A/N - This is a result of too many silly movies about quarterbacks, cheerleaders and the meaning of high-school life. I never intended to publish this, but I really wonder what you'll think about it. I still have ambiguous feelings about this story. One moment I love it, the next one it seems lame.
Kojuurou left the locker room late that night. His team mates were long gone, or so he thought. As he walked down the hallway he noticed three of them huddled up around something, jeering and bawling.
"Oi!" The group dispersed a little, only to show that there was a fourth teen there. He had a defiant look in his eyes, which surprised Kojuurou. Defiance was not something you should show when three football players pick on you. Begging, pleading, grovelling... There were many options, defiance was not one of them.
"What?" one of the bullies glared at the quarterback accusingly, as if he was interrupting on his birthright to beat the crap out of the smaller teen.
"Nothing," he replied indifferently. It was none of his business. Before he walked away, he caught a gleam of those defiant eyes aimed towards him, and it betrayed utter and complete hatred.
He was sitting in the school cafeteria, surrounded by his team mates and girls which liked so much to be associated with football players. He felt a sharp pang of despise at one moment, but the feeling soon lapsed into that of necessary tolerance. The three bullies from yesterday were not around and he wondered what happened to them. But more than that, he wondered about what happened to the boy with hatred in his eyes.
"Did you hear what happened?" Kojuurou heard a girl's voice behind him.
"That weird guy ended up in a hospital. I heard it was some showdown in his gang."
"What?" another girl spoke, a bit too enthusiastic about the news. "I didn't' know he was in a gang. That's kinda cool," she added, unable to hide her fascination.
"He's in no fucking gang! How many gangs do you know of in this town? He just got beaten up because he's a pussy, is all," a guy at the same table said indignantly, as if defending his status as a non-gang affiliate.
"Whatever," the first girl said, "I know for a fact that he's into some martial arts shit, and I don't think someone would kick his ass so easily."
The halls grew thick with rumours that week. The boy's name was Date Masamune, and after his mysterious disappearance he became a sociopath, a gang-leader, a thug, a kung-fu master, a pussy, a wimp. But only one thing screamed out of all the whispers, the one that made the Masamune boy a pirate. The news that the boy had lost his right eye (in a bar fight, in an illegal boxing competition, in a gang showdown...) was the only thing that rang true. And another thing was confirmed to be true. That boy did not go down without a fight. Two of the team mates that Kojuurou interrupted that day came back to school after two days. One had an impressive black eye, and the other had a swollen lip. The third was still nursing a broken nose and a few cracked ribs. Kojuurou could not help but be in awe of Masamune, and he knew the three thugs will never nurse their pride back to health. That was probably what cost the boy his right eye.
Date Masamune showed up two weeks later, his right eye covered with a black patch. He walked down the crowded hallway, people parting before him with whispers of those same rumours on their lips. The only one who did not move out of his way was Kojuurou. Masamune stopped his progress. That one remaining eye contained enough disdain and insolence to make up for the one he lost.
"What?" Masamune grunted, the crowd growing silent, wondering what did the quarterback have to do with the famous one-eyed, kung-fu gang-leader. The quarterback had no idea why he'd stopped Masamune. He had no idea what he wanted to say. Is there a way to apologize for a man's eye?
"You need something?" Masamune was irritated, and his nerves were stretched too thinly by his new-found glory, and emergence from the social shadows he'd been lurking in until recently.
"No," Kojuurou answered, and stepped aside to let the infamous legend in the making pass through.
He made a massive mistake. But it did not feel wrong to try and make amends for the role he'd played in Date Masamune losing his eye. He viciously attacked his three team mates, beating them down to a pulp, earning himself a broken arm, a three week suspension, and an expulsion from the team. Which, by extension, resulted in his father having a tantrum and making a point of not paying for his college tuition, and in him losing all his so-called friends. Once he's back in school, there will be no flock of fangirls fluttering around him anymore. Fuck.
A knock on the door stirred him from a spell of depression and self pity. Date Masamune was standing in front of his door, a menacing spasm on his pretty face. His hair was covering the eye patch almost completely, and there was something exotic and mysterious in him now. Kojuurou walked back into the living room and shouted:
"You coming in or what?"
