it hurt, but Sakito is a lot smaller than me and not exactly buff). My vision blurred and I totally lost track of our relative positions, true, not because I'm a total wimp but because I was shocked, and furious, to a degree I'd never imagined I could be. I didn't even notice myself move, I was so taken aback by it.
The next thing I knew, from the black haze of anger, was that I had him forced up against the wall, my left arm hard across his throat, pinning him there. Now, I'm not generally a violent man - not physically, anyway - and for a second I was genuinely shocked to see what I'd done. I was about to let him down and apologise with bad grace, because I'd taken things too far, never mind that he'd started it. Sakito just bared his neat little teeth at me and had a spirited go at kneeing me in the groin. Well, so much for my good intentions: I increased the pressure of my arm until he whimpered.
“You fucking jerk.”
Sakito didn't (obviously couldn't) answer. Instead he reached out and, to my shock, slid his slender arms around my waist, dragging me against him. The flash of heat as his body met mine made me twitch in surprise, and I almost let him go as I realised with horror that I was hard. That first moment was probably the most disturbing thing that had ever happened to me to date, because I was not the kind of guy to get a boner at being belittled by my (male!) friends or by the prospect of physical violence.
But there it was. And Sakito was not helping by grinning breathlessly and sliding one hand between my legs. I let up on his throat as I recoiled.
“Oh, Ruka,” he said, with an air of such smugness and scorn that I wanted to punch him. I felt myself stir beneath his fingers, and pushed him, trying to get some space between us. He pushed me back, roughly, and I heard myself growl. Then I grabbed him. I don't even know why, I just couldn't stand the way he'd shoved me, like I was something completely distasteful.
“Get off,” he ordered, stamping hard on my foot, which I barely felt, not when his entire body was shifting like warm sand against mine. My knee slid between his legs and he bit his lip; to my astonishment I could feel his erection against my thigh, but he was still pushing at me, fingers scorching and angry. I pressed my cheek to his and dragged my hands down his sides, capturing him effectively between the wall and my body.
“What...the fuck...are you doing?” I whispered; I could hear the incensed tremble in my voice and it made everything worse. “Do you even know?!” Sakito heaved in a breath.
“You want this, you want me,” he gasped into my ear, goading me on deliberately even as his hands came up to cover his belt buckle protectively. I was so damn confused! And horny, and angry. I grabbed his wrists and forced his hands aside, and as I ripped open his jeans I felt his nails digging through my shirt. So far as I could tell he was putting up a real fight (it hurt like hell, anyway), and all the while his lips were on my ear, my neck, mouthing insults and encouragement into my skin.
I pushed one hand beneath his tshirt, lifting it, and oh, the feel of that perfect stomach beneath my fingers was like heaven. He shivered against me, and by then I had shoved his jeans and black underwear down and he was as hard as I was. That settled it. I pulled him tighter to me, the sensation almost making me stagger. He turned his head away swiftly so I kissed his throat instead, the long line of his neck burning under my lips.
“If you don't want it,” I managed, taking a laboured breath, “...say, now...!”
No answer, just a faint sniff of derision. I was going to do it. I was actually going to do it, I was going to fuck the most beautiful man in Japan, and I was going to make him sorry. And the mad thing is that at the time it felt so logical; of course I now realise that the best thing to do would have been to rise above the whole sordid argument and walk away the moral victor. But until you've had Sakito's celestial body simmering against yours and heard his barbed words in your ear, you can't begin to imagine how difficult that was.
Anyway, in the heat of the moment none of this crossed my mind. I just pushed my knee more forcefully between his long legs (the jeans had disappeared some time during the arousing course of his struggles) and spread them wider. I spat into my hand, keeping him braced against the wall, and slid my fingers between his thighs.
“Bite your tongue.” Sakito let his head fall back and did as he was told, clenching his fine jaw and remaining resolutely silent as I pushed a finger inside him, then another, though I could tell it was more out of pride than because he felt like obeying me. I caught his initial wince, and allowed myself a humourless smile. Again, I wasn't thinking about what this could do to him, to us; all I knew was that I wanted him, and that I wanted to hurt him.
As soon as Sakito's eyes began to flutter closed and the tension eased in the line of his neck, I left off my preparations, perfunctory as they were, and yanked my own clothing aside. Pressing an ungentle kiss to the spot where his jugular vein raced beneath the skin, I set my hands to his hips and lifted him effortlessly off the ground.
That got me a swift inhalation of breath, and his arms went around my neck, nails leaving red crescents in my skin. Then I was inside him and he was tight, tighter than any woman I've ever had, letting out a raw sound through clenched white teeth and curling his thighs around my waist as I shifted him higher.
“God!” I'd never felt anything like it, and I never will again: it had to be his first, judging by the brief, shocked stillness as I began to move, followed by a stubborn scowl as he attempted awkwardly to dictate the rhythm. I was having none of it; it felt fabulous, the fierce sense of pleasure doubling with every moan, every fleeting expression of uncertainty, and I wanted to keep him that way. I know I wasn't being careful, I just needed more of it, and judging by the ribbons of skin Sakito was ripping off the back of my neck he wanted to damage me as badly as I did him.
“Hurts...! Ruka...” he ground out as I increased the pace, my arms burning with the continued effort of supporting him. I ignored him, and he grabbed a fistful of my stylish new hairdo and yanked on it, making me grit my teeth and thrust into him harder. He swore at me so loudly it almost jolted me out of my rhythm; I clapped a hand over his mouth and he promptly bit me.
“Fuck...!” I snatched it back, too angry to check if he'd drawn blood, and set my palm to his brow, knocking his head back against the wall with unthinking force. He cried out at that and gave me a pained, insolent smile; I shoved my hand across his lips again, taking care not to get too close to his teeth this time, and was amazed when he just glared at me and gave a fluid undulation of his hips, sinking down further onto my cock and making me gasp helplessly into his hair. He always smelled so good.
I was almost at the edge, but the hurt, resentful part of me, the bitter part I was only just discovering, made me want to prolong it as long as possible, just so I could drag out every sound of discomfort he could make to gloat over after all this was done with. And, to my somewhat wolfish delight, I was no longer getting a lot of opposition.
Sakito was moaning raggedly into my hand, ethereal features half obscured by my fingers so all I could see were his closed eyes, tears springing from the corners to sparkle against his skin like ice, but it felt too good inside him to stop any time soon, and I was too furious to even entertain the idea. Perhaps I tried to slow down once, but he just clung tighter to me, hands sliding beneath my shirt and fingers biting hard into my back, dragging me closer, deeper, until I could feel him pressed rigid and excited against my stomach.
“Don't you want...this over?” I managed, my voice guttural with lust and aggression, and now I half hoped the answer would be yes because I was so tightly wound, all my limbs screaming surrender and my mind sick with pleasure.
“Yes!” growled Sakito as I removed my hand, his fist thumping against my shoulder-blade enthusiastically. I sank my head against his throat, tasting salt beneath my lips, and felt one of his arms leave its strangle-hold around my neck to slip between our bodies. His moans changed key; I knew he was touching himself, and just the thought of it was so delicious that I nearly came that second.
I managed to hang on though, because the last thing I needed now was for him to see me give in, and soon I was rewarded by the press of his sleek torso against mine as he arched his back and climaxed; I dragged my head back and was just in time to watch him come, and goddammit the bastard looked angelic, that beautiful face blank and bright with ecstasy. It was completely extraordinary, and gave me the excuse I needed to let go; I pulled him back towards me and he allowed it, gasping for breath and whining sharply as my teeth met in his shoulder.
It seemed to go on forever, the best and the worst thing I had ever felt, my hands raising bruises in the soft flesh of his buttocks, his breathing tearful and triumphant in my ear. But it couldn't have lasted longer than ten seconds, and it was certainly no more than thirty before the mindless pleasure began to ebb and my brain clicked dutifully back on, one shamed synapse at a time.
I let Sakito go all at once, and he slid down until his feet hit the floor. Those long, marvellous legs were trembling like a baby animal's, and he leaned back against the wall, biting his lip. I did hurt him.
