Exposition and Rising Action
Bakura sat on the faded, once-cobalt-blue couch, elbow propped against the sofa-arm and his head resting against his hand. His lids sank low over his dark, brown-sugar eyes. Splashes of color from the television blurred over his and Marik's faces, distorting the shadows of the small apartment.
"This movie is boring," Marik whined, his chin pointing down.
"You picked it, I wanted to watch Cannibal Holocaust."
"We've seen that movie a million friggn' times."
"Then A Clockwork Orange."
"Silence," Marik ordered, "I'm trying to watch this piece of shit movie."
Bakura grunted in response, his eyes shut now. Nodding off, he felt pressure on his right shoulder as Marik also fell asleep. A small, cynical grin decorated Bakura's face for a moment, but then his facial muscles relaxed as did his breathing. Fifteen minutes passed and Bakura's arm tingled from lack of circulation from Marik's body weight. Bakura shifted his arm, unconsciously wrapping it around Marik's shoulders.
Another hour passed, an irritating, consistent sound dragged Bakura away from sleep and back into the room. On the television the title screen glowed while a bothersome thirty seconds of theme music repeated. Bakura fumbled for the remote, smashing the power button and snapping the room into beautiful darkness. He rubbed his neck, stiff with leaning one way too long. Nudging Marik in the shoulder, he muttered, "go to bed."
Marik mumbled something inaudible and nuzzled harder into Bakura's side.
"Sod it," Bakura muttered half asleep as he shifted to a more comfortable position. He turned sideways in order to spread out on the sofa, Marik's body blocked his legs. He poked at Marik's ribs with his foot, "move Marik."
Instead of moving off the couch, or even to the other end of it, Marik shifted in his sleep, wrapping his arms around Bakura's torso, settling between his legs, and burying his face between Bakura's stomach and chest. This woke Bakura. He sat there a moment, his arms balanced awkwardly on each side as he looked down at Marik sleeping on top of him in the dim, quiet room. "Um . . . Marik?"
Marik inhaled a deep breath, resisting being woken, he exhaled and muttered something that sounded like, but wasn't, Mazel Tov. Bakura sighed, forfeiting and lowering his arms around Marik's back and shoulders. He finished settling into the old couch, looking up at the black ceiling and blowing a lung full of air out of his mouth. At the moment he felt unbelievable contentment and it infuriated him. Thousands of years of ambitions, goals, and schemes dulled in his mind as he laid with a boy that refused to come out of the closet. However, he knew the current moment was temporary and what he wanted he could not have.
Bakura bent his head closer to Marik, breathing in the scent of his hair. "Your hair smells good," Bakura whispered the the room's shadows.
"I stole your shampoo," Marik muttered. Bakura watched him for a moment before realizing that Marik was talking in his sleep. He closed his eyes and relaxed, the moment may be temporary, but there was nothing to do but enjoy it for as long as possible.
Marik couldn't remember falling asleep, his mind only now comprehending that he was asleep and in the process of waking – he didn't want to. He felt comfortable and protected, but sensed that as soon as he awoke those feelings would end. It reminded Marik of his first trip to the surface with his sister, bright and exciting, but dreadful because he knew it was temporary. His mind closer to consciousness, he had the vague realization that he held someone and that person held him in return. Marik felt his cheek pressed against a layer of cotton with muscle waiting beneath the fabric. He pressed his face full into the material, wishing to the Winged Dragon of Ra that he wasn't waking. Marik's movement caused Bakura to groan, squeezing Marik tighter. Bakura's voice pushed Marik's mind to the surface of full consciousness. His eyes popped open as complete realization of the situation seized him. Through the frame of his blond hair, Marik saw Bakura's t-shirt and pale arm. He felt his cheeks burn as blood rushed to his face and he felt himself swell as blood rushed lower. The arousal sent Marik into a panic and he repressed the emotions by pushing himself up and screaming, "Bakura, what the hell do you think you're doing?"
Bakura yawned, his head leaned against the arm of the couch with a small throw cushion behind his neck. "What? Let me sleep, Marik."
"Let go of me!" Marik commanded.
"What?" Bakura repeated the question, opening his eyes and adding, "oh." He released Marik and slid to the edge of the couch, rubbing his face with both hands and scratching his white mess of hair. Bakura stared at Marik for a moment, a devil's smile playing on his lips. "Well, well, Marik, I've never seen your hair in such a state."
Marik pushed stray blonde hairs back against his scalp, they sprung out of place the moment he moved his hands. "What the hell did you think you were doing?"
Bakura frowned, "I told you to move."
"You had your arms around me!" Marik screamed at him.
Bakura pointed at Marik, "well, you had your arms around me."
