Fic: Leave my thoughts behind [3/3]

[reikah]

Last part hoorah

Title: Leave my thoughts behind [3/3]
Author: reikah
Rating: Hard R.
Pairing: Kurogane/Fai, Kurogane/Yuui, some Fai/Yuui.
Word Count: 21,599
Notes: In which there is some snogging.
For: shadow_of_egypt, with fond thoughts if a consummate lack of skill. MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Parts: [1] - [2] - [3]

Oh, i'm missing all the things i knew
I miss them yet i want them gone
Yes, i'm missing all the things i knew
Yet wish i knew nothing at all
I wish i knew nothing at all

← part 2

"... And the postman comes by at 4pm, Kuro-tan, so be sure not to go fetch the mail before then, unless there's a package, in which case you should take it into your apartment because I don't trust the lunatic downstairs not to steal it -"

Kurogane grits his teeth and lets his hand tighten around his mug. "Idiot, I know when the mail comes. I live here! And that 'lunatic' is the head of the math department -"

"And while I'm sure Fuuma-sensei is a fine man with a compass I'm not so sure I trust him with my post," Fai replies cheerfully, clapping his hands together, and Kurogane squares his jaw and glares at him. Fai beams at him like the sun. "Is there anything else you need to know?"

"Why you're so damn irritating?" Kurogane growls, and Fai heaves in a dramatic breath.

"I'm going away for a whole week and Kurowan-sensei has no kind words of parting? No kiss for his departing beloved?" Fai bats his eyelashes and Kurogane huffs in disgust, which only makes the airhead pout. "Mean."

"You're only going away for a week, idiot," Kurogane says.

"A whole week. Kiss me before I go!"

Kurogane dodges the blond's surprise assault without spilling a single drop of his tea; Fai lands on the couch and then rolls over, his lower lip sticking out in a pout. Kurogane ignores this and instead raises his mug to drain it, and Fai gives up with a loud sigh.

"Kuro-tan and his intimacy issues," he sighs at the sky, and the hypocrisy is enough that Kurogane nearly spits his tea out across the rug. Fai trudges over to his suitcase, borrowed from Yuui for the duration of the trip. "Look after Yuui while I'm gone, okay?"

"I don't think your brother needs anyone to look after him," Kurogane points out. "He's not you."

"He's my baby brother," Fai says firmly. "Look after him, don't stay up too late, and feed the fish!"

Kurogane twitches. "You don't have any fish."

The idiot grins at him, and Kurogane has the sense he's blundered into a trap. "Then get me some fish, Kuro-kind~! It's my birthday soon."

"You said it was your birthday last September, last August and last May," Kurogane says. "You must be well over a hundred by now."

"Not my fault Kuro-christmas cake likes older men."

"I - what?" Kurogane snarls, and Fai beams at him cheerfully and bends down, unthreading the shoulder strap on his bag.

"Kuro-tan appreciates... experience, is all I'm saying," he purrs, and then his cell phone rings; Kurogane swears under his breath as he marches into the kitchen with his mug while Fai answers it.

"That's my ride to the airport," he calls loudly, and when Kurogane emerges he's heaving his bag up onto one shoulder. "The taxi's outside, I have to go."

"Yeah, yeah," Kurogane growls, and before he can reconsider he crosses the room and slips his fingers under Fai's jaw, angling the idiot up for that kiss he'd wanted. Fai smiles into it, and his lips are dry and chafed.

"Mmm. Thank you."

"Whatever."

"Be nice to Yuui!" Fai hollers as he hauls the door open, and Kurogane waves a hand by way of parting. "And don't abuse that poor fleshlight!"

Kurogane flushes. "Like hell I would, you -"

Whatever Fai is is cut short by the door closing, and Kurogane subsides although he can hear the weird bastard laughing to himself as he makes his way down the corridor outside.

After Fai's gone Kurogane does the dishes, fetches out his cleaning materials and settles in for a Sunday spent mostly Fluorite free. He's been putting off his housekeeping for too long, and if his mother were to visit she'd be appalled at him, so he spends the day vacuuming rugs, sweeping floors, washing windows and wiping down surfaces, and he doesn't think of the blond idiots at all.

Not at all.

He's allowed to be selfish, right?

He's watching a samurai movie (with his pants firmly on, because Fai is an idiot and he's wrong about a lot of things) when the knock sounds at his door. It's not Fai's knock, but it sounds too harsh to be Yuui's, so Kurogane climbs to his feet and heads over with as much stealth as he can. He taped a bit of paper over the eyehole so the light inside wouldn't give him away to a visitor, and he pushes it out of the way to peer intently at his guest.

It's Yuui standing on the mat, wearing a pair of jeans, a hoodie and a scowl. As Kurogane watches he begins banging again, his palm making the wood jump, and Kurogane undoes the lock and opens the door. "What?" he asks.

"I'm going to murder him," Yuui says.

"What?"

