lullabies to paralyze [final?]

[izkariote]

X-Posted to reuk_schitz and stitched_o.

As promised. :3

Feedback appreciated. I hope this'll be worth the read.


Lullabies to Paralyze.
Mikhail and Hikaru in Fourteen Parts.

Fourteen. “You Got a Killer Scene There, Man…”

It didn’t look like there was anyone around when he came to #2041, Citrus Avenue. This wasn’t surprising: it was the beginning of the hottest summer the country had seen. Everyone woke up to the sun burning holes through their eyelids. That evening was relatively cooler than the rest, but it was small comfort. The crickets singing in the tall grass blocked out the sound of the river and did little else beyond annoying him.
Mikhail Kaledin stood in the narrow corridor by the entrance of the boys’ boarding house, reaching deep into the pockets of his coat for those Sobranies he was sure he had bought a day ago, at the train station. Blake Jerevinan - the boarder that had been sent as his guide - had already moved off to inform 2041’s other residents of the new arrival. Mikhail was not expecting anyone to bother with helping him, and it didn’t really matter; most of his belongings had already gone to the house ahead of him, and were probably waiting in his new room. All he had on him at the moment was a suitcase and a metal attaché that he preferred to handle himself.
…Definitely not at par with what I can actually afford, but that’s a good thing in its own way, I suppose.
Mikhail was not at the boarding house for the lack of better options; the city was full of choice apartment units and higher-class residences all within the generous amount of money he had at his disposal. #2041 was, however, the closest to Isherwood University, and Mikhail had always considered himself to be a creature of practicality. So he had come to this humble compound of three nearly identical houses, aligned to face each other across a common garden. Two levels excluding provisions for an attic and basement, white walls, steel and dark wood accents, and wide windows; the minimalist design for each house appealed to him. Given the compound’s surroundings in the wide-ended cul-de-sac that Citrus Avenue bled into, he could only wonder how young the place was compared to everything else.
“Excuse me,” he murmured to the boy he spotted cutting across the hall ahead of him. “I just got here… I’d like to know where my room is.”
“Where were you assigned?”
“302.”
“What do you know? That’s near mine!” The boy grinned; he looked like the type who smiled easy. Mouse brown hair, steady eyes. Almost cute, in a sun-bronzed sort of way. “Third floor. Go for the door that has a small set of steps at front… its right in front of the stairwell. The name’s Adam, by the way. Adam Morrison.”
“Mikhail Kaledin. You a freshman?”
“I wish!”
Mikhail exchanged a few more niceties with Adam before he went for the iron-wrought spiral staircase at the end of the hall and Adam went to get some milk in the kitchen. He encountered no one else on the way to his room. When he reached the third floor and spotted the door Adam had talked about, he briefly wondered if he should have asked whether he was alone or had a roommate. Then he figured as he opened the black door that it didn’t really matter.
The first thing that he noticed was how radically different the temperature in the room was compared to what he had encountered outside; the second were the walls. Painted in black and midnight blue, and covered inch by inch with collages made from magazine clippings, newsprint, photographs, and random junk. Third came the rugs (striped gray and midnight blue), fourth were the shelves upon shelves of books. Fifth was the fact that all furniture in the place was either black, made of metal, made of leather, made of glass, or a combination of all of the above. The air-conditioner hummed merrily away from its place high up near the ceiling.
Light was scattered between pockets of shadow by candles floating in small coiled pottery bowls and small studio lights in odd corners or rows hanging from the ceiling. There were two steel-framed beds with black pillows, black sheets and head and foot boards that looked like collections of horizontal straps and buckles rather than anything solid. One was by the window on the north wall that slanted inward; the other was at the far corner of the room, which would have looked like a lonely place if it wasn’t for a reading corner fashioned from a circular rug surrounded by large throw pillows and bean bags, another metal closet, a small fridge and two empty shelves. The cardboard boxes labeled with his last name were huddled beside it.
Strangely, it was the boy he noticed last. What Mikhail could only infer as his new roommate was coiled up rather tastefully in a leather seat, typing away at his Mac. Moonlit skin, tousled black hair, features soft enough to attract and sharp enough to be gothic poetry in line art. There was the small hollow and sketched definition of muscles in that lithe build, beneath the folds of the loose sweater the boy was wearing. Probably the irresponsible rocker kind, the libertine, the sin pooled in a woman’s wildest dream, or maybe a man’s.
Gorgeous.
Tori Amos was singing to them about things that had never been said through the speakers, and there was a black cigarette smoldering away on its perch by the ashtray shaped like a hollowed-out trunk of some dead tree. Mikhail couldn’t stop himself from smiling. He was glad his mother had always taught him to appraise and appreciate beauty at its best.
“Mikhail Kaledin, right? About twenty-five, taking an MA in Business Administration.”
“The one and only. Blake told you?”
“Blake told me.” Long, tapered fingers plucked the fag up, kissed them to curved, supple lips, and then continued their dance across the keyboard. “Hikaru Shinta. About nineteen, taking History with a minor in Literature. I’m your new roommate and this is your new room, whether you like it or not.”
“I like what I see.”
“Good for you.” In most of the conversations Mikhail had with people, by this point they’d be smiling at him, pressing skin on his skin in the kind of silent message that pointed all arrows towards one bed and no clothes. He got none of this from Hikaru, and that only served to intrigue him further. “Hope you don’t mind helping yourself to things for a bit. This poem demands every ounce of brain power I’ve got left in me.”
Mikhail murmured assent and walked further inside, heading for what was now his space in the room to make his own. As he passed the shelves he counted as much comics and books of close to all genres worth reading in his eyes as he did in historical references.
“Check the fridge, if you’re thirsty. Dry snacks are in the cabinet above it.”
Man follows Earth, Earth follows Heaven, Heaven follows Nature, said the words on the white postcard magnetized to the door of the fridge. Vodka, Cervesa Negra, Irish Cream, Japanese miscellany and, strangely, a bottle of lube and a collection of drugs that didn’t look like the medicinal kind. Mikhail tried not to smile again and wondered, briefly, where the condoms were kept. He picked out a Cruiser.
“Want anything?”
“Whatever you’re having.”
There might have been another meaning to that statement if they weren’t delivered so neutrally. He came up behind Hikaru, handing the bottle over his companion’s shoulder and scanning what lines he could from the younger student’s work.
“Looks like you’re a man after my own heart so far. I approve.”
“I’m absolutely tickled to hear that.” Finally, a smile and a turn in his direction. Those violet eyes, however, held on to his for longer than they should have. They held for dear life.
“What?”
“…N, nothing.” Hikaru looked away from him as though he was stung. He took a few generous swigs from his bottle, and only spoke again after he was halfway done with it. “Our bathroom’s near your end… it’s the door with the poster of gibberish on it. Prepare yourself for odd hours. I think I’ve lost track of what sleep is supposed to be.”
Mikhail didn’t know how to answer, and it wasn’t for the lack of wit. That moment had been more than weird. He might have asked, but his new roommate had lapsed into silence. When he had finished unpacking his things, freshening up, dressing down and carefully tucking the attaché case away under his bed where no one had to see it until he meant them to, Hikaru was still typing. He was listening to Queens of the Stone Age now. He fell asleep to a lullaby.

