Title: Not Quite So Good
Author: Ceresi
Rating: R
Summary: "Scars are scars, stripes of skin with no feeling -- flesh ripped and healed, not quite so good as before." Seto's thinking. Drabblefic.
Author's Notes: Because I am apparently an utter t00b . . . I consider anything under 2000 words to be drabblish. Sorry for the confusion from the last drabblefic.
***
Seto doesn't have many scars -- two, actually.
The first is on the heel of his right hand, memento of a stressful meeting and a reckless jab with some scissors. It aches, every now and then, and serves as a reminder of Seto's occaisional irritation-spawned stupidity. He doesn't like to think about it.
He likes to think about his other scar even less. It's a thin white stripe above his left ear, covered mostly by his hair.
He was arguing with Gozaburo, playing the cocky prince. It was during the tumultuous, frightening transition from KaibaCorp heir to KaibaCorp CEO -- everything Seto said and did for those few weeks was a lie. His bravado was just a part of it.
Mokuba told him afterwards what happened -- Gozaburo, in a fit of temper, hit him. Seto lost his footing and fell, bashing his head into the railing and nearly snapping his neck.
Gozaburo left, uncaring of the bleeding boy at the foot of the stairs, as Mokuba ran through the mansion, searching for a phone, calling an ambulance. Mokuba didn't say that he had been crying at the time, he didn't say that he'd been horrified and panicked by the sight of Seto's blood, but Seto knew. He knew.
He knew, he knows, and he doesn't want to think about how Mokuba's small voice would have sounded to the operator, choked with tears. He doesn't want to think about Mokuba standing over his body, blood drenching his socks. He doesn't want to think -- he doesn't. He won't. Think about it.
Gozaburo visited him in the hospital. Mokuba told anyone who would listen that Seto didn't trip, that Gozaburo hit him. Seto was forced to lie -- he remembered the betrayal and hurt that crossed Mokuba's face.
Of course he couldn't tell on Gozaburo. If their foster father was arrested, he and Mokuba would go back to the orphanage. And he was so close . . . .
He tried to apologize. He did.
And then two weeks later, he threw Mokuba to the floor and shouted at him, called him a traitor. Even years later, he prays with whatever's left of his soul that Mokuba can forgive him. Somehow.
Those are his only scars. Joey, however, has scars everywhere -- his arms, his legs, his chest, his back, even his scalp, like a stray dog that's been in too many fights.
Seto found them after the second night they spent together, when he began his routine of waking before Joey and watching him sleep. His first panicky thought was that these were from Joey's father -- that Joey was simply a better actor than anyone ever realized, that these were signs of the abuse -- that Joey had been mistreated and harmed for years --
-- his vision greyed and his hands clenched. His thoughts turned towards murder.
But those thoughts faded quickly. Joey would never put up with something like that. And even if he did, his friends -- no matter how naive and idiotic they might be at times -- would put a stop to it.
No, these scars were from something else.
~
He and Joey wound up giving each other a demonstration of their fighting styles: Joey's of the street, Seto's of the dojo. Late that night, both of them sprawled and nude on the training mat, Seto realized that the few blows he landed on Joey's body overlapped old scars.
Seto knows how to fight. He's been taught by the best that money can buy, and he's spent more time practicing than he has sleeping -- after all, martial arts might save his life. What's sleep do?
But Joey knows how to fight, too. Someone -- or many someones --taught him.
Seto longs to know their names, their faces, so that he can destroy them. Slowly.
Joey wears so much on the outside -- his emotions in his face, his poverty in his clothes. And he wears the lesson of defense on his skin, traced in a painful pattern of scars. Seto learned to fight in armor, with a mat to catch him. Joey learned through broken bones and bruises, torn skin and blood.
~
Seto doesn't kiss Joey's scars. He's never understood why so many sentimental idiots do. Scars are scars, stripes of skin with no feeling -- flesh ripped and healed, not quite so good as before.
But Seto's traces the scars with his fingers. He memorizes them for a brief time, until he's called away to Milan or New York or Hong Kong on business. And when he comes back, he finds that he hasn't memorized them after all. There are some that he has inevitably forgotten.
Seto tries to remember. He can't explain why he finds it important. There is nothing beautiful about Joey's scars, vivid against the gold of his skin, there's nothing erotic. But he wants to remember.
One boring night in L.A., a movie came on the TV and he let it play, watched the sex scene with a certain clinical detachment. He couldn't quite grasp it's appeal. He had no desire for those airbrushed bodies, smooth and unmarred, perfect, nor for those unstained silk sheets.
When his eyes closed, he saw tan skin, paler along the chest and legs, nearly white across the hips. His lips parted, tongue seeking the taste of sweat and tears. He thought of a scar beneath a shoulder blade, of the inelegant, sexy sounds that Joey made when Seto was inside him. His fingers twitched, wanting to touch -- his body ached, longing for remembered warmth and weight.
He doesn't understand Joey's scars or why he likes them. Once, they might have been a source of ridicule. But now he finds them inexplicably beatiful, imperfect parts of a perfect whole.
~
Joey is sleeping. Seto doesn't bother to wake him.
His hands slip down Joey's chest, his fingers caressing a scar along his ribcage. Joey stirs, moves towards him, sighing in his sleep. He's like a furnace beneath the blankets, warm enough to keep even Seto warm.
Seto touches him a while longer, soothing himself, smirking as Joey snuffles and squirms, ticklish even in sleep. His smirk fades, replaced by something soft.
He has this body memorized. And eventually, he falls asleep.