“I'm sorry-” I heard myself say in a horrified voice, suddenly appalled at what I'd done. He heaved in a harsh breath. I reached out for him, I don't know what I meant to do, steady him, hold him, maybe just touch him because he still looked so stunning it dazzled me.
Before I could figure it out he moved like a snake, grabbing my outstretched arm and twisting until I felt my balance go. Sakito was in the aikido club in junior high. Bet you didn't know that. Neither did I, until I was flat on my back on the floor and wondering what the hell had happened (Hitsu-kun told me later that Sakito was so damn pretty, even back in the day, that his friends were forever coming up with over-dramatic doomsday predictions of the terrible hentai-manga things that might happen to him on the way home from school, and had eventually ganged up and insisted he take self-defence classes. I can attest to the fact that they worked).
Sakito gave me a complicated look that partly radiated satisfaction and partly suggested that, in his opinion, I now ranked somewhere on the same moral level as a woodlouse. I was still lying there, winded, as he slipped back into his jeans, struggling on his wobbly colt's legs. He gave me another searing glance and left. I considered how I was feeling right now: I hurt, and my body was singing with pleasure, and jesus fucking christ, what had I done?
I covered my eyes with my hands.
And that was how it started. After that, he had me. I just didn't know it yet.
I didn't see him that weekend. I worked on my solo project, took my car to be serviced, and played some MonHan. And spent the entire time feeling like a rapist, or at least the perpetrator of domestic abuse. By the time work began on Monday I was royally screwed up (well, I thought so at the time; in hindsight, I was practically living the life of Riley compared to what would come later), just imagining how horrific our meeting would be and what he might have told the others about me.
Sakito just gave me the same breezy smile he gave everyone else, offered me a potato chip, then whipped out his notepad and pen and began to organise our schedule. As official band leader I kept my mouth shut and let him get on with it, as did our manager. I doubt if I could have come up with a coherent sentence in any case: I was too busy staring. If I'd thought he was beautiful before (and I always did), it was nothing to how he looked that morning when he shot me that smile. I ducked my head down and checked him surreptitiously for telltale marks of what I'd done to him: his white throat where I'd pinned him to the wall, his slender wrists where I'd grabbed him. But his skin was the smooth and perfect canvas it always had been.
I didn't know what to say to him; I was so sorry, and so grateful, and it always took me a long time to come up with something articulate - whether that meant interviews, lyrics, or just apologising to this man I'd worked with and had fun with and respected for over a decade. And every time he flashed that smile at me it got harder.
That's how he got me, see. Oh, he's clever. He laid his trap perfectly, with its tantalising bait of guilt and forgiveness and brave little smiles, and I circled it without even knowing what I was doing, nervous at first of approaching but getting gradually closer, wanting to be near him like I never had before. He played me like a fish on a line, letting me reel myself in. And then he simply reached out and caught me.
It took three days before he finally took pity on me, and they went slowly. By then I was aching to apologise, to find out what I'd need to do to make things better between us. Sakito made sure I never got the chance, using his organisational pull to ensure that he wouldn't find himself alone with me, and looking so sweet and oblivious throughout that I didn't have the heart to force him into a confrontation. And the longer this went on, the sorrier I was.
When I finally got the opportunity, it was by accident, or at least I thought so at the time. Now I'm not so sure. We'd been doing more album rehearsals that day, and Sakito, as usual, was careful to finish his parts before me. My peripheral senses, ever aware of his presence, noticed him leave, but I was busy with my tech; so I resigned myself to another lonely day of guilt.
A few minutes later Kenji reminded me that I'd promised him the Steins;Gate doujinshi novel I'd bought in Akiba a few weeks ago (I only ever read this stuff once), so I trudged down to my car to fetch it while he was changing the skin on my snare drum. As I entered the cool, dim underground car-park I heard the echo of footsteps, then caught sight of a slender shape flitting between the cars. I only knew one person who moved like that.
“Sakito!” I called, and the figure stopped and turned towards me. I don't know if he was taking a short-cut through the car-park or whether he'd waited there deliberately, but he didn't seem surprised. “Can I talk to you?” I demanded as I panted up to him. Sakito blinked, looking, as usual, like nothing had happened between us at all.
“If you like.” He leaned back against the side of the car where he'd stopped (my car, as it happened), shining chocolate hair spilling over the metal as he relaxed. “What is it?”
I sighed. What is it. He looked so innocent, so serene, that I almost didn't want to spoil it for him by bringing up the events of the previous week. What an idiot I was back then (as if I'm any smarter now). Still, I screwed up my courage and got ready.
“Well, I...Look, I want to apologise.” Sakito's friendly expression flickered for a moment.
“Pardon?” For all I knew, he was trying his best to forget the whole experience; but I had to say it. It had been bad enough this week; maybe it was cruel of me, but I couldn't stand the remorse any longer without at least attempting to fix things.
“Let me say sorry. Please. Then I'll never mention any of this again.”
Sakito looked up searchingly into my face, and for a long minute I had an uninterrupted view of that bright, naïve expression. That was the last I ever saw of it: his gaze stilled and he pointed imperiously to the floor at his feet.
“Down.”
“Excuse me?” I said, taken aback. Sakito smiled at me sweetly.
“You want to act sorry? Fine with me. Get on your knees and apologise.” He spoke calmly, but the words hit my ears with venom; I'd got it wrong, I thought, he must still be furious. It wasn't until much later, looking back on it, that I realised he wasn't: Sakito is very rarely angry, I know now; he just uses the possibility to persuade my brain and my body into punishing me. And, to be honest, most of the time I've done something to deserve it. Or maybe he just makes me think I have. Fuck, I don't even know any more.
In any event, this was all still new to me, and I'd been feeling guilty. It was almost a relief to drop to the floor at his feet, the cold concrete scraping my knees.
“Saki,” I said, not sounding particularly gracious, but then I wasn't used to this; “I'm sorry. Really.” Sakito didn't acknowledge that, but he didn't dismiss it either. I kept my eyes on his shoes, not ready to see his face. He remained silent; after a while he began to drum his fingers against the car at his back, nails clicking on the black steel in a way that set my teeth on edge. Some more silence. “Aren't you gonna say anything?” I demanded eventually. I was getting worried: I could feel my contrition beginning to ebb away into my customary moodiness, and some sorry it would turn into then.
“Once you've apologised,” said Sakito, stilling his fingers abruptly, “then I might.”
“I-” Sitting back on my heels, I finally looked up at him. Well, glared. “All right. I just said I was sorry. What more do you want?” He lolled back more comfortably against my car, slid his fingers across his flat stomach to his belt buckle, and raised his eyebrows at me. I felt my jaw drop.
“That's the way,” he said drily, and the next sound I heard was his zip. “You can talk at me with that sulky fucking attitude till the cows come home, Ruka, it won't make you sound convincing. Or you can actually make your mouth useful and show me how sorry you are.”
You can imagine my reaction to this: disbelief, anger, a wash of bitter amusement, and finally the swift and inevitable onset of horniness. This is Sakito we're talking about, after all, and whatever else he may be...holy hell is he arousing.
So I apologised. At length. With feeling. And, in a way, you could say I've never got off all fours since.
And so we began. Once I knew he wanted me, or at least wanted what my body could do for him, I became obsessed. My temper, never exactly vaunted for its stability, was now on a hair-trigger, and it seemed like the barest word of criticism from Sakito was enough to set it off. It's not my fault; well, not just my fault: he was training me that way, I'm sure. Soon it was an almost Pavlovian response: arguments with Sakito led to sex with Sakito, which was the only time I could hurt him, and my subconscious learned to explode at the first harsh word. And that's what he wanted all along, a kind of mental button he could push that would have me standing to attention at a moment's notice.
Why does he pick on me? I find myself wondering, even now. Why not Hitsu-kun, who would probably give his eye-teeth to be Sakito's private plaything and would be so much less trouble to train? I was almost feral in those first days, crazy with confusion, and it amazes me that he thought me worth the effort.
It's one of the things that's been bothering me since this began: why did Sakito choose me? Is it because he thought I'd be a challenge, or because he thought I'd be a pushover? I'm not sure which is worse. It doesn't do a lot for the state of my ego either way. All I ever wanted was someone I could be a considerate lover to, be friends with (and maybe bully just a little, in play). And look what I've got.