Thirteen. I Never Came.

“…And that’s about all there is to see on campus. I think we can stop here.”
Mikhail made an acquiescent sound, looking off to the near invisible line between the rooftops of Isherwood University and the sky. Rethe Kyriff stood beside him with hands in pockets and blue-gray eyes beyond serene. A sophomore majoring in Literature with a minor in Philosophy, and another addition to #2041 Citrus Avenue. They had run into each other a few times already in the hallway over the past two days since Mikhail’s arrival, but they had only talked now, with Rethe giving Mikhail a tour on Blake’s suggestion.
It was hardly a week after the end of the school year and not even the beginning of the summer semester. They were probably alone with the maintenance and the stray cats that seemed to be everywhere Mikhail looked on campus. He decided he liked this place, with its quaint scenery and over abundance of trees. And there was the boarding house too. One of the boys he now lived with was amusing enough, with the signals he kept sending with his eyes. Nikolai Rostov, was it? The name had a nice roll on his tongue.
“Let’s head back.”
“Mm.”
The trip back to #2041 was made in silence, with Mikhail driving and Rethe sitting silent in the passenger’s seat beside him, arm pillowed against the ledge of the window and staring off apathetically at the trees as they zipped by.
“There’s a river behind the compound. It’s that time of the year, so the fireflies always come out at night. Have you been there already?”
“No.”
“Ah. Lots of the other boarders go there to talk and drink when the nights are too warm for them to stay inside. I think you’d like it.”
Odd of this boy to be speaking to him. Then Mikhail remembered walking into his room to find Rethe at Hikaru’s computer and Hikaru picking out stuff to read from the shelves, waxing New Criticism between each other through words. When he had asked Hikaru, his roommate had affirmed that they were friends, and that he shouldn’t be too alarmed if Rethe ‘did weird things.’ Mikhail guessed that holding any sort of conversation with another person must have been one of those ‘weird things.’
Some of the boarders were gathered on at the bottom curve of the cul-de-sac, watching two skateboarders - one a boy with violently orange hair and the other a girl in black and beads - see who could do the most number of aerial turnovers at a time. Rethe murmured a request to be let off at the small supermarket that was more of a convenience store than anything else on the pretense of picking up the groceries. It was his turn this week. Mikhail complied. He parked his Benz in the garage, slipping it beside Hiroshi Fukazawa’s F150. He walked inside, stepping out into the common garden hugged on all sides by the rest of the compound.
“Don’t run away from this time. You’ve avoided me long enough!”
“I’m not running away.”
“Then why haven’t you answered me?”
The sound of voices stopped him just within the shadows of the garage’s rooftop and the tool shed. He dared to look up, and he spotted the source in Hikaru standing indignant on the porch of the teacher’s boarding house, glaring up at a man Mikhail figured was one of the professors. He had longish gray hair and an impossibly tall frame; his face looked like a collection of hard angles. It looked like he was having a hard time meeting Hikaru’s eyes.
“We’ve been through this before, Hikaru. I don’t want to lose a job, and I doubt you’d want to lose a brother.”
“I keep telling you, we’re not going to lose anything. Why won’t you believe me?”
The professor made as if to leave. Hikaru grabbed his arm.
“You can’t know what I’ve given up for this. Please.”
It was an odd plea, carried on the air as the barest whisper. For a moment, Mikhail almost thought that things would go well from that point. He knew it would have if it had been him, at least. But then the professor removed himself from Hikaru’s grasp and turned away for real.
“You shouldn’t have had to give up anything.”
The garage door opened behind him, and Mikhail turned to see Rethe coming in with two bags full of groceries. He offered to help the boy. By the time they stepped out into the garden, Hikaru had retreated into the house and the professor was nowhere in sight.
It was only after he was done unpacking the groceries with Rethe in the kitchen that Mikhail realized that the professor had gray eyes almost exactly like his own.

Twelve. Medication.

