Sculpting for Dummies
AN: Yes, it's horribly, horribly late. I've been busy with the beginning of the spring semester and preparations for cosplay in Feb. In most humble apology, I offer you smut. Not particularly detailed, because I both don't wish to get banned and I don't really like writing it, but it's there all the same, for your enjoyment, such that it is.
Special thanks to 4eversleeping for, once again, being my beta.
Chapter 22:
The sun peaked over the trees and painted the sky with pinks and oranges. Tobi ignored the sight. The clay bird's wings flapped wearily from the bird's repeated use and Tobi's faltering chakra, the masked man focusing all of his attention on keeping it in the air.
Tobi's eyelid inched closed. He shook his head and opened it again, but he couldn't manage to open it wider than a sliver. He pinched his nose. The bird, which had been drifting off at an angle, corrected itself.
The brunette tugged his mask off of his face and slapped his cheeks. The cool morning wind chilled the heated skin. His eyes opened all the way.
"'m almost there," he mumbled. "Jus' gotta keep going."
The Thorn Village wall rose up beyond the trees, and Tobi's sleepy eyes opened wide when he saw it. "Home," he cooed.
The bird fluttered down and skidded to a landing. Its feet broke off on impact and became part of a ten foot trail of clay that marked the end of its final flight. The mangled piece of art gave its wings a last pitiful flap as Tobi stepped off of it.
Tobi left the bird and his bags and staggered toward the village gate.
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The sun shined through Deidara's bedroom window with cheery determination along with the sounds of birds singing and children laughing. Deidara flicked the sun an obscene gesture, buried his head under a pillow, and fell back asleep.
In his defense, he'd only crawled into bed a few hours earlier, after an afternoon and evening devoted to satisfying the village's sudden need for his pottery. The pieces were now baking in the kiln, and Deidara didn't plan on emerging from his pillow-and-blanket cocoon until lunchtime at the earliest.
A crash in the hallway penetrated his cloth-and-down fortress and he emerged just in time to see his bedroom door fling open. Tobi rushed in, bedraggled.
His breath stopped and he was reminded of the time when Tobi used Zetsu's jutsu to escape Sasuke's headquarters and his lungs physically collapsed.
"Sempai," Tobi rasped. He dove onto Deidara's bed and collapsed on the artist. The dead weight on top of him didn't move.
'He better not have fainted,' Deidara thought. He rocked Tobi's body to the left, then the right, getting the momentum to shove him off.
Tobi's arms snaked around him and latched on. "Sempai, I'm so sorry," he whispered again. "I love you so much and I'll never leave you and I'll never even look at Konoha again."
Deidara's body tensed. He stopped trying to push Tobi away. "What did you say, un?" he hissed.
Tobi relinquished his hold on Deidara long enough to pull off his mask. He tossed it away and attached himself again. He met Deidara's gaze with his mismatched eyes.
"I love you, sempai," he said. His eyes brimmed with tears as he spoke. 'If he starts crying, I'll kick his fucking ass,' Deidara swore in disgust. He refused to deal with such pathetic whining when he'd just woken up. His revulsion didn't change the fact that his heart raced and his face burned bright red at Tobi's words
"Shut up," the blond demanded. He narrowed his eyes and set his jaw; Tobi had to know he wasn't kidding around.
"I love you, Deidara," Tobi continued. He wasn't even trying to hide the fact that he was crying! The bastard had no shame. And since when was he allowed to call Deidara by his name? He'd never done that before, and Deidara certainly hadn't given him permission.
"Shut up!" he repeated. The artist jabbed his fist into Tobi's ribs, but, pressed up against him, he couldn't get enough momentum to actually hurt him.
Tobi shut up. He pressed his lips to Deidara's and kissed him…and damn, where had he learned to kiss like that? It better not have been in Konoha….
It was more passionate than any of Tobi's other kisses, more passionate than anyone else's Deidara had received. He felt his mind melt away, and he sank into Tobi's arms in a boneless heap. Tobi tilted Deidara's chin up and ran his fingers through his hair. Deidara sighed into Tobi's mouth.
