There for Each Other Chapter Twelve (Bleach, Rose/Love)
Title - There for Each Other Chapter Twelve
Disclaimer - Don't own any of the characters, I just lock myself in my room and make them bend to my muse's will.
Rating - Here's that pesky M rating we were waiting for....:D
Word Count -6,799
Warning - There is het in here (Lisa/Love & YoruHara) but this will be yaoi so there are some overtones, if that bothers you (or vise versa).
Summary - It began with a stranger rescuing a stranger and went on from there. Love & Rose's story from Academy, Soul Society & beyond. There will be angst, UNF to the max, meddlesome YoruHara with help from a certain raven-haired be-spectacled visored - & let's throw in a Kuchiki!
Back to Chapter Eleven!
Delightful Routine
Rōjūrō found himself becoming more familiar with the grounds of the Academy. He had an easier time of migrating from class to class thanks to his occasional wandering in an attempt to avoid the passionate steam-room that had once been his dorm. He spent plenty of time with Aikawa and Lisa but there was a point where it became too obvious that they were a couple and he was a single.
It would have been easier to ignore if he hadn’t kept seeing Lisa’s glance every time he chanced to look toward them, as if she was asking him what he was doing (implying that whatever it was, it was wrong). Their study sessions were beneficial; she had interesting insights on kidō and was eager to pluck whatever knowledge she could from the blond, even though he constantly claimed not a drop of his mother’s skill.
While wandering he found plenty of semi-peaceful spots his favorite a small almost enclosed space with a fantastic view of the very edge of the kidō field and most of its adjacent wooded area. He had mentioned it to Aikawa and eventually showed it to him, they sometimes studied there, but mostly they enjoyed lunch in the alcove of wood and creeping vines.
It didn’t take long before he found his hiding place compromised. It couldn’t have been more than a week after he’d shown it to Aikawa that he found his roommate in it, very much tangled up with Yadōmaru. He wasn’t standing there a moment agog before a feeling of irritation start to fill him; he gave a few moments concentration to make sure his reiatsu wasn’t lashing out against the strange mixture that was his study buddies’.
Before Aikawa became aware of the blond’s presence, spectacled eyes flickered upward to encounter Rōjūrō’s. She made sure to say the same thing she always did when the other noble interrupted their time together, “Oh it’s Rōjūrō-kōhai.”
If Rōjūrō had to guess he would have said she was doing it to see what sort of reaction she could get out of the two of them. It was starting to get on the blond’s nerves, and clearly they needed to have a private conversation. “Can we talk Lisa-senpai?”
“Y’got shitty timin’ y’know?” Aikawa grumbled and Lisa leaned in to kiss along his cheek, lips moving along his ear as she whispered something to him. “Yeah,” Came the grinning answer.
“Then scoot,” She watched him get to his feet and lifted a hand for help up.
“See y’tomorrow?” Aikawa lifted her effortlessly, letting her lean along his front.
“Of course,” She nodded, canting her head back for a kiss and as he leaned down to press their lips together Rōjūrō sighed and crossed his arms over his chest. “Bye.”
Aikawa nodded, glanced toward his roommate curiously before bidding them farewell and leaving them alone together.
“So?”
“What do you think you’re doing?”
“Talking to you at the moment,” Lisa smirked.
How to ask such a thing? There was no polite way to bring up his suspicions. You look at me as if you expect me to pull the two of you apart and you’re disappointed when I don’t. Like you’re goading me? There was no tactful approach here. “It doesn’t matter how jealous I am, he is never going to be interested.”
“So you are jealous?” A black eyebrow lifted over the curve of her spectacle frame. “I thought you weren’t the relationship type.”
It wasn’t an admission but Rōjūrō was still sure his suspicion was correct. “I wasn’t lying.”
Just like Lisa hadn’t admitted the other’s notion was true, the blond didn’t really answer her question about his jealousy concerning Aikawa and she. “Things change,” She gave Rōjūrō her own version of a sad smile. “I didn’t expect to be getting married to a man I might love if he even looked my way once.”
“All you’re going to do is send me out to find some cute thing,” Rōjūrō threatened.
“I think your roommate would have something to say about that.”
“He can say all he wants to,” Rōjūrō shrugged and adjusted his weight to balance it on his feet. “I don’t even have to leave the Seireitei.”
Lisa looked at him a moment, as if speculating whether or not to voice the thoughts in her head. “You might like to stay and listen to his talking if he read to you.” She reached down to retrieve what looked like a book bag with a long shoulder strap. “I have some good books in here.”
“Did you hear me?”
“I did,” Lisa stopped rummaging in the bag to meet his eyes, teal staring out of her glasses. “You’re jealous and want to blackmail Love into ending our relationship.”
Something made a hollow pang in the blond’s chest at the name she called his roommate. “Why would he--”
“He would stop seeing me if you even tried, don’t tell me your foolish enough to think he wouldn’t,” She ordered as she pulled out a small book the cover brilliant red.
“Yadōmaru--”
“Listen…he started reading this book to me and I almost had to excuse myself…then he started talking to me…” A faint blush tinted her cheeks and she looked down at her fingers as she ran them along the spine of the book. “That voice…mm…”
“No.” Rōjūrō held a hand up. “I don’t want to hear about Love’s sex voice. Not interested.” He gave a shake of his head, enough golden hair having escaped from its tie that it flew into his face. “Stop.”
Lisa caught his hand and slapped the small book into it, making his fingers curl around its spine before letting go and walking past the other noble. “I have no idea what you’re talking about Ōtoribashi.”
A shunpo left the blond standing there with his mouth opening to talk, his breath expelled in an exasperated huff and the small book protested his grip on its spine. “That girl.”
#
“Y’all right?”
Rōjūrō stood staring at the shoji a moment after closing it, his back to the gruff-sounding voice of his roommate. “I’ll be fine. I’m sorry I interrupted.”
“Didn’t mean to snap at y’earlier, Lisa’s nothin’ but a tease anyway,” Aikawa shrugged, his body stretched out on his futon his uniform in total disarray, the blond clucked with his tongue at the sight after making himself turn around and step into the room. “Wut?”
“You could wear that again if you don’t let it wrinkle,” Rōjūrō informed the other man, moving to his futon on the opposite side, having already changed earlier between his last class and wandering the Academy grounds.
“I ain’t gettin’ up,” Aikawa crossed his arms underneath his head, eyes trained on the ceiling as if he were imagining stars up there. “Nobody told me that when I stopped walkin’ the forest t’become an academic I’d still get tired.”
“Are you saying that you assumed your new Academy life wouldn’t involve any noteworthy physicality?” Rōjūrō meant to turn toward the wall but found himself on his other side, looking across the floor to the profile of his roommate.
For some reason that question gained Rōjūrō a full frontal of Aikawa face, brown eyes looking over at him in a slightly perturbed way that was becoming familiar. “If that’s yer longwinded way of sayin’ I don’t move around enough, the answer’s yes.”
“It was, I suppose,” Rōjūrō felt a strange jolt zing down his body at the contact of brown eyes to his purple. Quickly -- but not quick enough to look suspicious -- the noble rolled to his back not paying attention as he reached for something to put in front of his face.
Upon entering the room the blond had tossed Lisa’s small red book and it had landed just shy of his futon and as his hand encountered it he didn’t make the connection to Aikawa or how obvious it might be to someone that had seen that brilliant a shiny red cover.
Read from it.
Rōjūrō didn’t bother looking for something else; Aikawa had seen the book and putting it down to read something else would be a problem…
‘…she opened her eyes as he moved carefully inside her until she felt his pelvis meet hers and he gave a pause his eyes drifting closed at her exquisite feel. She had never heard him utter a word of his native language but now she heard him murmur something soft and fast as he moved to brace his hands on either side of her on the futon and his hips moved--‘
Looking into the book had been a bid to hide the small paint of embarrassment on his noble face but it only served to intensify it and he heard a rumbling chuckle.
“She didn’t tell you what was in it did she?” Aikawa asked and Rōjūrō didn’t debate on turning to look at him, he avoided it studiously. “Me either.”
“That girl,” Rōjūrō muttered and it was quiet enough in the room that he was sure his roommate heard, the noble hoped his elevated heartbeat was going by unnoticed.
“It started out like a normal story, ‘bout a girl that fell in love with an old demi-god or somethin’,” Aikawa remembered the beginning of the book, it had gotten steamy very quickly after that. “He loved her but already had him a lady demi-god but she was…” He gave a single-shouldered shrug. “She was a bitch; he left her after seein’ her in the sheets with another half-god guy ‘n’went to see his new girl.”
The random spot the blond had opened the book onto wasn’t even halfway through the small pages. He tried and failed to keep himself from wondering how far into the book Aikawa had read aloud before stopping.
