FANFIC: "Home in a Hotel" (The GazettE AoixUruha & ReitaxRuki)
Title: "Home in a Hotel"
Pairing: Aoi/Uruha & (beginnings of) ReitaxRuki
Writer: black_prophet (Midsummer_Slave)
Genre: Fluff, Randomness
Rating: PG13 (Language maybe?)
Warning: Rambling?
A/N: Written awhile ago, based on the remnants of a dream I remember... It just sort of evolved into this.
Disclaimer: THIS IS A FANFICTION. It is a work of Fiction starring real people that I sadly do not own in any way, shape, or form except for CDs, and DVDs and an impressive collection of pictures, which should count but doesn't. *SAD FACE*
Another fantastic album... Sold out concerts... Awesome live performances.. Meeting fans... Signing autographs and smiling and talking.. Sharing the love of music.. Another town, another night, another live... Bone-breaking exhaustion, spirit-shredding stress, but perfection. They loved the life they shared, loved the band, loved the fans. Loved music.
Another town.
Another town.
They all drag their way into the hotel in the screamingly early hours of the morning -or the excessively late hours of the night, depending on how one wanted to look at it- bags and staff in tow. The manager hands them the keys to their suit and they drag themselves off, not even bothering to keep a thread of conversation going on the elevator ride.
There were tired smiles and nods, the occasional playful lean on each other that was half quiet companionship and half dead-dog exhaustion. They had talked backstage and in the van, but that ride from the venue to the hotel was where exhaustion caught up. As long as they kept moving they were alright, but that sitting still with the soothing rush of air conditioning and humming tires. That was where you realized just how long your days were, how short a time you had to sleep, and how much your muscles protested your idiocy.
They were tired, but they loved it.
Kai curled up in a comfortable chair, laptop on a working table before him. Headphones in, he considered the hotel room and his fellow band mates over the top of the black and silver machine, head swaying slightly as he reviewed drum-patterns in various songs and stages of recording. Kai never stopped working. If he wasn't shepherding around the other four, or seeing to concert details, or wardrobe details, or music details, he was tweaking something or other on the laptop. Even now, where everyone else was practically the walking dead, Kai was working. Working, and watching over them.
Someone had to.
Reita sighed softly to himself as he lay back on the hotel couch, one toned arm thrown casually over his closed eyes to help block out the light. He was doing his best to ignore the fact it was noon, and they'd been up with the live and getting back to the hotel... None of them had mellowed down enough to sleep until well after four a.m. And by rights, none of them should have been out of bed. Yet, here they all hovered -in some form or another- too awake to sleep, too tired to do anything else but lounge in the lushly appointed room. Well, at least they were comfortable in their insomnia.
So the bassist turned on his iPod and threw himself onto the couch, a few pillows between his back and the arm of the couch, which he draped himself against. One long leg hung off the couch, the other he had folded at the knee and leaning against the back of the couch. The position was more of a contented sprawl, arm over his face to cover his eyes, not to hide the fact he was currently without the band he wore to every public function. The people in the room with him were those he let 'see' him, he hid little from his bandmates.
On the other couch -the one angled to face the television- lay the two guitarists. Aoi was currently stretched the length of the couch, one arm propping up his head so he could see the t.v. over the body that was pressed against his front. By rights, Uruha should have fallen off by now, as he was hardly awake enough to save himself, and one wrong breath could have sent him tumbling to the floor. As it was, he was pressed closely back against Aoi, head pillowed on one arm, lazily slitted eyes fixed on whatever the television revealed. And somehow the honey-blond was content in his gravity-tempting lounge.
Rather than watch the television as his pose indicated he would be, Aoi's focus was solely on his fellow guitarist. His free arm was draped along his own hip line, occasionally stirring enough to stroke Uruha's hip, which was bared due to the faint shift of his t-shirt. Uru obviously didn't mind the small triangle of skin being visible, for every time his lover's fingertips touched his skin, his eyes closed in bliss and he snuggled back a little more into the body that spooned his own, prompting a smile from his dark-haired counterpart.
"You're so beautiful." Aoi murmured softly as he bowed his head to Uruha's ear, his lips ghosting along the silk of Uru's mane. "Without any make up, without any artistry but your own. You're beautiful."
Uruha gave a pleased purr, snuggling firmly back against the welcoming body as he lifted and turned his head, stealing a kiss from his lover's surprised lips. "Thank you, flatterer."
Ruki chuckled softly as he paced past the lovebirds, ruffling their hair before shuffling over to the empty corner of Reita's couch. As he curled up in the corner, leaning against the armrest, he gently tapped the bassist's foot. The arm Reita had tossed over his face lifted slightly, a faint smile quirking one corner of his mouth before he covered his eyes again. It was an acknowledgement and a greeting, and then the bassist returned to his music with a faint shifting of his body, making more room for the small vocalist, whether he noticed it or not.
Kai took a break and padded through the room, flinging a blanket over Aoi and his sleeping ducky, then taking another to cover Reita. By this point, Ruki had tossed a pillow over the bassist's legs and flopped sidewise, looking like he was about to drop off into sleep at any minute. The drummer smiled and grabbed a second blanket before he approached the pair.
