Dislaimer: I do not own Junjou Romantica, Sekai ichi Hatsukoi, or Cafe latte Rhapsody or any of their characters.

The Uke Flu

Chapter Thirty-nine: Guests

Hiroki headed towards the door.

"Are you coming, Nowaki?"

Just then the timer on the stove went off.

"Will you please get the door, Hiro-san? I'll be right there in a minute; I have to get something out of the oven." Nowaki padded towards the kitchen. Hiroki looked at Nowaki as he walked past him and shrugged. He went to the apartment door and opened it.

"Ah, Kusama-san?" A pleasant voice queried.

Hiroki stared at the two men before him, straightening from their bows. It took him a minute to realize he was just standing there rather stupidly. Then he bowed himself.

"No, I'm Kamijou. Nowaki… I mean, Kusama is in the kitchen."

Hiroki realized he was staring again, so he shook his head slightly and stepped to the side.

"Welcome to our home. Won't you please come in?" he invited. The two men entered and slipped off their shoes. As they stepped into the guest slippers that Nowaki had laid out, Hiroki had a chance to study the men.

The couple seemed quite young. The smaller of the two reminded Hiroki a bit of Misaki. He was slight with dark black hair and large dark brown eyes.

Cute… But he doesn't look as though he could be a day over eighteen.

It was the other guest, however, that had really caught Hiroki's attention. As he had straightened, the professor noted the swelling of the young man's belly. It was very noticeable because the rest of the guy's body was impeccable. The youth was tall, just as towering as Nowaki, in fact, and equally as handsome. Hiroki observed that this new arrival's coloring was almost identical to his own, though perhaps just a bit more cinnamon. He couldn't help but find himself wondering if he and Nowaki had a son, if the kid might not turn out looking something like this tall auburn-haired visitor. Hiroki would tell anyone right then, however, that there was no way any boy of his would be ever allowed to sport as many piercings as this lanky youth had.

Just then Nowaki popped into the entry.

"Yukina-san?" Nowaki bowed.

The two guests bowed back. When Yukina straightened he offered, "Kusama-san, so wonderful to meet you at last. This is my boyfriend, Kisa-san." The smaller man blushed at the introduction and Hiroki found himself thinking it didn't seem as though their dark-haired guest was entirely comfortable with the term "boyfriend."

"Ah, so nice to meet you, Kisa-san. Yukina-san has told me so much about you, I feel almost as though we've met already." Nowaki was glowing as he greeted the smaller of the pair.

"Erm, Nice to me you as well, Kusama-san," Kisa offered hesitantly blushing a bit more.

"Kusama-san, here's the dish I promised to bring, but it might need to go in the oven for a few minutes." Yukina sparkled as he offered the decorative baking pan he'd been holding. Nowaki took it with a smile.

Both Kisa and Hiroki were squinting a bit at this point, as the luminosity their two semukes together generated was a bit like being caught in a solar storm.

"Would you like to come with me to the kitchen, Yukina-san? I have a few things I'm just finishing and then you can direct me in what to do with your dish," Nowaki offered happily. Yukina responded with a breathtaking smile and the two tall men headed into the apartment chatting amicably, as though they'd been friends for years.

Hiroki looked at Kisa who had been watching the two semes' interaction closely. Kisa sighed and nodded to Hiroki who in turn just nodded back. Then the reticent uksemes silently followed the two giants out into the apartment.

As the two lanky ones entered the kitchen; Nowaki suddenly realized he hadn't turned the small radio off yet. He was about to apologize for the noise, but as soon as Yukina heard the music he exclaimed:

"Wow, I love this song!"

"Me too!" Nowaki beamed. This realization led to a bunch of happy chatter and a high-five between the two knocked up semes. The two quiet ukes, meanwhile, looked at each other and simultaneously rolled their eyes. Then Kisa looked keenly at Hiroki.

"I'm going to say you're a classical man, Kamijou-san."

Hiroki nodded. "Indie or jazz?"

Kisa shrugged. "It depends on my mood."

"Would you like something to drink, Kisa-san?"

Looking at the at all the glitter and tiny winged bunnies floating in the air over the two laughing pregnant semukes in the kitchen, Kisa sighed. "I could sure use a beer, Kamijou-san."

