Note
Nothing explicit in this chapter, but some brief mentions of events in previous ones. Next chapter will be the first official scene.
- asterire
River came to on Kiyoshi's bed, still naked and his skin slightly damp from where he'd been wiped down. Kiyoshi's arm was curled around him so that River was tucked into his side, his head resting on Kiyoshi's chest.
He blinked a few times to try and clear his head then turned his head to glance up at Kiyoshi's face, to see that Kiyoshi was watching him with amused interest.
"You're clingy when you're in subspace, kitten," he commented, flicking his eyes downwards to indicate how tightly entangled River was with him. River blushed.
"Sorry," he said sheepishly.
"Oh, don't be." Kiyoshi waved him off. "It's past ten; you were out for nearly twenty minutes. Got pretty high then, did you? Guess you must've enjoyed it."
River buried his face into the pillow past Kiyoshi's shoulder, his face burning. "I, I did, yeah," he mumbled, his voice muffled by the pillow.
"So did I. Wasn't expecting it to take the turn that it did, though," Kiyoshi said casually, and River flushed harder at the memory of him begging Kiyoshi – oh God. "Can't say I didn't like it, though. A lot."
River raised his head from the pillow, grinning a little lopsidedly in response to Kiyoshi's crooked smirk. "Hah, no doubts about how much I'm into this anymore?"
"None at all," Kiyoshi confirmed, his eyes bright with playfulness. "We didn't really cover every kink under the sun, but that would've taken fucking forever – ah, no pun intended – and I think this is a decent place to start."
"Yeah," River agreed. They fell into comfortable silence, and River focused on the motion of the rise and fall of Kiyoshi's chest, his head pillowed back onto it, and the quiet hum of the lights. It was relaxing, and he felt airy and light, with hardly a care in the world.
"I should go," River said finally. "I, um, have to celebrate Sofia's birthday with our friends tomorrow."
Kiyoshi hummed in acknowledgement. "Want me to call a cab for you, kitten?"
"Uh, no," River said. "I can walk back."
All of a sudden, Kiyoshi was propped up on his elbow, and River had two fingers under his chin and was being guided to make eye contact with him.
"Look, either you take a cab, get a ride, or use public transit – and honestly, I'm not a big fan of the last one, for the same reason I'm absolutely not letting you walk back to your apartment in the dark, downtown, in one of the biggest cities in the country."
River blinked, a little taken aback. "Um, fair enough."
"Exactly. And if this is about not being able to accept my money, I'm going to assure you that I have more than enough."
"I'll, um, take the cab, then," River agreed. "But you don't have to -"
"Kitten, you're a university student. You absolutely have no money to spare. I know, I've been there. Just let me pay for the fucking cab."
Kiyoshi still had his arm curled warm around River's waist, and maybe that was what made River sigh and nod compliantly. Despite the firmness of his tone, there was an underlying, genuine concern, only deepened by Kiyoshi's proximity.
He couldn't resist a sarcastic comment, though.
"I thought I was supposed to be your sex partner, not your sugar baby."
Kiyoshi laughed. "Don't tempt me, I might give into the impulse. Go get dressed. And pass me your phone," he added suddenly.
River's phone turned out to still be in the pocket of his jacket. He passed it over to Kiyoshi (still shirtless, but now wearing loose sweatpants that was almost a shock; he'd never seen Kiyoshi in anything but suits before) as he was pulling on the jacket and watched as Kiyoshi tapped something out.
"You're not making this 'resisting the sugar daddy lifestyle' thing easy," Kiyoshi teased. "Your phone, kitten. It's truly terrible."
"It's functional," River argued, half-laughing. "I can text, call, take pictures, listen to music - and access the Internet. I'm fine."
"Darling," Kiyoshi sighed, shaking his head. "I own a software development company. We make phones. I'm a little offended."
River felt a flutter of excitement at the endearment - it was something thrown out easily, almost without thinking. It was different, somehow, from all the words of praise that Kiyoshi had uttered during the scene, now that they were exposed in the bright lights of his apartment and
Kiyoshi finished doing...whatever he was doing in River's phone, then handed it back him.
"My number," he explained. "Easier for us to communicate than, let's say, chance meetings at tea cafés and after lectures."