"Ruki."
The vocalist opened one eye as he frowned up at the drummer and band leader, giving his best pouty, little-boy voice. Though it was obvious he knew Reita was sleeping, for it was little more than a whispered complaint. "Kaaaaaaaiiii! Was sleepin'..."
"Not quite." The drummer retorted, nonplussed. "Sit up a minute, and take your pillow."
"Meanie." Ruki teased softly as he obeyed.
"Only to spoiled little rock stars." Kai replied with a smirk as he tossed one blanket over Reita. "So really, just for you."
"I feel special." Ruki muttered as he watched Reita shift slightly, wincing as he waited for the bassist to wake up snarling. "Kai-"
"He won't wake up." Kai replied as he let Reita shift again, then took Ruki's pillow and rested it on the bassist's hips. "Now lay down."
Ruki was quick to obey, gently pressing his shoulders back against Reita's still-propped-up leg, and cautiously resting his arm over Reita's other thigh. He looked up the drummer, insecurity written on his fine features. Kai chose to ignore the vulnerable look, knowing Ruki took great pleasure in being so near to the one he (not-so) secretly adored above all others. The drummer casually unfolded the last blanket he had, laying it over the vocalist, and then smoothing it with a faint smile.
"Why don't you try to rest, hmm?" The drummer offered, then padded back to his seat and put his headphones back in, refusing to act as though there were anything awkward with Ruki's situation.
As long as none of the others made a fuss over it, when Reita woke, the bassist would avoid doing so... He would just take it as 'Ruki'. Ruki was prone to falling asleep wherever, whenever, and on whoever he felt like. And with Aoi and Uruha hogging the other couch, and Ruki having been on Reita's to begin with, it was no great stretch of the imagination to think the vocalist would simply flop over and use the body as a pillow so he could nap.
It really wasn't the first time... Though the last time such a thing had occurred, it had been Uruha whom Ruki used as a pillow. The guitarist hadn't minded, knowing how much the vocalist needed the reassurance of touch. It wasn't like he could do anything to seek affection from Reita, that just wasn't how the bassist worked... So Uruha had been on a nearby couch, Ruki had used him as a pillow, sighing softly when the guitarist's skilled fingers began soothingly stroking his hair. However, Aoi was a little on the possessive side, and upon seeing his lover petting someone else, had gotten just a little territorial.
So while the one guitarist paid their vocalist some much needed attention, his lover had snuck up behind him. Resting one hand on the arm of the couch as he leaned over the back, Aoi used his silk-soft lips to assault his lover's tender throat, the occasional love-bite dropped on Uruha's neck as the guitarist arched his head and silently asked for more. Ruki had remained more or less oblivious, until a particularly skilled caress had Uruha purring out loud. At the sound, Ruki had shot up off the couch and across the room before he spun around, greeted with a softly chuckling Aoi.
"What do you know." The dark-haired man had laughed, placing another kiss on Uruha's neck. "My ducky can purr... What a rare thing you are, pet."
Since then, Ruki was very careful how close he got to Uruha. At that point in time, Aoi had been content to make his point in a more playful fashion. The vocalist did not want to be around if the guitarist decided force was the necessary display.
The vocalist had been laying on Reita for about an hour, and yet it felt like only minutes. But then, he could also feel the strain of that stolen hour jumping up and down his neck. He felt like any minute now Reita would simply vault off the couch wide awake and screaming that if wanted the perverted vocalist groping him, he'd be awake and asking for it himself. So far, it hadn't happened... And yeah, he was mentally exaggerating Reita's reaction, but when you were paranoid about something, you had that tendency.
But rather than stare actively at the one he so desperately longed to touch even as he reluctantly did so, the singer was watching the guitarist couple on the far couch. Uruha had fallen asleep at last, Aoi's arm firmly around his waist and holding him into his lover's body. The elder male still had his head propped up, now with his arm folded beneath his head and atop a pillow, so he could look down at his lover without effort.
It was to that look Ruki clung.
"Why do you do that?" Ruki asked in a soft whisper.
Tortured black eyes left the angelic face they'd been memorizing, slowly focusing on Ruki's distant visage, before returning to the dear face so close. "Do what?"
"Look at him..." Ruki licked his lips and swallowed, gaze skipping up to Reita's lips -all he could clearly see of the other male's face- and back to the guitarist he was questioning. "Like your heart is breaking."
Silence met the question, the low hum of the television sounding so loud in the utter stillness of the room. The vocalist shifted slightly, eager to know the answer -and yet not- but not wanting to ask again. Aoi had a temper -they all knew that- and the last thing Ruki wanted to do was rouse it, and risk the guitarist deciding not to answer at all. And Aoi could -and would- do such a thing, and would have every right to it. He didn't have to answer Ruki's question...
"You should know the answer to that better than almost anyone here, Takanori." Aoi replied at long-last, not bothering to glance at the vocalist as he delivered a rather 'loaded' answer. He didn't want to fight, particularly not now and not about this, but he wasn't going to let Ruki continue lying to himself either.
"If I did, I wouldn't have asked." The younger male replied sulkily, a growl behind the words.