Sakito likes it rough, as rough as he can stand it, and he likes to fight back: every scratch I've dealt trying to fend him off is reflected double on my body. To give him credit he carries his own marks without complaint (though, since I don't dare aim for that beautiful face, or anywhere else on his body the cameras could document - and that doesn't leave me much leeway, not with those costumes - he gets off relatively unscathed). Psychologically, I don't think I'm leaving any scars, any imprint at all. When I look in the mirror I feel like I'm stained with him, his colour, the deep, unsettling red of a wound.
He has a good right arm, despite being such a willowy, flyaway thing. He likes to hit, and it shows (remember that one interview we did together a few months ago? Where Sakito looks like a white angel, shining away in the pictures like butter wouldn't melt, while I'm lurking around all sullen and shadowy beside him? I had a black eye that day - hence the pirate patch - which he gave me as a reward after basically riding me into the ground, and I swear, nothing had ever been so painful or felt so good in my life before). He does it freely and with great enjoyment, because he knows that, even though we're both guys, there's a line of violence I just can't cross. I want to; sometimes I want to go for the throat so badly that the struggle to hold myself back actually hurts. But I can't.
And that's where our relationship (can you even call it that?) stood a few months in: Sakito would initiate a colossal argument once or twice a week, usually next to a handy cupboard or studio car-park, and we would have magnificent, sordid sex that left us both reaching for the first-aid kit. If I hurt him particularly badly I'd find myself doing a few days of grovelling and trotting at his heels, knowing how undignified it was but unable to stop myself, until he grudgingly forgave me and the whole palaver could start up again.
That was it, the entire extent of it; you can describe it in a single paragraph. Apart from some casual accusations from the other guys about how snappish I was lately, the daily course of my life carried on as normal. Sometimes, when I was with my friends and feeling entertained, I could admit to myself how silly the whole thing was; or, even better, forget about it altogether.
I'm not sure if Sakito knew what I was thinking, or whether he just got bored one day and decided to mess with me some more. Either way, he wasn't content to let things lie, and before I knew it I was in deeper trouble than ever.
*****
I'm not a very social person. Everyone knows this: I've said it in interviews time and again, as if my surly expressions and general muteness weren't enough of a give-away. Being in my apartment, with a friend or two (not Yomi!)...that's the best way to spend a weekend I can think of. Lame, I know. And at one point I was trying really hard to deal with it.
Sakito is perfectly aware of this; and it wasn't long before he figured out how to use it to his advantage, which of course means to my detriment. The first time went something like this:
“You coming to Aki-chan's party?” asked Hitsu-kun, whizzing past me on his way to the Barks lunch buffet before Yomi the Human Hoover could make away with all the mayo-shrimp.
“Where?” I demanded, looking up from my DS.
“Roppongi.” And he was gone. I felt myself make a face: travel more than fifteen minutes from my apartment and miss several hours of TV and sleep, all to watch Hitsu-kun get paralytic with his bosom buddy and narrowly avoid throwing up on some poor kouhai's shoes? I wasn't feeling it. But I was supposed to be making an effort.
“If you really don't want to go,” came a genial voice from behind me, “you don't have to.” Turning, I saw Sakito leaning over the back of my chair, lunch plate piled high. I gave him an incredulous stare: Sakito has a zero-tolerance policy for non-attendance at events thrown by important colleagues, and has been known to nag for up to three hours straight in order to get his way (which he always does).
“Says you,” I muttered. Sakito dropped a proprietary hand to the back of my neck, and his cool skin sent the usual ripple of resentful lust through me.
“I do say. Stay home, chill out.”
“What're you up to?” I asked suspiciously. I felt a fingernail trail lightly along my vertebrae.
“Your sulking brings Hitsu down,” Sakito told me drily. “I'm just trying to keep my band happy.”
“My band,” I growled under my breath. Dammit, I was still leader!
“We quibble over terms.” He straightened up at the sight of Ni~ya-chan waving a pack of cigarettes invitingly at him. “Do you want to stay home or not?”
“Yes.”
“Well then.” He sashayed off, and I glared after him, feeling obscurely that I'd been outmanoeuvred somewhere along the line. But no. I got my own way. Didn't I?
As it turned out, I spent a quietly enjoyable evening eating takeaway pizza and dismantling my drum tech's broken laptop. Other than the occasional text from Yomi, updating me on the progress of his mission to find a girl tall enough that he could just walk straight up to her and stick his face in her cleavage (to which I didn't bother replying - it was never going to happen, unless Aki's party happened to be replete with Russian models), I didn't give a thought to what I was missing. All in all, I was delighted that Sakito had let me off the hook.
It was one a.m, and I was just on my way to bed, when my doorbell rang. This could not be good: the percentage of my friends likely to be paying me a sober visit in the small hours, especially after a night of festivities at Aki's, was not large. I grumped my way over to the genkan.
“There you are!” said Sakito, as if he'd had to knock on every door in the hallway before he finally found me. I stepped back in sheer surprise, and he wafted in on a cloud of expensive ume-shuu and tipsy serenity. He dropped his bag on my kitchen floor, then began to examine his perfect nails with apparent fascination.
I allowed myself a quick smirk: he was squiffy, and a tanked-up Sakito is always really funny. At least, that's what I thought. More fool me.
“Have you been here this whole time?” he demanded irrelevantly, after almost a minute of scrutiny; he dropped his hands and fixed those dark eyes on me.
“Er, yes.” This was all very entertaining, but what was he doing here? It didn't seem like he wanted a fight, and if he just needed a place to crash Hitsu-kun's apartment was always his abode of choice. It was the first time, since this thing began, that he had come to my place. But it wasn't until much later that I realised how much letting him in had advanced his campaign of underhand tyranny, had given him the nod to encroach even further on my life. I know: I was an idiot.
“You haven't been out?”
“I think I just said as much,” I replied flatly.
“And you didn't have anyone round?” He'd been wandering in the direction of my fridge, but turned abruptly as he spoke and almost banged into me.
“No, Sakito. It's just been me, Yomi's fascinating social commentary, and the Gundam soundtrack. Wanna know if I talked to the pizza delivery guy? If I phoned the Speaking Clock? Well I didn't. All right?” Sakito gave me an over-long, appraising stare. Then,
“Good boy,” he said, and dropped to his knees. I'd barely realised where he'd gone before he was tearing my fly open hungrily and yanking my underwear down. Then his lips were on my cock and it was less than five seconds before I was hard: in our previous encounters I had been given every opportunity, when I wasn't busy punishing it, to worship Sakito's magnificent body; but he had barely shown any interest in mine except as a tool that could give him pleasure.
“Saki...!” I heard myself quaver, and could have bitten my tongue at how needy I sounded. His mouth was soft and sweet as he kissed my stomach, then wickedly hot and wet as his lips closed over my erection. “Why the hell are you-” I began, almost as unnerved as I was aroused.
“Shut up!” Sakito gasped, taking a swift breath, one elegant hand sliding across my thigh to balance himself while the other created an airless vacuum around my cock. And then, after several more seconds of debilitating pleasure during which I could only gape and splutter wordlessly, “...You want your reward or not?”
“...For...what?” I managed, as his lips met his fingers and encased me in warm, liquid heaven. “For getting my own way...?!” I felt him chuckle in the back of his throat, and the subtle vibrations along my hard-on made me groan and reach down to grab a fistful of his rich hair. I didn't understand him, or this sudden one-eighty in attitude - but, frankly, right then I probably couldn't have come up with the correct answer to 'what is three plus three?', so I didn't worry too much about it.
Sakito was working hard by this time, eyes closed in concentration, lashes two perfect crescents against his cheeks; he gave a soft moan of effort, tongue working magic patterns across the underside of my cock. I felt almost faint at the sound, it was so erotic. I slid my fingers beneath his fine-boned jaw encouragingly, caressing his long, industrious throat. I may have been the first man to fuck him (I say may), but this at least he had done before. Surely. I caught myself entertaining a brief rush of jealousy, but pushed it aside to get paranoid about later. Now, this moment, was too good to spoil.
