[A/N: Used to be known as "Fck Buddies", but I had a hunch that the site might not be too cool with that title. I tried to capture a possible M/N-relationship in a very everyday fashion, what it would look like if they really sort of tried to get along. Emphasis on "sort of". Also, based on my theory that their sex life would be a very complicated and awkward affair. This was done for the German version of "30 Kisses", the prompts I used were #20 the road home, #24 Good Night, and #27 overflow. I always look for ways to improve my English writings, so if you find errors that you´d like to point out, please do!
Clandestine.
"..."
"..."
"You ok?"
"I´m fine, Mello."
"..."
"..."
"You sure you´re ok."
"Yes. You can stop touching me now."
"Does it hurt?"
"It does, but that is unavoidable, isn´t it? Don´t touch me, please."
Near´s voice was lifeless, but Mello could hear a slight trace of impatience, and that "please" had a little sting to it. It told him that the needle was deep in the red, that he was invading more of Near´s personal space than the other could bare.
Which was an excellent reason to continue.
"It gets better every time, you know," he muttered into the silvery locks that were covering parts of his face. It was weird - Near had small shoulders, but they did look very much like a massive brick wall when he turned his back to Mello like that. A very dainty, very pretty, but also decidedly cold shoulder.
Mello remembered that all his life, he had been the one to turn his back to people after sex. But of course, Near had to take that away from him, too.
He closed his arms around the smaller boy, locking him in his embrace like he was a mouse in a trap. "It´ll only get better, you´ll see..."
"I am aware of that, or else I wouldn´t agree to do it. You can stop touching me any time now, Mello. Please don´t make me repeat myself again and again. Stop touching me."
Mello let him go, rolled on his back an closed his eyes. He wondered again why he had bothered to trade screwing people that actually begged him to touch them - for this. For Near, who snapped like a particularly touchy oyster after fucking, who refused to be touched the second the sensation was over, because he was so damn peculiar and special and whatnot. Near, who made him sneak out right after fucking, like some lousy burglar, so that nobody knew.
"It´s your fault," Matt had once dryly stated, when Mello must have looked particularly sexually frustrated munching down on his chocolate bar, "YOU insisted on banging the freaky prodigy, now deal with it."
It wasn´t a nice way to put it, but Matt had an excellent point.
At least Near made sure to always have a bar of Mello´s favorite chocolate ready for him on the nightstand, so he took it and let it melt on his tongue while he listened to Near as he completed his little post-coital ritual.
Once they were done, Near usually waited a few minutes - in which he´d rather not be touched, please - until he could walk again, and then he stood up, folded himself into his blanket, shuffled off to the bathroom without saying a word, and locked himself in.
And then he apparently took an insultingly long bath.
As if he tried to wash Mello, and the things Mello did with him, off like some kind of toxic waste. It was an insult, but Mello had to admit it was practical. It was his cue to snatch his clothes, his stuff, and get the hell out of Near´s royal hotel suite, before they landed themselves in some sort of awkward poist-coital conversation. They already sucked at pre-coital conversations, so it was unnecessary to endure more of it after. Near never came out of the bathroom as long as Mello was still in his bed. It was a pretty clear statement. It was also a clear statement, however, that Mello would find the door to Near´s bedroom unlocked again the next night.
There it was, like every night. The folding, the shuffling, the locking of the bathroom door. Mello listened to the sound of running water, devoured his chocolate, and frowned.
Why Near wanted to keep Mello from seeing him naked after lying underneath him for about one hour of pretty complicated intercourse, was a mystery to him, and quite irrational for a rational person like Near. But Mello figured it all made sense if he kept in mind that his fuck buddy was nuts. It didn´t matter anyway. The only time they ever functioned together was during those selected moments between tearing off each other´s clothes and mutual orgasm, and that was that. As soon as their brains stopped spilling endorphines, the magic was gone, and the feeling of annoyance, rivalry and frustration that smothered pretty much everything else was back. It was right back to Mello finding Near cold and repulsive, and Near wishing Mello had removeable batteries like other toys, as it had always been.
And still ... Mello couldn´t quit, because he knew he´d never again come so hard and so passionate in his life like when he managed to flood Near´s brain with hormones to the point where he stopped being Near. It was unparalleled, and it was worth all the conflict that came with it.