River half-blushed at the reminder, of the fumbling awkwardness and wide-eyed surprise in the face of a composed, cool drawl. It hadn't been all that long ago, less than a month since the interview. But everything was so altogether different, now, as if the world had tilted and shifted and the very orbit of the earth had changed.
"You should go down," Kiyoshi suggested. "I'll text you, make sure you haven't been snatched off the street or some shit while you're waiting."
It was at the doorway that River hesitated, lingering for a few moments.
"I'll see you again, what, same time, next week?" Kiyoshi queried. River nodded, a little taken aback by how casually Kiyoshi could talk about - well, anything, really, but in particular, their arrangement.
"Um, Kiyoshi?" He asked, a little tentatively, not quite sure how to approach it. His curiosity was gnawing at his mind, though, and it was something important. Kiyoshi made steady eye contact with him, his head cocked slightly to the side and his eyebrows raised, casually, almost disinterestedly questioning
"What's your safeword?"
There was a heartbeat of silence, where River startled and started to draw back, apprehensive that he'd said something wrong. Kiyoshi looked down at him with dark, fathomless eyes that sent him plunging, spiralling dizzily into their depths.
"Larkspur."
The moment River had forced the door open to the apartment, he was greeted by a wolf-whistle that pierced through the room and made him start.
"Shit, Riv, you've been busy, haven't you?"
River shot a half-hearted glare at Jun, which was lessened mainly by the fact that his face was flaming. He glanced accusingly at Kacey, perched on the end of the couch next to Jun, who shrugged a little guiltily.
"They asked where you went," she explained. "And, well, I didn't really want to lie."
"I didn't really want the two of them to know about it, either," River retorted. "Shit, what have you guys been saying? Gossiping, maybe?"
"Did you hook up with Nakano again?" Sofia called out, looking vaguely impressed.
"I - um, kind of," River said, casting his mind back to - fuck, they really had had a lot of sex.
"Kind of," Sofia repeated. "How do you kind of have sex with someone?"
River winced. "No, uh, we fucked. We definitely fucked. I, um. He. We. We have an, an arrangement, now."
"An arrangement," Sofia echoed. "As in, a sexual relationship?"
"I, uh, yeah," River said, ducking his head down and reaching up to play with his glasses - but realizing belatedly that they weren't there.
Wordlessly, Jun thrust out his arm, holding out River's glasses, clearly not trusting River's ability to catch with his eyesight limited as it was. River took them and hastily slipped them on, wincing when everything immediately sharpened into focus after a day of blurred edges and softened corners. His eyes pricked with tears and he blinked furiously, trying to adjust.
His friends' faces were now sharply detailed. Kacey, at least, seemed mostly indifferent - but at least a little concerned. Sofia was nothing short of taken aback, almost shocked by River's answer, even though she'd been the one to ask. But of course, that was Sofia, always probing for answers, even if she knew she would probably regret them.
Jun seemed outwardly teasing, grinning, but his eyes were shrewd as he looked River up and down – an abrupt change from his formerly teasing tone. River almost cringed away from his gaze, forcing himself to stay neutral - though he knew his face would betray his anxiousness. He willed his fingers to stay still, but found that he gravitated back to pulling on his sleeves, nudging at his glasses, anyway. Jun clearly had something on his mind…
"Right," Sofia said - Sofia, always the peacemaker, the most willing to skim over anything unusual and go back to playful bickering and banter. "All right, well, we were planning on watching a movie. Tell Jun that he's a coward for not wanting to watch that new horror movie."
"Well, I'm not much of a fan, either," Kacey said mildly. "Action movie, anyone? Really, though, I'm fine as long as it isn't a rom com."
"Actually, I think I'll get to work on an assignment," Jun spoke up finally. "Won't have time to do anything tomorrow, will I?"
"I, ah, yeah, so will I," River agreed, not too willing to stay within the awkwardness in the room. "I've been, um. Haven't had time this weekend so far, since, you know..." he trailed off, wincing. Jun grimaced, too, likely from River's complete social ineptitude.
"Oh," Kacey said suddenly. "We're not judging or anything. It's just a little weird to think about, you know, Nakano. He's just...how old is he, thirty?"
"Twenty-seven," both Sofia and River corrected automatically. Kacey rubbed at the back of her neck, and though she still didn't look absolutely thrilled, a bit of the concern dropped from her face.
