A/N: This part contains sex. Please don't read it if you think it will offend you.
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Six
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Youji threw himself down on Aya's bed, nearly misjudging and tumbling off the edge. The redhead wasn't in his room, but the lamp was on, so he hadn't gone far. The window was closed against the pre-winter chill, the room comfortably warm. The blonde stretched, his belly-baring shirt rising up his chest and Youji decided he was warm enough without it. He stripped out of it, tossing it carelessly across the room. His boots had been left by the back door, damp and a little muddy from not missing a puddle in the back lot.
Settling back against the mattress, Youji sighed, tucking his hands behind his head, wanting a cigarette, but since he didn't have a death wish, he refrained. He lay there for a minute, finally deciding his pants needed to go. Unsteadily, he stood to unfasten them, stopping when the door opened and Aya stepped through, a bath towel wrapped haphazardly around his waist.
Aya stopped short. "What are you doing here?"
"What's it look like?" Youji winked and grinned, stalking forward. He pressed himself against Aya, standing in the middle of the room, dripping a little, still damp from his shower, warm and fresh smelling. Youji stepped closer, breathing the moist air around the slim form of his lover, bringing their bodies together. Slowly, he leaned forward, dipping his head slightly and meeting Aya's lips with his own.
Youji pressed the kiss deeper, turning them around so Aya stumbled back toward the bed with Youji leaning against him. The towel wrapped tenuously around the pale man's waist came loose, tangling around his legs. When his knees hit the bed, Aya sat, Youji's momentum pressing him back.
Youji pulled away when the need for air overrode the delicious feeling and taste of Aya's mouth. He used the opportunity to push his pants down over his hips and kick them over the side of the bed while Aya slid further back so his legs were no longer hanging over the edge. Restrictive material gone, Youji draped himself over Aya, pressing his lips against Aya's again for a brief moment, then trailing wet, open mouthed kisses over his jaw, down his throat and over his chest.
He continued down, tracing a line with his tongue down the center of Aya's chest, bringing his hands up to tease nipples into hard points, listening to Aya's breath become more ragged, less controlled as the more base demands of his body took over. When he reached Aya's belly button he paid it special attention, laving it with his tongue, feeling Aya's cock twitch at the sensations.
He moved further down finally, taking Aya into his mouth, breathing through his nose the scent of his lover, soap and musk. He wrapped his tongue around Aya's length, pulling back slowly, exhaling through his nose, trying not to grin at the small gasp Aya made at the contrasting sensations. Youji used his tongue to push aside Aya's foreskin and lap at the fluid leaking from the tip of his cock, Aya's hips arching up, seeking more contact as his body shivered in reaction to the intense stimulus.
Youji felt hands tangle in his hair, clenching, but not uncomfortably tight as he took Aya into his mouth again. He relaxed his throat as far as he could, burying his nose in the rough red curls at the base of Aya's shaft. Aya's legs came up around his waist as he began to suck, the slightly rough skin on the redhead's heels scraping across his lower back, sending a ripple of pleasure straight to his groin.
He moaned in response, Aya's hand's tightening against his scalp as the vibrations traveled up his erection. Youji guessed he liked that when he repeated the caress, causing Youji to shiver and focus on what he was doing so he didn't hurt him, starting to hum intermittently as he sucked gently, his own arousal climbing higher as Aya stroked one foot over his back and worked the other between them and pressed it against Youji's throbbing erection.
The sudden press against his straining cock surprised him. Youji knew Aya was flexible, but fuck. He began to lose his concentration as Aya's foot rubbed against him in counter rhythm to the motions Youji was making with his mouth. The blonde loosed his hold on one of Aya's hips, allowing the redhead a little more freedom of movement, and trailing his fingers over pale thighs to cup his balls, running the tip of a finger over one, then the other, feeling Aya begin to squirm and thrust a little more in earnest.