Yuui glares at him. "My brother," he says tightly. "He's managed to lock me out of my flat."

Kurogane raises an eyebrow. "Uh. How?"

"I don't know!" Yuui snaps. "He changed my keys or something, they won't fit in the lock anymore!"

He's bristling on Kurogane's doormat, giving the impression of barely contained violence, and Kurogane hesitates for a few minutes before hesitantly offering to give the door a try. Yuui glares at him, but he holds his keys out and drops them in Kurogane's open palm, and after Kurogane puts the catch on the door he follows him down the corridor to his own apartment.

It takes about three minutes of trying before Kurogane realises what Fai's done, and then he offers to lend Yuui his cell phone so he can call a locksmith. "He's filled in the keyhole with some kind of putty, I think," he says, and Yuui stares at him for a heartbeat and then turns away and violently kicks the wall.

"I knew there was a reason he followed me out of my flat this morning! I'm going to kill him."

"Call a locksmith," Kurogane says. "I have a phone directory in my apartment near my landline."

Yuui scowls. "I'm going to kill him."

"I know. You said that already."

"Well, I am."

"I heard. Go on, go make that call," Kurogane says, and Yuui scowls at his locked door and stomps his way back into Kurogane's flat, cursing under his breath in what sounds like French as he does so. Kurogane wonders just how many languages the twins know between them.

He slips into the apartment as silently as he can to find Yuui sitting on the arm of his couch, the phone to his ear, and quietly makes Yuui a cup of tea before loitering in the middle of the room, feeling superfluous. Yuui answers the locksmith's questions with terse, bad-tempered brevity, and eventually concludes the conversation with, "Fine. I'll be there."

Kurogane holds out the steaming mug of tea. "Is he coming out?"

"Yeah," Yuui says, scowling. "Tomorrow. Honestly, killing or not, I am going to murderise my brother. His pranks have always been pretty goddamn stupid, but this takes the cake."

Kurogane hesitates. "You can stay the night if you like," he says. "There's room enough on the sofa."

Yuui blinks at him, startled, and then his face lapses into his familiarly rueful smile, albeit stressed at the edges. "Thank you," he says. "That would be kind of you. Is there anything I can do...?"

"Tch." Kurogane looks away, embarrassed, and raises a hand to scratch at the back of his neck. "You don't have to do anything. Your brother screwed you over, right? It's not a big deal, you don't have to repay me."

"But I want to," Yuui says softly, and Kurogane stares intently at the floor. His toes are very interesting suddenly.

"I guess you could... I don't know. You could cook, if you wanted. But you don't have to!" he adds fiercely, and Yuui chuckles.

"That sounds fair. Thank you. Do you mind if I have a look around your kitchen?"

Kurogane shakes his head, standing aside to let Yuui pass, and glares mulishly up the ceiling. You could cook if you wanted, he repeats back to himself in a stupid high-pitched voice. You're an idiot.

Why does he always feel thirteen again around Yuui?

"Kurogane?" Yuui calls, his voice echoing in the stainless steel of the kitchen.

"Yeah?"

"I didn't know you liked Pinot Gris."

Kurogane's brows draw together. "What?"

"Alsace Pinot Gris? The wine?" Yuui sticks his head around the door, smiling. He has a delicate bottle in one hand, labelled in French. "It's my favourite too. And it's a 2005, good taste."

Kurogane stares at him. "I don't drink wine at home. Give me that. Where was it?"

"In your top cupboard," Yuui says, staring at him. "Behind the busted rice cooker, which by the way might explain how you fail at making onigiri."

Kurogane turns the bottle over and sighs when his suspicions are confirmed. There's a hot pink post-it note stuck to the end of the bottle; a very familiar hand has written on it in shaky kanji: "He's a three-glass exhibitionist."

"... Is that?" Yuui scowls when Kurogane peels the post-it note off and passes it to him, and then sighs deeply. "Fai. Did I mention the murdering?"

"I think so."

"I'm not really a three-glass exhibitionist," he adds.

"I didn't think you were."

Yuui nods. He's turning faintly pink. "I... I know. I was just making sure."

"Okay," Kurogane says.

"Because I don't know what else my idiot brother has said."

"Reasonable," Kurogane agrees.

"So we're clear?"

"We're clear."

"Okay. Good." Yuui smoothes his hands down his hoodie and bites his lip. "Um. Seems a shame to waste the wine, though. It goes well with chicken...."

"Middle drawer of the freezer," Kurogane says. "You need any help?"

"No."

"Okay."

They stare at each other in silence.

Yuui licks his lips. "... Can I have the wine bottle back, Kurogane?"

Kurogane jerks and hands it over, and he's aware as he does so that he's definitely lost his battle with this blush. He thinks the tip of his nose is burning. Yuui bites his lower lip, and he has to look away rapidly. He's an adult man, he reminds himself. He's an adult man, not a teenage boy, and he's a martial artist and he has control of himself.