Hikaru was not really around for the next week both in body and in spirit. When he was there he was absorbed in writing whatever he was writing on his computer. When he wasn’t he was out clubbing, and came back smelling like sex, drugs, alcohol and cigarettes, even though a part of Mikhail was certain that his roommate hadn’t had much of the first option by choice.
The professor was the one whom Mikhail saw the most. The man was part of the History department. He was often by the river with targets propped at various heights, shooting his guns in the company the Irish workaholic from the Science and Engineering Department. When he had asked Blake about it, the blond had said that the gray-haired one was Alistair Mordechai. “Cool guy, if I do say so myself,” the blond had added. “The kind with the license to kill, if he was ever in a gang or something.” Mikhail had already figured that he must have been, to merit such devotion from the sensual creature that was his roommate. He asked no more of the issue, and Hikaru continued coming home late and locking himself away from everything.
That strangeness led to the weird of another sort with the next weekend. It started with Mikhail smoking at the reading corner as he mulled over the monthly report of his company. He stared off at the poster of gibberish on the bathroom with the words ‘I’, ‘never’, ‘liked’, ‘your’ and ‘Poetry’ in five pastel shades as one often does to understand something better, and then the bathroom door opened to let Hikaru into the room, naked but for a towel.
“Let’s go out.”
“Okay.” Mikhail marked the last paragraph he had read and set the papers aside, squaring gray eyes up to Hikaru’s pale violet ones. Idly and only for a moment, he wondered if his roommate intended to go out exactly as he was. “Where?”
“I don’t know. Anywhere but here, I guess.”
Hikaru crossed over to his closet, dropping the towel and letting it pool at his feet as he searched for clothes. Mikhail might have been so prude as to assume that Hikaru had done that innocently, but he had fucked around enough and loved well enough to know when nakedness was an accident and when it was intentional. Perhaps Hikaru simply didn’t care about the fact that he wasn’t alone. That was better, in more ways than one. Mikhail made it a point to enjoy every second of the free show, memorizing what he could of that ripped frame too perfect to suit the historian and bookworm that the course of his roommate professed him to be.
Hikaru was dressed in five, and they were out of the dorm in fifteen. It was midnight by the time they hit the city’s bar scene, and the clubs were now anemones of arms and gyrating bodies under laser light shows fluorescent shades. They did not dance this time, but knocked back a few at the bar instead, where the bartender was flipping bottles in a merry show of movement that mildly amused the sober and highly amused the drunk. Mikhail was more interested in the silence of his companion over the festivities. He did not know exactly when his patience was finally rewarded, only that it was.
“I used to have a girl. She was a sweet one. Believed in tantric sex.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah. We broke up after finals week. She said she understood, so it was fine.”
“What happened?”
“Nothing.”
“Nothing?”
“Yeah. Nothing happened, but it ended anyway. It might have been my fault.”
Hikaru ended on that note and looked into Mikhail’s eyes only to flinch away again and retreat into his drink. The arch of his back and the way he lifted the glass to his lips made Mikhail wonder just how long it had been since somebody had touched the boy, kissed him, or had him. He stopped himself from asking the question out loud by downing another shot.
Mikhail hadn’t thought it possible, but regardless Hikaru was very drunk by the time they left their tenth bar. He caught the younger man before he could take a header into the street. Hikaru smelled fantastic at that point, with the night air and the alcohol, his body a warm and generally limp weight from knees up.
“Come on. Let’s go back.”
A soft, lazy chuckle. It grated down Mikhail’s spine like a serrated blade. The city passed him by in a blur with lights swimming in it after that.
The sounds of common insomnia filled the boarding house at their return. The trek back to their room went generally uninterrupted. Mikhail dumped Hikaru into his own bed and stripped him of everything save his pants and undershirt before going off to make coffee. By the time he was done, the boy had passed out. Mikhail went to take a shower. When he came back, Hikaru was curled on his side, whispering Alistair’s name and other sad nothings in his sleep. Mikhail did not bother to wake him. When he slept, it was his first night with dreams in years.

Eleven. In My Head.

When Hikaru woke up to shadows beyond the window panes and a buzzing hangover, he couldn’t help but feel as though time had betrayed him. He lurched to his feet and went for his computer, trying to be as silent as he could even though he doubted his own ability to walk straight. He was off-balance. Losing control and drinking to oblivion did that to people like him. He turned the computer on and wrote until the digital clock went from 2:00 AM to 5:00 AM. With fingers still tingling from typing too much, Hikaru attempted to pull out a cigarette and light up. It hadn’t felt like three hours. He checked the clock again, and again.
Obsessive-compulsiveness. A sign of a person who desires control for he has been granted little of it himself. He could hear Satsuki’s voice in his head, feeding him with psychobabble. Hikaru let the fag drop from his fingers as he wandered into the bathroom, peeling off his clothes. He hadn’t realized how hot it was all of a sudden, in spite of the air-conditioner.
White marble tiles and stainless steel, all of it hard, unforgiving and frigid to the touch. It was one half of two extremes, the other being the near scalding water of the shower that he flicked on the moment he slipped into the stall. Nothing like the warmth of human skin, but it would do. There were times that he would have liked to think that the one he really wanted wasn’t human at all.
How many times had it been like this, he wondered as the water seemed to burn away everything written on his skin. To let the steam and heat hide his flushes as he touched himself, pretending someone else was doing things to him. There was no relief in it. Maybe the only time he’d be able to run away from it all was if he managed to get himself killed.
You shouldn’t have had to give up anything. There had been nothing after that, only a strange light in Alistair’s eyes before he had turned and walked away. Alistair said anything, did anything. No hints, no promises, only an arm holding him away from what he was sure both of them wanted. But there were factors in the equation called ‘family’ and ‘duty’ that Alistair was convinced they couldn’t get rid of.
Hikaru could hear his breath quicken over the relentless pound of water against taut body and shower stall floor, harsh and uncontrolled despite the steadiness of his hand. The years hadn’t changed anything, only made him more afraid of the dreams that left him flushed and breathless. It wasn’t good anymore, gaining what pleasure he could from something like this, but it would be enough to sustain him through another day and give him the ability to walk forward and face the other boarders with a smile that revealed nothing. Maybe it would keep Mikhail from noticing too, for that was the last thing he needed. Another soul who knew.
From that point onward, only the walls’ deaf ears could hear the name he whispered into the steam.

Ten. Little Brother.

“It’s not what you think it is.”
Ping. Mikhail brandished the tongs in his hand and lifted the Pop Tarts from the toaster. He plopped them unto a plate then turned to check on the black boiling away on the coffeemaker, knowing full well that Rethe was in the doorway looking at him but not caring a smidgen for it.
“And what is it that you think that I think I know?”
“You think it’s a doomed relationship. You think it’s not going to work.”
So Rethe had caught the exchange in the common garden as he had, and then how he had come home with Hikaru draped on him, too perfectly and beautifully drunk for it all to have been an accident. Mikhail flipped a black mug off the whole rack of them tacked above the counter. He forked off a bit of Pop Tart from the biscuit and popped it into his mouth.
“You must be psychic. Want some? It’s good.”
Rethe merely blinked at him.
“Hikaru broke up with Satsuki because his brother had said that it was all right if he went with Alistair. Alistair doesn’t want to believe him.”
“I don’t know who the bigger idiot between them is.”
“Alistair feels that there are better men than him, and that the only thing he’ll manage to do to Hikaru is hurt him.”
“There are better men, and if that’s what he believes than he is succeeding.”
“You’re not one of the better ones.”
Mikhail grinned.
“I beg to differ.”
The coffeemaker’s whisper built up into a keening wail. Mikhail went to get himself a mug while he chewed on more Pop Tarts. He was unto his second biscuit, and was contemplating on toasting another batch.
“I’m only going to let this slip if you’re going to make him happy.”
When Mikhail looked up, Rethe was already gone.

