#everyone wants to indulge in karamatsu apparently

[pekodayz]

fastest art trade on earth actually @matsukitty can u look again ? like NOW???????????????

#everyone wants to indulge in karamatsu apparently #Tch. #bofa #can u say bofa #ososan oc #other's ocs❣

[cookinguptales]

please mind the author’s note.

Before you read any of this, please know that it’s really just a vent fic. I didn’t put a lot of effort into making the pacing, plot, or even the characterization that strong. I have a lot of stuff going on in my life and Osomatsu-san was annoying me on several levels. So I guess I just tried to work some stuff out and ended up with sixteen thousand words of...whatever the hell this is. I went back and forth on even putting it in the tag, but I figure if y’all are well warned, you can make your own decisions.

Anyway, here’s a largely unedited fic about Chibita learning the joys of promiscuity and Karamatsu trying to adapt himself to the situation. It is...filthy. So uh. Go in warned.

It started, like most of Karamatsu's bad ideas did, with unexpected knowledge and an unwise amount of alcohol.

"We virgins have to stick together," Osomatsu was saying, swaying slightly in his seat in front of Chibita's cart. "It's so--solimarity."

"Eh?" Chibita asked. He stopped wiping down the counter in front of him. "Don't lump me in with you losers, idjit. I never said I was a virgin."

They all stopped for a second, squinting at Chibita in a wholly unattractive way. Karamatsu was experiencing the deeply unpleasant sensation of being frozen in freefall, all his muscles tensing up, his veins flowing quick with ice water, but the world just kept moving all around him. Dizzying. Wrong.

"But you don't have a girlfriend," Choromatsu said slowly.

Chibita shrugged, a little bit self-conscious. "Who needs a girlfriend to have sex? Idjit."

They blinked, slow and confused and the slightest bit betrayed. 

"Oh no! I get it," Todomatsu said, sighing dramatically. "That's so sad, Chibita. You'll find someone someday! You don't need to pay hookers!"

"What the hell? You fucking idiot!" Chibita growled. "I'm not-- I'm not doing that! I'm just..." His face was bright red now, and he seemed to be groping around for the right words. "I'm just having some fun."

Karamatsu was still falling, falling, the ground nowhere in sight and yet half an inch from his toes. His mind was full of it, of Chibita having some fun, and his stomach clenched. He felt sick with it, with Chibita kissing girls and touching girls and smiling at them as he let them into his apartment. Their old apartment. Fuck.

"Isn't that kind of bad, though?" Choromatsu asked. "Maybe you shouldn't hang out with girls like that, Chibita."

Ichimatsu scoffed. "Like you'd say no if 'a girl like that' asked you, Fappymatsu..." he muttered, and Jyushimatsu snickered beside him.

"Yeah, Fappymatsu. What decade are you in, anyway?" Osomatsu asked, nudging him a little too hard, a little too drunkenly, to be quite companionable.

"I'm just saying," Choromatsu started to protest, but then Chibita cut him off.

"I didn't say they were girls, idjit." He was standing ramrod straight now, his back tense and his shoulders set back. He looked ready to fight. Ready to run. Ready to take a goddamn beating.

A moment. Then, "What the fuck?" Osomatsu sputtered amongst five loud voices.

Meanwhile, Karamatsu, mouth hanging open and tongue stilled into silence, had hit the fucking ground.

It wasn't like Karamatsu had never thought about it before. Their time living under the same roof had been brief but utterly unforgettable. He'd caught glimpses of strong, thick shoulders as Chibita undressed, and he'd looked away before he could be caught staring. Once you got past the babyface and the oden obsession, Chibita was a pretty good-looking guy. He was strong all over, strong arms, strong hips, strong heart. He could see why men would want him.

Hell, it wasn't as if Karamatsu could point any fingers in that particular arena.

But somehow, Karamatsu had believed that he was the only one who could see all that. He'd thought that all that potential, all that maddening, seductive possibility, was hidden under too much weirdness. The height and the oden and the, ah, ebullient personality. He thought he'd been the only one to get close enough to Chibita to peel all that back and see the radiance beneath.

He was wrong. Clearly. And once he knew he was wrong, he could see the evidence everywhere he looked. Dark marks not quite hidden by Chibita's collar. Men sitting there at the cart, giving Chibita knowing looks that spoke to a shared history Karamatsu would never be part of. The whispers around town that Chibita was more than he appeared. Far more.

It was new. He knew that much. He remembered sitting there with Chibita in that tiny apartment of theirs, and he remembered Chibita confessing to him that he was scared he'd always be alone. That he didn't have enough space in his heart for anything but oden, that his strange looks would turn strangers off, that he was too rough, too straightforward, for a nice girl to give him a chance.

Well. Sometime between then and now, Chibita had clearly found his niche. Karamatsu started listening to the gossip that he'd never been privy to beforehand, the murmurs in seedier parts of town, the parts he'd always walked past quickly just because he could feel himself wanting to slow. It was recent, he'd learned. It'd happened while all of them were busy getting their fucking egos stroked in a fucking bizarro world that didn't quite feel real anymore.

Chibita had been left all alone for a long time, and he'd filled the void with other men's cocks. And goddamn it, he seemed happier than Karamatsu had ever seen him before. He wasn't some fallen woman, like the dramas or the light novels loved to talk about. He wasn't sad or mad or lonely. He wasn't some drug addict drifting between bad choices. He just looked happy. He had a confidence to his posture that he hadn't quite before all this, and a buoyancy, a fluidity to his movements that Karamatsu couldn't believe he'd never noticed.

Chibita was happy. He was far happier than Karamatsu had ever made him. Chibita was happy and he was well-fucked. It seemed like half the gay men in town had indulged in a one-night stand with him. Karamatsu even heard rumors that Hatabou of all people had gotten a taste of that ass, and he couldn't pretend that knowing that didn't make his stomach go cold and hot and resentful every time the two of them ran into each other.

But well-fucked didn't mean well-loved. As much as Karamatsu listened, he didn't hear a single story about Chibita actually dating one of his conquests. It wasn't like no one had ever tried; Chibita had apparently gotten quite the reputation in some circles by now. He was a heartbreaker. Great for one night of fun, but don't bother calling him in the morning. A lot of people had learned that the hard way.

Just like Chibita had told them, he was just "having some fun". And try as he might, Karamatsu couldn't quite reconcile that with the man he'd lived with not that long ago. Chibita had seemed stunningly frail then. Like all those big words and that strong spine were just covering up a heart that had been hurt again and again and again, but despite it all still managed to keep beating. Karamatsu had fallen in love with that heart, maybe.

But maybe Chibita had felt tired of feeling like that. Maybe he was tired of everyone in his life, Karamatsu included, leaving him behind. Maybe he was tired of being in a position to have his heart broken. He'd covered the cracks with oden and boisterousness, but now... Now perhaps he'd learned how to keep people at just the right arm's length. If he had a different man in his bed half the time, he'd never long for any of them. He wouldn't be lonely, but there was no risk of getting attached.

It was smart, in a way, but it made Karamatsu's heart ache. Hell. Maybe he was just overthinking it, anyway. Maybe Chibita had just finally realized how fucking beautiful he was and was now taking advantage of all the attention he could have had at any time. Who turned down sex, anyway?

Still. Still. Karamatsu couldn't help but connect the dots. The timelines. Couldn't help but notice that it had been when they'd gone away that Chibita had replaced them with someone, everyone else. It had been when he'd gone away. And what... Fuck it all, what would have happened if he'd stayed? What if Karamatsu hadn't let his head get turned by stupid baseball games or dumb aliens or fans that were here and gone in a flash? What if he'd let himself grow just like Chibita had always believed he could? What if he'd given up all those flights of fancy to be the constancy that Chibita seemed to crave?

He was being an idiot, maybe. Just as stupid as Chibita always said he was, fond and desperate and angry in turn. Maybe Chibita didn't feel anything towards him at all and letting him stay with him in the first place was just pity. Maybe Chibita had just been exercising his newfound sense of freedom when he'd started bringing guys back to his newly-vacated apartment.

But Karamatsu wasn't like Chibita. He didn't want a hundred guys to call his name. He just wanted one. He didn't care if it was a girl or a guy, really. He just wanted to find someone to love, who'd love him right back. Someone kind and caring, who didn't care that he was painful. Someone who'd want to spend the rest of their lives with him. And if he were really being honest with himself, that someone was Chibita. It'd been Chibita for a long, long time. Maybe even before he'd stayed with him.

He only had his own foolish self to blame. He hadn't seen it. He hadn't seen any of it. He'd known that Chibita was important to him. That Chibita had been like a lifeboat in the middle of the goddamn ocean, finally a person he could depend on. He'd known that spending time with Chibita made his heart quail and soar by the day, and he knew that leaving him had hurt in a bone-deep way he'd never fully been able to explain. He'd known in a faraway unknowable part of his mind that he was attracted to Chibita. Deeply.

But it wasn't until the word had been said out loud that everything finally came crashing into clarity. Bisexual. Chibita was bisexual, and so was he. And Karamatsu had figured it out too goddamn late.

Or maybe he hadn't.

"Jeez, why d'you keep asking so many questions about Chibita, kid?" a guy asked him one night. The man was tall and dark and handsome, ash glowing in the darkness as he smoked. He was exactly the kind of guy Karamatsu wanted to be, and Chibita had already fucked him. Once. "Do you want a go at him or something?"

Karamatsu had been tongue-tied and stumbling, stammering out some noncommittal answer that felt false on his lips. But the man's answer had stuck with him.

"It's not a big deal. Just stop by his cart some night. He's a good kid, but he's not that picky."

Chibita had a lot of reputations, it seemed.

