"Questionable, At Best"
by Princess of Pain
"You know, if you bought an American bed, this would be easier, 'Gure-san."
"Yes, yes," Shigure said airily, waving his hand in dismissal. "But that's not where the fun is, is it? Personally, I find that the payoff is that much more rewarding when one has to work for it."
Ayame gave him a baleful glare--or, at least, Aya's version of a baleful glare. Hatori gave him such looks all the damn time, but in spite of this helpful model, Ayame never could fully get rid of the mischievous glint in his gold eyes. That ruined any seriousness that he attempted to portray. "All right. It's your turn to jump on your bed, then."
Shigure gave a lazy, rolling shrug. Fair enough. Ayame had been jumping for five minutes or so.
The two switched places, solemn as the changing of the guard, in a swirl of red cheongsam and slate kimono. Shigure situated himself on the bed, grabbing onto the flaring skirt of his kimono, bunching them up and holding them firm, to keep himself from tripping and falling over. That would ruin the game, after all.
-----
In their nearby bedrooms, Kyo and Yuki were beginning to rue the fact that they were not born deaf. It was true, they both knew that Tohru was too far away in the house to hear this utter debauchery, and they both knew damned well that Shigure and Ayame were not doing what they so desperately wanted everyone to believe they were doing. The two "men" were just doing their best to make everyone else's lives a living hell.
That did not stop Yuki from wishing death upon his older brother. And it did not stop the nosebleed that overtook Kyo when, after a long pause, the bed started to thump and crash, and the noises began anew:
"Oh--oh--oh--"
"You're so cute when you blush, Aya-chan!"
"You always make me--oh!--blush whenever you--oo, right there!"
"Mmm... like that?"
"No, to the left--ah, yes, that's it--"
"Move your legs up--yes, like oh that's good--"
"I HATE YOU AND I WANT YOU TO DIE!" Yuki and Kyo, in one of their touching moments of synchronicity, bellowed at once.
"You can't stop our love!" Ayame called back. "We're so-o-OOO--"
The two teens, each in his separate room, both buried their heads under their pillows.
-----
The two old friends collapsed onto Shigure's flattened bed. Ayame had both his hands clapped over his mouth, to smother his bizarre, booming laugh. His pale skin was flushed pink from the effort of jumping and screaming so much over the last hour. Shigure laid back, a satisfied Cheshire grin lazing over his features. He didn't smoke, but he wanted a cigarette. It would make the picture perfect: the post-coital cancer-stick.
"So," he said. "Was it as good for you as it was for me?"
Ayame couldn't answer; he was set off into another round of raucous giggles. Shigure had to grin. He could no longer remember who had started the game between them, of playing at being lovers, although he had his suspicions that it might have actually been Hatori. He seemed to recall something from when they were in high school, something Hatori had said, about how everyone from the faculty to the first-year students believed that they were all screwing each other senseless when they got home.
That might have been it. Ayame would have found such an idea so deliciously funny that he'd latch onto it, exploit it for whatever weirdness he was planning for the day. And Shigure was just fine with that. Weirdness was right up his alley.
The pale man appeared to recover from the force of his hilarity. "We really need to start up again," he said, his eyes nearly shining of their own light. "I think we might actually give my dear little brother a stroke if we keep at it."
"That wouldn't do at all," Shigure said, false disapproval threading into his voice. "What will all of the members of his fan-club do without him?"
"You'll just have to go in and pick up the pieces, won't you, 'Gure-san?"
Mmmmm. High school girls. "Give me a minute. I need to get my wind back."
-----
The bearers of the Cat and the Rat both cautiously laid back onto their respective beds. Shigure and Ayame had been silent for a long time, now--before, their pauses had only lasted for a few seconds. This stretch was almost five minutes in the making. Maybe they were done being horrible bastards for the evening. Maybe they'd finally fallen asleep--
"Oh, God, yes, Shigure--"
"Beg for it!"
"Please, o please!"
"Is that--mm!--is that what you want?"
"YES!"
... or, not.
-----
Both men were jumping enthusiastically on Shigure's trampled mattress. The blanket and base-sheet were both in a heap in the corner, far away from the bed itself. One of the pillows was as flat as Hatori's typical facial expression; the other had found its way to the ceiling fan, and was turning quiet circles as it dangled from one of the blades. Bright crimson and dove gray swirled and shimmered in the air as their respective skirts jostled and spun.
Ayame executed a particularly high jump, throwing his arms back and kicking up his feet, screaming in what he considered to be a reasonable impression of a monkey having an orgasm (having never heard one before). It would have been great--a finale that was just enough to make Yuki's head explode--except that when he landed, he did so on the hem of Shigure's kimono, and he somehow managed to clobber the novelist straight in the nose, to boot. The other man stumbled back, both hands cupping his wounded nose--and his feet were out from under him, unable to strain too much against Ayame's presence on top of his kimono.
They fell in a heap, both bellowing from surprise (and Shigure, from pain). The frogs on Ayame's cheongsam snapped open, and he shrieked, horrified at the destruction caused to his clothing. They were a haphazard tangle of arms and legs, fighting to separate, and only getting more entangled in a mass of obi, kimono, and cheongsam.
Finally, they gave up. Rolling around so much took too much effort to be worth it.
"Now what?" Ayame's pale skin was flushed--they normally didn't fuck around for such a long time. His hands were completely snagged in Shigure's obi.
The novelist shrugged. He opened his mouth, intending to say something about how they should probably check on Yuki and Kyo to ensure their respective livelihoods. But, you know, he was finding the bed to be rather comfortable, even though it was stripped of sheets. It was a shame. He'd personally been hoping to make his roommates beg for mercy again--it would be the second night in a row, if they did--but just jumping on the bed and making sex noises did not seem to be turning that trick. All it did was make him tired, and more than a little bothered.
He looked at Ayame.
Both men got the same idea at the same time--he could feel it. His smirk was a perfect match for the equally-lecherous-and-mischievous sparkle that danced in Ayame's eyes. Why not? They'd been fooling around for years, and it had been such a long time since they'd had a chance to fully enjoy each other's company.
"Did you bring the schoolgirl outfit?" he said.
"Got it in my overnight bag," Aya said, and Shigure broke up laughing.
-----
The prince and the punk exited their bedrooms. Both were dressed in their pajamas. Their hair stuck up in kinky cowlicks and matted knots. Black circles were pressed under their eyes.
They walked towards each other, meeting face to face. Neither acknowledged that their ears were being assaulted with more racket, or that the racket was much more enthusiastic than usual, as well as... realistic. There wasn't the usual giggling or sarcasm behind these cries:
"Oh--oh--oh, yes--right there, that's it, uh-huh--"
"Lift up your skirt a little--mm, there we go--"
"I want you to hit me as hard as you can," Kyo sighed.
"Only if you hit me," Yuki grumbled.
"For once, I agree with you."
-----
In the morning, Tohru found both Kyo and Yuki prostrate in the hallway, twin knots on their heads. They were dead to the world; no shaking or light slapping could rouse them. She finally left them to get some smelling salts, wringing her hands as she went. She had no idea why they'd get up in the middle of the night to fight each other, when they did it all the time during the day.
Nor did she understand why they had both appeared to have solidly knocked the other out. Wouldn't that mean that they'd have hit each other at the exact same time?
-end-