By the time I came it felt like my entire body was burning ten degrees hotter, the air around me heavy and scented with whatever he'd been drinking and with him: vanilla, lime, and a faint twist of smoke, smells that even now set my nerves jangling with danger and desire. I gazed down hazily at him; a vivid blush was spreading beneath his skin, his jaw slick and warm under my fingers as he increased the pace until I was biting down on my lip to stop myself crying out.
“Saki...!” I croaked, and to this day I don't know if it was a warning or the beginning of a love declaration, because it just felt that incredible. Sakito opened his eyes and looked up at me, pupils dilated so far that they swallowed the luscious bistre of his irises almost completely. Taking a deep breath through his nose he tilted his head fluidly, and all of a sudden I was buried down his throat and speechless as his wicked tongue dragged across the base of my cock. I came then, twisting his smooth hair in my hands, and he stiffened below me but didn't try to get away.
I hadn't known sex could be so good without one or both of us getting hurt in the process, and it literally took my breath away. It took what seemed forever to come back from that sweet, thoughtless state of ecstasy, and once I'd regained control of myself and let him go Sakito was gasping too. He sat down quickly on the kitchen floor, wiping his mouth with the back of one hand in a movement that still managed to look dignified. How many people can do that?
“Drink?” I panted, yanking open the fridge and pulling out a beer with shaking hands. Sakito licked his lips and frowned slightly.
“Water.” His low voice was soft, a little hoarse from the rollercoaster ride he'd just given my dick; but not drunk, not any more. I handed him a glass, popped the tab of my beer and joined him exhaustedly on the floor. I didn't know what to say: we were being so weirdly civil, and to come out with something like 'thanks for the quickie, what the fuck were you thinking?' would just be rude, right? So we sat there, Sakito sipping at his water calmly.
“How was the party?” I asked in the end, picking at the cracks in the floor tiles with a fingernail.
“Pretty good.” Sakito began to straighten out his hair, the familiar double-handed sweep down his forelocks. “Hitsu puked in Aoi's shoulder-bag.”
“Oh, lovely.”
“It's okay,” he said, “Aoi was practically unconscious, he'll never know who it was.”
“I'll come next time,” I promised, encouraged by how naturally we were conversing (which just goes to show how fucked up we were, that I had to worry about being natural with a guy I've spent over a decade beside and once shared a bedroom with). Sakito continued primping.
“Up to you.”
“I do like going out sometimes,” I assured him, since I was pretty sure I wouldn't be allowed to get away with skiving off twice in a row. “It's just...” How to explain to someone like Sakito the effort it takes someone like me to fit in?
“It's all right, Ruka,” he said quite unconsciously, running a finger along his flushed lower lip. “It's not like you're any kind of social diamond.”
I opened my mouth, then shut it again. Where was the lightning-fast comeback that should have been sitting there on the tip of my tongue, ready to scourge him with caustic wit? Apparently it was having a post-coital snooze, and without it I had nothing to cover the glum, sinking feeling in my stomach. He really didn't want me to go out with them. I couldn't be that much of a killjoy. Could I?
“There's no law that says you have to be good with people,” Sakito continued blithely. “If you like to stay home...well, you should do whatever makes you happy.”
I gave an ambiguous grunt and he kindly shut up while he examined the lovely contours of his mouth in a pocket mirror. Luckily, I'm a master of hiding my emotions behind a wall of blank sulkiness; I would have hated him to see how dismayed and, yes, how offended I was by his offhand comments. He was barely looking at me, and I allowed myself a small sigh of relief because I was sure he hadn't noticed.
Now I know better.
That was just the first time; you can hardly blame me for being clueless. After a while, yes...I began to feel uneasy. But it wasn't until the whole thing had been repeating itself for a month or two that I realised what he was doing, and how cunning it was: letting me have my way and rewarding me for it, indulging me until he had started to isolate me from everyone around me, until I'd learnt to sit and stay and wait for my master to come home.
“How come Ruka's the only lucky bastard who gets nights off all the time?” grumbled Yomi good-naturedly one day, having been forced by Sakito to rearrange his date so he could show his face at some dinner or other. I'd been let off, as usual, and tonight I genuinely wasn't interested in going anyway. There have been times when I'd have liked to, mind, because contrary to popular belief I do actually have friends. At least, I used to.
“Ruka works hard enough,” said Sakito staunchly, “being leader. He deserves a night off.” The other three raised their eyebrows in general amazement at this statement. But the voice of authority had spoken, and that was that.
I kept quiet: I knew just how much Sakito's defence was worth, and what he really thought of me and my contribution to our social sphere. But he got his way, and I got my reward. And I've been increasingly loyal and lonely ever since.
It's got so that the only people I ever see these days are him, the other three, and various work-related staff, because when I'm not working I'm alone, and whenever I'm alone I'm yearning for him. I know it's not right, letting him cut me off from everyone. But he's trained me so well I can't stop myself, and he's undermined my confidence in my social abilities deeply enough that I barely even have the desire to resent him.
*****
To part 2
Group: Nightmare
Pairing: Ruka x Sakito
Rating: NC-17
Warnings: non-safe sex, mild violence, excessive bitching
Summary: The trials and tribulations of being a pet.
Well, I've written Sakito with everyone else in the past. So now it's Ruka's turn XD
As promised, it's full of sex, violence, and people being total and absolute bitches...
This fic is loosely based on the Naito song Cherish, which I love because it sounds adorable but is actually really dark and creepy.
If you haven't heard it, you can see a pretty good English translation here on YouTube.
I also did some fanart to go with it. Enjoy!
(link to fic is under the pic)
I was going to start the whole thing with one of our lyrics. But screw it, it's a good song and I don't want to spoil it for myself by making it all about me. So to kick this off, here's some Elvis, which explains things almost as well:
You look like an angel
Walk like an angel
Talk like an angel
But I got wise: You're the Devil in disguise
CHERISH
I'm just like his dog.
No, wait. While I'm being honest let's at least call things by their proper names. I'm his bitch, with all the humiliation and gratification it entails.
And if I'm the bitch then who's the master?
He's looking at me right now, bewitching body angled towards me enquiringly.
“Ruka-san?”
I blink and quit staring at his legs, and remember where I am: in the middle of a Shoxx interview, my other bandmates regarding me with amusement as I wake sulkily from my reverie. Oh yeah. Should I be speaking now? There's a warning edge in his voice that's pitched for my ear alone, and like a good dog I come to heel. He raises his fine head on his elegant little neck, and watches me appraisingly as I reply to whatever the hell question the interviewer asked me. My muscles relax as he tilts his chin in approval.
And there you have it. There he is, in all his glory, geeky and beautiful and cruel: Edokawa Sakito. My master.
How did this come about? you may wonder. This frankly unlikely combination. How did I, legendary 'S', end up at Sakito's feet?
You know, I'm sometimes as mystified as you.
Okay. Being honest: I'm a bully, and I know it. But like most of my kind, I only bully down (in effect that means Yomi, and Hitsu-kun sometimes, in the gentlest way possible; Ni~ya-chan just laughs and ignores me). Somehow, Sakito has always been above me. Not on a pedestal or anything. Just...untouchable.
Until suddenly he wasn't.
It all started with sex. Well, actually, it started with an argument, and at the time I had no idea where it was headed. But he made it clear soon enough.
Now, for Nightmare - we happy few (except Hitsu-kun, who gets spoiled rotten) - Sakito has always basically filled the role of nagging wife; okay, so he doesn't cook our dinner and we don't get an obligatory once-a-week shag, but in most other respects the comparison works: if we're late or hungover or not getting our drum fills just right, we all know to expect a wrinkle of that pretty nose and a subtle stream of criticism until we finally get our asses in gear out of sheer vexation.
So I wasn't at all surprised, much less perturbed, when he glided up to me in the studio storage room after work, wearing the miss-priss-librarian look that told me I was in for a scolding. I just slid a cymbal into its bag and gave him my routine glare.
“Spit it out.”
“I wanted to talk to you about the new song,” Sakito said innocently. Ah. My new song.
“Yes?”