The problem was, it <i>was</i> a big deal. Karamatsu didn't just want some one-night stand with Chibita. He knew he'd never be satisfied with just one-and-done. It would be worse than never getting to touch him in the first place. Fucking him and knowing that Chibita just thought of him like some toy to keep him busy on a cold night... Just the thought of it made bile rise up hot in his throat.

But Chibita didn't want a boyfriend, it seemed. Not one man had managed to satisfy his sexual wanderlust in the past, and Karamatsu had no reason to think he'd be any different. Which hurt. Truthfully speaking, though, what did he have to offer that none of those other guys had? All he had was a patched and broken heart. All the pretty words in the world couldn't change that all those other men were bigger than him and stronger, more handsome and more talented. Every one of them was more experienced.

But maybe, some part of his stupid, stupid heart said. Maybe he could do it right. Maybe he could -- could do some research. Find out the best way to sweep a guy off his feet and reduce his brain to mush. Maybe he could train himself to be exactly what Chibita had never known he needed. Not... not with other men. Karamatsu didn't want to do -- that -- with anyone but Chibita. But somehow.

What was it Chibita had always told him? That all he needed was guts? Maybe that really could be enough. Maybe if Karamatsu just had the stomach for some hard, weird work and the heart to see it through, he could do it. He could seduce the consummate seducer and do it so well that Chibita never wanted anyone else.

It was a terrible idea, but Karamatsu had a lot of terrible ideas. And that was how he found himself with a brown paper bag full of all kinds of "research materials" and a heart aflame.

He'd do it. Bad idea or not. Impossibility or not. He'd fuck Chibita so damn good that he'd never look anywhere else again.

Three weeks later, he'd masturbated so much that he was almost fucking tired of it. Sexy research was harder than he'd expected -- no pun intended. 

It had started simple, almost gentle. A few well-placed google searches and he had the basic idea of what to expect. He read about lube and about prostate massage and the best way to work up to anal sex. Then, after imagining "Chibita" and "anal sex" in the same fucking sentence, he'd jacked himself off frantically. Twice. And then opened up "100 Tips For A Better Blow Job". And then he was right back to fucking his hand with a quiet desperation. He didn't know what was hotter, thinking about Chibita's mouth stretched tight around his cock, or the unknown mystery that would be Chibita heavy in his own.

Karamatsu pushed his fingers into his mouth as he fisted himself, wondering what it would feel like to suck Chibita off. After he'd come again, shaking now with the power of it, he'd hesitantly raised his other hand to his mouth. He wondered, gingerly sucking on his own messy fingers, if Chibita would taste the same way he did.

He'd gone more slowly after that. There was something about masturbating three times in two hours that taught a man caution. He started exploring the wonderful world of gay porn, and found himself attracted and repulsed in almost equal measure. It was hot. Holy fuck, it was hot. He found his eyes glued to the fucking screen, his hand going to palm his dick almost without thought, as he watched. They were so beautiful. So strong. So fucking hot.

But it was weird, too. False in a way he hadn't quite encountered with straight porn. Maybe it was because he had a more concrete fantasy in his mind as he watched, and he couldn't help but think that he didn't -- he didn't want to fuck Chibita like that. He wanted to hear Chibita moan like that, wanted to hear him scream, but he couldn't bear to think of fucking him like the men in these videos. Like he was anyone. Like he was meat.

He wanted to kiss Chibita, wanted to hold him tight for hours. He wanted to trail his lips down his neck, down his chest, wanted to trace patterns over his ribs as he learned their tempo better than his own. He wanted to make Chibita feel as beautiful as he was, wanted Chibita to feel how much he longed for him. How much he loved him. He wanted to be close, close, he wanted to be so close that Chibita wouldn't be able to tell where he stopped and Karamatsu began. He wanted to make Chibita feel good, make him feel great, wanted to blow his fucking mind. But he wanted to be there when he came down, too. Wanted to hold him as he shook. Wanted Chibita to know he'd be there every fucking day of the rest of their lives if Chibita would have him.

Karamatsu whimpered even as he came in his own hand, eyes fixed to the screen, and cursed himself for a fool. Why the hell couldn't he have realized he was this obsessed back when he actually had a chance? Why couldn't he be like all the other men Chibita wanted, men like the guys in these videos. Ones who just wanted a little fun. Maybe then coming down off the high of an orgasm attained wouldn't sting so much.

It just wasn't as fun anymore now that he knew he wanted something more. And hell, what kind of shitty world was he living in if jacking off wasn't fun anymore? Ugh. He was such an idiot.

He lay there at night now, feeling far away from his brothers. It was like a secret part of him had come awake and now he was someone new. Someone none of them knew. He was someone who finally knew what he wanted, and someone who knew there was a very strong possibility he would never get it. He finally had a goal, a real, concrete goal, and it felt utterly foreign to him. He wanted to be better. He wanted to be dependable and attractive and perfectly capable of taking care of a lover. He wanted to be what Chibita wanted. What he needed. He wanted to be the guy who Chibita came home to. And he'd do it right this time.

And hey, he thought to himself as he carefully worked himself down on a dildo he'd attached to their floor, maybe if this whole Chibita thing didn't work out, maybe he'd have a future making some of those dirty videos himself. He was certainly starting to like some of the solo ones he'd found. Beautiful men fucking themselves with toys, touching themselves with all the tenderness of a lover, moaning their bliss to a camera that absorbed every bit of it.

This part, this part was new. It was so fucking new. Even before, even when he was watching Chibita from the corners of his eyes and shuddering over the soft-hard lines of him, he'd never thought about doing this. But if he did manage to convince Chibita to give him a chance, he didn't know what Chibita would even want. Would he want to get fucked, slow and smooth and intimate? Or would he want to flip Karamatsu over on his futon and fuck him hard?

Karamatsu worked his hips as he slid down slow, tiny little movements that felt like the entire fucking world breathing around him, and he imagined Chibita's hands on his hips. Chibita's legs beneath his. Chibita's cock opening him up wide and vulnerable, making him feel things that he'd never even imagined.

Karamatsu's hips bucked as he brushed against a particularly sensitive spot, forcing the dildo up inside him to the fucking hilt, and Karamatsu imagined that, too. Chibita deep inside him, learning his body so well that he could hit that spot whenever he fucking felt like it, whenever he wanted to reduce his Karamatsu to a mewling fucking mess on the floor. He moaned low, as loud as he felt comfortable doing in a house that was never entirely empty. He could be as loud as he wanted in Chibita's apartment. If his walls weren't thick enough, then his neighbors had to be used to it by now. He could feel this, all this, with his face buried in Chibita's pillows or squashed against the tatami mats or even maybe breathing against Chibita's shoulder if he was lucky enough to fuck him face-to-face. He could feel Chibita inside him, deep as anything, and he could moan as loud as he goddamn wanted, could beg and yell and plead with Chibita to never, ever stop.

He fucked himself, imagining it. He bounced himself with increasing desperation, imagining Chibita above him, below him, inside him. Imagining Chibita panting in his ear as he lost control and fucked Karamatsu the way he'd -- the way he never had with anyone else, better somehow, newer. Because somehow Karamatsu would be better, would be new, and Chibita wouldn't be able to resist him. They'd fuck like this, just like this, and in a million other ways. It wouldn't be one night, it'd be a thousand, and Chibita would be addicted to him. Chibita would never stray again, would stop roaming the night searching for what only Karamatsu could give him, would just keep fucking him and getting fucked by him and touching him just like a lover and --

Karamatsu came hard, dick untouched, as he imagined Chibita coming inside him. Then he sat there for a few long minutes, panting heavily, feeling too full and too cold and all alone. He pulled himself off of the toy and flopped onto the floor of their room, telling himself that the stinging at the corners of his eyes was just sweat and not the ever-increasing certainty that his fantasies were just that: mad, improbable fantasies.

His breathing didn't slow, just hitched in his throat. He really was such a fucking idiot.

Guts. Guts. His guts felt like they were fucking curdling inside him, but he tried to hold on tight to the desperate, foolish optimism that had gotten him into this mess. It was worse, somehow, to train for an Olympic event that might never come. It hurt to take concrete steps towards an insane goal. It hadn't been nearly this bad when he was just quietly pining. But all this, the practice and the pleasure and the fucked-out exhaustion that had dogged him for weeks, all this made it feel real. Made it seem dangerous.

And three weeks, three weeks wasn't nearly long enough. It wasn't enough to make him agile or experienced or seductive. Karamatsu was still so overwhelmed by all these new things that his hands shook every time he took his "research materials" from their hiding place. He probably would have needed years to attain the sex god status he'd need to seduce Chibita into a real relationship.

Fortunately, or maybe unfortunately, the schedule was moved up a little bit.

He woke up one morning with a buzzing by his ear. His cell phone. He was drowsy until he wasn't, bleary-eyed until his eyes sharpened enough to see who had texted him.

Chibita.

'Can you come by the cart tonight?' it said, 'Want to talk to you.'

He stared at it, hoping his quickening breaths wouldn't wake his brothers, then buried his face in his pillow.

Later that day, after endlessly dithering over what super-cool-definitely-not-painful outfit to wear, Karamatsu found himself sallying up to Chibita's cart. There was another man there, but he looked about done, so Karamatsu just stood a little ways away and waited.

He watched the man critically as he finished his meal and paid. Was he one of Chibita's exes, or someone who was interested in becoming one? Or was he just some guy who felt like a plate of oden on the way home? He was certainly attractive enough, but his eyes weren't lingering on Chibita like Karamatsu's always had...

"Karamatsu," Chibita called even as the man walked off. "I can see you over there, idjit."

Karamatsu's fingers twitched ineffectually in his jacket pockets. He hadn't been trying to hide, exactly... But the idea of walking over now...

"Just come over already. I'll make you a plate."

