Apologies for the inconvenience, but we ended up editing this chapter for FF.net too. But this should be the last one. ^^ Like before, the unedited version is at my site, mediaminer, or here:
(sans spaces)
http:// adultfan.nexcess.net / aff / story.php?no=14804&chapter=18
Kaiba knew things were getting domestic when he tripped over toys in his own bedroom. Or maybe it was that after tripping over said toys, he was able to turn around and bitch at Joey for it, who was in his bed with his head buried under a pillow to block out Kaiba's swearing.
"Damn it, if the kid has toys in his own room, what the hell are they doing in mine?" Kaiba demanded. That was another sign that things were getting homey: ever since the night in the apartment, Joey had ended up staying with Kaiba often enough that one of the guestrooms became Alex's unofficial bedroom.
Joey grumbled, "He's a kid; kids make messes."
"I know that." Kaiba sighed. "You're hopeless."
"Good. Let the hopeless sleep."
"You've got work today."
Joey groaned and lifted the pillow enough to look at the bedside clock. "In two hours – that's an hour and a half to sleep." With that he dramatically pulled the pillow down onto his head.
It was just like they had done every morning for nearly two weeks. Well, sans the toys; it was the first morning that Kaiba had stepped on any toys. And like always, Joey would probably still be asleep when Kaiba left, and the kid would be running around with the staff. Yet somehow Joey would make it to work on time. Then they would be boss and employee; there would be no mention, not even the slightest joke or hint, of what may have happened the night before… or that morning.
After work Joey would head to his apartment after work, and do whatever it was he did at his apartment while Kaiba was at work. He would call around eight or nine to see if Kaiba was home; if he was, then Joey would toss the kid in his car and head over. He almost always stayed the night, and the ritual would continue the next morning.
Kaiba had started making it home before nine, but never earlier than eight.
He frowned at Joey's sleeping form; the blond's head was still hidden beneath the pillow, and he was mostly cocooned in blankets. They had fallen into a routine without him noticing. It was a little bothersome, but mostly just surprising – Kaiba couldn't remember a time when his life fit so perfectly into a mold.
He needed to shake it up a little bit. "Up," he ordered, stepping forward to take Joey's pillow.
"No," Joey protested, eyes firmly shut.
"Yes."
"Why?"
"Because you're going to take a shower."
"I shower when I get home from work."
"No," Kaiba corrected, "you'll shower now."
"And if I don't?" Joey challenged, and one eye popped open to look at Kaiba.
"Then I'll give you a reason to." Come to think of it, he rather liked that alternative better than making Joey shower – they DID have two hours…
"Fine," Joey grunted, rolling onto his back and sitting up. He made his way to the bathroom, closing the door behind him. There was the sound of more stumbling, then of something metal clattering to the floor. "Damn, Kaiba! How many light-switches does one bathroom need?" Joey shouted.
"It's not like I put them there," Kaiba called back, looking around the room. Usually he'd be showering… He had messed with the routine, and he had no idea what to do with himself. He ended up falling back onto the bed, staring at his ceiling. He wasn't on his back often, but Joey had once teasingly told him that the ceiling was interesting. Of course, Kaiba had proceeded to give him something better to focus on than the ceiling.
It wasn't some domestic dream-come-true; they still had their disagreements, and their arguments, and they didn't do things together outside the house. Not to mention that Joey was an emotional train wreck, just like Kaiba had once suspected. He could go from half-asleep and grumpy to horny in ten minutes flat; he could switch from pensive to dense in forty-five minutes without any explanation.
Actually, Joey didn't explain much of anything; he could ramble for hours about things of little consequence, and he enjoyed listening to Kaiba talk, but when it came to what he thought or felt… Well, Kaiba expected that even HE would have opened up before Joey would, and the fact that neither of them was about to spill his guts seemed to bode dangerously. The only reason he avoided getting on Joey's case for being so close-lipped was that he really wasn't much better.
Then again, it wasn't like things were horrible, either.
"Hey, wise ass!" Joey called from the bathroom doorway; there was a towel wrapped around his waist. "I don't suppose I have any clothes here, do I?"
