Gift fic for unna_rainchaser
For: unna_rainchaser
From: Naughty Reindeer
Title: Telescope Eyes
Pairings/Characters: Ruki/Reita
Rating: R
Warnings: None
Notes: Dear the always-lovely unna_rainchaser, I’m not the best at smut (I still hide behind pretty metaphors), but I desperately hope that you enjoy this little ficlet all the same. Happy holidays! :)
Summary: In which Ruki gnashes his teeth and reaches towards starve-for-glory dreams and Reita follows, beckoned by his glow.
:2001:
Ruki always had a way of kicking daylight in the face - inked-stained hands grasping at rays even as the mics from ratty hole-in-hell dives spluttered static. Sometimes he bit into the feedback, teeth white and spine poking through a threadbare shirt they’d sewn together from 100yen shops. He created his own light, even in the dim live-houses as the rest of them choked on dust-motes, little streams of sun flowing through his veins - bypassing the bruises of daddy’s-disappointment and fuck-where’s-the-rent - to bleed out his lips in gilded splatters. The burn ached in Reita’s chest as he swallowed each lyric Ruki screamed-lived-believed. He refused to sink into horizons with the sun, only dug his black-chipped nails in deeper - and Reita followed, beckoned by his glow.
Ruki lolled his head towards him in the aftermath, the flickering lights of the ‘live’ still echoing in his eyes - strewn across Reita’s ragged mattress they were forced to share each night as Kouyou snored in the next room. His lids were still smudged with kohl, endless black and navy smears that made his gaze snarl. His hair was still stiff from the impromptu dye-job in the dive’s bathroom, crimson streaking the sink and staining Reita’s fingers. The bassist shifted so he could trace the shadows on Ruki’s face, blinds drawn and electric bill still unpaid. The younger watched him steadily.
Reita made sure to commit this moment to memory - Ruki usually collapsing into bed right when the thirteenth hour bled into the sheets and leaving by morning, bestowing strands of gold-scarlet-russet like dew across the pillow.
But when he was there - like now - he was right there, right inside Reita’s ribs and cradling his lungs with fire-bitten fingers.
"If you could go anywhere - ?" He asked in a hush, the same question each time. His gaze was hidden in shadow, perhaps eyeing Reita’s blistered fingers, their stark ribs, and trying to remember why again.
Reita imagined tangling their legs together - wherever you are - catching a lock of crimson-fire in his fingers, but instead he kept his eyes locked on the ceiling.
"You first," he whispered back, knowing Ruki needed it. Needed to hold onto something tight and not let go until each word was a declaration, a promise. And Reita needed to hear him, needed to imagine alongside him the beautiful places they could reach with these gnarled fingers.
Somewhere, nameless.
Hours passed - bleeding into dark bruises beneath their eyes - and Ruki laced the names of cities into the gossamer sheets that bound them both tight. His eyes sparked, lips that were still tinted in rouge widening into a grin as he listed off every place he knew. It was only foreign syllables they couldn’t pronounce, awkward and farfetched in their chapped mouths, but it was still somewhere. It was still beyond this two-room apartment with its locked windows and their shivering legs.
Someplace where Reita shatters the stubborn hesitation to grasp Ruki’s hand, where the other smirks at him behind designer lenses in some gilded city and huffs, “About fucking time.”
But now - here - as Ruki whispered of Tokyo Dome and glossed streets and neon signs (that could sear their skin; make them forget) against Reita’s palms, voice rough from screaming lyrics on deaf ears, the elder wondered if those plush lips could feel his rapid heart beneath his skin - if he was swallowing each skipped beat.
And sometimes Reita had to hide his trembling hands beneath the ratty sheets - hide them or else he’d reach out and touch and never let go - because Ruki would fervently mouth “you’re coming with me, Suzuki” against his collarbone. He’d smudge his makeup on Reita’s skin and make them both glimmer in the gasp of night, voice fading into the blonde’s chest. There were never any what-if-but-maybe-nots because Ruki already knew.
