A/N: Thanks HIMYM for (some of) the inspiration. I also really want a tattoo. I don't know why. I have a serious phobia of needles and of anything permanent, but I still was able to get piercings...I guess it's the decision about what to have done in terms of a tattoo that it is difficult. But, I really want a tattoo.

I'll probably just get another piercing instead.

XXX

"Nanase Haruka in room 101 woke up this morning."

"Have you ever seen anything so gruesome?"

"It's so hard to believe. He comes from such a good family. It really makes you wonder..."

XXX

When Haruka woke up, he felt an overwhelming urge to vomit. He went out of his room into his apartment living room. Nagisa was in the kitchen and there was a pretty big smirk on his face. He started to say something to Haruka, but Haruka ignored it and went straight to the left to their bathroom. He leaned over and there was a sudden gush.

Haruka hated vomiting. He really hated vomiting when he was hungover.

He cursed himself a bit, because he had a promise with his drunk self that his drunk self would throw up and then in the morning he would wake up hungover, but not hungover to the extent that he needed to throw up. His drunk self had last night broken their promise.

Throwing up when you are hung over is literally the worst feeling in the world. Haruka was all too familiar with this, which is why he always tried to get the vomiting over with when he was drunk. At least he didn't remember it then. But for some reason, last he hadn't done that. Most likely he had simply been too drunk.

Haruka had to wonder just how drunk he had gotten. But, not at that particular second. At that second, all he could focus on was making it to the next second.

He emptied some of his stomach, and tasted the vomit that remained in his mouth. He should brush his teeth. He knew this. But, he'd wait a little bit longer. More was sure to come up in the next five minutes.

It did.

Nagisa put his mockery of Haruka on the back-burner. For now, he found himself concerned about his best friend and coworker, "Hey. You okay?" he called out as he walked over to the bathroom.

Haruka made some muffled sound, "Quiet...please."

Nagisa couldn't help himself. He laughed.

Haruka groaned. He rested his head on the toilet bowl. Haruka didn't get like this often. He hadn't since being an undergrad and that felt like forever ago.

"I've made you some breakfast. It's your favorite hangover cure," Nagisa smirked.

Haruka nodded slightly from the bowl, "I got pretty fucking hammered, didn't I? I don't think I've ever been that drunk. I remember literally nothing."

"That's probably for the best," Nagisa said. He was at the door to the bathroom now. Haruka hadn't locked it, and he peered in to get a good look at his friend.

Haruka's shirt was slightly lifted from behind, allowing Nagisa to get a look at Haruka's boxers and part of his lower back.

Nagisa made an audible squeaking noise.

Haruka's hand slowly raised to cover his ear.

"S-sorry," Nagisa apologized. The sight that he saw made him temporarily forget his best friend's hangover.

"It's fine," Haruka moaned, "god, I fucking hurt everywhere. Especially my back. It really fucking hurts and it kind of itches. Do you see some kind of rash there or something?"

Nagisa bit his lip and thought about the best way to tell his mostly straightlaced best friend that last night he had somehow managed to get himself a butterfly trampstamp. There really wasn't one, he decided, "Um...something like that."

Haruka's head pounded, but the tone in Nagisa's voice was able to get him alert about it, "W-what is it?"

"You got a tattoo."

"What?"

"Yeah, although, I think tramp-stamp may be more a more appropriate title for it," Nagisa laughed. He couldn't help it. Haruka's backside had the outline of a butterfly sitting right square on top of it. There was no way Nagisa could keep himself from laughing.

"Fuck," Haruka tried hard to remember, but his mind was a blank slate. The last thing that he remembered was climbing out the fire escape after Nagisa had put him to bed. The two of them had gone out the night before to celebrate his promotion. One of the partners had made a comment about how straightlaced Haruka was, that Haruka would make the perfect partner given that he had nothing special about him. That partner had even joked that he would pay money for Haruka to get a tattoo, just to see that Haruka actually had real skin and wasn't a cyborg.

The guy knew little about Haruka's past, but Haruka let his boss joke around. It was only a joke after all.

