Title: Of Gods and Mortals
Genre: Angst, Drama, Romance (if your view of romance is as warped as mine)
Beta: chilibreath, pinksnow
Fandom: Prince of Tennis
Pairing: OshiAto, Dirty Pair later on...
Disclaimers: All Konomi-sensei's. Didn't make money off of this. Don't sue.
Summary: "Divine beings are there to inspire, to guide, to lead… but for a lowly human being to fall in love with divinity is taboo. There are heights that one just cannot aspire for. There are boundaries that one must never cross."
Author's Notes: The fifth story in a series of completely unrelated first kiss fics. This one was lovingly and whole-heartedly written at the request of pinksnow, the angel who watches over my writing.
First Kiss Series
Of Gods and Mortals
He is exquisite. Stunning in a way that no man should be. I look at him and fall into the belief that superlatives came into existence only because there was a need to try to define him. Try being the operative word here, because no amount of words would ever be enough to define Atobe Keigo.
He is perfection personified. A complete and absolute being unto himself. So appallingly capable that he doesn't even need a vice-captain to keep in hand the two hundred member-strong tennis club of Hyotei Gakuen. A snap of his fingers affords him unconditional control over everything he surveys, as though singularly blessed and touched by divinity. No, that's not quite right—as though he, himself, is of divine origin. And just as any deity is revered and worshipped, he too, gets more than his fair share of awe-inspired respect and adoration.
But deities were never meant to mingle with mere mortals. Divine beings are there to inspire, to guide, to lead… but for a lowly human being to fall in love with divinity is taboo. There are heights that one just cannot aspire for. There are boundaries that one must never cross.
----------------------------------------------------
I feel his pull on me, as though an external center of gravity.
I am cool. I am calm. I am touted to be Hyotei's own genius, at a level with Seigaku's Fuji Syuusuke. I am everything that everybody expects me to be—and then some—but only because of him. Only because Atobe expects it of me.
But despite the almost unholy hold he has on me, I still have my pride. I will not be one of the sycophants who cling to him and feed his (justifiably) immense ego. I cling instead to a different reality. A reality far-removed from the insistent longings I tamp down each and every day at the sight of one who never fails to remind of Apollo, said to be the most beautiful of the Greek gods. Or perhaps it would be more accurate to associate him with Phoebus, Apollo renamed after he acquired the glory of the god of the sun. Sometimes I even get the ridiculous urge to ask Atobe if he ever dazzles himself when he looks at himself in the mirror.
I heaved a sigh at the outrageous turn my thoughts have taken and decided that I've dragged my feet long enough. Practice has long since ended and I've bounced enough thoughts and tennis balls against that innocent wall.
----------------------------------------------------
I entered the club room just in time to see Shishido and Ohtori adjusting their tennis bags on their shoulders. They gave me an almost absent-minded wave as they walked out of the room, completely absorbed in the conversation they were having on the merits of the plushie catcher in the arcade nearest the school versus the one beside the tennis equipment store downtown.
I breathed out another sigh, this one of relief, as I pulled my eyes away from the door the Silver Pair had just gone out of, thinking that my procrastination ploy in order to get the club room to myself had worked.
And then I felt as though the bottom of my stomach had fallen out when I turned my eyes to find Atobe Keigo elegantly perched on a club room bench. He was looking oh-so-tempting in his boxers and his immaculate white undershirt that showed beneath his unbuttoned uniform top, as he generously slathered his right leg with a subtly sweet smelling lotion. I couldn't help but stare at him, completely mesmerized by the hypnotizing motion of his hands, feeling every bit the gauche 15-year old Kansai boy that I was.
"That's very rude, you know."
My eyes snapped up to Atobe's face at his quiet declaration. He was smirking at me, the jerk!
"You're staring at me, and that's just rude," he reiterated. "Don't look at me like that; it makes me feel uneasy."
And then, completely contradicting himself, Atobe made a production of lowering his right leg and bringing up his left leg to receive its share of lotion as he threw a coy look at me through half-lidded eyes. What started out as an act of unintended, artless seduction became a full-blown attack on my self-control.