"I'm. I'm going to, to, to go start," Yuui says nervously, and then he's vanished back into the kitchen in a whisk of blond hair. Kurogane finds himself looking after him and then curses when he realizes he's yet to get around to the bathroom in his housekeeping chores, and makes his rather urgent way to assess the condition of that room. He wasn't expecting company.

He wipes the sides down quickly with a folded wad of toilet paper and disposes of the wads of bloody cotton wool balls on the countertops where he staunches the bleeding when he nicks himself shaving. His mother taught him basic hygiene, so it isn't too bad in there, but while he's frantically picking up his bathroom detritus of empty soap bottles and hair gel cans and broken razors from the sides of the bathtub he comes across a tupperware box placed neatly on the shelf above the bathtub, right at eyelevel if you're soaking. There's another hot pink post-it stuck to it, and Kurogane picks it up with narrowed, suspicious eyes.

These aren't actually finger puppets, it reads, and he pops open the tupperware with a crippling sense of inevitability. The silver foil packets inside are stamped with their maker's label and claim to be 'hardwearing'.

Yuui isn't the only person who's going to murder Fai, he decides.

"Kurogane? I can't find the - oh," Yuui says, standing in the bathroom doorway and staring at him, and Kurogane glances down quickly at the condoms in his hand.

"This isn't -"

"Of course it's not," Yuui says. "Forget waiting for him to come back, I'm going to chase him to London and kill him there."

"I'll come with you," Kurogane says, finding his voice at last. "That idiot."

Yuui grins at this, showing just a hint of teeth, and it soothes some of the anger boiling in Kurogane's belly. "I get first dibs. Sibling privileges."

"Fine," Kurogane agrees. "I'll get what's left." They share small smiles at this, bonding over Fai's imminent demise, and then Kurogane recalls the reason for Yuui interrupting him. "What did you want help finding?"

"Oh, right," Yuui says, and his eyes slide away ruefully. "I couldn't find your sage."

"Yeah. Right. I buy it fresh, it's the small plant on the windowsill," Kurogane says, and hesitates. "You need help finding anything else?"

"Your flour, maybe," Yuui says, and Kurogane grins at him briefly; a curve at the edges of his mouth, less a smile and more a slash of a smirk.

"Let me show you," he says, taking a step toward the door, and the blond hesitates. "What?"

"You don't need to bring the condoms into the kitchen," Yuui says amused, and when Kurogane glances down he realises he's still holding the tupperware in one hand.

"Right. Fine, I'll..."

"I'll see you in the kitchen," Yuui says, pushing away from the door frame, and Kurogane looks uncertainly down at the stupid box and then at the pedal bin in the corner.

Well, no point in throwing them away. He can probably use them with Fai, assuming Fai survives Yuui's wrath. Hesitantly he slides the box back onto his bathroom counter, and then slinks out of the bathroom and after Yuui.

He's always been pragmatic.

Yuui cooks them an Icelandic recipe that he claims was the first 'real' meal he made by himself; it's spicy and warm on Kurogane's tongue, and when he uncorks the wine it does about as well as he'd thought. It's a heady, rich wine that is more potent than he'd assumed, and for a while they don't talk, busy eating and drinking.

"Sorry it wasn't as good as I'd hoped," Yuui says after the plates have been cleared and it's just them and the wine bottle. "Really I should have been able to marinade the chicken longer, but I was hungry. If you like I'll make you the dish again later properly."

"It was fine," Kurogane grunts, and Yuui gives him a look like he knows Kurogane's lying but doesn't want to call him on it.

"I wouldn't have pegged you for the type to grow your own herbs, though," he says, amused."Especially given your failure to make basic onigiri."

Kurogane flushes and takes another sip of wine to cover for it. "My mother grew herbs when I was a kid," he says. "She had a herb garden out back of the house, next to dad's dojo."

"Is she a good cook?" Yuui asks quietly, and Kurogane shrugs.

"She makes amazing fish," he says honestly. "I missed it when I moved out."

Yuui smiles at him sadly. "I'm glad," he says. "Not that you missed it, but that you have that from her. I don't remember much about my mother. Just the piano."

Kurogane peers at him cautiously. Yuui's face is pink but he doesn't look drunk; he's pulled off his hoodie and he's leaning back against Kurogane's couch with his ponytail spilling over his shoulder and his knees pulled up to his chest, his bare feet resting on a cushion. His gaze is distant, but there's no tension around his face.

"At least you have the other idiot," he points out, and Yuui huffs out a short life.

"That I do. A toast to my idiot?" He holds up the glass, and Kurogane leans forward over the table to knock his own against it with the dull thonk that's the sign of cheap wineglasses.

"To our idiot," he says. "Who we're going to murder when he gets back."

"To Fai," Yuui echoes, laughing, and tips his head back, draining his wine glass in one long fluid gulp. His throat works, Adam’s apple bobbing as he swallows, and Kurogane hurriedly copies him because it's either drain his glass or touch his lips to that Adam’s apple to feel it move, and...