Once more Aoi's gaze was on him, making Ruki shift uncomfortably, even as the guitarist called him on his denial in a voice that was utterly deadpan. "That is complete bullshit, and you know it."
Ruki glared back. "I don't know what you mean."
"You do so." Aoi argued. "After all... I've seen you give the very same look."
Ruki looked away, focusing on a bit of floor, saying nothing.
"You think I don't see it?" Aoi pressed, sitting up slightly.
As he moved, so did Uruha, prompting an unconscious petting from his dark-haired lover. Graceful pale hands with black-painted nails stroked over the waistline of worn blue jeans and glided over the clinging cotton of a swiped shirt, one of Aoi’s own. He couldn’t care less that Uruha had stolen it; if anything, he preferred the idea of his lover wearing his clothing.
Ruki glanced back at the pair to longingly watch the way the other male thoughtlessly gave his affection, soothing his lover back to sleep without breaking his attention to Ruki. Black eyes were still fixed on him, Aoi’s attention was still on him, but the eldest member of the band was still perfectly in tune with his honey-haired counterpart. It was as natural as breathing, which was something Ruki envied… Even as he wished it wasn't true so -perhaps- Aoi would be distracted and forget about him.
"Do you think we're all blind and dumb?" Aoi snarled, making Ruki jerk his gaze back to Aoi's. The guitarist's black gaze burned with anger and frustration. "I know how badly you fucking want him, I can taste it every time I see you look his way. Across the stage, across a set for a photo shoot, in the damn bus if he falls asleep on you... You practically scream for him, and yet, you never do a damn thing about it."
"There is nothing to do." Ruki growled back.
"Which is why you're still single and aching." Aoi returned, his voice not breaking its ominous rumble. "If you want him so fucking bad, why don't you try? You're heart is breaking just like this, you know. Slowly shattering into a thousand needle-sharp pieces... What do you have to lose if you just try, damn it!?"
"Everything."
"He might surprise you." Uruha's quiet murmur had both of them twitching in surprise.
"Ducky." Aoi pouted softly, the black rage gone in a moment as he turned to face the fairer male. "You should be sleeping..."
"I can only sleep so long through all that sexy growling." The blond teased as he lifted his head slightly and slid one arm behind his neck as he rolled slightly to more comfortably consider Ruki and Reita.
As his lover moved, so did Aoi, until Uruha could lean his head back against Aoi's shoulder. The honey-haired male gave him a faint smile and the ghost of a kiss as he shifted, then looked back to Ruki. "We've known each other a long time."
"This is the last time." Ruki reminded him. "This is our last band, Kouyou... I'm not going to screw it up. I can't... I love this too much."
"Akira loves it too, Taka-chan." Uruha persisted.
"More than he loves females." Aoi muttered.
Uruha elbowed him lightly, his voice mildly disapproving. "Yuu, stop it."
"I think they're both in denial." Aoi said firmly, nipping at his lover's ear. "One of them needs to just suck it up and try... And then we all pray the pair of you have enough sense to meet each other half-way."
"He's not meeting me anywhere..." Ruki argued. "He's not like that."
Aoi rolled his eyes. "Riiight."
Reita muttered drowsily as he made to shift into a more comfortable position and found his lower body felt like he had a lead weight strapped to it. With what seemed like a supreme effort, the bi-color haired bassist moved his arm off his eyes and cautiously slid them open to the merest slits. The afternoon sun was not nearly so bright as the morning's direct light, painting a different corner of the room with soft twilight through the curtains.
Still, the soft grey-gold light was more than enough for him to see by. The television had since been turned off, as Aoi and Uruha had left the room. Assuming they had retreated to the bedroom, Reita paid their absence little mind. Kai now slept on the couch, a book just beyond his fingertips as he had one arm draped off the couch. Obviously the drummer had been working until he'd just passed out. Standard Kai, really. Reita could see he'd been listening to music by the dainty white cords that pooled on his chest and traced the side of his face into the dark of his hair.
Well, that was three out of the four accounted for.
With a slow flick of his eyes, Reita focused on the fourth member of the band, fighting the urge to smile or shake his head and tsk. It was a tough call as to which impulse was stronger. But then, when it came to Ruki, things were like that. The adorable, impulsive, hell-bent pervert of a vocalist had the strangest affect on people. Two completely opposite impulses could over take a person, leaving him torn between the varying extremes, and wondering how in the hell the little midget had managed it all.
A pillow lay abandoned on the floor, presumably in use by said vocalist before he pitched it. There was no telling why, or when, he had decided the pillow wasn't good enough.. Just like there was no telling why or when he had decided that Reita's stomach was a better alternative. But decide he had, or so it seemed.
For a mane of dark curls was spread across Reita's abs like a wind-swept bronze tide, curling around the pale, familiar face -and voice- of GazettE. Ruki slept peacefully, his face relaxed and nearly innocent between sleep and no makeup. Laying chest down with a blanket tangled around him, the vocalist rested his right cheek on Reita, arms wrapped around the bassist's waist and somehow curled into the small of his back. Surprisingly, Reita was not uncomfortable. More surprising still, that Ruki had managed all the obvious moving and cuddling without waking Reita up.