He would remember why as he was struck with crooked inspiration at 2AM and start writing lyrics on his arms, Reita’s shoulders, crinkled receipts of meals they couldn’t afford - anywhere, anywhere (like always). He could already imagine the venues, the fans, the hotel beds that would keep them warm this time -
- and just them, together -
But then some nights were like this - Ruki’s warm breaths ebbing into the room, filling in the missing insulation and the snaking cracks in the walls, soothing Reita’s purpling toes.
And really, they’re just lost Peter Pans who were born to gnash their teeth and reach towards starve-for-glory dreams. Ruki’s suddenly just human - just nineteen - and not the divine being who shines so fucking bright when the dim, broken stage lights paint his gaunt face in yellow hues.
Not that deity who turns to look back at Reita as the lights flicker out, lips still pressed to the mic and eyes molten chaos - almost burning as bright as their stolen cigarettes - and captures him.
Just here. Just Takanori - bones and blood instead of pulsing sun; composed of empty promises and broken homes and desperate melodies.
And the most heart-pounding thing in Reita’s life - besides Kouyou’s run-in with the Yakuza and nailing every note in tonight’s live - was sharing his grandmother’s quilt to battle the frost of winter, staying up until dawn’s light listening to empty names and places; flicking ashes from stolen Marlboros onto the coverlet and connecting the burns into galaxies they can touch.
But it’s not all empty.
Because whenever Ruki swears he’ll take Reita along (wherever, wherever), the words are softer. Surer. The one thing he knows - more so than if they’ll have enough to keep the lights on this month or how to outline his eyes in perfect symmetry.
He takes the time to find the elder’s eyes in the cover of darkness - noir to brown.
“Where to?”
“Fucking anywhere.” - because Reita knows Ruki’s fingertips can even graze fucking Andromeda.
Ruki’s eyes were already far away tonight, already there choking the stars - and Reita poked him hard in the ribs to stifle the rambling words, to bring him back for one more mortal breath - to wait for him. He whispered lowly, “Fuck Dome, what about the Sun?
"…What the fuck, Akira?" Ruki cocked an eyebrow at him, eyes bemused as he peeked out from underneath his vermillion fringe. A flush rose in Reita’s neck and his heart stammered, caught. Because, really, what the hell was he talking about?
The Sun was right here.
"Did Shima sneak you some cheap shit from the bar?" Ruki asked suddenly, worrying his bottom lip as the absurd dive-bar schedule they had lined up passed through his mind - no time to mend hangovers from one of Uruha’s concoctions.
Reita blinked.
His head felt like cotton. He was too hot. His palms were slick.
And he might have an arrhythmia because his heart keeps skipping out like an old record -
"Maybe," he concluded.
And leaned in - because he’s not right in the head, not right and possibly-not-really-drunk and can get away with it, maybe - and kissed his neck, right on those faded black lines he helped paint on.
Ruki’s pulse was breathless.
- - -
- and sometimes he’ll nudge Ruki’s side in the studio, in the new apartment, in the backseat of a thousand vans, in the darkness of backstage-encores and ask with a knowing grin:
どこへ?
And Ruki will tilt his head, lips brushing Reita’s ear (hand sliding to his) and whisper:
どこも.
- - -
:Now:
“Where would you take me?”
The whisper was laced with smoke, grey wisps caressing Reita’s jaw as Ruki pressed his lips along his skin. The ashes were landing across the dip of his cheek, little forget-me-nots pulsing orange-crimson as midnight stuck to their bones. Reita swallowed, the younger’s hand - still criss-crossed with the scars of drumming, years of gripping mics and strangling Fate - finding each place that made him tremble, bury his hands in bleached hair and tug.
He mouthed desperately into the heat that fell to his lips, into each thrust and desperate shudder of Ruki’s spine: “anywhere, anywhere you fucking want - ”
Ruki bit down on his cigarette, more cinders dotting the hotel’s sheets, charring the rosebud design.
So everyone would remember them and revel in this glory -
Reita hissed as a few ashes sizzled against his chest, “Oi, I’m not your ashtray.”