Nagisa and Haruka were lawyers at one of the biggest law firms in Tokyo. Last night, Haruka was made the youngest partner that ever had. It was a huge deal for him. His coworkers had all taken him out, and they had all insisted that he do a shot with them. Nagisa took him home before he could truly embarrass himself, and put him to bed, but obviously, Haruka had decided that the party shouldn't be over. Apparently, Haruka decided to show the partner that he was in fact willing to get a tattoo.

Shit. Haruka thought.

All jokes aside, such a thing could get him fired. Tattoos in Japan were associated with the Yakuza, which was somewhat funny because Yakuza tended not to get them as a result of the association. It was a good thing that Nagisa had been the one to discover it.

"Do you remember what happened?" Nagisa asked.

Haruka shook his head slightly from the toilet. Everything after leaving the apartment was completely wiped from his memory. Everything before it was rather fuzzy. Haruka couldn't even pinpoint a moment where he had blacked out during the night. It was all fuzzy, but he was definitely mentally gone when he decided to sneak out.

Nagisa sighed, "Well at least you can cover it up, and hell, given your raise, I'm sure you can afford to get it removed without anyone knowing."

"Yeah," Haruka could still hardly manage to talk, and his mouth still tasted like puke, and the fact that he had apparently decided to drunkenly get a tattoo sure as hell did not help. It made his already terrible headache about a hundred times worse.

Haruka used the toilet to pull himself up. He faced Nagisa who looked concerned about him.

"You should start to work on getting some fluids in you, and you should take it easy for the rest of the day," Nagisa couldn't help mothering him a bit. Haruka was completely pale and his eyes were sunken in, he was badly dehydrated. The tattoo situation could be put on the backburner, for now Haruka needed to simply get through the next few hours.

Haruka nodded slowly, "I'll have some breakfast, vomit some more, brush my teeth, then back to bed."

"Sounds like a good plan," Nagisa led Haruka to the kitchen.

Haruka sat at the table and leaned back into the chair. This was a decision that he instantly regretted. His ass hurt like hell. It felt different than it would have had he been fucked, but it was still unbearably painful. Somehow the pain from the tattoo seemed to stretch all the way down to his legs. He groaned a bit.

Nagisa's expression showed some pity for Haruka.

He sighed, "Well, thanks for the bagel."

Haruka's favorite hangover food was a bagel with bologna and mayonnaise. Nagisa had also procured some gatorade for Haruka to help him regain his electrolytes. Haruka appreciated Nagisa's help, but nothing except time would make him feel fully better. This would all help for the typical Haruka hangover, but Haruka doubted that anything would help him today. He dreaded the next couple of weeks.

"Later on, when you feel better, maybe we can call your credit card company and see where you got the tattoo. Then, you can sue them," Nagisa tried to lighten the mood.

Haruka laughed, but it came out more like a choking sound, "I doubt that'll do anything. I do think they should pay for it to be removed. Isn't it illegal to tattoo drunk people?"

Nagisa nodded. It's not only illegal for the obvious reason that the person isn't in a stable enough mindset for the tattooing, but also because when people are drunk it changes their blood flow and if the artist isn't careful, they can severely injure the customer.

Haruka sighed, mostly he was upset because this was going to be bothersome. Strangely though, at the moment, he couldn't decide what was more upsetting, the terrible hangover or the tattoo. He felt utterly awful.

XXX

Haruka stumbled into the building. He collected himself and walked towards the door. The neon sign for the store flashed above his head. He had walked past this tattoo parlour probably a thousand times on his way to the train station to get to work. He had never paid it any attention, but for some reason, the idea of getting a tattoo sounded completely appealing to him tonight. The reason was that his coworker had brought it up earlier, but Haruka had long since forgotten that in his drunken stupor.

Before he could make it to the door, he stopped in front of a small cherry blossom tree that was in bloom. Haruka didn't take notice of that though. The tree couldn't be more than 20 years old, and Haruka unloaded a special type of fertilizer onto it. That was about all Haruka could focus on.

He wiped his mouth and continued swaggering towards the parlour. He couldn't wait to see Nagisa's face in the morning. Nagisa would never be able to believe what Haruka was about to do. Everyone who had called him straightlaced and boring at that party was sure to be amazed too. He'd rip off his shirt and show them all what a badass he could be.

Yes, he thought, this was a brilliant plan.

He pulled open the door, which felt oddly heavy to him. The bells on the door slammed onto the glass. Haruka leaned against the frame, unable to stand on his own.