"Troublesome bastard." Reita muttered in his usual manner, grinning slightly as one of his hands lifted to smooth one of Ruki's loose curls. "Taka... You should have gone to bed..."
The vocalist made a pleased humming sound deep in his throat at the stroking, rubbing his cheek against Reita's abdomen in an almost kittenish gesture as the rest of his body stretched, then relaxed. Clearly the smaller man wanted to be pet, which would explain why he usually fell on Uruha -provided Aoi was preoccupied or feeling generous. He was an attention whore, they'd all made a point of telling him so before. Though Reita had never realized how true it was until that exact moment, because even unconscious, the smaller male was asking for it.
And for whatever reason, Reita knew his smile never faded as he stroked that silken hair again. It was too good to be true, the shining length of Ruki's hair. There was no telling what products he put in it to keep it so soft and flowing, even with all the dye and stress his mane went through for even a single show. That was a lot of flat-ironing, hair spray, hair gel, hair glue, blow-drying, pulling, curling, and stretching. And still, it was shining, healthy, soft and smelled amazing.
"Dunno' how you do it, runt." Reita chuckled as he shifted himself slightly, his hand resting on Ruki's hair and fingers lightly caressing his scalp as he tried to soothe the smaller man, who was frowning and displeased at the motion. "By rights I should have pitched you, this isn't exactly my ideal arrangement."
"Sorry, forgot about him." Kai was yawning from the other couch as he sat up slowly. "Gimme a sec and I'll heft him off of ya, can probably get him to his bed as long as he doesn't flail."
Reita's eyes jerked up from the vocalist -whom he was still petting- to the drummer. "What? Oh, its not that bad... I'm pretty sure I deserve it, all the times I've fallen asleep on him in the bus and stuff..."
One corner of his mouth twitched in a faint smile as he shrugged. Kai grinned back at this, chuckling softly.
"He owes you a couple hundred more times if we're talking about how much you 'deserve' it..." The drummer pointed out as he untangled the blanket. "You sleep on him all the time."
"He never complains." Reita defended himself, one hand gently touching Ruki's hair as the vocalist shifted in his sleep, muttering incoherently in displeasure at the loss of his blanket. "You're gonna wake him up, Kai... You know he doesn't sleep enough, none of us really do... Leave him."
The bassist wasn’t going to give voice to the urges that prompted his coddling of the small vocalist, whether he was awake or not. Reita didn’t mind that Ruki had fallen asleep on him, but he knew he’d live to regret it -if only barely- if Kai managed to wake the runt up. They’d all be in for it.
Which was the perfect reason to chase Kai off.
"You won't be able to sleep with him on you, and he has a bed." Kai pointed out.
"I slept through it earlier... And it’s fine, just leave him be." Reita pressed, gently stroking the smaller male's hair as Ruki continued to shift and grumble. "And give the damn blanket back, will you? He can be such a bratty ass if you wake him up, and don't think for a minute I'll hesitate in throwing you under the bus. Because you know what? I won't. To save my skin, I'll point right to you and he won't hesitate in throwing you out the damn window. Give it back!"
Kai hesitated momentarily, frowning faintly though he didn't argue with the glare the bassist was giving him. Finally the drummer nodded slightly, tossing the blanket back over the singer as he had been directed.
"There." He murmured, rolling his eyes and leaving the bassist to his fate. "But you're going to be sore later from laying that way and putting up with him.. I don't want to hear you complain."
‘Band mother till the end.’ The bassist almost laughed as he noted Kai’s sulky look.
"Thanks..." He murmured, pulling the blanket up to Ruki's shoulders and resting one hand in the center of the smaller male's back. "Shhh now, Taka..."
"Mmmph." Ruki grumbled one last time, smiling faintly at the stroking his back and mane were receiving.
"Settle." The bassist murmured again as he waved Kai away. "Just settle down, Taka..."
"Hmmmm." The low hum was a contented sound, accompanied by another faint shift and a rub of his cheek against his 'pillow'. His brows quirked in a frown, echoed by the twisting of his perfect lips. "’Kira?"
"Yeah, I've got you Taka..." Reita muttered, voice low and a little gruff as his fingers danced through bronze hair in what he hoped was a soothing fashion. "I've got you..."
"Mmmm." Another mutter of sound, lashes parting so dark eyes were mere slits of question. "Y-you ok?"
"Yeah, yeah Taka..." Reita grinned, tawny eyes affectionate. "Go back to sleep, runt... You need it more than the rest of us. I'll wake you up for food later..."
"Mmnnn 'k." Ruki gave a slight yawn, half-hidden against Reita's Sex Pistols t-shirt as he turned his face away from the light. "Night ‘Kira..."
Amused, the bassist glanced at the late-afternoon sun trying to work its way through the heavy linen curtains. "Yeah, yeah... Night Taka."
And the vocalist smiled as calloused fingers tangle in his hair, the gentle repetition of strokes soothing him to sleep in no time at all. He doesn't know that a certain bassist is watching him with a faint smile... He doesn't know that their drummer is standing in the kitchen observing them both... He isn’t aware of the fact that their guitarists are wrapped around each other and fast asleep in the other room.
He just knows that his family is with him, and as far as he's concerned, that means he's home. Even if they’re just at one hotel, for one night, he’s Home.
