I hiss softly as the latest in a long line of girls slides her painted fingernails down my chest, picking the buttons of my shirt loose and scratching slightly like she half expects my skin to tear back, reveal something alien to match my hair and eyes. She was staring at me from across the bar all night, but I found out fast that it was just because I was different. Just like always.

She's not in this for money but she still slides slowly to her knees, pale soft skin resting against thin, rough carpet as she undoes my pants and tugs them out of the way. I know she's checking to see if the carpet matches the drapes and I can't decide if the little surprised noise she makes is because it most certainly does or because she wasn't expecting my size. I've had a girl or two tell me that they always figured half-breeds had tiny dicks. Something to do with dirty genes and grudges.

Regardless of her motives, she's good. She sucks me off like a champion, her lips and tongue drawing soft, harsh grunts of approval out from between my clenched teeth. I don't remember her name so I keep quiet, random guesses dying as soon as they flicker to life because she's obviously done this a couple times before. Even without some kind of connection, it feels good. Even though I'm in this to get off and satisfy her curiosity, I want to make it worthwhile.

I push her back before those red-stained lips can pull me all the way to my completion, staring her in the face as she licks them clean with that dainty, wicked tongue. I just want to get off, and I don't think I want to see how much practice other parts of her body's had too, so I take it slow and kiss her, licking the taste of my own skin out of her mouth like I'm trying to erase it off of her, erase me off of her, as I guide her hand to finish what she started and drop my own to return the favor.

She shudders and gasps prettily enough as she comes, but I can tell half of it's for show. It makes me laugh as she manages to get me through an acceptable orgasm and pulls her hand back to lick my come off of her fingers. I tell her she's a tease and grin disarmingly as I suck my own clean of the taste of her cunt.

I don't go back to my room satisfied. Not by a long shot. It wasn't good enough for that, and I didn't have the patience or the inclination to follow her home. It takes a shower to get the smell of her and her perfume off of my skin and I don't bother to go back out again, knowing that there hadn't been any better offers in this little hick town. As I settle down on my bed, though, I can't shake the antsy feeling that's settled into my bones, like all of that was just some kind of thin attempt for me to try and convince myself that a quick jerk was all I wanted. Being in this ragtag little foursome is making me re-evaluate a lot of what I think about being alone.

Was a time, not too long ago, when I figured I could deal with it being just me against the world. Banri sauntered into my life and made me see the pros of running with someone who understood you, but he fucked off and did what he pleased enough that no matter how grateful I was that he hung around when he did, I never got the feeling that I had anything but one tenuous ally against an endless army of apathetic strangers. When Banri left the last time before everything changed, I figured I wouldn't see him again and that was fine. He didn't pay rent and he cheated at cards, but he brought booze every so often and told me that we were brothers in a sense and that was better than I'd had in years, so I took it. Getting walked out on by a brother wasn't something I was new to, anyways.

And then time finally ticked over to that night. I wonder, every so often, what would have happened if I'd gone with that girl who had asked me about my hair. If I'd shrugged it off and fucked her anyways, let her have her little moment of fascination rather than walk away. If I'd been feeling lower, I might have, but the relative good mood I'd been in had been enough to make me forget for a second that I was never just one of the guys, that I didn't really belong in the bar. If I'd taken more time, maybe I wouldn't have been there before Hakkai bled out in the rain. Maybe I wouldn't have been there in time to shove his guts back in him and carry him home. Maybe all I would've been good for was digging a shallow grave in the middle of the night so that a fellow former fuckup could go the night without having his guts eaten by coyotes.

Maybe I wouldn't be here right now.

I sigh and shuffle around a little, stripping my clean clothes off on the off chance that baring my skin to the open air will help get rid of that annoying restless feeling settling in under my skin. It helps a little and I just lie on top of the covers, staring at the ceiling as I continue to just let my mind wander, scratching a little at my stomach as my restless fingers look for something to do. I don't smoke in bed. Too much of a chance of setting shit on fire.

Maybe if Hakkai had died that night, Sanzo never would have come down from Kinzan with his monkey and fucked what was left of my life up so royally. Maybe I'd still be home right now, drinking familiar booze without having to worry about some psycho youkai jumping out of nowhere and trying to tear my throat out. Maybe I'd still be happily alone.

Only, really, I was never happy with being lonely. I slept around so I wouldn't have to deal with a cold bed at night. I drank to forget that there was no one waiting for me to get home, no one in the world who'd care if I didn't make it, if I dropped off of the face of the earth right then and there. I was living a hollow, empty life because I was too chicken to off myself and too stubborn to let anyone else do it.

And then I almost tripped over a dying man and resented him for how fucking happy he looked about it, so I dragged him home and patched him up.