Nine. Everybody Knows That You Are Insane.

Some later day. Mikhail came home to the boarding house and his room to find Hikaru lying down on the floor, staring up at the ceiling and smoking. Violent Femmes sang a ballad of coloring once and coloring twice from the computer speakers.
“What are you doing?”
“Hush. You’re disturbing the experimental specimens.”
“The what?”
“Nicodioxidetology. New course. I made it.”
“And what is it?”
“The study of smoke rings.”
Mikhail crossed the room. He opened the window and turned the fan on to blow the smoke away. When he spoke, he took pains to make his voice sound rough enough to seem exasperated, smooth enough to make someone think he cared. No mention had been made of Hikaru’s first drunken night with him, and he still had to pretend that he didn’t know anything.
“I’d invite you out, if you weren’t so busy drowning in contemplation.”
“I’m not drowning.”
“Dog-paddling, then?”
“No, no. Freestyle.”
Mikhail threw himself down unto one of the beanbags. “A boy like you shouldn’t waste away like this,” he remarked, putting his chin on one hand. “It’s a sin to save yourself for someone who refuses to be with you.”
Hikaru sat up. In the sunlight streaming through the windows, every detail of his person was carefully etched and burned unto Mikhail’s eyes. When the boy spoke, he heard every careful enunciation, tasted the depth of their brevity.
“If I don’t do it this way, I’d probably break apart.”

Some later day. Mikhail followed Hikaru to the university training hall, where the boy made it a habit to keep himself in shape. The promotional tournaments for all martial arts were coming soon, and Isherwood’s teams were going to participate in each one. In the courtyard nearby, the archery team was doing target practice. Mikhail fancied that he could hear each arrow let loose in as much as he could follow the whoosh of his roommate’s sword cutting through air.
“How long have you studied the art?”
“For as long as I can remember. My father is a Nine-Dan kendo master. I’ve always wanted to reach his level.”
“How close are you now?”
“About four or five Dan away.”
“Devotion seems to be a finer quality of yours.”
“It hasn’t gotten me very far in life.”
“Maybe you’re measuring it with the wrong kind of scale.”
Watching Hikaru lash out at nothing in perfect serenity was like watching a tiger in a zoo pacing about in its cage. Somehow he knew that if he measured each step and movement they would come off even, perfectly proportional, exacting, and cold.
“Ever considered being with someone else while you’re waiting?”
“I have been.”
“And?”
“I’d rather be alone. Being satisfied just deepens the hurt sometimes.”
Mikhail wondered on how anyone could be that harsh on one’s self because he knew that he wasn’t capable of it.
“Your girlfriend must have been a saint.”
“She was. When I told her we were off, she just looked me straight in the eye and made me promise to let her watch if I finally had the chance to get done in by the guy I really want.”
“What did you say to her?”
“I said yes.”
Mikhail leaned back against the wall and ran his fingers through the chain of a necklace some girl had given to him in the past. Now would have been an excellent time for a cigarette, but he had left his pack at home. Nicotine was always around when he actually needed it the least, and when he wanted it beyond the sake of simply wanting it, nicotine was never there.
“What if I was the one who offered you?”
The wooden sword froze, poised over the head of some invisible enemy. It curved downward, tentatively, as though sliding across the skin of a neck. And then Hikaru lowered it and walked out of the dojo.
“I’ll see you at home.”

There were other conversations, some involving literature and history and politics while others involved sexual conquests of all sizes or ages and the principles of bondage and stories of sucking off or getting sucked off in back rooms to clubs while gloriously high, but none of them were as conclusive.

Eight. Someone’s in the Wolf.

Some later day. Mikhail found that he decided upon taking Hikaru for himself.



Seven. Burn the Witch.

The first week of summer classes marked the beginning of Mikhail learning about the regular rituals governing #2041 Citrus Avenue and the occupants of the compound. There was Risk Night on Monday, Gaming Night on Tuesday, Strip Poker Night on Wednesday, Cram & Group Study Night on Thursday, Grill Night on Friday, Rave Night on Saturday, and Poetry Night on Sunday. Of all the gatherings, Fridays and Wednesdays had the most people.
Laughter and testosterone was abound at one corner of the field, where Blake Jerevinan, Feränen Hellesing, Trent Aznar and Calintz Duskrider - the perpetual ‘masters’ of the grill - were busy guzzling beer and keeping the meat coming. In another corner, Rilea Heartnet and Ganymede Erasmus - two female professors - were setting up their newest rocket. Almost everyone else was spread out on mats, enjoying the food and the company.
Mikhail reclined on one such mat, surveying the scene. Nikolai Rostov was spread on top of him, idly playing with the buttons of his collar. The boy was still flushed from their previous mad sessions of kissing. They had been at it at ever since they had tumbled into bed together earlier that day. “Shouldn’t you be with your boyfriend?” Mikhail eventually asked again. The Russian boy merely laughed and ran his fingers through Mikhail’s dark hair.
“He does not mind. I would like to think he rather approves of my… ah, selection.”
And they were kissing again. Mikhail let this go on for a while longer before he insisted that Nikolai keep up appearances with Maes Mordechai, the professor that happened to be the boy’s lover. He sent the cute Russian off with a slap to the butt. When his gaze wandered back towards the dormitories, the first thing he spotted was Hikaru coming down to join the party.
…And here I thought he’d stay holed up there forever.
After spending most of his day engaged in gratuitous amounts of sex with Nikolai in the boy’s room, Mikhail had returned to his own quarters and Hikaru working away at his computer. They hadn’t talked to each other at all that day, beyond a small reminder on Grill Night. Mikhail had gone ahead to join the festivities, thinking that Hikaru wouldn’t bother turning up. His roommate hadn’t been very receptive to much of anything as of late.
He’s not supposed to be like this.
Such a conclusion had only been drawn recently, after some casual conversation with the other dormers at the house. Things had never quite been the same with the ‘evil senpai’ of Citrus Avenue since finals, when he and his girlfriend of six months had broken it off. No one seemed to know the reason why, but Mikhail knew, and that was enough.
Hikaru was crossing over to him, and Mikhail promptly de-railed that chain of thought. The graduate student flashed his roommate an accommodating smile as the boy plopped down beside him with two bottles at hand.
“Here.”
“Thanks.”
They took their swigs together. Hikaru was looking off to a group of young women sitting on the porch of the girls’ boarding house. They noticed him in the next minute or so. One of them - an attractive-looking thing with light blue eyes and long light brown hair - beamed and waved. Hikaru returned the gesture with a pale shadow of what had been given to him.
“Satsuki. My ex.”
Mikhail nodded. Hikaru took another swig. A crash sounded from the general direction of the people manning the grills. More laughter followed, and then a hoot of surprise.
“Whoa… am I dreaming? Am I actually seeing a god descend from the sky to commune with the common folk of fair Citrus Avenue?”
“Can it, Duskrider.”
Alistair Mordechai had crossed into the garden to the round of greetings from his colleagues and students alike, but it was not Alistair that Mikhail could see Hikaru watching. It was the woman beside him, the pretty one with gray hair and gray eyes almost like Alistair’s who taught Political Science and was the stuff an adolescent’s wet dream. His arm was over her shoulders. Her lips nearly kissed his ear whenever she said words for him alone.
It did not surprise Mikhail to see Hikaru stand up and go back into the boarding house, leaving his drink behind. He made it a point to drink to the bottom of his own bottle and of Hikaru’s, then he went to flirt some more with Nikolai before going inside. On a night like this he wasn’t one to waste good alcohol, or the body of a good boy.