"Six years isn't terrible," Kacey said musingly, and her calm tone did serve to make River feel a little less like melting into the floor. Then again, the casualness of her words still made him shudder with slight embarrassment. "Or is it seven?"
"A little less than six, his birthday's in March," Sofia said. "I've done research," she defended herself from their surprise. "Look, I wanted to be informed for the interview. I mean, it's a little weird. It feels like he's entirely out of our league, you know?" (And River kind of appreciated the fact that Sofia didn't say out of River's league) "He's young, but still older than us, and he's rich as fuck, and he could absolutely be River's sugar daddy -"
River made a small, strangled noise, which turned into a choked laugh when he thought back to his earlier conversation with Kiyoshi. "No," he said. "Absolutely not, 'Fia."
"And he's hot as hell," Sofia continued, as if there had been no interruption at all. "Bet he has a six-pack."
"You're so goddamn shallow," Jun spoke up at last, at the same time River said, "he does."
"Oh, fucking hell," Sofia swore appreciatively, and River knew she would have wolf-whistled if she knew how. "What about his dick? Six inches? Seven? Nine, even?"
"So shallow," Jun repeated. He gestured at River to sit down, and River realized that he'd been hanging awkwardly in the doorway the entire time.
"God, Jun, you're so straight," Sofia said as she shuffled aside to make room for River. "If Kacey and I can appreciate girls, you can appreciate guys."
"But I do like girls," Kacey said, looking confused. "Sofia, that's kind of the point of being lesbian."
"Technicalities. So, River -"
"All right, since this conversation is, very clearly, not appealing to my incredibly heterosexual mind," Jun announced. "I'm off. Really, this time. See you all."
"So am I," River said hastily, because Jun didn't look uncomfortable, not exactly, but there was a familiar glint of purpose in his eyes. Jun shot him a subtle, meaningful glance. He stood up and followed Jun down their narrow hallway into their room at the end of the hall, watching as Jun closed the door softly behind them.
"You looked uncomfortable," Jun observed, collapsing down on their shared bed and wincing when the stiff mattress resisted. "So."
"You're not actually getting to work on that assignment, are you?"
"Hell no. And I'm willing to bet my share of next month's rent that you're not that academically responsible, either. You don't even have any assignments due within the next week that I know of."
"Well, there's one due on Friday, but yeah." River sat down by Jun on the bed. "So, what's this about? You wanted to talk to me in private."
"As hopeless as you are to do with anything involving strangers, at least you're not entirely oblivious."
"Well, yeah, I'm familiar with all of the weird faces you make to get my attention. I've known you since freshman year."
"Oh, yeah, when you tripped during orientation and face-planted into my crotch."
"Jun," River begged, and though there was no one around to hear, his face flamed with his mortification. "That was four years ago, please can we forget about it?"
"I can assure you that as a straight man, I've never once imagined what it would be like to have another guy's face between my legs, but I don't think I would've imagined it to be like that even if I wasn't absolutely not into dick -"
"Jun!" River half-shouted, laughing nonetheless even though his face was still burning. "You wanted to talk. Then talk."
"Oh, fine. I'm going to wash up first, though. I'm tired, and if the conversation gets awkward, I can just sleep."
Just sleep was Jun's way of avoiding just about any conflict. Absurdly enough, he was considerably less anxious than River was on a daily basis.
It was past eleven, nearly twelve, at this point anyway, so River elected to follow Jun's lead. The girls had the master bedroom, so Jun and River had to use the one across the hall from them. Jun always took longer in the bathroom than River did, but that gave River enough time to sit by the bed and gather his thoughts while he stared out the window.
The scene with Kiyoshi had been nothing short of electrifying, so much so that it was jarring to be in the normalcy of their dingy, cramped little apartment. The familiar, easy teasing from his friends did do its part in starting to shift his mind back down to earth, though. But even considering that, it had made him the slightest bit uncomfortable, the flippant, casual way they had discussed his and Kiyoshi's...arrangement, however briefly they had touched on it. This realization only made him more uncomfortable.
