Fic for ashesto
Passion and Ashes
For: ashesto
Media/um: Fic
Request:1. Yuuta/Mizuki/Yuuta angstfic? :D
Warnings/Rating: R-language and implied sexual situations.
Notes:: This is a future fic, taking place sometime after college and jobs happen. I have never written these two before, so please forgive me if the characters are off some. This whole thing was inspired by the song Rush Hour by Ani Difranco (click the title for the song download, consider it a free gift with fic!), so blame her for this :-p
Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters herein. I do not claim to own them, and I am not making any profit off of this. This is just fun in a fandom I enjoy. If you want to sue me for all I’m worth…please do! You’re welcome to my student loans and other bills.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Before he even opened his eyes, Yuuta reached over to pat the mattress next to him. It was empty and cold.
Again.
Yuuta sighed and reached over to his other side, killing his alarm before it even had a chance to ring. He wasn’t surprised, really, he told himself. This had been the pattern for the past six months or so. Somehow or other-Yuuta couldn’t even be sure about how it happened most times-he and Mizuki would meet up somewhere, usually in some dive bar, they’d then end up back at Yuuta’s place, there would be a night filled with passion that would end with a crash into slumber…and then invariably Yuuta waking up alone to cold sheets and an even colder heart.
He wasn’t sure why he let Mizuki keep doing this to him. Wasn’t sure why he had been so excited to see Mizuki that first time. And Yuuta sure as hell wasn’t sure why he continued to let Mizuki into his home in bed.
Well, that’s part of it, Yuuta thought ruefully as he stretched slowly and felt the soreness in his muscles that spoke of a deeply satisfying sexual encounter. Even if he is a bastard, Mizuki’s still great in bed. Is it really enough, though?
Reluctantly, Yuuta abandoned the comfort of his mattress, standing and stretching as he ambled over to look out the window. Rain again. He sighed, and went to prepare himself for his day.
Maybe, that night, he’d avoid the bar district. Avoid that one extra shot of tequila that always weakened his resolve to not cave in and bring Mizuki home. Maybe, then, he could wake up to an empty bed and not feel that initial heart wrenching burst of disappointment and abandonment.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Yuuta still wasn’t sure just how his life had ended up this way. Some days, he wondered if he had ever made a decision for himself, or if they were all to spite someone else.
He worked in an office, having given up tennis because he didn’t want to play a sport that his brother, against all odds, had decided to go pro in. He was a computer systems operator because his friends and family had assumed that he’d go into sports therapy or something similar.
And he took home Mizuki every night because it was expected that he’d marry a lovely woman and have two or three lovely children.
Mizuki’s entrance into Yuuta’s life had been a complete surprise to Yuuta, though he had a suspicion that Mizuki had calculated his every move. Yuuta hadn’t seen Mizuki since high school, when he had had a pathetic and ill-concealed crush on the other boy. Yuuta suspected, with hindsight being twenty-twenty, that Mizuki had known exactly what he did to Yuuta and kept stringing him along, offering up a little hope, then snatching it back just when Yuuta felt that it was safe to try and grasp for it.
Yuuta had sworn, when Mizuki graduated and then left without a backwards glance, that he was going to forget about him. Just erase Mizuki from his life.
So he had gone to Kyoto for college. Studied a subject simply because he knew it would it would be easy to find a job in that field after graduation. Found a comfortable, entry-level job with a firm and moved comfortably up the ranks by merit of his competent, if not passionate, work.
There was no passion in Yuuta’s life. He had had a suspicion that it had left when Mizuki did. He didn’t obsess over it, though. He just moved in the rhythms of his life, not minding the emptiness, or, if he found himself missing something, he simply took himself to any of the many bars near his office or home, where a few drinks could quiet anything, even the voices that whispered that Yuuta needed more in his life.
It was quiet, comfortable. And Yuuta was content, if not happy. It was safe.
And then Mizuki came crashing back into his life.
It was in a bar, on one of the rare nights where Yuuta was spending more time staring into his glass than drinking from it, contemplating just where he had gone wrong in his life, why things had ended up so differently from what he had ever pictured.
He hadn’t even looked over to acknowledge the person who took a seat next to him at the bar, not until a voice, changed some but still so familiar to Yuuta that it made him ache, asked almost incredulously, “Fuji Yuuta?”
Yuuta looked up slowly, not at all prepared for who he was seeing. “Mizuki? But I thought…you had left the country!”
Mizuki shrugged, the very movement showing his time spent in Europe. “I came back.”
Yuuta wasn’t too clear on what had happened after that. More drinks, for certain. Conversation, though the topics eluded him. He remembered feeling the warmth of Mizuki’s hand on his arm, his thigh, and, later, the softness of skin against skin and the heat of passion….