Masamune stomped into the house, slamming the door behind him, in a gesture that showed that he had no idea just how pissed off he was.
"So?" Kojuurou asked, looking at the smaller teen who managed to loom large over him. Masamune's eye glided over the cast on his right hand.
"What the fuck were you thinking?"
"Sorry?"
"You had no right to do that, you know. I don't need you to fight my battles."
"I was fighting my own battle," Kojuurou explained, straightening up a bit to lose the feeling that Masamune's overwhelming presence awoke in him.
"Really? Explain," Masamune said calmly, slumping onto the couch next to Kojuurou, pulling out a pack of cigarettes from his pocket.
"I did that to you," Kojuurou said, both of them fully aware of what that was.
"You're just as self-centred as I thought," Masamune muttered around a freshly lit cigarette.
"You had nothing to do with it," he said off-handedly, tapping the ash into Kojuurou's cafe-latte. He seemed to snuggle into the couch, putting his feet up on the table. He obviously carried the feeling of home wherever he went.
Kojuurou stood up, kicking Masamune's feet off the table in an attempt to obtain his complete attention.
"Whatdafuck?" the boy yelled out.
"Tell me, when you wake up, go into the bathroom and look at yourself in the mirror; when you see that which you are hiding so adamantly, whose face pops up in front of that unseeing eye?"
"Yours," Masamune whispered, lowering his gaze after throwing the cigarette into the coffee cup.
"But you couldn't have stopped them!" he exclaimed, all the effort to make it convincing pointing out that it was more of a question than an assertion.
"Maybe not alone. But the two of us together..."
"Guess so," Masamune agreed.
"Your arm? Will it work again?"
"No. I screwed up the tiny bones in my hand."
"So even if the coach changes his mind..."
"He won't change his mind. As far as he's concerned I've attack three of my team mates out of sheer boredom."
"Well, no football for you, no karate for me. You think it's a fair trade? Did your idiotic sacrifice heal your conscience?"
"No."
"No what? "
"No on both accounts," Kojuurou explained, and sat down again. They sat in silence for a while, slouched forward in a mock-Thinker pose. Masamune was confused. The ex-football player sitting next to him could be accused of being a decent guy. He grinned.
"What?"
"I was just thinking that, although you're an idiot, you're not as bad as I thought."
"Thanks, I guess, for thinking about me," Kojuurou said mischievously.
Masamune nudged him in the ribs with his elbow, drawing a muffled yelp out of him. There were other wounds Kojuurou suffered in order to preserve some self-respect.
Days dragged on. After going back to school, he learned that he had become a persona non grata. Apparently, most of the students thought he was a raving lunatic, bound to snap at any moment. They were afraid of both Masamune and Kojuurou, but Masamune also had their respect. Although nobody knew the truth, an opinion of him losing his eye in self-defence was widely accepted. Kojuurou was just a quarterback gone crazy from all the drugs he ingested to make himself into an overgrown seventeen-year-old.
"For fuck's sake," Masamune panted as he sat down at the cafeteria table, facing Kojuurou. The ostracized teen gave him a look of surprise, but said nothing.
"It's been over a month. I wish they would all just FUCK OFF." The last two words were shouted out loudly, so that they could clearly hear them.
"If you hang around me for a few days, they'll leave you alone," Kojuurou said, more playing with the food on his tray than eating it.
"Is that an offer?" Masamune inquired.
"Sure, why not."
Kojuurou was sitting on a bench, freezing his ass off, reluctant to go home. He felt as if he had died and became a ghost. Nobody saw him anymore. Except when, during lunch, some pirate cosplayer sat down at his table and exchanged concise sentences with him. Sometimes his father saw him, but that was too rare a sighting to be even mentioned as pertinent. He was not sorry about what he'd done. He did, however, feel a bit regretful about the social consequences of his actions. The fact that he single-handedly and voluntarily screwed up his future, was not very enjoyable, either. So he sat there, alone, in the cold, snowflakes melting on his face. He had learned one thing, though.
