Chapter 13

Wine enters through the mouth,
Love, the eyes.
- W.B. Yeats

Dessert is a tub of pralines and cream ice-cream, because they are classy like that, and Ino did just go through a breakup, after all, and Hidan has just had an Uncomfortable Revelation.

Hidan is too lazy to get his own spoon and Ino refuses to share hers, so he tries to eat the ice-cream with his take-out chopsticks and swears vociferously at them when they don't cooperate, to Ino's increasingly giggly amusement, because she is on her fourth glass of wine, because it's been that kind of night.

They adjourn to the living room along with the sputtering candle. Ino opens a new bottle of wine, because, as she explains to Hidan, she deserves it; she is sad about ruining farmer-boy, he was such a sweet man. Hidan does not seem entirely convinced by this reasoning, but then, he generally disapproves of alcohol.

Ino gets closer to him on the sofa with wine-laced overconfidence and tries to explain these feelings, this guilt, that is bothering her, what is it with men? He doesn't seem to empathize enough, so she clambers onto him and gets in his face to better make her point and asks, why, Hidan? Why do they always fall in love? Why, when she expl– explish– explicitly tells them not to…?

Hidan does not have a satisfactory answer for her. Ino droops against him and sighs and tries to think back to the last time she had this much wine in one sitting; she had quite forgotten how silly and tipsy and touchy-feely it makes her. Then she looks down and sees that she has climbed onto Hidan like he is a priestly bicycle of some sort, and that bicycle is looking extremely uncomfortable.

"You need to loosen up," says Ino in that flushed, generous way that the drunk have, thinking that they can solve all of the problems in the world with more drink. She presses her wineglass to his mouth. "Have."

"Hell no," says Hidan, extricating the glass from her grip and putting it on the side table, very far away, it seems to Ino. But then, everything seems kind of far away right now; the table, the wineglass, the bottle… everything except Hidan's face, that seems very close.

Ino focuses on his face and looks at it attentively.

"You're so pretty," says Ino, petting Hidan's hair. He looks instantly huffy, which makes her giggle.

She leans in and looks deep into his eyes, as though she could find his pretty soul somewhere in the violet, if she looked hard enough.

"Woah, now, angel-slosh," says Hidan, looking away. "You've had way too much to fuckin' drink. Don't come in my head, you're gonna break something."

Ino brings her hands around the back of his neck and links her fingers together there. "I won't. I'm not that drunk…"

He looks unconvinced. Ino presses her forehead to his. "Not that you'd even know. Why don't you ever drink?"

"Because. I'm a goddamn priest," says Hidan. "And you shouldn't, either. It's unbecoming for an angel of Jashin."

"Unbecoming," repeats Ino.

"Exactly."

Ino frowns at him. "Don't moralize, Hidan. It makes you less pretty."

She attempts to lean over and grab her wineglass. Hidan beats her to it and pushes it just out of reach, so all Ino manages to do is lean over him, smush her breasts into his face, and come back empty-handed.

"Hey," says Ino slowly, looking at the glass that is now, incomprehensibly, even further away.

"You're done," says Hidan. "I'm cutting you off."

Ino looks down at him to complain, but she notices that his pale cheeks are tinged with pink. Her curiosity piqued, she sinks back into his lap so that their faces are level.

"You're blushing, priest-boy. Why?"

"It's hot in here."

"No," corrects Ino, egotistically, but also, rightly: "I'm hot. And that's why you're blushing."

He ignores her statement, which confirms that she is correct more than anything he could have said.

"It's time for you to go to bed," says Hidan.

"Mm… only if you carry me," says Ino with exaggerated coyness as she twists a strand of his hair around one of her fingers.

"You've had way too much goddamn wine," says Hidan, pulling her hand free of his hair.

He sits tensely underneath her. Ino giggles and wiggles. "I know. It's fun. You look so uncomfortable right now."

He glares at her. Ino bites her lip, tipsily amused at her own forwardness and his apprehension. "So, about this rebound thing…"

"I was just fucking around," says Hidan quickly. "It was a joke."