For fuck's sake.

Yuui leans forward, picking the bottle up by the neck and giving it a cautious shake, then peers down the neck and pouts at the lack of wine inside. "We've been quite industrious, Kurogane," he complains.

"Help yourself to the rest," Kurogane says, and maybe he's drunk too much because his mouth keeps on running even after he's told it to stop: "You've already had three glasses and you haven't taken any clothes off yet."

The liquid in the bottle slooshes as Yuui lowers it abruptly, staring directly at him. His lips are parted and his eyes are very blue and for the love of fuck self restraint isn't working so well because Kurogane really wants to kiss him. Just to see what he'd do.

"Would you like me to?" Yuui asks, very slowly. There's something in the careful light of his gaze, the way his head is tilted. "It's a strong wine, but you haven't drunk enough that you can blame it on the booze, Kurogane."

Kurogane scowls. "It doesn't matter. No. I shouldn't have said that."

Yuui glances down at the bottle and then pours it out into his glass. His hand is quivering, barely noticeable but there. "Okay," he says. "Because... because we shouldn't."

"No."

"Because Fai wouldn't like it."

"No," Kurogane says. "Because..."

He pauses. He can't remember why they're not doing this.

Yuui is watching him with eyes as dark and unfathomable as the deep blue sea. "Fai told me that he wanted to share, did you know that?"

"Yeah," Kurogane says, and then when Yuui's eyebrow goes up, "Well, not what he told you. The idiot said something similar to me."

Yuui's tongue darts out to wet his lower lip, a tiny pink triangle. "So Fai doesn't mind," he says carefully. "And we both know that. And. And I said I wanted to get to know you, Kurogane, do you remember...? I want..."

Every muscle Kurogane has feels like it's wired tight, like there's no flexibility in him at all. If his old kendo coach could see him now he'd be getting a righteous kicking. "What do you want?" he asks, and if his voice is hoarse it's not surprising. Yuui raises his wine glass to his lips, and his eyes flick to Kurogane's as he raises it to drink, and his eyes are as blue as Fai's and yet different in every way that matters.

"I want to touch you," he says, barely audible, and puts the glass down on the table with the delicate click. "I want to touch you, Kurogane."

Well. Kurogane's down with that. More than down with that, actually, and his mouth goes dry. "Okay," he says in that hoarse voice, and Yuui gives a small bark of laughter. "What?"

"Is that it?" Yuui demands. He pushes himself up onto his knees and folds his arms over his chest. "Is that all you have to say? Two twins at once -"

"Not at once," Kurogane corrects quickly. Fuck, Fai is enough by himself.

"- Two twins at different times and all you can say is mmmmph!"

Kurogane grins. It seemed the prudent thing to do to interrupt Yuui by seizing his wrist and using it to tug the blond toward him, and now Yuui is sprawled across his lap and is just the right angle for kissing, and so Kurogane submits to his baser instincts, slides one hand around the side of Yuui's throat - thumb splayed across his jaw, fingers buried in that (soft, fine) hair - and indulges himself at last.

It's good. Maybe it's anticipation speaking, but the shy, delicate brush of their mouths is so achingly, so stupidly good that the kiss is ruined because both of them are smiling too hard to actually make with the lip locking, which goes to figure. Yuui's lips are warm and hard, thin against his; it's nothing like kissing a girl and it's nothing like kissing Fai and fuck, Kurogane likes that.

He stoops, craning his neck at an awkward angle and tipping Yuui's chin up a few degrees to make another go of it, and this time it sucks less; Yuui's mouth opens for him and he sweeps his tongue in softly, feeling the rasp of Yuui's teeth against its underside and chasing the faint thread of wine amidst warm salt and spice and iron. Yuui's hands settle on his shoulders, palms solid and heavy against him and fingers splayed, and Kurogane can feel himself hardening under his jeans from this kiss and this man and this warmth on his lap.

They part and it's Yuui who dives back for more; Kurogane sets his hands to the blond's hips and tilts his head up as Yuui kisses the corner of his mouth, tongue flicking out fever-fast to sweep up some stray sauce from dinner and Kurogane growls low in his throat. Yuui's hands on his shoulders are firm but forceful, pushing him back, and eventually with Yuui's weight on his chest and hips he has no choice but to comply, sinking onto his back on the rug as Yuui sucks soft teasing kisses along the line of his jaw, the underside of his chin.

"Wanted - to do this - for a long time," Yuui murmurs, his breath a wash of warm air behind Kurogane's ear that makes him shiver and his cock twitch in his pants; his nipples are standing at attention and Yuui releases his tight-fingered grip on Kurogane's shoulder to rub circles around one of them through Kurogane's shirt. Kurogane growls and it comes out low and shaky.

"Naked," Kurogane orders. He runs his hands along Yuui's spine, following its bumps along his palms; the t-shirt fabric is soft but he's sure Yuui's skin would be softer. "Oi. Naked, we're not doing this clothed, I - hnngh."