"Just because you're good at something, it doesn't mean you enjoy it," he muttered to himself, only adding to the opinion that he was insane.
"What?" Masamune asked.
"I said: Just because you're good at something, it doesn't mean you enjoy it," he repeated as if Masamune was there this entire time, and as if the words were directed to him.
"Feeling a bit down, are we?"
"Not really. "
"You know, sitting here all alone, melting snow with your body heat isn't something a renowned lunatic should do. Not if he wants to improve his image," Masamune said, surprising Kojuurou with a sweet laugh.
"I don't really care," he answered. It was impossible to admit it, but in the past few months Date Masamune became the only source of warmth and amusement in his life. He had these images in his mind. Images of Masamune and him, blurred by his unwillingness to acknowledge them.
Masamune woke him out of his reverie by pushing him onto the wet snow behind the bench.
"C'mon. Stop moping around," Masamune said.
Kojuurou stared at him walking away.
"Well? You coming or what?"
They were sitting on a mouldy couch in Masamune's basement, chugging beer after beer, watching some ridiculous show about weird-ass warriors who wore funky outfits, and fought with bursting, colourful lights. After too many beers, and too much weed to keep count, Masamune solemnly declared:
"I have to go take a piss." And so he did.
Kojuurou stared at the TV, seeing nothing definite, only a kaleidoscopic play of primary colours. It made his head throb with some strange sensation, faintly reminiscent of pain. His thoughts ran rampant. Unleashed by the alcohol and weed, there was nothing to contain them. When Masamune came back, he froze at the sight of Kojuurou's tears.
What was a man supposed to do when faced with another man's tears? Was he supposed to act like nothing was going on? Or would a slight pat on the back, and a comforting 'there-there' be more appropriate? Masamune sat down, his blind eye turned to Kojuurou making it easier to pretend he did not notice.
His name on Kojuurou's lips broke the festering silence, and he jerked his head to the right. Masamune found himself face to face with a look glazed over with something he could not name. It must have been this indiscernible sensation which pushed Kojuurou's chest against Masamune's, pinning him to the couch. Gasping for air under Kojuurou's weight, his lips parted only to meet an unrestrained intrusion. The unfamiliar tongue swirled, tangling around his own. Masamune realized that he was returning this unwarranted kiss, which was concluded by a temperate bite on his lower lip. Their eyes met again, when Kojuurou pushed his body a few inches away from Masamune. The younger boy could not help but think that it was desire he was seeing in those unyielding eyes. Kojuurou smiled.
"That was nice," he said before he fell over Masamune.
The one-eyed boy deftly freed himself from the weight of the unconscious body on top of him. He was strong enough. Why didn't he struggle against the kiss? He shrugged the thought away. The beer, the weed, and Kojuurou's tears made a fine excuse. The fact that heat was rising in his groin was unimportant. He was a teenage boy, after all, and he hadn't been with a girl in some time. It was all so very understandable.
He ran up the stairs, coming back to the basement with a blanket. He threw it over Kojuurou, his lonely eye glistening with knowledge of everything but the truth.
Days dragged on, melting into an undistinguished mass of sideways glances, murmurs and solitude. Kojuurou felt like a ghost more than ever. His one friend, Date Masamune, obviously did not care much for the kiss he had received, and now he did his best to avoid Kojuurou. And the ex-quarterback made no effort to confront him. He'd fucked up. He'd done something that he shouldn't have, and now he was paying the price. Pretending it did not happen did not make any difference.
It seemed like the spring break was never going to come, but once it did he felt relieved. At home he was invisible only to his father. Masamune put his infamy into good use, or at least so it seemed. Kojuurou noticed he was hanging around some girl from his class a bit too often. Good for him. Bad for Kojuurou.
He spent his days half-miserable, half-indignant with his own, self-inflicted, fate. Kojuurou was sure his father would change his mind about college, so he did the only thing he could do. He studied his ass off. He was just finished some assignments in math, when his phone rang. Date Masamune.
"Yeah?" He was ready for some tough love. In his mind, Masamune deserved nothing less for abandoning him so easily.
