***Happy Birthday MooksMookin! This is kind of a thank you for drawing those pics for the zombie fic (it was the first fanart drawn on any of my stories, so it deserves a proper thank you). You've mentioned that you like sadder, angsty fics so I tried my best, although painful stories aren't really my scene (and I still tried to give it a good ending considering the circumstances), and I specifically used bunny!Ryou as a homage to Social Intercourse. Hope you like this! It's 5 chapters long, fyi, so don't worry, it's not a one-shot.***

***Disclaimer: Amane dies. Let's get that out of the way. Everything else is bad language and smut and nothing all that serious, but Amane does die.

"Someone has to die in order that the rest of us should value life more. It's contrast." Virginia Woolf in The Hours***

Ryou Bakura Googled his address. It was amazing, the things one could Google these days. Ryou walked down the street, ignoring the people that walked past him, ignoring the fast food wrappers, paper cups, and broken malt liquor bottles that filled the gutters. His mind felt like the city, crowded, polluted, dirty, and tired. He'd been up all night at the hospital, waiting on the doctor, praying in the little chapel on the ground floor, deciding he was an atheist because if there was a God, He wouldn't let his sister have cancer, and then deciding that he wasn't an atheist because he didn't like the thought of his sister rotting in a box with no afterlife. By the end of it all, hours later, all the doctor said was "She's stable for now. We'll have to wait and see."

Ryou Bakura didn't want to wait and see how long it would take for Amane to die.

He rubbed his eyes, inky circles already bruising his eyes from too many sleepless nights, but it could have been worse, he could have been bald (like Amane), he could have been nothing but a frail skeleton because the chemo made him too sick to eat (like Amane).

She was going to spend the rest of her life, three days or three months, in that godawful hospital and Ryou couldn't take it.

The room was too common, cream-colored walls, ugly chartreuse and turquoise drapes covering the window, a bad painting of a bowl of fruit. Amane had a scholarship to go to art school, a scholarship she'd never be able to use. She loved art. Before she got sick, Amane woke up every morning just to sketch the sunrise; she'd stay up late each night to paint the stars. She deserved better than a goddamn picture of a bowl of fruit.

Hence Ryou's very strange quest which led him to a shady neighborhood about three blocks from Amane's hospital. Amane's favorite painter lived down that street, and Ryou Bakura had a mind to commission him to paint her something to hang in the hospital room.

It would not be an easy quest.

According to Wikipedia, Mariku Ishtar was the picture book definition of the isolated, broody artist, an eccentric introvert with a list of mental disorders and a larger list of bad PR incidents. He was especially known for physically beating critics of his work to the point of hospitalization. As far as the article read, Mr. Ishtar had even been imprisoned for assault three times because of such incidents. It only made his art more popular, abstract smears of reds, purples, and blacks that Ryou didn't understand but Amane gushed over non-stop.

He found the building and buzzed the call button. A shaft opened. The rusty, cage-style elevator within looked less safe than a game of Russian Roulette, but Ryou stepped inside. The recluse hated reporters, hated his agent, even hated his admirers, but Ryou did not give one single damn.

Amane would have her painting.

The elevator rocked and groaned as it struggled to lift Ryou to the top of the otherwise vacant building that Mr. Ishtar owned. It stopped on the top floor with an ear-piercing screech. The main door opened, but the cage remained closed. Through the bars, Ryou saw a man leaning against the brick wall framing the elevator. He looked like he never brushed his platinum blonde hair; it stood in maniacal spikes and cowlicks. He wore paint-splattered jeans and nothing else, and smelled of vodka even at a distance.

"Who the fuck are you?"

Ryou tried to smile; it made him feel like prey. "Hello, my name is Ryou Bakura. I was wondering if I could speak to you for a moment?"

"No." Mariku moved to slam the "close" button on the elevator door.

"Wait you asshole!" Ryou shouted, lack of sleep and unbearable stress finally breaking him.

Mariku paused a moment, eyebrow cocked high. He pulled the gate to the side and stepped inside the elevator. Ryou backed away as the artist rushed him, pinning Ryou to the wall.

"You want to say that again, Bunny?"

"I-I j-just, I wanted -"

"Speak up, Bunny. I can't quite hear you over all the sniveling."

"Fuck you," Ryou hissed, "and I'm not a bunny."

The drunk artist chuckled, tangling his dark fingers into Ryou's already slightly tangled, white hair. "You could have fooled me, Bunny."