Weirdly enough, he did. "The housekeeper put them in the bottom drawer," Kaiba explained, pointing towards his dresser.
"I'll be damned." Joey shrugged, going to the dresser and kneeling down to dig through the bottom drawer; he held the towel firmly around his waist. Kaiba smirked and leaned down behind Joey, one arm winding around his waist.
"You're so shy," Kaiba whispered in his ear, trying to ease the towel from Joey's fingers. Joey was still shy and jumpy about sex – they hadn't gotten past heavy foreplay, much to Kaiba's disappointment.
"I just took a shower."
"So?" He leaned down to kiss Joey's shoulder, fingers still working gently yet diligently to loosen Joey's grip on the soft fabric of the towel.
"I can't have you…" Joey sighed contentedly, leaning back slightly against Kaiba, "…uh, getting me all sweaty."
Kaiba smirked and gave up on the towel; he reached around it, fingers trailing teasingly over Joey's inner thigh. "We'd just have to shower again," he said simply. Joey hissed; he seemed just seconds from crumbling…
There was a knock on the door. "Mr. Kaiba," the serious voice of Kaiba's butler came from the other side, "there's a phone call from the corporation for you."
Kaiba sighed, leaning in to give Joey a mind-blowing kiss – and guessing by the look on Joey's face as he pulled away, he had succeeded. "I'll see you after work," he said as he stood.
"Uh… Oh! I'm gonna go out with Tristan and Bakura tonight; they insist."
"Is that so?" Kaiba asked, standing. Joey nodded.
"Yeah, but I'll be back by midnight, okay?"
Kaiba raised an eyebrow. "Are you asking my permission? Is this when you start calling me master and kissing my feet?"
"No!" Joey said indignantly. "Fine. I'm going out tonight, and I won't see you until midnight."
"That's better."
With a roll of his eyes Joey turned back to the dresser and took out some clothes, and Kaiba went to answer his phone call, still clad in his pajamas. It seemed they got interrupted a lot, if not by work, then by Alex, or Joey's friends, or a phone call from Mokuba… While Kaiba didn't mind hearing from Mokuba, he was surprised that he hated being disturbed so often; he couldn't remember ever wanting time alone with anyone except his brother. Joey was definitely getting under his skin, much more than Kaiba had expected he ever could.
The thought was both exhilarating and frightening.
Kaiba nearly had a heart attack when his computer chair jerked back; it was midnight, he had been absorbed in work, and he hated being snuck up on. Luckily, before he did anything drastic Joey identified himself, simply by laughing.
"Working? It's midnight, Kaiba; if you're not asleep, you should at least be relaxin' or something." Immediately Joey's hands went to brush through the brunet's hair. "I mean, look at this – you've already got some grey hair. At least it looks good there." His fingers continued to sift through Kaiba's hair, and after a minute Kaiba reached up to bat the hands away.
"There's something very wrong with you," he replied. "Go to bed; I'm busy."
Joey rounded the chair and pushed Kaiba back from the computer, grinning as he settled down to straddle his lap. "You work too hard," he said seriously. "You should call it quits for the night." He leaned down to kiss and suck on Kaiba's neck.
"You're… playful," Kaiba sighed, reaching up under Joey's shirt, urging the blond closer. "Are you drunk?"
"Nope," Joey replied, leaning away from Kaiba. "Hey, I have something for you. Close your eyes."
Kaiba raised an eyebrow. "Excuse me?"
"It's nothing bad," Joey elaborated. "I just… you know, it'll be more fun if you don't see."
With a small sigh, Kaiba obeyed. A second passed, and then he felt something pressed into his hand.
"Okay, you can look now."
Kaiba looked down at his hand, then back up at Joey. "Since when did you start giving out lube as an offering?"
Joey laughed. "I prefer to think of it less as an offering and more as a subtle way to say 'fuck me right now'," Joey explained; his hands went to the zipper of Kaiba's pants.
Kaiba wasn't fooled – assured as Joey's words were, he had heard the masked waver in them. He let his 'gift' fall into the chair and grabbed Joey by the wrists. "You mean that?"