Six. The Blood is Love.

The light was in his eyes and the suddenness of his own movement made him wince, but since something had cranked the volume dial of his mind up past one hundred his thoughts were loud enough to keep him occupied. Hikaru thought he met people on his way up; maybe they were trying to ask him what was wrong. He couldn’t really bring himself to care. The words were all gone and he wanted them back.
Cigarettes, leather seats and a blank computer monitor spelled salvation. He had the seat, but did not have the strength to retreat into digitized poetry. He wanted the nicotine but he could not light up. Damned lighter wouldn’t work. Or maybe it worked just fine and he just couldn’t move his fingers right. He couldn’t do much of anything right anymore.
Hikaru slumped forward before he was even aware of it. It hurt. It hurt more than he would ever admit to, or ever write about. He had thought himself ready, but it still hurt. Strange though. He was not crying yet.
Footsteps on the landing preceded Mikhail’s entrance. Hikaru knew who it was because no one else carried himself with in such languid ease, such perfect apathy. And then he remembered there was another person who did that and he tried not to choke on hurt again.
“Nice retreat back there. I blink, and you’re gone. Do they teach you that in kendo?”
Another time would have meant an appropriate retort, but instead Hikaru turned away from the tall shadow in his doorway, the one with the gray eyes. Somewhere behind him, Mikhail was coming closer. The room was quiet enough to hear each other breathing.
“So then. That’s it. He goes with a woman and you’re not going to say anything. What happened to noble sufferance? Where’s the good martyr act now? All I see is a sobbing little school boy before me.”
It was anger that gave him the words back. “You’ve had one too many.”
Hands took a hold of the chair and spun him about, to have him soak in gray eyes and a killer smile. Mikhail’s arms locked around either side of him, keeping Hikaru right where he was. The distance melted away as he drew close, to murmur against the boy’s skin.
“Two isn’t much at all.”
Hikaru shoved Mikhail away and Mikhail let him, hardly losing his balance as he backed off. “Admit it,” the older student said with a laugh, watching his roommate retreat. “You like getting hurt. You’re enjoying this.”
“Shut up!”
“I’m only telling the truth. Since when was that a crime?”
And the words were gone again. Mikhail was there, coming closer, drawing near enough to breathe down his neck. He was spent, he was weak, and he could not push the other away when Mikhail wrapped any arm about his waist, and moved his other hand upwards, to find his lips. When the voice came again, it was right at his ear.
“I could give you what you want.”
“Let go of me.”
“Why?”
The hand moved away from tracing the shape of his lips and slid underneath his shirt, crawling across his chest. The touch was cold. Hikaru shut his eyes.
“L… let go.”
Mikhail took hold and slammed him against the wall in a single movement, knocking the air from Hikaru’s lungs. The pain was blinding; when some of the light spots cleared he saw that Mikhail was not smiling anymore. With the way their arms tangled together, it looked like they belonged with each other.
“I was going to make this easier for you, but since you have to be such a fucking masochist I’ve just changed my mind.”

Hikaru refused to look him in the eye. The boy’s skin had gone beyond pale; it seemed like there wasn’t any color left in him save the red of those full, supple lips and the blue of veins webbed just beneath the skin of his neck. Mikhail almost felt sorry for him.
“You won’t even fight back anymore. You’re pathetic.”
Whatever answer Hikaru might have given him was lost in the rough kiss that followed. Mikhail felt Hikaru tremble beneath his fingers when he slipped them into the boy’s pants. The shuddering increased when he reached the right place and started stroking, in the way a master touched his pet.
Mikhail drew back after the kiss was done, taking in the tarnished violet of Hikaru’s eyes, noting the near feverish flush in the boy’s cheeks. Hurt had stiffened the lines of the desirable, almost girlish mouth that now panted slightly before his own. It would probably stay there even if he was kind, even if he did not do what he wanted but what Hikaru wanted.
He wears it almost proudly, like they were battle scars.
“Ah…”
Mikhail drew in closer when he felt the boy try to move, and he increased the pace of his hand. Hikaru’s breath was hitched in a tiny rhythm of gasps against his ear. When he dug in grip in deeper, the boy whimpered.
“One more lesson in pain. Surely you approve?”

Five. Skin on Skin.