Yuui gives him a sly look from behind his bangs, and flicks Kurogane's nipple with his thumbnail again in an attempt to solicit the same response; Kurogane hisses under his breath and sweeps his hands up the blond's body to the back of his hand, sliding his fingers in silky-soft hair and tugging, pulling Yuui down for another hot, hungry kiss.

The blond's mouth is moving softly against his own despite the presence of tongue and he's so hot, burning against Kurogane's body, his thighs warm against Kurogane's own and his erection pressing down into Kurogane's hip. He's a hard heavy weight atop Kurogane's ribcage, hot and sweaty and pleasantly male, his musk heavy on the air, and he's not Fai. This isn't how things go with Fai. This is something else entirely, different and slower and just as goddamn good.

Yuui's t-shirt goes first; Kurogane grips its hem firmly and pushes, up, and reluctantly Yuui breaks the contact of their mouths and straightens, covering Kurogane's hands with his and helping him get the stupid thing off. His hair-tie vanishes with it, and his hair spills soft and shaggy around his face as he tosses the shirt negligently into some corner of Kurogane's living room where he will no doubt be unable to find it the following morning.

His hungry expression says he doesn't care about that, but Kurogane's eyes are on the winding edges of the tattoo, the delicate branding lines snaking over flat hips and wide shoulders. Naked it's hard to remember why he ever thought of Yuui as soft; his muscles are as sleek as Kurogane's, and he snakes a hand along the flat expanse of Yuui's stomach and around his narrow tight hips to the small of his back, following the path of the tattoo and watching the way Yuui rocks his hips thoughtlessly as he does.

"Kurogane," he says in a low, tight voice.

"Yeah," Kurogane says. He lets his hand dip down, splaying his fingers across the taut curve of Yuui's buttock. "Yeah, I'm here."

"You're wearing too many clothes," Yuui whispers, squeezing Kurogane's hips between his thighs, and Kurogane hisses. Yuui has to be able to feel his length pressing urgently against the material of his trousers, but he doesn't seem to object; if anything his smile widens. He shifts his balance curiously, testing, and Kurogane grunts as their matching erections rub against each other, separated only by suddenly flimsy fabric. His fingers tighten convulsively on the smooth roundness of Yuui's rear, and something flickers through Yuui's eyes.

Finally Kurogane has had enough of being the passive partner and tightens his core muscles, flipping them over; they wind up on their sides, Kurogane with his back to the bottom of the couch and his arms full of shirtless Yuui, who wastes no time hungrily diving his head down a few precious inches to yank the collar of Kurogane's t-shirt down and tongue his way across his collarbones.

He's too hot abruptly and so he pushes Yuui away gently but firmly, ignoring Yuui's small noise of protest (although it's hard; just not as hard as he is) and twisting upright to wrestle with the dratted t-shirt; he gets it off and then Yuui is suddenly pressed against his torso, his skin soft and smooth under Kurogane's arms as he licks at the hollow of Kurogane's throat with a surprisingly rough tongue and then slides down. There's a wicked light in his blue eyes and he keeps glancing up to watch Kurogane's face, and when he reaches Kurogane's nipple he swipes the pad of his tongue over it and smiles.

"Down," Kurogane says, and Yuui crooks an eyebrow. He flushes. "I mean... I mean, I ache, I..."

With a growl he cuts himself off and tosses an arm around Yuui's ribs, pulling him down to lie on the ground again before his twisted torso starts protesting too loudly at the angle, and Yuui darts forward and plants a mischievous kiss on the very edge of his jaw, right where it segues into his ear.

"You taste good, Kurogane," he whispers, and his eyelashes are lowered and he looks playful, and Kurogane grins back at him, a feral wolf-smile that has sharp edges.

"Heh. Do you want to -?" He ducks his head, unable to finish, to say what he wants to say: do you want to take this to my bedroom? Do you want to do this seriously, to turn this into more than it is right now?

Yuui pauses, eyes roaming over his face, and then he lets a smile creep over him like the sun rising and leans forward to close those last few inches between them, gently touching their lips together in a soft kiss and then parting again with a wet pop.

"Not just yet," he says, reaching out and sliding his hand over Kurogane's; his fingers are rougher than Fai's, from a lifetime spent around hot surfaces. He glides his palm down over the back of Kurogane's hand until he can lace their fingers together, and Kurogane cuts his gaze sideward and grins at the sight; the mesh of colours, his darker skin mixed with Yuui's alien whiteness. Yuui's eyes are suddenly calm on his face, the desperate fires that ignited within him not extinguished, merely banked.

"Are you sure?"

"Kurogane. I just want you," Yuui says. "I don't really care what we do." His whole face is open in a way Fai's never is, quite. "I just want to... I don't know."

"Want to what?" Kurogane asks, intrigued, and Yuui flushes.

"I want to be with you," he says, avoiding eye contact suddenly. "We don't have to hurry."