I blinked at him once before leaning a shoulder to the closest locker and crossing my arms at my chest. "Atobe, you live on attention. You perform better when you know there are people watching you," I drawled out, deep voice heavy with the accent I knew a lot of people found irresistible. Two can play this game. "You probably get off on the thought of a million eyes trained on you," I added before I turned my back on him. I've got to hit the showers before I started mentally berating myself for the sharp edge of bitterness that I let slip along with that last statement.
Atobe's rich, deep-throated chuckle followed me into the first shower stall, along with his smug, "Well, wouldn't you just love to know what I jerk off to?"
----------------------------------------------------
"You're still here," I observed in a flat voice as I briskly rubbed the excess moisture from my hair with the fluffy towel that the Hyotei tennis club room always had an abundant supply of.
Atobe gave me a nonchalant shrug of his elegant shoulders from where he was lounging on the bench directly in front of his locker.
In order to get to my own locker, I had to pass Atobe. And if I were to finish my post-practice rituals, I had to stay within his arm's reach. Honestly! Who did the locker assignments this year, anyway? Whoever thought it was a smart idea to put my locker right next to Atobe's must have been insane!
I mentally calculated the possible risks of going anywhere near Atobe, considering the fact that I was wearing only a towel that rode low on my hips, and that I only had the other towel I used to dry my hair with as a contingency measure, should it become necessary to protect my modesty.
I can still see the ghost of a smirk hovering on his lips. And as though reading the hesitation in my thoughts, a graceful eyebrow arched at me tauntingly.
It was all I can do to keep from blowing out my breath in a huff of irritation before I resolutely headed towards my own locker. I did my best to ignore Atobe, rubbing my hair with the towel again, only more vigorously than was necessary this time, and then nearly suffocating myself in a cloud of body spray, but when it came time for me to re-dress myself, I stopped to look at him.
There I was, clad in nothing but a towel, holding my boxers out in readiness in front of me, and pointedly asking, "Do you mind?"
Atobe's smile, if anything, became even more wickedly delighted before he airily answered, "Not at all. Go right ahead," an unconcerned hand casually waving its permission.
I rolled my eyes and minutely shook my head in disgust. The guy who did the locker assignments this year was definitely an idiot.
And I am consigning him to the deepest of the nine levels of hell.
----------------------------------------------------
Finally dressed and having just finished tying the laces to my shoes, I was blindly grasping beside me for my eyeglasses only to find nothing but thin air. With a frown, I looked to the space beside me on the bench where I was positive I laid down my glasses before starting to get dressed.
"I don't understand why you don't just get rid of these things," Atobe drawled out from behind me.
My head swiveled back to look at him, the very picture of relaxed indolence, leaning against a set of lockers as he toyed with my eyeglasses in his hands. I had been so intent on ignoring him, I didn't even notice when he moved to stand behind me.
"I would very much like to have my eyeglasses back, Atobe." I requested in pretty much the same tone one would use while asking for candy from a drooly two-year old kid.
Atobe frowned at me, not appreciating my tone of voice one bit. "It's not like you need them to see clearly," he pointed out as he sexily slinked his way nearer to me in a way that had all my self-preservation instincts screaming at me to run away.
Far too soon, I found myself far too close to Atobe. Apparently, he had no compunctions about invading my personal space. He stepped over the bench I was sitting on and stopped right in front of me, as though having him lodged firmly between my legs was the most natural thing in the world. He brought his face down closer to my own and huskily repeated, "You don't need them to see clearly."
My mouth instantly dried up at his close proximity, but I still managed to answer him with, "No, I don't need them to see clearly… but I need them to keep people from seeing me too clearly…"
I only saw a split-second of a triumphant, knowing gleam in Atobe's eyes, as though telling me that he knew all along I was going to say that, before I felt his lips on mine.
Dominant.
Powerful.
Possessive.
Hungry.
For another split-second, I wondered if, perhaps, my mind had finally broken. I felt his tongue sliding seductively against mine, inviting me to give in and take the pleasure he offered. This was Atobe!
Hyotei's king.
An impossible dream.