Youji relaxed his throat farther, wrapping his tongue around Aya's cock, increasing the pressure he applied. He felt Aya's balls draw up against his hand, felt him stiffen under the hand still on his hip an instant before he came silently, hot and bitter across Youji's tongue. He swallowed what he could, reveling in the taste for a minute; as much as he disliked it, he let the taste of this time combine with the alcohol and fuzzy memories to create something new to replace the images of the night before.
Youji pulled back, letting Aya's softening length slip from his mouth as he settled back on his haunches. He gasped, Aya's foot, forgotten for a moment, pressing against him, toes sliding against the underside of his erection, a nail lightly scraping.
Batting Aya's foot aside, Youji looked down at the redhead, pale skin practically glowing with a sheen of sweat, naked chest rising with each breath, still quickened from the rush of release. Damn, but Aya was gorgeous, he thought as he wrapped a hand around his cock, allowing himself one long, satisfying stroke from root to tip, thumb pushing back foreskin, swirling fluid over the sensitive tip.
"Wait."
Youji stopped suddenly, unaccustomed to words that weren't his in Aya's bed. Purple eyes gazed up at him from under crimson bangs. One of Aya's hands slid up the bed, rasping against the sheets as he reached under the pillow. He produced a tube, half depleted, squeezed from the middle, a little battered. Aya offered it to Youji and the blonde took it hesitantly, searching for the understanding and finding it with the want glowing in the violet eyes.
Aya looked away, perhaps embarrassed by the need that had so clearly been written on his face. He rolled onto his side putting his back to the blonde, still kneeling in the middle of the bed.
He had often wondered what Aya got out of these little encounters, in the morning, when he was sober enough to care about the other man's obviously fragile feelings under that veneer of ice. But he had never found an answer. Aya and his motivations were still as confusing as they were the day he had first laid eyes on the redhead.
Stretching out next to Aya, but not pressing up against him, Youji ghosted a hand down pale ribs. "Don't worry about me, baby," he whispered. "If you don't want to ..."
"I've never worried about you before, why should I start now?" Aya's voice was quiet, but cutting just the same.
"Mmmm, keep talking, baby." Youji pressed his lips to Aya's spine, moving up slowly, savoring the clean taste of his skin. Aya's breath hitched almost imperceptibly when he reached the juncture between his neck and shoulder.
"Shut up," Aya growled, but turned his head to give Youji access to his neck just the same.
Youji obliged both requests, focusing his attention on the pale column of flesh, feeling the strong steady heartbeat under his lips, the soft catch in Aya's breath when he scraped teeth gently over a familiar spot, followed by a swipe of his tongue to soothe the sting. His hands continued to ghost over Aya's skin as he patiently brought a mark to the surface of Aya's neck. It was rare that the redhead let himself be marked, but Youji plunged ahead, hands brushing over Aya's returning erection.
Satisfied with the bruise he raised, Youji trailed his lips up the curve of Aya's jaw.
"I want to fuck you," Youji breathed into Aya's ear, nuzzling at the long tail of hair hanging in his path.
"So do it already." Aya's reply was breathy, his hips arching into Youji's searching hand.
Searching with one hand, using the other to tease Aya into full hardness, Youji located to the lube among the bed sheets, easily getting the cap off with one hand. He rose to his knees again, straddling Aya as the smaller man rolled onto his back as he squeezed lube into the palm of his hand, spreading it over his fingers.
Youji pressed a slicked finger into Aya slowly, easing past the tight ring of muscle. He moved the finger around, pressing deeper, loosening and stretching. Youji added a second finger, scissoring until he thought Aya was stretched enough to take him. Youji was painfully hard, and when he slicked himself with lube he was tempted to continue to stroke, but Aya's legs came up to hook over Youji's shoulders.
Youji shifted to line himself up and pressed forward, entering Aya with a smooth motion. He paused, head tossed back in bliss. This was where he belonged, in this moment, with this man. "Fuck, Aya," he breathed, withdrawing almost completely, then slamming back in. He shifted once again, positioning so each stroke raked across Aya's prostate.