"My sister loves your work."

"I don't give autographs"

"She's 19."

"So what?"

"She's dying."

"We're all dying. It's the price of living."

"Right now. Maybe she has a month or six, but not a year. She'll never be twenty. She'll never-" Ryou choked on his words, forcing himself not to break down in front of a stranger. "I want a painting."

Mariku leaned closer. The scent of vodka made Ryou gag. Mariku didn't seem concerned with this. "Art isn't a command. I do not sit. I do not speak. I do not paint because you order me to."

Ryou started laughing, a wild mixture of stress, grief, and sleep deprivation made his head giddy and he heard his own voice joking although his brain felt like a detached observer. "Not even for a Scooby Snack?"

Mariku laughed as well, pulling his fingers out of Ryou's hair in order to draw them down his cheek instead. "Why are you so white, little Bunny?"

"Why are your eyes lavender?"

"Touché." He grabbed Ryou's throat, leaning closer still. "You're a smartass."

"No." Ryou said between choking breaths. Part of him wished Marik meant the hand on his throat. If he was serious, Ryou could die first and never have to worry about Amane again. He could meet his mom, and then his sister could join them, and it would be the closest thing to a happy ending Ryou could see his story ever having. He looked into Mariku's pale purple eyes, daring him. "Usually I'm quite polite. I guess it's something about you."

"How about this?" Mariku slipped his hand up Ryou's striped t-shirt, caressing the pale, white stomach. "I can gut you." As he said the word gut, Mariku jabbed his finger hard right below Ryou's pantline, dragging his nail all the way up to Ryou's sternum. "And then hang you upside down from a hook, collecting your blood in several buckets, and use that to paint a picture for you sweet little sister. Would you like that, Bunny?"

"If you're short on supplies, I could buy the paint for you," Ryou said with a practical tone, still feeling detached from the situation, like he was watching a movie instead of experiencing it.

"No, no, no, using paint wouldn't give it that personal touch. You want the best for your sister, don't you?"

Ryou stared at the man pressed against him, with his hand firm, but loose enough, on Ryou's throat, and his other hand still poking into his chest. "You get off on this shit, don't you?"

Mariku brought their lips a hair's length away from each other, so close that Ryou could feel the movement in Mariku's facial muscles when he smiled. "Maybe just a touch."

Ryou didn't flinch, not from the closeness, nor from the suffocating thickness of alcohol vapors breathing onto Ryou's face. "Give me a knife and bowl."

Mariku pulled back an inch, eyes looking drunken and confused. "Why?"

"You want to paint with my blood? Okay. I'll give you some blood and you can mix it with your paint, but I get the first thing you paint to give to my sister."

"You can't simply donate the blood." Mariku stumbled to the adjacent wall of the elevator, glaring at Ryou.

"Why not?"

"Why not? Because it takes away all the fun of gutting you like a little bunny and hanging you up on the ceiling to dry."

Ryou narrowed his serpentine-green eyes at Mariku. "What if I let you hunt me?"

Mariku tossed his head back and laughed. "So, we turn off the lights like kids playing hide and seek, only when I find you, instead of becoming it you get stabbed?"

Ryou stared at the elevator floor, noticing the stains and dust collecting below their feet. "If that's what it takes."

Mariku's laugh grew loud, manic. "I'm drunk, and mentally ill, and an artist - which is arguable a worse thing to be than the other two. Do you realize that what you're suggesting sounds fucking insane even to me?"

Ryou shook his head. "I don't care."

Mariku stopped laughing. The silence that filled the elevator rang painful inside Ryou's head because of its stillness. Mariku stumbled back to Ryou, propping each hand against the wall on either side of Ryou and leaning close again. "I want to meet this kid."

Ryou's head jerked up. "Amane?"

"Do you have a different sister dying of cancer?"

"I'm not sure that's a good idea. She's sick. You're an asshole. I'd rather she not have to deal with you." Ryou bit his lip, eyebrows knitting together. "Why would you even want to? You seem to hate everyone."

He snorted heat and vodka vapors into Ryou's face. "Because, sweet, little Bunny, she has inspired you. She inspired you to find me. She inspired you to face me despite the risks to yourself. She inspired you to sacrifice yourself just to ease her passing." Some strange look overtook Mariku's face at that moment, and Ryou Bakura found himself pitying the man despite himself. Their eyes met and held together for a moment before Mariku continued. "I've run out of inspiration . . . haven't painted in over a year. I drink and sleep. I want to meet this muse of yours."