Kurogane reaches up and tucks an errant strand of Yuui's hair behind his ear, and then lets his hand slow down; down, over Yuui's cheek and jaw and throat, up along his shoulder and along the line of his arm, from his elbow to this ribs and down over his waist and the flat bony jut of his hips, over his flanks and then along and around until he curls his hand around the back of Yuui's thigh, fingers pressing in to the muscle there.

Yuui watches him do it with absolute trust on his face, still for Kurogane in a way Fai would never be, and it's a simple thing to pull, tugging Yuui into him and bringing their still-clothed cocks rubbing up against each other. Yuui's mouth falls open, the edges quirking up in a smile, and Kurogane slides his other hand up across the backs of Yuui's shoulders, fingers gliding over marked and different skin.

"Come on," Yuui whispers, his breath hitching. "Kurogane -"

"I'm here," Kurogane growls, and he rocks sharply sideward into Yuui, pulling him closer, holding him tighter. "I'm here."

"Kurogane - uh, Kurogane - yes - yes - Ah!" Yuui's head is tipped back and his chest is heaving against Kurogane's and so he does the logical thing, which is bend just so and drag his tongue along the fluttering column of Yuui's throat, tasting sweat and salt and the tangy, heavy musk of Yuui himself, and he tugs Yuui tighter against him and presses into him hard, feeling the burning heat of Yuui's erection rubbing against him, and it's good, it's good -

And it's friction and heat and the clinging tightness of fabric against his cock, Yuui warm against his chest and his mouth wide open as he silently sucks in air; Kurogane grits his teeth and digs his hands in tighter, pushing and pushing until Yuui rolls over onto his back and Kurogane can dip his hips down and in like he wants, and Yuui is chanting something in a hoarse, awed voice but it isn't Japanese and so Kurogane pays it no mind until quite suddenly it is -

"... Kuro-sama - Kuro-sama, Kuro-sama~!"

- peaking and shuddering and then Yuui stiffens underneath him and lets out an obscene gasp, his hips bucking and his spine bending, and Kurogane growls and bears down into him, nose and lips mashed into the long line of Yuui's throat as he thrusts - once, twice, thrice! - into resistance and then the heat in his belly is too much, it's overflowing, pouring through the rest of his body; and he he doesn't even know what he yells when he comes but it's probably not anything complicated because he doesn't have the brainpower.

In fact it takes him a little while to remember that he should move, collapsed on top of Yuui while Yuui sucks in soft, keening breaths, but when it does he rolls away quickly as his sleepy, happy body will let him. He's no teenager anymore and he's naturally inclined to zonk out after sex, but he's smart enough to know that that's the wrong thing to do in this case.

Yuui looks thoroughly debauched, which satisfies Kurogane somewhat. He could never have satisfied Fai with just some petting and fully clothed grinding, but Yuui has a wide sloppy stupid grin on his face, his eyes almost completely closed; he turns his head when Kurogane moves away and pouts.

"I'm not going anywhere," Kurogane says, only it comes a bit more slurred than he's proud of. Fuck's sake, he's twenty-eight. He's done this before.

He's aware he has a grin on his face equally as stupid as Yuui's.

Yuui's eyes open fully to squint at him, and then he smiles this slow smile that's so rich in affection it makes Kurogane's heart vibrate in his chest. "Hi," he says, and Kurogane heaves out a deep sigh and settles down next to him, resting one hand on Yuui's sweaty, slick abdomen.

"Hi," he replies, and watches the way Yuui grins at him. "You called me 'Kuro-sama,'" he says. It seems like something that will be important when he can think. Yuui closes his eyes and nods and lets his head fall to one side, so that his nose bumps against Kurogane's hairline.

"Seemed the thing to do at the time," he says drowsily.

Kurogane pokes at his ribs curiously. "Are you going to pass out?"

"I might."

He crooks an eyebrow. "Already?"

"What do you mean, 'already'?" That has Yuui's attention, and Kurogane digs his toes into the rug and surges up an inch or so to kiss the edge of Yuui's mouth; Yuui's eyes are both open now and watching him steadily. "Kurogane?"

"Your brother left us condoms," Kurogane says, walking his hand carefully over Yuui's ribs and around to his back, cradling the sharp heaviness of a shoulder blade in his palm. Yuui is still watching him, perfectly trusting, and it is hard to keep the smugness from his voice. "He left us condoms, and I have lube."

"..."

He tilts his head and raises an eyebrow at Yuui, querying.

"I have the best twin ever," Yuui says in a voice tinged with something like awe, and then they're kissing again, Yuui's long calloused fingers splayed across his jaw, and despite his post-coital lassitude Kurogane feels something like anticipation weaving through his belly, dipping lower.

"Tch. We need to get out of these pants," he says.