Youji felt ready to explode, painfully aroused for too long, the tight heat of Aya's body around him driving him faster, Aya's hands on his hips pulling him closer, urging him faster, deeper. Youji needed little encouragement.
His thrusts soon reached a fevered pace, Youji's body leaning forward, pressing his lips to Aya's, trapping the redhead's erection between their bodies as he moved, Youji feeling the precum leave a trail on his chest.
He pulled back and leered at Aya even as he continued to pound him into the mattress, the redhead's eyes closed, hips arching up to meet each thrust. Aya needed to be fucked as much as Youji wanted to fuck him, the blonde realized through a haze of lust.
"Open your eyes, lover," Youji gasped, feeling himself tighten, heat coiling low and deep within.
"Don't call me that," Aya growled but opened his eyes.
Youji lost himself at that moment, coming deep inside Aya as he stared into violet eyes gone darker with passion. He continued to thrust, feeling Aya climax again, warm stickiness spreading across his chest.
Youji fell forward, unable to hold himself up any longer. He lay atop Aya for a minute, eyes closed, breathing harshly the clean scent of the man beneath him.
It took just a moment for Aya to push him aside with a growl. Youji was used to it. Sex was fine, but nothing more. No post coital cuddling, no words other than "get out". As he tumbled over the side of the bed, Aya's shove more forceful than he had anticipated, he wondered once again what Aya got out of these nights spent together. Aya never sought Youji out, but Youji knew that the younger man would most likely be awake when he decided to stagger home at night, demons sufficiently drowned for him to sleep.
Youji glanced back at the redhead as he scooped his shirt and boots. Aya was still lying on his back, staring up at the ceiling, ignoring Youji as the blonde gathered his things like a whore.
He stopped suddenly, the thought burning through his mind. Is that how Aya saw him, like Ken did, the resident whore? What remained of the alcohol induced buzz he'd come home with evaporated at that moment, along with the pleasant haze of euphoria from one of the best orgasms he'd had in a while. His despair of the previous night came crashing back down on him in a wave that was almost physically painful. He sucked in a breath as he tore his eyes away from the oblivious man on the bed, the sound of it feeling like a sonic boom in the silence of the room.
He finished gathering his things and he left, not daring to look back in Aya's direction. It hurt too much to be used and discarded, and he doubted that Aya felt more used than he did at the moment. Youji fled to his room, trying to outrun the emotions he didn't want to acknowledge, didn't want to think about. If Aya didn't care than why should he?
Youji dumped his things on the floor of his room, retrieved a full pack of cigarettes from the dresser and grabbed a shirt off the chair near the closet, shrugging into it as he mounted the stairs to the roof.
"I've never worried about you before, why should I start now?" Aya's words floated back at him as he stepped into the chill autumn night, drawing in a deep breath of city air. He shook loose a cigarette, sticking it between his lips and lighting it, stuffing his hands into his pockets as he paced, the tar roof cold under his bare feet if he didn't keep moving.
It was true; Aya had never worried about him. It wasn't like theirs was a normal relationship of give and take; it was just sex. No emotional attachment, just a way to burn off energy, to find release.
With practiced ease Youji puffed away at his cigarette without using his hands, holding the tube at the corner of his mouth, lips damp enough to stick to the paper. Why the hell had he started this whole mess in the first place? He'd been drunk, he'd been horny, but there had been more to it. He'd been lonely.
Since taking down Riot and watching yet another girl die at their hands, Youji had stopped finding dates. He was contaminated. Like the legendary Typhoid Mary of turn of the century America that his mother told him tales of, Youji spread death to the women of Tokyo, all the while being spared of it himself. The men he'd picked up after that had been good, a distraction, but it wasn't enough. The one-night stands didn't work for him anymore.