Bondage, no matter how little there was involved in the actual act of somewhat-seduction-but-mostly-rape, was an art. Sometimes it was becoming on a person regardless of whether they were inherently ugly or beautiful. Other times it was the victim that made the silken ropes, the metal buckles or the leather cuffs perfection.
Although he hardly spoke of it out loud to anyone, Mikhail had a fascination for the round angles of the human spine, for the subtle grace of human hands. They were always among the first things he looked at. He often ended up rather… unsatisfied, with whatever he saw in the lovers he took to bed. This time, however, with him on top and Hikaru beneath, was different.
“Hush, child.” Mikhail nearly breathed the words, letting it slip through his smile. “You don’t really want someone to hear us, do you?” He said this as he brushed his fingers over Hikaru’s lips, and slipped them into that delectable mouth. The boy’s breathing had gone ragged.
It seemed like a great effort on Hikaru’s part to keep from making a sound when Mikhail slipped two fingers inside, but to his satisfaction that perfect curve more suited for lovemaking than the rigors of training with blades arched upward from the strain of feeling everything through. Leather cuffs suited those slender wrists rather well. Idly, he considered trying out the metal ones next time.
“You’re deliciously tight. Has it really been so long since someone else topped you?”
“Bastard-” Hikaru cut off with a gasp as Mikhail inserted a third finger within him, drawing pain out from the tenderest of places. He shuddered, cheek pressed against pillows and salt on his lips as the older student stroked him off with one hand and finger-fucked him with the other. Mikhail purred his words into Hikaru’s ear as he pressed deeper, searching for the spot that would send the boy into a fitful of moans and shivers.
“Hmm. Is this where it is…? Ah. I guess so.”
“S-stop… teasing me…!”
That trembling plea brought another smile to Mikhail’s lips. He didn’t consider this ‘teasing.’ ‘Teasing’ involved several objects in the metal attaché case beneath his bed and taking turns with them to see how well each one fit into the same spot. When he stopped, Hikaru whimpered. The boy might have pressed against him if he had allowed him to.
“What? You told me to stop.”
“I d-didn’t mean it… I swear…”
“Then what do you want?”
Hikaru’s response nearly came out in a whine. Mikhail chuckled as he took his fingers out. They came away wet. He went for the lube, slathering a generous amount on himself as the boy tried to recover as much as he could beneath him. Then, without any kind of warning, Mikhail entered him with a single thrust, pressing in deep in the way he knew would hurt. The hoarse shout that escaped from Hikaru’s lips was music to his ears.
“Don’t complain,” Mikhail whispered as he nibbled on the younger student’s ear. “I could have done this without the lube if I felt like it.” Hikaru didn’t answer him. Tears traced their way down the boy’s perfect cheek and vanished into the black of the sheets.
Rhythm was the master in the moments that followed. Mikhail pressed Hikaru’s head down against the mattress and took him relentlessly, seeing no need to slow down to a pace that his roommate might have found easier to deal with. The boy’s breath gasped over the pillows, sometimes ending in ragged sobs or whimpers of pleasure intermingled with too much pain. Mikhail let nothing reflect in his expression or loose the iron grip he had on his control, even though this was probably the best he had had in a while with anyone. He only allowed himself to come once, stilling himself on the highest crest of pleasure that he could achieve. He did not know how many times he had made Hikaru come, only that he had made the boy hurt and that was a good thing.
Mikhail released the cuffs then leaned down to kiss Hikaru’s forehead when they were finished. He drew the blankets over the both of them, but not before covering the boy’s trembling body with his own. Downstairs, where the boarders and professors of #2041 Citrus Avenue celebrated the weekend, the drinks kept coming and the laughter went on until sunrise.

Four. Broken Box.

Mikhail was already gone by the time Hikaru woke up. The older student’s absence almost made him believe that last night had never really happened. And then he saw the lube on the counter with an open (and empty) condom packet, and he remembered. He stopped himself before he could remember too much.
Every inch of his body hurt; it was all Hikaru could do to keep himself from wincing as he raised ginger fingers up, towards his face. The ache grew into enough pain to bother him as he pushed himself up and out of bed. He limped his way to the bathroom. The lights inside accenting the near blinding white of everything within, and he stood in the doorway squinting for a good minute or two before he could step inside without aggravating his headache any further. He caught sight of himself in the mirror, as he bent over the sink to wash out the funny taste of toothpaste and whole-wheat bread out of his mouth.
His skin was paler than the marble tiles behind him, and seemed drained of all color save for the multitude of bruises mottling it, like flowers. While some of them had turned the dark shades of brown, blue, purple and black of healing, others remained red and angry, glaring out accusingly from the raked garden of his own flesh.
Hikaru paused at that moment, moving his hand back up to his lips and fingering the swollen parts on it. Beyond the varying levels of pain that he felt in generally every part of his body, there was the vague haze misting over his eyes, removing all sharpness from them. Like a zombie. The boy ripped his gaze away from the mirror.
He could feel them again. Phantom fingers of memory lodged against his throat, clamped over his wrists, spreading his legs out wide, teasing him, stretching him from inside out…
Lessons in pain… fucking asshole.
Touch and tongue all over. Thinking like that with visuals was sure to get him killed someday. Hikaru limped into the shower stall to strip the stink from his bones and wash himself clean. The water pelted him with the force of hundreds of tiny pebbles, coaxing out more of the pain trapped within the bruises mottling his body.
Eyes like an 8-milimeter bullet through the skull, and they had stared at him mercilessly as they had dragged him to the places he had wanted to go to for years, but it hadn’t been what had been promised. It had hurt, hurt enough to wring more than one sob from his throat during the whole ordeal, and it would keep hurting because it wasn’t like he’d be able to forget.
Don’t complain, he had murmured. Hikaru pressed his forehead against the cool tiles, trying to will the dizziness away. He would have cursed or sworn or made some sort of sound if his throat didn’t hurt so much. The boy shut his eyes as the injuries of the other night burned beneath the kiss of water, knowing that nothing on earth could wash the memory from his skin.

Diego Salvador was singing some Italian serenade at the top of his lungs in the kitchen by the time Hikaru came down the stairs. The Filipino was busy whipping up breakfast and spreading cheer around to the many hung-over members of the household. He chimed out a greeting when Hikaru came around, trying to disguise his limp by slowing his pace.
“Someone’s in a bad mood today,” Mikhail murmured from over the rim of his mug. The dark-haired student was seated at one end of the table, legs crossed and bespectacled eyes skimming the headlines. Nikolai Rostov was beside him. “What’s the matter?” the Russian boy politely inquired, turning his gaze up at his upperclassman standing livid in the doorway. Hikaru nearly reached out to strangle them both.
Blake was every inch the concerned dorm head as Hikaru sat beside him, reaching for the coffee. “You okay?” the blond asked. “You took off pretty quick last night. What happened?”
“Nothing.”
“Come now, don’t deny it,” Mikhail chuckled, turning to the next spread of the paper. “I think Blake deserves to know what happened. There’s no shame in enjoying yourself once in a while.” Hikaru clenched the handle of the coffeepot tight enough to make his knuckles go white.
“Come off it, Kaledin.” Blake’s voice went soft and firm with authority. “If there’s something I don’t have to know then we’ll leave it as it is.” Mikhail shrugged. Nikolai stuck his tongue out at Blake, a gesture that the blond ignored.
“You hungry?”
“Not anymore.”
“Hey, wait a second-”
But Hikaru was already walking away. Diego waltzed in from the kitchen a few moments after the boy had left, completely oblivious to the silence that filled the dining room. He had a striped apron on, and was carrying a serving plate heaped with waffles.
“Maple syrup, anyone?”