“I don’t know why I’m surprised,” Rōjūrō slapped the little book shut and shoved his hand under his pillow, stashing Lisa’s gift underneath. “I don’t get her.”
“Me either.”
The noble was able to look over at his roommate letting his relief show, “Glad to know it’s not just me.”
“She’s a riddle,” Aikawa nodded. “But so are you.”
“Gee thanks Love,” As he said the nickname Rōjūrō decided the best way to avoid the implications of Aikawa’s comparison was to ask a question that had been begging to be voiced. “When did Lisa-senpai start calling you ‘Love’?”
Rōjūrō thought he had successfully hidden any jealousy in the question, he had carefully thought out the choice of wording; since the first thing that had sprung to his lips had been something like, ‘I thought you only wanted me to call you that.’ This hadn’t really been a question but something he might say right before he stomped his food in a brattish tantrum.
Aikawa’s eyes widened in surprise and shook his head, “She don’t. Told you that’s yer name.” His eyes crinkled at the corners as a grin curled his lips and his voice came out a few octaves lower as he murmured, “She’s got her own names to call me.”
The noble gave a small wiggle into his futon and sucked in a soft breath through his nose at the tone of his roommate’s voice. The knowing smile of their mutual bespectacled female acquaintance resonated in his head, the look on her face as she thought about listening to that voice whisper sultry and low for her alone.
Damn that girl and her ideas.
#
…
“I can finally do that pedicure I’ve been meaning to do since…forever...I could do yours…although…do you know what a pedicure is?”
…
“No fuckin’ idea.”
…
“Oh, Love.”
…
“That bad’hm?” Disembodied voices finally coalesced and Aikawa came into sight as he tilted his head back a little, trying to catch a lavender eye from between noble knees.
“Mhm…I’m missing a few tools I’ll have to do your pedicure later.”
“Few tools,” Aikawa turned his head a bit laughing and the hot puff of breath skittered over the inside of Rōjūrō’s knee, thankfully the other man was still sitting a bit too high for it to do any more than that.
“Yes,” He tried not to hiss the word but could hear the longing lacing it as his imagination ran away with him.
Aikawa’s only answer was a drawn out, “Hmph,” as his magnificent torso twisted a little, dark lips lowering to press to the inside of his knee, gaze lifting to consider Rōjūrō’s frustrated expression. The gentle lips moved away only to kiss a scant inch higher on his inner thigh, and simply pressed there, his warm breath nothing but hot pleasure rushing out across the noble’s skin.
Their eyes met and Rōjūrō gasped, “Don’t stop.”
“Y’sure?”
“Love.” Came out demanding and exasperated.
Warm brown eyes didn’t leave purple as seeking lips stayed in contact as the kiss slid upward, towel-covered head turning inward, the tilt of his head was how Rōjūrō saw the anxiety his roommate was trying to hide.
“I’m sorry,” Escaped from the blond in a rush of air. “You don’t have to--”
“I’ve just never…ah…” His hand lifted out of the water to hook a finger in the edge of the kimono where it hung over Rōjūrō’s thigh in an attempt to keep the noble covered.
Which obviously didn’t work for Aikawa.
Rōjūrō watched as Aikawa slid the cloth aside and didn’t let the sight of the blond’s arousal deter him. The noble’s nimble fingers plucked at his obi until both edges of his silken kimono fell open, “What do you want to do?”
The heated look Aikawa sent Rōjūrō’s newly-uncovered cock sent an uncontrollable twitch of interest through said hard-on along with the words, “Taste you.”
“Then do it.” Steel entered the noble’s voice as he answered, quickly regaining the other man’s gaze.
“Rōjūrō…” Breathed hot across his skin and even if the hushed puff of his name sounded frightened, it still curled the noble’s toes.
“Wrap your hand around it,” Came out gentle, yet sharp, the husky whisper had enough command that soon Aikawa’s fingers were wrapped around the base of his penis. Just the soft pressure of his grip made pleasure shoot through the blond, making his next order a bit more wanton but no less authoritative, “Taste. Me.”
The hot grip adjusted and Rōjūrō watched as Aikawa angled him low enough to take the tip into his mouth, tongue sliding along underneath. They were both very still for a few moments, the quiet only interrupted by the lap of water and noble panting, then Aikawa’s tongue did some unintentionally delicious wiggle that made Rōjūrō’s jaded sensibilities fracture.
It was just an inch of friction, a wet lick along the underside of the head ending in the tip of a tongue pressing along it and it ripped a sound so obscene from the noble he felt his face burn. Realizing his head had fallen back as his moan broke the silence the noble lifted his head, and he barely contained the whimper as their gazes connected.
Beautiful lips slipped from around him, a pink tongue darting out to catch excess saliva, “Fuckin’ gorgeous.”
“What…” Rōjūrō’s voice was hardly above a whisper.
“You heard me,” The rumbling purr of his voice hit the blond much like his roommate’s earlier taste. He was suddenly confronted with wet glistening shoulders and torso and, “Lay back,” in such a rough deep baritone the blond couldn’t help but comply.
“Now what?” Rōjūrō asked eagerly eyes taking in the soapy hot wet expanse of dark skin and muscle. He tried not to shiver as he pulled his feet out of the water to brace his toes on the edge of the spring.
“Do what y’do best Ōtoribashi…” Brown eyes drowning in blown pupil focused very intently on the man’s underneath him, Rōjūrō knew his eyes were no better. “Keep talkin’.”
“What about?”
“What about? Princess watta y’think?” Aikawa had to have seen the focus of lavender eyes as he slipped between the noble’s bent knees.
“No,” The blond shook his head at the nickname as he thought about answering the question. “What about how do I taste? Can we talk about that?”
“You can,” Aikawa had decided he needed further study, one of his muscular arms holding him up, hand pressed just to the left of Rōjūrō’s torso while the other stroked down the back of a pale thigh. “I wanna help y’relax.”
“Keep talking like that--ordothat!--ahhmmm,” His eyes slammed shut a moment as Aikawa suddenly took him in hand and got a second taste to make sure of the first. “Oh, Love yes…touch me…”
The request gave the large hand around his cock permission to do more than guide the blond to his mouth, he gave a stroke and his lips followed as far as they could, tongue driving Rōjūrō mad. He didn’t tell Aikawa that with words so much, it was something more sound than word, more emotion than meaning and nothing but praise.
“What?” Aikawa disengaged enough to say, catching lavender eyes frustrated still. “That good huh?”
“Yes that was one of my good sounds, Love…” Rōjūrō gripped with his toes and pushed with his feet a little to get a thrust into the other man’s fist. “Don’t stop.”
Dark fingers squeezed as they pumped down and Aikawa took the noble back into his mouth lips meeting fingers as they stroked back up. Back down, up.
“More,” The blond groaned keeping his eyes open enough to watch. He let his hips shift into a shallow thrust, just enough to encourage movement in those glistening lips.
There was no move in reaction to the noble’s prompting but there also was no rejection, no move to pull away. There was only a tightening of fingers as they pumped into Rōjūrō’s thrust, squeezing at the base and a flash of the whites of Aikawa’s eyes as he let his eyelids flutter open to pierce the blond with his gaze.
Something very un-noblelike came from the blond and he didn’t hesitate to buck his hips this time, a little harder and followed it with another. Aikawa’s hand kept perfect counter to the thrusts, his focus on finding all of the best places to give friction or pressure with his tongue.
“Yes, right there--oh…Love--oh!” Rōjūrō was disappointed to feel Aikawa’s weight shift so the hand he used to steady himself moved to the noble’s narrow hip to keep it from gyrating upward.
That was until the slide of his lips began again, this time under Aikawa’s control, and somehow knowing it was the other man’s desire behind the stroke of his mouth made it that much better. Part of him -- a tiny part -- was embarrassed that he was so close to coming, the rest of him -- that tiny part as well -- didn’t give a shit.
Aikawa’s fingers dug into Rōjūrō’s hip and that only pushed the blond closer, until he was nothing but the sensation of mouth and hand and the pressing points of Aikawa’s fingers in his flank.
A low moan rose from the noble’s throat as his hip gave an involuntary buck and Aikawa’s answer was more pressure on a pale hip and the almost painful dig of fingers did Rōjūrō in. “I’m coming--oh I--
Lavender eyes snapped open, for a moment his heart thundering in his ears not knowing what had woken him up, then his gaze began to grow accustomed to the dark.
The noble had two simultaneous reactions as he saw the dark shape over him and registered its identity; one was automatic defense the other was to wonder how talented that mouth was in real life.
“Oi--” Aikawa tried to shake him awake again and was very suddenly rolled underneath the sleeper in a mess of blankets and bedclothes. “Rōjūrō!”