The only thing his was sure of was that after that was the first morning that he had rolled over, expecting to see someone in his bed with him, but instead finding it empty and cold.
It had hurt, that first time, but Yuuta had shrugged it off fairly easily. It was a chance meeting, a one-off that could easily be written off as liquor and hormones and an opportunity to finally live some of his high school fantasies.
He had really honestly expected to never see Mizuki again. And for a few days, he didn’t. Yuuta went from the office to home and back again. On the third night, though, some of his regrets began to catch up with him again, in the form of an email from his brother, and Yuuta took himself to a bar, a different one from where Mizuki had found him.
But Mizuki found him again.
That time, Yuuta had drunk less, so he remembered the night clearly. He remembered turning the tables on a surprised Mizuki, proving once and for all that he was no longer that tough-seeming boy with the insecure interior that had made him so easy to manipulate in the past. He remembered the feel of Mizuki under him, and Mizuki’s face, watching the arrogance melt away to surprise, then to pleasure. He remembered collapsing into an exhausted, sated slumber, his arms wrapped around Mizuki.
And Mizuki was still gone when Yuuta’s alarm rang in the morning.
Yuuta had sworn then and there that it would be the last time. He’d taken and been taken by Mizuki. It was all out of his system, and he didn’t need the complication in his decidedly non-complicated life.
He was done with it.
Until the next time. And the next, and the next…until six months had gone by, and Yuuta wasn’t sure exactly what had happened, all he knew was that he was too entangled in it to stop.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Yuuta was at the bar again. This time, though, he wasn’t drinking. No, this time he was…waiting. Stalking, almost.
He wanted answers, and he didn’t want anything to cloud his mind or judgment. Unless that was a spell all of Mizuki’s doing, and not the drinks, in which case Yuuta knew he was screwed.
Almost as if he had been summoned, Mizuki slid onto the barstool next to Yuuta and flagged down the bartender. “I’ll have what he’s having, if you please.”
The bartender shrugged and placed a glass in front of Mizuki, who sipped and almost choked. “There must be some mistake…this is water!”
“With a lemon wedge,” Yuuta chimed in helpfully. “It’s what I’m drinking tonight.”
Mizuki’s expression shifted to something more calculating. “Are you sure you don’t want something with more…taste? I’ll buy, if money is the issue….”
“It’s not.” Yuuta shifted so he could look directly at Mizuki, something that he hadn’t done outside of the bedroom in all those months. “We need to talk.”
Mizuki laughed that signature chuckle of his. “Why, Yuuta, it almost sounds like you’re trying to break up with me.” He sipped daintily at his water glass.
“Maybe I am.”
Mizuki stared at Yuuta. “That would imply that we had a relationship to begin with.”
Yuuta glared, feeling almost as he did when his brother tried to cajole something from him. “I don’t know what else to call six months of fucking and disappearing.”
“That would mean assuming that you’re the only person that I’m fucking.”
Yuuta froze. “I…what?”
Mizuki waved a hand dismissively. “Honestly. I’m not that kind of man, Yuuta-kun.”
“But you are the kind of man who can screw and run.” Yuuta drained his water glass in one swallow, suddenly wishing that he had ordered something stronger.
“I don’t do relationships, Yuuta-kun. I don’t do morning afters.”
“But you do “do” former teammates who you knew had a crush on you,” Yuuta said bitterly, staring into his glass.
“I wasn’t even going to approach you that first night. But you looked lonely, like you were missing something. I just wanted to give you some excitement in your…dreary life.”
Yuuta scowled. He had forgotten that about Mizuki, his way of making everything that he did sound like a big favor that you should be grateful for receiving. “Yeah, my life may not have been very exciting, but at least it made sense. Then you came in and started fucking with me-literally and figuratively-and suddenly it’s just like junior high again, where you’re manipulating me to fit your needs. Well, I’m not that kid anymore! I’m not going to take your games lying down.”
“But you have been,” Mizuki pointed out, a smirk on his face. “Last night, in fact-”
“Shut up!” Yuuta shouted, cutting Mizuki off and drawing the attention of half the bar. Flushing some, Yuuta lowered his voice and continued. “That’s exactly it. I am not going to let you manipulate me. Not this time. I’m telling you right now what I want from you. I want a relationship. A real one, where we do things other than drink at bars, and where you’re there when the alarm goes off. Where I get to see your place, and actually know what you do, and a thousand little things that go with a relationship.”
“And if I do not want any of that? If I am satisfied with the status quo?” Mizuki’s tone and posture radiated confidence in himself and his desires.