So he drank and came home, locked himself in his room and drank some more until he passed out. It kept him from having to think, kept him from feeling.
But that night…he'd come home earlier than usual, the band at the bar not worth listening to, and Youji himself too sloshed to find a new bar to get served. Aya had still been awake, had probably been curled up on the couch reading until Youji had stumbled through the back door. And there had been the answer he'd been seeking.
Aya. They lived together, they killed together. Aya was maybe the one person he could not spread death to, because Aya also carried that disease. And Aya was a gorgeous man, at times seeming to have been carved from marble, and not just in his outward appearance. And Youji had been just drunk enough to act on his thoughts. Maybe he could melt some of that icy façade, reach the passionate man he knew had to reside underneath. He'd seen that passion, usually applied to taking out targets, specifically cutting down Takatori, but he'd seen it.
And he wanted to see it again, applied to something more life affirming.
Aya hadn't resisted too much, the beating Youji half expected never landing. And after, Aya had kicked him out. They repeated the scenario over months, but the closeness Youji hadn't dared to hope for never happened. Their relationship never extended past sex. Aya didn't seem to care about him past a working relationship.
Yet there were hints. Youji, as dazed and shocked as he had been, had seen the glow of anger in Aya's eyes when he realized what had happened in that room in the bar. And he'd woken up the next morning draped with a blanket in the chair in Aya's room, the redhead still fast asleep in his own nest of covers.
It all could have been explained away, Youji thought as he lit a fresh cigarette with the end of the one he'd just about finished, flicking the butt over the edge of the roof. The mission hadn't gone as planned and that was bound to have pissed Aya off. As for falling asleep in the chair…that wasn't so easily ignored.
But still nothing melted that icy exterior Aya projected, though Youji had tried. He longed to see what was underneath, to understand the redhead. Omi he could talk to, Ken he could take out for a drink. But Aya, even though they shared something intimate, wouldn't open up to him, wouldn't let himself be known.
And Youji was still as alone as he had been that night he'd asked Aya to go upstairs with him.
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Six
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Youji threw himself down on Aya's bed, nearly misjudging and tumbling off the edge. The redhead wasn't in his room, but the lamp was on, so he hadn't gone far. The window was closed against the pre-winter chill, the room comfortably warm. The blonde stretched, his belly-baring shirt rising up his chest and Youji decided he was warm enough without it. He stripped out of it, tossing it carelessly across the room. His boots had been left by the back door, damp and a little muddy from not missing a puddle in the back lot.
Settling back against the mattress, Youji sighed, tucking his hands behind his head, wanting a cigarette, but since he didn't have a death wish, he refrained. He lay there for a minute, finally deciding his pants needed to go. Unsteadily, he stood to unfasten them, stopping when the door opened and Aya stepped through, a bath towel wrapped haphazardly around his waist.
Aya stopped short. "What are you doing here?"
"What's it look like?" Youji winked and grinned, stalking forward. He pressed himself against Aya, standing in the middle of the room, dripping a little, still damp from his shower, warm and fresh smelling. Youji stepped closer, breathing the moist air around the slim form of his lover, bringing their bodies together. Slowly, he leaned forward, dipping his head slightly and meeting Aya's lips with his own.
Youji pressed the kiss deeper, turning them around so Aya stumbled back toward the bed with Youji leaning against him. The towel wrapped tenuously around the pale man's waist came loose, tangling around his legs. When his knees hit the bed, Aya sat, Youji's momentum pressing him back.
Youji pulled away when the need for air overrode the delicious feeling and taste of Aya's mouth. He used the opportunity to push his pants down over his hips and kick them over the side of the bed while Aya slid further back so his legs were no longer hanging over the edge. Restrictive material gone, Youji draped himself over Aya, pressing his lips against Aya's again for a brief moment, then trailing wet, open mouthed kisses over his jaw, down his throat and over his chest.