While River wasn't exactly the most promiscuous person among the four of them - that honour went to Jun, and even then, he rarely found time to indulge at all - he'd had his own fair share of the college experience, and had one or two boyfriends in the time he'd known his three friends. And it was easy to relate one night stands, usually laughing in embarrassment and amusement at their failures and shortcomings and occasionally discussing particularly memorable ones. And while Sofia was the one most likely to complain about her significant others, all four of them, usually together, had dissected in full the traits and characteristics of whatever partners they had, and always to the great amusement of the other three.
Talking about Kiyoshi seemed different altogether. Their arrangement hardly seemed real - even though River's cock was still sensitive and raw, and even though the marks Kiyoshi had made with his mouth were still very evident on him. It was almost impossible to believe that he and Kiyoshi had fucked, and even more difficult to believe that it was something they would be doing long-term.
More than that, though, there was something utterly untouchable about Kiyoshi - and, as Sofia has pointed out, he was very much out of River's league. What was a poor, anxious, debilitatingly awkward college student compared to incredibly wealthy, attractive, confident Kiyoshi Nakano?
"Your turn," Jun announced as he came in, wearing only a pair of sweatpants.
"Put some clothes on," River replied, slipping past Jun to the bathroom.
"I pay my share of rent, I get to wear what I want!" Jun yelled back.
Their bathroom was small and cramped, to match the rest of the apartment. It was a far cry from the sleek, modern design of Kiyoshi's...but the thought of Kiyoshi's bathroom only made River think of the things they had done in it, a line of thought that he quickly shoved away to avoid getting turned on, again.
This is worse than when I was a teenager, he thought to himself. Fuck, this is ridiculous.
River stared at himself in the bathroom mirror, trying to see something different in his reflection, to see if the shift he had felt internally in himself had somehow manifested itself physically. Wide brown eyes, blinking up through those long eyelashes that he'd never known whether he'd liked or not, full lips, perpetually tinted pink, a round nose and narrow chin. No, he looked the same as ever. He still felt dazed, as if he wasn't exactly on earth, though. He splashed his face with water, so violently that even his fringe and his shirt ended up soaking wet and plastered to him. He tugged off his shirt, grimacing, setting it aside, and tried to part his fringe away from his face.
A few minutes later, he emerged from the bathroom to see Jun lying on their bed, scrolling absently through his phone. He closed the door softly behind him, turning around to see Jun look up and do a double take, immediately throwing his phone aside.
"You have a hickey."
River started. Jun was staring at his bare shoulder, so he twisted, trying to catch what he was looking at - oh.
Kiyoshi's mouth, hot on his skin, hotter than the shower spray across his body…
"Yeah," River said feebly. "Um, it's - I -"
"I really don't need details," Jun interrupted. "Like, I really, really don't need them. Please."
Jun's exaggerated grimace of disgust made River grin; it did a fair job of making everything seem normal, as things always were between them, no matter how different and changed River felt. He tried for a teasing joke.
"Well, shit, I was about to tell you about the hickeys all over the rest of my body -"
"You can stop talking now," Jun announced, almost frantically waving his hands to stop River, making him laugh. "And cover that up, fuck, I can't look at it without thinking of you getting fucked. And you're a great friend and all, but that's really not something I want on my mind. Christ, there's another one on your hip - wait no, two - oh, Jesus, I don't want to know how far those go down. Put something on, now."
"You're not wearing a shirt, either," River pointed out, even as he pulled one on - a baggy, oversized t-shirt that was faded from use and that could have belonged to either of them at one point.
"Well, I haven't been sleeping with a goddamn vampire like you have, by the look of things," Jun retorted. "Oh, God. I'm never going to be able to hear Nakano casually mentioned in conversation without remembering those."
"Stop being overdramatic, there are at least three girls that I can't ever talk to any more because I've walked in on them with you."
"Look, you have an incredibly bad habit of walking into rooms like you belong there -"
"We share a room, Jun. We share a bed. Which you've violated before, multiple times."
"Well, Sofia's had her fair share."
"Yeah, but Sofia doesn't sleep in the same bed as me."
"All right, fair enough." Jun shifted over to the right - his side of the bed, closest to the door - to make room for River, who always took the spot closest to the window.
"All jokes aside, though," Jun said, his voice seeming very loud in the darkness, once the lights had been turned off and the blinds drawn. "Are you...what's going on, with this?"
River turned his head on his pillow to glance at Jun. He was staring up at the ceiling, frowning. He wasn't sure how to respond, especially in the face of an uncharacteristically serious Jun.
