Secrets by OneRepublic

Spirit has never been very good at keeping secrets. He doesn't understand the basic premise; all the secrets he has ever had he eventually shared, and every time it has been for the worst that he kept them at all. He had tried very hard to be considerate of his meister's distance, though, because Stein is very good at keeping them, so good that Spirit has spent months not entirely sure the other boy is keeping any because it has been so hard to catch him out in the emotional tells that Spirit can't help but display. He has been watching though, and now he is sure, and he is tired of the distance and he is tired of the misinterpretation and, above all, Spirit is tired of the secrets.

It takes a long time for Stein to answer his door. The entry to the meister's room is more secure than the front door that protects them from the outside, but given Spirit's plans for tonight he is pretty sure a door is the least of his concerns, so when the first tentative knock goes unnoticed he knocks again, louder. And again. He is raising his hand for the fourth attempt when the sound of movement from inside the room stops him, and he has time to compose himself into the picture of patience before the meister cracks the door open.

Stein looks exhausted, as he usually does, the smudges under his eyes the same saturated darkness as the grey shirt he's wearing. His hair is even more unkempt than usual, tousled and tangled, and his green eyes are dull with sleep instead of razor-sharp as Spirit has come to expect. The knocking clearly dragged him out of bed. If Spirit weren't so set on his path, he would feel bad about this, but he committed himself as soon as he knocked the second time and there isn't space for guilt right now.

"What is it, Spirit?" Even Stein's voice is showing signs of his half-awake state, rasping in his throat with the lingering traces of drowsiness. Spirit has never seen his meister this tired or this vulnerable or this human, and if his pre-determined conviction didn't have him in its grip the novelty would pull the confession right out of him anyway.

"I like you." The words have been choking him, rising up in his throat all day, but now that he says them they seem to deflate and lose their meaning under Stein's confused expression. "I really like you." Stein is still staring at him, although confusion is fading into blank disbelief now. Spirit laughs, painfully self-conscious, and almost shuts his eyes to grant himself at least the illusion of isolation. But he started this, he's the one who wanted to have this conversation, and his rarely-used determination rises up and takes control of his body, smooths the tension from his shoulders, straightens his spine, brings his eyes back up to calmly meet the meister's, and takes over his tongue and mouth.

"Look, Stein, I'm crazy about you. I have been for months, maybe for years. I've been dreaming about you and thinking about you all the time and I tried to tell myself for a while that it was just hormones but it's not, it's really not, and I know you probably don't care but I didn't want to keep on talking to you everyday like I'm not thinking about kissing every scientific thought right out of your head and I assume this will make everything horribly awkward but I'm just so tired of pretending like my heart's not trying to pound it's way out of my chest every time I'm around you and this all just seemed so stupid so I thought I should just get all this out on the table." He comes to a halt. Stein's eyes are perfectly round; Spirit realizes belatedly that the meister's glasses are gone, probably taken off while he was sleeping, and with no reflection between them they are very very green against his pallid skin and silver hair.

"Fuck," Spirit enunciates carefully. "I'm going to kiss you, okay?"

He doesn't wait for a response before he steps in and reaches out to cup his hands carefully around Stein's sleep-tangled hair and brings his too-talkative mouth to rest against Stein's lips. The meister's mouth is barely parted in the same shocked expression he has been wearing, his lips are chapped against Spirit's, and he exhales in surprise into Spirit's mouth, and Spirit is lost, wandering through the taste of Stein against his lips and the faint warmth of the other boy's skin next to his and the silky-soft threads of grey on his palms.

Spirit keeps his lips slightly separated in imitation of Stein's - he's not interested in pressuring the other boy into more - but he does inhale against the meister's lips, breathing him into his lungs for the seconds that he has like this. When he releases the meister and steps back, he holds his last breath for a long moment, clinging to what he has stolen from the half-awake body of the other boy.

Stein hasn't shut his eyes, hasn't moved, hasn't responded at all, but he hasn't stepped away either, and for the first time there is the flicker of suspicion and of hope in Spirit's mind. The weapon tries on a shaky smile and Stein gusts an exhale like he's been inadvertently holding his breath as Spirit has deliberately done.

"So." Spirit's voice comes out high and trembling and he clears his throat carefully before going on. "That's...done."

"Uh. Yeah." Stein sounds as shaken as Spirit feels, which is some small consolation.

"Uh. You don't - I mean I know something's up with you, but you don't need to tell me. I just thought - this was - easier." Spirit pulls his hand through his hair, looks away - all his brief fortitude has evaporated - and looks back. "So. Yeah."

Stein swallows visibly and pulls the door open the rest of the way. Spirit gets a glimpse of a poorly-lit interior, piles of books and tangled sheets on a narrow bed, and then Stein steps in to close the gap between them and he has eyes only for his meister. When the younger boy reaches up to thread his fingers through the long strands of Spirit's hair, the weapon stops breathing. When he pulls Spirit's head down towards his, Spirit sucks in air so hard he almost chokes.

Stein doesn't kiss like anyone Spirit has ever kissed before. The meister comes just barely close enough for their lips to touch, so the counterpoint rhythm of their breathing pulls them out of contact and then pushes them back together. Spirit's never been more aware of the ebb and flow of air in his lungs or in Stein's. When the meister carefully moves his mouth, Spirit holds utterly still and lets the shift of those chapped lips drag over his with spine-tingling sensitivity. Just before the younger boy steps back, he runs the very edge of his tongue against the part of Spirit's mouth. The weapon is still shivering when the meister pulls away, and Stein's fingers stay in Spirit's hair, idly toying with the strands like he has forgotten Spirit is someone else.

The smile on Stein's face is lopsided and shy, but his eyes are glowing now like Spirit's never seen them do before, and there is an openness in his face that sparks through Spirit's blood like fire.

"Fair's fair," he says, and then Spirit is smiling too.