~~So, it turns out that the real thing that actually motivates me to put
out chapters, is deadlines. When I have things due, I punt by writing. When
nothing's due, I fail to twitch adequately enough to start babbling. So,
I'd better hurry and put out as many updates as I can before Friday, eh?~~
And so, there they were. A man and a woman, more in common than they would have thought, less in common than even they could know. Perhaps they were just carried away by the knowledge of their shared plight; their hopelessness in the face of others' pain; their inability to escape the responsibilities that bound them. What does it matter, but that they were there?
Well, to tell the truth, there was a lot that mattered.
Somehow, they'd ended up at Tsukushi's place, presumably on the theory that Yuki wasn't likely to be coming home anytime soon, not given Soujiro's ability to exhaust his playmates. Not that this was discussed at all -- you know how these things just slip by in a tacit glance or nod.
And now, the scene. Familiar, like a well-worn archetypal paradigm. The crumpled sheets, the naked bodies, the faint sheen of sweat. Ah, so it looks like a casual act of passion, the classical bar pick-up. But it's not. If you were standing there, you could sense it in the tension in the air, the unease, the cautious care with which Akira proceeded -- as if Tsukushi might freeze him out at any moment. Those shivers rippling across her skin, not of excitement, or anticipation, but the rigidity of fear, discomfort-- as if she wasn't comfortable with the responses of her body, the way it seemed to react without the agreement of her subconscious or even conscious mind, as if she feared the loss of her own iron control.
Akira leaned in closer, studying the doctor's pale skin, with a fascination born from years of studying women's flesh. Doctor Makino was pale, as if her skin never saw the sun. Small wonder, that, with the way she kept covered up in severe clothing, and her white coat -- her badge of office as it were. More than that, however, he observed, as his callused hand stroked her sides, and caressed her bony hip, that the woman was painfully thin, with sadly untoned muscles -- as if she cared not at all for her body, or as if she were deliberately neglecting it. With her bone structure, Tsukushi could have been a hottie, he mused with absent regret. Instead, she locked herself away, preferring to forget what her body was capable of -- what it was built to enjoy. Being able, as he was, to guess the root cause of this, made Akira want to get his friends and do far worse to Junpei, than a mere kick in the crotch. But he wasn't here to get involved in that debacle, or not so directly. He was here to enjoy himself, and hopefully, to bring Dr. Makino an equal pleasure -- or at the very least, to ensure that she slept well tonight.
He applied himself to the task with a will, only peripherally noting how Tsukushi responded slowly, as if relearning dusty lessons from long ago, shaking the rust off her amorous skills, such as they were. And still, there was something missing, something a little too deliberate about her actions. As though she wasn't allowing herself to respond naturally, as though she had to think about every movement, every breath.
Akira, on the other hand, Was enjoying himself, Was allowing his cares to dissolve in the blissful sensation of tingling nerves, the scent of heated flesh, the smooth caress of flesh on flesh. And it appeared that Tsukushi too; was loosening up at last; was easing into the eternal now of sex, all building up towards that one glorious moment when everything dissolved, control snapped, the world vanished. . . That moment was the one Soujiro lived for. And now, Akira craved it as well; a moment's escape, that's all. Not so very much to ask, was it?
And Tsukushi tried, she really did. She wanted to escape just as badly as Akira, if not more so. But old habits were hard to change, Old memories remained too strong. The need to remain in control, too overpowering. For her, there was no moment of ecstasy. Never had been, in either of her previous failed relationships, nor tonight. But she was an empath, responding almost automatically to Akira, giving him the illusion he needed, just as she might try to give her patients the support and reassurance they yearned for. . .
In the aftermath of his orgasm, Akira pulled away, a puzzled expression hazing over his flushed features. She couldn't have. . . No one had ever done that to him before. . . His skills as a lover were paralleled only by Soujiro! But, it was undeniable, that something he'd sensed as they were building up to this climax. . .
"You faked it!" Oh sure, towards the end there, she'd almost seemed natural, almost allowed herself to respond. And yes, her imitation was very good. But it wasn't the real thing. Where was the real Dr. Tsukushi Makino, and what would it take to get her to come out and play?
Tsukushi sighed faintly, watching warily as Akira cuddled up to her. "This was a mistake." She murmured at last, pushing herself to sit, huddled over, at the edge of the bed. "A really big mistake. I think you should leave now."
"You shouldn't be alone."
"Everyone, Mr. Mimasaka, is alone." She laughed bitterly, "You can't change that just by wishing."
