"Haven't I?" Shuusuke was bored-sounding and barefoot; that was all Yuuta could understand of him at that moment.
"You know you haven't! I've left messages, I've heard you answer the phone and then put it down when you hear it's me, I've..." Yuuta trailed off in the face of his brother still looking at him as if he were one of his photography groupies. How he even had photography groupies, Yuuta had no idea, but nothing was ever impossible with Fuji Shuusuke.
"Really?" Shuusuke took a sip from the mug he was holding, reclining back against the wall of the hall, seemingly uninterested in actually inviting Yuuta in. Yuuta wondered what was in the mug; the fleeting idea of alcohol crossed his mind, since his brother never acted like this with him, but no, he knew Shuusuke when he was drunk, and this wasn't it. He'd be giggling if he was drunk, and dancing slightly to the rhythm of his own words as he spoke. There was no rhythm here.
"Yes, really!" Yuuta sighed the sigh of someone trying very hard not to lose their temper. "Why are you doing this? I know you know what I'm here for, and I... well, I'd thought you wanted it too."
"Well, I don't want it, so now you know."
"And you think I'm going to believe that? Do you really?" Yuuta really wanted to snatch Shuusuke's mug from him and have a swig of whatever it was he was drinking, because a dose of crazy was the only thing he thought could stop him from feeling this cocktail of anger and confusion and humiliation. He would wait until Shuusuke spoke again, though; maybe he would finally stop talking rubbish and he wouldn't need to down anything.
Shuusuke was quiet for a moment, and then said, "How am I supposed to want it too, when you don't even know what it is that you want?" His lips were soft, but his eyes were hard.
"Of course I know what I want!" Yuuta did snatch the mug now, and took what he imagined to be a rebellious and commanding gulp. The effect was ruined by a coughing fit as the twin urges to gag and avoid looking weak conflicted. "Fuck, do you still drink Inui Juice!"
Shuusuke took the mug back. Normally he would have patted Yuuta on the back and saved him from his continued coughing, but he just leant back against the wall and studied him.
"Not Inui Juice, no. It's apple, orange, lemonade and tonic water."
Yuuta was still unable to speak, but his face stated clearly what he thought of this combination.
Shuusuke raised his eyebrows sardonically. "How can I believe you know what you want from me when you don't even know what you want to drink?" His lips were hard but his eyes were soft, this time.
"That's completely different!" Yuuta exclaimed, aware that his point was lessened somewhat by the watering of his eyes and the wobble in his voice as his throat battled to reclaim itself from the unholy combination of bubbles and flavours. "I don't want a carbonated smoothie, I want you! And I know that I do!"
"Is this why you split up with your boyfriend last month?"
"What? No! I mean yes, I mean..." Yuuta's stuttering was nothing to do with the tickle in his throat now.
"Did you love him?"
"Of course I did! We were together for three years - of course I did!"
"Did you pretend he was me?"
"What!"
"Did you pretend he was me?" Shuusuke held his mug out, offering, a cruel gesture that Yuuta really didn't appreciate. Yuuta wasn't appreciating any of this. He'd expected their talk to go an entirely different way, once he'd actually managed to catch his brother for a conversation. "Think carefully about that."
"What the fuck?" Yuuta was nearly vibrating with anger. "Of course I didn't! How screwed up do you think I am!"
Shuusuke shrugged and walked back into his dark apartment, his bare feet making soft noises on the wooden floor. Yuuta assumed that this was as good an invitation as he was going to get to join him.
"Are you scared of the light or something?" he asked as Shuusuke perched himself on the glass coffee table in front of the more normal seating of the sofa, which Yuuta sat down heavily on, leaning on his outspread knees.
"Yes. And now that you know, I'm going to have to drink your blood..."
"Ha!" Yuuta exclaimed triumphantly, and slightly more loudly than he'd intended. "You slipped up!"
"What do you mean?"
"You're flirting with me!"
"Flirting?" Shuusuke scoffed. "That was sarcasm."
"Not the way I heard it. Sarcasm's beneath you, don't think that I don't know that. Is my blood all you want to drink?" Yuuta knew he was crossing a line here, but he felt empowered by what were now obviously Shuusuke's true feelings, and almost drunk on the morbid possibility that this would be the end of everything, if Shuusuke kept insisting he wasn't interested.
"Our parents were happy that you broke up with him, you know." It was hardly a masterful diversion, but Shuusuke knew that Yuuta would fall for it nonetheless.
"What do you mean? They never said anything to me. I thought they liked him!"
"They did," Shuusuke said, finding the change in Yuuta's eyes painful. "But can you really not see why they would be happy?"
"No," Yuuta said mutinously.
"Then I shall tell you, although I know you already know. They're expecting you to get married and settle down now; they think it was just something you had to get out of your system."
"Well, I do want to settle down! Just... I don't want to get married. I want-"
"Don't say it," Shuusuke said dangerously. "Don't you dare say it."
"I want you," Yuuta said loudly, into the swallowing silence of the shadowy lounge. His brother's eyes burned into him, even though he could barely see them. He just knew they were there; he could feel them, and now he was scared. Aniki was never sharp with him, was never angry with him.