Well, that was a good sign. At least Chibita wouldn't be feeding him if he were upset about something. Probably. Unless it was poisoned. Karamatsu crept towards the cart, feeling a sort of gnawing in his stomach as he did. The cart used to be a safe place for him, a place to relax and unwind. That was no longer the case.

Chibita was quiet for a few minutes as he assembled Karamatsu's food, his usual cheerful greeting missing. He looked thoughtful, maybe even a little conflicted. Then, "You've been weird lately, Karamatsu."

Karamatsu teeth clenched so hard that he almost bit his tongue, but he forced himself to open his mouth. "What do you mean?" he asked. Chibita couldn't know about the -- the practice. There was no way for him to know.

Chibita finished assembling the plate, but he didn't hand it over. He just held it in his hands like it was all that was keeping him together. "You've been asking about me."

Fuck. Karamatsu, who had been feeling pretty stupid for the past month or so, was now feeling extremely stupid. Why the hell hadn't he thought that anyone with a big enough mouth to talk to him wouldn't talk to Chibita, too? Why had he thought that his furtive inquiries -- not so much furtive as desperate, actually, upon reflection -- wouldn't get back to the source? "I..."

"You what?" Chibita snapped, and his knuckles went white around the plate he was holding. "Why are you fucking investigating who I'm having sex with?"

He sounded angry, but he also sounded -- fuck, he sounded scared. And something hovering at the edges of Karamatsu's thoughts finally sank in. How scary it had probably been to come out to the six of them. Karamatsu had never told Chibita that he thought that he was...that he was probably just like him. He hadn't told Chibita that he didn't care what kind of person Chibita wanted to have sex with, had just stumbled drunkenly away from the cart even as his brothers lost their damn minds. He'd been so wrapped up in his own thoughts. He'd been so wrapped up in his own pain. He hadn't even thought what that might look like to Chibita.

Karamatsu cleared his throat. "It's not... It's not like that..." he said, and hated how weak his voice sounded.

"Then what the hell is it? You were--" Chibita's voice caught in his throat, and Karamatsu could see now that he was shaking. "You were asking for names! You were fucking asking what I liked! Who the hell does that?"

It had been, Karamatsu realized with a bright flash of clarity, really fucking creepy. He'd been so caught up in his own illicit investigation that he hadn't even realized it. "I just..."

Chibita put the plate down on his own side of the cart, the ceramic a dull clatter against wood. Karamatsu could see him massage his temples. "You just what, Karamatsu? I'm allowed to have sex with whoever I want, and it's none of your fucking business," he said.

"Of course you can," Karamatsu said, the words dull and rote in his mouth. Chibita was a grown-ass man. It really wasn't any of his business, no matter how much he wished it were. "I just didn't know what to do."

For a moment, Chibita faltered. Then, "What the hell do you mean, idjit? You didn't have to do anything."

"I didn't know you anymore!" Karamatsu said, and then he shrank back from his own outburst. That had really been what it'd been, though, wasn't it? There were sides to Chibita, the Chibita that he'd fallen in love with, that were totally foreign to him. He'd just -- he'd just wanted to know him again. To feel like an intrinsic part of himself, the part that was Chibita, hadn't gone away forever. But then he'd learned the truth and he hadn't liked it.

"So this was... This was what, some kind of pervy research?" Chibita asked, and at least he didn't sound angry anymore. Stunned, maybe. But not angry.

"Yes," Karamatsu said. "No. I don't know. I just... I thought I knew you, but I didn't. I didn't know if you'd changed or if I was just wrong all along."

"Because what," Chibita asked, starting to sound a little bitter. "I wasn't normal like you thought I was?"

"No!" Karamatsu said. As old as he was, jobless and sexless and utterly alone, Karamatsu was the abnormal one. "I just thought you wanted something different. You always said you wanted a girlfriend--"

Chibita scoffed a little from across the counter.

"And even if you got a boyfriend," Karamatsu pressed on, "I thought you'd just... You'd want it to be love." He was quiet for a moment, voice thick in his throat. "You always said you wanted love."

Chibita stared at him, and Karamatsu could see a wound in there. There was something hurt inside Chibita, but Karamatsu could see that he was already covering it up as best he could. "I..." Chibita cleared his throat. "This has nothing to do with love. Idjit."

"Exactly," Karamatsu said, looking down at the counter. "That's... That's why I was so confused. I was surprised that you weren't... Straight... But it was all the, the one-night stands and the casual stuff that was weird. It was like I was seeing a whole new part of you and I wasn't sure if it was even new or not. Or if I... If I just didn't notice it."

Chibita didn't say anything for a long time. Then he picked up the plate of oden in front of him and handed it across the counter. It was cold now, Karamatsu was sure, but he took it all the same. "It was new," Chibita finally said, his voice too quiet. Karamatsu liked it so much better when he was excitable. "Everything in my life was changing, so I changed, too."

Karamatsu hesitated for a moment, then finally gave voice to the suspicion in the back of his mind. "Were you mad because we went away?" he asked.

Chibita shrugged, but it was a weak movement. "A little. Iyami went away, too. Everyone was gone and it was just me and -- I don't know, I thought I'd try something different. Nothing I'd done up to then had worked. None of the people I liked ever worked out. So I thought... I dunno, why not put love on the backburner and just have fun for a while? It was better than hurting all the time."

There was a dullness to his voice that Karamatu hated. And -- it had been stupid, hadn't it, to think that it was his leaving that caused all this? Stupid and arrogant. But he was a part of it, he was sure. They all had been. And this new Chibita, who wasn't any better or worse than the old one, this new Chibita was the product of their neglect.

Karamatsu looked at him, at this new Chibita who still wanted love but who maybe no longer hoped for it. Who'd found a new life for himself fucking his way through Tokyo and enjoying every minute of it. Who was finally letting himself let go a little bit and enjoy the freedom that Karamatsu had been treated to his entire life. Maybe Chibita deserved to play a little bit.

But, Karamatsu realized, the knowledge opening up to him like a late flower that had only just started to bloom, he did have something that none of Chibita's other partners had had. He loved him. Wholly and completely. And maybe Chibita didn't love him back. Maybe Chibita didn't love anyone anymore. But he could give Chibita at least one night that was different from the others. One night where instead of fucking, he could make love. Maybe that way, he could put a little bit of hope back into his eyes.

Karamatsu sat back on the bench and crossed his arms in front of him, a shield for the most terrifying battle he'd ever fought. Then he looked at Chibita over the tops of his sunglasses and said, "I think we should have sex."

Chibita honest-to-god flinched. "What? What the hell are you talking about, idjit?" he asked, and his voice wobbled.

"We should have sex," Karamatsu said again, this time a little more sure. "I promise I'll make it fun for you."

"The fuck? Did those assholes tell you I'd spread my legs for anyone or something?" Chibita asked. "I don't just fuck anyone who asks."

That wasn't what Karamatsu had heard, but who fucking cared what he'd heard? Tonight, all that mattered was him and Chibita. "I know," he said. "But just once? For old times' sake?"

Chibita was shaking again, and Karamatsu wasn't sure why. Was he still angry? It couldn't just be that he didn't fuck friends -- Karamatsu knew for a fact that wasn't true. "No! Why the hell would I want to have sex with some shitty NEET virgin, anyway? How would that be fun?" he asked.

"I practiced," Karamatsu said, the words out of his mouth before he could even think twice about them. "I promise. It'll be good. You can kick me out if it's not."

"You--" Chibita gaped at him. "What the hell do you mean, 'you practiced'?"

"I practiced," Karamatsu said, and pushed his sunglasses up on his nose to let his natural mysterious air help him out a little. "You'll see."

Chibita was just staring at him. His expression was utterly unreadable, but there was a crease between his eyebrows that looked unhappy. "Fine," he finally snapped. "If it'll get you off my back and you'll promise to stop asking around about me."

"Done," Karamatsu said, even as his stomach flopped around inside him.

Chibita sighed, sounding far more tired than he had any right to be so early in the day. "Come to my place around midnight," he said. "That'll give me time to finish the day and get everything put away."

"Okay," Karamatsu said, his voice a little hoarse in his dry throat. Holy shit. Holy fucking shit.

Chibita rubbed at his temple. "Now fuck off, okay? I'm gonna have real customers soon and I don't want you to scare them off."

Karamatsu just nodded, the implicit insult rolling right off his back.

Holy fucking shit. He was going to have sex with Chibita.

It felt weird, walking the familiar path to Chibita's apartment. He'd lived there too long, too short. Walking those same steps felt nostalgic in a way he had no right to. He could feel the night air tingling against recently-scrubbed skin, and he shivered. As soon as Chibita had dismissed him, he'd gone home, changed. Showered, changed again. Touched himself. Considered a third shower of the day. It was a good thing that midnight had come more quickly than he'd hoped, because his brothers were about ready to throw him out themselves.

When he finally reached Chibita's door, he just stood there for a moment. Waiting. Trying to psych himself up enough to knock. He'd felt almost like this once before, when he'd bowed low and begged Chibita to let him stay. He'd thought back then that it'd been the secret to straightening out his life, and who knew? Maybe it would have been, if he'd seen it through. Maybe he never would have had this sick, cold feeling rolling around in the pit of his stomach, and maybe he never would have felt so excited and so terrified to see Chibita all at once.

Or maybe his heart would have just broken a hell of a lot faster.

Karamatsu breathed in, breathed out, then knocked on the door. Chibita opened it before his hand was even back at his side, and jeez. Maybe Chibita was a little nervous, too.

He looked good, though, even if he was tense. He was soft and pink and warm, just out of the shower. Karamatsu had always used to sneak glances at him when he was like this. He'd always been irresistible. Karamatsu had always resisted him anyway, and look where that had gotten them?

He meant to say something cool. He meant to say something that would make Chibita's heart swoon. Something about the way the moon looked reflected in Chibita's dark eyes. The way his rosy skin was enough to make the glaciers melt. "Hi," he said instead.