“How to put it.” I waited; you don't interrupt Sakito when he's cracking the whip, there's literally no point. He doesn't listen and he always gets his way. “The pre-chorus hook, it needs an extra something, don't you think?” He wasn't actually asking, so I kept quiet. He ran a thoughtful finger along the voluptuous body of one of his guitars in its rack. “Let me do something with it.”
“Oh.” It was entirely possible he was right. But I had a good feeling about this song, and he never said a thing when we were sorting out the primary instrument parts. Now it was this far along in its development, now I'd got attached to it, saying he wanted to change it was kind of like telling someone their girlfriend is ugly and you want to give her a facelift. Just not done. Sakito knew this perfectly well, and had chosen to ignore it. Of course I know why, now; but at the time it set my teeth on edge.
“The thing is...” he began, “when it comes to transitions you have a bit of a blind spot. Musically.” Whoa now. This was all getting rather personal rather quickly. Sakito was usually a lot more roundabout in his run-up to criticism, and the words stung.
“A fine time to tell me, after a decade.” Sakito shrugged apologetically.
“I didn't like to say. You get so grouchy.”
“I do not.” I was getting nettled.
“You do.” He looked at me warily. “And once you start sulking it's a lot of extra work for us, mediating between you and the rest of the world until we can get you to snap out of it.” I gaped at him: there's a line of politeness you don't cross, not even with your friends, and Sakito used to be more aware of it than anyone. But he was skirting dangerously close to it right now.
“Thanks a lot, Saki.”
“I'm telling you this for your benefit,” he said, with a little toss of his graceful head. “As well as ours.”
“Oh really.”
“I'm just saying that if you had better control over your moods, we wouldn't be so nervous of coming to you with problems. And your musicianship might improve.”
“At least I'm not such a goddam perfectionist that I drive all my colleagues crazy.” Oh. Oh no, what was I doing? You did not criticise Sakito back. You just didn't.
“There's nothing wrong with attention to detail,” he said coolly, tilting his head back to look down his nose at me. He can act so superior when he wants to.
“Not in itself,” I countered, feeling myself flush darkly with annoyance under that stare. “But when it gets to the point where everyone in the studio cringes when you open your mouth and say 'yeah, but...', you know you've got a problem.” I saw his eyes narrow at that, but I didn't care; I was getting genuinely angry, because this was rapidly devolving from constructive nagging into a mud-slinging match.
“It beats being a slacker.” Slacker! If anyone knew how hard I worked it was Sakito, both of us songwriters, both of us leaders.
“And better to be a slacker than a pedantic bastard.” He breathed in sharply, lovely eyes flashing, but never raised his voice.
“You are an arrogant son of a bitch, Ruka.” Oh, we were way off base now. I looked him up and down, my incensed gaze running over his skin-tight jeans, the low, swooping neck of his tshirt that bared the smooth skin of his sternum, his unnecessarily beautiful face, and spat out the first thing that came into my head.
“And you're an egotistical little slut!” Bad. Bad, bad, bad, and it felt good.
Sakito sighed through his nose at the insult, raised a pale hand with a calculating expression, and slapped me hard across the face. And for a minute, just a minute, everything went dark.
No, I didn't swoon or have a fainting fit (it hurt, but Sakito is a lot smaller than me and not exactly buff). My vision blurred and I totally lost track of our relative positions, true, not because I'm a total wimp but because I was shocked, and furious, to a degree I'd never imagined I could be. I didn't even notice myself move, I was so taken aback by it.
The next thing I knew, from the black haze of anger, was that I had him forced up against the wall, my left arm hard across his throat, pinning him there. Now, I'm not generally a violent man - not physically, anyway - and for a second I was genuinely shocked to see what I'd done. I was about to let him down and apologise with bad grace, because I'd taken things too far, never mind that he'd started it. Sakito just bared his neat little teeth at me and had a spirited go at kneeing me in the groin. Well, so much for my good intentions: I increased the pressure of my arm until he whimpered.
“You fucking jerk.”
Sakito didn't (obviously couldn't) answer. Instead he reached out and, to my shock, slid his slender arms around my waist, dragging me against him. The flash of heat as his body met mine made me twitch in surprise, and I almost let him go as I realised with horror that I was hard. That first moment was probably the most disturbing thing that had ever happened to me to date, because I was not the kind of guy to get a boner at being belittled by my (male!) friends or by the prospect of physical violence.
But there it was. And Sakito was not helping by grinning breathlessly and sliding one hand between my legs. I let up on his throat as I recoiled.
“Oh, Ruka,” he said, with an air of such smugness and scorn that I wanted to punch him. I felt myself stir beneath his fingers, and pushed him, trying to get some space between us. He pushed me back, roughly, and I heard myself growl. Then I grabbed him. I don't even know why, I just couldn't stand the way he'd shoved me, like I was something completely distasteful.
“Get off,” he ordered, stamping hard on my foot, which I barely felt, not when his entire body was shifting like warm sand against mine. My knee slid between his legs and he bit his lip; to my astonishment I could feel his erection against my thigh, but he was still pushing at me, fingers scorching and angry. I pressed my cheek to his and dragged my hands down his sides, capturing him effectively between the wall and my body.
“What...the fuck...are you doing?” I whispered; I could hear the incensed tremble in my voice and it made everything worse. “Do you even know?!” Sakito heaved in a breath.
“You want this, you want me,” he gasped into my ear, goading me on deliberately even as his hands came up to cover his belt buckle protectively. I was so damn confused! And horny, and angry. I grabbed his wrists and forced his hands aside, and as I ripped open his jeans I felt his nails digging through my shirt. So far as I could tell he was putting up a real fight (it hurt like hell, anyway), and all the while his lips were on my ear, my neck, mouthing insults and encouragement into my skin.
I pushed one hand beneath his tshirt, lifting it, and oh, the feel of that perfect stomach beneath my fingers was like heaven. He shivered against me, and by then I had shoved his jeans and black underwear down and he was as hard as I was. That settled it. I pulled him tighter to me, the sensation almost making me stagger. He turned his head away swiftly so I kissed his throat instead, the long line of his neck burning under my lips.
“If you don't want it,” I managed, taking a laboured breath, “...say, now...!”
No answer, just a faint sniff of derision. I was going to do it. I was actually going to do it, I was going to fuck the most beautiful man in Japan, and I was going to make him sorry. And the mad thing is that at the time it felt so logical; of course I now realise that the best thing to do would have been to rise above the whole sordid argument and walk away the moral victor. But until you've had Sakito's celestial body simmering against yours and heard his barbed words in your ear, you can't begin to imagine how difficult that was.
Anyway, in the heat of the moment none of this crossed my mind. I just pushed my knee more forcefully between his long legs (the jeans had disappeared some time during the arousing course of his struggles) and spread them wider. I spat into my hand, keeping him braced against the wall, and slid my fingers between his thighs.
“Bite your tongue.” Sakito let his head fall back and did as he was told, clenching his fine jaw and remaining resolutely silent as I pushed a finger inside him, then another, though I could tell it was more out of pride than because he felt like obeying me. I caught his initial wince, and allowed myself a humourless smile. Again, I wasn't thinking about what this could do to him, to us; all I knew was that I wanted him, and that I wanted to hurt him.
As soon as Sakito's eyes began to flutter closed and the tension eased in the line of his neck, I left off my preparations, perfunctory as they were, and yanked my own clothing aside. Pressing an ungentle kiss to the spot where his jugular vein raced beneath the skin, I set my hands to his hips and lifted him effortlessly off the ground.
That got me a swift inhalation of breath, and his arms went around my neck, nails leaving red crescents in my skin. Then I was inside him and he was tight, tighter than any woman I've ever had, letting out a raw sound through clenched white teeth and curling his thighs around my waist as I shifted him higher.
“God!” I'd never felt anything like it, and I never will again: it had to be his first, judging by the brief, shocked stillness as I began to move, followed by a stubborn scowl as he attempted awkwardly to dictate the rhythm. I was having none of it; it felt fabulous, the fierce sense of pleasure doubling with every moan, every fleeting expression of uncertainty, and I wanted to keep him that way. I know I wasn't being careful, I just needed more of it, and judging by the ribbons of skin Sakito was ripping off the back of my neck he wanted to damage me as badly as I did him.