"Matsuoka-sama, there's a customer…" a voice in the distance said, but Haruka hardly heard it and barely noticed the silverhaired man who was talking to him.

Rin Matsuoka got up from the desk in the back and walked out to the front. Nitori looked a bit apprehensive about their guest, but he had less experience with drunk people than Rin had gotten over the years. He's still learning, Rin thought.

Haruka managed to make his feet work well enough to get him over to the seating area where people waited. He slouched down in the chair, and started to almost fall asleep. It was hard for him to even remember where he was or what he was doing there. He felt so far gone and it would be so nice to just slip away and go to sleep.

Nitori got him some water in a paper cup from a fountain that they had, "Here. You should drink this."

Haruka looked at the man addressing him. He saw a cup of water and even in his drunken stupor realized that he needed to drink some water. So, he took the cup, but his grip wasn't good. He dropped it straight onto the floor, "Whoops!" he burst out laughing.

"Th-that's okay," Nitori said, and he quickly went off to fetch another cup.

Rin Matsuoka was largely disinterested in the person in front of him. He had to deal with this type too often. A businessman dressed in a suit, who had gotten too drunk, and simply needed a babysitter. He sighed. This wasn't what he had expected when he had dedicated his life to mastering his art, "We'll help you sober up a bit, and then, I'm going to have to ask you to leave."

"I'm here for a tattoo," Haruka disregarded everything that Rin said to him. This attitude was also common for drunks.

"We can't tattoo drunks," Rin's voice was harsh. It was a simple rule for their store. Rin's boss and the great master would never allow it. In truth, Rin was skilled enough to be able to tattoo a drunk person without physical risk, but it wasn't good for their business. This was especially true because if police found out that they were tattooing drunken people, they would be shut down.

Nitori appeared with another cup which he helped guide to Haruka's mouth.

Haruka took a nice swallow and thanked him, "Well, I don't care. I want one and you're going to give one to me."

Rin rolled his eyes, "Nitori, help him get some water, and then, call him a cab. Send him home. Once again, I welcome you to the shittiest part of this job."

Nitori nodded and bowed, "Th-thank you Matsuoka-sama for your guidance."

Rin headed for the back, "Call me if someone sober comes in."

Rin had little expectation of that. Most of his clients made appointments with him in advance, but their master insisted that they work late hours, so as to appear welcoming and to better their status in the community. It mostly meant that Rin spent his nights caring for drunk people and training Nitori.

Haruka called out after Rin, he slurred his words, but his message came out clear, "Hey! You can't just walk away from me. I'm Nanase Haruka, I'm a fucking famous lawyer, and I'll fucking sue you if you don't give me a tattoo."

Rin stopped dead in his tracks. Nanase Haruka...There's a name I haven't heard in awhile. Rin turned around and faced Haruka.

"Matsuoka-sama?" Nitori asked, confused as to why Rin would suddenly seem to get interested in Haruka.

Rin didn't give him any explanation. He walked over to Haruka.

"That's right," Haruka's language rough, and was hardly his own. The alcohol was doing all the talking for him.

Rin got close to Haruka, much closer than he had been before. He looked over Haruka. He definitely looked like Nanase Haruka, but what were the chances? Of all the tattoo parlours in all of Tokyo? Something crazy like that wasn't possible, was it? "What did you say your name was?" Rin asked.

"Nanase Haruka," Haruka managed to pronounce his own name.

Rin could hardly believe it, but Haruka's name wasn't common. Rin laughed, "And you want a tattoo, Nanase Haruka?"

Nitori looked cautiously over at Rin, "Matsuoka-sama...he's…you shouldn't...Seijuro-sama won't be happy..."

Rin waved a hand, "It's fine. I'll handle it Nitori, and if Seijuro gets pissed, I'll take the heat. You can go home if you want."

Nitori shook his head though, he was Rin's student. He was supposed to watch Rin's every move. Rin was the most famous tattoo artist in all of Japan, and it was an honor to get to study under him. Still, he had never seen Rin tattoo someone drunk. He felt like this was wrong, but he wanted to learn what he could from Rin. He wanted to spend every moment with Rin that was how he had ended up living with Rin.