The noble was quite sure the combination of cloth made it near impossible to feel the erection wanting to press without barrier into the hollow of his roommate’s hip, even if he was pinning the larger man to the futon. “Love? What.” He looked down into wide brown eyes, noble limbs shaking from the speed of his heart and the longing roiling through him from his dream. The warm body beneath him.
“Y’all right?” Aikawa’s voice rumbled out in the dark and he didn’t move until he knew the blond was awake and aware.
“I…y-yes…sorrysorrysorry…” Rōjūrō rolled away from him and up onto his feet, adjusting the nearby lamp to a very low intensity so he could see clearly enough.
“Bad dream?” Aikawa’s voice drifted to the blond from over his shoulder as he walked toward his trunks, willing himself to calm as he pretended to find something to wear, tomorrow was a holiday, no lessons.
It was some school faculty day but Rōjūrō still looked for something with a little shine to it. His sisters had harped on him endlessly for packing the kimono he now sought in his standing trunk. It wasn’t vibrant or gaudy, but parts of the design were traced with gold, mostly indiscernible to the eye unless one moved correctly in the light. Unless Okaasan wanted him dolled up in something special he wore his holiday kimono and its various accoutrement.
“Why would you say that?” Rōjūrō was glad to hear that his voice was even, his thoughts severely curtailed since he hadn’t heard Aikawa get up from his bed yet, or move. Don’t look. Don’t. Don’t. Don’t.
“You were pantin’, groanin’,” Aikawa finally sat up, the movement out of the corner of the noble’s eyes automatically signaling something instinctive in him causing his head to turn and glance at the motion to see what it was. Even if the rest of him knew what it was, what he was saying.
“Just…” Rōjūrō swallowed nervously and pulled out a similar kimono distracted. “The usual,” He tore his gaze away from the bare-chested man in his bed to look at the kimono, frowning before he put it away and found the correct one. It was true, it was usual; this was his fourth time having it! That was ‘usual’ damn it! “I’m sorry I seemed to have disturbed your sleep.”
“Naw, I’d rather wake up a few times n’be wrong then not wake up n’you need me,” He said this a moment before flopping down onto the futon again.
“I need you?” Rōjūrō was glad for the low light as his face lit up with embarrassment at his blurted question.
“Y’do if yer suffocatin’ in yer sleep!” Aikawa’s head shot up to look over at the noble sharply but the blond was looking at his kimono as if it held the secrets of the universe.
“Oh.”
“’Oh,’ like it ain’t a big deal.”
“Hm,” Tossing the kimono to drape over the top half of the trunk he started removing his night clothes.
“Excuse me?” Aikawa barked, and Rōjūrō almost jumped as he turned back to look at him. “Girl it ain’t even four in the mornin’ yet get back in bed.”
“I would but it’s occupied,” The blond sniffed moving closer to his futon night-shirt clutched in his hand. “And I’ve watched you put your dirty feet in yours too often, we’re not switching.”
“Oh I’m so fuckin’ offended right now,” Aikawa looked up at his roommate with a smirk. “Y’just said I fuckin’ put my dirty feet on my bed…I think I might cry.”
“My heart breaks for you,” Rōjūrō opted to throw the shirt at his roommate’s head. “Get out of my bed.”
“Oh y’can’t tell me noble’s don’t do sleepovers, cuz Lisa was the one that told me all about’em,” Aikawa tossed the shirt back at the noble, shaking his head mentally after realizing he’d been staring at the blond.
“I’m guessing she invited you to one?” Rōjūrō said lightly through his teeth.
“How’d you know?”
“I’m brilliant,” The noble shot back, pulling the shirt back on. “And I’ve decided that I do have Lisa-senpai’s number; she may as well be transparent.”
“Huh? How’s that?” Aikawa saw the tired lines of his roommate’s face and wondered how he kept looking so radiant when he obviously felt this way, waking up at such ungodly hours.
“Us girls can’t fool each other,” Was Rōjūrō’s flippant answer, he yelped in surprise as a strong hand wrapped around his wrist and yanked him off balance. Instead of landing in an indignant heap Rōjūrō found himself caught in the other man’s arms, the rest of him sprawled out off the edge of his futon.
“Go back t’sleep,” Aikawa said before depositing him on his bed, blond head on pillow.
“I only let men in my bed for one reason,” Rōjūrō grumbled, his hair slightly rumpled his nightclothes definitely in disarray. “So get back to your bed, or get naked.”
Brown eyes widened and Rōjūrō told himself that he was not rising to Lisa’s bait, damn dream. “Y’all right?”
The noble yanked the blankets that were tangled in Aikawa’s legs, and rolled away from him, trying to garner the strength to… “I’m fine. Tired I guess.”
“Y’know you can talk to me,” Aikawa’s voice drifted over his shoulder and Rōjūrō gave a soft sigh.
“You don’t want to hear my bullshit.”
“Wut a scandalous mouth,” Aikawa teased, falling back to lie on the other side of the bed, perusing this side of the room’s ceiling. “And a’course I wanna hear it. I asked Dumbshit.”
“No.” At the nickname Rōjūrō jerked his head around to stare at the other man over his shoulder.
“No?” Aikawa laughed. “None’a the nice ones were workin’.”
“Keep trying,” Rōjūrō suggested as he turned back to stare across the room at Aikawa’s empty futon, silence his answer to the suggestion he talk about what was happening to him, to the man that was heavily involved in creating said ‘happening’.
The dream had not returned the night after it’s first occurrence and Rōjūrō had thought it might mean he had suppressed the errant thoughts he was having of his roommate but the following night it had returned with a vengeance. Tonight had been almost exactly the same, except for the addition of one very sexy bedroom voice. The previously mute Aikawa had said not one single word in all the past renditions, Rōjūrō wasn’t surprised by the change after Lisa’s damn suggestive words--and that book!
Damn it.
Already awake and moving through morning katas a certain dark-haired bespectacled senpai was suddenly seized with the compulsion to sneeze, which interrupted her stride. AH-CHOO! She moved back into the beginning of the set wondering why she had been doing that so much the last couple of days.
…
The noble awoke several hours later, much later than he usually slept-in until. He let his eyes slide open, his body stretching slowly and all the way up and down. He had his head turned toward Aikawa, whose face was peeking out from where he was resting his own arm across it.
The small amount of rest had done Rōjūrō good, he felt much more awake than earlier, he carefully sat up in bed, moving to slide out of the blankets when Aikawa caught his wrist again, sleepy voice rumbling, “Oi girl y’ain’t gotta leave yet.”
Blushing at Aikawa’s sleepy mistake of identity Rōjūrō tugged on his wrist and ordered, “Love.”
“It’s a fuckin’ holiday where y’goin’?” Came out much more alert, proving the noble’s assumption wrong, Aikawa knew who he was in bed with.
“Holiday does not mean I’m going to lay in bed all day with you in my sleep-clothes,” Rōjūrō huffed, even if it really felt like a good time, you could even skip the ‘in my sleep-clothes’ part. “Maybe Lisa-senpai would be interested?”
“Maybe later, we can make a pile.”
“I did not just hear you say that,” Rōjūrō twisted his torso to look at his roommate who was still laying there lazily, his eyes not even all the way open, other arm still flung over his face.
“Oi,” Aikawa let him go and pushed the hand under the pillow and under his head, nestling into the futon. “Forgot bed only means one thing to you with two people in it.”
Rōjūrō got up and tried not to stomp his feet as he moved to his trunk, jerking his nightshirt off over his head, still half in it as he grabbed up his holiday kimono. “Apparently I was wrong.”
“Nothin’ wrong with that,” Aikawa moved his other arm to cross with the other under his pillow/head. “Came to a school, gonna learn.”
“I’m aware of that,” The noble found some unpatterned hakama to wear, and started to methodically arrange the ties and wrap them around his waist.
With a grumble at his now-awake state Aikawa rolled over onto the other side of the bed, although he wouldn’t have thought of that distinction to the sides of a bed. He punched the undeserving pillow a few times and shoved it together until he could rest his chin in it and still see the precise movements of his roommate’s hands.
He made that shit look easy, it put a frown on Aikawa’s face and he took it out on the pillow again before relaxing. He remember when the blond had helped him tie his hakama it had only taken the one time and Aikawa knew what he was doing, but his hands failed to look like he was making music with the slide of his hands along the dark swath of fabric as it got progressively shorter and twisted around his paler kimono it’s pattern not exactly scales but close enough.
Rōjūrō turned toward him and Aikawa saw the fabric shimmer in the low light and he felt himself smile, gaze falling to the bared swath of pale torso only a moment as an excuse to return to his hands as they started working on the second set of belts. “Morning.”