“You worried I’m gonna set you alight?” Ruki murmured, smirk curling around the Pianissimo. He leaned down, hips snapping - igniting a spark in Reita’s dark eyes as he nipped his lip:
“You should know by now if you burn, I burn.”
Reita gasped, body arching into the sting - into the words on Ruki’s lips - and tangled his fingers around the damp locks sticking to the back of the other’s neck. Trying to keep him here because Ruki had always been so damn bright and hell if Reita would let him shine on alone.
His head fell back with a snap, eyes wide and whispering nonsense - “I know, fuck, I know, so don't fucking leave me here, just please” - as Ruki’s pressed open-mouthed kisses to his jugular, smoke curling against those faint freckles nestled there. Another drag, a flick of ashes, stars bursting across his skin - and Ruki quickly leaned in to catch his gasp.
The taste of nicotine flooded his mouth, wisps still escaping him as the sharp nip of Ruki’s teeth pulled at his maw with a wanton growl. Reita opened his eyes, watching the sweat shine along the curve of Ruki’s collarbone - feeling Ruki’s back arch beneath his fingertips.
The entire universe pulsing against his palms.
“Where - ?” He choked out, the hard slam of the younger’s hips against his own and the feather-touches to his jaw making him rattle apart. Each thrust was unraveling promises to mind the flames, making him press closer, closer.
Fuck - fingernails clawing shoulder blades, scarlet painting their lips and smoke stuck to their skin - just tell me where and let’s fucking go.
Ruki looked at him then, hands tangling in the sheets (in bleached roots, in Akira), breathless - blue-brown-silver eyes locking with his. His make-up was smudged, the last remnants staining Reita’s fingers, and hair a mussed halo of broken gold. Grey light wafted in from the parted curtains, painting their flesh in soft blushes.
Reita gripped the vocalist tighter, breath hitching as shoulders pushed against the headboard, “Tell me, Taka.”
Ruki leaned down, hand finding the one clawing at his back, and twined their fingers together. His lips parted, forehead kissing Reita’s own - noses bumping together and smoke hiding their shaking breaths, his smile.
“Right here.”
From: Naughty Reindeer
Title: Telescope Eyes
Pairings/Characters: Ruki/Reita
Rating: R
Warnings: None
Notes: Dear the always-lovely unna_rainchaser, I’m not the best at smut (I still hide behind pretty metaphors), but I desperately hope that you enjoy this little ficlet all the same. Happy holidays! :)
Summary: In which Ruki gnashes his teeth and reaches towards starve-for-glory dreams and Reita follows, beckoned by his glow.
:2001:
Ruki always had a way of kicking daylight in the face - inked-stained hands grasping at rays even as the mics from ratty hole-in-hell dives spluttered static. Sometimes he bit into the feedback, teeth white and spine poking through a threadbare shirt they’d sewn together from 100yen shops. He created his own light, even in the dim live-houses as the rest of them choked on dust-motes, little streams of sun flowing through his veins - bypassing the bruises of daddy’s-disappointment and fuck-where’s-the-rent - to bleed out his lips in gilded splatters. The burn ached in Reita’s chest as he swallowed each lyric Ruki screamed-lived-believed. He refused to sink into horizons with the sun, only dug his black-chipped nails in deeper - and Reita followed, beckoned by his glow.
Ruki lolled his head towards him in the aftermath, the flickering lights of the ‘live’ still echoing in his eyes - strewn across Reita’s ragged mattress they were forced to share each night as Kouyou snored in the next room. His lids were still smudged with kohl, endless black and navy smears that made his gaze snarl. His hair was still stiff from the impromptu dye-job in the dive’s bathroom, crimson streaking the sink and staining Reita’s fingers. The bassist shifted so he could trace the shadows on Ruki’s face, blinds drawn and electric bill still unpaid. The younger watched him steadily.
Reita made sure to commit this moment to memory - Ruki usually collapsing into bed right when the thirteenth hour bled into the sheets and leaving by morning, bestowing strands of gold-scarlet-russet like dew across the pillow.
But when he was there - like now - he was right there, right inside Reita’s ribs and cradling his lungs with fire-bitten fingers.