Haruka missed the entire conversation between Rin and Nitori, "I want a tattoo, yes."

"Did you have any sort of tattoo in mind?" Rin asked. His voice was filled with icy malice, but Haruka didn't hear any of that. He could hardly focus on the words.

"Something b-badass," Haruka slurred and laughed.

Rin smirked, "I know just the thing."

He led Haruka over to the table and had Haruka lay down. Haruka started to take off his entire long sleeve shirt, and he revealed a part of a tight stomach, Rin had a rather sharp intake of breath, but insisted that he keep it on. Nitori stood close to Rin to keep a close eye on Haruka.

Rin pulled down Haruka's boxers revealing the top of Haruka's ass. Rin's eyes lingered a little and Haruka made a slight comment given his drunkenness, "Like what you see?"

Rin's eyes moved over to Haruka's face. His lips tightened into a line. He didn't say anything to Haruka. He only looked at Haruka. Nitori stared at Rin trying to figure out what exactly was going on, "M-matsuoka-sama."

Rin looked over at Nitori and smiled, "It's fine."

Then, Rin raised Haruka's shirt a little bit. He cleaned off Haruka's skin. Rin was gentle as he always was with all of his clients, but he couldn't help hoping to cause Haruka's back to arch. Haruka however was too drunk to feel much, and didn't respond at all to Rin's touch.

Rin prepared a needle, and then he created the outline of a butterfly which he planted onto Haruka's skin.

"That's Re-" Nitori started to say, but Rin hushed him.

Rin cleansed Haruka's skin, and finished the process. It wasn't a complete tattoo, but it was good enough to achieve what Haruka had asked for, it was also good enough to satisfy Rin's need for revenge.

Nitori looked at Rin strangely. Rin knew that his apprentice felt disappointed in his master. Rin couldn't help feeling slightly guilty about that, but he'd explain it later. This hadn't been his wisest decision, he knew that. He knew that Seijuro was sure to get super pissed at him later on, but there was something satisfying about seeing a drunk Nanase Haruka and causing him pain.

Rin focused his attention on Haruka. He helped Haruka sit up, and he handed Haruka the usual cleaning kit. He collected Haruka's wallet and put on his credit card what double a fully finished tattoo of the size that he had put on Haruka's backside would have cost. Nitori looked away. He had started to figure out that in some way this had to be personal, and even though he didn't approve, there was no way that he was going to say anything against his master. He had worked too hard to get here.

Rin handed the receipt to Haruka, and even though it was not custom to tip in Japan, drunken Haruka decided to give a tip to Rin for the full value of what he had just paid for the tattoo, "I just got a promotion," he explained.

Rin simply smiled and thanked him for his patronage. The pay that he had gotten from Haruka would make this a rather good month for him especially considering how little work it had been.

"Should I call him a taxi?" Nitori asked.

Rin shook his head, "I'll make sure he gets home."

"M-matsuoka…sama…" Nitori said softly. He was a bit afraid of what Rin might do to this guy.

Rin smiled, "It's okay, Nitori. I'll be fine. I'm going to take him home. Honest. I'll meet you at our place."

Haruka forced himself to focus in on the conversation around him, "I'm fine, I can get home myself."

Rin shook his head, "I can't let you do that."

Nitori bit his lip, "Are you sure you don't want me to call?"

Rin nodded, "Just close up and go home. We've made enough money for tonight."

Nitori sighed, "Alright...I guess I'll see you at home then."

Rin turned his attention to Haruka, "Come here," he said softly to Haruka offering his shoulder as a place for Haruka to lean against while they walked home.

Haruka knew better than to fight him on that. The room around him was spinning too much and he wanted to just lay down on the floor and wait for the room to stop spinning. And in spite of his drunkenness dulling his senses to pain, he felt something odd on his back.

"So, where do you live?" Rin asked.

"Down the street from here," Haruka slurred out.

Rin had taken the cup of water that Nitori had prepared for Haruka with them and was continuing to help Haruka get rehydrated, "Really?"

It was hard for Rin to believe that after all this time, Haruka had been so close.

"Yep," Haruka led him down a few blocks to an apartment building. On the way the pair stopped for Haruka to throw up.

"You're being so nice to me," Haruka slurred out, "you're pretty nice for someone who looks like you do."