“Mornin’,” Aikawa moved a hand out from under the pillow to turn the lamp on its usual intensity setting. “Don’t stop.”
“What.” Rōjūrō looked over at him and Aikawa felt the look all the way down to his toes. He tried not to be obvious as he twisted them in the blankets.
“Y’could tie your hakama ten times by the time I got mine done…’nd it still looks slow ‘nd careful,” He curled a hand back under the pillow to support his chin. The pillow smelled like the noble, it wasn’t too bad a smell when it stayed on Rōjūrō, Aikawa had never been interested in soap scents.
The blond huffed audibly and turned until he was in profile, so Aikawa could watch him wrap the hakama belt around his waist. “It’s not hard, you do fine with your waraji it’s the same idea.”
“Sure,” He took his nose out of the pillow and watched the noble finish his belt, the meticulously exact bow at the center. “Y’say that like yer not tappin’ yer foot before I’m even done with the first set.”
“I’m not going to dress you.”
“Nobody asked y’to,” Aikawa sighed and lifted his gaze to the still-flustered noble face. “Y’don’t gotta wait fer me, I can find my way by now.”
“I’m making sure you get there on time, not that we get there.”
“Thanks Ōtoribashi,” Aikawa watched the blond frown a moment then turn toward his trunks, the light catching the gold in the design.
“No problem at all Love,” Rōjūrō wondered at the strange feeling that his last name from Aikawa panged in his chest. There was no distance in the name, like another person would have instilled in the use of it, Aikawa didn’t seem to deem that social convention significant.
“Y’gonna show me where y’been hidin’ yerself?” Aikawa asked and it wasn’t the first time he’d done so.
“I already showed you that alcove, and you told someone else,” The blond gave the words playfulness but he was sure the other man knew it was hiding his feelings.
“I didn’t know it was a secret.”
“It was quiet and the more people know about it the less it will be that way,” He paused a moment trying to distract himself with the mirror in his standing trunk. “You don’t want to spend all day with me anyway.”
“Who says?” Aikawa rolled back to the other side of the bed, and onto his back.
“Lisa-senpai has a holiday too,” Rōjūrō said even though he thought she might have just a few too many obligations to properly spend an entire day lazying about.
“She has other friends y’know…think she knows the whole damn school,” He commented as he watched the blond move across the room to open the door, the attendant’s cart had a squeaky wheel that heralded his arrival and departure from the hallways.
“I was thinking it might be nice to walk the actual grounds…before it gets too cold to enjoy it,” Rōjūrō murmured as if to himself as he took their breakfast trays and deposited them on the table. “And maybe you miss walking underneath a sky?”
“Shit yeah,” Aikawa grinned as the idea surprised him in how strongly it resonated in him. Damn. “Didn’t realize.”
“Sometimes it’s just a part of you and you don’t realize it,” The noble poured them both tea as Aikawa crawled out of bed and plopped into place across from him. “I would eat this whole bowl of…whatever it is…to get my hands on a set of strings.”
“Damn that’s how t’get you t’eat?” Aikawa already had half of his own bowl digesting, thinking of drinking the steaming cup of tea even as he watched Rōjūrō finish off his first cup before touching a single piece of food.
“Yes. If you find music for me I will eat whatever you tell me to,” Lavender eyes met brown in sincerity before tacking on, “Until I get fat.”
“Shut-up,” Aikawa picked up his cup to drink some, knowing Rōjūrō wouldn’t pour himself a second cup of tea until he could at least refresh his roommate’s. I should have asked Lisa about it already, she knows the entire place top to bottom, Aikawa thought sullenly to himself, realizing he hadn’t wanted to started yet another conversation about Rōjūrō with her.
“I will if I eat too much,” Rōjūrō started to whittle down the supply of food the cafeteria had sent him, he swore up and down to his roommate that the Head Chef had started giving him even more food after his audacity of earlier. It was one of the few things he argued with Aikawa about, never mind the noble’s food intake.
“Y’gotta actually eat before you can eat too much,” After draining half his tea he put the cup next to Rōjūrō’s and the noble subconsciously took the prompt, pouring them both some more. “So do that.”
Without another word the noble ‘dug in’ or at least as much as he seemed capable.
Aikawa chuckled and finished his breakfast before getting up to get dressed enough to leave their quarters. Without a thought grabbed up the noble’s discarded nightshirt and gave it an inspecting sniff, it was ridiculously large on the blond and didn’t even smell bad. Smelled like his pillow.
“What are you doing?”
“Checkin’ fer stink,” Aikawa admitted before throwing the simple shirt on over his head. As he turned back to look at Rōjūrō the noble was very visibly blushing and it was hard to mistake his agog expression. “Y’mind?” He asked a bit surprised after having the noble offer to let him borrow clothes before he had gotten his supply from Yasu.
“N-no,” Rōjūrō shook his head and even if he would have put up a fuss over going out with someone so underdressed he found he really didn’t mind for some reason. “Ready to go, or will there be shoes to go with that ensemble?”
“Just fer that Ōtoribashi…no there won’t be,” Aikawa moved past the table, giving a glance at the noble’s breakfast he figured it was more than he should have expected him to eat he continued on to the door and slid it open.
“Hey,” The noble collected everything on the tray and moved it to the door, one hand balancing the large tray easily as the other hand drained his cup of tea. “I don’t think rushing is suggested on holidays--”
“Hope I’m not interrupting,” A soft unexpected voice cut in as they moved down the hall toward the nearest exit. Lisa was moving in the opposite direction, probably from the same exit they were moving toward, her kimono as short as usual when left to her own non-uniform wardrobe.
Although there was a sharp stab of disappointment at the disruption Aikawa felt something else zip through him as he realized he could ask Lisa about parts of the school he might be interested in for one reason or another. “Sight fer sore eyes.”
“I got all my work done late last night -- officially I’d call it very early this morning-- Yamamoto-sama decided the junior faculty could enjoy the day…as long as they had no standing reports,” She gave a gentle nudge to her glasses and returned her arm to folding with the other across her chest.
“You’re looking radiant for someone that’s going on little sleep,” Rōjūrō observed.
“Same to you Rōjūrō-senpai,” Lisa countered as she fell into step with them, about-facing to walk toward the exit. “What are your plans? I thought you said Yamamoto himself couldn’t get you out of bed today Aikawa.”
“He couldn’t.”
“Hm,” Lisa shared a look with Rōjūrō as Aikawa pushed the door open before them, the blond gave a sharp sigh of irritation and glared at her. “Awfully possessive of you Rōjūrō-senpai,” She said under her breath.
“Rōjūrō thought I should get some dirt under my feet,” Aikawa said as they walked past him out the door.
“I said no such thing.”
“Well I’m sure you forgot there was dirt under those pedicured feet,” Aikawa shot back and Lisa burst out laughing.
There was a perfectly good reason to blush; Rōjūrō told himself that as he battled the warmth back knowing it suffused his face for an entirely different reason than either of the two present probably understood. “I’d forgotten to do mine so it’s been quite some time actually,” The noble felt his own toes curl as if to hide themselves from sight as he admitted it.
“Darn I was hoping to show you some more of my books,” Lisa sighed and lifted a hand to point her thumb back over her shoulder. “I’ve got a few things to take care of if you want to hang out later.”
“Oi,” Aikawa frowned. “Wanna talk t’you.”
“About what?”
Aikawa sighed and turned to Rōjūrō who couldn’t help but catch the knowing look the girl behind his roommate shot him as she met his gaze. “I’ll see y’later? I gotta ask Lisa some questions.”
“I’ll just be wandering around, looking for a garden or two.”
Lisa pointed off to the right, “There’s a few speckled toward Hado training…A really magnificent one straight toward the faculty office, smaller than the main garden but much more serene.”
“Domo,” Rōjūrō gave her a small smile and moved in a decidedly different direction from them. “Jaa ne Love.”
Lisa felt a little skip in her heart at the wistful sound of the blond’s parting and she turned her gaze to Aikawa to see he was watching the departing form of his roommate. Maybe he wasn’t so oblivious.
“So what’s so important that you break a date with Sugarbear?” Lisa asked wanting to see just what reaction she would get.
“No,” At the word Aikawa turned his gaze to her, then proceeded to shake it in reference to the nickname.
“No? Aw, I can picture you calling him that,” She gave him a cute frown and leaned close to tug on his borrowed sleeve. “What was it you wanted to know?”
“I’m lookin’ for a music room.”
“Dunno about a room…it was odd but the few places we had such extra-curricular activities were emptied out a few days after the semester started,” Lisa thought about the ultimatum that had supposedly brought Ōtoribashi to the Academy, he was probably both to blame for their absence and the reason Aikawa was asking about them. “May know of a few stray instruments if you know specifically what you need.”