"I don't mean to be rude," Hiroki said in his politest growl. "But are you even old enough to drink?" Kisa looked at Hiroki with a world-worn air.

"I'm over thirty," the petite uke mumbled. The he frowned as he studied Hiroki. "What about you?"

"The same."

"Really?" Kisa's uncreased brow rose. "I wouldn't have pegged you for a day over twenty two, Kamijou-san."

The two ukes studied each other again for a moment; a slight smile twitched the corner of each one's mouth.

"Let me get that beer for you, Kisa-san," Hiroki, looking into his radiant kitchen, grumbled as he headed in. "There's no need for us both to get sunburned."

Kisa's serious face relaxed when he heard this. He let out a low breath of relief and watched Hiroki carefully weave around the glowing semes on his way to the fridge. Kisa thought for the first time that this evening might not turn out to be as awful as he'd feared.

As Hiroki reached into the fridge to grab the beer he felt a warm hand drift through his hair. He straightened up quickly.

"Nowaki," he hissed. "There's people here." Nowaki smiled at his flustered partner completely undisturbed.

"Yes, but they're our kind of people, Hiro-san." Then he leaned down and kissed Hiroki's forehead. "Would you please hand me that dish on the bottom shelf?"

Hiroki set the beer on the counter and wiped his forehead with the back of his hand before he retrieved the dish. Nowaki took it from his scowling professor and ruffled the older man's hair once more. Hiroki looked anxiously over at their guests.

Kisa was leaning against the bar that separated the kitchen from the main room, talking with Yukina who stood at the stove positively beaming. Neither man seemed to have noticed Nowaki's antics. If they had, it certainly didn't seem to bother them. Then it struck Hiroki that, despite all his escapades before Nowaki, he'd never really been around other yaoi men in a setting like this before.

Well of course there's Akihiko and Misaki and Miyagi and his brat, but they don't really count and we've never really done anything as couples together. The notion that Nowaki might openly touch him and that the other couple there wouldn't think anything about this display of affection or be offended by it struck Hiroki as slightly surreal.

"By the way, Hiro-san." Nowaki's eyes slipped into puppy mode. "Yukina-san said he met another semuke today at the University."

"Yes. It's true, Kamijou-san." Yukina pushed back from the counter and sparkled his way over. "I feel really badly for the fellow. He's very young and I think he has already had kind of a hard time fitting in: he's of a mixed heritage and looks kind of imposing. I think he ends up spending a lot of time on his own."

From across the bar Kisa frowned. Though he wasn't the type to really get jealous (or so he told himself) he asked curiously, "Is this another art student, Yukina?"

"No, Kisa-san." Yukina smiled reassuringly at Kisa who just ducked his head and blushed. "He's in the sciences I think… Astrophysics or something."

"So what does this have to do with anything, Nowaki?" Hiroki looked at his giant suspiciously.

"Well, Yukina-san said that Keito-san and his boyfriend don't live too far from here. Though I know it's short notice, maybe we could invite them to join us too?" Nowaki's voice was hopeful but tentative, knowing how social events stressed his partner. "I mean we certainly have enough food after all, Hiro-san."

"Keito-san seemed kind of shy, so he might not even come," Yukina offered helpfully.

"Besides the other couple called while you were answering the door, when I was in the kitchen getting that dish out of the oven," Nowaki added. "And they ran into a bit of trouble so they're going to get here just a bit later than expected anyway."

Hiroki shook his head: all the giant semes in the kitchen were making him feel a bit claustrophobic.

"It's your party Nowaki, I don't care." Though Hiroki was beginning to wonder, with all the pregnant semukes popping up, if they might not be on the verge of a whole other epidemic.

This acquiescence on his part resulted in another round of high-fives. Seeing this, Hiroki made a bee-line for the front room before he was crushed by optimistic seme-enthusiasm. It seemed to him that this would be a very undignified demise.

Out in the main room he handed a beer to a grateful Kisa. The two ukes then made their way over and sat on the couch, hopefully a safe distance from the clouds of felicitous fallout that were currently wafting out of the kitchen.

"So Yukina-san is an art student?" Hiroki asked Kisa.