“Then… I lived without you once, and I can live without you again.” Yuuta’s voice was steady and firm.
“You don’t mean that.” The confidence in Mizuki’s voice was almost disgusting. “You’ve had a taste of me. I’m in your system, and you can’t just drop me like that.” He leaned in close to Yuuta and breathed in his ear, “I’m like a drug you can’t resist.”
Yuuta pulled away from him. “And we all leaned in elementary school that drugs are bad.” He left money to cover their waters. “Think about it. My requirements will not change. If you want me, come find me. You have one week, and you know where I live. If not…enjoy your life, Mizuki-san.”
Yuuta stood and walked out of the bar without looking back.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
That started the longest week of Yuuta’s life.
Yuuta thought that Mizuki was correct, that he was a drug, and Yuuta was going through withdrawal. It was a struggle to go right home from work at night, without hitting a bar and seeing if Mizuki would appear, but he made himself stay strong. He would not give in and play Mizuki’s game.
He had grown out of that long ago. Now it was time for Mizuki to learn to play by someone else’s rules.
It didn’t make it any easier though, the waiting. As much as Yuuta tried to tell himself that he didn’t care if Mizuki disappeared as fast as he had appeared, that there were no feelings involved, he knew it was a lie. He knew that every night that went by without hearing a knock on his door killed him a little bit more each time.
Yuuta wasn’t sure just when it was that he had started caring again. About anything not just Mizuki. Things that hadn’t bothered him about his life before, that had slipped under his radar, were grating on his last nerve now.
Even if he disappears, I have to hand it to Mizuki. He’s changed my life yet again. And I need to do something about it. Switch jobs, go back to school, something. It’s just a question of if I do it with or without him.
Three days. Four days, then five. Six days. And nothing, still nothing.
On the seventh day, Yuuta slumped miserably in his apartments kitchenette. He’s not coming back…if he hasn’t by now, then I know he won’t. At least I can do something to get my own life back together.
Yuuta dragged himself to his computer, all set to do some research on education programs that might interest him more than his current field. He was ready to immerse himself in trying to find the passion for life that Mizuki had awakened in him again.
But I still want him….
And then….
It came so faint that at first Yuuta, in another room and his mind occupied, didn’t hear anything. But then it came again, and again and louder, and this time, it was unmistakable.
A knock on Yuuta’s door.
--The End--
For: ashesto
Media/um: Fic
Request:1. Yuuta/Mizuki/Yuuta angstfic? :D
Warnings/Rating: R-language and implied sexual situations.
Notes:: This is a future fic, taking place sometime after college and jobs happen. I have never written these two before, so please forgive me if the characters are off some. This whole thing was inspired by the song Rush Hour by Ani Difranco (click the title for the song download, consider it a free gift with fic!), so blame her for this :-p
Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters herein. I do not claim to own them, and I am not making any profit off of this. This is just fun in a fandom I enjoy. If you want to sue me for all I’m worth…please do! You’re welcome to my student loans and other bills.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Before he even opened his eyes, Yuuta reached over to pat the mattress next to him. It was empty and cold.
Again.
Yuuta sighed and reached over to his other side, killing his alarm before it even had a chance to ring. He wasn’t surprised, really, he told himself. This had been the pattern for the past six months or so. Somehow or other-Yuuta couldn’t even be sure about how it happened most times-he and Mizuki would meet up somewhere, usually in some dive bar, they’d then end up back at Yuuta’s place, there would be a night filled with passion that would end with a crash into slumber…and then invariably Yuuta waking up alone to cold sheets and an even colder heart.
He wasn’t sure why he let Mizuki keep doing this to him. Wasn’t sure why he had been so excited to see Mizuki that first time. And Yuuta sure as hell wasn’t sure why he continued to let Mizuki into his home in bed.
Well, that’s part of it, Yuuta thought ruefully as he stretched slowly and felt the soreness in his muscles that spoke of a deeply satisfying sexual encounter. Even if he is a bastard, Mizuki’s still great in bed. Is it really enough, though?
Reluctantly, Yuuta abandoned the comfort of his mattress, standing and stretching as he ambled over to look out the window. Rain again. He sighed, and went to prepare himself for his day.
Maybe, that night, he’d avoid the bar district. Avoid that one extra shot of tequila that always weakened his resolve to not cave in and bring Mizuki home. Maybe, then, he could wake up to an empty bed and not feel that initial heart wrenching burst of disappointment and abandonment.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Yuuta still wasn’t sure just how his life had ended up this way. Some days, he wondered if he had ever made a decision for himself, or if they were all to spite someone else.