"We're not dating, if that's what you mean," River said slowly, trying to decide whether it was the right thing to say or not. He couldn't tell if it was, because Jun's expression twisted into something that looked both like a grin and a grimace.
"But you're doing something," Jun surmised. "Long-term. River, you'd be the worst lawyer, you're shit at avoiding questions."
"You just know me too well," River half-teased, because Jun's voice was strangely cold and his body seemed tense, even lying down as they both were. It worked, a little. Jun laughed and shook his head, relaxing slightly, but the odd look on his face remained.
"You're an open book, Riv," Jun argued back good-naturedly. "So, to put it bluntly, you're Nakano's new boy toy."
Something flared inside of River at those words - hot, angry, even though Jun had only been teasing, even though he was, really, mostly right - perhaps because it was everything he was, truthfully, a little terrified of being. He didn't want to be another one in a long string of lovers, all of them ultimately discarded and meaningless. It would be humiliating, if nothing else. And logically, he knew that expecting anything more was ridiculously foolish, but he still ached, furious, to correct Jun, to prove that he was something more.
"I'm Kiyoshi's submissive, actually."
River's own voice surprised him - flat, almost icily cold. It seemed to surprise Jun, too, who stared at him uncomprehendingly for several moments before his eyes widened.
"Right," he said faintly. "Okay. You two are into some kinky shit. Oh, Christ. You're the last person I'd expect to be into this. Jesus fucking Christ. All right, okay, sure, you and Nakano have some kinky sex thing going on - wait, you call him Kiyoshi? He lets you call him Kiyoshi?"
River blinked, startled by the sudden change. Somewhere within Jun's appalled rambling, all the anger had dissipated as quickly as it had appeared, and it was with bemusement (and guilt over his sudden outburst) that he answered Jun. "He's been balls deep inside of me, Jun, what do you think?"
"Christ, I'm sorry I asked. Well, I'm sure he's done more than that. Or he will. Fuck, you don't seem the type to be into this. You're too independent to seem like you want to be controlled like that - fuck, I don't know, I'm not into this BDSM shit."
"Well," River started, but found that he didn't really have any words.
"Does this entail any sort of...physical shit?"
River shrugged, redirecting his gaze to the window. "As, as in?"
There was a grimace in Jun's voice. "Like...oh, fuck, I don't want to say it. Whipping, spanking, that kind of...?"
River was abruptly grateful that he'd turned away moments before, because his face flamed at the mention. "Among other things, yeah," he said, and if Jun noticed that he was a little breathless, his voice gone a little higher than normal, he didn't comment.
"Cool," Jun said faintly, and River almost laughed despite his mortification. "As long as it's what you want. If it makes you happy, I guess."
"I guess it is," River agreed. "Was this all you wanted to talk about? Confirming that I'm actually, um, doing it with Kiyoshi?"
"You're not really one to make things up," Jun said. "So no, it wasn't. It's just, look, I know you're capable of taking care of yourself, and God knows you've got your shit together much better than I have, but still. Be careful. Especially around him."
"What do you mean?" Jun sounded tense and more than a little uncomfortable. "What, you don't approve of him or something?"
"Well, he hasn't really given me a reason to approve of him, has he? Everything I know about him is from news articles. And, well, that one time he came in to speak during our class. Look, River, I just want you to be careful what you do. I don't want you ending up hurt."
"He wouldn't hurt me," River said automatically, thinking back to the past few nights – is this okay, are you still with me, can I touch you – "he'd never. Well, unless it was consensual. I trust him."
"I don't," Jun said flatly, and the bluntness of this admission surprised River. "And I don't mean being hurt physically, necessarily. But if he does that, I'll fucking fight him, too."
River let out a laugh – low, almost harsh. "Look, it's just sex. I appreciate it, really, Jun, but it's not going to happen. I know him."
For several long moments, there was silence. When Jun spoke up again, it was to a quiet, still, tense room.
"Do you, really?"
There was a sigh, and a creak of bedsprings as Jun rolled over. "You're right," he mumbled. "You've got this, you're fine. I'm sorry. Good night, Riv."
And with that, his breathing steadied and evened. But it was a while before River, still reeling and confused from Jun's words – do you, really – even exhausted as he was, could drift off to sleep.
