Guys, I'm going to travel into that which I have never traveled into before…the world of fluffy, lovey-dovey YAOI! I'm feeling pretty stoked. First. Yaoi. Fic. EVER.

YAY!

Disclaimer: If I owned Yu-Gi-Oh, I'm pretty sure this would be in the actual series. I don't own The Footprints of God, either. That goes to Greg Iles.

Insert Witty Banter Here

Fool Me Once, Fool Me Twice

The moon cast a soft glow across the ground, mixing with the dim shine of the streetlights that dotted the sidewalk. Little spotlights of yellow pockmarked the roads, and were occasionally occupied for the briefest of seconds by a rushing car. It was a peaceful night. The sky was beautiful, each twinkling star like a happy little thought. Everything was calm. Still. Tranquil.

"Yugi, turn off the light."

The young man in question rolled over in the bed, turning to the ball of blankets lying beside him. "Hm?"

"Turn off the light." The ball repeated, shifting slightly to get a little more comfortable.

Yugi grinned, "Demanding, aren't we?" He teased, eyeing the ball as it made a low sound of displeasure.

"Come on now, I'm trying to sleep." It would have sounded aggressive, had it not come from a quiet, timid voice that sounded more exasperated than grumpy.

"And I'm trying to read."

"So? It's my bed."

Yugi chuckled. It was a typical night, for the two of them. After all, they'd been together nearly two years. They weren't anything official, or even anything super-serious. They just shared a nice companionship. It was something they'd both wanted. Nothing intense. Compassionate, but not intense. Sexual? Often. But not intense.

A white head poked up from inside the ball of sheets, and two irritated brown eyes followed suit, "I'm going to kick you off." He warned, and the head disappeared back into the covers.

"Oh, one minute. Don't get all bent out of shape about it…"

"Already bent into an unnatural one, thank you."

Yugi snickered this time, not feeling any kind of empathy towards his partner whatsoever. "Well, that's your fault, Ryou."

"Thanks. I appreciate the sentiment."

"You're sounding more and more like Bakura every day." Yugi commented casually, leaning his back into the pillow. Ryou's pillows were so very comfy.

"With you, that's probably a good thing."

It probably was. After high school had passed, and Yugi and his friends had all meandered in the general direction of adult life, everyone had grown and changed. Yugi, in one instance, had become something of a smart aleck, and often exercised this aspect of his personality with Ryou.

Which, in turn, often got him kicked out of bed.

Somewhere along the way, back when they were eighteen, they'd managed to get themselves into another odd save-the-world expedition. One that ended up splitting the lights from their darker halves. It wasn't too bad, though. Once they'd gotten used to it, they'd all settled down into a new routine, one that included two new, tangible friends.

Bakura had become a friend to the 'gang', no matter how much of a menace he liked to be. Yami had fit in instantly, of course, and had taken up dating Anzu with much vigor. They'd been married just the past fall, actually.

Yami had told Yugi in private one day that Anzu was begging for baby number one. Yugi had promised to stay out of the house for those little trial-and-error runs. Sharing a house with his darkness was the only way both Yugi and Yami could really function properly, and the same went for Bakura and Ryou. It came with some downsides, though. Like Yami and Anzu and their particularly…loud nights.

Those were the days that Yugi often spent with Ryou overnight, which didn't bug either of them. They quite enjoyed one another's company. Yugi loved Ryou, and Ryou loved Yugi.

Bakura loved walking in on them.

"Where is Bakura tonight, anyways? Usually he's got one ear on the door so that he can walk in when…well, you know." Yugi felt a slight blush rise up, turning his ears red, and he tried to shrug it off. No matter how much he matured with age, he'd always be a little bit childlike when it came to certain things. Well, talking about them, at least.

Ryou shrugged, or at least Yugi figured he shrugged. It was kind of hard to tell, with the way he'd wrapped himself up. "He's out at the bar with Malik, Jonouchi, and Honda. They do that almost every Friday."

"Right. Sorry, forgot."

"Retard."

"Hey now, that's not very nice." Yugi chastised, amusement spreading across his face. Ryou was always interesting when he was tired and cranky.

The top of Ryou's head poked up, and his eyes were narrowed with evil glee. "You're right. It's insulting to the mentally ill."

Yugi gasped in mock pain, his book falling onto the bed as his hands made a stabbing motion to his chest. In his moment of complete melodrama, Yugi flung himself onto the ball that was Ryou, which made the white-haired man jump in surprise. "You wound me!" Yugi cried out, having trouble keeping down the bubbling laughter threatening to ruin his act.

Ryou jerked, shoving Yugi off of him. He pulled the blankets off of himself, revealing a bare torso. Yugi's eyes trailed up and down the exposed chest appreciatively.