“Somethin’ with strings.”
Onward to Chapter Thirteen!
Disclaimer - Don't own any of the characters, I just lock myself in my room and make them bend to my muse's will.
Rating - Here's that pesky M rating we were waiting for....:D
Word Count -6,799
Warning - There is het in here (Lisa/Love & YoruHara) but this will be yaoi so there are some overtones, if that bothers you (or vise versa).
Summary - It began with a stranger rescuing a stranger and went on from there. Love & Rose's story from Academy, Soul Society & beyond. There will be angst, UNF to the max, meddlesome YoruHara with help from a certain raven-haired be-spectacled visored - & let's throw in a Kuchiki!
Back to Chapter Eleven!
Delightful Routine
Rōjūrō found himself becoming more familiar with the grounds of the Academy. He had an easier time of migrating from class to class thanks to his occasional wandering in an attempt to avoid the passionate steam-room that had once been his dorm. He spent plenty of time with Aikawa and Lisa but there was a point where it became too obvious that they were a couple and he was a single.
It would have been easier to ignore if he hadn’t kept seeing Lisa’s glance every time he chanced to look toward them, as if she was asking him what he was doing (implying that whatever it was, it was wrong). Their study sessions were beneficial; she had interesting insights on kidō and was eager to pluck whatever knowledge she could from the blond, even though he constantly claimed not a drop of his mother’s skill.
While wandering he found plenty of semi-peaceful spots his favorite a small almost enclosed space with a fantastic view of the very edge of the kidō field and most of its adjacent wooded area. He had mentioned it to Aikawa and eventually showed it to him, they sometimes studied there, but mostly they enjoyed lunch in the alcove of wood and creeping vines.
It didn’t take long before he found his hiding place compromised. It couldn’t have been more than a week after he’d shown it to Aikawa that he found his roommate in it, very much tangled up with Yadōmaru. He wasn’t standing there a moment agog before a feeling of irritation start to fill him; he gave a few moments concentration to make sure his reiatsu wasn’t lashing out against the strange mixture that was his study buddies’.
Before Aikawa became aware of the blond’s presence, spectacled eyes flickered upward to encounter Rōjūrō’s. She made sure to say the same thing she always did when the other noble interrupted their time together, “Oh it’s Rōjūrō-kōhai.”
If Rōjūrō had to guess he would have said she was doing it to see what sort of reaction she could get out of the two of them. It was starting to get on the blond’s nerves, and clearly they needed to have a private conversation. “Can we talk Lisa-senpai?”
“Y’got shitty timin’ y’know?” Aikawa grumbled and Lisa leaned in to kiss along his cheek, lips moving along his ear as she whispered something to him. “Yeah,” Came the grinning answer.
“Then scoot,” She watched him get to his feet and lifted a hand for help up.
“See y’tomorrow?” Aikawa lifted her effortlessly, letting her lean along his front.
“Of course,” She nodded, canting her head back for a kiss and as he leaned down to press their lips together Rōjūrō sighed and crossed his arms over his chest. “Bye.”
Aikawa nodded, glanced toward his roommate curiously before bidding them farewell and leaving them alone together.
“So?”
“What do you think you’re doing?”
“Talking to you at the moment,” Lisa smirked.
How to ask such a thing? There was no polite way to bring up his suspicions. You look at me as if you expect me to pull the two of you apart and you’re disappointed when I don’t. Like you’re goading me? There was no tactful approach here. “It doesn’t matter how jealous I am, he is never going to be interested.”
“So you are jealous?” A black eyebrow lifted over the curve of her spectacle frame. “I thought you weren’t the relationship type.”
It wasn’t an admission but Rōjūrō was still sure his suspicion was correct. “I wasn’t lying.”
Just like Lisa hadn’t admitted the other’s notion was true, the blond didn’t really answer her question about his jealousy concerning Aikawa and she. “Things change,” She gave Rōjūrō her own version of a sad smile. “I didn’t expect to be getting married to a man I might love if he even looked my way once.”
“All you’re going to do is send me out to find some cute thing,” Rōjūrō threatened.
“I think your roommate would have something to say about that.”
“He can say all he wants to,” Rōjūrō shrugged and adjusted his weight to balance it on his feet. “I don’t even have to leave the Seireitei.”
Lisa looked at him a moment, as if speculating whether or not to voice the thoughts in her head. “You might like to stay and listen to his talking if he read to you.” She reached down to retrieve what looked like a book bag with a long shoulder strap. “I have some good books in here.”
“Did you hear me?”
“I did,” Lisa stopped rummaging in the bag to meet his eyes, teal staring out of her glasses. “You’re jealous and want to blackmail Love into ending our relationship.”
Something made a hollow pang in the blond’s chest at the name she called his roommate. “Why would he--”
“He would stop seeing me if you even tried, don’t tell me your foolish enough to think he wouldn’t,” She ordered as she pulled out a small book the cover brilliant red.
“Yadōmaru--”
“Listen…he started reading this book to me and I almost had to excuse myself…then he started talking to me…” A faint blush tinted her cheeks and she looked down at her fingers as she ran them along the spine of the book. “That voice…mm…”
“No.” Rōjūrō held a hand up. “I don’t want to hear about Love’s sex voice. Not interested.” He gave a shake of his head, enough golden hair having escaped from its tie that it flew into his face. “Stop.”
Lisa caught his hand and slapped the small book into it, making his fingers curl around its spine before letting go and walking past the other noble. “I have no idea what you’re talking about Ōtoribashi.”
A shunpo left the blond standing there with his mouth opening to talk, his breath expelled in an exasperated huff and the small book protested his grip on its spine. “That girl.”
#
“Y’all right?”
Rōjūrō stood staring at the shoji a moment after closing it, his back to the gruff-sounding voice of his roommate. “I’ll be fine. I’m sorry I interrupted.”
“Didn’t mean to snap at y’earlier, Lisa’s nothin’ but a tease anyway,” Aikawa shrugged, his body stretched out on his futon his uniform in total disarray, the blond clucked with his tongue at the sight after making himself turn around and step into the room. “Wut?”
“You could wear that again if you don’t let it wrinkle,” Rōjūrō informed the other man, moving to his futon on the opposite side, having already changed earlier between his last class and wandering the Academy grounds.
“I ain’t gettin’ up,” Aikawa crossed his arms underneath his head, eyes trained on the ceiling as if he were imagining stars up there. “Nobody told me that when I stopped walkin’ the forest t’become an academic I’d still get tired.”
“Are you saying that you assumed your new Academy life wouldn’t involve any noteworthy physicality?” Rōjūrō meant to turn toward the wall but found himself on his other side, looking across the floor to the profile of his roommate.
For some reason that question gained Rōjūrō a full frontal of Aikawa face, brown eyes looking over at him in a slightly perturbed way that was becoming familiar. “If that’s yer longwinded way of sayin’ I don’t move around enough, the answer’s yes.”
“It was, I suppose,” Rōjūrō felt a strange jolt zing down his body at the contact of brown eyes to his purple. Quickly -- but not quick enough to look suspicious -- the noble rolled to his back not paying attention as he reached for something to put in front of his face.
Upon entering the room the blond had tossed Lisa’s small red book and it had landed just shy of his futon and as his hand encountered it he didn’t make the connection to Aikawa or how obvious it might be to someone that had seen that brilliant a shiny red cover.
Read from it.
Rōjūrō didn’t bother looking for something else; Aikawa had seen the book and putting it down to read something else would be a problem…
‘…she opened her eyes as he moved carefully inside her until she felt his pelvis meet hers and he gave a pause his eyes drifting closed at her exquisite feel. She had never heard him utter a word of his native language but now she heard him murmur something soft and fast as he moved to brace his hands on either side of her on the futon and his hips moved--‘
Looking into the book had been a bid to hide the small paint of embarrassment on his noble face but it only served to intensify it and he heard a rumbling chuckle.
“She didn’t tell you what was in it did she?” Aikawa asked and Rōjūrō didn’t debate on turning to look at him, he avoided it studiously. “Me either.”
“That girl,” Rōjūrō muttered and it was quiet enough in the room that he was sure his roommate heard, the noble hoped his elevated heartbeat was going by unnoticed.
“It started out like a normal story, ‘bout a girl that fell in love with an old demi-god or somethin’,” Aikawa remembered the beginning of the book, it had gotten steamy very quickly after that. “He loved her but already had him a lady demi-god but she was…” He gave a single-shouldered shrug. “She was a bitch; he left her after seein’ her in the sheets with another half-god guy ‘n’went to see his new girl.”
The random spot the blond had opened the book onto wasn’t even halfway through the small pages. He tried and failed to keep himself from wondering how far into the book Aikawa had read aloud before stopping.