"But I'm here now." He murmured, stretching up behind her, to wrap his arms around her bony frame, "Two heads are better than one. We can help each other. . . All it takes is a little honesty."
". . .I'm going to clean up. Please, just forget this ever happened." Tsukushi shrugged Akira off, and stalked wearily towards the bathroom, ignoring the joking plea behind her,
"At least tell me that you'll still respect me in the morning!"
-----
In the bathroom, Tsukushi stepped into a blisteringly hot shower, leaning forward against the still-cool tiles, while steaming cascades of water washed her body clean of the residue of sex. God what had she been thinking? With Junpei's harassment only a few hours behind, the memory of his betrayal so freshly recalled. Oh yeah, she could picture what her textbooks or her professors would say about this. 'Plainly a classic case of denial. She's afraid of men, so she's going to go out and fuck one, just to prove she isn't.' Brilliant, Tsukushi, Just brilliant. Couldn't you have at least had the sense to pick a random stranger with whom to screw up? Not the friend of your oldest patient and long term crush? So humiliating, and now she was going to have to go out there and face him, pretend she didn't just want to curl up and die. Even now, she cringed, all she'd been able to think about during their recent activity, was how, this time, like every other time she'd had sex, she'd had to fight down a rising sense of horror, and of nausea, with every caress, and every penetrating thrust. Oh, it didn't matter that he was skilled and gentle-- Amon had been skilled and Kin had been gentle -- still, she'd never been able to let go with either of them either. It was easier, in the end, to learn to fake an orgasm, then to deal with their more ardent efforts. Yeah, she knew she had problems, insurmountable as far as she could see. So what on earth had made her think that taking Akira home would be a good idea? Couldn't even be blamed on alcohol. One beer was not enough for that sort of stupidity.
But, oh. . . Sometimes. . . Sometimes, when she couldn't help herself, she did dream. She dreamt of the way she once had been, before Jun. When she'd had friends; when she'd been cheerful and strong, like tempered steel, not like now, when the only strength she had was hard, and cold, and brittle, like old iron. Once she'd known how to smile for real. Once she could have been the kind of person to take real pleasure from helping her patients. Once she might have known how to relax; how to just be herself and enjoy what life had to offer. Enjoy the release Akira had tried to share with her. . . But all that was a dream, from which Jun had so rudely awoken her, a dream she could never return to.
Reluctantly, she turned the shower off. All actions had consequences. Now it was time to face hers.
-----
"You're still here." Tsukushi gazed impassively at the man in her bed, her drawn features and nervously flicking eyes betraying her unease.
"I wanted to make sure you didn't get the wrong impression." Akira replied smoothly, fighting the childish impulse to tease the uptight doctor about her incredibly prosaic choices in undergarments,
"And what wrong impression would that be?" Tsukushi stiffly pulled her robe closer about herself and frowned her query. "Look, doc." Akira soothed, "We both needed something. We still do. So we tried something that didn't quite work out. It's not the end of the world. I'm sure you've had the experience before, with your patients, that some therapies just don't work. So you try something else. Or try harder. . . ." At the look on her face, he hurried on, "No! I'm not saying we should try the, ahem, physical therapy again. . . But, you have to admit you have a problem, before anything can be done. We're enough alike, you and I, that I can help you. We can help each other. So why are you so afraid to even try?"
"That's not what you really want." Tsukushi replied coldly. "Is it just some game to you? First you send Mr. Nishikado after me, then yourself? Was it all a contest? Well fine. You won, go and tell your friends that you fucked the doctor and that it was just as bad as you thought it would be. Have yourself a good laugh, but spare me the rest of this bullshit." Her control, frayed by the emotionally turbulent events of the night -- from the soaring high of the concert, to the crashing low of her encounter with Junpei and the subsequent Misjudgments and mistakes she'd made, finally snapped, and she staggered out of the doorway, into her living room, where she stood, huddled against the door, crying in great sobs, as if all the pent-up tears of years and years of unhappiness were finally flooding out.
"Go away. Just go away." Was all she could manage to gasp when she finally noticed that Akira had followed her.
"I don't think that's such a good idea." Akira shook his head, and gently steered Tsukushi towards the couch. "You're the doctor. You know that it's bad to be alone in times of such emotional distress. I'm not going anywhere, until you talk to me.. . .Talk to me Doc. Don't you think it's about time you showed someone the real you?"
TBC.
