Title: bullet with Butterfly wings
Rating: M
Summary: Peeling away Squall's layers is an art.
Notes: For brightspark's request for "love/hate pre-game smut." Title from the Smashing Pumpkins song.


Picking through Squall's layers is an art, a test, to see if he can pull him apart bit by bit and get to the part of Squall he knows is there under the coal-black leather and the blood-red belts. It's like opening a present, he thinks, pulling at it slowly and deliberately, peeling away the bow and the tape and the pretty, pretty wrapper – all of the pretty, pretty leather and belts – to get to the prize inside, the part he knows is easy to break and easy to lose, but so, so valuable, precious and new and all his to keep.

He breaks him down with words and taunts and jeers, and, god, his breakdowns are always so fucking gorgeous, and it doesn't take long for Squall to be in his room with the door shut up tight and curses falling from those ruby lips, even as he's giving in, pressing against him and wrapping close and shoving him against the shelf at the back wall, just so he knows Squall doesn't want to give in that easily, won't go down without a bit of a fight, first.

Oh, but he does go down, in the end, like always.

Squall moans under his hands when he strips him free of all of that leather keeping him away from the world, the wrapping on the prize, and presses against him and kisses him hard and deep and, if he's too caught up in the moment and in his romantic illusions-and-lies-called-dreams, maybe a little meaningful, warm, slick, messy kisses on his mouth and jaw and neck. He peels away the leather and the belts and the fur, unwrapping him and spreading him out, a pinned-up prize, like a butterfly with its wings torn off and pinned up and held out for everyone to marvel and admire, only he's the only one allowed to admire this particular butterfly-prize.

He presses into him, fingers pulling at him and tearing him open, spreading him out, and he doesn't seem the same anymore, because he's moving and squirming and gasping out his name, and he knows that's the best part, because it's his name and no one else's, no matter how hard they tried to get the prize in the end. He wraps him close to his body and kisses him all over and cherishes every single scratch and bruise the nails and fingers dragging slow patterns down his back leave, because they're just as meaningful as the battle scars they give each other, only a little more sweet and pleasant and he'd never heal these away with a simple Cure spell. They're marks he wants to remember when he leans back in a cold, metal desk in Quistis' classroom and they sting at his flesh to remind him of what they've done, when he watches Squally-boy try to forget the whole thing beneath a layer of hatred, forget the marks he knows he left on his neck and shoulders and hips, and they go back to the roles of rivals and classmates once again.

Squall comes beautifully, too, willing and pleading and flushed bright red, like his skin's on fire, burning from the inside out, and he yells his name and swears how much he hates him – hate you so much – and – yeah, I know you hate me – but he gives up in his arms anyway, and they lie like that, tangled up in starch sheets for just a little while, pretending they're something like lovers even though they're nowhere near that, before he slips out of bed and Squall bites his lip and pretends he doesn't feel the pain of the bites and bruises and muscles, and follows after Seifer.

At the end, he wraps him up again, pretty package sitting there waiting for him to pull open whenever he wants, with just the right words and just the right push, and only he knows how to force his way in, knows how to perfect this art.