Let me know what you think! ^.^
Pairing: Aoi/Uruha & (beginnings of) ReitaxRuki
Writer: black_prophet (Midsummer_Slave)
Genre: Fluff, Randomness
Rating: PG13 (Language maybe?)
Warning: Rambling?
A/N: Written awhile ago, based on the remnants of a dream I remember... It just sort of evolved into this.
Disclaimer: THIS IS A FANFICTION. It is a work of Fiction starring real people that I sadly do not own in any way, shape, or form except for CDs, and DVDs and an impressive collection of pictures, which should count but doesn't. *SAD FACE*
Another fantastic album... Sold out concerts... Awesome live performances.. Meeting fans... Signing autographs and smiling and talking.. Sharing the love of music.. Another town, another night, another live... Bone-breaking exhaustion, spirit-shredding stress, but perfection. They loved the life they shared, loved the band, loved the fans. Loved music.
Another town.
Another town.
They all drag their way into the hotel in the screamingly early hours of the morning -or the excessively late hours of the night, depending on how one wanted to look at it- bags and staff in tow. The manager hands them the keys to their suit and they drag themselves off, not even bothering to keep a thread of conversation going on the elevator ride.
There were tired smiles and nods, the occasional playful lean on each other that was half quiet companionship and half dead-dog exhaustion. They had talked backstage and in the van, but that ride from the venue to the hotel was where exhaustion caught up. As long as they kept moving they were alright, but that sitting still with the soothing rush of air conditioning and humming tires. That was where you realized just how long your days were, how short a time you had to sleep, and how much your muscles protested your idiocy.
They were tired, but they loved it.
Kai curled up in a comfortable chair, laptop on a working table before him. Headphones in, he considered the hotel room and his fellow band mates over the top of the black and silver machine, head swaying slightly as he reviewed drum-patterns in various songs and stages of recording. Kai never stopped working. If he wasn't shepherding around the other four, or seeing to concert details, or wardrobe details, or music details, he was tweaking something or other on the laptop. Even now, where everyone else was practically the walking dead, Kai was working. Working, and watching over them.
Someone had to.
Reita sighed softly to himself as he lay back on the hotel couch, one toned arm thrown casually over his closed eyes to help block out the light. He was doing his best to ignore the fact it was noon, and they'd been up with the live and getting back to the hotel... None of them had mellowed down enough to sleep until well after four a.m. And by rights, none of them should have been out of bed. Yet, here they all hovered -in some form or another- too awake to sleep, too tired to do anything else but lounge in the lushly appointed room. Well, at least they were comfortable in their insomnia.
So the bassist turned on his iPod and threw himself onto the couch, a few pillows between his back and the arm of the couch, which he draped himself against. One long leg hung off the couch, the other he had folded at the knee and leaning against the back of the couch. The position was more of a contented sprawl, arm over his face to cover his eyes, not to hide the fact he was currently without the band he wore to every public function. The people in the room with him were those he let 'see' him, he hid little from his bandmates.
On the other couch -the one angled to face the television- lay the two guitarists. Aoi was currently stretched the length of the couch, one arm propping up his head so he could see the t.v. over the body that was pressed against his front. By rights, Uruha should have fallen off by now, as he was hardly awake enough to save himself, and one wrong breath could have sent him tumbling to the floor. As it was, he was pressed closely back against Aoi, head pillowed on one arm, lazily slitted eyes fixed on whatever the television revealed. And somehow the honey-blond was content in his gravity-tempting lounge.
Rather than watch the television as his pose indicated he would be, Aoi's focus was solely on his fellow guitarist. His free arm was draped along his own hip line, occasionally stirring enough to stroke Uruha's hip, which was bared due to the faint shift of his t-shirt. Uru obviously didn't mind the small triangle of skin being visible, for every time his lover's fingertips touched his skin, his eyes closed in bliss and he snuggled back a little more into the body that spooned his own, prompting a smile from his dark-haired counterpart.
"You're so beautiful." Aoi murmured softly as he bowed his head to Uruha's ear, his lips ghosting along the silk of Uru's mane. "Without any make up, without any artistry but your own. You're beautiful."
Uruha gave a pleased purr, snuggling firmly back against the welcoming body as he lifted and turned his head, stealing a kiss from his lover's surprised lips. "Thank you, flatterer."
Ruki chuckled softly as he paced past the lovebirds, ruffling their hair before shuffling over to the empty corner of Reita's couch. As he curled up in the corner, leaning against the armrest, he gently tapped the bassist's foot. The arm Reita had tossed over his face lifted slightly, a faint smile quirking one corner of his mouth before he covered his eyes again. It was an acknowledgement and a greeting, and then the bassist returned to his music with a faint shifting of his body, making more room for the small vocalist, whether he noticed it or not.
Kai took a break and padded through the room, flinging a blanket over Aoi and his sleeping ducky, then taking another to cover Reita. By this point, Ruki had tossed a pillow over the bassist's legs and flopped sidewise, looking like he was about to drop off into sleep at any minute. The drummer smiled and grabbed a second blanket before he approached the pair.
"Ruki."