~~whoot! It's another bad-sex scene! Cm's antidote to all the fanfic fluff out there in which lovesick virgins get it on and live on eternally in monogamous bliss (not necessarily in the hyd fandom, but I'm sure you've seen the genre -- it's been annoying me excessively.)
And so, there they were. A man and a woman, more in common than they would have thought, less in common than even they could know. Perhaps they were just carried away by the knowledge of their shared plight; their hopelessness in the face of others' pain; their inability to escape the responsibilities that bound them. What does it matter, but that they were there?
Well, to tell the truth, there was a lot that mattered.
Somehow, they'd ended up at Tsukushi's place, presumably on the theory that Yuki wasn't likely to be coming home anytime soon, not given Soujiro's ability to exhaust his playmates. Not that this was discussed at all -- you know how these things just slip by in a tacit glance or nod.
And now, the scene. Familiar, like a well-worn archetypal paradigm. The crumpled sheets, the naked bodies, the faint sheen of sweat. Ah, so it looks like a casual act of passion, the classical bar pick-up. But it's not. If you were standing there, you could sense it in the tension in the air, the unease, the cautious care with which Akira proceeded -- as if Tsukushi might freeze him out at any moment. Those shivers rippling across her skin, not of excitement, or anticipation, but the rigidity of fear, discomfort-- as if she wasn't comfortable with the responses of her body, the way it seemed to react without the agreement of her subconscious or even conscious mind, as if she feared the loss of her own iron control.
Akira leaned in closer, studying the doctor's pale skin, with a fascination born from years of studying women's flesh. Doctor Makino was pale, as if her skin never saw the sun. Small wonder, that, with the way she kept covered up in severe clothing, and her white coat -- her badge of office as it were. More than that, however, he observed, as his callused hand stroked her sides, and caressed her bony hip, that the woman was painfully thin, with sadly untoned muscles -- as if she cared not at all for her body, or as if she were deliberately neglecting it. With her bone structure, Tsukushi could have been a hottie, he mused with absent regret. Instead, she locked herself away, preferring to forget what her body was capable of -- what it was built to enjoy. Being able, as he was, to guess the root cause of this, made Akira want to get his friends and do far worse to Junpei, than a mere kick in the crotch. But he wasn't here to get involved in that debacle, or not so directly. He was here to enjoy himself, and hopefully, to bring Dr. Makino an equal pleasure -- or at the very least, to ensure that she slept well tonight.
He applied himself to the task with a will, only peripherally noting how Tsukushi responded slowly, as if relearning dusty lessons from long ago, shaking the rust off her amorous skills, such as they were. And still, there was something missing, something a little too deliberate about her actions. As though she wasn't allowing herself to respond naturally, as though she had to think about every movement, every breath.
Akira, on the other hand, Was enjoying himself, Was allowing his cares to dissolve in the blissful sensation of tingling nerves, the scent of heated flesh, the smooth caress of flesh on flesh. And it appeared that Tsukushi too; was loosening up at last; was easing into the eternal now of sex, all building up towards that one glorious moment when everything dissolved, control snapped, the world vanished. . . That moment was the one Soujiro lived for. And now, Akira craved it as well; a moment's escape, that's all. Not so very much to ask, was it?
And Tsukushi tried, she really did. She wanted to escape just as badly as Akira, if not more so. But old habits were hard to change, Old memories remained too strong. The need to remain in control, too overpowering. For her, there was no moment of ecstasy. Never had been, in either of her previous failed relationships, nor tonight. But she was an empath, responding almost automatically to Akira, giving him the illusion he needed, just as she might try to give her patients the support and reassurance they yearned for. . .
In the aftermath of his orgasm, Akira pulled away, a puzzled expression hazing over his flushed features. She couldn't have. . . No one had ever done that to him before. . . His skills as a lover were paralleled only by Soujiro! But, it was undeniable, that something he'd sensed as they were building up to this climax. . .
"You faked it!" Oh sure, towards the end there, she'd almost seemed natural, almost allowed herself to respond. And yes, her imitation was very good. But it wasn't the real thing. Where was the real Dr. Tsukushi Makino, and what would it take to get her to come out and play?
Tsukushi sighed faintly, watching warily as Akira cuddled up to her. "This was a mistake." She murmured at last, pushing herself to sit, huddled over, at the edge of the bed. "A really big mistake. I think you should leave now."
"You shouldn't be alone."
"Everyone, Mr. Mimasaka, is alone." She laughed bitterly, "You can't change that just by wishing."
"But I'm here now." He murmured, stretching up behind her, to wrap his arms around her bony frame, "Two heads are better than one. We can help each other. . . All it takes is a little honesty."