He continued down, tracing a line with his tongue down the center of Aya's chest, bringing his hands up to tease nipples into hard points, listening to Aya's breath become more ragged, less controlled as the more base demands of his body took over. When he reached Aya's belly button he paid it special attention, laving it with his tongue, feeling Aya's cock twitch at the sensations.
He moved further down finally, taking Aya into his mouth, breathing through his nose the scent of his lover, soap and musk. He wrapped his tongue around Aya's length, pulling back slowly, exhaling through his nose, trying not to grin at the small gasp Aya made at the contrasting sensations. Youji used his tongue to push aside Aya's foreskin and lap at the fluid leaking from the tip of his cock, Aya's hips arching up, seeking more contact as his body shivered in reaction to the intense stimulus.
Youji felt hands tangle in his hair, clenching, but not uncomfortably tight as he took Aya into his mouth again. He relaxed his throat as far as he could, burying his nose in the rough red curls at the base of Aya's shaft. Aya's legs came up around his waist as he began to suck, the slightly rough skin on the redhead's heels scraping across his lower back, sending a ripple of pleasure straight to his groin.
He moaned in response, Aya's hand's tightening against his scalp as the vibrations traveled up his erection. Youji guessed he liked that when he repeated the caress, causing Youji to shiver and focus on what he was doing so he didn't hurt him, starting to hum intermittently as he sucked gently, his own arousal climbing higher as Aya stroked one foot over his back and worked the other between them and pressed it against Youji's throbbing erection.
The sudden press against his straining cock surprised him. Youji knew Aya was flexible, but fuck. He began to lose his concentration as Aya's foot rubbed against him in counter rhythm to the motions Youji was making with his mouth. The blonde loosed his hold on one of Aya's hips, allowing the redhead a little more freedom of movement, and trailing his fingers over pale thighs to cup his balls, running the tip of a finger over one, then the other, feeling Aya begin to squirm and thrust a little more in earnest.
Youji relaxed his throat farther, wrapping his tongue around Aya's cock, increasing the pressure he applied. He felt Aya's balls draw up against his hand, felt him stiffen under the hand still on his hip an instant before he came silently, hot and bitter across Youji's tongue. He swallowed what he could, reveling in the taste for a minute; as much as he disliked it, he let the taste of this time combine with the alcohol and fuzzy memories to create something new to replace the images of the night before.
Youji pulled back, letting Aya's softening length slip from his mouth as he settled back on his haunches. He gasped, Aya's foot, forgotten for a moment, pressing against him, toes sliding against the underside of his erection, a nail lightly scraping.
Batting Aya's foot aside, Youji looked down at the redhead, pale skin practically glowing with a sheen of sweat, naked chest rising with each breath, still quickened from the rush of release. Damn, but Aya was gorgeous, he thought as he wrapped a hand around his cock, allowing himself one long, satisfying stroke from root to tip, thumb pushing back foreskin, swirling fluid over the sensitive tip.
"Wait."
Youji stopped suddenly, unaccustomed to words that weren't his in Aya's bed. Purple eyes gazed up at him from under crimson bangs. One of Aya's hands slid up the bed, rasping against the sheets as he reached under the pillow. He produced a tube, half depleted, squeezed from the middle, a little battered. Aya offered it to Youji and the blonde took it hesitantly, searching for the understanding and finding it with the want glowing in the violet eyes.
Aya looked away, perhaps embarrassed by the need that had so clearly been written on his face. He rolled onto his side putting his back to the blonde, still kneeling in the middle of the bed.
He had often wondered what Aya got out of these little encounters, in the morning, when he was sober enough to care about the other man's obviously fragile feelings under that veneer of ice. But he had never found an answer. Aya and his motivations were still as confusing as they were the day he had first laid eyes on the redhead.
Stretching out next to Aya, but not pressing up against him, Youji ghosted a hand down pale ribs. "Don't worry about me, baby," he whispered. "If you don't want to ..."