“Hurts...! Ruka...” he ground out as I increased the pace, my arms burning with the continued effort of supporting him. I ignored him, and he grabbed a fistful of my stylish new hairdo and yanked on it, making me grit my teeth and thrust into him harder. He swore at me so loudly it almost jolted me out of my rhythm; I clapped a hand over his mouth and he promptly bit me.
“Fuck...!” I snatched it back, too angry to check if he'd drawn blood, and set my palm to his brow, knocking his head back against the wall with unthinking force. He cried out at that and gave me a pained, insolent smile; I shoved my hand across his lips again, taking care not to get too close to his teeth this time, and was amazed when he just glared at me and gave a fluid undulation of his hips, sinking down further onto my cock and making me gasp helplessly into his hair. He always smelled so good.
I was almost at the edge, but the hurt, resentful part of me, the bitter part I was only just discovering, made me want to prolong it as long as possible, just so I could drag out every sound of discomfort he could make to gloat over after all this was done with. And, to my somewhat wolfish delight, I was no longer getting a lot of opposition.
Sakito was moaning raggedly into my hand, ethereal features half obscured by my fingers so all I could see were his closed eyes, tears springing from the corners to sparkle against his skin like ice, but it felt too good inside him to stop any time soon, and I was too furious to even entertain the idea. Perhaps I tried to slow down once, but he just clung tighter to me, hands sliding beneath my shirt and fingers biting hard into my back, dragging me closer, deeper, until I could feel him pressed rigid and excited against my stomach.
“Don't you want...this over?” I managed, my voice guttural with lust and aggression, and now I half hoped the answer would be yes because I was so tightly wound, all my limbs screaming surrender and my mind sick with pleasure.
“Yes!” growled Sakito as I removed my hand, his fist thumping against my shoulder-blade enthusiastically. I sank my head against his throat, tasting salt beneath my lips, and felt one of his arms leave its strangle-hold around my neck to slip between our bodies. His moans changed key; I knew he was touching himself, and just the thought of it was so delicious that I nearly came that second.
I managed to hang on though, because the last thing I needed now was for him to see me give in, and soon I was rewarded by the press of his sleek torso against mine as he arched his back and climaxed; I dragged my head back and was just in time to watch him come, and goddammit the bastard looked angelic, that beautiful face blank and bright with ecstasy. It was completely extraordinary, and gave me the excuse I needed to let go; I pulled him back towards me and he allowed it, gasping for breath and whining sharply as my teeth met in his shoulder.
It seemed to go on forever, the best and the worst thing I had ever felt, my hands raising bruises in the soft flesh of his buttocks, his breathing tearful and triumphant in my ear. But it couldn't have lasted longer than ten seconds, and it was certainly no more than thirty before the mindless pleasure began to ebb and my brain clicked dutifully back on, one shamed synapse at a time.
I let Sakito go all at once, and he slid down until his feet hit the floor. Those long, marvellous legs were trembling like a baby animal's, and he leaned back against the wall, biting his lip. I did hurt him.
“I'm sorry-” I heard myself say in a horrified voice, suddenly appalled at what I'd done. He heaved in a harsh breath. I reached out for him, I don't know what I meant to do, steady him, hold him, maybe just touch him because he still looked so stunning it dazzled me.
Before I could figure it out he moved like a snake, grabbing my outstretched arm and twisting until I felt my balance go. Sakito was in the aikido club in junior high. Bet you didn't know that. Neither did I, until I was flat on my back on the floor and wondering what the hell had happened (Hitsu-kun told me later that Sakito was so damn pretty, even back in the day, that his friends were forever coming up with over-dramatic doomsday predictions of the terrible hentai-manga things that might happen to him on the way home from school, and had eventually ganged up and insisted he take self-defence classes. I can attest to the fact that they worked).
Sakito gave me a complicated look that partly radiated satisfaction and partly suggested that, in his opinion, I now ranked somewhere on the same moral level as a woodlouse. I was still lying there, winded, as he slipped back into his jeans, struggling on his wobbly colt's legs. He gave me another searing glance and left. I considered how I was feeling right now: I hurt, and my body was singing with pleasure, and jesus fucking christ, what had I done?
I covered my eyes with my hands.
And that was how it started. After that, he had me. I just didn't know it yet.
I didn't see him that weekend. I worked on my solo project, took my car to be serviced, and played some MonHan. And spent the entire time feeling like a rapist, or at least the perpetrator of domestic abuse. By the time work began on Monday I was royally screwed up (well, I thought so at the time; in hindsight, I was practically living the life of Riley compared to what would come later), just imagining how horrific our meeting would be and what he might have told the others about me.
Sakito just gave me the same breezy smile he gave everyone else, offered me a potato chip, then whipped out his notepad and pen and began to organise our schedule. As official band leader I kept my mouth shut and let him get on with it, as did our manager. I doubt if I could have come up with a coherent sentence in any case: I was too busy staring. If I'd thought he was beautiful before (and I always did), it was nothing to how he looked that morning when he shot me that smile. I ducked my head down and checked him surreptitiously for telltale marks of what I'd done to him: his white throat where I'd pinned him to the wall, his slender wrists where I'd grabbed him. But his skin was the smooth and perfect canvas it always had been.
I didn't know what to say to him; I was so sorry, and so grateful, and it always took me a long time to come up with something articulate - whether that meant interviews, lyrics, or just apologising to this man I'd worked with and had fun with and respected for over a decade. And every time he flashed that smile at me it got harder.
That's how he got me, see. Oh, he's clever. He laid his trap perfectly, with its tantalising bait of guilt and forgiveness and brave little smiles, and I circled it without even knowing what I was doing, nervous at first of approaching but getting gradually closer, wanting to be near him like I never had before. He played me like a fish on a line, letting me reel myself in. And then he simply reached out and caught me.
It took three days before he finally took pity on me, and they went slowly. By then I was aching to apologise, to find out what I'd need to do to make things better between us. Sakito made sure I never got the chance, using his organisational pull to ensure that he wouldn't find himself alone with me, and looking so sweet and oblivious throughout that I didn't have the heart to force him into a confrontation. And the longer this went on, the sorrier I was.
When I finally got the opportunity, it was by accident, or at least I thought so at the time. Now I'm not so sure. We'd been doing more album rehearsals that day, and Sakito, as usual, was careful to finish his parts before me. My peripheral senses, ever aware of his presence, noticed him leave, but I was busy with my tech; so I resigned myself to another lonely day of guilt.
A few minutes later Kenji reminded me that I'd promised him the Steins;Gate doujinshi novel I'd bought in Akiba a few weeks ago (I only ever read this stuff once), so I trudged down to my car to fetch it while he was changing the skin on my snare drum. As I entered the cool, dim underground car-park I heard the echo of footsteps, then caught sight of a slender shape flitting between the cars. I only knew one person who moved like that.
“Sakito!” I called, and the figure stopped and turned towards me. I don't know if he was taking a short-cut through the car-park or whether he'd waited there deliberately, but he didn't seem surprised. “Can I talk to you?” I demanded as I panted up to him. Sakito blinked, looking, as usual, like nothing had happened between us at all.
“If you like.” He leaned back against the side of the car where he'd stopped (my car, as it happened), shining chocolate hair spilling over the metal as he relaxed. “What is it?”
I sighed. What is it. He looked so innocent, so serene, that I almost didn't want to spoil it for him by bringing up the events of the previous week. What an idiot I was back then (as if I'm any smarter now). Still, I screwed up my courage and got ready.
“Well, I...Look, I want to apologise.” Sakito's friendly expression flickered for a moment.
“Pardon?” For all I knew, he was trying his best to forget the whole experience; but I had to say it. It had been bad enough this week; maybe it was cruel of me, but I couldn't stand the remorse any longer without at least attempting to fix things.
“Let me say sorry. Please. Then I'll never mention any of this again.”
Sakito looked up searchingly into my face, and for a long minute I had an uninterrupted view of that bright, naïve expression. That was the last I ever saw of it: his gaze stilled and he pointed imperiously to the floor at his feet.