"Kojuurou, it's me." The voice on the other side of the line trembled, making it impossible for Kojuurou's to be derisive and obnoxious. He sighed, slightly disappointed that he won't be able to vent his pent up anger.
"What is it, Masamune?"
"Could you ... ehm ... come over, please," his voice trailed off, and Kojuurou found nothing with which he could fill the silence. He was not sure that a reunion was a good idea.
"Please, Kojuurou," Masamune repeated, as if he was about to cry.
"Fine," he said coldly and hung up, more angry at himself for not keeping his ground, than he was at Masamune for calling.
The door looked somehow ominous to Kojuurou, and he felt stupid for standing there long enough for Masamune's mom to notice.
"Kojuurou?" she asked suspiciously, looking at the young boy.
"Ma'm, I ... erm ... Masamune," Kojuurou found no coherence in his mind to explain what he wanted.
"He's in the basement," she said and smiled to the confused boy.
"I think something happened."
"What?" Kojuurou blurted.
Masamune's mom shrugged, wondering if Kojuurou was the kind of boy who told his mother everything. If he was, he was the lonely representative of the species.
"His girl was here, and I guess they had a fight."
Oh God, instantly went through Kojuurou's mind. He felt the grip of an invisible hand tighten around his guts. And it squeezed, and squeezed. The idea of giving Masamune girl-advice nauseated him.
The first thing he noticed when he went down the stairs was the eye patch on the table next to the couch on which Masamune was sitting. Dark, long strands of hair covered the boy's wounded eye. The idea of seeing that eye, the wound on Masamune's existence he had inflicted, aroused him in a way that troubled him, made him feel even more sick to his stomach. Sick of himself, and of the things his body deemed exciting.
"Masamune?" he called out. The one-eyed boy did not move a muscle. He just grunted.
Kojuurou sat next to Masamune, on his left. He did not want to take advantage of the situation, despite the burning desire to see the scar, to graze it with his thumb, to taste it with his lips. He shivered.
"The bitch asked for it," Masamune murmured, his voice brimming with anger.
"Asked for what?" Kojuurou inquired, trying to keep his words calm.
"To see it. Without the patch."
The invisible hand in Kojuurou's guts tightened its grip; he had to hold down a moan.
"And?"
Masamune turned to his friend, and through gritted teeth he spewed:
"She looked as if she was about to puke. I told her to get the fuck out of my sight."
The one-eyed boy may have sounded as if he was about to cry over the phone, but his face, and his left eye showed no trace of pain or insult. His left eye gleamed with a tint of murderous intent.
Kojuurou did not know was it the invisible hand of his desire, or maybe some other force, that led him to brush the hair off Masamune's dead eye. He lightly touched his cheek, the soft flesh strangely exciting. Masamune's right eye was closed, eyelid ripped by a jagged scar, tracing from his eyebrow to the cheek Kojuurou had touched only moments ago. The face in front of Kojuurou suddenly changed. Now he found himself looking in the eye of a scared, wounded boy.
"Kojuurou..." he said, plaintively.
"It's not pretty," Kojuurou said, his words bringing back the obstinate boy.
"What? Did you think it was beautiful? Did you expect a fifteen year old girl to get off on scar tissue on the beautiful face of her boyfriend?"
Masamune growled, and pulled his hair back over his eye. Kojuurou was grateful for the gesture of shame, because his body was in a tight vice of desire which pushed him forward, which urged him to reach out and touch, caress.
"Listen, it's not pretty, but it's kinda cool. It tells a story, and chicks love that shit. A dark, morose figure with a pretty face that has a painful story to tell. It's like a story from some cheesy soap opera."
Kojuurou wondered if Masamune had noticed how many times he had told him that he was beautiful. He hoped it did not resonate through his wounded pride.
Something shattered inside Masamune at that moment, and he could not hold back his tears. It was the first time he cried since he had lost his eye. All the strength he had mustered not to feel sorry for himself abandoned him, and he broke down. Kojuurou reached out and pulled the boy on his chest, holding him reassuringly tight, pressing him against the warmth of his own body. Masamune clenched his fist around his friend's shirt, and he cried wildly, sobs shaking his body.