“I don’t know why I’m surprised,” Rōjūrō slapped the little book shut and shoved his hand under his pillow, stashing Lisa’s gift underneath. “I don’t get her.”
“Me either.”
The noble was able to look over at his roommate letting his relief show, “Glad to know it’s not just me.”
“She’s a riddle,” Aikawa nodded. “But so are you.”
“Gee thanks Love,” As he said the nickname Rōjūrō decided the best way to avoid the implications of Aikawa’s comparison was to ask a question that had been begging to be voiced. “When did Lisa-senpai start calling you ‘Love’?”
Rōjūrō thought he had successfully hidden any jealousy in the question, he had carefully thought out the choice of wording; since the first thing that had sprung to his lips had been something like, ‘I thought you only wanted me to call you that.’ This hadn’t really been a question but something he might say right before he stomped his food in a brattish tantrum.
Aikawa’s eyes widened in surprise and shook his head, “She don’t. Told you that’s yer name.” His eyes crinkled at the corners as a grin curled his lips and his voice came out a few octaves lower as he murmured, “She’s got her own names to call me.”
The noble gave a small wiggle into his futon and sucked in a soft breath through his nose at the tone of his roommate’s voice. The knowing smile of their mutual bespectacled female acquaintance resonated in his head, the look on her face as she thought about listening to that voice whisper sultry and low for her alone.
Damn that girl and her ideas.
#
…
“I can finally do that pedicure I’ve been meaning to do since…forever...I could do yours…although…do you know what a pedicure is?”
…
“No fuckin’ idea.”
…
“Oh, Love.”
…
“That bad’hm?” Disembodied voices finally coalesced and Aikawa came into sight as he tilted his head back a little, trying to catch a lavender eye from between noble knees.
“Mhm…I’m missing a few tools I’ll have to do your pedicure later.”
“Few tools,” Aikawa turned his head a bit laughing and the hot puff of breath skittered over the inside of Rōjūrō’s knee, thankfully the other man was still sitting a bit too high for it to do any more than that.
“Yes,” He tried not to hiss the word but could hear the longing lacing it as his imagination ran away with him.
Aikawa’s only answer was a drawn out, “Hmph,” as his magnificent torso twisted a little, dark lips lowering to press to the inside of his knee, gaze lifting to consider Rōjūrō’s frustrated expression. The gentle lips moved away only to kiss a scant inch higher on his inner thigh, and simply pressed there, his warm breath nothing but hot pleasure rushing out across the noble’s skin.
Their eyes met and Rōjūrō gasped, “Don’t stop.”
“Y’sure?”
“Love.” Came out demanding and exasperated.
Warm brown eyes didn’t leave purple as seeking lips stayed in contact as the kiss slid upward, towel-covered head turning inward, the tilt of his head was how Rōjūrō saw the anxiety his roommate was trying to hide.
“I’m sorry,” Escaped from the blond in a rush of air. “You don’t have to--”
“I’ve just never…ah…” His hand lifted out of the water to hook a finger in the edge of the kimono where it hung over Rōjūrō’s thigh in an attempt to keep the noble covered.
Which obviously didn’t work for Aikawa.
Rōjūrō watched as Aikawa slid the cloth aside and didn’t let the sight of the blond’s arousal deter him. The noble’s nimble fingers plucked at his obi until both edges of his silken kimono fell open, “What do you want to do?”
The heated look Aikawa sent Rōjūrō’s newly-uncovered cock sent an uncontrollable twitch of interest through said hard-on along with the words, “Taste you.”
“Then do it.” Steel entered the noble’s voice as he answered, quickly regaining the other man’s gaze.
“Rōjūrō…” Breathed hot across his skin and even if the hushed puff of his name sounded frightened, it still curled the noble’s toes.
“Wrap your hand around it,” Came out gentle, yet sharp, the husky whisper had enough command that soon Aikawa’s fingers were wrapped around the base of his penis. Just the soft pressure of his grip made pleasure shoot through the blond, making his next order a bit more wanton but no less authoritative, “Taste. Me.”
The hot grip adjusted and Rōjūrō watched as Aikawa angled him low enough to take the tip into his mouth, tongue sliding along underneath. They were both very still for a few moments, the quiet only interrupted by the lap of water and noble panting, then Aikawa’s tongue did some unintentionally delicious wiggle that made Rōjūrō’s jaded sensibilities fracture.
It was just an inch of friction, a wet lick along the underside of the head ending in the tip of a tongue pressing along it and it ripped a sound so obscene from the noble he felt his face burn. Realizing his head had fallen back as his moan broke the silence the noble lifted his head, and he barely contained the whimper as their gazes connected.
Beautiful lips slipped from around him, a pink tongue darting out to catch excess saliva, “Fuckin’ gorgeous.”
“What…” Rōjūrō’s voice was hardly above a whisper.
“You heard me,” The rumbling purr of his voice hit the blond much like his roommate’s earlier taste. He was suddenly confronted with wet glistening shoulders and torso and, “Lay back,” in such a rough deep baritone the blond couldn’t help but comply.
“Now what?” Rōjūrō asked eagerly eyes taking in the soapy hot wet expanse of dark skin and muscle. He tried not to shiver as he pulled his feet out of the water to brace his toes on the edge of the spring.
“Do what y’do best Ōtoribashi…” Brown eyes drowning in blown pupil focused very intently on the man’s underneath him, Rōjūrō knew his eyes were no better. “Keep talkin’.”
“What about?”
“What about? Princess watta y’think?” Aikawa had to have seen the focus of lavender eyes as he slipped between the noble’s bent knees.
“No,” The blond shook his head at the nickname as he thought about answering the question. “What about how do I taste? Can we talk about that?”
“You can,” Aikawa had decided he needed further study, one of his muscular arms holding him up, hand pressed just to the left of Rōjūrō’s torso while the other stroked down the back of a pale thigh. “I wanna help y’relax.”
“Keep talking like that--ordothat!--ahhmmm,” His eyes slammed shut a moment as Aikawa suddenly took him in hand and got a second taste to make sure of the first. “Oh, Love yes…touch me…”
The request gave the large hand around his cock permission to do more than guide the blond to his mouth, he gave a stroke and his lips followed as far as they could, tongue driving Rōjūrō mad. He didn’t tell Aikawa that with words so much, it was something more sound than word, more emotion than meaning and nothing but praise.
“What?” Aikawa disengaged enough to say, catching lavender eyes frustrated still. “That good huh?”
“Yes that was one of my good sounds, Love…” Rōjūrō gripped with his toes and pushed with his feet a little to get a thrust into the other man’s fist. “Don’t stop.”
Dark fingers squeezed as they pumped down and Aikawa took the noble back into his mouth lips meeting fingers as they stroked back up. Back down, up.
“More,” The blond groaned keeping his eyes open enough to watch. He let his hips shift into a shallow thrust, just enough to encourage movement in those glistening lips.
There was no move in reaction to the noble’s prompting but there also was no rejection, no move to pull away. There was only a tightening of fingers as they pumped into Rōjūrō’s thrust, squeezing at the base and a flash of the whites of Aikawa’s eyes as he let his eyelids flutter open to pierce the blond with his gaze.
Something very un-noblelike came from the blond and he didn’t hesitate to buck his hips this time, a little harder and followed it with another. Aikawa’s hand kept perfect counter to the thrusts, his focus on finding all of the best places to give friction or pressure with his tongue.
“Yes, right there--oh…Love--oh!” Rōjūrō was disappointed to feel Aikawa’s weight shift so the hand he used to steady himself moved to the noble’s narrow hip to keep it from gyrating upward.
That was until the slide of his lips began again, this time under Aikawa’s control, and somehow knowing it was the other man’s desire behind the stroke of his mouth made it that much better. Part of him -- a tiny part -- was embarrassed that he was so close to coming, the rest of him -- that tiny part as well -- didn’t give a shit.
Aikawa’s fingers dug into Rōjūrō’s hip and that only pushed the blond closer, until he was nothing but the sensation of mouth and hand and the pressing points of Aikawa’s fingers in his flank.
A low moan rose from the noble’s throat as his hip gave an involuntary buck and Aikawa’s answer was more pressure on a pale hip and the almost painful dig of fingers did Rōjūrō in. “I’m coming--oh I--
Lavender eyes snapped open, for a moment his heart thundering in his ears not knowing what had woken him up, then his gaze began to grow accustomed to the dark.
The noble had two simultaneous reactions as he saw the dark shape over him and registered its identity; one was automatic defense the other was to wonder how talented that mouth was in real life.
“Oi--” Aikawa tried to shake him awake again and was very suddenly rolled underneath the sleeper in a mess of blankets and bedclothes. “Rōjūrō!”
