Title: Halloween, or "Please, He'll Never Agree to That"
Fandom: Yu Yu Hakusho
Pairing(s): Yusuke/Kurama
Rating: PG-13
Beta:
nightwalkerA/N: A Halloween special. Early, and not written for the Halloween Challenge, which I intend to participate in, but still a Halloween special. Also my introductory post to this community.
“Yusuke, correct me if I’m wrong, but you appear to be holding a dress.”
Yusuke winces, gold hoop swinging in his newly-pierced ear. “It’s a pirate dress,” he says quickly, holding the offending garment protectively in front of him.
Kurama cocks an eyebrow. He’d been skeptical enough when the half-demon arrived at his door unannounced, dressed to the nines in pirate garb - complete with high boots, tight breeches, eye patch, even an elaborately feathered captain’s hat - and even more so when he’d announced that there was a costume for Kurama, as well. It now appears that skepticism was well-founded.
He stands and watches Yusuke fidget uncomfortably a moment longer - subtly hefting the novel he’s been translating for his English class, carefully calculating just how much damage both it and Yusuke’s skull will sustain if he uses it as a projectile weapon - before he turns smartly on one heel and stalks back to his room. Undeterred, his lover tails him.
“Come on, Kurama. The store only had a few pirate costumes left - apparently, pirates are big this year; there’s some ninja-versus-pirate thing going on - and I had to take what I could get. And it could be worse. It could some horrendously girly thing, all lace and frills and stuff.”
“And why, again, do you want to see me in a dress?”
“It’s not like that!” Yusuke denies loudly and quickly, and Kurama finds himself hard-pressed to subdue the insistent smirk tugging at the corners of his mouth. “It’s just - I figured, you know, you’re thin enough and you’ve got long hair, so -“
“Ah, so this has become an attack on my figure now, has it?” Kurama interrupts, never once bothering to look up from his homework.
It amuses him to no end that he can hear Yusuke’s indignant flush when the half-demon mutters in response, “There’s nothing wrong with your figure.”
This is all just too easy. “What was that, Yusuke?”
“I said, there’s nothing wrong with - “ Yusuke begins, but he cuts off short when Kurama finally loses the battle with his self-control and laughs softly.
“Evil,” Yusuke accuses sullenly.
Kurama chuckles, carefully marking his place in the novel and swiveling to face the half-demon “Yes,” he admits easily, and not without a glow of pride. “Now, why don’t you tell me what this is really about?”
Yusuke eyes his lover carefully, and Kurama can just see the elaborate lie forming behind his lips. He gives the younger boy a hard look, and catches the exact moment Yusuke gives up on a lost cause in favor of dropping onto the bed with a defeated sigh. The dress falls across his knees.
“It was all Kuwabara’s idea,” he points out rather unhelpfully, reaching up to tug on his hoop with a wicked glint in his eye.
Kurama’s eyebrow meeets his hairline again. “I find it hard to believe that Kuwabara is entirely responsible for this attempt to humiliate me.”
“I don’t know,” Yusuke muses in what is almost a sing-song. “He did have that dream about making out with me.” His sly glance is met with a calm, incredulous stare.
“Funny, I remember that being your doing.”
Yusuke pouts. “Have I ever told you how much I hate it when you’re logical?”
“Once or twice,” Kurama answers with a smile.
With an exasperated groan, Yusuke collapses backwards onto the bed. “It really was Kuwabara’s idea, you know. He heard about this club downtown that lets groups of people in for free on Halloween. The catch is, they have to be dressed in coordinating costumes.”
“Ah,” Kurama says simply.
Yusuke rolls onto his side, picking at a loose string on Kurama’s coverlet. “I just figured we could hang out, just us guys. You know, go dancing, get smashed, pick up some chicks.”
“Yusuke, if you plan on spending the evening attempting to ‘pick up chicks’, I will most definitely not be joining you, in that dress or not.”
“I didn’t mean - “ Yusuke begins, surging upright, but Kurama only smiles patiently, and he breaks off, shaking his head. Instead, he tosses the dress across the room at Kurama, who snatches it deftly out of the air.
“Put on the dress, you damn girl.”
“As you wish, Yusuke. Shall I do my hair and makeup, as well?”
“Oh, shut up.”
*****
Several hours later, Yusuke sits sulking at a dark corner table, nursing a beer - one of a long series, the previously emptied bottles strewn across the table around him.
“He’s got some nerve,” he slurs angrily, and Kuwabara - cupping a beer of his own in large hands - grins.
“You can’t really blame him,” he says reasonably, gesturing at the fox-demon. He takes a brief moment to readjust the stuffed parrot on his shoulder. “He looks surprisingly good in that thing.”
“Don’t you start,” Yusuke protests sourly, and Kuwabara backs off.
Yusuke glowers across the club at the throng of young men - in various intensities and complexities of pirate garb - who have descended upon his lover. With all the fawning and flirting and stolen touches, Yusuke hasn’t been able to get close all night. Now, a chance hole opens up in the crowd, and Yusuke catches the fox-demon’s eyes for an instant.
Without quite realizing he’s moving, the half-demon is up and stalking across the floor. Everyone else be damned; he wants his lover, and he wants him now. Forcing his way through the knot of people, he comes up short for a brief moment once he’s reached Kurama.
Kuwabara has, perhaps, been a bit unforgiving in his description: as far as Yusuke’s concerned, Kurama is absolutely breathtaking. The dress is elegantly simple - a plain white shift with loose sleeves, a black overdress that laces tightly up the front - but it clings and drapes and flows in all the right places, and Yusuke has to think for a long, hard moment before he can remember why he’s stormed over here.
And then Kurama looks up at him with sultry, relieved eyes from beneath long, curled lashes, and Yusuke wastes no further time in scooping the fox-demon up and slinging him unceremoniously over one shoulder. Ignoring the various threats and protests, he shoulders his way to the door.
“You’re besmirching my maidenly virtue,” comes a muffled voice from near his waistline.
“I have no idea what that means, and even if I did, I don’t think I’d care,” Yusuke replies breathlessly, feeling Kurama’s hips grinding softly against his shoulder.
The fox-demon laughs before sliding a hand along Yusuke’s tightly-clad rear. “Never mind, Yusuke. It’s not important.”
*****
Kuwabara, who’s been watching the proceedings with some interest, politely manages to contain himself until after the two have moved out of earshot. Then, he absolutely howls. He knows a certain ill-tempered fire-demon who now owes him a great deal of money.
To be honest, he does feel a little guilty about using his spiritual awareness to gamble - after all, without being able to read auras, Hiei’s at a real disadvantage in terms of understanding just how strongly Kurama cares for Yusuke, just how far he’ll go and how much he’ll do for his half-demon lover - but, then again, it is the shrimp.
Kuwabara cackles, rubbing his hands together. Time to go collect his prize.
Enjoy! Comments and criticisms are welcomed.
Crossposted to
30_kisses,
yyhyaoi, and my personal journal.