The vocalist opened one eye as he frowned up at the drummer and band leader, giving his best pouty, little-boy voice. Though it was obvious he knew Reita was sleeping, for it was little more than a whispered complaint. "Kaaaaaaaiiii! Was sleepin'..."
"Not quite." The drummer retorted, nonplussed. "Sit up a minute, and take your pillow."
"Meanie." Ruki teased softly as he obeyed.
"Only to spoiled little rock stars." Kai replied with a smirk as he tossed one blanket over Reita. "So really, just for you."
"I feel special." Ruki muttered as he watched Reita shift slightly, wincing as he waited for the bassist to wake up snarling. "Kai-"
"He won't wake up." Kai replied as he let Reita shift again, then took Ruki's pillow and rested it on the bassist's hips. "Now lay down."
Ruki was quick to obey, gently pressing his shoulders back against Reita's still-propped-up leg, and cautiously resting his arm over Reita's other thigh. He looked up the drummer, insecurity written on his fine features. Kai chose to ignore the vulnerable look, knowing Ruki took great pleasure in being so near to the one he (not-so) secretly adored above all others. The drummer casually unfolded the last blanket he had, laying it over the vocalist, and then smoothing it with a faint smile.
"Why don't you try to rest, hmm?" The drummer offered, then padded back to his seat and put his headphones back in, refusing to act as though there were anything awkward with Ruki's situation.
As long as none of the others made a fuss over it, when Reita woke, the bassist would avoid doing so... He would just take it as 'Ruki'. Ruki was prone to falling asleep wherever, whenever, and on whoever he felt like. And with Aoi and Uruha hogging the other couch, and Ruki having been on Reita's to begin with, it was no great stretch of the imagination to think the vocalist would simply flop over and use the body as a pillow so he could nap.
It really wasn't the first time... Though the last time such a thing had occurred, it had been Uruha whom Ruki used as a pillow. The guitarist hadn't minded, knowing how much the vocalist needed the reassurance of touch. It wasn't like he could do anything to seek affection from Reita, that just wasn't how the bassist worked... So Uruha had been on a nearby couch, Ruki had used him as a pillow, sighing softly when the guitarist's skilled fingers began soothingly stroking his hair. However, Aoi was a little on the possessive side, and upon seeing his lover petting someone else, had gotten just a little territorial.
So while the one guitarist paid their vocalist some much needed attention, his lover had snuck up behind him. Resting one hand on the arm of the couch as he leaned over the back, Aoi used his silk-soft lips to assault his lover's tender throat, the occasional love-bite dropped on Uruha's neck as the guitarist arched his head and silently asked for more. Ruki had remained more or less oblivious, until a particularly skilled caress had Uruha purring out loud. At the sound, Ruki had shot up off the couch and across the room before he spun around, greeted with a softly chuckling Aoi.
"What do you know." The dark-haired man had laughed, placing another kiss on Uruha's neck. "My ducky can purr... What a rare thing you are, pet."
Since then, Ruki was very careful how close he got to Uruha. At that point in time, Aoi had been content to make his point in a more playful fashion. The vocalist did not want to be around if the guitarist decided force was the necessary display.
The vocalist had been laying on Reita for about an hour, and yet it felt like only minutes. But then, he could also feel the strain of that stolen hour jumping up and down his neck. He felt like any minute now Reita would simply vault off the couch wide awake and screaming that if wanted the perverted vocalist groping him, he'd be awake and asking for it himself. So far, it hadn't happened... And yeah, he was mentally exaggerating Reita's reaction, but when you were paranoid about something, you had that tendency.
But rather than stare actively at the one he so desperately longed to touch even as he reluctantly did so, the singer was watching the guitarist couple on the far couch. Uruha had fallen asleep at last, Aoi's arm firmly around his waist and holding him into his lover's body. The elder male still had his head propped up, now with his arm folded beneath his head and atop a pillow, so he could look down at his lover without effort.
It was to that look Ruki clung.
"Why do you do that?" Ruki asked in a soft whisper.
Tortured black eyes left the angelic face they'd been memorizing, slowly focusing on Ruki's distant visage, before returning to the dear face so close. "Do what?"
"Look at him..." Ruki licked his lips and swallowed, gaze skipping up to Reita's lips -all he could clearly see of the other male's face- and back to the guitarist he was questioning. "Like your heart is breaking."
Silence met the question, the low hum of the television sounding so loud in the utter stillness of the room. The vocalist shifted slightly, eager to know the answer -and yet not- but not wanting to ask again. Aoi had a temper -they all knew that- and the last thing Ruki wanted to do was rouse it, and risk the guitarist deciding not to answer at all. And Aoi could -and would- do such a thing, and would have every right to it. He didn't have to answer Ruki's question...
"You should know the answer to that better than almost anyone here, Takanori." Aoi replied at long-last, not bothering to glance at the vocalist as he delivered a rather 'loaded' answer. He didn't want to fight, particularly not now and not about this, but he wasn't going to let Ruki continue lying to himself either.
"If I did, I wouldn't have asked." The younger male replied sulkily, a growl behind the words.
Once more Aoi's gaze was on him, making Ruki shift uncomfortably, even as the guitarist called him on his denial in a voice that was utterly deadpan. "That is complete bullshit, and you know it."