Hikaru did not know where he was going until he heard the sound of the river, and he only lurched to a halt when he found himself standing at the edge of the hill, looking down at the water. The summer’s heat had dried up a good portion of the river. Whatever remained glistened in the morning sun, waiting for death by evaporation. He stood for a while, catching his breath, listening for the intrusion that was almost certain to come at any moment.
“Quite the flair for dramatics, have we?”
It was ironic how clean air was what hurt his lungs the most nowadays. Hikaru found a point somewhere on the distant cityscape and kept his gaze there, determined to ignore Mikhail completely. He heard the older student laugh behind him.
“I only did that because you needed it, Hikaru. You needed it as much as I wanted to do it to you. Is that a sin?” The smirk stood out plain in every syllable. “All of this could work out rather well for the both of us, if you let it.”
Hikaru held unto his silence. A lighter clicked to life somewhere behind him.
“Face it. Professor Mordechai’s got someone else now. You might as well move on. The martyr act is cute the first time around, but I figure that even you’ll get tired of it someday.”
There was the drag of nicotine, and then a quiet sigh.
“So I was right. You do love to hurt yourself.”
And then Mikhail was gone.

Three. Tangled Up in Plaid.

“So I was thinking that we could arrange the works that Professor Lethe gave us by genre, then figure out what kind of reading we ought to do after… Hikaru? Are you listening?”
Hikaru snapped back to attention, lifting his head to meet with Liandrin Delacroix’s curious gaze. The young woman sat across of him at the table, arrayed against the lights of the tea house in black silk and red lace. Rethe Kyriff sat on one side and Shizuka Fujiwara sat on the other, both pausing in their work to see what had happened.
“Are you all right?” Lia quietly asked. Hikaru turned from her gaze with a small nod, running a hand through his hair.
“I haven’t been getting much sleep lately.”
“I see…” A frown marred the young woman’s smooth features as she watched Hikaru stare off at the other customers of the tea house. “Are your classes that bad? I would think that summer would be easier.”
“They’ve been fine.”
“Right.” Liandrin was clearly unconvinced, but a polite cough from Shizuka’s end brought things back into perspective. “Anyway, let’s move on. As I was saying, it would be best to arrange all of this by genre, and then…”
His fingers wouldn’t stop shaking. Hikaru folded his hands together to disguise it and tried to pay attention. It was probably due to the fatigue that came with lying awake nearly every night, listening to silence. Mikhail hadn’t been back at the room since their exchange at the river; he was usually out in the city or sharing someone else’s bed.
Rethe was watching him. The younger boy kept quiet up until Hikaru reached for his cigarettes and thumbed one out. Rethe stopped him by putting a hand over his own.
“That’s not good for you.”
“I think my mother could have told me that just fine, Rethe.”
Rethe didn’t answer. “Maybe you should go home,” the boy said instead, lowering his voice so that Shizuka and Liandrin wouldn’t hear. “I think you’ve come down with something.”
“Let’s just finish this.”
Nothing more of the matter was said between them.

The train ride back was a dizzying blur, and it was all Hikaru could do to make it up the stairs and into his room without assistance. He closed the door, locked it, and then stumbled into his bed, wracked by the chills he had been trying to fight off for the past week. The sheets still smelled like Mikhail. Hikaru turned on his side and he hugged himself, shutting his eyes tight. He hadn’t counted on actually getting sick.
Almost everyone in the boarding house must have been around. Footsteps sounded louder than a car crash to him, and voices rang like gunshots. Every now and then someone would come around and knock at the door and call out to him, but he couldn’t answer. His mouth was full of cotton and his head full of sound.
You do love to hurt yourself.
Memory was his curse. It kept him from writing, from functioning, from getting any rest. He might have cried if he had the strength to, or if it wasn’t so damned hot and cold at the same time. Someone was knocking at the door again. He wanted whoever it was to go away. No one had to see him like this. He could recover just fine and then prove Mikhail and all the rest of them wrong. He’ll get over it, after he managed to stop shaking.
Because part of Hikaru was thoroughly convinced that he wouldn’t ever be able to go to sleep in that state, when it finally came the boy wasn’t aware of it. The room fell asleep with him.

Two. This Lullaby.

Mikhail had grown up in love with storms. The power of the elements had left him in awe, and as a child he could recall crawling out of bed whenever there was a typhoon in order to stick his head out the window and watch lightning and water brew in the sky, doing battle for his attention. This fascination had whittled down to something like a small appreciation as he grew older. Nowadays, when it started raining he hardly bothered to look out the window.
The garage at the compound was full by the time Mikhail got home, forcing the young man to step out and make a short jog for the boarding house. He stopped in the corridor to wipe his glasses on the end of his shirt once he was inside. An odd sense of déjà vu coated his thoughts when he picked up the cigarettes hiding away in his jacket. The student almost smiled.
“Welcome home.”
Rethe was leaning against the kitchen counter, cradling a cup of tea. Mikhail didn’t know why he bothered to pause at the stairwell and turn to face the boy properly.
“This is a surprise. You don’t look like the type who would greet people you hate.”
With the way Rethe simply stared at him, Mikhail might as well have stayed silent. The older student went up the stairs, and to his surprise Rethe followed him.
“Our rooms are on the same floor.”
“…Right. Is Hikaru around?”
Again, no answer. Mikhail rolled his eyes and went for the door only to find it locked. He cursed the god of lost things as he spent about a minute or so padding himself down for the key before he managed to find it in the first place he had looked when he did a double-check. He was sure Rethe would have laughed at him if it was the boy’s nature to.
Not a single light was on in the room; the only source of illumination could be found in the window, where the upcoming storm had dyed the sky in eerie shades of purple, green and red. Mikhail turned on one of the small studio lights, and found his roommate curled up in a fetal position on his bed, shivering from a cold that no one else could feel.
“That would be your fault.”
Rethe was leaning against the doorframe, arms folded over his chest and blue-gray eyes fixed on Mikhail. Mikhail turned from the boy and looked back towards Hikaru, who had barely stirred. “He’s been spreading himself too thin lately,” Rethe went on to say as the older student sat at the edge of his roommate’s bed. “I think it started after the Grill Night last week.”
Mikhail reached downward, brushing his fingers against one pale cheek. Hikaru’s eyebrows knitted, and he whimpered at the contact. His skin was almost too hot to touch. “And how is this my fault?” Mikhail muttered, turning back towards Rethe. Rethe blinked at him again as though the answer should have been obvious.
“Do I really have to tell you everything?” Rethe straightened up at Mikhail’s silence, letting his arms fall away to his sides. “Take care of him, Kaledin-san.” The honorific might as well have been a frozen icicle jutting out from his lips. “He’s your roommate.”
“He’s your friend.”
“You’re the one who hurt him. Don’t deny it. I already know.” Rethe turned away. “I’ll go get some supplies for you,” the boy murmured as he left. “I’ll be back.”
The door clicked shut in Rethe’s wake. Mikhail turned away, running his fingers through Hikaru’s hair. All the words hung silent in the air around him, but there was a boy threatening to shake himself apart in the bed beside him, and he couldn’t be bothered with them.