It felt good, being held by a bigger, stronger man. It made him feel like everything was going to be all right, because Kojuurou's strong hands were there to hold him, to make him feel safe, protected from the attacks of the outside world. Kojuurou was his friend, his safeguard, his right eye.
"I'm sorry," Masamune murmured into his chest.
"What for?" Kojuurou asked, stroking Masamune's hair, enjoying the scent which crawled into his nostrils.
"When you cried, I did nothing. I thought you might get angry if I hugged you or something."
Masamune felt the tremors from Kojuurou's laugh run through his own body.
"It' ok. I was being silly back then."
Masamune struggled out of the embrace to look at Kojuurou's face, into his dark, brown eyes.
"Why were you crying?" he asked.
"It's really not important," Kojuurou said, not ready to admit the reason behind his tears.
"I want to know. It's only fair, don't you think?"
Kojuurou stood up, slightly irritated by his inability to say the truth.
"It doesn't work that way, Masamune. You don't get to comfort me retroactively."
Masamune frowned.
"You passed out right after you ..."
"Right after I, what?" Kojuurou asked wryly, knowing that Masamune will not mention the kiss, not while there was a hope that his friend had forgotten.
"Nothing," Masamune said, reaching out for his patch. Kojuurou grabbed his hand.
"Don't," he said, a bit embarrassed by his eagerness.
"What?"
"Don't put it back on," Kojuurou explained, letting go of Masamune's hand to once more brush off the hair that hid the scar. Masamune blushed, feeling exposed, naked. He dropped the patch back on the table.
"Whatever," he said, unable to hide a small smile overtaking his features.
Everything got back to normal, as if that girl had never existed. As if she was a hallucination Kojuurou and Masamune shared, a hallucination which helped them get closer.
But nothing lasts forever.
A few weeks after the spring break the said girl appeared at his door. He just stared at her, not knowing what in the world she could have wanted. Not to mention that she voluntarily came to visit the ghost, the heathen, the madman – those names still lingered around him wherever he walked.
"Hi. I'm Yuuki," she said, shyly. She was pretty. Kojuurou preferred his girls interesting.
"Come in," he said, showing her to the living room. She looked around the house apprehensively.
"My father's at work," he said reassuringly. He found no strength in him to send her to hell.
"You want something to drink?" he offered, being very hospitable, despite the hostility he felt.
"No, thank you. I ... I wanted to talk to you, to ask for your help with Masamune."
Kojuurou sat down, and sighed.
"I figured as much. What's on your mind?"
Yuuki stared at the teen in front of her. She had to fight against all the rumours to come and ask for help. She had to believe all those things Masamune had said defending Kojuurou.
"I like him. I really, really do."
"How 'bout I tell you what to do, and you get the hell out of my house?" The hostility showed its ugly teeth, making Yuuki wince, remembering what the man in front of her had done.
"Ok."
"You go to him today. You tell him you're sorry. You were just surprised, and you did not know how to react. You like him. You'd like him with two eyes, you like him with just one eye, and you'd like him if he was blind. You think he's amazing. Strong. Because he lost an eye and he did not let it ruin him. You admire him for that. You admire him for being able to overcome such an obstacle without flinching, becoming even stronger. Tell him you like it. His eye. Because, although it's not a nice sight, it's evidence of how amazing he is."
Yuuki stared in bewilderment. She did not feel all that. Where did Kojuurou pull out all of those words and feelings from?
"I ... erm ... ok. I'll tell him. I didn't give it that much thought, really," she admitted.
"You should have. If you like him, really, really like him, as you said."
"I do."
"Fine. Now get out. I have things to do," he lied.
"I'm sorry for bothering you. And thank you."
Yuuki walked towards Masamune's place, even more scared of Kojuurou than she was before. He seemed as violence waiting to happen. Sure, he was calm and composed, but there was something wild and dangerous in his eyes, something full of abhorrence that gnawed at her while he was telling her what to say to Masamune.