He worked in an office, having given up tennis because he didn’t want to play a sport that his brother, against all odds, had decided to go pro in. He was a computer systems operator because his friends and family had assumed that he’d go into sports therapy or something similar.
And he took home Mizuki every night because it was expected that he’d marry a lovely woman and have two or three lovely children.
Mizuki’s entrance into Yuuta’s life had been a complete surprise to Yuuta, though he had a suspicion that Mizuki had calculated his every move. Yuuta hadn’t seen Mizuki since high school, when he had had a pathetic and ill-concealed crush on the other boy. Yuuta suspected, with hindsight being twenty-twenty, that Mizuki had known exactly what he did to Yuuta and kept stringing him along, offering up a little hope, then snatching it back just when Yuuta felt that it was safe to try and grasp for it.
Yuuta had sworn, when Mizuki graduated and then left without a backwards glance, that he was going to forget about him. Just erase Mizuki from his life.
So he had gone to Kyoto for college. Studied a subject simply because he knew it would it would be easy to find a job in that field after graduation. Found a comfortable, entry-level job with a firm and moved comfortably up the ranks by merit of his competent, if not passionate, work.
There was no passion in Yuuta’s life. He had had a suspicion that it had left when Mizuki did. He didn’t obsess over it, though. He just moved in the rhythms of his life, not minding the emptiness, or, if he found himself missing something, he simply took himself to any of the many bars near his office or home, where a few drinks could quiet anything, even the voices that whispered that Yuuta needed more in his life.
It was quiet, comfortable. And Yuuta was content, if not happy. It was safe.
And then Mizuki came crashing back into his life.
It was in a bar, on one of the rare nights where Yuuta was spending more time staring into his glass than drinking from it, contemplating just where he had gone wrong in his life, why things had ended up so differently from what he had ever pictured.
He hadn’t even looked over to acknowledge the person who took a seat next to him at the bar, not until a voice, changed some but still so familiar to Yuuta that it made him ache, asked almost incredulously, “Fuji Yuuta?”
Yuuta looked up slowly, not at all prepared for who he was seeing. “Mizuki? But I thought…you had left the country!”
Mizuki shrugged, the very movement showing his time spent in Europe. “I came back.”
Yuuta wasn’t too clear on what had happened after that. More drinks, for certain. Conversation, though the topics eluded him. He remembered feeling the warmth of Mizuki’s hand on his arm, his thigh, and, later, the softness of skin against skin and the heat of passion….
The only thing his was sure of was that after that was the first morning that he had rolled over, expecting to see someone in his bed with him, but instead finding it empty and cold.
It had hurt, that first time, but Yuuta had shrugged it off fairly easily. It was a chance meeting, a one-off that could easily be written off as liquor and hormones and an opportunity to finally live some of his high school fantasies.
He had really honestly expected to never see Mizuki again. And for a few days, he didn’t. Yuuta went from the office to home and back again. On the third night, though, some of his regrets began to catch up with him again, in the form of an email from his brother, and Yuuta took himself to a bar, a different one from where Mizuki had found him.
But Mizuki found him again.
That time, Yuuta had drunk less, so he remembered the night clearly. He remembered turning the tables on a surprised Mizuki, proving once and for all that he was no longer that tough-seeming boy with the insecure interior that had made him so easy to manipulate in the past. He remembered the feel of Mizuki under him, and Mizuki’s face, watching the arrogance melt away to surprise, then to pleasure. He remembered collapsing into an exhausted, sated slumber, his arms wrapped around Mizuki.
And Mizuki was still gone when Yuuta’s alarm rang in the morning.
Yuuta had sworn then and there that it would be the last time. He’d taken and been taken by Mizuki. It was all out of his system, and he didn’t need the complication in his decidedly non-complicated life.
He was done with it.
Until the next time. And the next, and the next…until six months had gone by, and Yuuta wasn’t sure exactly what had happened, all he knew was that he was too entangled in it to stop.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Yuuta was at the bar again. This time, though, he wasn’t drinking. No, this time he was…waiting. Stalking, almost.
He wanted answers, and he didn’t want anything to cloud his mind or judgment. Unless that was a spell all of Mizuki’s doing, and not the drinks, in which case Yuuta knew he was screwed.
Almost as if he had been summoned, Mizuki slid onto the barstool next to Yuuta and flagged down the bartender. “I’ll have what he’s having, if you please.”
The bartender shrugged and placed a glass in front of Mizuki, who sipped and almost choked. “There must be some mistake…this is water!”
“With a lemon wedge,” Yuuta chimed in helpfully. “It’s what I’m drinking tonight.”
Mizuki’s expression shifted to something more calculating. “Are you sure you don’t want something with more…taste? I’ll buy, if money is the issue….”