Mello listened to the distant splashes in the bathroom, and realized that he would probably never again feel what it was like to simply fall asleep after a night of fucking. There was no way he could stay here, it was against their rules. They had finally found something they were able to do together, but it was pretty clear that neither of them would ever be able to rest with the other one in the same bed, and that was a fact. It was now his part to stand up, pack his things, and clear the place from all the compromising traces of their little tryst, and, most importantly, from himself. His boots from behind the couch, his gloves from somewhere by the coffee table or more likely beneath it, his keys from the nightstand, in three, two, one ...
He heard a familiar sound, which was emerging from his pants, which were located under the bed. It was his phone. "What?"
"Mello? Good, so you´re alive."
Mello raised an eyebrow. "Why wouldn´t I be, Matt? You thought he´d screw me to death? I wish."
"I really don´t want to hear anything about that, man," Matt replied. "I figure you haven´t watched the news, then? Or looked out the window?"
Mello was tempted to snap that he had been unable to catch the nine o´clock news while he was working hard to get approving noises out of his uncommunicative lover. But Matt had made it very clear several times that he didn´t want to hear any details about what Mello and Near were up to together, since Near creeped him out, and Mello couldn´t blame him. Most of these details were sordid ones, anyway. "No, I didn´t. What happened? Did something blow up without my participation?"
Nervous, he got out of bed and went to the window. He really didn´t want to miss anything important only because he was too busy shoving his tongue down the throat of someone he didn´t even really like. Carefully, Mello spied through the curtains - and saw immediately what Matt was talking about.
"Oh fuck."
"No kidding, Mello. It´s a thunderstorm, with hurricanes and shit like that. The highway is awash, all the tunnels and bridges are shut down, and ..."
Mello grimaced and glared outside, where he saw streets flooding with muddy water and flickering emergency lights. Neither he nor Near had noticed anything, too busy to have their own little hell break loose in the safety of this room. Or probably Near had noticed and hadn´t said anything, because he simply didn´t care. Near never had to go somewhere. "... and that means I´m stuck here", Mello stated, finishing Matt´s sentence.
And THAT in turn meant that he would still be sitting here like some loser when Near decided to emerge from his bath, and Near would probably give him a very offended and emotionless stare, and then call security. Or worse, they would be forced to talk to each other.
"I´m going anyway!"
"Mello, that´s madness. If you don´t happen to have a fucking arc somwhere with you, it´s suicide."
Why on earth did Matt always have to be so damn plausible?!
"I don´t mind suicide! There´s no way in hell I´m staying here!" Mello growled as he started to circle Near´s ridiculously spacious suite in aggravation. He wasn´t used to be stalled by anyone, and to be stalled by something as marginal as the weather was indisputable!
But still, it did look like Armageddon out there.
He passed by a mirror, stopped and blinked, realizing he still didn´t have any clothes on. He paused for a second to admire himself, which brightened his mood a little. There were deep burns covering his torso, the explosion scars, but he didn´t mind them. They suited him like a bizarrely beautiful mosaic, and he liked it. And going by the way he liked to run his busy little fingers over the scar tissue, Near liked it as well.
It would have been nice, though, to have a lover who actually voiced these things instead of "You can stop touching me now."
"I need to get out of here," he murmured. "I need to get away from him."
"Aren´t you just two lovebirds," Matt said, "Not my business, but please don´t die drowning lonely on some highway just because Near´s conversation sucks, ´kay?"
"You´re right ..." Mello groaned, threw himself on the bed an started to search his pants for a credit card. "I gotta go, I´ll book a different room in this joint somewhere, away from him, or something ..." He stopped, his late mobster bosse´s Golden American Express in his hands. Or ... something ... Well, he could give it a try, couldn´t he...? If only to see the look on his insolent fuck buddy´s face ...
"Matt, I gotta go."
"You said so. Did you figure something out?"
Mello smiled, playfully. "Yeah, I figured something out. Bye, Matt."
"Mello, don´t do anything stupid now, ok? Even if it´s Near, it would still be murd ..."
Click.