Marik stopped for a moment, the statement was true so he didn't know how to counter, "well you had your leg around me."
"Shut your buggering mouth. I don't need this rubbish, I'm going back to bed." Bakura stood and stormed towards his bedroom. Stopping with his hand on the door knob he shouted from the hall, "the whole mess is your fault for picking a movie too awful to keep us awake!" He went into his room, slammed the door, and locked it behind him.
After locking the door, Bakura pulled off last night's crumpled shirt, tossed it towards the hamper in his closet, and plopped face down on his unmade bed. The morning went as predicted. Bakura growled, sitting up and leaning against the headboard with his knees tucked to his chest. He reached for the bottle of baby oil he kept on his nightstand beside the bed and tossed the bottle from his left hand to his right hand as he listened to the sound of the liquid sloshing against the plastic bottle's sides. He sat there, staring at the bottle jumping from hand to hand, and tried to decide if he wanted to relieve his frustration. Instead, he cocked back his arm and hurled the bottle against the opposite wall. It hit the plaster with a crash before dropping down and landing on the thread-bare carpet. Bakura pressed his head against the headboard and stared at the ceiling stripped with three thin lines of sunlight sneaking through cracks in the blinds. To hell with everything. Revenge, schemes, tomb keepers, and couches alike, to hell with it all. The dark force sleeping in the Millennium Ring growled at Bakura's thoughts, but Bakura ignored it.
Marik watched Bakura storm to his bedroom, flinching as the door slammed. His lavender colored eyes stared at the hallway in which Bakura disappeared, a small whimper tried to escape from his mouth, but he swallowed the noise. Marik grabbed the throw cushion Bakura lay against a moment before and hugged it, laying curled on the couch, still staring at the hallway. Would it have been so wrong to lay there a few minutes longer? Pretending to sleep and allowing Bakura to wake up first? Seeing what would have happened had he not started yelling?
Yes, it would be wrong because that would be gay and evil villains can't be gay.
A twack broke the silence as Bakura threw something in his room. Marik closed his eyes and squeezed his pillow tighter at the noise. He opened his eyes, catching his reflexion in the t.v. screen across from the couch. Crumpled clothes, hair strewn around his head, Marik thought that he looked pathetic. He didn't know how to handle his emotions. When his father's knife, the metal white-tipped from heat, carved open his back as a child he'd pushed everything on Melvin to deal with, but Melvin couldn't save him from this. Still, he didn't know how to fix his feelings so he stood up, smoothed a wrinkle from his shirt, and walked towards the bathroom to take a shower and fix his appearance. On the way, Marik passed Bakura's bedroom. He touched the door with his fingertips and pressed his cheek against the cool, painted wood. He stood there a moment, breathing, listening, wondering if Bakura slept, wishing he had the courage to call out Bakura's name, fearing what the reply would be. He continued towards his own room to gather fresh clothes.
Bakura decided that he'd look for another flat. He didn't like the idea of being alone again. Bakura had grown accustomed to Marik's constant, even if aggravating, presence, but he was tired of pretending that they were mere roommates staying together only to defeat the Pharaoh. For a moment, Bakura thought he heard the door shift in its frame. He stared at the door, wanting an excuse to change his mind, but nothing happened.
Two minutes later, Bakura heard the radio in the bathroom click on and music pushing through the walls. Bakura listened to the hiss of the shower and Marik's tuneless voice chanting misremembered lyrics to 80's classics. He wished he hadn't chosen the bedroom that shared a wall with the bathroom. The thought of Marik standing under a rush of hot water clad only in a veil of white steam was more than he could withstand. He stood up, walked to the other end of his room, removed the rest of his clothing, and retrieved the discarded bottle of baby oil. Returning to his bed, Bakura leaned against the headboard, his eyes closed and both mind and hands wandering.
Unbeknownst to him, Marik stood two feet away. A headboard, two layers of drywall, and tiles separated them. The apartment didn't own a bathtub, simply a stand alone shower, and Marik pressed his back against the tiled wall in the exact place where Bakura leaned against his bed's headboard. Marik stood still with his eyes closed as the water poured over his chest. He wanted to wash away the arousal he felt ever since waking up entangled with Bakura. Instead, he grabbed himself and tried not to think of Bakura as he denied his repressed emotions, but the sensation of arms wrapped around him refused to leave his mind. He objectified them, focusing on the feeling of the arms, while ignoring their male identity.
Their images were a perfect reflection and contrast. Marik, a golden sun in the well lit, steaming bathroom filled with music; Bakura, a constellation of silver-white stars in his dim, cool, quiet bedroom. Although only two feet of distance separated them, miles of empty, black space may as well divided them, because they did not realize how each mirrored the other.