"Not drunk," Ryou insisted. "And not if you're going to be an asshole. I swear to God if you if you aggravate my sister's condition I will do much worse than hang you from a fucking meat hook."

Mariku returned to a wobbling standing position. "Relax, Bunny, I can behave in public if I feel like it."

"And you have to shower and sober up before I take you anywhere."

"Can't sober up too much. I'll DT."

"Do you have coffee?"

"Pffffft, vodka, vodka, more vodka, and there may be a pizza in the fridge from two days ago."

An irritated noise escaped Ryou's throat. "Let's start with the shower, and work on sobering you up afterwards."

Mariku stepped out of the elevator and into the studio proper, raising his hands in an over dramatic gesture. "Then let the shower begin! Come, Bunny, let us shower!"

"You shower. Alone."

"But Bunny, I'm drunk! I could slip and fall and die and never be able to paint a picture for your sweet sister. You must hold me and make sure that doesn't happen." He gave Ryou an evil wink, already unzipping the fly of his paint-speckled jeans.

"It's a risk I'm willing to take."

"No fun." He slid the pants off of his legs. He didn't seem to bother with underwear, so Ryou had a full view of Mariku's round, graham-cracker-colored ass.

Ryou tried averting his eyes, but they kept slipping back to Mariku's ass, the way Mariku's thigh muscles rippled as he walked with a slight sway, and the chaos of scars of Mariku's back. Ryou wondered about them, vague lines, thick slashes, one on his right shoulder that looked like a badly done smiley face, but Ryou kept his lips pressed together to avoid being rude.

There was no bathroom. The studio was one huge room with a tiled section in one corner for a kitchen, and a tub and toilet in a separate corner. Mariku filled up the tub, steam floating from the basin like magic from a cauldron. He dumped some sort of herbal gel into the scalding water and bubbles foamed up over the lip as the smell of jasmine invaded the room. Ryou hoped that the jasmine would help cover up the vodka sweating out of his pores.

As Mariku busied himself with scrubbing, Ryou looked around the apartment. It had an odd charm despite the destitution. The furniture was simple and elegant, a black, velvet chaise and futon near a fireplace, a day bed pressed against the wall away from the kitchen, thick rugs to fight off the chill of the brick walls and concrete floors. The studio had more art supplies than Ryou had ever seen, and there were plenty of windows, although they were painted over in shades of black and dark red.

"You have a nice place," Ryou muttered, staring at the paintings on the wall.

"You have a nice ass."

Ryou spun around and glared at Mariku. He kept his gleaming, thistle-colored eyes trained on Ryou, a sleek smile pulling at his lips. His left arm hung along the lip of the tub, a heaving, antique mass of copper with high, curving sides. It suited him, an erotic, copper beauty bathing in a copper bathtub. Ryou noticed, for the first time, the gold bracelets and choker he wore. The metal flashed with droplets of water and overhead lighting, and those suited him as well, accenting his skin and matching his hair.

"I see you staring." Mariku Ishtar licked his lips, confident and blatant in his wants.

Ryou blushed and turned back to the artwork. "Please hurry so we can get this over with."

"Hurry? No, I'm afraid I can't. This opportunity is too unique to squander."

"Opportunity?" Ryou rolled his eyes back towards Mariku, wondering what he meant.

Mariku slid his fingers along the wet curves of muscle stretched across his chest, wandering lower until his hands sank beneath the bubbles. "I so rarely get to-" his breath hitched as some unseen ministration beneath the soap and foam excited him. "Entertain guests."

"Because you're an asshole, otherwise you'd have more friends." Ryou's voice maintained a conversational tone, as if he didn't notice the way Mariku's eyes lidded as he stared at Ryou and touched himself, as if Ryou's own cock wasn't burgeoning at the diorama set before him.

"But Bunny," Mariku gave a mocking whine to his words as he started to pant between bits of speech, "don't you think this is serendipitous? Two people with similar interests and no time - or patience in my case - for a relationship . . . in the same room, together, without distraction. It's the perfect opportunity to - ahh - relieve some stress."

Ryou rolled his eyes. He pulled off his shirt and slung it to the ground, marching to the tub. Mariku's eyes rounded in anticipation, but Ryou only snorted at the response. "Don't try that poetic bullshit with me. It's not serendipity - you're a slut, but I'm not one of your art groupies."