Yuui smiles and he's so beautiful and so different from his twin it takes Kurogane's breath away all over again. They're not the same person, and he doesn't regret now striking that deal, because he could never give up Fai - who has wormed his way into his heart somehow for all his teasing and deliberate stupidity; Fai who he worries over and because of - and the way he feels for Yuui is different but no more and no less valuable because of it. Fai is adventure and worry and excitement; Yuui is blushing like a fucking teenage girl and handholding and reading newspapers in bed.

Separate, but equal.

"Why, Kurogane," Yuui purrs. "I was hoping you'd say that."

Later:

Two bodies move together across the sheets. Moonlight splashes over them through the blinds and picks out details in silver; black ink of tattoo, bristly short hair. Pale skin, red eyes. Fingers tangled.

Mouths meet and part; skin slides over skin. Kurogane moans, although he'll deny it if asked. One of them whispers, "Want you inside me," and the other whispers agreement; there is lubricant in drawer of the nightstand, he says, and the other reaches over him to rummage for it. He pauses.

"What?"

"Is this a fleshlight?"

Heat rises in the first's cheeks. "Gift from your brother. I don't use it."

"Why didn't you throw it away?"

"Are you kidding? Have you seen the staff at this place? What if I threw that away and some crazy pervert - by which I mean Seishirou - found it in the garbage, huh?"

"... Good point," says the other, and the strange little toy goes back into the drawer to be forgotten about all over again. One bends to the other; mouths meet and the cap is popped on a little tube labelled asstroglide.

They are one.

The ceiling fan whirs lazily, doing little to lessen the closed-in, musty air of his bedroom. Kurogane stares up at it through half-lowered eyelids, his body loose and sated, and for half a second he contemplates whether or not to get up, out of his rumpled heap of sweat-soaked sheets, and turn the air conditioning unit on. It seems like it would require a lot of effort.

"Mmm," purrs the blond bundled into the sheets next to him. "Kurogane, are you alright? You've got this look on your face..."

"Tch," Kurogane says, but just succeeds in making the man laugh.

For a while they lie there atop the covers of Kurogane's bed, dozing; Kurogane's not too proud to admit his body basically shuts down for a while after orgasm, and he's had more than one of those in the last twelve hours. When the chef starts moving, wriggling sideways out of bed and jolting the mattress, Kurogane rouses enough to growl at him.

"No school tomorrow," he says. "You don't have to go anywhere."

The bed stops quivering as Yuui stills, and then Kurogane registers a shadow passing over him; he opens his eyes to see Yuui leaning over him, his hair falling loose around his face.

"If I don't go turn on the air conditioning, you'll smother me to death," he says, and smiles. "You put out enough heat to qualify as a blast furnace. I'll be right back."

"Hnn," Kurogane says. He closes one eye and stretches his limbs out across the bed, along the covers. "Sure about that?"

"Um. Reasonably?" Yuui says.

"'cause I have a bathtub," Kurogane adds lazily, satisfaction thick in his voice. "And we're gross."

Yuui pauses with his hand on the air conditioning dial, and then turns to him with a grin on his face and light in his eyes. He's unashamedly naked, his hair spilling down over tattooed shoulder and spine, and Kurogane lets himself look because he can.

"Yes," he says. "We are." He pads back over to the bed and leans forward, kissing Kurogane slow and sweet, and then sits down. "Fai is going to be so smug."

"Tch," Kurogane says. "We'll see."

"I'm hooo~me!" Fai announces, as though they could miss the door bouncing loudly off the wall. Kurogane grunts, not looking up from his manga; he's sitting on the couch while Yuui is curled on the floor with his legs under the kotatsu, flipping through TV channels. "Did you miss me?"

"No," Kurogane says, turning a page. "You're annoying and - what the fuck are you wearing."

Fai beams at him cheerfully, and Yuui glances up and blanches. Fai appears to have bought every tacky touristy piece of clothing he could find; he's wearing at least twelve union jacks and a t-shirt that contains a picture of Big Ben, already peeling. "I bought some for Yuui too," he says happily. "They didn't sell any in Kuro-giant's size."

"I'll pass," Yuui says, his lip curling slightly in horror. "Fai, you're wearing a baseball cap with the Manchester United logo on it. A baseball cap sporting the logo of the football team. Where did you even find this stuff?"

"Oh, somewhere," Fai says absently. "Some nice people under a bridge - it doesn't really matter." He turns, dragging his suitcase all the way into the apartment, and slams the door behind him. "I bought fridge magnets and posters and best of all -"

"Chocolate?" Yuui guesses wearily, and Fai beams at him.

Kurogane rolls his eyes and shifts on the couch so he doesn't have to look at Fai's walking Tribute to a Clueless Tourist, flipping one of the pages on his manga, and Fai drops the handle of his suitcase and wanders further into the room. "So," he says, excited. "What happened?"

"Hmm?" Yuui says, turning his attention back to the TV set, and Fai pouts and goes down to his knees next to him. "What do you mean?"

"You know," Fai says. "The two of you, back here?"