"If you could go anywhere - ?" He asked in a hush, the same question each time. His gaze was hidden in shadow, perhaps eyeing Reita’s blistered fingers, their stark ribs, and trying to remember why again.
Reita imagined tangling their legs together - wherever you are - catching a lock of crimson-fire in his fingers, but instead he kept his eyes locked on the ceiling.
"You first," he whispered back, knowing Ruki needed it. Needed to hold onto something tight and not let go until each word was a declaration, a promise. And Reita needed to hear him, needed to imagine alongside him the beautiful places they could reach with these gnarled fingers.
Somewhere, nameless.
Hours passed - bleeding into dark bruises beneath their eyes - and Ruki laced the names of cities into the gossamer sheets that bound them both tight. His eyes sparked, lips that were still tinted in rouge widening into a grin as he listed off every place he knew. It was only foreign syllables they couldn’t pronounce, awkward and farfetched in their chapped mouths, but it was still somewhere. It was still beyond this two-room apartment with its locked windows and their shivering legs.
Someplace where Reita shatters the stubborn hesitation to grasp Ruki’s hand, where the other smirks at him behind designer lenses in some gilded city and huffs, “About fucking time.”
But now - here - as Ruki whispered of Tokyo Dome and glossed streets and neon signs (that could sear their skin; make them forget) against Reita’s palms, voice rough from screaming lyrics on deaf ears, the elder wondered if those plush lips could feel his rapid heart beneath his skin - if he was swallowing each skipped beat.
And sometimes Reita had to hide his trembling hands beneath the ratty sheets - hide them or else he’d reach out and touch and never let go - because Ruki would fervently mouth “you’re coming with me, Suzuki” against his collarbone. He’d smudge his makeup on Reita’s skin and make them both glimmer in the gasp of night, voice fading into the blonde’s chest. There were never any what-if-but-maybe-nots because Ruki already knew.
He would remember why as he was struck with crooked inspiration at 2AM and start writing lyrics on his arms, Reita’s shoulders, crinkled receipts of meals they couldn’t afford - anywhere, anywhere (like always). He could already imagine the venues, the fans, the hotel beds that would keep them warm this time -
- and just them, together -
But then some nights were like this - Ruki’s warm breaths ebbing into the room, filling in the missing insulation and the snaking cracks in the walls, soothing Reita’s purpling toes.
And really, they’re just lost Peter Pans who were born to gnash their teeth and reach towards starve-for-glory dreams. Ruki’s suddenly just human - just nineteen - and not the divine being who shines so fucking bright when the dim, broken stage lights paint his gaunt face in yellow hues.
Not that deity who turns to look back at Reita as the lights flicker out, lips still pressed to the mic and eyes molten chaos - almost burning as bright as their stolen cigarettes - and captures him.
Just here. Just Takanori - bones and blood instead of pulsing sun; composed of empty promises and broken homes and desperate melodies.
And the most heart-pounding thing in Reita’s life - besides Kouyou’s run-in with the Yakuza and nailing every note in tonight’s live - was sharing his grandmother’s quilt to battle the frost of winter, staying up until dawn’s light listening to empty names and places; flicking ashes from stolen Marlboros onto the coverlet and connecting the burns into galaxies they can touch.
But it’s not all empty.
Because whenever Ruki swears he’ll take Reita along (wherever, wherever), the words are softer. Surer. The one thing he knows - more so than if they’ll have enough to keep the lights on this month or how to outline his eyes in perfect symmetry.
He takes the time to find the elder’s eyes in the cover of darkness - noir to brown.
“Where to?”
“Fucking anywhere.” - because Reita knows Ruki’s fingertips can even graze fucking Andromeda.
Ruki’s eyes were already far away tonight, already there choking the stars - and Reita poked him hard in the ribs to stifle the rambling words, to bring him back for one more mortal breath - to wait for him. He whispered lowly, “Fuck Dome, what about the Sun?