The next day, at school, Kojuurou saw Masamune, holding hands with Yuuki. The girl smiled, Masamune smiled, Kojuurou frowned. Then Masamune noticed Kojuurou, and he frowned. Then Yuuki frowned. There was quite a lot of frowning going around. Kojuurou decided he preferred when people smiled, so instead of going to talk to Masamune, he turned around and went back into his lonely, ghost world.
Kojuurou could not remember what book he was looking for. He stared blindly into the shelf in front of him.
"Dammit," he murmured, his voice not exceeding the pitch of the whisper allowed in the library. He could not think clearly. Once more, Yuuki took Masamune away from him, and he was left all alone. The only difference was that Masamune stopped acknowledging his existence altogether. Little fuck. Kojuurou, unlike his little friend, could not stop thinking about Masamune. The images once vague and obscured, crystallized in his dreams so vividly it ached to wake up. He saw his one-eyed friend naked, sweaty and panting. Almost every night he kissed his wounded eye, traced his tongue across the scar, sending shivers through Masamune's body. In his dreams, that was enough to make Masamune's cock rigid. The one-eyed boy never resisted. Not in Kojuurou's dreams.
"Fuck," he murmured, the images on his retina taking over his awareness.
"Kojuurou," someone whispered behind his back. Masamune walked in between the shelves, his contours dark in the dim light of the library. The boy screamed his name. Sometimes he moaned through the letters as he came into Kojuurou's mouth. But this whisper betrayed no arousal, no coming of orgasm.
"What is it?" Kojuurou whispered back.
Masamune walked toward him in a swift stride, and he grabbed his shirt, pulling him down, levelling their eyes. It was a ridiculous scene, the bigger boy allowing the smaller one to man-handle him.
"You talked to Yuuki, didn't you?"
"Yeah, so?" They kept whispering, their voices unable to resound what they felt.
"She is none of your business. You need to stop meddling into my life, asshole!"
Nobody saw them, but still a loud "Shhhhhhhhhhh..." reached them, because Masamune's voice carried through the air.
"She came to me. Asked me for help. I helped," Kojuurou explained calmly, still tolerating Masamune's hands holding him unpleasantly slouched.
"You should stop meddling into my life. I'm sick of you. I don't need you. I don't need a right eye."
Kojuurou had enough. He tried to be helpful, not of his own volition, and Masamune was using it as an excuse to judge him. He grabbed Masamune's wrists, and twisted his arms behind his back, making Masamune fall onto his chest. The one-eyed boy tried to wriggle out, but Kojuurou was to strong.
"Wha..."
"Shhhhhhh, Masamune. We're in the library. You don't want the librarian to come here, to see us like this between the bookshelves, so intimate," he purred into Masamune's ear, threatening him.
"Fuck you, you meddling asshole," the captured boy sighed.
"How 'bout I give you a valid excuse for hating me? Yours is so fucking pathetic."
Masamune said nothing. He moved not an inch, waiting. Even though he did not need comforting, even though he was forced into submission, it still felt good to be leaned against Kojuurou's strong chest. Even though Kojuurou was angry, even though he threatened him, he still felt safe. It made no sense.
"I don't like you," Kojuurou whispered in a husky voice, his words hurting Masamune more than he cared to admit.
"I don't like you do way you think I like you. I don't like you as a drinking buddy, I don't like you as a friend to whom you go when you have girl-problems. I don't like you that way."
Kojuurou could feel the boy in his arms struggling to look into his eyes. He was not about to allow something like that. He pressed harder, forcing Masamune to remain calm.
"I do, however, like you. I like you so much that there's nothing I'd rather do now than kiss you. I like you in a way that makes me wanna do all sorts of things to you."
He pressed Masamune's wrists harder against his lower back, forcing their hips together.
"That is how I like you, Masamune."
Kojuurou let go, and he took a step back, almost leaning against the shelves that hid his silent confession from others in the library, the others who liked to murmur "Shhhhhhhhhhhh" in unison. Masamune did not move. It might have been a little too much for the boy, to feel another man's erection against his hip.
Kojuurou half-expected it, so he was surprised only by the force of the punch which sent him flying into the shelf, burying him in books.
