A/N: The italicized portion of this chapter is a flashback of Bakura and Ryou's lives when they were younger. For simplicity's sake, all italicized sections from now on are flashbacks. Normal text is set in present time. (And… so sorry I haven't updated in forever. I'm a horrible, lazy person, and I need to be poked more often and reminded to update.)

Tainted – Part Three

"Aniki?"

Ryou stood in the doorway, half hiding behind the doorframe. His hair was messy and it fell down about his head in long strands, some obscuring his face.

"Yeah?"

The boy stepped inside, shutting the door behind him quietly. "Um…" He trailed off and started pulling at the jeans he wore with his fingers as he fumbled with what he wanted to say. He apparently found the words he was searching for while staring down at the beige carpeting. "Can I ask you something?" His eyes remained downcast before they flickered up to meet with his older brother's briefly.

Bakura turned away from his computer and leaned back in his chair, eyeing the other with an inquisitive gaze. "Sure. What is it?"

Ryou walked over and sat down on the bed next to the computer. "Well…" The sentence fizzled out before it even began and was replaced with silence.

Noting that the conversation would be going absolutely nowhere without encouragement, Bakura got up from his chair and went to sit down next to his brother. "Ne, Ryou-chan," he looped an arm around his younger sibling's shoulders as he spoke, "you know you can talk to me about anything."

It took a moment but Ryou relaxed into the embrace, sighing and resting his head against his brother's much broader shoulder. Their age difference of a whole seven years gave Bakura a considerable advantage in size over his younger brother. "I don't know… it seems so stupid now that I think about it."

"I promise I won't laugh."

There was a pause and Ryou took a breath, as if preparing to say something of utmost importance.

"Can you teach me how to kiss?" He blushed faintly and sounded terribly embarrassed about it, shifting as if to pull away from his brother's hold on him. "Well, I mean… I don't know. I sort of like someone, and I don't want to have my first kiss and completely mess it up or something like that—I'm sorry, I should have never said anything…"

Bakura just blinked at the stream of words before chuckling a bit and drawing his younger brother back. "Is that all?"

A small nod was all the reply that he received. The older of the two smiled lightly. "It's really not that hard, you know."

"It's not?" A meek inquiry.

"Of course not. All you have to do is get your mouths together; the rest comes naturally."

"But… what do you do with your noses?"

Bakura looked amused at the question. "Tilt your head to the side a bit so your noses don't squash together."

Ryou looked like he was thinking this information over. "What do you mean that it comes naturally?"

"It just does. Don't think about it. Just do whatever feels right."

The boy's nose scrunched up in a small face. "What if you end up doing it wrong?"

A small laugh made it out from Bakura's throat as he poked his brother lightly in the side, earning tiny yelp for his efforts. "There's no right or wrong way to do it."

"But… your tongue. What are you supposed to do with it? I mean, you can screw up a lot with that, can't you?"

"You'll figure out what to do with it with some practice."

"Practice?"

Bakura waved a hand in front of him absently. "You need to practice everything to get a hang of it, don't you?"

"But I thought you said it comes naturally."

"The movements do; doesn't mean you'll be at ease or confident about it immediately."

"… This is too confusing."

The older brother smiled and rubbed Ryou's back gently. "Don't worry so much about it. You're still too young for this sort of stuff."

"I am not." Came the indignant reply.

"You're eleven, Ryou."

"I'll be twelve next month!"

"Whatever," Bakura teased, grinning lightly. Ryou just pouted and folded his arms across his chest, looking affronted.

"Oh come on, you know I'm just teasing."

"Yeah yeah, I know." Ryou turned his face towards his brother and smiled softly. After a moment of silence he spoke again. "'Kura?"

"Hmm?"

"Could you… show me? I mean, how to do it?"

Bakura arched an eyebrow as he eyed Ryou. "Show you?" As much as he loved his younger brother, the idea of kissing the boy wasn't particular appealing. The taboo of incest flitted through his mind and settled uncomfortably in the pit of his stomach.