"Yuuta, it was a mistake. I should never have let it happen." The artificial venom in Shuusuke's voice hurt regardless of the insincerity.
"It was a mistake? Tensai Fuji Shuusuke never makes mistakes!" Yuuta sprang up and smouldered down at his brother, who was still annoyingly perched, cross-legged, on the infuriatingly stylish coffee table.
"He did seven years ago. It was a night I should never have let happen."
"Why?" Yuuta's voice trembled with something that was neither rage nor upset, merely fear. "Why was it a mistake? Was I not good enough for you? Was I just there? I can't believe that. I won't believe that."
"You can believe whatever you'd like, Yuuta. But you're wasting your time and your heart, and that's really something I don't want to have to kick out of the door. But I will, if you don't start to understand."
"What the fuck is wrong with you?" Yuuta intended to lean down and shake Shuusuke's shoulders, but instead shoved him backwards so he fell down on the narrow table, his head narrowly avoiding hitting the floor as his back bent further than it was ever designed to.
"God, I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to do that, I'm sorry, I'm really sorry..." Yuuta was babbling as he pulled him back up, cheeks burning with shame.
"I think you should go now," Shuusuke said, voice devoid of emotion. "Unless you intend to bend me back over this table?"
"I don't... I didn't... I want you to..."
"You want me to push you onto my table? My, Yuuta, you've got rough over the years." Shuusuke stood up and gestured down to the glass top. "I don't think so; I don't want cracks in my favourite table."
Yuuta's voice was viscous with humiliation. "What do you want, then? Why are you playing these games with me? Don't you care at all?"
"I," Shuusuke said, taking hold of Yuuta's shoulders, "care too much." He stared into his eyes, shaking Yuuta to the core, and then captured his lips with his own, a dark kiss that was full of everything but emotion. "Is this what you wanted? We can stay in the dark, I can fuck you on the floor, you can have what you want, and then you can leave again and we can pretend it never happened. It would be foolproof."
Yuuta pushed Shuusuke away again, this time not caring at all whether he tripped over the table or not. "Get off me! Don't ever do that again! What on earth is it you think that I want? I don't want some sordid little affair in the dark! I want you, I want us, I want... I want it all. I want it all. Everything."
"And it took you this long to realise it?"
"No, it took me this long to gather the courage to tell you this, after you never let us happen again." Yuuta could feel his heart trembling in his chest, could feel his neck throb and his body empty of everything but the confusion and fear that his brother was doing everything in his power not to alleviate.
"Why are you telling me this if you know that I'd never let us happen again?" Shuusuke was sounding bored again, and Yuuta knew he was losing him.
"Because..." He had to get his attention, had to say something that would make him take him seriously. "Because you're scared and you won't admit it."
Shuusuke laughed the laugh of the unamused. He sounded like a cartoon villain, which was somehow frightening, in the dark, lit only by the lights outside.
"Do you really not understand it?"
"I can't if you won't tell me!"
"I'm scared for you, Yuuta. One move, and I could ruin your life, and you wouldn't realise it till it was too late. Do you understand me? It would be too late. And I cannot, will not, be responsible for that. Stop asking it of me; stop asking anything of me, for I will have to refuse, every time."
"My life? What about yours!"
"What about it?"
"Have you just given up, on everything? What are you waiting for, if not me? You haven't had a date for seven years! Seven years! Don't think I don't know what that means!"
"And what does it mean?"
"That you're still in love with me!"
Yuuta hadn't meant to shout, but it had been powerful enough to bring surprise to Shuusuke's face, and maybe that meant he was getting somewhere.
"And if I am?" Shuusuke said quietly, turning his head to stare out of the window. "What would you have me do? What would you have us do?"
"Isn't it obvious? We could get a place together, or I could move in here – your apartment's way too big just for one person, after all – and we could just... live together. What's hard about that? Isn't it simple?"
"Yuuta, you do know that mother and father will be disappointed in you? Have you thought about that?"
"Of course I have!" Yuuta couldn't understand why aniki was making this as hard as he was. Why was he being so obtuse? "And who cares? They were okay with my boyfriend, they've been okay with everything I've done, so what's the big deal? They'll get over it, won't they?"
Shuusuke fell silent. Yuuta was beginning to wonder if he would respond at all, and then: "They got over me..." He almost didn't catch it, it was so quiet.
"You mean... they know?"
"When your prodigy son is single for seven years, a bachelor distinctly not living it up in central Tokyo, questions get asked."
"You told them?"
"Answers get anticipated, and Yumiko's not the only one who can see things."
"What did they say to you?"
"Not very much. We all laughed and then I showed them my latest photography shoot."
Yuuta found this information hard to process.
"So you all just... swept it under the carpet?"
"We would've done, if I'd had carpet. Isn't that the best way?"
"Is it?"
"Not really," Shuusuke said with a smile that made Yuuta feel sick. "But we're still talking, and that's... nice."
"Well," Yuuta said, biting his lip and then punching his thigh, trying to rile himself up sufficiently for what he needed to say. "If they don't approve, then I don't care."