"See something you like?"

"I like it every time, Ryou."

Ryou rolled his eyes, falling back onto his own pillow. "Mhm, well, at least I took my shirt off. You're planning on sleeping in a dress shirt."

"Stingy, are we?"

The pale man snorted, closing his eyes. He didn't say anything in response to Yugi poking fun at him. It was a common occurrence between the two. They both knew not to take each other's antics seriously.

Yugi sighed dramatically, pulling his tie through the collar and laying it in a heap on the bedside table. "I'm taking it off." He announced, tackling the task of his buttons.

"Good to know." Ryou mumbled, turning to the side. Shivering slightly, he pulled the blankets up to his shoulders.

Yugi made a bit of a show of unbuttoning the shirt as slowly as possible, dragging out the process or removing his arms and dropping the shirt onto the floor in a heap. He'd pick it up in the morning.

On to his bad-tempered partner…

Yugi sidled over to Ryou's side of the bed. The other male made no move to say that he'd noticed Yugi's movements, or even that he really cared. Sliding under the covers, the multi-colour haired young man slipped his arms around Ryou's waist. He always enjoyed the feeling that his arms fit perfectly around the other's narrow hips.

Ryou shivered again, this time at the contact of Yugi's cold arms on his warm body. He groaned slightly, annoyed that Yugi was maintaining the stubborn desire to keep him awake until all hours of the night.

Yugi pulled Ryou's body towards him. Closer, closer, closer…Yugi moved his head so that it was resting over Ryou's ear. Ryou could feel Yugi's breath tickling his cheek. Both of them tensed a little, and then…

"Did you just lick me?"

Yugi couldn't take it anymore. He burst out laughing, the vibrations of his hysteria shaking the entire bed a little bit. Ryou wormed out of Yugi's arms, sitting up and frowning at his bed-mate.

"That was very immature of you, Yugi." Ryou reprimanded, crossing his own arms over his chest.

Yugi managed to force the laughter to a slight chuckle, "What, were you expecting something else?" He queried in a low, rough tone.

Ryou smirked, "Yes, in fact."

"And that was…?"

Perhaps Yugi shouldn't have said anything. He'd figured that Ryou was too tired to play any kinds of games that night. He'd guessed wrong.

Ryou was on top of him almost instantaneously, straddling Yugi's hips. His hands fell on either side of Yugi's head, and he leaned down so that their noses were almost touching. "I was expecting something more along the lines of this…" He whispered huskily.

Yugi felt an excited shudder course through him. "Really?" He choked, trying to regain his composure. It wasn't that he didn't like it. In fact, he liked it a lot. He just hadn't been expecting Ryou to act so…unusually, considering his mood.

Ryou brought a hand up and trailed the side of Yugi's face with a finger, "Mm…yes. I was."

"I thought you weren't feeling kinky tonight." Yugi muttered under his breath, turning into the nice feeling of Ryou's gentle strokes along his cheek.

Ryou let out a deep chuckle of his own, "Now, now. What happened to the innocent, naïve little Yugi we all knew and loved?"

Oh, so now Ryou was teasing him.

"You weren't much better." Yugi shot back, not daring to move. When Ryou got like this, it was better to leave him to his own devices.

"Or so you think."

"What, so you were a closet pervert?"

Ryou's lips twitched slightly, in a mysterious smirk. Okay, so he was definitely enjoying all angles of his moment of manipulation and power over Yugi.

"Take your pants off and we'll find out." Ryou said in a tone that was too soft and pure for the situation he was trying to instigate.

Yugi cocked one slender eyebrow, "Dirty talk, now?" He asked, his voice calm despite how rigid and tense his body had become. His muscles were clenched so tightly, Yugi wondered if he was going to cause some permanent damage. Ryou had most definitely surprised him, to have gotten this kind of reaction.

Ryou hummed against Yugi's body, his finger moving down to trace the lines of Yugi's chest. He wasn't super built or anything, but Yugi had turned out fairly well-toned. He didn't have Yami's more defined chest, but Yugi wasn't scrawny anymore, at least.

Suddenly, Ryou's hand snapped out. He snatched up the book that had lain forgotten within the folds of the bed. Ryou pulled it up to eye-level, scanning the title. "The Footprints of God." He read, "Is it good?"

"Very. It meshes science and religion in a very interesting way."

"Sounds interesting." Ryou mused, laying the book onto the bedside table, right on top of Yugi's tie. "You won't get any more reading done, tonight."