The noble was quite sure the combination of cloth made it near impossible to feel the erection wanting to press without barrier into the hollow of his roommate’s hip, even if he was pinning the larger man to the futon. “Love? What.” He looked down into wide brown eyes, noble limbs shaking from the speed of his heart and the longing roiling through him from his dream. The warm body beneath him.
“Y’all right?” Aikawa’s voice rumbled out in the dark and he didn’t move until he knew the blond was awake and aware.
“I…y-yes…sorrysorrysorry…” Rōjūrō rolled away from him and up onto his feet, adjusting the nearby lamp to a very low intensity so he could see clearly enough.
“Bad dream?” Aikawa’s voice drifted to the blond from over his shoulder as he walked toward his trunks, willing himself to calm as he pretended to find something to wear, tomorrow was a holiday, no lessons.
It was some school faculty day but Rōjūrō still looked for something with a little shine to it. His sisters had harped on him endlessly for packing the kimono he now sought in his standing trunk. It wasn’t vibrant or gaudy, but parts of the design were traced with gold, mostly indiscernible to the eye unless one moved correctly in the light. Unless Okaasan wanted him dolled up in something special he wore his holiday kimono and its various accoutrement.
“Why would you say that?” Rōjūrō was glad to hear that his voice was even, his thoughts severely curtailed since he hadn’t heard Aikawa get up from his bed yet, or move. Don’t look. Don’t. Don’t. Don’t.
“You were pantin’, groanin’,” Aikawa finally sat up, the movement out of the corner of the noble’s eyes automatically signaling something instinctive in him causing his head to turn and glance at the motion to see what it was. Even if the rest of him knew what it was, what he was saying.
“Just…” Rōjūrō swallowed nervously and pulled out a similar kimono distracted. “The usual,” He tore his gaze away from the bare-chested man in his bed to look at the kimono, frowning before he put it away and found the correct one. It was true, it was usual; this was his fourth time having it! That was ‘usual’ damn it! “I’m sorry I seemed to have disturbed your sleep.”
“Naw, I’d rather wake up a few times n’be wrong then not wake up n’you need me,” He said this a moment before flopping down onto the futon again.
“I need you?” Rōjūrō was glad for the low light as his face lit up with embarrassment at his blurted question.
“Y’do if yer suffocatin’ in yer sleep!” Aikawa’s head shot up to look over at the noble sharply but the blond was looking at his kimono as if it held the secrets of the universe.
“Oh.”
“’Oh,’ like it ain’t a big deal.”
“Hm,” Tossing the kimono to drape over the top half of the trunk he started removing his night clothes.
“Excuse me?” Aikawa barked, and Rōjūrō almost jumped as he turned back to look at him. “Girl it ain’t even four in the mornin’ yet get back in bed.”
“I would but it’s occupied,” The blond sniffed moving closer to his futon night-shirt clutched in his hand. “And I’ve watched you put your dirty feet in yours too often, we’re not switching.”
“Oh I’m so fuckin’ offended right now,” Aikawa looked up at his roommate with a smirk. “Y’just said I fuckin’ put my dirty feet on my bed…I think I might cry.”
“My heart breaks for you,” Rōjūrō opted to throw the shirt at his roommate’s head. “Get out of my bed.”
“Oh y’can’t tell me noble’s don’t do sleepovers, cuz Lisa was the one that told me all about’em,” Aikawa tossed the shirt back at the noble, shaking his head mentally after realizing he’d been staring at the blond.
“I’m guessing she invited you to one?” Rōjūrō said lightly through his teeth.
“How’d you know?”
“I’m brilliant,” The noble shot back, pulling the shirt back on. “And I’ve decided that I do have Lisa-senpai’s number; she may as well be transparent.”
“Huh? How’s that?” Aikawa saw the tired lines of his roommate’s face and wondered how he kept looking so radiant when he obviously felt this way, waking up at such ungodly hours.
“Us girls can’t fool each other,” Was Rōjūrō’s flippant answer, he yelped in surprise as a strong hand wrapped around his wrist and yanked him off balance. Instead of landing in an indignant heap Rōjūrō found himself caught in the other man’s arms, the rest of him sprawled out off the edge of his futon.
“Go back t’sleep,” Aikawa said before depositing him on his bed, blond head on pillow.
“I only let men in my bed for one reason,” Rōjūrō grumbled, his hair slightly rumpled his nightclothes definitely in disarray. “So get back to your bed, or get naked.”
Brown eyes widened and Rōjūrō told himself that he was not rising to Lisa’s bait, damn dream. “Y’all right?”
The noble yanked the blankets that were tangled in Aikawa’s legs, and rolled away from him, trying to garner the strength to… “I’m fine. Tired I guess.”
“Y’know you can talk to me,” Aikawa’s voice drifted over his shoulder and Rōjūrō gave a soft sigh.
“You don’t want to hear my bullshit.”
“Wut a scandalous mouth,” Aikawa teased, falling back to lie on the other side of the bed, perusing this side of the room’s ceiling. “And a’course I wanna hear it. I asked Dumbshit.”
“No.” At the nickname Rōjūrō jerked his head around to stare at the other man over his shoulder.
“No?” Aikawa laughed. “None’a the nice ones were workin’.”
“Keep trying,” Rōjūrō suggested as he turned back to stare across the room at Aikawa’s empty futon, silence his answer to the suggestion he talk about what was happening to him, to the man that was heavily involved in creating said ‘happening’.
The dream had not returned the night after it’s first occurrence and Rōjūrō had thought it might mean he had suppressed the errant thoughts he was having of his roommate but the following night it had returned with a vengeance. Tonight had been almost exactly the same, except for the addition of one very sexy bedroom voice. The previously mute Aikawa had said not one single word in all the past renditions, Rōjūrō wasn’t surprised by the change after Lisa’s damn suggestive words--and that book!
Damn it.
Already awake and moving through morning katas a certain dark-haired bespectacled senpai was suddenly seized with the compulsion to sneeze, which interrupted her stride. AH-CHOO! She moved back into the beginning of the set wondering why she had been doing that so much the last couple of days.
…
The noble awoke several hours later, much later than he usually slept-in until. He let his eyes slide open, his body stretching slowly and all the way up and down. He had his head turned toward Aikawa, whose face was peeking out from where he was resting his own arm across it.
The small amount of rest had done Rōjūrō good, he felt much more awake than earlier, he carefully sat up in bed, moving to slide out of the blankets when Aikawa caught his wrist again, sleepy voice rumbling, “Oi girl y’ain’t gotta leave yet.”
Blushing at Aikawa’s sleepy mistake of identity Rōjūrō tugged on his wrist and ordered, “Love.”
“It’s a fuckin’ holiday where y’goin’?” Came out much more alert, proving the noble’s assumption wrong, Aikawa knew who he was in bed with.
“Holiday does not mean I’m going to lay in bed all day with you in my sleep-clothes,” Rōjūrō huffed, even if it really felt like a good time, you could even skip the ‘in my sleep-clothes’ part. “Maybe Lisa-senpai would be interested?”
“Maybe later, we can make a pile.”
“I did not just hear you say that,” Rōjūrō twisted his torso to look at his roommate who was still laying there lazily, his eyes not even all the way open, other arm still flung over his face.
“Oi,” Aikawa let him go and pushed the hand under the pillow and under his head, nestling into the futon. “Forgot bed only means one thing to you with two people in it.”
Rōjūrō got up and tried not to stomp his feet as he moved to his trunk, jerking his nightshirt off over his head, still half in it as he grabbed up his holiday kimono. “Apparently I was wrong.”
“Nothin’ wrong with that,” Aikawa moved his other arm to cross with the other under his pillow/head. “Came to a school, gonna learn.”
“I’m aware of that,” The noble found some unpatterned hakama to wear, and started to methodically arrange the ties and wrap them around his waist.
With a grumble at his now-awake state Aikawa rolled over onto the other side of the bed, although he wouldn’t have thought of that distinction to the sides of a bed. He punched the undeserving pillow a few times and shoved it together until he could rest his chin in it and still see the precise movements of his roommate’s hands.
He made that shit look easy, it put a frown on Aikawa’s face and he took it out on the pillow again before relaxing. He remember when the blond had helped him tie his hakama it had only taken the one time and Aikawa knew what he was doing, but his hands failed to look like he was making music with the slide of his hands along the dark swath of fabric as it got progressively shorter and twisted around his paler kimono it’s pattern not exactly scales but close enough.
Rōjūrō turned toward him and Aikawa saw the fabric shimmer in the low light and he felt himself smile, gaze falling to the bared swath of pale torso only a moment as an excuse to return to his hands as they started working on the second set of belts. “Morning.”
“Mornin’,” Aikawa moved a hand out from under the pillow to turn the lamp on its usual intensity setting. “Don’t stop.”