". . .I'm going to clean up. Please, just forget this ever happened." Tsukushi shrugged Akira off, and stalked wearily towards the bathroom, ignoring the joking plea behind her,
"At least tell me that you'll still respect me in the morning!"
-----
In the bathroom, Tsukushi stepped into a blisteringly hot shower, leaning forward against the still-cool tiles, while steaming cascades of water washed her body clean of the residue of sex. God what had she been thinking? With Junpei's harassment only a few hours behind, the memory of his betrayal so freshly recalled. Oh yeah, she could picture what her textbooks or her professors would say about this. 'Plainly a classic case of denial. She's afraid of men, so she's going to go out and fuck one, just to prove she isn't.' Brilliant, Tsukushi, Just brilliant. Couldn't you have at least had the sense to pick a random stranger with whom to screw up? Not the friend of your oldest patient and long term crush? So humiliating, and now she was going to have to go out there and face him, pretend she didn't just want to curl up and die. Even now, she cringed, all she'd been able to think about during their recent activity, was how, this time, like every other time she'd had sex, she'd had to fight down a rising sense of horror, and of nausea, with every caress, and every penetrating thrust. Oh, it didn't matter that he was skilled and gentle-- Amon had been skilled and Kin had been gentle -- still, she'd never been able to let go with either of them either. It was easier, in the end, to learn to fake an orgasm, then to deal with their more ardent efforts. Yeah, she knew she had problems, insurmountable as far as she could see. So what on earth had made her think that taking Akira home would be a good idea? Couldn't even be blamed on alcohol. One beer was not enough for that sort of stupidity.
But, oh. . . Sometimes. . . Sometimes, when she couldn't help herself, she did dream. She dreamt of the way she once had been, before Jun. When she'd had friends; when she'd been cheerful and strong, like tempered steel, not like now, when the only strength she had was hard, and cold, and brittle, like old iron. Once she'd known how to smile for real. Once she could have been the kind of person to take real pleasure from helping her patients. Once she might have known how to relax; how to just be herself and enjoy what life had to offer. Enjoy the release Akira had tried to share with her. . . But all that was a dream, from which Jun had so rudely awoken her, a dream she could never return to.
Reluctantly, she turned the shower off. All actions had consequences. Now it was time to face hers.
-----
"You're still here." Tsukushi gazed impassively at the man in her bed, her drawn features and nervously flicking eyes betraying her unease.
"I wanted to make sure you didn't get the wrong impression." Akira replied smoothly, fighting the childish impulse to tease the uptight doctor about her incredibly prosaic choices in undergarments,
"And what wrong impression would that be?" Tsukushi stiffly pulled her robe closer about herself and frowned her query. "Look, doc." Akira soothed, "We both needed something. We still do. So we tried something that didn't quite work out. It's not the end of the world. I'm sure you've had the experience before, with your patients, that some therapies just don't work. So you try something else. Or try harder. . . ." At the look on her face, he hurried on, "No! I'm not saying we should try the, ahem, physical therapy again. . . But, you have to admit you have a problem, before anything can be done. We're enough alike, you and I, that I can help you. We can help each other. So why are you so afraid to even try?"
"That's not what you really want." Tsukushi replied coldly. "Is it just some game to you? First you send Mr. Nishikado after me, then yourself? Was it all a contest? Well fine. You won, go and tell your friends that you fucked the doctor and that it was just as bad as you thought it would be. Have yourself a good laugh, but spare me the rest of this bullshit." Her control, frayed by the emotionally turbulent events of the night -- from the soaring high of the concert, to the crashing low of her encounter with Junpei and the subsequent Misjudgments and mistakes she'd made, finally snapped, and she staggered out of the doorway, into her living room, where she stood, huddled against the door, crying in great sobs, as if all the pent-up tears of years and years of unhappiness were finally flooding out.
"Go away. Just go away." Was all she could manage to gasp when she finally noticed that Akira had followed her.
"I don't think that's such a good idea." Akira shook his head, and gently steered Tsukushi towards the couch. "You're the doctor. You know that it's bad to be alone in times of such emotional distress. I'm not going anywhere, until you talk to me.. . .Talk to me Doc. Don't you think it's about time you showed someone the real you?"
TBC.
~~whoot! It's another bad-sex scene! Cm's antidote to all the fanfic fluff out there in which lovesick virgins get it on and live on eternally in monogamous bliss (not necessarily in the hyd fandom, but I'm sure you've seen the genre -- it's been annoying me excessively.)