"Yeah? You're half naked already."

Ryou knelt at the head of the tub, grabbing the shampoo and shaking a glob out onto Mariku's mess of hair. "Not to fuck you."

"Fuck me?" Mariku shouted. "You had that reversed."

"Did I?" Ryou smiled, wetting his hands in the tube before scrubbing Mariku's scalp. "Guess it doesn't really matter since it's not happening either way."

"What are you doing?" Mariku asked, irritated.

"Washing your hair. Visiting hours start at five, it's three, and I still need to get some food and coffee in you to try and sober you up before we go to the hospital."

"Food? Gross, no, I don't want food."

"I don't want a drunk painter talking to my sister."

"But you want this drunk painter to paint for your sister."

"Why do you think I'm still here?"

"Sex will sober me up."

"I don't think that's how it works."

"Sure. It increases blood flow."

"Ethanol is metabolised in the liver. Would increased heart rate change anything?"

"Well coffee sure as hell doesn't help."

"Hold your breath," Ryou warned, waiting for Mariku to suck in a breath before dunking his head under the sud-laced water.

When he came up, he twisted onto his stomach so he could face Ryou. "Don't tell me you're not tempted. I saw the gleam in your eye."

Ryou stood, shaking his wet arms and hands. "It's called self-restraint. You should try it sometime."

"Sounds awful." Mariku reached out and pressed into the bulge in Ryou's pants.

Ryou closed his mouth to mute the noise trying to escape his mouth at the heavy, broad touch. It was nice, the touch. His life had been consumed by doctor visits, tests, sleepless nights, the distraction was welcomed ... needed.

He leaned over, gripping the copper tub with both hands and pressing back against the touch. "We're . . . not . . . sleeping together . . ."

"You don't sound too sure about that," Mariku purred, palming Ryou's erection through the thick jean fabric.

"I am. I don't have one night stands."

"Great." Mariku gave a sarcastic snort, hand never ceasing. "I find the one queer in the entire city that doesn't like one night stands."

Ryou combed his fingers into Mariku's pyrite spikes, tugging hard and jerking Mariku's face upward. The cool, glass green of Ryou's eyes bore into Mariku's lavender ones. "I have enough to worry about right now. I don't have time for your shit."

"Goddamn, you're hot when you're assertive. Maybe, just maybe, I would let you top, but you seem rather against having any sort of fun."

"You're trying to bait me."

"Yes."

"It's not working."

Mariku sighed. "What about a compromise?"

He forced his head down, despite Ryou's firm grip in his hair, and undid the button to Ryou's jeans.

Ryou sighed, aggravated. "How is this a compromise? Looks like you're still trying to get laid to me."

"It's not fucking - technically." Mariku tugged at Ryou's zipper and shifted his pants and boxers to the bath mat below Ryou's feet.

Ryou's erection swayed, brushing against Mariku's nose. The darker male chuckled, as if the touch tickled, and then grabbed Ryou's shaft. He gave one last glance to Ryou who stood and watched with detached interest, and then he swallowed Ryou's entire length.

"Christ!" Ryou shouted. He'd expected Mariku to tease him, trying to get Ryou to consent to some greater form of intercourse. At the least, he'd expected a less tempting, less intimate hand job, not a hot, wet mouth enveloping his cock. Ryou closed his eyes, the other hand tangling into Mariku's wet hair. He was so tired, and so stressed, and so worn down, and the heat around him was the first pleasant moment he'd had in weeks.

Mariku pulled back slowly, popping his lips as Ryou's tip slipped free. "Acceptable compromise?"

"Not returning the favor," Ryou grunted, eyes still shut, mind screaming for Mariku's mouth to return to his twitching need.

"What a mean little Bunny," Mariku chided, swallowing Ryou whole again and sucking hard.

"Fuck!" Ryou's white hair dangled in front of his face and he leaned forward.

Holding onto Mariku's hair like reins, Ryou began to buck into Mariku's opened mouth. He couldn't take it, the heat, the soft friction of Mariku's lips, the offer of setting his life aside for a few minutes and losing himself in physical need and physical release.

Mariku took Ryou's rough handling in stride, purring at the hair tugging and aggressive bucking. One hand stayed at the base of Ryou's shaft, but the other grabbed and kneaded Ryou's ass. Water splashed over the copper sides of the tub, but Mariku didn't seem concerned.