"MOTHERFUCKER!" Masamune screamed.
"Shhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh," the others murmured.
"There you go," Kojuurou smiled, "now you have a decent excuse for avoiding me."
Masamune left the library before the librarian came, shouting in a whisper (a professional hazard, I guess). Kojuurou did not hear the old woman as she ranted at him, because the sound of his own heartbeat muffled her voice. He'd been in fights, he'd played football against superior adversaries, but never in his life had he felt an adrenaline rush like the one he was on now. His ears were still ringing as he was being dragged to the principal's office by the frantic librarian.
"SUSPENDED AGAIN! DO YOU PLAN ON GRADUATING?" his father yelled, his deep voice shaking the windowpanes.
"I'm sorry, dad," Kojuurou said. His father will have a fit. He'll scream and shout and get himself to the brink of a heart attack, and then he'll calm down. All he had to do was tough it out. What surprised him, was that his father's voice suddenly turned mild.
"Sit down. We need to talk," his father said. He obeyed silently.
"I know you, son. And I know you're not a savage they make you out to be. Now tell me, what's going on."
Kojuurou suddenly felt embodied. His father robbed him of his ghostly existence, he noticed.
"Dad, it's not nice. You're not going to like it."
"I don't care. I just need to know if you're ok, or if I need to start worrying about you."
"I have a problem, and I don't know what to do. I don't think you can help."
"I know I haven't been around much. I know I've worked too hard and that we never talk. But these past months... I can't recognize you. You got kicked out of the team, you did not even blink. You get into fights. I want to understand."
"I think I'm gay, dad," Kojuurou blurted out. He never even formed those words in his mind, but his father's worrisome words, his warm interest ... the words just escaped from his soul. His father stared at him speechlessly, jaw dropped, eyes widened. Kojuurou let him gather his wits.
"You...you think?"
How was he supposed to explain it, when he himself did not understand.
"I don't know. I've never been ... you know. Girls yes. Quite a few. And I've never liked a guy. Before."
"And now you like a guy?"
"I think I love him," another sentence he never dared to utter to himself.
"I see."
"You're not mad?"
The older man managed to smile. It wasn't his dream to have a gay son. He did not even thought of the option. His athletic, skirt-chasing, football-playing son – gay? Well. It could have turned out worse, I guess. He had to think of his late wife, of what she would want him to do. And she would want him to support his son.
"Are you mad I'm heterosexual? I don't think it's something you can be mad about."
Kojuurou jumped from his seat and hugged his father.
"Thank you, dad. I ... I ... fuck," he started crying, "thank you."
"Hey. Gay is ok. Saying fuck is off limits," his father said, putting his reassuring hands around his son who thought he might be gay.
"He got suspended," Masamune said.
"So?"
"Well it's my fault. It's not fair for him to take the fall. Although it so fucking like him. Going around, doing the selfless thing for the one-eyed cripple."
Yuuki did not like to talk about Kojuurou. She severely disliked the fervour which always took over Masamune when he would talk about him.
"You said you had enough of him, and you can't stop talking about him," she said, feigning insult.
Masamune took her hand and stroked her cheek.
"I'm sorry. I'll stop," he said and kissed her.
Admitting he was gay, or at least almost admitting it, changed something. Kojuurou did no longer leave his desire only to his dreams. He started thinking what he would do if Masamune was with him in his bed. He tried to uncover the secrets of sex between two men every night before sleep. He would crawl in between the sheets, close his eyes, and he would envision Masamune, naked, next to him. In his fantasies Masamune resisted only at the beginning, and then he would surrender to Kojuurou, and he would be free to do whatever he wanted.
The first time he did that, was the night after he'd told his father what was bothering him. He did not know what he was supposed to do with the naked Masamune of his imagination. He let his instincts guide him. He soon found out that his pulse quickened at the thought of his fingers inside Masamune's anus. His blood would boil and rush down to his cock every time he imagined Masamune's lips around it. But what brought him to the edge was the image of his cock trapped inside Masamune, throbbing, filling Masamune with seamen. It took him only a few harsh strokes to make him come after that.