“Down.”
“Excuse me?” I said, taken aback. Sakito smiled at me sweetly.
“You want to act sorry? Fine with me. Get on your knees and apologise.” He spoke calmly, but the words hit my ears with venom; I'd got it wrong, I thought, he must still be furious. It wasn't until much later, looking back on it, that I realised he wasn't: Sakito is very rarely angry, I know now; he just uses the possibility to persuade my brain and my body into punishing me. And, to be honest, most of the time I've done something to deserve it. Or maybe he just makes me think I have. Fuck, I don't even know any more.
In any event, this was all still new to me, and I'd been feeling guilty. It was almost a relief to drop to the floor at his feet, the cold concrete scraping my knees.
“Saki,” I said, not sounding particularly gracious, but then I wasn't used to this; “I'm sorry. Really.” Sakito didn't acknowledge that, but he didn't dismiss it either. I kept my eyes on his shoes, not ready to see his face. He remained silent; after a while he began to drum his fingers against the car at his back, nails clicking on the black steel in a way that set my teeth on edge. Some more silence. “Aren't you gonna say anything?” I demanded eventually. I was getting worried: I could feel my contrition beginning to ebb away into my customary moodiness, and some sorry it would turn into then.
“Once you've apologised,” said Sakito, stilling his fingers abruptly, “then I might.”
“I-” Sitting back on my heels, I finally looked up at him. Well, glared. “All right. I just said I was sorry. What more do you want?” He lolled back more comfortably against my car, slid his fingers across his flat stomach to his belt buckle, and raised his eyebrows at me. I felt my jaw drop.
“That's the way,” he said drily, and the next sound I heard was his zip. “You can talk at me with that sulky fucking attitude till the cows come home, Ruka, it won't make you sound convincing. Or you can actually make your mouth useful and show me how sorry you are.”
You can imagine my reaction to this: disbelief, anger, a wash of bitter amusement, and finally the swift and inevitable onset of horniness. This is Sakito we're talking about, after all, and whatever else he may be...holy hell is he arousing.
So I apologised. At length. With feeling. And, in a way, you could say I've never got off all fours since.
And so we began. Once I knew he wanted me, or at least wanted what my body could do for him, I became obsessed. My temper, never exactly vaunted for its stability, was now on a hair-trigger, and it seemed like the barest word of criticism from Sakito was enough to set it off. It's not my fault; well, not just my fault: he was training me that way, I'm sure. Soon it was an almost Pavlovian response: arguments with Sakito led to sex with Sakito, which was the only time I could hurt him, and my subconscious learned to explode at the first harsh word. And that's what he wanted all along, a kind of mental button he could push that would have me standing to attention at a moment's notice.
Why does he pick on me? I find myself wondering, even now. Why not Hitsu-kun, who would probably give his eye-teeth to be Sakito's private plaything and would be so much less trouble to train? I was almost feral in those first days, crazy with confusion, and it amazes me that he thought me worth the effort.
It's one of the things that's been bothering me since this began: why did Sakito choose me? Is it because he thought I'd be a challenge, or because he thought I'd be a pushover? I'm not sure which is worse. It doesn't do a lot for the state of my ego either way. All I ever wanted was someone I could be a considerate lover to, be friends with (and maybe bully just a little, in play). And look what I've got.
Sakito likes it rough, as rough as he can stand it, and he likes to fight back: every scratch I've dealt trying to fend him off is reflected double on my body. To give him credit he carries his own marks without complaint (though, since I don't dare aim for that beautiful face, or anywhere else on his body the cameras could document - and that doesn't leave me much leeway, not with those costumes - he gets off relatively unscathed). Psychologically, I don't think I'm leaving any scars, any imprint at all. When I look in the mirror I feel like I'm stained with him, his colour, the deep, unsettling red of a wound.
He has a good right arm, despite being such a willowy, flyaway thing. He likes to hit, and it shows (remember that one interview we did together a few months ago? Where Sakito looks like a white angel, shining away in the pictures like butter wouldn't melt, while I'm lurking around all sullen and shadowy beside him? I had a black eye that day - hence the pirate patch - which he gave me as a reward after basically riding me into the ground, and I swear, nothing had ever been so painful or felt so good in my life before). He does it freely and with great enjoyment, because he knows that, even though we're both guys, there's a line of violence I just can't cross. I want to; sometimes I want to go for the throat so badly that the struggle to hold myself back actually hurts. But I can't.
And that's where our relationship (can you even call it that?) stood a few months in: Sakito would initiate a colossal argument once or twice a week, usually next to a handy cupboard or studio car-park, and we would have magnificent, sordid sex that left us both reaching for the first-aid kit. If I hurt him particularly badly I'd find myself doing a few days of grovelling and trotting at his heels, knowing how undignified it was but unable to stop myself, until he grudgingly forgave me and the whole palaver could start up again.
That was it, the entire extent of it; you can describe it in a single paragraph. Apart from some casual accusations from the other guys about how snappish I was lately, the daily course of my life carried on as normal. Sometimes, when I was with my friends and feeling entertained, I could admit to myself how silly the whole thing was; or, even better, forget about it altogether.
I'm not sure if Sakito knew what I was thinking, or whether he just got bored one day and decided to mess with me some more. Either way, he wasn't content to let things lie, and before I knew it I was in deeper trouble than ever.
*****
I'm not a very social person. Everyone knows this: I've said it in interviews time and again, as if my surly expressions and general muteness weren't enough of a give-away. Being in my apartment, with a friend or two (not Yomi!)...that's the best way to spend a weekend I can think of. Lame, I know. And at one point I was trying really hard to deal with it.
Sakito is perfectly aware of this; and it wasn't long before he figured out how to use it to his advantage, which of course means to my detriment. The first time went something like this:
“You coming to Aki-chan's party?” asked Hitsu-kun, whizzing past me on his way to the Barks lunch buffet before Yomi the Human Hoover could make away with all the mayo-shrimp.
“Where?” I demanded, looking up from my DS.
“Roppongi.” And he was gone. I felt myself make a face: travel more than fifteen minutes from my apartment and miss several hours of TV and sleep, all to watch Hitsu-kun get paralytic with his bosom buddy and narrowly avoid throwing up on some poor kouhai's shoes? I wasn't feeling it. But I was supposed to be making an effort.
“If you really don't want to go,” came a genial voice from behind me, “you don't have to.” Turning, I saw Sakito leaning over the back of my chair, lunch plate piled high. I gave him an incredulous stare: Sakito has a zero-tolerance policy for non-attendance at events thrown by important colleagues, and has been known to nag for up to three hours straight in order to get his way (which he always does).
“Says you,” I muttered. Sakito dropped a proprietary hand to the back of my neck, and his cool skin sent the usual ripple of resentful lust through me.
“I do say. Stay home, chill out.”
“What're you up to?” I asked suspiciously. I felt a fingernail trail lightly along my vertebrae.
“Your sulking brings Hitsu down,” Sakito told me drily. “I'm just trying to keep my band happy.”
“My band,” I growled under my breath. Dammit, I was still leader!
“We quibble over terms.” He straightened up at the sight of Ni~ya-chan waving a pack of cigarettes invitingly at him. “Do you want to stay home or not?”
“Yes.”
“Well then.” He sashayed off, and I glared after him, feeling obscurely that I'd been outmanoeuvred somewhere along the line. But no. I got my own way. Didn't I?
As it turned out, I spent a quietly enjoyable evening eating takeaway pizza and dismantling my drum tech's broken laptop. Other than the occasional text from Yomi, updating me on the progress of his mission to find a girl tall enough that he could just walk straight up to her and stick his face in her cleavage (to which I didn't bother replying - it was never going to happen, unless Aki's party happened to be replete with Russian models), I didn't give a thought to what I was missing. All in all, I was delighted that Sakito had let me off the hook.
It was one a.m, and I was just on my way to bed, when my doorbell rang. This could not be good: the percentage of my friends likely to be paying me a sober visit in the small hours, especially after a night of festivities at Aki's, was not large. I grumped my way over to the genkan.
