Sora's PoV
I just lay there for a long time. Somehow I'd gotten wrapped up in Riku's arms, and I was perfectly content to just lie there, letting Riku tend the cuts on my arms. His hands were gentle, soothing the sting of wounds I truly hadn't noticed in the heat of battle.
"Mm… I don't think this needs to be stitched. It's still bleeding though." I giggled, exhilaration and blood loss making me almost giddy.
"Just slap a butterfly bandage on it." I told him, giggling again. Butterfly bandage. Suddenly, I hissed as a cut on my cheek opened. Minor and barely deep enough to bleed, it still stung badly. I grabbed for a bottle of "painkiller" from the kit—airline bottles of cheap brandy. The liquor served double purpose as painkiller and sanitizer. I drank the bottle in three gulps, wincing at the flavor. Burned like fire and tasted worse than cat spit, but almost instantly, a pleasant numbness burned through me, starting at my fingers and spreading until it reached my face. I sighed and relaxed, letting Riku deal with the rest of my cuts. He placed the last bandage and fixed it down, then slid a hand along my jaw to capture my face.
"You," he said calmly, "are amazing." Then he brushed his lips slowly over the cut on my cheek, licking away the blood smeared there from when I had run my hand across my face. I wrapped my arms around his neck and pulled his lips down to meet mine. His kiss was gentle, and as innocent as any other aspect of him. I deepened it, pressing against him, and felt him respond, tentatively. I just lost myself in him for a time, letting my lips and hands tell the truth I would never find the words to say. I pulled out of it finally, quite pleasantly drunk, and with the aftereffects of the fight really hitting me, I was suddenly exhausted. I sighed, and attempted to lie down. Riku moved with me, so that I ended up half on top of him, my head on his chest and his arms around me. He lifted one, briefly, to snuff out the lamp, and I wrapped my arms around his waist to pull him closer to me. I didn't want to wake up and find him gone. I drifted off quickly, lulled by his warmth and the gentle drumbeat of his heart.
Riku's PoV
Sora's lips were like fire on mine, tasting of blood and alcohol. Eventually, he pulled away, exhaustion in every line of him. I shifted with him, moving him so his head lay against my chest. I reached up and snuffed out the lamp with the metal lid on the case, and Sora hugged me tightly against him. Quite soon, I heard his breathing slow into the steady rhythm of sleep. I drifted slowly myself, neither wholly asleep nor fully awake, but some part of my mind wouldn't let me sleep, for fear that when I woke, it would all turn out to be a dream.
I pulled Sora closer, my talisman against loneliness. He was so intense, a raging fire that never gave itself half-heartedly. That was a good metaphor for him—like fire, he would push himself until he burned out. He looked so innocent asleep. I knew now, how inaccurate that image was. I wouldn't have been surprised to learn that he had killed. He was definitely not an innocent. I was not as young as he imagined, either. I had neither loved nor fought as he had; but I was innocent, not ignorant. I drifted deeper into sleep, and for a long time, all there was was the warmth pressed against me, and the smell of blood and cheap brandy, not quite masking the gentle fragrance of vanilla.
When I woke completely, the only light was from the candle on the end table to my right. I nudged Sora gently, and he stirred, wrinkling his nose and opening his eyes. For a moment they were wary, then they fell on me, and the affection—and trust—in those bottomless eyes stole my breath for a moment. In the dim light, they looked almost navy, slightly dizzy.
"Sora?" My voice seemed very loud, and it was only then I realized how silent it was outside. "We should go. What time is it?" He blinked twice and looked at his watch, still a little out of it.
"Wha.. About six o'clock." He answered, sleepily. I heaved a sigh of relief. "Mom won't worry till seven. I need to get home." I grabbed my backpack and swung it over one shoulder. "What about your dad?" I asked. Sora laughed, bitterly.
"He won't notice if I come home at all. May I come over for dinner?"
"Sure, my mom won't mind, and that say we can claim we stayed after school." He followed me up the stairs, into the empty shop. It turned out it wasn't full dark, but dim twilight. "We'd better hurry, before it gets dark." We picked up the pace to a slow run, and didn't slow down 'till we were barely a block from my house. My mother greeted us at the door, with only a raised eyebrow at Sora. I led him up the narrow stairs to my room, and slung my backpack down on the floor. "Dinner probably won't be ready for another half hour." I told him. My mother was making roast chicken, and the timer had still had twenty minutes left when we went through the kitchen. I picked my way across the room to the window, a nice bay one with a window seat. Sora followed me carefully; Large, orderly stacks of books were scattered across the floor, some of them waist high. I sat down on the window seat and looked out. Behind our house is a tiny rocky beach, and the moon was already beginning to rise over the water, even though it wasn't fully dark.
"It's beautiful." Sora whispered, hushed awe in his voice. He sat down beside me, and when I wrapped my arms loosely around his waist, he leaned against me, comfortably.
"It is." I agreed, mentally discarding a cheesy line about 'not as beautiful as you'.
Sora's PoV
Riku's mom was a pleasant surprise. I had expected it to be like mine; the only thing they really had in common was height of the ground. A converted attack, the ceiling sloped as low as five feet on two walls, peaking to nearly ten in the middle. The ceiling beams had been painted royal blue, and the walls were a pale, icy blue. Book cases lined every bit of three walls except for a dresser, a desk, and a mattress on the floor. The crowning feature, however, was the enormous bay window on the fourth, empty wall. The window seat was covered with a blue cushion and white gauze curtains blowing in the wind off the water. A laptop computer sat on one corner of the seat, a sleek silver one with a microphone headset and exterior speakers plugged in. Riku paced over to the window, threading neatly between waist high stacks of books. The books where everywhere—even Alex had never read this much. He sat gracefully, and I sat beside him, feeling a faint thrill when he pulled me into a loose embrace. I was enthralled by the beauty of the moon and the ocean, but they did not compare to Riku.
Your reviews were frankly, so good I had to re-read them a couple of times to believe what I was reading. I mean, wow. No, this story is not over. It is, however, the lull before the storm. I think I may take a break to get a head on the typing, so if I don't post for a week or so, I have not abandoned the story. My love to you all.
Dyslexic Angel