But somehow it felt wrong. Every night he made Masamune into his toy, into a vessel of his lust. He violated him every night. But not all of the violations of his imagination were loving and caressing. Sometimes Masamune would resist, and he would overpower him. He would turn him on his stomach, tie up his wrists with his eye patch, and he would fuck him fiercely, angrily, without restrain. Kojuurou hated when his imagination would escape his reigns. But his orgasm was so much fiercer, so much closer to the idea of how would it be to come inside of Masamune.
It all swerved out of his control.
He tried imagining other guys, because he did not want to subject Masamune to more cruelty. And that's when it hit him that he maybe wasn't gay. The idea of any other guy did nothing to him. It had to be Masamune; Masamune's cock, Masamune's anus. Then, he would pull out his porn stash and skim through the lascivious images of women with large breasts and willingly parted lips. His cock thickened every time, and with a little persuasion, those images provided relief.
"I'm not gay," he declared to his father, a little bit ashamed with the pride those words showed.
"Oh? Where did that come from?" his father asked, word reflecting something close to relief.
Kojuurou skipped the details of his thorough research on the subject.
"It's just the one guy. No other guy would do. Girls would," he said, revealing more about his research than he intended.
His father squinted: "You love him right?"
Kojuurou nodded.
"Then you should tell him, you should try to go for. if it doesn't work, you can move to greener pastures." Female pastures.
"Kojuurou speaking," he answered drowsily. The phone woke him up from his righteous sleep.
"It's Masamune." Kojuurou was never more awake.
"What do you want?"
"To talk. You alone? Mind if I come?" Oh no, Kojuurou would not mind if Masamune came. He would not mind if he came while he was inside of him, stroking his hard ... stop.
"Sure. Come ... over."
Masamune lit up a cigarette.
"I got suspended," Masamune said.
"Why?"
"I told the principle what happened. I told you to stop, remember?"
"Stop what?"
"Stop protecting me. Stop saving me. Stop being so meddlesome."
"I wasn't being meddlesome. She didn't even ask me what happened. She just told me I've got a two week suspension and she sent me home."
"You should've told her I hit you. Why didn't you?"
"Why didn't you tell her who took your right eye?"
"Fuck you, asshole."
"Is that an offer?"
"You wish."
"I do."
"What?"
"I want to fuck you, Masamune. Will you let me?"
Masamune threw his cigarette at Kojuurou. It hit his left cheek. Kojuurou acted as if nothing happened. He mused about subduing Masamune, pinning him to the wall, pulling his pants down, fucking him whether he wanted it or not. He never moved from the spot.
"You're a sick motherfucker," Masamune muttered, not nearly as upset as he should have been.
"Sorry," Kojuurou said candidly.
"Jesus, Kojuurou. I'm not gay."
"Apparently, neither am I," he said. For the first time in months he felt good about himself. He felt sane, he felt as he was one with the world. He wanted to be one with Masamune.
"Asshole, you just said you want to fuck me. How's that not gay?"
"Well, that is gay. But I'm not."
Masamune sat down. He lit another cigarette, and Kojuurou hoped his flesh would not be used as an ashtray again.
"You make no sense, fag."
"The fact that I want to fuck you, doesn't make me gay. "
"Oh really? How's that?"
"I want to fuck you."
"This conversation is disturbing, don't you think?"
"It's honest," Kojuurou shrugged.
"Well, nonfag, what do you want me to do?"
"I told you."
Masamune grinned. Why was he all of a sudden playing along? Was it because of what Yuuki screamed at him when he said he got himself suspended?
"You told me what you want to do. You did not tell me what you want me to do."
Kojuurou was frozen with distrust. Was Masamune implying that... No way .
"I want you to go to my room, take off all of your clothes and lie on top of my bed," he said nervously. "And the patch goes to," he added feeling the strain in his groin increase.
Masamune took off his patch, and he pushed back the hair caressing his face. Kojuurou let out a moan. The one-eyed boy stood up, and made his way up the stairs. Kojuurou followed. Maybe Yuuki was right after all. Maybe he really was obsessed with Kojuurou.