Author's notes: Had a great deal of fun writing this little piece, with some flirty Jazz by Dave Brubeck to help me finish the last stretch. Fanon always has Fujitaka unaffected while Sonomi struggles with denial and fits over him, which didn't seem fair at all, so I decided to put Fujitaka on the spot for once. Hoped that, if it wasn't convincing, at least people will find it fun, which is the most important thing about fics anyways. Special thanks to Aoife-Hime, to whom I feed and in return am fed FujiSonomi.
Also, people might see a strong resemblance between Fuji/Sonomi in this piece and another couple I like to talk about in CCS. I did that on purpose.
Man in Heat
If you looked at him, studied him, staked him out and observed closely with a cool eye and object mind, you'd never know that Kinomoto Fujitaka was a man in turmoil.
He's seated at a round table inside a room with an elevated ceiling and bookshelves twelve feet tall. On the polished tabletop are stacks of binders, innumerable folders, a spread of documents, pen, pads, and calculator. The floor to ceiling windows a ways behind his companion display a gray winter day outside; cold light contrasting with the warm bordering on stuffy atmosphere inside.
Speaking of his companion, she was glaring death threats at an unfortunate tax filing from five years prior through the spectacles she never wore in front of other people, due to their diminishing effects on her presence; he thought they made her look inquisitive, intelligent, and ridiculously sharp. He liked the way she rolled up the sleeves of her pinstriped blouse, better to wrestle the task beforehand into submission. He liked the way she loosened her collar and rested her proud chin in one hand as she looked down upon the offending documents with equal disdain and professionalism. In a moment of distracted carelessness, his elbow bumped into his staple remover, which made a noiseless landing on the thick carpeted floor. When he bent down, he saw a shiny black heel dangling off wiggling toes as her crossed leg shifted restlessly. Replacing the staple remover, he drained his sweating glass and poured himself another. Sonomi glanced up. "Is it too warm? I could lower the thermostat."
He actually liked his rooms cozy rather than drafty. "It's alright."
She raised her brows at him then went back to work. He tried to do the same; he wouldn't be much good to her if he kept letting himself get distracted by unimportant little details and the strange little thoughts that followed them.
Three minutes later, Sonomi removed her glasses and began nibbling lightly on one curved end. Fujitaka was transfixed.
She took notice. "What?"
"Nothing."
That he had not caught himself before she did told him much; that the situation was more severe than he originally thought. Bizarre though it was to associate the effects of hormones with a well-matured man, he could think of little else that could explain why a disheveled, grumpy, four-eyed Sonomi doing taxes was turning him on so. Perhaps because it had been some twelve years since he looked at any woman that way, and in that span he never looked at a woman more than the one sitting before him. If his son was here he would probably smirk and say some thing smart about his predicament, and he would probably be right.
The problem was not so much that he was attracted, but that he was attracted to her. If Sonomi learned of how his thoughts towards her strayed—and she would, if he continued to be careless about keeping up appearances of oblivious innocence—she would waste no time unearthing the hatchet she took twenty years to bury and take it back to work on him.
But wait, hadn't they shared a moment that night? When she touched his arm in the middle of Tomoeda elementary school's drama performance? When they woke up next to each other not remembering at all what had happened the night before, then laughed together when they realized the cliché?
As he battled the counterproductive train of thought—counterproductive, because they could lead only to nowhere—the lady that was the source of all his troubles groaned and stretched deliciously, fingers twined and palms flipped towards the ceiling and chest thrust towards his general direction, sending his heart racing. "I don't know about you, but I've crunched as many forms as I can handle in one afternoon. What say we call it a day?"
Yes, the taxes can wait. "Sure."
He followed her into the kitchen, where she poured them fresh-squeezed grapefruit juice. His fingers grew taut along with his senses when she placed the glass with its cool liquid content against the curvature of her neck and let out a drawn out sigh. "It was rather warm in there."
He swallowed; he was definitely reading too much into things. The way she tilted her head and narrowed her eyes and licked her lips became signals that he found himself responding to, and his smile—the gentle mask of indifference and platonic and boring—became harder and harder to maintain. "Was it? I thought it was just right."
She set her glass down and leaned back against the counter. "You don't need to pretend like you're sixty-five, sensei."
It was a trap. She knows and she's tempting him to cross the line first, make him the first to misbehave so she can bring back the hatchet and chop up this so-far-strictly-friendly-but-no-one-said-it-had-to-be relationship they've cultivated over the years through coffee, then tea, then morning jogs, then lunch, then brunch, then weekend hiking trips and dinner and…
Why was he kidding himself?
He reached for her and the next moment they were locked in a hot embrace and melding mouths, making out like they've been wanting to do so for a very long time. When his lips traveled to the spot on her neck where her glass had been, she began to chuckle; he grinned as he leaned in once more, whispering in a low tone after they parted for air. "You must invite me over to help file your taxes more often."
"They were already done. I dug out some old stuff."
Her eyes gleamed with mischief and victory and joy like she just let him in on a secret; that she had pulled a fast one on him. He liked what he saw and he liked how she made him feel—younger and reckless and happy to be that way. "Aren't you the little plotter?"
Her arms around his waist, she pecked him on the lips once more, a gesture of apology that was utterly unrepentant. "Gotcha."