And after that, I wasn't alone in the house. I spent a solid three and a half months waiting for Hakkai to heal up, to get strong enough to move around on his own, before I went back to some semblance of the life I'd given up. But even then, nothing was the same. When I came home smashed I didn't have to worry about waking up with the door still open behind me and rainwater soaking into the hall carpet. When I came home hungry, there was always a plate of something set aside, wrapped up carefully to keep. The mess that had been piling up over years of casual neglect started to disappear, and for the first time in years I had an ashtray on the kitchen table and someone to harp on me when I used an empty beer can instead…

And then the monkey and his pet monk had dropped by and things went to shit again, and I ran the risk of being alone all over again.

As much as I hate it…Hakkai is the only person I've ever cut my hair for.

But it turned out that they didn't haul him off to kill him, and when I saw him again, standing there as pretty as you please, picking up groceries for something, I couldn't help but take him back, all one-hundred and fifty pounds of him, with enough emotional issues to sink a fucking oil tanker. And he brought Goku and Sanzo back into the fucking picture and…

Well…

It turned out that I don't like being alone at all, really.

Like right now, which in a really long, really involved, really annoying kind of way brings my thoughts back full circle. Sure I like 'alone time' as much as the next guy, but not when I'm really actually alone. Even the monkey does better with lonely nights than I do; for all that he's pretty much glued to our Glorious Leader at any other time. I keep brushing my fingers across my belly, just to have the feeling of something there, and after a long moment I close my eyes and try to imagine it's someone else's hand.

I start out like I always do, the image of some pretty girl swimming to the forefront of my mind, leaning over me and petting my skin gently. The vision doesn't make me feel any better, so I cast around for a new one, flitting absently through memories until I wind up sticking on one of Hakkai, his deep green eyes looking at me, the corners crinkled a little in a way that tells me that he's not just smiling for the sake of it for once. Real smiles are a rarity from him…but then I've been around him long enough to have seen a few.

It's surprisingly easy to pretend that my touch is his, that the calloused fingertips smoothing over my skin are doing so to check for injuries like always. He touches me enough that I don't have to stretch my imagination to think of it. That I hum a little in appreciation as I imagine that smile getting a little warmer, his full lips curving up a bit more…

Maybe I'm in deeper than I think I am.

I take my cues from the gentle touches I remember, the little, exploratory brushes of his fingers as he checks for broken bones and torn ligaments. I imagine what his face would look like if he was taking the time to just…explore me, because he wants to this time…a little less pointed but no less focused. He's not looking for something in particular, just looking…and I can feel a heat pooling in my gut that I should probably be worried about…

He smiles a little warmer in my mind and drags his fingers down a little farther, his eyes scrunching a little more as I make a soft, warm sound in the back of my throat. I love that look, the way he looks just before he laughs…it's beautiful. Seems like my imagination's pretty good too.

I'm a little surprised by how much just this is getting to me, imagining his face in my mind's eye, pretending that his fingers are tracing aimless patterns over my skin, rubbing against my nipples until they're stiff and sensitive. I groan a little in appreciation and his eyes get a little darker as I mix the intense look he gets when we're in the middle of a fight in with the smile on his face.

I have to take over my fantasy at this point. I can't decide whether he'd tease me until I begged or if he'd just take my arousal in stride and start stroking me right then so I imagine him leaning back, just watching me as I take a more active role, sliding my hand back down my chest and stomach until I can palm at my steadily rising erection. It feels good; better than it usually does when I'm just jerking off on my own and it has to have something to do with the deep green eyes I'm imagining watching the progress of my hands. I groan a little too loudly as I stoke myself, reaching down with my other hand to fondle my balls, massaging them hungrily with my fingers as I start to pant, gasping out little noises of pleasure. I imagine him shifting a little, trying to get more comfortable as he watches me. I go so far as to imagine him reaching down to rub at himself as he takes in the sight, purring softly as I start to move my hands a little faster, rubbing my thumb against the sensitive slit at the tip of my erection.

I try to keep as quiet as possible, not sure of how thin the walls are. We have adjoining rooms and the last thing I want is for someone to shatter the illusion completely by pounding on a wall or something and shouting at me to shut up. I can't help the little lost, pleading noises that slip from my lips as I tease myself for my imaginary audience's benefit, as I start getting closer, visualizing him licking his lips like he wants a piece of this for himself.

It's the thought of what he could do with those full lips that finally throws me over the edge, my mind turning to frantic images of his cheeks hollowed out as he sucks on my length like he needs to taste me come. I grunt and manage to hold back a louder cry as his name falls shakily from my lips, my hips bucking up against my hand in the last throes of my orgasm.

It takes me a few minutes to get my breathing back under control, a little longer to clean up and get settled back in to sleep, but I feel better than before. The last of that restless feeling seeps out of me as I wedge the spare pillow between me and the wall at my back, pretending that it's his body like on the nights when we're forced to sleep in the same bed.

My last thoughts before slipping off to sleep are about how it seems that I really don't like being alone anymore. And how I can work towards maybe not having to feel like I am ever again…

If he'd be willing to humor me, of course.