Chibita's eyebrows quirked upwards. "Hi," he said, then opened up the door. "Are you coming in or what? It's cold out here."

He probably was cold. He was only wearing a loose t-shirt and some tight shorts and Karamatsu wanted to strip him out of them so badly he could barely breathe. But that would come in time. For now, he just followed Chibita inside and toed off his shoes.

"You remember where to hang up your jacket, right?" Chibita asked, glancing back at him over his shoulder.

"Yeah," Karamatsu said. He felt a little lump in his throat when he realized that the hook Chibita always left for him was still empty. "Thanks."

And then it was just the two of them in Chibita's cramped apartment, too close for comfort and too far away for distraction. Karamatsu could hear the ticking of a clock somewhere, but it was all but drowned out by the sound of his own uneven breaths. His hands hung awkwardly at his sides and -- god, how did people do this, anyway? This wasn't like the movies, where two people stumbled in the door, barely able to keep their hands off each other. This was just him and Chibita. Staring at each other.

Finally, Chibita sighed. "You never make things easy, do you?" he muttered, maybe to himself more than Karamatsu, and then he'd taken a step in, too fast for Karamatsu to track, had gone up on his toes so he could--

Karamatsu's breath caught in his throat as Chibita's lips met his. It was -- fuck, it was better than he thought it'd be. Even awkward like this, Chibita's mouth was so warm, so soft. Karamatsu could smell the gentle scent that had enveloped him every night, making him feel safe. He'd remembered it on the edges of daydreams, and the dreams at night that he could never quite retain.

This, this. This is what he'd wanted for so fucking long. He felt too aware of his hands, but simultaneously felt like he had absolutely no control over them himself as he reached out to draw Chibita in close. They'd been half-formed desires in his mind a year ago, but now it was all he could think about. Kissing Chibita. Touching him. Being with him in every sense of the word.

He tilted his head without even meaning to, crouching down a little so Chibita wouldn't need to strain. He didn't know what he was doing, but his body didn't seem to need the coaching. It was kind of a bad kiss, probably, to someone like Chibita who did shit like this almost every night. But to Karamatsu, it was nothing short of life-changing. God, he wanted him so badly.

A few moments later, a thousand, Chibita pulled back to settle back on his heels. His mouth was very wet and very red, and his eyes had gone very, very wide. "I--" His voice came out a little too hoarse, a little too unmanageable, so he cleared it, started again. "I already laid the futon out because I knew you were coming. You can... Sit, I guess. If you want."

And there it was, there on the floor. It wasn't the same one Chibita had used back when they used to live together. It was a lot bigger, and Karamatsu tried not to wince at the implication. Chibita had probably found the need to upgrade at some point. Karamatsu had not been the person to make him feel that need.

He swallowed hard and sat down on the damn futon. After a moment more, Chibita dropped down next to him. The movement was practiced, but didn't look easy. As if Chibita had done this song and dance before, knew all the steps, but was inexplicably off the beat. He didn't look particularly happy, and Karamatsu's stomach sank.

"We don't... We don't have to do this," he said haltingly, hating the words even as they came out of his mouth. "I won't bother you again if you don't want me to." He wanted to. He wanted to so fucking badly. But he also wanted Chibita to look starstruck when he kissed him. He wanted Chibita to look at him the way Karamatsu felt, like the moon and stars had moved just a little bit to the left the minute they'd touched. He didn't want him to look so anxious. So fucking unenthused about the proceedings.

"No," Chibita said. He shifted a little, right into Karamatsu's personal space. "Don't go." He said it imperiously, the way he said all things, with a confidence that Karamatsu had only ever worn like an ill-fitting coat. But there was a note to his voice that shook, just a little, and Karamatsu could hear the order for what it was. A plea.

Karamatsu looked at him, looked into those dark eyes of his, and wondered just what the hell he was thinking. Chibita had never been nearly this hard to read in the past. "Okay," he said softly, and then he kissed him.

It was a little easier this time, there on the floor. The height difference wasn't nearly so pronounced, and their legs tangled up together as Chibita leaned in close. Karamatsu reached out for him, slid trembling fingers down over his back, his waist, his hips. Tentatively, he let one hand curl around his ass, and he pulled him in.

He'd half-expected Chibita to pull away, to tell him he was a pervert who was going too damn fast, but instead he came willingly. He even pushed Karamatsu back a little bit so it was easier for him to crawl into his lap. He sat there, straddling his legs and cradling his head in his hands, and he licked at his lips.

It was a request, Karamatsu knew, and he felt dizzy with it. Fuck. How the hell did people have sex so easily when just kissing felt this overwhelming? He'd never done it before, but he felt like he'd already been doing it for hours, for years. He knew he couldn't be doing it quite right, quite gracefully, but he felt like it was as natural as breathing. Maybe it was just because it was Chibita. Maybe it would never feel so right with anyone else.

Maybe he was just a hopeless romantic.

But the sensation of it, the waves of pleasure, shocking in their intensity, only served to remind him of his goal. This wasn't just sex. It couldn't be. Karamatsu wasn't sure he'd be able to manage that if he tried. This was making love. He had to -- he somehow had to communicate to Chibita the depths of his feelings. He might never have another chance. To be known. To give Chibita exactly the kind of tenderness he deserved.

He stroked blindly at whatever skin was available, Chibita's thighs, his legs, that little strip of skin between shirt and shorts that was exposed when he sat up like that. He was tender, he thought. Loving, he hoped. And then, as Chibita tried again, licked at the seam of his lips once more, Karamatsu opened his mouth.

Chibita sighed into his mouth, pleased, and started to explore. And god, fuck, if Karamatsu had thought it was intense before... The noise he made was a muffled moan, and Chibita just drank it in. Chibita's tongue was talented and sure, and his fingers were gentle on Karamatsu's jaw, his neck, as he stroked soft skin and manhandled him into a more comfortable position for them both.

Chibita drew back for a moment, just half a second, so his could press a soft kiss to Karamatsu's lax lips and whisper, "Come on, sweetheart. Kiss me like you mean it."

And hell, how the fuck was Karamatsu supposed to ignore a request like that? He let his own tongue sneak out, tentative at first, then eager. The exploration was an adventure, and the moments their tongues touched the first time, curling against each other soft and sweet, was a fucking revelation. He was lost in it, lost, and he clutched at Chibita like he was a lifeline. Any other time, he might have been embarrassed to be so obviously needy, to be making those sounds like a man possessed, but now, who cared? Who gave a flying fuck if Chibita knew how much he affected him? Let him know. Maybe it would make him feel good. Powerful. Loved.

He was so wrapped up in the kisses, all that slow, slick, sinuous movement, that he was utterly unprepared for Chibita's next move. Chibita's hips shifted in his lap, just fucking writhed against him, and Karamatsu suddenly realized he was really fucking hard. He could feel Chibita's cock through the thin fabric, only just starting to fill, but his own? Fuck. Fuck. He was so fucking hard.

The noise he made as Chibita pressed their hips together was almost pained in its pleasure, and all that did was encourage him to do it again. Chibita was kissing him open and sloppy now, was stealing his breath away almost faster than he could make it, and it felt so fucking good. All of Karamatsu's carefully-laid plans, all his thoughts of slow kisses and loving caresses, were quickly fizzling in his lust-hazed mind. It was too much. It was everything. Chibita was all he could have ever hoped for and more. No amount of reading or watching or imagining could even come close to the real thing. He felt so good. Tasted so good. He was so damn perfect, the way he moved like that, and Karamatsu felt himself steadily losing ground, losing his footing, losing his goddamn mind.

It was so good, so fucking--

And then it stopped. Everything stopped. The whole fucking world stopped as white-hot pleasure roared through him, taking what little sense he had left and throwing it to the wind. He'd never felt anything so intense in his entire life -- at least until he came back to himself and realized what the hell had just happened.

Even an orgasm like that couldn't stand up to the sheer fucking embarrassment that fell over him like a ten-ton weight.

Chibita stared at him, a little shocked, a little uncertain. "Did you just..."

He let the words hang there between them, even as Karamatsu breathed hard and felt himself burn crimson-hot with shame. He had. He fucking had. He'd had one goddamn chance with Chibita and he'd ended it in his own fucking pants.

"I--" Karamatsu swallowed, hard, and tried again. "I think I need to go to the bathroom."

Chibita was still just staring at him, gaping like a fish, that beautiful kiss-bitten mouth of his opening and closing in something like shock. Then he blinked once, twice, then shook his head to clear it. "I. Sure. Back-- Fuck, you know where it is."

And Karamatsu did. Chibita eased off of him, all fumbles and awkwardness, and then Karamatsu was up, was moving, was making a beeline to the bathroom.

And then he just stood there, staring at the tile and wishing he'd never even been born. He could feel the mess in his pants starting to cool into something sticky, something disgusting, and he wondered how the hell he was even going to get home. He'd been too stupid to think to bring a spare set of clothes.

He started to breathe a little faster, a little more than was strictly comfortable. He hadn't even brought clothes. Maybe he'd known, deep in his heart, that Chibita was never going to let him spend the night. He was never going to pull this stupid, insane plan off. He never could have made Chibita feel the way he'd wanted him to feel. Fuck. He'd never even gotten his fucking clothes off.

Karamatsu breathed in and in and in, feeling himself starting to go lightheaded with it, and he could feel tears burning at the corners of his eyes. What a failure. What a goddamn fucking failure he was. He'd always been a failure. He'd failed in everything he'd ever tried at. He'd failed at growing up. At getting a job. At being a real fucking human being. He'd failed to notice the best thing he'd ever had in his entire life, and he'd failed to make good use of the second chance he'd somehow, somehow been given.

No wonder Chibita didn't want him. He probably never had and never would. Who would want a shitty NEET virgin like him, anyway?