When Tobi finished plundering his mouth, they were both panting for air. Tobi smiled and mouthed "I love you" against Deidara lips.
The Stone ninja remembered he was supposed to push Tobi away. He shoved him off of his bed and sent him tumbling to the floor. "Stay away from me, un!" he growled. What had he been thinking? He'd let that stupid, abandoning idiot hurt him once. He'd almost killed himself for Tobi's sake. It wouldn't happen again. He wasn't dumb enough to be tricked twice.
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Tobi smiled from his tangle on the ground. Deidara was mad, but he had expected that and his sempai's anger never lasted more than a month or so. He'd felt the way Deidara relaxed into his kiss; he'd been angry and tense and embarrassed when Tobi confessed his love, but in the end that kiss had shown his relief. Once his anger ran its course, Deidara would be ready to accept his love.
He really shouldn't be smiling- who knew what sort of hell Deidara would put him through before the inevitable forgiveness? - but his mind skipped over that part and went straight to the fantasies of holding Deidara's hand in public. Of telling him, 'I love you' every day. And one day, Deidara finally whispering it back…but even in his fantasies, Deidara threatened to disembowel him if he ever told another soul.
Tobi found it endearing.
The brunette curled up on the hard wood floor next to Deidara's bed. Deidara hadn't kicked him out of the room yet; that was proof in Tobi's eyes that the blond wanted him there. "Good night, sempai. I love you," he yawned.
Deidara had wormed his way back into his pillow cave, but the tip of an ear stuck out and flushed at his words. "It's morning, idiot. If you want to sleep, go to your own room, un," his muffled voice demanded.
"I'd rather stay with you," Tobi replied.
Deidara's hand groped for a pillow and threw it blindly in Tobi's direction. It hit Tobi's face with a thunk'Nice aim.' "Thank you, sempai. I love you," he repeated. He didn't care that he was beginning to sound like a broken record- there was so much lost time to make up for. He lay down on the newly acquired pillow and listened to Deidara's restless fumbling underneath the covers. The artist couldn't sleep, but Tobi was too exhausted not to.
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'It's not real. He doesn't mean it,' Deidara reminded himself.
Beside the bed, Tobi snored softly. The blonde couldn't understand why was he sleeping on the floor when he had a perfectly good bed in the room next door?
Deidara peaked his head out of his cocoon and looked his partner over. His clothes were wrinkled and dirty, and Deidara was pretty sure they were the ones Tobi had been wearing when they parted. His eyes had dark rings around them, and his bottom lip was swollen from where he'd been chewing it nervously.
"Tobi, you look like crap, un," he muttered. "Why are you here?"
Tobi tossed in his sleep. "mmm, love you," he murmured.
Deidara turned to face the wall. "Thought you had a family now, un." 'I thought I'd never see you again.' His heart wouldn't stop pounding, and each beat sounded like, 'he's here, he's here.'
"I'll kill you for making me feel like this, un," he swore. There was no point in trying to sleep now, so he threw back the covers and slid out of bed. He pulled on his clothes and tied back his hair quietly, not wanting Tobi to wake up and see him half-clothed. Once he was presentable, he crossed the room. On the way out, he gave Tobi's head a well-deserved kick.
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The villagers were starting to give Tobi that sympathetic look that crazy people often get when he went out in public. Tobi, sporting bruises and cuts, would only wave happily and hum as he walked on. No amount of abuse from the blond artist could put a damper on his mood.
Strange as it seemed, the villagers were starting to suspect that Tobi's happiness was derived from Deidara's attacks. Every time they saw them together, Tobi would inevitably lean over and whisper something to him, Deidara would react with a punch or a kick or an elbow to the stomach, and Tobi would skip and frolic around.
Needless to say: the villagers were deeply puzzled.
The two had been home for a week when they were spotted walking to the grocery store together.
"Stop following me, un!" Deidara turned around and screamed at the masked man.