"Yes," Joey said firmly. "Haven't we been over this before? You aren't casual, and I don't do things I don't mean. There, we understand each other, okay?" Joey's tone was impatient, even a little antagonistic.
Kaiba ignored it. "Fine, but not in my computer chair," he replied, pushing Joey back. "We can at least make it to the bedroom like civilized people." Joey obeyed and stood, but the second Kaiba was up, Joey latched to him, and Kaiba's resolve to make it to the bedroom was lost when one hand slipped down the front of his pants, teasing him.
"How does the couch work for you?" Joey asked, amusement evident in his voice. Kaiba nodded, and Joey grinned, leaning down to retrieve the lube form the chair. "Don't want to forget this."
"Where did this mood come from?" Kaiba asked. "Usually you're much more timid."
Joey seemed to falter for a second, and the faintest hint of a blush graced his cheeks. "I… I'm just in the mood, that's all."
"Hmm, odd that you're in the mood after spending time with Tristan and Bakura," Kaiba mused, taking a seat on the couch. He idly tossed a couch pillow to the floor. "Every time, in fact." Maybe they were urging Joey to action; god only knew what those two could be capable of, and if they were pushing the issue…
"I don't know what you're trying to say, and I don't think I want to," Joey said, moving to drop down onto Kaiba's lap – Kaiba managed to contain his sound of surprise. "If you spent a couple hours watching those two, you'd wonder if there was something you were missing too."
"Missing?" Kaiba hadn't been aware that they were 'missing' anything; the relationship was imperfect, yes, but it didn't feel incomplete.
"Yeah… I mean, there's obviously something between them that just clicks; I've never seen either of them as happy as they've been since they got together, and I've come up with two theories on why."
"Which are?"
"Well, either they're doing massive amounts of drugs behind everyone's backs, or it's the sex."
"Are you suggesting sex makes a relationship?"
"No, but it's definitely a factor." Joey started unbuttoning Kaiba's shirt, deliberately not looking up at him. "One that we've been missing. And, since I'm the one that keeps stopping, I figured I ought to rectify the situation. So, are we gonna spend all night talking about it, or – "
Instead of letting him finish the sentence, Kaiba moved to switch their positions, pressing Joey back into the couch, holding himself up on his arms, which were positioned on either side of Joey's head. He opened his mouth to speak, but Joey was quick to interrupt, "You want me, right? I mean, there's no other reason you'd be with me if you didn't." One of Joey's legs encircled Kaiba's waist and pulled him closer; any objections Kaiba had were lost. Something about Joey's words was rubbing him wrong, but at the same time he couldn't bring himself to pull away and work out what felt so wrong when the way that Joey's hips were gyrating up against him felt so right. Instead, he settled for leaning down and kissing Joey, one hand cupping a side of the blond's face.
"You're going to be the death of me," he murmured, hand trailing across Joey's cheek; his index finger moved over the blond's bottom lip. "I just know it."
With a grin Joey retorted, "Then we might as well make it worth it while you're alive."
Afterwards, they didn't move right away – they just stayed curled together on the couch, and Kaiba could only way for Joey to say something. A few minutes passed, and nothing; Kaiba didn't want to wait all night, and he could tell by the semi-erratic rise and fall of Joey's chest that he was still awake. He nipped at Joey's neck. "Alive?" he asked, his voice surprisingly husky. Silence followed, and he felt Joey take a deep breath. Well? I know you want to say something…
"Oh my god," Joey finally breathed. Kaiba laughed and sat up, glancing over. Joey was blinking in an almost confused fashion, and slowly his eyes met Kaiba's. "Holy shit, thank you."
"My pleasure," he replied with a grin. After a moment he added, "And yours too, I assume?"
Joey just nodded and closed his eyes. "Jeez, we're a fuckin' mess now," he said, then released a huge yawn. "I say we take a shower and hit the sack."
"Sounds like a plan." Kaiba reached for his pants; he pulled them on without even bothering to button them. Joey reached for his shirt and nothing else; he merely stood and stretched before he went for the door, shirt barely covering him. He stopped and looked back at Kaiba; he still looked a little dazed, and his hair was mussed. In nothing but a t-shirt, he looked ridiculously younger than he was. It was a little surreal.