Karamatsu tried to take off his pants so he could deal with the worst of it, clean up the mess on the outside even if he was clearly powerless to deal with what lurked within, but his fingers were shaking too hard for him to even get through his fly. Finally, he just slumped down to the ground, back to the door and shaking. He couldn't breathe. He couldn't fucking breathe.

A knock at the door, somewhere behind his head. "Karamatsu?" The voice was soft, hesitant. Like Chibita was talking to some kind of wild animal. "Are you okay?"

Karamatsu opened his mouth and tried to say something flippant, something to make Chibita stop worrying and leave him alone, but he couldn't get the words out through his throat. There was something blocked off there, something that wouldn't let words or air or even coherent thought through. He thought it was shrapnel, maybe, left there as the remains of his shattered heart.

"Karamatsu, please. Answer me. It's not a big deal, y'know?"

Of course it was. Of course it was. Karamatsu laid his head on his knees and tried to breathe. He hadn't been able to satisfy Chibita, not in the slightest. He never had. What a fucking idiot he was, to think he might be the one who'd hook Chibita for good. All he'd ever done was disappoint him.

"Karamatsu?"

All at once, to Karamatsu's great shame, he found his breath. It heaved up out of him, past the wrecked remains of his heart, past the lump in his throat, in one great, wracking sob. And then there was another sob. Another. He was crying like a fucking baby on the floor of Chibita's bathroom, like the pathetic asshole he was. Did he really think he'd be able to make Chibita love a pitiful wretch like him? Did he really think there'd ever be anyone who wanted him?

Such an idiot. He really was such an idiot.

The crying was loud, embarrassingly loud, and he knew Chibita had to be able to hear it. That was the most humiliating thing of all, especially when he heard Chibita's shuddering breath. He'd hurt him. He'd just fucking hurt him again. He'd ruined Chibita's whole night with his pathetic attempts at lovemaking, and now he was going to have to deal with an embarrassing, painful mess of a man crying in his bathroom.

"I'm sorry," he gasped out, edged with another trembling sob.

Silence. A long, long silence. Then, "For what?"

"For this. For everything. For disappointing you again."

He didn't know if he could really hear Chibita breathing on the other side of the door, or if that was just his imagination running away with him again. And then, in a voice so small he could barely hear it, "Karamatsu, please open the door."

Maybe it was just because it sounded so tiny, so weak. Maybe even a little bit scared. Karamatsu wasn't sure what it was that made him reach up and unlock the door.

A soft click, and then the sturdy wall behind him was falling away as Chibita opened the door. He could hear Chibita's quick intake of breath, but he couldn't read it. Annoyed? Exasperated?

Chibita just stood there for a moment looking down at him, then Karamatsu felt him sit down right behind him, his knees bumping against Karamatsu's back. "I don't get it," he finally said.

Karamatsu didn't say anything. What could he say?

"You go away," Chibita said, far more quiet than Karamatsu ever heard him, far more quiet than he ever should have been. "And I have to deal with that. I start making new friends. Meeting new people. Making a new life for myself, a good one. And then you come back. You act like nothing's even fucking changed, like the six of you can just show up at the cart like none of it even happened. And as soon as you hear that I changed, you -- you what, you freak out? You start asking everyone what I'm doing? You ask me to have sex with you?" He paused, maybe momentarily at a loss for words. "And then this happens and you act like the whole world's ending. I don't fucking get it, Karamatsu."

Karamatsu felt a small touch at his back, gently trailing down his spine. "Why didn't you just talk to me?" Chibita asked, and hell, he sounded a little lost, too. "What the hell were you trying to do here?"

"I don't know," Karamatsu said, even though he did know, he did. The first question, though, was less humiliating than the second. "I was afraid we wouldn't be able to talk anymore."

That he'd go to Chibita with his concerns and Chibita would just shut down. Tell Karamatsu that he wasn't a part of his life anymore and that he didn't want him to be. Or worse, that Chibita would just laugh it off and give Karamatsu a non-answer, like they were just strangers and Chibita didn't want to get into it. What would he have done if he'd asked Chibita and Chibita hadn't answered?

Chibita breathed in, breathed out behind him. "Then didn't you just prove it?" he asked.

Hell. He was right. Of course he was right. If their relationship had been what it'd used to be, Karamatsu just would have been able to knock on his door and ask him. Hell, if their relationship had really been what it'd used to be, he would have just had to reach out across their living room floor and talk.

But it wasn't. It wasn't. And this whole mess was proof of that.

"Yeah," he said, and he sniffled a little pathetically. Fuck, he hated himself for that. "I know that. I just..."

He was quiet for a long time, and Chibita nudged him with one of his knees. "Yeah?"

"I just missed you. I missed you so fucking much."

And that was it. That was everything. Karamatsu had walked away and he'd regretted it every day. He could cover it up with misadventures and stupid quests and the accolades of millions, but none of it could erase that one simple fact. He missed Chibita so damn much. He missed what they'd had. He missed who he'd been when he was by Chibita's side. He missed all of it.

"But you left." Chibita's voice was a little hurt, a little accusing. Questioning.

Karamatsu gave a one-shouldered shrug. "It scared me, being with you. Everything it meant. I could have -- I could have made a good life with you. If I'd stayed."

"But I thought you wanted that," Chibita said, soft.

"I did. I do. Of course I did. But I felt like -- like I was giving up what I was. What we were. And when Osomatsu came with, with whatever the hell it was, it just felt like a sign. That we weren't done just yet. That I shouldn't have given up on them just yet."

That was the excuse he'd had, anyway. That his brothers needed him. That his family couldn't be torn apart. He'd known even then that it was a shitty idea. But then everything had just kept going, life had just kept living, and they'd become popular. At the time, it had seemed like a sign that he'd made the right decision.

"But you were okay saying that we were done. That you should give up on me," Chibita said, and he just. He sounded so fucking tired.

"No! It -- it didn't feel like giving you up, back then. You just -- you were just our Chibita. Always so steady. It felt like I could come back later and you'd still be there, like you always were."

Chibita made a small noise, angry and hurt. "It doesn't work like that, you goddamn idjit. You can't just move in and out of my life like that and get mad when I change, too," he said.

"I know. I know that," Karamatsu said. "I wasn't mad. I was just... sad, I guess. And scared. I didn't even realize I'd lost you until I had. I thought you'd just keep right on waiting for us, for me, and no one else would notice--"

"Notice what?"

Karamatsu sighed. The tears were still slick on his face, but there were no more coming out. Maybe he didn't have anymore. "Notice how amazing you are."

Behind him, Chibita swallowed so hard that he could just about hear it. "I'm not."

"You are," Karamatsu said. "And now everybody knows it. And I-- My whole fucking life, I couldn't fight for anything. But I wanted to fight for you."

"That's what you were doing..." Chibita said, his voice sounding far away and lost. "When you were asking all those questions."

Karamatsu nodded, the motion pushing his knees into his eyes. It felt good, in a way. "I needed to know you again. I didn't have you anymore and it hurt. I just--I asked everyone everything. I thought maybe I could figure out what I needed to do to get you back."

"And you arrived at...this?" Chibita asked, and now he sounded a little skeptical.

"You liked sex," Karamatsu said, shrugging. "For once, I wanted to give you what you wanted. I wanted to get really good at it and give you... I don't know. I just wanted to give you one really good night."

There were all these words in his head for the kind of night he wanted with Chibita. Sparkling and goddess-blessed and rose-soaked. He had a thousand fantasies about what he wanted for Chibita. But this, this right here. This didn't fit into any of them. And none of those words felt right anymore. Maybe he'd lost those, too.

"You practiced," Chibita said, and Karamatsu nodded. "With who?"

There was a little note of bitterness in his voice there, a little bit of possessiveness, that would have made his heart thrill any other day. But now he knew that he just heard what he wanted to. Chibita was probably just shocked at the idea that anyone would have him. He laughed a little, darkly. "No one."

A pause. "What the hell?"

Karamatsu sighed, a long, long sigh. "I looked things up online. Watched--watched videos. Bought some, um, things. I practiced."

Another pause, like Chibita was trying to work out what he was telling him. Then, "On yourself." The tone was odd, like he was surprised and yet not, all at once.

Karamatsu nodded again. "I prepared for--for weeks. I tried everything I could think of. I just kept thinking I needed to be ready for anything. I had to practice as much as possible so if I ever--if I ever got a chance with you, I'd impress you."

Chibita mumbled something that sounded kind of like a curse. "All that for me?" he asked, like it was too much to believe.

Karamatsu breathed in, then out. It'd seemed so sensible at the time. Like this mad plan would actually work. It had seemed like everything. When he finally spoke again, he couldn't quite keep the longing from his voice. “I wanted to make myself so perfect for you that you’d never let me go.”

Chibita was breathing more quickly behind him, unsteady. "I... I wasn't the one who let go, Karamatsu."

Karamatsu clutched a little more tightly at his knees, felt his nails dig into the denim coating his legs. "I know. I know. I fucked everything up."

Chibita didn't say anything. The silence just stretched out between them, both of them breathing too-quick in a tiny fucking bathroom. It was ridiculous. It was heartbreaking. It was all Karamatsu's fault.

It was a long, long time, but finally Chibita broke the silence. “I’m tired, Karamatsu. I’m not tired of the sex, I just — I’m tired of feeling like this. Because the guys, y’know, they come and they go and it’s a lot of fun. But it just goes right back to hurting. No matter how much I try to get my mind off it, it still hurts that you didn’t even say goodbye.” Karamatsu could hear him tapping a nervous little rhythm against the floor. “None of you did.”

They hadn't, had they? Out "adventuring" at breakneck speed so they'd never have to fucking stop and consider their own pitiful existence. Too fast to think about hellos or goodbyes or the people they'd left behind them in the fucking dust. They were all awful, weren't they?