"Really, now?" Yugi purred, reaching up to gently tug on Ryou's neck, bringing his face down towards him. A grin twisted onto his face, and he let their lips meet gently. His mouth worked against Ryou's in a slow, tender fashion. He wasn't about to let Ryou get all rough right off the bat.

Ryou's hand knotted in Yugi's messy hair, and he pulled away. "Don't think this means you've won." He warned, before crushing their lips together with much more force than Yugi had used. Fire exploded between them, and everything blurred with hazy lust and desire.

This kiss was much more passionate than the previous one, and they found their arms and bodies intertwined by the time they had to rip away from each other for air. Ryou had wound up back on his side of the bed, but with Yugi still pretty much wrapped around him.

Ryou grinned at his partner, "Had enough…yet?" He inquired breathlessly, running his hand through Yugi's hair.

"I…concede." Yugi panted, letting his arms fall from Ryou's hair and face onto the bed. "You've obviously gotten your second wind, whereas I…have not."

"Nah, I've just got more stamina." Ryou joked.

"And what's that supposed to mean?"

Ryou leaned towards Yugi, a vicious smirk on his face, "Have I wounded your manly pride?"

"You've wounded it so many times, there's barely any of it left to be hurt nowadays." Yugi replied, grinning right back in all of his smart-ass glory.

Ryou chuckled at the joke, his eyes still misty from their brief, but still strong, moment of passionate intertwinement. Yugi's mind wandered once more, as they laid in silence, trying to catch their breaths.

Yugi had been right in his thoughts earlier. The two of them had definitely changed very much in the past years. So much so, that should they have been propelled back in time, their younger selves probably would have not seen much resemblance.

Still, it was experience and their very companionship that had changed them. That, and the constant exposure to their other halves and their own personalities. Yami and Bakura had softened, ever so slightly, over the past couple years. Yugi and Ryou had lost a little bit of their naiveté.

And Yugi wouldn't change anything, not one solitary bit of it, for the whole world.

"Can I read my book, now?" Yugi asked in as polite a tone as he could muster, "I was at a good part, too."

"No."

"Why?"

"I told you that there would be no reading tonight."

"I was thinking that was if we had sex."

"Well, no."

"'No' to what?"

"To both."

"Why?"

"I'm tired."

"So?"

"So, I'm not going to be much fun if I'm tired."

"Doesn't bother me." Yugi murmured into Ryou's hair, having pulled the white-haired male back into his embrace, "Besides, I've got a Tournament on Sunday, and I won't see you for a couple days."

"Addict."

"What?"

"You're an addict."

"That was random. And to what, pray tell?"

"To sex."

Yugi laughed throatily, tightening his grip on Ryou's body, "Well, I already knew that." He nuzzled the back of Ryou's head, breathing in the nice scent of recently shampooed hair. Ryou always used a shampoo with very little scent to it, so he never smelled much other than…clean. It was refreshing. He'd always loved the way Ryou smelled, or rather, didn't.

When Ryou said nothing, Yugi moaned into Ryou's hair. "Ry-ou," He begged, "Please?"

"Tomorrow."

"Morning?"

Ryou sighed, accepting the slight defeat. It wasn't like Yugi was giving him any other options. "Sure, why not. Bakura will probably crash at Malik's anyways."

"Thank you." Yugi said sincerely, nipping Ryou's ear lightly. Ryou swatted Yugi away with a hand.

"That means you let me sleep tonight."

"Oh, fine."

"Wait."

Yugi blinked, having leaned over to pick up his book again. Ryou sat up, crawling across the short distance and pushing Yugi onto his back again. Ryou leaned down to kiss Yugi again, this time trailing kisses down his throat and to his collar bone.

"No hickeys, now. Yami will ask questions."

"Because he definitely doesn't already know what we'll have been doing." Ryou muttered sarcastically, before going back to Yugi's lips. Yugi had been about to make a comment, but Ryou's mouth on his silenced any responses from the multi-colour haired man.

There wasn't a doubt in Yugi's mind that Ryou was one of the best kissers in the entire world. Ryou had already sent Yugi into a daze, and he felt his mind whirling as Ryou gently pulled away from the contact.

"Now," Ryou whispered gruffly, running his fingertips down Yugi's chest again, a shiver raking up Yugi's spine.

"Now…?" Yugi queried, his eyes half-lidded from the pleasure of Ryou's hand on his chest and the after-effects of Ryou's kiss.

The white-haired, pale man pulled away, all sensuality lost upon him. He grabbed Yugi's face, forcing him to look his way.

"Now," Ryou continued in a tone that was so angelic, it was a little bit creepy. "Turn off the damn light."

End

Yep. It was chalk full of innuendos and almost-smutty moments. I hope you enjoyed it, and drop a review on your way out if you can.

Happy summer!