"I mean, I know you won't laugh at me, and I trust you…" Ryou shrugged a bit, looking up at the other with his wide, pleading eyes. "Please, aniki?"

In the end it was Bakura's desire to please his brother that won his consent. He hated to deny the boy anything that he wanted, and after some more coaxing on the other's part, he finally relented.

"Alright, alright…" A sigh escaped his throat as he ran a hand through his hair to collect his nerves a bit. He looked at Ryou's young face, which was a perfect image of his own with its rosy little mouth and round cheeks, and wondered what he'd gotten himself into. But he kept to his agreement and shifted closer, bringing their faces together. A faint pink dusted those round cheeks and he watched as Ryou closed his eyes, lips parting minutely in expectation.

Bakura took a slow breath as he lifted a hand and cupped his brother's face before leaning forward and pressing their lips together in a chaste kiss.

-----

"'Kura?"

Ryou's voice floated out from the living room as he heard the back door open. Rather than his brother, however, a distinctly feminine voice responded instead.

"Ryou! Why are you still awake at this hour?"

"Oh, mom, you're home!" Ryou slipped the book mark between the pages and set his book down on the table, pushing himself off of the couch to go greet his parents. He met them in the hallway and smiled brightly at them as he reached to take one of his mother's bags. "How was the trip?"

"Get to bed right now. You have school tomorrow," his mother ordered instead of answering the question, although she handed over her bag without complaint. However, she promptly pulled her youngest son into a hug, from which me made a little shocked noise since he nearly lost his balance with the heavy bag in his hand.

"Lighten up on the boy," his father said as he took the luggage Ryou was recently given and proceeded over to the stairs. "And the trip was fine, Ryou. I'm glad to be home, though." He let out a sigh as he moved up the stairs. "I can never get a good night's rests in those hotel beds…"

Ryou's mother smiled gently as she let go of the boy. "Have you been behaving and not causing trouble for your brother?"

"Yes, mom." Ryou replied monotonously.

"Have you been getting good grades?"

"Mom, you've only been gone less than a week. That's not going to change so quickly."

His mother smiled faintly. "Was just checking up on you. But why are you up so late? You know well that I never let you stay up till this hour regularly."

Ryou looked a little sheepish as he ran his right hand through his hair, shrugging a bit. "Aniki doesn't come home until around this time, and I don't like being alone so I wait up for him."

She clicked her tongue disapprovingly at that. "You should still go to bed. You won't be awake in school otherwise."

"I know, I know," Ryou mumbled.

The woman just shook her head and sighed as she motioned her hand towards the stairs. "Go to sleep already, Ryou."

Being the obedient child that he was, Ryou bid his mother goodnight before he proceeded to head back into the living room to fetch his book. With the novel clasped loosely in his hand, he then he headed up the stairs and disappeared onto the second floor in a flash of blue plaid and silver hair.

It was at that exact moment that the back door opened once more, admitting the older son into the house. Upon spotting his mother, he blinked at her before smiling as he slid out of his coat. "Welcome back, mom."

"Bakura, how could you let your brother stay up so late?"

He looked a bit embarrassed as he toed off his shoes, running his right hand through his hair and shrugging his shoulders faintly. This was one of the habits that Ryou had picked up, along with a few others, from his brother over the years. "Uh… I don't want to be the mean older brother and send him to bed when he doesn't want to sleep?"

His mother gave him a look that showed him just what she thought about that excuse. He smiled a bit nervously as she shook her head.

"Just don't do it again."

"I promise I won't."

"But thank you again for coming home to watch Ryou for us. I know how busy you are with school and work."

"It's fine; don't worry about it." He smiled at her as he spoke.

"I trust you've been taking good care of him while we were gone?"

Bakura's smile faltered a bit before it returned full-force. "Of course, mom."

-TBC-