“But maybe that’s a good thing," Chibita said, breaking into his thoughts. "It… It let me know where I stand. And it made me branch out a little bit. Meet some new people. Do some new things. And I don’t regret any of that. I’m just…tired.”

And that... Chibita just sounded so exhausted. So dull. So finished with the world and everything it had to offer. It was horrible. Chibita, their Chibita, loud and boisterous and strong, seductive and sweet and everything he'd ever wanted, Chibita wasn't supposed to sound like that. But he did. And it was his fault. Not just his, but his all the same.

Karamatsu pulled himself from his slump, wiped his soggy eyes with the back of his hand, then turned so he could scoot back to sit next to Chibita. Chibita, his Chibita. Who he'd left behind to deal with all this bullshit. Who he somehow'd thought he could win over with a little bit of sex when what he really needed was something entirely different. Karamatsu wound an arm around Chibita's waist and pulled him in so he could rest against his shoulder. So he could just rest. "I'm sorry," he murmured. "We shouldn't have done that. We were shitheads."

Chibita laughed weakly. "You really, really were. None of you idjits ever even dropped by to see if I was still alive. None of you six, or Iyami, or anyone else."

"Yeah," Karamatsu said. "I know." It had just been... It had been so overwhelming. There was a mindlessness, a desperate mindlessness, to their movements. And then they'd gotten popular and it was just encouragement to keep doing it. It felt like he had finally done something right in his whole, useless life. “They loved me.” he said softly. “No one had ever loved me before.”

“I did.”

Karamatsu's arm tightened around Chibita's waist, but Chibita didn't complain. "I didn't--I didn't know that. I didn't realize then. I knew that you were important. I knew that you felt like--like you were the one thing in the whole world I could depend on. But I didn't realize back then what I wanted. Or what you wanted. I didn't get it at all," he murmured.

“That’s just like you, idjit," Chibita said, that familiar sarcasm of his sounding weak below all that exhaustion. "You’re always chasing after some fantasy instead of working hard to make the best of what you’ve got. So what if all those people liked you? They didn’t even know you. That shit was never gonna last. But it was fun and it was flashy and you never even thought about if it was real.”

Karamatsu winced. And the realest thing he'd ever had was sitting right the fuck next to him. “Isn’t that what you’re doing, though? With the…” The sex. All the sex with men who'd never loved him and never would. Men who could help him forget for just a minute how fucking alone he was. He would have good feelings and good hormones and would feel fucking good until the minute they walked out the damn door.

Chibita didn't say anything, just turned his nose into Karamatsu's shoulder. “Maybe. But I already lost my chance at something real," he said softly. "You’re the one who threw it away.”

Karamatsu's throat closed up. That sounded so final. Like it didn't matter who'd loved whom. None of it mattered anymore. Because he'd thrown away their chance at happiness and Chibita had been smart. He'd moved the fuck on.

"You know the funny thing?" Chibita murmured. "All this time, this whole fucking day, I was thinking in the back of my mind… Maybe if it’s really good, this time he’ll stay.”

Karamatsu might have laughed if there had been any laughter still left in his body. It was ironic, in a way, but also utterly predictable. The two of them had never been as different as they'd seemed. They were both so desperate to be loved. To be anything but alone. They'd both been abandoned again and again and again, but were stupid enough to just keep reaching out. They could have been great together if he'd just realized what they had. Chibita was right. Karamatsu was always looking towards the next thing, to what could be the next best thing, and ignoring all the good things that were right next to him. He'd been so fucking foolish, and what had he done? Given Chibita one more abandonment to deal with. He had no right to want to seduce Chibita. To be seduced in turn. He had no right to want to sit here, right here, with Chibita breathing hard against his shoulder, for the rest of their lives.

But he wanted to be better. He wanted to be worthy. And maybe right now, that meant putting aside what he wanted and just listening to Chibita. He swallowed, looked straight ahead at the wall. "Do you want me to stay?" he asked, raw.

Chibita sighed, and he sounded so tired that he just about broke Karamatsu's heart all over again. "I don't know, idjit. When you're gone, all I want to do is see you again, but when you're here, all I can do is worry about how long you'll stay. Maybe I still love you. I don't fucking know. I'm not one of those cool guys who can put all their feelings into words. I just..." he trailed off, and Karamatsu's heart constricted in his chest.

"If you want me to stay, I'll stay," Karamatsu said, wishing his voice sounded a little more convincing when he said it. "If you don't want me to go, I won't." He swallowed. "Last time... Last time it never felt like I could really stay. It felt like--like you were just offering this place as a bridge. An oasis. Like I was supposed to just stay with you and become a better person and then leave again. And if I stayed with you, I'd just be putting off what I was really supposed to be doing."

He could feel Chibita's eyelashes against his shoulder when he blinked. He liked that feeling. "And what the hell were you supposed to be doing?"

"Back then, I thought I was supposed to be a proper adult, make a new life for myself. I was supposed to go out and get a job and get my own place. Find a girl, get married, have some kids. Raise them to be better than I was. I was supposed to leave the nest. And I thought back then that your apartment was still part of it. That I had to leave if I ever wanted to be a real person."

"And now?"

Karamatsu sighed. "Now I think I was supposed to stay here with you forever. You were supposed to be my new life," he admitted. He'd felt it the moment he'd walked away. That he was walking in the wrong fucking direction. And he'd wandered aimlessly, trying to find the right one, not realizing that any direction would be wrong. He'd already left the destination.

Now that place didn't exist anymore. That noisy little apartment with just him and Chibita, where Chibita would encourage him and help him and comfort him when the nights were long. It had been a place of the utmost hope, but it had also been a time. And he couldn't go back. He just had to look at what he had now, right now. He had to stop looking ahead at a future that would never exist and look beside him. For once. This life now wasn't as hopeful and it wasn't as sweet. But it was what he had to work with, and this time, he wouldn't squander it.

If Chibita still wanted him to stay.

Chibita was shaking now, so slightly that Karamatsu never would have felt it if his arm hadn't been wound tight around his waist. "I can't be your hope, Karamatsu," he said quietly. "I can't make you be anything you don't want to be."

"I know," Karamatsu said simply. He did. Things like hope didn't go one way. All there was in real life was support and love. Maybe he was finally ready to offer it instead of just taking all the time.

"It was really nice having you here," Chibita said. "I'd never lived with anyone before. Not since I was a kid. I didn't know what it was like to eat meals with someone or sleep near someone or just--just be with someone. When you first left, when we finished all that stupid bullshit and we all went home... It felt so lonely. I'd never felt that lonely because I never knew what I was missing. But when you left, it felt like my apartment was completely empty. And I thought... I thought maybe that was why it hurt so much. Because I was alone again. I didn't know, either. Back then. What I wanted."

Karamatsu breathed out slow. So he hadn't been the only clueless one back then.

"But you weren't completely gone yet. You were still around town. We still hung out sometimes. And even when you fucking drove me nuts, I was still always happy to see you. You were my dependable Karamatsu, even when you weren't. It wasn't until everyone went away that I got it. Because I was all alone again, really alone this time, and the person I missed most was you. Even when you left my apartment, I could still see you whenever I wanted. It wasn't until I didn't even have that anymore that I felt like--I felt like I'd lost everything. Like I had to remake myself because there wasn't anything left. Everything I did reminded me of you, of all of you. So I started doing different things."

And different people. Karamatsu still felt a yawning cavern inside himself every time he thought about all the men Chibita had been with, but now it was filled with regret. Chibita had been so alone. He hadn't lost Chibita; he'd left him. And Chibita had filled his own cavern with casual sex and good times, and how could he blame him? How could he blame him for abandoning the idea of "forever" when the best he'd ever had was "for now"?

"But that's not working, either," Chibita said. "Like, I like it. Don't get me wrong, it's a lot of fun--"

Karamatsu grip tightened incrementally.

"But it's not working. I thought it was helping, that getting a new hobby or whatever would help me get over it. But then you show up and it's like I'm all alone again. I've been a wreck all fucking day. I couldn't stop thinking about having sex with you. Not the first time, I guess, but this time I just... I was so scared. Like... What if I liked it? What if you didn't? What if... What if I did a good job and you realized what you'd been missing all this time..."

Karamatsu didn't say anything. It probably wouldn't have gone over well if he'd said he'd known what he was missing the second he'd heard other men were having it. That made it sound like he only wanted Chibita because other people wanted him and that--that just wasn't true.

"I don't think I can get over you," Chibita admitted. "And I thought I had to because you were over me, but..."

"I'm not," Karamatsu said. That much was obvious to them both. No one had a fucking panic attack in someone's bathroom because it was fun.

Chibita was quiet for a moment, and Karamatsu could almost feel him building up that legendary spine of his. Then, "Do you think maybe we could try again?"

Karamatsu's pulse quickened. "The sex or...?"

Chibita shook his head against his shoulder. "All of it."

All of it. All of it. Going by the oden cart whenever he wanted to, just because he wanted to hear Chibita's laugh. Hearing him snore quietly at night when everything else was still. Chatting about everything and nothing as Chibita chopped vegetables for dinner. Holding each other close, kissing, grinding, touching him the way he'd always wanted to... God. All of it.

"I don't want to have sex with you," Karamatsu said, abruptly.

Chibita tensed at his side. "What?" he asked. "I go and fucking pour my stupid heart to you and--"

Karamatsu took a chance. He turned his head to the side, just so, and caught his lips against the side of Chibita's mouth. "I want to make love."

Chibita froze for just a second, and then all of his air seemed to pour out of him at once. "You asshole," he said weakly. "That's just like you. Fucking painful."

And then Chibita kissed him.