Ruki glared back. "I don't know what you mean."
"You do so." Aoi argued. "After all... I've seen you give the very same look."
Ruki looked away, focusing on a bit of floor, saying nothing.
"You think I don't see it?" Aoi pressed, sitting up slightly.
As he moved, so did Uruha, prompting an unconscious petting from his dark-haired lover. Graceful pale hands with black-painted nails stroked over the waistline of worn blue jeans and glided over the clinging cotton of a swiped shirt, one of Aoi’s own. He couldn’t care less that Uruha had stolen it; if anything, he preferred the idea of his lover wearing his clothing.
Ruki glanced back at the pair to longingly watch the way the other male thoughtlessly gave his affection, soothing his lover back to sleep without breaking his attention to Ruki. Black eyes were still fixed on him, Aoi’s attention was still on him, but the eldest member of the band was still perfectly in tune with his honey-haired counterpart. It was as natural as breathing, which was something Ruki envied… Even as he wished it wasn't true so -perhaps- Aoi would be distracted and forget about him.
"Do you think we're all blind and dumb?" Aoi snarled, making Ruki jerk his gaze back to Aoi's. The guitarist's black gaze burned with anger and frustration. "I know how badly you fucking want him, I can taste it every time I see you look his way. Across the stage, across a set for a photo shoot, in the damn bus if he falls asleep on you... You practically scream for him, and yet, you never do a damn thing about it."
"There is nothing to do." Ruki growled back.
"Which is why you're still single and aching." Aoi returned, his voice not breaking its ominous rumble. "If you want him so fucking bad, why don't you try? You're heart is breaking just like this, you know. Slowly shattering into a thousand needle-sharp pieces... What do you have to lose if you just try, damn it!?"
"Everything."
"He might surprise you." Uruha's quiet murmur had both of them twitching in surprise.
"Ducky." Aoi pouted softly, the black rage gone in a moment as he turned to face the fairer male. "You should be sleeping..."
"I can only sleep so long through all that sexy growling." The blond teased as he lifted his head slightly and slid one arm behind his neck as he rolled slightly to more comfortably consider Ruki and Reita.
As his lover moved, so did Aoi, until Uruha could lean his head back against Aoi's shoulder. The honey-haired male gave him a faint smile and the ghost of a kiss as he shifted, then looked back to Ruki. "We've known each other a long time."
"This is the last time." Ruki reminded him. "This is our last band, Kouyou... I'm not going to screw it up. I can't... I love this too much."
"Akira loves it too, Taka-chan." Uruha persisted.
"More than he loves females." Aoi muttered.
Uruha elbowed him lightly, his voice mildly disapproving. "Yuu, stop it."
"I think they're both in denial." Aoi said firmly, nipping at his lover's ear. "One of them needs to just suck it up and try... And then we all pray the pair of you have enough sense to meet each other half-way."
"He's not meeting me anywhere..." Ruki argued. "He's not like that."
Aoi rolled his eyes. "Riiight."
Reita muttered drowsily as he made to shift into a more comfortable position and found his lower body felt like he had a lead weight strapped to it. With what seemed like a supreme effort, the bi-color haired bassist moved his arm off his eyes and cautiously slid them open to the merest slits. The afternoon sun was not nearly so bright as the morning's direct light, painting a different corner of the room with soft twilight through the curtains.
Still, the soft grey-gold light was more than enough for him to see by. The television had since been turned off, as Aoi and Uruha had left the room. Assuming they had retreated to the bedroom, Reita paid their absence little mind. Kai now slept on the couch, a book just beyond his fingertips as he had one arm draped off the couch. Obviously the drummer had been working until he'd just passed out. Standard Kai, really. Reita could see he'd been listening to music by the dainty white cords that pooled on his chest and traced the side of his face into the dark of his hair.
Well, that was three out of the four accounted for.
With a slow flick of his eyes, Reita focused on the fourth member of the band, fighting the urge to smile or shake his head and tsk. It was a tough call as to which impulse was stronger. But then, when it came to Ruki, things were like that. The adorable, impulsive, hell-bent pervert of a vocalist had the strangest affect on people. Two completely opposite impulses could over take a person, leaving him torn between the varying extremes, and wondering how in the hell the little midget had managed it all.
A pillow lay abandoned on the floor, presumably in use by said vocalist before he pitched it. There was no telling why, or when, he had decided the pillow wasn't good enough.. Just like there was no telling why or when he had decided that Reita's stomach was a better alternative. But decide he had, or so it seemed.
For a mane of dark curls was spread across Reita's abs like a wind-swept bronze tide, curling around the pale, familiar face -and voice- of GazettE. Ruki slept peacefully, his face relaxed and nearly innocent between sleep and no makeup. Laying chest down with a blanket tangled around him, the vocalist rested his right cheek on Reita, arms wrapped around the bassist's waist and somehow curled into the small of his back. Surprisingly, Reita was not uncomfortable. More surprising still, that Ruki had managed all the obvious moving and cuddling without waking Reita up.
"Troublesome bastard." Reita muttered in his usual manner, grinning slightly as one of his hands lifted to smooth one of Ruki's loose curls. "Taka... You should have gone to bed..."