Rin controlled his temper well and didn't rise to Haruka's bait. Rin had always dressed outside of the standard expectations for Japanese. Part of it, he blamed on solely being half-Japanese. He already didn't fit into society, so why bother bending to it? Part of it was also his job. He was an artist, and artists were supposed to be stand outside of the rules of society.

Recently, he had dyed his normally redhair purple for the hell of it. He had piercings up and down his ears, a nose ring, and a lip ring. He didn't wear his tongue piercing anymore but he had one of those too. His body was covered in tattoos as well, all of which were done by he himself or by his own master. He had some blank parts of his body, but for the most part, Haruka was right, he looked like the sort of person that any society member would tell you to avoid.

Still, the last person that Rin wanted to hear that from was Haruka.

Haruka coming into his shop had pissed him off enough to actually mark a drunk person with something that couldn't be called art, but it was worth it. Haruka could say whatever he wanted, tomorrow morning he'd work with an ass pain that was worse than the pit he had left in Rin's heart.

Haruka kept leading Rin down the road until he finally stopped in front of a building. The building was nice, but it wasn't overly fancy as Rin had expected.

"Here we are," Haruka slumped against the railing for the steps going up to his building.

Rin smiled, "Well, I'm glad you got home safely."

"Thanks for taking me home."

"You really have no idea who I am, do you?" Rin asked staring hard at Haruka.

Haruka tried to sober up enough to get a good look at Rin. Everything was pretty blurry, but he was certain that he didn't know the man in front of him. Why would he know someone who ran a tattoo shop?

Rin laughed, "Maybe this will help remind you, Nanase."

Rin leaned in pushing Haruka against the railing and kissed Haruka fully on the lips. His tongue slid into Haruka's mouth. He tasted like vomit and beer, but he was as good of a kisser as Rin remembered. He pulled back and Haruka opened his eyes trying hard to focus on the man in front of him.

Haruka's head was spinning more than it had been. There was something oddly familiar about Rin's kiss, but he couldn't place it. As quickly as it had come though, it was gone.

Haruka was simply too drunk.

"Sleepy," was all Haruka said and with that he forced himself up the steps.

Rin watched him go upstairs and enter his building. Then he thought, shit. Why the fuck did I do any of that?

He started to head to his own home.

XXX

"I called you a doctor," Nagisa informed Haruka when Haruka got out of bed for the second time that day. It was around 5 pm now.

Haruka's hangover was almost entirely gone. He felt a lot better, but his ass and back still hurt. He sighed, "I don't think I can trust them."

Haruka's business would not look fondly upon his new body art. It was necessary that whoever removed the tattoo do it as fast as possible with as much secrecy as possible. There was only one doctor who he trusted with such a task, but he wasn't sure that he could make the phone call.

His head started to pound, but in a different way from his hangover.

Nagisa nodded, understanding, "Who will you call then?"

Haruka looked away and sighed, "I think I have to call him."

Nagisa raised his eyebrows, "Are you sure that's a good idea?"

"It's for medical reasons. He'll be professional, I'm sure," Haruka rested his head in his hands.

"Also, I called your credit card company and figured out where you went last night. You blew a pretty healthy chunk of money last night."

"Oh?" Haruka was a bit afraid to ask.

"50 grand."

"Shit," not that it mattered. Haruka more than had the money, especially now. He made almost seven figures as it was, but he tried to be careful with his money. For the majority of society, 50 grand was what they took home in a year. Haruka tried to live like a normal human being.

"You went to several bars after I put you to bed," Nagisa's voice was slightly condescending.

Haruka knew he had been a bad drunk though, and he sure as hell felt punished enough already, but he let Nagisa continue.

Nagisa went on, "As for the tattoo parlour, you went to a place down the street. They're open pretty long hours. I'm sure if you went over there, you could talk with the owner about your situation."

Haruka nodded, "I'm going to take a shower, and then, I'll head over there."

"Are you...um," Nagisa thought about how to word it, "sure that you should do that?"

Christ, Haruka thought. He had almost managed to forget, "Yeah. Whoever tattooed me, sent me home with some manual and cleaning supplies. I should be able to figure out how to shower. This whole mess blows though."

"Well, the promotion should make it worth it."

"Hardly."

XXX