It wasn't like before. Before, Chibita had been a man on a mission. Now he was just soft and slow and sweet. Brushing his lips over Karamatsu's, pressing in lightly every so often. Catching their lips together, pulling away, leaning in with another sigh. He was so good at this that it almost made Karamatsu a little self-conscious.

"Sorry," Karamatsu mumbled into the kiss. "I'll get better at this, I promise."

Chibita blinked at him, his eyes gone hazy in a way that made Karamatsu's stomach flutter. "What're you talking about, idjit? I love the way you kiss me." He leaned in again, reached out so he could caress Karamatsu's cheek with gentle fingers as he kissed him. "Like I mean something."

"Darling," Karamatsu said, the endearment coming out as naturally as breath, "you mean everything."

Chibita made a tiny, broken sound into their kiss, like he couldn't quite decide whether he wanted to laugh or cry. "Painful," was all he said, before kissing him again.

And Karamatsu, Karamatsu could have done this for the rest of his life, but after just a few minutes, Chibita was pulling away again. "What's wrong?" he asked, blinking down at Chibita a little dopily.

"Nothing's wrong," Chibita said, but the way that he was pulling away seemed at odds with his words. "Just thought you might want to clean up a little before we..." He paused, nose wrinkling. "'Make love'."

Karamatsu flushed. The mess in his pants was absolutely disgusting, clammy and sticky at the same time, but it had seemed like such a small thing when Chibita was laying his heart bare for them both to dissect. Now that he was starting to come to attention again, though? Now he could feel it. "Can I...?"

"You know where the shower is," Chibita said with a shrug.

He did, he thought with a little thrill, and how many of Chibita's one-night stands had been able to say the same thing? 

Letting go of Chibita wasn't easy, but another couple kisses and murmured endearments later, Karamatsu was staggering to his feet and into the shower room. He left his soiled clothes for Future Karamatsu to worry about, then stepped under a scalding spray.

It was, he realized, a little scarier to think about their upcoming activities when Chibita wasn't pressed warm against his side. He sort of half-wished he'd invited Chibita to shower with him, but it was probably for the best that he have some time to pull himself the fuck together. He still hadn't managed to put the facts of the night into a working order in his brain, hadn't quite been able to make sense of them. He'd walked into the apartment practically a stranger, and now...what? He and Chibita loved each other again? Hell, had they ever stopped?

It didn't make sense. It just didn't. But what part of his life did, really? What part of his bizarre day-to-day life fit into a neat little narrative? Maybe this time, he thought as he washed away salt and snot and other distasteful things, he'd just take things as they came. He couldn't guarantee that this thing with Chibita would be forever. He couldn't guarantee that they'd have a beautiful romance for the ages. This mess of theirs didn't belong in a romantic film, that was for damn sure. But Chibita had given him a second chance. And that would have to be enough.

He stepped out of the shower feeling clean and new and, well, <i>almost</i> ready to try again. He wasn't sure what Chibita would want this time, but he had hopes that he'd do better.

Better in bed, better in life. He had hopes.

He walked out of the shower room, feeling a little awkward holding a damp towel around his mostly-dry waist. He hadn't had any new clothes to change into, but if Chibita was just planning on taking them off anyway...

Chibita looked up from his phone, sprawled where he was on the futon, and Karamatsu saw his fingers slip as his eyes widened. Well. That was gratifying. 

"I didn't know..." Karamatsu started, awkward, but he didn't know quite how to finish. He didn't know if there was something he should be wearing. If there was something Chibita wanted him to do. Hell, he hadn't even known if there was somewhere specific Chibita had wanted him to clean.

"Just come here," Chibita said, sitting up a little straighter.

Karamatsu didn't have to be asked twice. He padded over to him, feeling the familiar sensation of Chibita's tatami beneath his toes, until he was right at the futon's edge. He knelt down next to Chibita, knowing that if he sat down pretty much any other way, the towel wouldn't cover up anything. He knew that was the eventual point, but...

Chibita just looked at him for a minute, hot eyes tracing over all the lines of him, and Karamatsu fought not to fidget under his gaze. Then Chibita reached out, squeezed one knee, and said, "Can I...?"

Could he what? Karamatsu swallowed hard and nodded, knowing that the answer, truthfully enough, was that he'd let Chibita do anything.

Chibita carefully slid his fingers up the seam where the ends of the towel met, but once he got to where they were tucked together, he didn't pull them apart. He just let his fingers rest there, gentle, as he leaned in for a kiss.

It was disappointingly brief; Karamatsu had only just settled into the warmth of him before he was pulling away again. "So what was your plan?" Chibita asked him, and Karamatsu just blinked at him. "Your plan, before you got here," Chibita clarified. "You wanted to make it so good I'd never let you go, right? What did you want to do?"

Karamatsu's red face only went redder. After their first disastrous attempt, all his plans just sounded foolish in his head. "I wanted..." He swallowed. "I wanted to kiss you. All of you. All over. And then maybe... Maybe um. Suck you." Fuck, this was embarrassing. "And then we could, y'know," he said, making a strange, abortive little gesture that he hoped communicated fucking. "You on top, or me. I wasn't sure which you'd want."

Chibita's eyes had gone wide and dark and a little bit glazed, but all he did was swallow hard and say, "That sounds like a lot for your first time."

"Yeah," Karamatsu said, looking down at his knees. It had clearly been a lot more than he'd been capable of.

Chibita looked at him, at his red, red face and the slump of his shoulders, and then he smiled. It was a private little smile, but the sweetest one Karamatsu had seen on him all night. "My first time, I came before he even got me wet all the way. I think I really surprised him. He'd barely even touched me. I thought I was gonna die, I was so embarrassed," he said.

Karamatsu didn't really want to think about another man slicking Chibita up inside, but he understood what Chibita was doing here. "And what happened?" he asked.

Chibita shrugged. "He fucked me anyway. It still feels good even if you aren't hard anymore," he said. "It usually turns out okay eventually. Even bad sex is pretty good."

Karamatsu paused, tilted his head to the side. "I would have waited," he finally said. "I would've gotten you hard again before I did anything else. I want..." God, he was red. It'd be amazing if he could actually get a hard-on with this much blood up in his face. "I want you to feel good."

"It's not that simple," Chibita said, and ducked in for another kiss. "And besides, sometimes I liked it that way."

Damn. Wrong again, somehow, even when he was trying to be romantic. Karamatsu drooped.

"Don't worry," Chibita said, laying his fingers against Karamatsu's collar and leaning up on his knees so he could press their foreheads together. "I'll show you what I like."

Karamatsu's breaths went a little unsteady. Communication, he'd read, would be key. He'd certainly learned his lesson on that front. And god, wouldn't it be so much easier to have Chibita teach him what to do? So much easier than reading dozens of internet guides and feeling around with his own fingers like they could be any substitute for Chibita's. So much easier than thinking about any sex act imaginable and wondering if that would be what would drive Chibita crazy.

Maybe making things difficult wasn't necessarily more romantic. He didn't have to figure things out on his own. He didn't have to make elaborate plans and sweep Chibita off his feet. He just had to listen to him and do what he wanted him to do.

Karamatsu reached out to pull Chibita in close, one hand on his back and the other curving up his spine until he could cup the back of Chibita's head and bring their lips together again. "I'll do anything you want," he murmured, soft.

Chibita kissed him back, gentle at first, then deep. And Karamatsu, god, was starting to become so fond of that tongue. It was slow, it was scorching, and Karamatsu could feel a shiver from his head all the way down to his cock. Fuck.

Chibita was rubbing along the fold of the towel, dipping his fingertips below it. "Why don't we start with something easy?" he asked, so close that Karamatsu could still feel the whisper of his tongue against his lips.

"Okay," he mumbled, like he'd be able to say no to a goddamn thing Chibita said at this point.

Chibita pulled back, just a breath, and Karamatsu instantly missed his heat. "I want to take this off," Chibita said, tapping the towel. "D'you want to take my clothes off, or should I?"

"I want to," Karamatsu blurted before he'd even really made sense of the question. "Can I--"

Chibita laughed, and god, Karamatsu had missed his laugh. "Sure," he said. "I picked stuff that comes off easy."

The shirt, for sure, came off easy. Karamatsu enjoyed it, too, the feeling of his fingers skimming against Chibita's ribs, his warm belly, as he slid his hands up under Chibita's loose shirt. He pulled it up over his head, Chibita helping out readily enough, and then there was just. There was so much to look at. All that soft, warm skin, golden in the lamplight, and Karamatsu could have just looked at that for days.

But Chibita was wiggling, was pulling Karamatsu's hands down to the waistband of his shorts so they could work together to get them off. There were still every bit as tight as they'd looked when Karamatsu had walked through the door, dumbstruck at Chibita's beauty, but Karamatsu could feel now that they were light, malleable. Maybe some kind of workout shorts. And then Chibita eased Karamatsu's fingers beneath the waistband and Karamatsu's mouth went dry.

"You're not wearing anything under these," he said, a breathless statement rather than a question.

"Nope," Chibita said, and his voice was light and playful in a way that was so, so much better than his tense curtness earlier that evening. Was this the way Chibita always was during sex? Or was he starting to feel some of the wild relief that Karamatsu was, that strange buoyancy around his heart?

God, Karamatsu really fucking hoped so. Because he was still nervous, still didn't know what the hell he was doing there, but there was a sort of lightness inside him that was filling him up. He felt better than he had in weeks, in months, and it was all down to that sparkle in Chibita's eyes.

Karamatsu kissed him, was helpless not to, as he slid one of his hands into Chibita's shorts so he could cup his bare ass.

Chibita gasped into the kiss, but he didn't pull away. Instead, he just raised his ass up a little bit to make it easier for Karamatsu to slide in the fingers of his other hand too, to caress all that beautiful warm, soft skin and yank the fabric down around it.