“What.” Rōjūrō looked over at him and Aikawa felt the look all the way down to his toes. He tried not to be obvious as he twisted them in the blankets.
“Y’could tie your hakama ten times by the time I got mine done…’nd it still looks slow ‘nd careful,” He curled a hand back under the pillow to support his chin. The pillow smelled like the noble, it wasn’t too bad a smell when it stayed on Rōjūrō, Aikawa had never been interested in soap scents.
The blond huffed audibly and turned until he was in profile, so Aikawa could watch him wrap the hakama belt around his waist. “It’s not hard, you do fine with your waraji it’s the same idea.”
“Sure,” He took his nose out of the pillow and watched the noble finish his belt, the meticulously exact bow at the center. “Y’say that like yer not tappin’ yer foot before I’m even done with the first set.”
“I’m not going to dress you.”
“Nobody asked y’to,” Aikawa sighed and lifted his gaze to the still-flustered noble face. “Y’don’t gotta wait fer me, I can find my way by now.”
“I’m making sure you get there on time, not that we get there.”
“Thanks Ōtoribashi,” Aikawa watched the blond frown a moment then turn toward his trunks, the light catching the gold in the design.
“No problem at all Love,” Rōjūrō wondered at the strange feeling that his last name from Aikawa panged in his chest. There was no distance in the name, like another person would have instilled in the use of it, Aikawa didn’t seem to deem that social convention significant.
“Y’gonna show me where y’been hidin’ yerself?” Aikawa asked and it wasn’t the first time he’d done so.
“I already showed you that alcove, and you told someone else,” The blond gave the words playfulness but he was sure the other man knew it was hiding his feelings.
“I didn’t know it was a secret.”
“It was quiet and the more people know about it the less it will be that way,” He paused a moment trying to distract himself with the mirror in his standing trunk. “You don’t want to spend all day with me anyway.”
“Who says?” Aikawa rolled back to the other side of the bed, and onto his back.
“Lisa-senpai has a holiday too,” Rōjūrō said even though he thought she might have just a few too many obligations to properly spend an entire day lazying about.
“She has other friends y’know…think she knows the whole damn school,” He commented as he watched the blond move across the room to open the door, the attendant’s cart had a squeaky wheel that heralded his arrival and departure from the hallways.
“I was thinking it might be nice to walk the actual grounds…before it gets too cold to enjoy it,” Rōjūrō murmured as if to himself as he took their breakfast trays and deposited them on the table. “And maybe you miss walking underneath a sky?”
“Shit yeah,” Aikawa grinned as the idea surprised him in how strongly it resonated in him. Damn. “Didn’t realize.”
“Sometimes it’s just a part of you and you don’t realize it,” The noble poured them both tea as Aikawa crawled out of bed and plopped into place across from him. “I would eat this whole bowl of…whatever it is…to get my hands on a set of strings.”
“Damn that’s how t’get you t’eat?” Aikawa already had half of his own bowl digesting, thinking of drinking the steaming cup of tea even as he watched Rōjūrō finish off his first cup before touching a single piece of food.
“Yes. If you find music for me I will eat whatever you tell me to,” Lavender eyes met brown in sincerity before tacking on, “Until I get fat.”
“Shut-up,” Aikawa picked up his cup to drink some, knowing Rōjūrō wouldn’t pour himself a second cup of tea until he could at least refresh his roommate’s. I should have asked Lisa about it already, she knows the entire place top to bottom, Aikawa thought sullenly to himself, realizing he hadn’t wanted to started yet another conversation about Rōjūrō with her.
“I will if I eat too much,” Rōjūrō started to whittle down the supply of food the cafeteria had sent him, he swore up and down to his roommate that the Head Chef had started giving him even more food after his audacity of earlier. It was one of the few things he argued with Aikawa about, never mind the noble’s food intake.
“Y’gotta actually eat before you can eat too much,” After draining half his tea he put the cup next to Rōjūrō’s and the noble subconsciously took the prompt, pouring them both some more. “So do that.”
Without another word the noble ‘dug in’ or at least as much as he seemed capable.
Aikawa chuckled and finished his breakfast before getting up to get dressed enough to leave their quarters. Without a thought grabbed up the noble’s discarded nightshirt and gave it an inspecting sniff, it was ridiculously large on the blond and didn’t even smell bad. Smelled like his pillow.
“What are you doing?”
“Checkin’ fer stink,” Aikawa admitted before throwing the simple shirt on over his head. As he turned back to look at Rōjūrō the noble was very visibly blushing and it was hard to mistake his agog expression. “Y’mind?” He asked a bit surprised after having the noble offer to let him borrow clothes before he had gotten his supply from Yasu.
“N-no,” Rōjūrō shook his head and even if he would have put up a fuss over going out with someone so underdressed he found he really didn’t mind for some reason. “Ready to go, or will there be shoes to go with that ensemble?”
“Just fer that Ōtoribashi…no there won’t be,” Aikawa moved past the table, giving a glance at the noble’s breakfast he figured it was more than he should have expected him to eat he continued on to the door and slid it open.
“Hey,” The noble collected everything on the tray and moved it to the door, one hand balancing the large tray easily as the other hand drained his cup of tea. “I don’t think rushing is suggested on holidays--”
“Hope I’m not interrupting,” A soft unexpected voice cut in as they moved down the hall toward the nearest exit. Lisa was moving in the opposite direction, probably from the same exit they were moving toward, her kimono as short as usual when left to her own non-uniform wardrobe.
Although there was a sharp stab of disappointment at the disruption Aikawa felt something else zip through him as he realized he could ask Lisa about parts of the school he might be interested in for one reason or another. “Sight fer sore eyes.”
“I got all my work done late last night -- officially I’d call it very early this morning-- Yamamoto-sama decided the junior faculty could enjoy the day…as long as they had no standing reports,” She gave a gentle nudge to her glasses and returned her arm to folding with the other across her chest.
“You’re looking radiant for someone that’s going on little sleep,” Rōjūrō observed.
“Same to you Rōjūrō-senpai,” Lisa countered as she fell into step with them, about-facing to walk toward the exit. “What are your plans? I thought you said Yamamoto himself couldn’t get you out of bed today Aikawa.”
“He couldn’t.”
“Hm,” Lisa shared a look with Rōjūrō as Aikawa pushed the door open before them, the blond gave a sharp sigh of irritation and glared at her. “Awfully possessive of you Rōjūrō-senpai,” She said under her breath.
“Rōjūrō thought I should get some dirt under my feet,” Aikawa said as they walked past him out the door.
“I said no such thing.”
“Well I’m sure you forgot there was dirt under those pedicured feet,” Aikawa shot back and Lisa burst out laughing.
There was a perfectly good reason to blush; Rōjūrō told himself that as he battled the warmth back knowing it suffused his face for an entirely different reason than either of the two present probably understood. “I’d forgotten to do mine so it’s been quite some time actually,” The noble felt his own toes curl as if to hide themselves from sight as he admitted it.
“Darn I was hoping to show you some more of my books,” Lisa sighed and lifted a hand to point her thumb back over her shoulder. “I’ve got a few things to take care of if you want to hang out later.”
“Oi,” Aikawa frowned. “Wanna talk t’you.”
“About what?”
Aikawa sighed and turned to Rōjūrō who couldn’t help but catch the knowing look the girl behind his roommate shot him as she met his gaze. “I’ll see y’later? I gotta ask Lisa some questions.”
“I’ll just be wandering around, looking for a garden or two.”
Lisa pointed off to the right, “There’s a few speckled toward Hado training…A really magnificent one straight toward the faculty office, smaller than the main garden but much more serene.”
“Domo,” Rōjūrō gave her a small smile and moved in a decidedly different direction from them. “Jaa ne Love.”
Lisa felt a little skip in her heart at the wistful sound of the blond’s parting and she turned her gaze to Aikawa to see he was watching the departing form of his roommate. Maybe he wasn’t so oblivious.
“So what’s so important that you break a date with Sugarbear?” Lisa asked wanting to see just what reaction she would get.
“No,” At the word Aikawa turned his gaze to her, then proceeded to shake it in reference to the nickname.
“No? Aw, I can picture you calling him that,” She gave him a cute frown and leaned close to tug on his borrowed sleeve. “What was it you wanted to know?”
“I’m lookin’ for a music room.”
“Dunno about a room…it was odd but the few places we had such extra-curricular activities were emptied out a few days after the semester started,” Lisa thought about the ultimatum that had supposedly brought Ōtoribashi to the Academy, he was probably both to blame for their absence and the reason Aikawa was asking about them. “May know of a few stray instruments if you know specifically what you need.”
“Somethin’ with strings.”
Onward to Chapter Thirteen!