An unreachable god…
Some semblance of sanity kicked in and I wrenched my lips away from Atobe. I was breathing rather harshly and I was pretty sure I was looking owlishly up at him. "This can't be real," I whispered hoarsely.
Atobe gave a delighted little chuckle before bringing his face sinfully close to mine, so close that our noses were almost touching. "Why can't it be real? I've seen you looking at me. I've felt your eyes on me more times than I'd care to count… Can I not be benevolent and let you have what you want?"
His words sent hope surging within my chest. Could it, indeed, be possible? Can one get close to the sun and not be burned? Could I reach out to a dream and not have it disappear into a cloud of evanescent smoke?
A hand hovered a few inches from Atobe's face, hesitating to touch for fear of some divine retribution…
"Yuushi…" he whispered in that silken voice of his, and I couldn't help the shiver that ran up my spine. He gave me a small smile, took my hand to meet his smooth cheek, before continuing in that soft voice, "I'm not going to break. Touch me."
And that was all it took to demolish the iron control I had over myself. In one fluid motion, I stood up, pushed Atobe back, pinned him between myself and the lockers, and kissed him the way I've always dreamed of doing. I was gentle but thorough, worshipping those soft lips as though there was no tomorrow. He let out a demanding little moan and I took advantage of his parted lips, slipping my tongue in to mate with his. He slanted his head at an angle and wrapped his arms around my head, drawing me in closer, drowning my senses until all I can think of and taste and feel was him.
----------------------------------------------------
"Is that what you wanted, Yuushi?" Atobe softly asked against my lips.
I drew away from him slowly, taking that opportunity to clear my head of the fog that blurred the lines of reality in my head. "No, not really. But it doesn't matter, does it?" I answered just as softly.
'Because that's all I'm getting…'
He raised an eyebrow at that. "Oh? What makes you think so?"
I gave a soundless, mirthless chuckle. "Planets revolve around the sun, Atobe. The sun does not revolve around anything… or anyone."
A few minutes of pregnant silence hung heavy between us. Atobe was silently regarding me. I was unable to pull my gaze away from his.
A part of me realized that Atobe was trying to communicate something to me. Something that I, alone, should be able to understand. But deeply ingrained habits are hard to break. I've been running away from him for so long, keeping myself in check, sparing myself from the certain heartbreak and disappointment… I couldn't understand what he was trying to tell me.
I did not want to understand.
"Ne, Atobe…" he quirked an eyebrow at me, waiting for me to continue. I cocked my head to one side and asked, "Do you ever dazzle yourself when you look at yourself in the mirror?"
A look of utter surprise went through Atobe's features for a fleeting second before his mask of untroubled self-assurance fell firmly into place. He smiled the smile that he usually reserved for a full gallery during tennis tournaments, flicked the hair out of his face, and drawled out, "Who do you think you're talking to, ahn?"
And with that, he turned his back on me. An obvious dismissal. A god who grew weary of his tiresome devotee.
"Oshitari, lock the door on your way out," he instructed me without even looking back at me. "I still have a ton of paperwork I need to take care of for the club and the student council. Ore-sama does not wish to be disturbed."
I followed his retreating figure with my eyes until he disappeared into this little corner of the club room that served as his office.
"Hai, buchou," I quietly whispered.
----------------------------------------------------
There are heights that one just cannot aspire for. There are boundaries that one must never cross.
Atobe Keigo is a god. And I, a mortal.
A prodigiously gifted mortal.
----------------------------------------------------
But a mere mortal, nonetheless.
La Fuego
12/26/07
End Notes:
1) This could be the end of the story right here... or you could move on to read the epilogues if you still haven't had your fill of angst.
2) A wikipedia entry for Hyotei's students actually does tell that Oshitari Yuushi has no need for eyeglasses. It says, and I quote:
"Along with Tezuka and Inui, they are known as the "Megane Trio" (Glasses Trio) and often performs songs and mini-dramas together. It was pointed out, however, that Oshitari does not actually need glasses as his eyesight is not faulty."
3) ...So yeah... Comments and reviews are much appreciated.