Karamatsu could feel Chibita pulling away again, squirming as he helped Karamatsu pull the shorts down his legs, but he didn't open his eyes, couldn't, until they were done.

And then he opened his eyes and Chibita was naked, gloriously so, and watching him with eyes that laughed.

"Like what you see?" Chibita asked him, and fuck, what kind of question was that?

"Like" was too mild a word for what Karamatsu felt looking at him now. There was heat, such intense fucking heat, all the way down, but there was also a sense of wild, childish wonder. Like he'd never quite thought he'd really get there. That he'd really be right the fuck where he was right now. He'd seen Chibita naked before; Chibita had never been particularly shy with his nudity. But this, this was so different. Chibita's skin was so warm, his cock was just starting to fill, and all that flesh was for him.

"Fuck," Karamatsu said, and it came out as an embarrassing whimper.

But Chibita only looked pleased, and he did a little something, something fucking sinful with those hips of his, an undulation that Karamatsu was pretty sure he'd never be able to replicate. It was the sexiest thing he'd ever seen.

"Now," Chibita said. "Let me do something about this," he said, putting one hand to the fold keeping Karamatsu's towel in place, "So I can do something about this." He pressed his other hand to the rising bulge in Karamatsu's lap, lightly squeezing his cock through the material and just...

"Do it," Karamatsu groaned, "Quick." He didn't want a repeat of last time.

"I've got you," Chibita said, dragging the heel of his hand across Karamatsu lap in another maddening caress. With his other hand, he moved his hand down, away from the folds. Karamatsu whimpered again, and he bobbed his hip upward like he could push Chibita's hand back where he wanted it to be.

"Shh," Chibita murmured, and put his hand right on Karamatsu's thigh, then started to slide it upward. Karamatsu realized what he was doing right as the loose folds fell away under the movement of his hand, and then Chibita was pulling the towel away, pushing it back to expose Karamatsu's hard cock to the open air of his apartment.

Karamatsu spared a brief second of anxiety, of worry that Chibita might not like what he saw, but Chibita was just staring down at him greedily, absorbing every detail like he could store it away in his memory for later.

Karamatsu thought about Chibita remembering him later, of Chibita touching himself to the memory of Karamatsu's cock, and his own erection jerked beneath Chibita's gaze. Fuck. He hadn't thought that it was possible that Chibita might want him as much as Karamatsu wanted him, but the heated, wondering look in Chibita's eyes had him guessing otherwise.

"Sit flat," Chibita said to him, voice gone hoarse, and Karamatsu would have fucking jumped off a goddamn cliff if that voice had asked him to. "I can't get in your lap if you're sitting up like that."

Karamatsu swept his legs out from under himself so quickly that he almost kicked Chibita, who only snickered at his hurry. He untangled the towel from his legs, pushed it off to the side somewhere so it wouldn't get in their way, then sat flat with his legs loosely crossed in front of him. He could tell that he was perfectly on display like this. That Chibita could see goddamn everything.

Let him look. Karamatsu liked having Chibita's eyes on him.

Chibita did look, eyes taking in the view with interest even as he crawled forward so he could climb in Karamatsu's lap. They were right up against each other now, Chibita's legs splayed wide across his, and just an inch more and--

Chibita moved an inch more, pushing his cock right up against Karamatsu's, and Karamatsu's breath stuttered to a stop. "You--"

"Yeah," Chibita said, too smug now for words, and he ground up against Karamatsu, skin on skin and god, it felt so good. They'd been in this position before, just a little while ago, and Chibita had clearly thought that it'd be good for an encore. This time there were no clothes separating them, though, no hurt feelings and misunderstandings and broken fucking hearts. It was just skin and skin and skin and the muffled laughter in Chibita's throat. He reached down between them, put one hand on Karamatsu's chest to steady himself and the other in their laps to stroke them both together.

He was casual as he stroked, like he wasn't driving Karamatsu out of his mind, like it wasn't the best thing he'd ever felt in his entire life. This was "easy", he knew. This was just beginner's stuff, hand jobs and grinding, but fuck, fuck, it was so good that Karamatsu couldn’t imagine doing anything better. Chibita's fingers caught against skin still slightly damp from the shower, and the sensation was like nothing Karamatsu could even try to put words to. All the flowery words in the world couldn't describe the simple pleasure of Chibita hand on his cock.

"Hey," Chibita murmured, his voice taking on this sexy, raspy tone that Karamatsu wanted to hear every day for the rest of his life. "Y'know, I've never made a guy come in his pants before."

Karamatsu blinked at him, momentarily confused. Why the hell was Chibita bringing that up now? "I..."

But Chibita just smiled at him, free and joyful in a way that Karamatsu hadn't seen in months, and leaned in close, closer, so he could kiss him deep. "It was really hot," he whispered.

And fuck, fuck, wasn't that just like Chibita? Liking him despite his faults. Maybe even loving him for them. Karamatsu groaned deep in his throat, then reached down himself so he could give Chibita a hand. Chibita gasped, but let him, moved to the side so Karamatsu could do whatever the hell he wanted. It was awkward at first, two hands doing different things, but then Karamatsu caught on to the way of it, the rhythm, and suddenly he and Chibita were moving together, were pulling and stroking and rubbing themselves together and fuck, fuck.

Karamatsu knew he was close, was sure he was about to embarrass himself all over Chibita's hand, but then Chibita moaned, loud and long, and came all over the both of them. His hand went slack around Karamatsu's cock, but Karamatsu just wrapped his hand around Chibita's, forced them both to rub a little harder, a little faster, Chibita's come making everything nice and slick and smoothing the way and--

Bliss. Karamatsu choked on his own orgasm, a sound that wasn't quite a moan and wasn't quite a cry, a sound he was pretty sure he'd never made before but hopefully would again. Waves of pleasure overtook him and it was blinding, it was everything. And when he came down, Chibita was holding him close.

Chibita let Karamatsu rest his head against his shoulder, running his clean fingers through Karamatsu's hair as they both breathed hard. Chibita ran his other hand down Karamatsu's back, and he couldn't even mind the mess. It felt so good here in Chibita's arms.

"You okay?" Chibita asked softly, pressing a kiss to Karamatsu's hair.

Karamatsu nodded mutely against Chibita's shoulder. He was too tired to do anything else.

Chibita was quiet for a moment, then asked, even more quietly, "Was it good?"

"Yeah," he mumbled, and he hoped that Chibita understood that mumble for the achievement it was.

"Good." Chibita's breathing slowed, slowly but surely, as his fingers brushed the shivers from Karamatsu's skin. Then, quietest of all: "Good enough to stay?"

Karamatsu blinked against Chibita's skin. Exhaustion be damned. He sat up best he could and looked Chibita dead in the eyes. "I will stay," he said, as clearly as he could, "As long as you'll let me. I won't go until you make me go." He swallowed. "I love you."

Chibita blinked once, very quick, but Karamatsu knew it wasn't surprise this time. Chibita's eyes shone too bright for that. "Good," he said again, and his voice sounded thick. He pulled Karamatsu in for one quick gentle kiss. "Good," he murmured one more time, as if to himself. As if reassuring himself that yes, they were good. They were great. This, all this, wouldn't have to happen again.

He didn't say it back, though. Those words. Karamatsu knew it was harder for Chibita, that it was harder for most people than it was for him, but there was also the chance that--that Chibita didn't, anymore. That now he'd have to settle for something a little less. Karamatsu worried at his bottom lip, tried to think of what to say. How to ask.

"Was it," he said tentatively, "Was it so good you can't bear to let me go?"

And god, that really had been such a fucking stupid plan. But Chibita only smiled at him, a little watery, and said, "No, idjit. It really wasn't. But it will be. We'll have a long time to work on it. This wasn't--this wasn't some one-night thing." He kissed Karamatsu again, achingly gentle. "You're not like the rest."

"Yeah?" Karamatsu asked, because he couldn't help but dig just a little more. He could see there in Chibita's eyes that he knew what Karamatsu wanted to hear.

"Yeah," he said. And then he paused for a moment and Karamatsu could see the struggle written on his face, the fear and sadness and loneliness that had never quite gone away. But then Chibita relaxed, sighed like he'd come to a decision that he'd been fighting with for a long, long time. "Yeah," he said again. "I love you, too."

"Good," Karamatsu said, and his voice wobbled dangerously. He could feel his eyes starting to sting, and he put his head back down on Chibita's shoulder so he could keep his tears to himself.

Later, much later, after their breaths had evened and they'd been able to bear to let go of each other, after Chibita had gone to the bathroom and come back with a wet rag they could use on each other, after they'd straightened the futon and turned out the lights and lay down together, Karamatsu rolled over in Chibita's futon and curled against his back.

It felt strange. The air in here was the same, the dripping faucet and the cars outside, the faint shapes of Chibita's furniture in the blackness. Chibita's soft breaths. But they'd never lain together like this back then. They'd always had separate futons then, and at least an arm's length between them. This, all this warm skin and a sense of togetherness that was lovely and frightening both, this was all new.

Karamatsu thought about forever and whether romantic things like that really existed. He liked to think they did. He liked to think the whole world was one big stage, and if you were lucky, you might stumble into one of its epic love stories. But he and Chibita didn't fit into any of those stories. Maybe they didn't have forever, either. But they had now, right now, and right now Karamatsu had a kind of happiness inside him that he wasn't sure he'd ever felt before.

"Can I use your washing machine tomorrow morning?" Karamatsu murmured against Chibita's neck, punctuating the request with a kiss. As much as he enjoyed lying here naked with Chibita now, tomorrow he'd have to get home somehow.

"Yeah," Chibita said, soft and drowsy. "We can hang it up together. I hear tomorrow's gonna be a beautiful day."

#...I do feel better now tho #like weirdly enough I feel like this whole endeavor really did help with my mental health #so there's that #karabita #fic stuff #oso