"…What the fuck, Akira?" Ruki cocked an eyebrow at him, eyes bemused as he peeked out from underneath his vermillion fringe. A flush rose in Reita’s neck and his heart stammered, caught. Because, really, what the hell was he talking about?
The Sun was right here.
"Did Shima sneak you some cheap shit from the bar?" Ruki asked suddenly, worrying his bottom lip as the absurd dive-bar schedule they had lined up passed through his mind - no time to mend hangovers from one of Uruha’s concoctions.
Reita blinked.
His head felt like cotton. He was too hot. His palms were slick.
And he might have an arrhythmia because his heart keeps skipping out like an old record -
"Maybe," he concluded.
And leaned in - because he’s not right in the head, not right and possibly-not-really-drunk and can get away with it, maybe - and kissed his neck, right on those faded black lines he helped paint on.
Ruki’s pulse was breathless.
- - -
- and sometimes he’ll nudge Ruki’s side in the studio, in the new apartment, in the backseat of a thousand vans, in the darkness of backstage-encores and ask with a knowing grin:
どこへ?
And Ruki will tilt his head, lips brushing Reita’s ear (hand sliding to his) and whisper:
どこも.
- - -
:Now:
“Where would you take me?”
The whisper was laced with smoke, grey wisps caressing Reita’s jaw as Ruki pressed his lips along his skin. The ashes were landing across the dip of his cheek, little forget-me-nots pulsing orange-crimson as midnight stuck to their bones. Reita swallowed, the younger’s hand - still criss-crossed with the scars of drumming, years of gripping mics and strangling Fate - finding each place that made him tremble, bury his hands in bleached hair and tug.
He mouthed desperately into the heat that fell to his lips, into each thrust and desperate shudder of Ruki’s spine: “anywhere, anywhere you fucking want - ”
Ruki bit down on his cigarette, more cinders dotting the hotel’s sheets, charring the rosebud design.
So everyone would remember them and revel in this glory -
Reita hissed as a few ashes sizzled against his chest, “Oi, I’m not your ashtray.”
“You worried I’m gonna set you alight?” Ruki murmured, smirk curling around the Pianissimo. He leaned down, hips snapping - igniting a spark in Reita’s dark eyes as he nipped his lip:
“You should know by now if you burn, I burn.”
Reita gasped, body arching into the sting - into the words on Ruki’s lips - and tangled his fingers around the damp locks sticking to the back of the other’s neck. Trying to keep him here because Ruki had always been so damn bright and hell if Reita would let him shine on alone.
His head fell back with a snap, eyes wide and whispering nonsense - “I know, fuck, I know, so don't fucking leave me here, just please” - as Ruki’s pressed open-mouthed kisses to his jugular, smoke curling against those faint freckles nestled there. Another drag, a flick of ashes, stars bursting across his skin - and Ruki quickly leaned in to catch his gasp.
The taste of nicotine flooded his mouth, wisps still escaping him as the sharp nip of Ruki’s teeth pulled at his maw with a wanton growl. Reita opened his eyes, watching the sweat shine along the curve of Ruki’s collarbone - feeling Ruki’s back arch beneath his fingertips.
The entire universe pulsing against his palms.
“Where - ?” He choked out, the hard slam of the younger’s hips against his own and the feather-touches to his jaw making him rattle apart. Each thrust was unraveling promises to mind the flames, making him press closer, closer.
Fuck - fingernails clawing shoulder blades, scarlet painting their lips and smoke stuck to their skin - just tell me where and let’s fucking go.
Ruki looked at him then, hands tangling in the sheets (in bleached roots, in Akira), breathless - blue-brown-silver eyes locking with his. His make-up was smudged, the last remnants staining Reita’s fingers, and hair a mussed halo of broken gold. Grey light wafted in from the parted curtains, painting their flesh in soft blushes.
Reita gripped the vocalist tighter, breath hitching as shoulders pushed against the headboard, “Tell me, Taka.”
Ruki leaned down, hand finding the one clawing at his back, and twined their fingers together. His lips parted, forehead kissing Reita’s own - noses bumping together and smoke hiding their shaking breaths, his smile.
“Right here.”