"But sempai, you might need help carrying groceries. I love you. What sort of guy would let the man he loved carry groceries all by himself?" Tobi asked.
Deidara growled and stamped his heel into Tobi's foot. The brunette hissed in pain, but continued walking a pace behind Deidara. The artist turned back toward the road and wrinkled his nose.
"Do you have to keep saying that every other sentence?" he asked desperately.
Tobi nodded.
"Until you start believing me," the masked man confirmed. He continued on with a new bounce in his step.
The villagers were confused. They'd thought the two living at the ceramics shop were a happy couple. "Ah, well, everyone has their troubles," they excused.
The clerk at the grocer's tugged Tobi's sleeve as he waited for Deidara to pick a cereal box.
"Tobi…all those bruises…are you alright?" she asked him in a hushed voice.
Tobi looked down at the marks on his arms and legs as if he were noticing them for the first time. "These? They're nothing."
"But they must hurt. How can you be so happy?" she wondered.
The masked man caressed the wounds with his gloved hands. "They're proof that sempai loves me," he sighed.
The clerk blushed. She'd never met a masochist before.
"He's still mad because he's still scared I'll leave, and he's still scared because he loves me that much," he happily chattered on. "And once he's finished being mad, he'll admit that he loves me, and then we'll have the best make-up se-"
A flying cereal box thrown by a blood-red Deidara silenced Tobi mid-sentence. When the masked man remembered who he was talking to and what he'd been about to say, he stuttered an apology and ran out of the store.
He waited outside to help his artist carry home their bags. Before they started home, Deidara kicked him roughly in the shin.
"I love you, Deidara," Tobi replied. Deidara gave his other shin a matching bruise.
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Three weeks after their return from Konoha, Deidara was tired of kicking Tobi's ass. He wished the idiot would stop saying…it…so he could stop beating him for it. But the simpleton had taken Deidara's words to heart, and every second sentence, he proclaimed his affections:
"Sempai, can you pass me the salt? I love you."
"Oww, I think you broke my nose! I love you. There are bandages in the bathroom, right?"
"But I don't want to sleep in my own room. I want to sleep in here with you, because I love you. I don't mind the floor. I love you and your hard, uncomfortable floor."
Each time, Deidara felt honor-bound to strike him. It felt less satisfying each time he did it. He wanted Tobi to stop, so they could go back to the way things were before Konoha. He even thought silently to himself, as Tobi's words twisted his stomach in a nauseating knot, that it might have been better if Tobi had just stayed gone.
People didn't love Deidara. They just didn't. They had sex with him, admired his art, but they never loved him. Maybe love worked for some people living in some perfect village with no troubles whatsoever, but not for him. To think he might experience love after all he'd been through, all he'd done, was stupidly optimistic. Only an idiot would subject themselves to such pain.
"An idiot, un," he mumbled to himself.
"What, sempai?" Tobi answered. "I love you," he added a moment later.
Deidara's eyes widened. "You're an idiot, un," he repeated incredulously. He couldn't meet Tobi's eyes. Tobi was just the kind of moron to do something as stupid as fall in love.
The artist's knees buckled as, for the first time, it occurred to him that Tobi was sincere. He crumpled to the ground and stared hard at the floor.
"Sempai, are you alright?"
'It's not a lie, he lo…he means it,' his baffled mind whispered. 'What a fucking idiot.'
Tobi knelt beside him and turned Deidara's face to look at him. "I love you," he affirmed. The blond blinked a couple of times, and slapped the hand away.
"Enough, I get it! You can stop now, un," he pleaded. He was too bewildered to hit Tobi properly. The moron seemed to interpret the non-hitting as permission to pull him into an embrace and cuddle him like he was some sort of oversized teddy bear.
Deidara pinched him and Tobi retreated. His victory was dampened when the brunette leaned forward and gave him a gentle peck of a kiss on the tip of his nose. The simple skin-to-skin contact had electricity running through his body; he didn't retaliate because he was afraid of what he might do if he touched him further.