“There you are!” said Sakito, as if he'd had to knock on every door in the hallway before he finally found me. I stepped back in sheer surprise, and he wafted in on a cloud of expensive ume-shuu and tipsy serenity. He dropped his bag on my kitchen floor, then began to examine his perfect nails with apparent fascination.
I allowed myself a quick smirk: he was squiffy, and a tanked-up Sakito is always really funny. At least, that's what I thought. More fool me.
“Have you been here this whole time?” he demanded irrelevantly, after almost a minute of scrutiny; he dropped his hands and fixed those dark eyes on me.
“Er, yes.” This was all very entertaining, but what was he doing here? It didn't seem like he wanted a fight, and if he just needed a place to crash Hitsu-kun's apartment was always his abode of choice. It was the first time, since this thing began, that he had come to my place. But it wasn't until much later that I realised how much letting him in had advanced his campaign of underhand tyranny, had given him the nod to encroach even further on my life. I know: I was an idiot.
“You haven't been out?”
“I think I just said as much,” I replied flatly.
“And you didn't have anyone round?” He'd been wandering in the direction of my fridge, but turned abruptly as he spoke and almost banged into me.
“No, Sakito. It's just been me, Yomi's fascinating social commentary, and the Gundam soundtrack. Wanna know if I talked to the pizza delivery guy? If I phoned the Speaking Clock? Well I didn't. All right?” Sakito gave me an over-long, appraising stare. Then,
“Good boy,” he said, and dropped to his knees. I'd barely realised where he'd gone before he was tearing my fly open hungrily and yanking my underwear down. Then his lips were on my cock and it was less than five seconds before I was hard: in our previous encounters I had been given every opportunity, when I wasn't busy punishing it, to worship Sakito's magnificent body; but he had barely shown any interest in mine except as a tool that could give him pleasure.
“Saki...!” I heard myself quaver, and could have bitten my tongue at how needy I sounded. His mouth was soft and sweet as he kissed my stomach, then wickedly hot and wet as his lips closed over my erection. “Why the hell are you-” I began, almost as unnerved as I was aroused.
“Shut up!” Sakito gasped, taking a swift breath, one elegant hand sliding across my thigh to balance himself while the other created an airless vacuum around my cock. And then, after several more seconds of debilitating pleasure during which I could only gape and splutter wordlessly, “...You want your reward or not?”
“...For...what?” I managed, as his lips met his fingers and encased me in warm, liquid heaven. “For getting my own way...?!” I felt him chuckle in the back of his throat, and the subtle vibrations along my hard-on made me groan and reach down to grab a fistful of his rich hair. I didn't understand him, or this sudden one-eighty in attitude - but, frankly, right then I probably couldn't have come up with the correct answer to 'what is three plus three?', so I didn't worry too much about it.
Sakito was working hard by this time, eyes closed in concentration, lashes two perfect crescents against his cheeks; he gave a soft moan of effort, tongue working magic patterns across the underside of my cock. I felt almost faint at the sound, it was so erotic. I slid my fingers beneath his fine-boned jaw encouragingly, caressing his long, industrious throat. I may have been the first man to fuck him (I say may), but this at least he had done before. Surely. I caught myself entertaining a brief rush of jealousy, but pushed it aside to get paranoid about later. Now, this moment, was too good to spoil.
By the time I came it felt like my entire body was burning ten degrees hotter, the air around me heavy and scented with whatever he'd been drinking and with him: vanilla, lime, and a faint twist of smoke, smells that even now set my nerves jangling with danger and desire. I gazed down hazily at him; a vivid blush was spreading beneath his skin, his jaw slick and warm under my fingers as he increased the pace until I was biting down on my lip to stop myself crying out.
“Saki...!” I croaked, and to this day I don't know if it was a warning or the beginning of a love declaration, because it just felt that incredible. Sakito opened his eyes and looked up at me, pupils dilated so far that they swallowed the luscious bistre of his irises almost completely. Taking a deep breath through his nose he tilted his head fluidly, and all of a sudden I was buried down his throat and speechless as his wicked tongue dragged across the base of my cock. I came then, twisting his smooth hair in my hands, and he stiffened below me but didn't try to get away.
I hadn't known sex could be so good without one or both of us getting hurt in the process, and it literally took my breath away. It took what seemed forever to come back from that sweet, thoughtless state of ecstasy, and once I'd regained control of myself and let him go Sakito was gasping too. He sat down quickly on the kitchen floor, wiping his mouth with the back of one hand in a movement that still managed to look dignified. How many people can do that?
“Drink?” I panted, yanking open the fridge and pulling out a beer with shaking hands. Sakito licked his lips and frowned slightly.
“Water.” His low voice was soft, a little hoarse from the rollercoaster ride he'd just given my dick; but not drunk, not any more. I handed him a glass, popped the tab of my beer and joined him exhaustedly on the floor. I didn't know what to say: we were being so weirdly civil, and to come out with something like 'thanks for the quickie, what the fuck were you thinking?' would just be rude, right? So we sat there, Sakito sipping at his water calmly.
“How was the party?” I asked in the end, picking at the cracks in the floor tiles with a fingernail.
“Pretty good.” Sakito began to straighten out his hair, the familiar double-handed sweep down his forelocks. “Hitsu puked in Aoi's shoulder-bag.”
“Oh, lovely.”
“It's okay,” he said, “Aoi was practically unconscious, he'll never know who it was.”
“I'll come next time,” I promised, encouraged by how naturally we were conversing (which just goes to show how fucked up we were, that I had to worry about being natural with a guy I've spent over a decade beside and once shared a bedroom with). Sakito continued primping.
“Up to you.”
“I do like going out sometimes,” I assured him, since I was pretty sure I wouldn't be allowed to get away with skiving off twice in a row. “It's just...” How to explain to someone like Sakito the effort it takes someone like me to fit in?
“It's all right, Ruka,” he said quite unconsciously, running a finger along his flushed lower lip. “It's not like you're any kind of social diamond.”
I opened my mouth, then shut it again. Where was the lightning-fast comeback that should have been sitting there on the tip of my tongue, ready to scourge him with caustic wit? Apparently it was having a post-coital snooze, and without it I had nothing to cover the glum, sinking feeling in my stomach. He really didn't want me to go out with them. I couldn't be that much of a killjoy. Could I?
“There's no law that says you have to be good with people,” Sakito continued blithely. “If you like to stay home...well, you should do whatever makes you happy.”
I gave an ambiguous grunt and he kindly shut up while he examined the lovely contours of his mouth in a pocket mirror. Luckily, I'm a master of hiding my emotions behind a wall of blank sulkiness; I would have hated him to see how dismayed and, yes, how offended I was by his offhand comments. He was barely looking at me, and I allowed myself a small sigh of relief because I was sure he hadn't noticed.
Now I know better.
That was just the first time; you can hardly blame me for being clueless. After a while, yes...I began to feel uneasy. But it wasn't until the whole thing had been repeating itself for a month or two that I realised what he was doing, and how cunning it was: letting me have my way and rewarding me for it, indulging me until he had started to isolate me from everyone around me, until I'd learnt to sit and stay and wait for my master to come home.
“How come Ruka's the only lucky bastard who gets nights off all the time?” grumbled Yomi good-naturedly one day, having been forced by Sakito to rearrange his date so he could show his face at some dinner or other. I'd been let off, as usual, and tonight I genuinely wasn't interested in going anyway. There have been times when I'd have liked to, mind, because contrary to popular belief I do actually have friends. At least, I used to.
“Ruka works hard enough,” said Sakito staunchly, “being leader. He deserves a night off.” The other three raised their eyebrows in general amazement at this statement. But the voice of authority had spoken, and that was that.
I kept quiet: I knew just how much Sakito's defence was worth, and what he really thought of me and my contribution to our social sphere. But he got his way, and I got my reward. And I've been increasingly loyal and lonely ever since.
It's got so that the only people I ever see these days are him, the other three, and various work-related staff, because when I'm not working I'm alone, and whenever I'm alone I'm yearning for him. I know it's not right, letting him cut me off from everyone. But he's trained me so well I can't stop myself, and he's undermined my confidence in my social abilities deeply enough that I barely even have the desire to resent him.
*****
To part 2