"I've never worried about you before, why should I start now?" Aya's voice was quiet, but cutting just the same.
"Mmmm, keep talking, baby." Youji pressed his lips to Aya's spine, moving up slowly, savoring the clean taste of his skin. Aya's breath hitched almost imperceptibly when he reached the juncture between his neck and shoulder.
"Shut up," Aya growled, but turned his head to give Youji access to his neck just the same.
Youji obliged both requests, focusing his attention on the pale column of flesh, feeling the strong steady heartbeat under his lips, the soft catch in Aya's breath when he scraped teeth gently over a familiar spot, followed by a swipe of his tongue to soothe the sting. His hands continued to ghost over Aya's skin as he patiently brought a mark to the surface of Aya's neck. It was rare that the redhead let himself be marked, but Youji plunged ahead, hands brushing over Aya's returning erection.
Satisfied with the bruise he raised, Youji trailed his lips up the curve of Aya's jaw.
"I want to fuck you," Youji breathed into Aya's ear, nuzzling at the long tail of hair hanging in his path.
"So do it already." Aya's reply was breathy, his hips arching into Youji's searching hand.
Searching with one hand, using the other to tease Aya into full hardness, Youji located to the lube among the bed sheets, easily getting the cap off with one hand. He rose to his knees again, straddling Aya as the smaller man rolled onto his back as he squeezed lube into the palm of his hand, spreading it over his fingers.
Youji pressed a slicked finger into Aya slowly, easing past the tight ring of muscle. He moved the finger around, pressing deeper, loosening and stretching. Youji added a second finger, scissoring until he thought Aya was stretched enough to take him. Youji was painfully hard, and when he slicked himself with lube he was tempted to continue to stroke, but Aya's legs came up to hook over Youji's shoulders.
Youji shifted to line himself up and pressed forward, entering Aya with a smooth motion. He paused, head tossed back in bliss. This was where he belonged, in this moment, with this man. "Fuck, Aya," he breathed, withdrawing almost completely, then slamming back in. He shifted once again, positioning so each stroke raked across Aya's prostate.
Youji felt ready to explode, painfully aroused for too long, the tight heat of Aya's body around him driving him faster, Aya's hands on his hips pulling him closer, urging him faster, deeper. Youji needed little encouragement.
His thrusts soon reached a fevered pace, Youji's body leaning forward, pressing his lips to Aya's, trapping the redhead's erection between their bodies as he moved, Youji feeling the precum leave a trail on his chest.
He pulled back and leered at Aya even as he continued to pound him into the mattress, the redhead's eyes closed, hips arching up to meet each thrust. Aya needed to be fucked as much as Youji wanted to fuck him, the blonde realized through a haze of lust.
"Open your eyes, lover," Youji gasped, feeling himself tighten, heat coiling low and deep within.
"Don't call me that," Aya growled but opened his eyes.
Youji lost himself at that moment, coming deep inside Aya as he stared into violet eyes gone darker with passion. He continued to thrust, feeling Aya climax again, warm stickiness spreading across his chest.
Youji fell forward, unable to hold himself up any longer. He lay atop Aya for a minute, eyes closed, breathing harshly the clean scent of the man beneath him.
It took just a moment for Aya to push him aside with a growl. Youji was used to it. Sex was fine, but nothing more. No post coital cuddling, no words other than "get out". As he tumbled over the side of the bed, Aya's shove more forceful than he had anticipated, he wondered once again what Aya got out of these nights spent together. Aya never sought Youji out, but Youji knew that the younger man would most likely be awake when he decided to stagger home at night, demons sufficiently drowned for him to sleep.
Youji glanced back at the redhead as he scooped his shirt and boots. Aya was still lying on his back, staring up at the ceiling, ignoring Youji as the blonde gathered his things like a whore.