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Deidara ignored Tobi for three days straight. No matter what Tobi did, it seemed like he didn't exist. Deidara looked through him, not at him, just like during his pre-Akatsuki days. The artist locked his bedroom door every night, so Tobi was forced to sleep outside of the room in the hallway.
His constant smile was beginning to slip.
'Maybe I should apologize,' he speculated. But he didn't know what to apologize for, so he didn't. He made sure not to embarrass his sempai in public anymore, and only said 'I love you' one or twice a day.
On the fourth day, a village merchant came by the house to ask Tobi to be his escort to Suna. Tobi turned him down. "I can't leave Deidara-sempai," he explained. He apologized to the man and shut the door. When he turned around, he saw a flash of yellow disappear into the studio.
Tobi leaned his head into the studio. "Need any help, sempai?" he asked. The flying porcelain saucer Deidara threw at him connected solidly with his forehead and left a red bump on Tobi's pale skin. "Guess not. I'll go make dinner then," he offered.
The artist didn't respond to him. He didn't speak with him during the meal, and he got up and walked off after he'd finished as if Tobi wasn't there at all.
But Tobi was pretty sure he'd been forgiven, because that night, Deidara's door was unlocked and left cracked open for him. His smile returned as he slipped inside.
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He hadn't thought it was possible. He missed Tobi. He missed Tobi. The bastard wasn't even gone, but he missed him. He missed hearing his annoying voice, missed seeing his goofy face, missed touching his skin. Deidara couldn't deny the fact that he wanted to talk to him, to sleep with him, to live together like they'd done before. He just wasn't quite sure how to bridge the gap he'd created between them.
Sex seemed a good a start as any. It was something he was familiar with, and it was the only route he could think of that would restore their life together without having to talk about his feelings. He'd rather die than say he forgave Tobi (that implied Tobi had hurt him, which he'd also never admit), but if he could show Tobi that he'd put Konoha behind him, Tobi would figure out the rest eventually. Besides, he still had to finish what they'd started in the Forest village forest.
Deidara stripped off his clothes and prepared himself thoroughly before he opened the door to his room. Tobi snuck inside before he had the chance to lie back down on the bed.
"Strip," the blond ordered. If he didn't act quickly, Tobi would start talking and make everything sappy and emotion-ridden.
Tobi stripped. Deidara pointed to the bed and Tobi lay down on it. The brunette waited for instruction.
The bottle of lubricant he'd used on himself earlier rested on the bedside table. Deidara picked it up and poured it directly onto Tobi's awakening cock. He sniggered as the cold liquid caused the taller man's hips to buck. He warmed up Tobi's erection with his hands, spreading the lube around and watching with amusement the variety of enraptured expressions that made their way across Tobi's face.
Just to keep Tobi on his toes, Deidara hopped onto the bed without warning and straddled the other man. Tobi tried to pull him down for a kiss; the artist pushed up to his knees and reached around for Tobi's erection. The pale man forgot whatever notion he had of kissing Deidara. He took shuddering breaths and watched in fascination as the blond positioned himself and sank down onto Tobi's length in one fluid motion.
They both gasped, Deidara in momentary pain, Tobi in surprise and pure pleasure.
"Oh, fuuuck," the brunette moaned. Deidara ignored his discomfort and gave the man beneath him a smug grin. He pushed up and slid down again, tauntingly slow. Tobi writhed beneath him.
"Sempai, please, fast-aaAAHH!" The man's begging broke off into another moan as Deidara clenched his muscles. Tobi arched his back and tangled his hands into the sheets trying to get a grip. Deidara decided he wanted him to scream. The artist increased his speed, not bothering to angle his thrusts to make Tobi hit his prostate; he didn't want to come yet. He had other plans for his own aching erection.
Tobi panted and tossed his head as Deidara rode him. He made small, pleading gasps with each lowering of Deidara's hips. The blond waited until he felt Tobi shuddering on the edge of his climax. He pushed himself down until his ass brushed Tobi's groin and clenched himself around Tobi's cock.
