******************************
"COULD YOU PLEASE KEEP IT DOWN IN THERE?!?"
Kyoko Tsunabe banged against the wall with the ball of her fist, trying to be heard over the din. Goddam appartments. She was entering her third year of university, and had finally saved up enough money from her part-time job to move out into a 2 1/2 with her boyfriend. Finally, she had thought, she would be able to study in the peace and quiet of her own home.
Right. What a joke.
A few short weeks after she had moved in, she had begun to hear the noises. At first, she thought maybe she had moved in next door to a couple of homocidal maniacs the screaming was so loud. She really would have preferred that to the truth of what was she realized was going on over there. At the moment, it sounded as though about 20 moaning people were banging their fists, aluminum chairs, chains, brothers, and howling cats against the wall. And she had to go to work the next morning.
Next to her, in bed, her boyfriend lay with a pillow curled around his silver-capped head to drown out the noise. He had had a tortured past, and as she looked at him in the dim light she smiled. Who would have thought that he was really such a softie? Listening to his breathing, Kyoko knew that he wasn't asleep - with that racket, sleep was downright impossible - and poked him on one of his many scars.
"Hey," she said sweetly, "that noise is so gross. Couldn't you go over there and tell them to quit it, in the name of your girlfriend's delicate sensibilities?"
Her boyfriend curled further into a ball, tightening the pillow around his ears. "I would'n go over there if ya paid me."
Kyoko scootched closer to him, wrapping an arm around his shoulder. "But don't you know them from some where?" She recalled an incident in which they had brushed past one of her neighbours on the street, and he had begun talking to her boyfriend in a very familiar way. He had even known his name. "Weren't they friends of yours once, or something?"
Kyoko's boyfriend rolled over, turning his back to her.
"Nope. I've never met those perverts before in m'life."
****************************************************************
Stretching out in the dim light of an early Saturday morning, tangled in a disarray of pillows and sheets, Schuldig stretched out with a contented sigh. Beside him Aya was still asleep, softly dozing with his face on Schuldig's chest and his hair cascading down in soft locks. The bed was not very large, and the four men were pressed closely together beneath the damp fabric. Yoji, already awake, leaned an arm against the open window pane smoking a cigarette.
Schuldig looked over, seeing the blonde's slender, naked form etched in contour by the light. Yoji must be giving the street quite a show, he thought to himself. Also, I could really use a smoke.
"Hey, Yo-tan."
Yoji nodded to Schuldig, leaning out the window and calling out to a woman who seemed to have become distracted from her early-morning jog. "Hey, why don't you take a picture, it'll last longer!" He leaned back in, sauntering proudly over and seating himself of the edge of the bed. He extended his hand .
Schuldig leaned over, not wanting to wake Aya but really needing some tabacco in his system. As he took a long haul, listening to the paper burning between his fingers, Ken lifted his head and looked at the two men with groggy eyes. His hair was almost wild, and he looked, other than the fact that he was being spooned by a hansome American, like a young boy just getting up for school.
Schuldig smiled at him, the cigarette between his lips. He winked. "See? I told you you wouldn't miss your turn."
Ken smiled broadly, and buried his face back in the comfort of the down pillows.
Craving sated, Schuldig passed the cigarette back to Yoji and took a deep breath. "Ahhh..." he sighed, mulling over memories of the night, "it really is TGIF."
Yoji squinted against the smoke, nodding assent.
"Still..." Schuldig continued, reaching out and pulling Yoji onto the vacant half of his chest, "the week just has so many days. We really should do this more often."
Yoji smiled, crushing the cigarette out in the ashtray on the nightstand. He ran a hand up Schuldig's chest, and leaned in to kiss his lips.
"Oh, definitely."