The first thing Hikaru heard when he woke up was the rain. Rat-tat-tat-tat-bang, like gunshots or something worse. The boy stirred, trying to shift positions and ending up stopping to catch his breath. His limbs felt like lead, and the buzz was on loop through his thoughts. The cool towel on his forehead wasn’t much comfort, because it was hot even though he could tell the air conditioner was on at full blast from the sound of it. He couldn’t remember ever feeling this weak before in his life.
“Welcome back, Sleeping Beauty.”
Mikhail was at the leather chair in front of his computer, reading a book. A foldable table stood beside him, with a basin of water, a stack of towels, some medicine in assorted containers and a tea set. The graduate student flipped a page.
“Hurry up and get better so I don’t have to take care of you anymore.”
The bitterness beneath his tongue was almost sour enough to make Hikaru feel more ill than he already was. “I’m not asking you to stay,” the boy snapped. Mikhail rolled his eyes and set the book aside.
“It’s not like I’ve got a choice here, Hikaru.” His smile was had an ironic twist to it. “I’m stuck with you. We’re roommates, remember?”
“That doesn’t mean that you have to care.”
“I don’t.”
“Then go away.”
“It’s every inch my room as it is yours.” Mikhail stood up, checking the tea pot and finding it empty. “I’m going to go down to the kitchen and re-fill this with hot water,” he said, turning about just once to smirk at Hikaru from over his shoulder. “Be a good boy and stay in bed.” He closed the door to a string of rather colorful expletives rising up after him.
“So how’s Hikaru?” Blake asked the moment Mikhail came into the kitchen. The younger student took his time with his response, choosing to fill the pot up before answering.
“Healthy enough to bitch at me. I suppose that’s a good thing.”
Blake laughed at that. “Seems like the two of you have got a lot in common.”
Mikhail didn’t know how to reply to that. He went back up the stairs without another word. Hikaru was still huddled on his side when he returned, wracked by a nasty fit of coughing. Mikhail picked out another teabag and plopped it into the pot. The smell of lemon filled the room.
“Try to stay alive a little longer. The tea’s coming.”
To Mikhail’s surprise, Hikaru elected to save his breath over a quick retort. It was hard to ignore how he hadn’t stopped shaking yet. The dark-haired student turned away from his roommate faster than he would have admitted to.
“…You don’t have to stay. Really.”
Mikhail stopped in the middle of stirring the sugar into his cup. When he looked towards Hikaru, his roommate refused to meet his gaze. The boy was in a miserable state; pissed as he was at the whole situation, even Mikhail couldn’t deny that. And now there were words up in the air between them again and (heaven forbid) he wasn’t sure about what to do next.
“I’m going to stay because if I don’t, your friend’s probably going to have me shot.”
“Rethe?”
“Yeah.”
A smile tugged at Hikaru’s lips, but it died faster than a candle dropped in the middle of a lake. Mikhail came over with the tea.
“…Here.”
Mikhail sat back, waiting for Hikaru to prop himself up before handing one of the cups over. They drank for a while in silence.
“The offer still stands, you know.”
Hikaru’s gaze fell on him, asking nothing of him but the possible question of why. Mikhail sipped his tea.
“Professor Mordechai has moved on. I’m here, and I’m not leaving. Given what’s happened between us, I don’t think we can go on like there’s nothing wrong.”
“I might be able to.”
“You don’t really mean that.”
Hikaru said nothing. Mikhail finished his tea. When he reached out to touch his roommate’s cheek, the boy didn’t move away. When he leaned forward to kiss him on the lips, the boy opened his mouth to his. “So what will it be?” Mikhail murmured when they were finished. The feel of Hikaru’s arms wrapping about his neck was enough of an answer.

One. Long, Slow Goodbye.

“Do you regret this now?”
Alistair Mordechai took a drag from his cigarette and tried to figure out an appropriate answer. Natalia Karaleva sat on the stone bench while he leaned against the tree, following his gaze to where a group of students sat on the stairs leading to the entrance of Isherwood University’s main building, on the pretense of studying when they were really just killing time.
Hikaru Shinta was among them. Mikhail Kaledin, the boy’s new roommate, was seated at his side with his arm around those slim shoulders. Every now and then, in the natural lulls between conversation, the older student would lean back to whisper some sweet nothing into his young lover’s ear.
“You went with me because you couldn’t be with him. Maybe a bit of you thought that it would be nice to have him waiting on you forever… it would almost be like you had him anyway. So. Now that things haven’t gone according to plan, do you regret it?”
He couldn’t taste the cigarette anymore. Alistair tossed it to the ground and crushed it beneath his heel. He pushed himself off the tree and walked away without ever answering Natalia. Natalia made it a point to smoke through her own fag; she wasn’t the type to let things go to waste. She sat there, watching the stairwell even long after all the students had gone away.

Now, to wrestle with schoolwork. There's a paper in Philosophy, a paper and a presentation in Chinese Lit, a paper in Lit Crit and a paper in Theology. There are also people to burn copies of Advent Children for.