Tobi screamed his name and thrust his hips up. Deidara felt burning seed fill him. He waited until Tobi's climax finished before he lifted himself off of the other man and winced at the mess he'd made.
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Tobi slouched back into the bed, unable to form any complete thought, but getting the vague impression that the world was a wonderful, joy-filled place.
"Ahem," Deidara cleared his throat beside him. Tobi cracked open an eye and looked at him. The artist glanced down purposefully; Tobi followed his gaze and froze.
Deidara was still hard.
Tobi burned with shame.
"S-sempai," he stuttered, wondering how he could excuse his horrible neglect of his partner's needs.
Deidara silenced his explanation with a dry look. He reached for the lube once more and poured it into his hands. He gestured for Tobi to roll over, which he did hesitantly. He hadn't really been gay before Deidara, so he'd never been taken before. He wasn't sure he'd like it, but how could he deny Deidara, who he loved, and who had just given him the most mind-blowing orgasm of his life? He tried not to wince as he felt fingers tracing his entrance.
He opened his legs and held back a wince as one of Deidara's nimble fingers slipped inside of him. It wasn't so bad, if he ignored the prodding and the intrusion and the sheer alieness of it. He craned his neck to try and watch what Deidara was doing.
A second finger joined the first and started stretching him. Tobi squirmed. A hand at his hip held him in place as the fingers pressed deeper and brushed up against a bundle of nerves. Pleasure surged through his veins, and he saw fireworks behind his eyelids. Tobi decided he might like bottoming
Deidara scissored his fingers a few times and loosened the ring of muscles. He pulled the digits out and replaced them with something larger. Tobi winced, gasped, bit his lip as he waited for Deidara to move, rocked with the motion of Deidara's hips, and decided, yes, he really might like bottoming.
At first he tried not to make any noise. A few thrusts later, he resolved not to scream. Then Deidara's hand slipped in between his legs and squeezed, and he decided that as long as the neighbors couldn't hear, a little noise couldn't hurt.
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Once he awoke from his orgasm-induced haze, Tobi inched over toward Deidara and wrapped himself around the blond. Deidara didn't push him away. When Tobi nibbled his ear, he tilted his head to give him better access, and when Tobi caught his lips in a kiss, Deidara opened his mouth and returned it with the same languid affection that Tobi gave it.
After a few minutes of dazed kissing, Tobi pulled away from him. "Am I allowed to talk now, sempai?" he asked.
Deidara grunted and laid his head on Tobi's chest.
"We're…we're ok now, right? You're not mad anymore?" Tobi questioned hesitantly.
Deidara nuzzled his cheek against Tobi's collarbone. "Hmmm," he replied.
"Sempai…?"
Deidara lifted his head and blinked at him sleepily. "I want an omelet, un," he told the brunette. Tobi's forehead wrinkled with confusion, but he wiggled out from underneath Deidara and sat up. A few certain muscles protested at his movement, slowing him down.
Deidara pulled him back down and draped a boneless hand over Tobi's waist. "Not now. In the morning, make me an omelet, un," he elaborated.
"I don't take food orders," Tobi muttered to himself. He watched Deidara yawn and fall asleep, and thought to himself that he probably would've made the blond breakfast in bed anyways. And, he admitted to himself, they'd probably both be limping tomorrow and want to stay in bed most of the day.
"Guess you've forgiven me, sempai. Omelet it is, then," he whispered as he closed his eyes.
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AN: Yayz! Everything's all better! To give y'all a rough idea of what's next, there will be one or two more chapters (depends on how verbose I end up being with the action as to the length), an epilogue, and an epilogue for the side story (which will actually be happy and might serve to counteract the general angst-ness that is What Deidara didn't tell Tobi. Don't get me wrong, I like the side story (I like the way chapters one and five turned out), but I am more than willing to admit it's depressing and melodramatic.). So yeah, the end is near. Get excited! Get teary-eyed! Get ready to yell at me if I take as long to update as I did last time!