"Don't you?"
"Your approval is-"
"Don't say it."
"Your approval is more important to me."
Shuusuke sighed, a small, shuddery sigh. "Oh Yuuta..."
"Aniki, I've been thinking about you for seven whole years. No, scratch that, ten. I can't give it up. I can't stop thinking about you, I can't stop thinking about how we felt together, I can't stop thinking about you anywhere. Everything I see reminds me of you, everything. So..." He took a deep breath, seemingly trying to suck the whole room into his lungs. "So... please don't do me the disservice of turning me away when I know you feel the same."
Shuusuke fell quiet again, and the apartment descended into something that felt to Yuuta like being trapped at the bottom of a well, the Tokyo lights marking the only way out, far above.
"Come with me." Shuusuke took hold of Yuuta's hand and led him into the bedroom; he was obviously expert at traversing his home in the dark. Maybe he didn't want a high electricity bill, but more likely he just preferred the dark.
Shuusuke motioned for Yuuta to sit on the bed. "One night," he said. "I'll love you for one more night, and then, if you're sure, I'll love you for another. And then another. Forever, if that is what you end up desiring, just... don't make any promises or declarations you might not be able to keep right now. Just this is enough tonight."
Yuuta nodded, almost trembling with surprise and anticipation. He made a quick sweep of the room with his eyes, trying to commit the whole feeling to memory before he was swallowed down and away by his brother out of the room and into that place he'd been unable to forget for the better part of a decade. There was another expansive window, lit also by the twinkling lights of Tokyo, and he realised then, if he hadn't known it already, that Shuusuke was a beauty junkie. And he was looking at Yuuta, right now, as if he were more of a drug than even the sparkling night sky, than even the forests and gardens and temples of the world.
He opened his mouth to say something, but Shuusuke put a finger over his lips and said "Not a word, Yuuta. Just feel for me. Can you do that?"
Yuuta nodded, and allowed himself to be pushed slowly down onto the bed. He allowed his socks and shirt and slacks to be removed, allowed everything to be taken off and discarded until Shuusuke was sliding over him and kissing him, dark again but now full of the emotion he had been keeping from him before.
"Aniki..." Yuuta moaned, the feel of Shuusuke's naked body against his infusing him with a heat he hadn't suffered from since he'd been seventeen.
"Just relax and let me love you, Yuuta..." Shuusuke said, kissing him again and rubbing against him, gasping as their hips ground against each other again and again, surprised as he realised he was in danger of losing control. Grinding harder seemed to resolve this temporarily; the little sounds Yuuta was making as he was overwhelmed made Shuusuke feel more in charge, which was what he needed to be. If he wasn't in control, he would be in danger, if Yuuta chose not to repeat this night. He didn't want to have to survive that vulnerable.
"Aniki aniki aniki stop!" Yuuta begged, although he sounded more like it was the opposite that he wanted. Shuusuke could feel the heat radiating from his cheeks and so reluctantly slowed down and then stopped, taking the pause to enclose Yuuta's nipples in velvet, liquid fire, trembling from the fulfilment of years of want. Yuuta needed to calm down but not cool down, until he was steady enough again for Shuusuke to give him what he'd spent the whole night fighting for.
Yuuta's breath kept catching somewhere between his lungs and his lips; even turning his head to catch a glimpse of the lights outside could not take him away from the tumbling chute he and his brother were hurtling down. He didn't think they'd ever reach the bottom, or even skid off over the sides, but he was wrong, as Shuusuke, still nipping and sucking his nipples, reached out clumsily to the side and grabbed at something and then began with the best preparation he had ever felt. Yuuta was well aware, if awareness had been something he possessed at that time, that it still hurt, but it was a good kind of hurt, wasn't it? He was desperate for his brother, desperate for a love, a lust, that had been kept under the surface for seven years, and he wanted it to hurt, wanted to feel everything it was possible to feel before the euphoria set in and he was catapulted off the slide and into the black utopia that was to follow.
"Hard. Please." Plea or command, Shuusuke couldn't argue; Yuuta's reaction to every thrust was keeping him powerful, was allowing him to believe that he was still in control and that he wasn't falling down with Yuuta into the blackness waiting for them below. He even forgot to remind Yuuta that he'd asked him not to speak; perhaps it was better this way after all...
"A-a-a-aniki..." Yuuta was gasping for air, the lights outside shining off his lips, off his hair, and Shuusuke lost control, too far gone to even feel chagrin for his fall. There were twinkling lights, something he'd never imagined there'd be when he was hurtling down and down and down, but they were beautiful, and shimmered all the colours of a negative rainbow as he collapsed onto Yuuta in the dark and the peace. Somewhere while he'd been falling, Yuuta had already hit the bottom, and was still trying to take oxygen into himself, to replace the liquid sex that filled his lungs and his heart and his body, drowning him.
When he had caught his breath, Yuuta looked up at his brother and moved his lips, trying to say something until Shuusuke cut him off.
"Don't say it," he said, although the epitome of kindness was in his eyes this time. "Just tonight is enough."
Make up your mind tomorrow.