"Oh?" says Ino, bringing up a hand to pull down one of the straps of her dress. "Well by all means, continue to fuck around…"

He watches her pull the strap down in a kind of open-mouthed daze and then he blinks and grabs her wrists to prevent her from pulling down the other one. "Don't do this to me, angel."

"But you're here right now," says Ino.

"I'm also a priest right now," says Hidan.

"But why," whines Ino in a very Hidan-ish fashion. She collapses bonelessly against him as she whines, putting him into full contact with all manner of interesting curves and grab-able parts. She squeezes her knees on either side of his thighs and rests against him with her face nestled into his neck. He sits rigidly below her, which amuses her all the more.

"You're pretty, I'm pretty," says Ino into his neck. She smiles a private smile as she sees goosebumps rise on his skin. "Let's be pretty together. Naked."

"I'm good," says Hidan, swallowing visibly. "I've got my god. My ritual. I don't need anything else. Anything else is sin."

"But Hidaan," purrs Ino as she caresses the back of his neck with the tips of her slender fingers. "I'm always in your ritual."

When he ignores her, Ino pushes her face into his, so that their lips are almost brushing. "Don't you want to see what it's like in person?"

He closes his eyes as her fingers tangle gently into the hair at the back of his head. He tries to turn away from her and, like he did to her some months ago, she grabs his chin and forces him towards her.

"Why aren't you looking at me, Hidan?" asks Ino.

He opens his eyes and they are an intense violet. "Because. You're too beautiful. And I don't think you know what you're doing right now."

"Too beautiful," repeats Ino, her lips curving into a pleased smile. "You're the sweetest asshole I know."

She pulls in closer to him and captures him in her depthless eyes, reaching ever so slightly into his head, touching her essence to his like breezy kisses. He quivers from the almost imperceptible touches, the feeling that she's in his head, but not quite…

"Tut," says Ino, drawing her fingers along his clenched jaw. "Look at how tense you are."

Her hands push away his loose shirt and pass down his tight shoulders and his contracted core. Her touch lingers on his hard stomach.

"You have such nice abs," says Ino seductively into his ear. "What's your secret?"

It's a dumb question, because Ino's toned stomach is absolute perfection, and she definitely doesn't need tips – but it gives her a reason to whisper into his ear and see the gooseflesh rise again, which is amusing and empowering all at once.

"I, uh –"

Hidan swallows as Ino's hand drifts lower. He sits stiffly below her, as though he's not enjoying her attentions or her blatant, drunken takeover of his personal space – but at the same time, Ino knows that he is fully capable of telling her to get the fuck away, of lifting her off him if he wants to, of pushing her from his lap…

But he doesn't. Why?

Ino contemplates him. "You're so conflicted right now, and it's all my fault."

"You're fuckin' right it's your fault," says Hidan, staring fiercely at the wall somewhere behind her.

"Mm," says Ino, settling herself against him more comfortably with unnecessarily provocative wiggles.

She hears his clench-jawed intake of breath, feels his over-tense muscles start to tremble slightly. And still he does not move to push her off, doesn't tell her to stop, to get away. And Ino begins to understand that he is not trying to resist her, so much as trying to resist himself, his own frailties, his own illicit wants…

"You really are just a man," says Ino. "A godly man, a fanatical man, a truly pious man… but even so…"

She feels like she is seeing him clearly for the first time, because this is the first time that she's actually treated him, not as an annoying collection of pieced-together parts called Hidan that she flirts with for kicks, but as she treats men. This is the first time that she's given him a real sense of the power of her seductions and her allure.

"You think I don't know that? I know – fuck, I know," Hidan says in a half-whisper. His eyes are closed, his face is turned away. "Why are you doing this to me?"

"Because," says Ino, brushing her lips to his as she speaks. "I'm cruel. It's what you like about me."

He recognizes those words, recognizes their truth. His eyes fly open and find hers.

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