“It’s not.” Yuuta shifted so he could look directly at Mizuki, something that he hadn’t done outside of the bedroom in all those months. “We need to talk.”
Mizuki laughed that signature chuckle of his. “Why, Yuuta, it almost sounds like you’re trying to break up with me.” He sipped daintily at his water glass.
“Maybe I am.”
Mizuki stared at Yuuta. “That would imply that we had a relationship to begin with.”
Yuuta glared, feeling almost as he did when his brother tried to cajole something from him. “I don’t know what else to call six months of fucking and disappearing.”
“That would mean assuming that you’re the only person that I’m fucking.”
Yuuta froze. “I…what?”
Mizuki waved a hand dismissively. “Honestly. I’m not that kind of man, Yuuta-kun.”
“But you are the kind of man who can screw and run.” Yuuta drained his water glass in one swallow, suddenly wishing that he had ordered something stronger.
“I don’t do relationships, Yuuta-kun. I don’t do morning afters.”
“But you do “do” former teammates who you knew had a crush on you,” Yuuta said bitterly, staring into his glass.
“I wasn’t even going to approach you that first night. But you looked lonely, like you were missing something. I just wanted to give you some excitement in your…dreary life.”
Yuuta scowled. He had forgotten that about Mizuki, his way of making everything that he did sound like a big favor that you should be grateful for receiving. “Yeah, my life may not have been very exciting, but at least it made sense. Then you came in and started fucking with me-literally and figuratively-and suddenly it’s just like junior high again, where you’re manipulating me to fit your needs. Well, I’m not that kid anymore! I’m not going to take your games lying down.”
“But you have been,” Mizuki pointed out, a smirk on his face. “Last night, in fact-”
“Shut up!” Yuuta shouted, cutting Mizuki off and drawing the attention of half the bar. Flushing some, Yuuta lowered his voice and continued. “That’s exactly it. I am not going to let you manipulate me. Not this time. I’m telling you right now what I want from you. I want a relationship. A real one, where we do things other than drink at bars, and where you’re there when the alarm goes off. Where I get to see your place, and actually know what you do, and a thousand little things that go with a relationship.”
“And if I do not want any of that? If I am satisfied with the status quo?” Mizuki’s tone and posture radiated confidence in himself and his desires.
“Then… I lived without you once, and I can live without you again.” Yuuta’s voice was steady and firm.
“You don’t mean that.” The confidence in Mizuki’s voice was almost disgusting. “You’ve had a taste of me. I’m in your system, and you can’t just drop me like that.” He leaned in close to Yuuta and breathed in his ear, “I’m like a drug you can’t resist.”
Yuuta pulled away from him. “And we all leaned in elementary school that drugs are bad.” He left money to cover their waters. “Think about it. My requirements will not change. If you want me, come find me. You have one week, and you know where I live. If not…enjoy your life, Mizuki-san.”
Yuuta stood and walked out of the bar without looking back.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
That started the longest week of Yuuta’s life.
Yuuta thought that Mizuki was correct, that he was a drug, and Yuuta was going through withdrawal. It was a struggle to go right home from work at night, without hitting a bar and seeing if Mizuki would appear, but he made himself stay strong. He would not give in and play Mizuki’s game.
He had grown out of that long ago. Now it was time for Mizuki to learn to play by someone else’s rules.
It didn’t make it any easier though, the waiting. As much as Yuuta tried to tell himself that he didn’t care if Mizuki disappeared as fast as he had appeared, that there were no feelings involved, he knew it was a lie. He knew that every night that went by without hearing a knock on his door killed him a little bit more each time.
Yuuta wasn’t sure just when it was that he had started caring again. About anything not just Mizuki. Things that hadn’t bothered him about his life before, that had slipped under his radar, were grating on his last nerve now.
Even if he disappears, I have to hand it to Mizuki. He’s changed my life yet again. And I need to do something about it. Switch jobs, go back to school, something. It’s just a question of if I do it with or without him.
Three days. Four days, then five. Six days. And nothing, still nothing.
On the seventh day, Yuuta slumped miserably in his apartments kitchenette. He’s not coming back…if he hasn’t by now, then I know he won’t. At least I can do something to get my own life back together.
Yuuta dragged himself to his computer, all set to do some research on education programs that might interest him more than his current field. He was ready to immerse himself in trying to find the passion for life that Mizuki had awakened in him again.
But I still want him….
And then….
It came so faint that at first Yuuta, in another room and his mind occupied, didn’t hear anything. But then it came again, and again and louder, and this time, it was unmistakable.
A knock on Yuuta’s door.
--The End--