Near´s bed was cozy, and it smelled good. Of course, it smelled a little like glue and crayons and other kiddy stuff, since it was Near´s bed, but Mello didn´t mind. This was a huge bed, much too huge for a spoiled little shit like Near alone. And there was no reason why Near should be the only one to enjoy its benefits. Mello hadn´t had the chance to lie in such a nice bed for a very long time. He sank into it like into a cloud of cotton candy. He realized that his muscles were still strained and his nerves were still sore. Their heated tryst on this bed didn´t even seem real to him anymore, but his body sure remembered it.
Barely noticing it, Mello drifted off into a light sleep. He woke up when he realized that a pair of very dark, very big eyes was watching him.
He slowly opened one of his eyelids like a lazy cat. Ah. So Near wore the same pyjama to sleep that he wore throughout the day. What a surprise. He looked pale and fragile and surreal against the darkness of the room. His hands were distractedly holding a rubber duck. His rigid, roundish face was tense. His hair was still a little wet and glistened beautifully. Near wasn´t close enough, but Mello imagined he´d smell nice.
"You´re still here." His voice was cold, and a little inquiring.
"Near ..." Mello purred, as if it was nothing special, "You don´t mind me sleeping here, do you?"
The answer was a pathetic squeak, as Near´s hands nervously squeezed the rubber duck. "Sleep...? In my ...?"
He fell silent, and Mello could positively feel Near trying to evaluate this unexpected turn of events. It was funny, really. Mello had spent so much time feverishly looking for ways to confuse Near, but in the end, it was the really simple things that did it.
Eventually, the soft voice objected: "I can´t sleep with other people lying in my bed."
If Near´s voice would have actually been able to reflect emotion, it would have been defiance. How cute.
Mello huffed. "Have you even tried sleeping in one bed with someone?"
"...no."
Mello again opened an eye and looked at Near, testingly. He had finally gotten rid of the rubber duck, but he still stood awkwardly at the foot of the bed, white and lucid like a ghost. "I´m not people´, Near. And I worked much harder than you did tonight. Somehow, lying beneath me motionlessly and repeating It hurts when you do that!´ Doesn´t strike me as much of an effort."
For a second there, Near almost looked hurt, but that wasn´t possible, Near never looked like anything, save the few occasions when he looked remotely horny. "Mello, why can´t you be more polite?"
"Near, why can´t you let me touch you?"
None of them answered.
Mello didn´t feel the time pass by, but he was positive that Near kept standing there, not moving, for quite some time, staring at him. He closed his eyes and decided not to pay attention to it anymore. Near´s indignated little mug was somehow annoying and adorable at the same time, and it was exhausting, and he was tired.
Eventually, he felt the sheets move, as a delicate figure climbed into bed with him, and heard Near´s low voice, apprehensively stating: "... but you stay in your half!"
Sleepily, Mello grinned. "No worries. I´ll only defile you when I´m unmistakeably invited to do so, I swear."
"That´s not funny at all, Mello."
"Oh yes it is."
"..."
"..."
"I don´t like it because it´s too much."
Mello opened his eyes. "...what?"
Near was crouched in his blanket, as far away from him as possible, but he was talking to him. "When we do this. It´s much."
Mello raised a little and moved towards the small figure in the dark, but all he saw was a tangled mass of white locks and that really forbidding pair of shoulders.
"Too much what, Near? Fucking? Pain? Life? Me?"
"Everything."
"Is that bad? Or good?"
"It´s just ... much." Near mumbled, barely comprehensible. So he did get tired after all, like every other creature that walked the earth. "... and that is why sometimes I don´t want you to touch me, whenever it´s getting too much."
"Who decides if something is too much?"
"Me."
"I see."
No, he didn´t.
Mello looked at Near, puzzled. What he said didn´t make any sense to him, but it seemed to be some kind of honest attempt to be open with him, to explain himself to Mello, and it was slightly touching. Vague and useless, but touching.
Mello leaned in on him to smell that soft, tousled hair.
"Go back to your half, Mello."
He smiled and softly pressed a kiss on a small, pale piece of neck that he was able to reach. "I think much is good," he said, before he obediently retreated to his half of Near´s bed. "Night, Near."
At being kissed, Near crawled up defensively, like a hedgehog. "I know you think that. Good Night, Mello."
"..."
"..."
"Near?"
"...what?"
"Wanna bet I can get up much earlier than you can?"
"You can´t let it go, Mello, can you?"
"No."