Ryou's legs shook; he had to focus to keep himself upright when all he wanted to do was collapse to the floor. They'd picked an asinine pose for a blow job, but they were too far into it for Ryou to try and switch their positions, so he held on, and leaned over, and bent his knees for the best angle as he all but fucked Mariku's mouth.

Ryou raised his head and screamed long and loud into the studio apartment as he came, grateful that no one else lived in the building. His fingers fell from Mariku's spikes of hair and he braced himself against the front of the tub. "Sorry," Ryou whispered. "I should have warned you."

Mariku didn't complain; he merely stared at Ryou, licking his lips and grinning.

Ryou felt shaky, and exhausted, and a mix of irritated at himself for acting so out of character and proud of himself for the same reason. He stepped out of his pants and climbed into the tub with Mariku. The wall of bubbles had reduced itself to a few foamy islands, and the water was tepid, but Ryou hardly noticed as he stared at Mariku, whose lips were plump from friction and whose face was flushed from effort.

Ryou grabbed Mariku's cock, both hard and huge in Ryou's slender hand. Mariku gasped, his eyelashes fluttered at Ryou's touch.

"You get this today." Ryou punctuated his sentence with a tug of his hand that made Mariku swallow a little grunt. "If you act decently at the hospital - I might return tomorrow."

Mariku muttered something. Ryou knew it was sarcastic, but ignored the incoherent words as he started shifting his hand up and down. He kept a firm hold, feeling the skin slide up and down Mariku's hardness. Ryou squirmed into a more comfortable position in the tub, bringing himself closer to Mariku's body. The artist leaned forward, giving Ryou's neck light nibbles. He sank his teeth deep into Ryou's collarbone and Ryou jerked back, slapping Mariku's face.

"Ow! What the hell, Bunny? I was just being playful."

"I'm not a whore! Don't bite me like you rented me!"

"Shit, you slap like a pimp, maybe I'm the whore."

One hand stayed wrapped around Mariku's erection, not moving, but gripping tight. The other rubbed at the forming bruise. "I'm sorry. It was a reflex."

Mariku chuckled, grabbing Ryou's hand and pulling it away from his collarbone. He nursed the bruise with dabs of his tongue and chaste kisses. "Don't stop. This is interesting."

Ryou snorted, but moved his hand in a steady rhythm. "That slap just turned you on more, didn't it?"

"Yes," Mariku hissed, licking Ryou's throat hard. "Pain is the spice of life. Do you fuck as hard as you slap?"

Ryou blushed, feeling awful for having done it. "I'm really a timid person, but you somehow manage to bring out the worst in me."

"I have that effect on people."

Ryou opened his mouth to apologize, realized there was no need because Mariku didn't care, and continued with his hand job. Their movements made the water heave onto the floor. It annoyed Ryou so he found the chain with his toe and yanked it to pull the plug and drain the water. They shivered as the water seeped away from their bodies, but Ryou couldn't help by stare at the ripples of muscles revealed inch by inch as the water sank down the drain. Droplets of jasmine-scented water clung to Mariku's chest like dew as he heaved in strong, wanting breaths. Mariku continued to squirm and fuss, trying to push himself in and out of Ryou's grip.

"Oh Bunny!" he shouted, mouth opened and eyes shut.

"You've got to be kidding me," Ryou grumbled close to Mariku's face, keeping his pace steady.

"What?" Mariku gasped, his length pulsing in Ryou's hand as he neared his end.

"That stupid nickname. My name is Ryou."

"Mmmmmm, Bunny. Sweet Bunny. Cute little Bunny. Grab my dick harder, Bunny."

Ryou did grab harder, his teeth clenching. "It's not dirty talk if it sounds ridiculous."

Ryou's disapproval only spurred Mariku on. "Ohhh yes. Yes, Bunny. Touch me, Bunny, touch me, touch - oh - oh shit - oh holy fuck!" Mariku threw his head back as semen splashed over his stomach and chest, beading up on his wet skin.

Ryou wrinkled his nose at the mess, but he remembered how Mariku had swallowed without complaint, so Ryou brought his own hand up to his mouth and licked a small dollop of cum off of his wrist.

Mariku eyed Ryou, a lurid grin decorated his face. "Damn, Bunny, if I could paint half as well as people think I can I would fill a sketchbook with nothing but you."