"Nothing," Kurogane says without looking up.

"You locked me out of my apartment," Yuui says, glaring. "Kurogane was kind enough to put me up overnight until the locksmith arrived."

"I'm sure he did," Fai replies, waggling his eyebrows; Yuui stares at him haughtily and then goes back to the TV. "Yuui~!"

Yuui ignores him.

"Yu~ui. I want to know! Give me details!"

"Nothing happened, dumbass," Kurogane says.

The smile gradually falls of Fai's face. "Are you two... serious? You aren't, are you?"

No response.

"Yuui! Kuro-slow, what - I left very specific instructions!" Angrily Fai stalked into the kitchen and Kurogane and Yuui exchanged a glance as they heard him banging around in the cupboards. "You drank the wine!"

"Well, yes," Yuui hollers after him. "It almost made up for being locked out of my apartment!"

Fai stomps back out and stands in the kitchen doorway, his shorter hair seeming to float around his face as he bristles with indignation; his gaze cuts back and forward between Kurogane and Yuui. "You're both useless," he announces.

"Says the man wearing a shirt with a picture of Tower Bridge on the back mislabelled as 'London Bridge,'" Yuui says, quirking an eyebrow. "How did you get your PhD again?"

Fai huffs. "That doesn't matter," he says. "What matters is the two of you. You're not leaving here until you get on with it."

"This is my apartment and I do keep kendo swords in it, dumbass," Kurogane remarks from the couch.

"You were supposed to get this out of the way so you'd be less..." Fai gestures vaguely, either imitating Watanuki's flailing or drawing a giraffe with three legs in the air. "Now I'll have to put up with the pair of you moaning all over again. This is unacceptable."

Kurogane slams the manga down and turns to fix the older of the twins with a piercing glare, and the gesture is so abrupt Fai actually takes a step back. "No. You want to know what's unacceptable, idiot?"

"Kurogane -"

"It's you treating us like toys, fucking around with us because you're bored."

"I never -"

"You never what?"

"I was trying to help you," Fai says through gritted teeth, and Kurogane snorts.

"Don't," he says succinctly.

Fai gazes at him thoughtfully for several heartbeats and then sighs. "Fine," he says. "I'm sorry."

"No you're not. You're just saying that, but the fact that you know you should means something. Idiot."

"Fai..." Yuui says quietly, and Fai huffs out a breath and sticks his hands in his pocket and refuses to look Yuui in the eye.

"I brought you both back some things," he says, making his way over to the suitcase, and both Kurogane and Yuui warily glance over at it.

"Not clothes?" Yuui asks.

Fai grins at him over his shoulder. "No. Look, cooking chocolate for Yuui... and look!" He triumphantly pulls a large bear out of the suitcase; it's wearing a red coat and a large bearskin hat. Yuui stares at it in mild horror. "This is for Kuro-cuddle!"

"The hell it is," Kurogane says in revulsion.

"His name's Ringo," Fai continues. "I'll just leave him in your room, shall I? ... Along with these British flag-emblazoned condoms."

"What? No!" Kurogane snaps, ditching the manga and scrambling off the couch, but although he lunges for Fai the idiot is like greased lightning and zips past him, tacky teddy bear under one arm and box of condoms (with, Yuui is faintly concerned to note, a snarling bulldog face on the packaging) in his hand.

"Kuro-tan is that desperate to hug Ringo-bear?" Fai calls, laughter in his voice. "If I'd known I would have brought him a cuddly bear sooner~"

"I don't give a damn about the bear, what the hell is -"

"I'll just put them in Kuro-wan's night table! For us!"

"... Wait, no!"

"Oh?" The scrape of the night stand drawer sliding out, and Yuui freezes as he recognises the sudden sly note to Fai's tone. "I'm sure I left Kuro-sama with a full tube of lubricant..."

The bedroom door clicks open again and Kurogane emerges with a thunderous scowl on his face. Fai follows on his heels, looking like the cat who got all the cream in the world. "Kuro and Yuui, sitting in a tree~"

Kurogane grabs one of his swords from his wall and turns around slowly, and from the way Fai's eyebrows climb Yuui is fairly sure his expression must be a wonder to behold. "I'm going to murderize you," he says icily.

Really, Yuui thinks; he'd expected Fai would be home for more than fifteen minutes before the chasing and the death threats begin again.

-fin

Notes:

- Thermite: Iron Oxide and Aluminium ('aluminum' to you across the pond). When ignited burns at 2,400 degrees Celcius (water boils at 100).
- Onigiri: Rice balls. Kurogane's failure to make his own is utterly remarkable. In the West, it'd be like not being able to butter bread.
- Cummerbund: Sash worn around the waist in male formal dress.
- Manchester United: Football ('soccer') team.
- Fleshlight: Sex toy; resembles a torch (flashlight) but when you take the cap off it's lined with jelly and has... orifices.
- PhD: Yes, he really does have one. Fai's special.
The comments section: for any other questions.