He stopped suddenly, the thought burning through his mind. Is that how Aya saw him, like Ken did, the resident whore? What remained of the alcohol induced buzz he'd come home with evaporated at that moment, along with the pleasant haze of euphoria from one of the best orgasms he'd had in a while. His despair of the previous night came crashing back down on him in a wave that was almost physically painful. He sucked in a breath as he tore his eyes away from the oblivious man on the bed, the sound of it feeling like a sonic boom in the silence of the room.
He finished gathering his things and he left, not daring to look back in Aya's direction. It hurt too much to be used and discarded, and he doubted that Aya felt more used than he did at the moment. Youji fled to his room, trying to outrun the emotions he didn't want to acknowledge, didn't want to think about. If Aya didn't care than why should he?
Youji dumped his things on the floor of his room, retrieved a full pack of cigarettes from the dresser and grabbed a shirt off the chair near the closet, shrugging into it as he mounted the stairs to the roof.
"I've never worried about you before, why should I start now?" Aya's words floated back at him as he stepped into the chill autumn night, drawing in a deep breath of city air. He shook loose a cigarette, sticking it between his lips and lighting it, stuffing his hands into his pockets as he paced, the tar roof cold under his bare feet if he didn't keep moving.
It was true; Aya had never worried about him. It wasn't like theirs was a normal relationship of give and take; it was just sex. No emotional attachment, just a way to burn off energy, to find release.
With practiced ease Youji puffed away at his cigarette without using his hands, holding the tube at the corner of his mouth, lips damp enough to stick to the paper. Why the hell had he started this whole mess in the first place? He'd been drunk, he'd been horny, but there had been more to it. He'd been lonely.
Since taking down Riot and watching yet another girl die at their hands, Youji had stopped finding dates. He was contaminated. Like the legendary Typhoid Mary of turn of the century America that his mother told him tales of, Youji spread death to the women of Tokyo, all the while being spared of it himself. The men he'd picked up after that had been good, a distraction, but it wasn't enough. The one-night stands didn't work for him anymore.
So he drank and came home, locked himself in his room and drank some more until he passed out. It kept him from having to think, kept him from feeling.
But that night…he'd come home earlier than usual, the band at the bar not worth listening to, and Youji himself too sloshed to find a new bar to get served. Aya had still been awake, had probably been curled up on the couch reading until Youji had stumbled through the back door. And there had been the answer he'd been seeking.
Aya. They lived together, they killed together. Aya was maybe the one person he could not spread death to, because Aya also carried that disease. And Aya was a gorgeous man, at times seeming to have been carved from marble, and not just in his outward appearance. And Youji had been just drunk enough to act on his thoughts. Maybe he could melt some of that icy façade, reach the passionate man he knew had to reside underneath. He'd seen that passion, usually applied to taking out targets, specifically cutting down Takatori, but he'd seen it.
And he wanted to see it again, applied to something more life affirming.
Aya hadn't resisted too much, the beating Youji half expected never landing. And after, Aya had kicked him out. They repeated the scenario over months, but the closeness Youji hadn't dared to hope for never happened. Their relationship never extended past sex. Aya didn't seem to care about him past a working relationship.
Yet there were hints. Youji, as dazed and shocked as he had been, had seen the glow of anger in Aya's eyes when he realized what had happened in that room in the bar. And he'd woken up the next morning draped with a blanket in the chair in Aya's room, the redhead still fast asleep in his own nest of covers.
It all could have been explained away, Youji thought as he lit a fresh cigarette with the end of the one he'd just about finished, flicking the butt over the edge of the roof. The mission hadn't gone as planned and that was bound to have pissed Aya off. As for falling asleep in the chair…that wasn't so easily ignored.
But still nothing melted that icy exterior Aya projected, though Youji had tried. He longed to see what was underneath, to understand the redhead. Omi he could talk to, Ken he could take out for a drink. But Aya, even though they shared something intimate, wouldn't open up to him, wouldn't let himself be known.
And Youji was still as alone as he had been that night he'd asked Aya to go upstairs with him.