"Hey… I mean it, thanks," Joey said. He didn't look away like he usually did when he was embarrassed.
"For the sex, or the shower?"
"Neither… okay, well, the sex too, but I meant for dealing with my bullshit. This… it wasn't at all like I expected," Joey explained.
"Don't worry about it," he replied nonchalantly, standing and stretching. "It was worth it." He was surprised to hear Joey laugh.
"No wonder you run Kaiba Corp; you're the master of spouting bullshit." Joey was chuckling, and Kaiba rolled his eyes.
"Shut up," he said, a surprisingly good-natured ring to his words. "Let's go take your shower."
notes
*sigh* I hate editing stuff. It feels so wrong; this just feels really gross, how I chopped it, but I couldn't come up with a better way. ^^;; 'Tis how these things go, I suppose, though I highly suggest reading the full version of it -- mainly because I like it better, though I'm sure there was something deep and meaningful in there... somewhere... XD
Thanks extended to Sarasusa for beta'ing ^^, Hannah for helping, and everyone over at LJ who listened to me bitch and bitch and bitch about this chapter for well over a month. Do you guys realize it took me that long to write the last half of this chapter? I didn't even have it done when I posted chapter fifteen. I was getting really anxious, lol.
Actually, I am really anxious about this chapter; I ended up completely rewriting the second half (*smirk*), and then I had to rewrite the first part of seventeen to fit in all the things that got lost in the rewrite... yikes. Everything worked out, thankfully, but it had me on my toes. ^^
I think I like it, sort of... well, I don't want to say ~dull~ (if it was dull, something is very wrong. ^_~), but rather not-overly-dramatic. But that doesn't last long. XD
..::responses to reviewers::..
ColeyCarissa: lmao!! That's a good point. XD Maybe Joey has some reasons for that -- who knows?
Yami) White Rain: ^^ Thanks, and good luck with that! :)
Alithiel, Kaneda-Shotaro and Yami Tetsuo, Lightning Sage, MilleniumDaggerHolder, Ranma Higurashi, Chronicles Baily, gyrrlgenius, youko-moon, Vegeta2J: ^_^ Thankies!!!
Alexander the Grand: haha, who needs homework? You wouldn't believe how much of mine has been sacrificed to the fan fiction gods whilst writing this story... ^^;;; Glad you liked it! ^^
Tanya Maxwell: lol, so now when something goes wrong, we can point at you and blame you? *kidding* Ooh, hope you have/had a good time in Europe! ^^
Jasper-Sable: You did? Holy crap. That's a lot. *freaks out* lmao, anyway, thanks! #^^# S'ok, I think I'd be a scared if people started bowing in my wake or something. ^^;;; But I admit that sometimes I forget that they're NOT teenagers in this fic, lol; it's one of those things I really worry about whilst writing.
Tadashi: lol, I guess Joey just trusts Tristan... and maybe Bakura. XD Thanks!
Nenya85: lol, yes, of all the things Kaiba has done/endured, being gay has got to be the least traumatizing. XD Yeah, you made sense. *thumbs up* Glad you liked it. XD
Fire Dragon of Darkness: Nahh, I couldn't make it to the end without some more trauma. I mean, this has all been pretty smooth sailing thus far, you know? Anyway, arigato! ^^
Angel-Belle: lol, yes, Tristan & Bakura are something of the little goofballs of this fic, little as you've seen them... thus far... ^_~ Haha, that would be a funny scenario! XD Gotta love masculinity.
Elsalhir-Erestar: *meep!* Gomen, babe; figured you knew. ^^;; lol, poor Joey wouldn't gotten all... de-mooded if Alex had walked in, poor guy! ^^ Heh, gotta love irony.
Hush Puppie: *thumbs up* no worries. ^^ Thanks! Haha, yes, those men are assholes. XD
Darkmus: lol, I hate trying to find places to end edited chapters -- it always feels really chopped, so I was pretty proud of that one. XD I like the unedited version too, for about the same reason. ^_~