The vocalist made a pleased humming sound deep in his throat at the stroking, rubbing his cheek against Reita's abdomen in an almost kittenish gesture as the rest of his body stretched, then relaxed. Clearly the smaller man wanted to be pet, which would explain why he usually fell on Uruha -provided Aoi was preoccupied or feeling generous. He was an attention whore, they'd all made a point of telling him so before. Though Reita had never realized how true it was until that exact moment, because even unconscious, the smaller male was asking for it.
And for whatever reason, Reita knew his smile never faded as he stroked that silken hair again. It was too good to be true, the shining length of Ruki's hair. There was no telling what products he put in it to keep it so soft and flowing, even with all the dye and stress his mane went through for even a single show. That was a lot of flat-ironing, hair spray, hair gel, hair glue, blow-drying, pulling, curling, and stretching. And still, it was shining, healthy, soft and smelled amazing.
"Dunno' how you do it, runt." Reita chuckled as he shifted himself slightly, his hand resting on Ruki's hair and fingers lightly caressing his scalp as he tried to soothe the smaller man, who was frowning and displeased at the motion. "By rights I should have pitched you, this isn't exactly my ideal arrangement."
"Sorry, forgot about him." Kai was yawning from the other couch as he sat up slowly. "Gimme a sec and I'll heft him off of ya, can probably get him to his bed as long as he doesn't flail."
Reita's eyes jerked up from the vocalist -whom he was still petting- to the drummer. "What? Oh, its not that bad... I'm pretty sure I deserve it, all the times I've fallen asleep on him in the bus and stuff..."
One corner of his mouth twitched in a faint smile as he shrugged. Kai grinned back at this, chuckling softly.
"He owes you a couple hundred more times if we're talking about how much you 'deserve' it..." The drummer pointed out as he untangled the blanket. "You sleep on him all the time."
"He never complains." Reita defended himself, one hand gently touching Ruki's hair as the vocalist shifted in his sleep, muttering incoherently in displeasure at the loss of his blanket. "You're gonna wake him up, Kai... You know he doesn't sleep enough, none of us really do... Leave him."
The bassist wasn’t going to give voice to the urges that prompted his coddling of the small vocalist, whether he was awake or not. Reita didn’t mind that Ruki had fallen asleep on him, but he knew he’d live to regret it -if only barely- if Kai managed to wake the runt up. They’d all be in for it.
Which was the perfect reason to chase Kai off.
"You won't be able to sleep with him on you, and he has a bed." Kai pointed out.
"I slept through it earlier... And it’s fine, just leave him be." Reita pressed, gently stroking the smaller male's hair as Ruki continued to shift and grumble. "And give the damn blanket back, will you? He can be such a bratty ass if you wake him up, and don't think for a minute I'll hesitate in throwing you under the bus. Because you know what? I won't. To save my skin, I'll point right to you and he won't hesitate in throwing you out the damn window. Give it back!"
Kai hesitated momentarily, frowning faintly though he didn't argue with the glare the bassist was giving him. Finally the drummer nodded slightly, tossing the blanket back over the singer as he had been directed.
"There." He murmured, rolling his eyes and leaving the bassist to his fate. "But you're going to be sore later from laying that way and putting up with him.. I don't want to hear you complain."
‘Band mother till the end.’ The bassist almost laughed as he noted Kai’s sulky look.
"Thanks..." He murmured, pulling the blanket up to Ruki's shoulders and resting one hand in the center of the smaller male's back. "Shhh now, Taka..."
"Mmmph." Ruki grumbled one last time, smiling faintly at the stroking his back and mane were receiving.
"Settle." The bassist murmured again as he waved Kai away. "Just settle down, Taka..."
"Hmmmm." The low hum was a contented sound, accompanied by another faint shift and a rub of his cheek against his 'pillow'. His brows quirked in a frown, echoed by the twisting of his perfect lips. "’Kira?"
"Yeah, I've got you Taka..." Reita muttered, voice low and a little gruff as his fingers danced through bronze hair in what he hoped was a soothing fashion. "I've got you..."
"Mmmm." Another mutter of sound, lashes parting so dark eyes were mere slits of question. "Y-you ok?"
"Yeah, yeah Taka..." Reita grinned, tawny eyes affectionate. "Go back to sleep, runt... You need it more than the rest of us. I'll wake you up for food later..."
"Mmnnn 'k." Ruki gave a slight yawn, half-hidden against Reita's Sex Pistols t-shirt as he turned his face away from the light. "Night ‘Kira..."
Amused, the bassist glanced at the late-afternoon sun trying to work its way through the heavy linen curtains. "Yeah, yeah... Night Taka."
And the vocalist smiled as calloused fingers tangle in his hair, the gentle repetition of strokes soothing him to sleep in no time at all. He doesn't know that a certain bassist is watching him with a faint smile... He doesn't know that their drummer is standing in the kitchen observing them both... He isn’t aware of the fact that their guitarists are wrapped around each other and fast asleep in the other room.
He just knows that his family is with him, and as far as he's concerned, that means he's home. Even if they’re just at one hotel, for one night, he’s Home.
Let me know what you think! ^.^