Kisa nodded thoughtfully, as he watched his overgrown lover talking with someone (most likely this Keito-san person) energetically on his cell phone.

"And what do you do, Kisa-san?"

Apparently all the hardware in Yukina's ears did nothing to hamper his hearing. The art student had just flipped his phone shut and answered proudly for Kisa.

"Kisa-san is an editor at Marukawa publishing in the shojou manga department."

At the mention of shojou, Nowaki's eyes widened with delight. "What authors do you work with, Kisa-san?"

Once again before Kisa could answer, Yukina started going down the list of authors and titles. Over on the couch Hiroki noticed that Kisa wasn't particularly disturbed by this, and in fact, seemed perfectly content to be quiet and let his own giant bubble on as he silently pulled out his wallet and offered his card.

Nowaki's face lit up with pleasure as many of the titles were his favorites. Then he dimmed a bit, realizing he couldn't very well start talking about his secret vice in front of Hiroki. Hiroki could see the tall man's conflict from where he was sitting across the room. He sighed.

"Nowaki," he called out. Nowaki looked over at him with an expression that was already slightly guilty.

"I know about your stash," Hiroki growled.

"What?" Nowaki's handsome face looked shocked.

"The shojou you keep in those shoe boxes in the bottom of your half of the closet. Honestly how long have we been together?" Nowaki looked at Hiroki with a stunned expression.

"Hiro-san, why didn't you tell me you knew?"

Hiroki felt his face grow hot. It made him crazy that it was his partner that taken to hiding his girlie romance manga collection like it was hardcore porn and yet he was the one who was blushing.

"I thought it was sweet. Okay?" Hiroki said in the voice he reserved for polite company. "I just brought it up to say, you should feel free to talk with Yukina-san all you want about it."

Nowaki smiled with appreciation at his partner's understanding and then began an immediate conversation with Yukina, who was delighted to share in a session of "All You Ever Wanted to Know About Shojou but Were Afraid to Ask."

Watching the exchange between the couple, Kisa asked Hiroki hesitantly, "Kamijou-san, how long exactly have you and Kusama-san been together?"

"Over eight years," Hiroki noticed as he said this that Kisa's expression kept flipping back and forth between horrified and hopeful. Hiroki took a swig of his beer.

"And you?" He looked back over at the psychic twins playing the Japanese version of Martha Stewart in his kitchen.

"Almost a year," Kisa admitted. His dark eyes softened just slightly as he watched Yukina take two extra plates from Nowaki and carry them over to add to the dining table. Kisa turned back to Hiroki. He wasn't usually so candid, but strangely he already felt a certain kinship with his host.

"I never thought it would last this long… I was uh… kind of active before I met Yukina-san, you know, Kamijou-san." Hiroki nodded and his expression was such that it communicated to Kisa that he did indeed know… exactly.

"Yeah… I was the same."

"So what happened?" Kisa's eyes held an inquisitive gleam.

"Nowaki was persistent as hel… Um, he was persistent, Kisa-san " Hiroki tried to remember to temper his language with his guest. Still even as he said this, he couldn't help but feel the corners of his mouth twitch up slightly at both the memories of their early days and now, seeing his giant puttering happily with his new seme sidekick. He looked at Kisa. "Do you know what I mean, Kisa-san?" Kisa glanced briefly at Yukina.

"Uh… Yes. I sure I do, Kamijou-san." Kisa took a drink of his beer.

"I know a couple people at Marukawa." Hiroki offered his own card to Kisa, switching the topic to something safer. "But they work in the literature division. I have a friend, an author, who's carried by the house."

"Hiro-san wrote a book," Nowaki exclaimed enthusiastically from the kitchen. He wanted everyone to know about his partner's accomplishment and on some level it always annoyed him when Hiro-san deferred to Usami as "the" author.

Hiroki found himself wondering if in addition to one's libido the flu also heightened the one's hearing.

"Really?" Kisa asked. "Are you carried by Marukawa then too, Kamijou-san?"

"Ah, no I'm carried by a house that specializes in academic publications," Hiroki answered, blushing.

"Hiro-san is a professor of Literature," Nowaki chirped cheerfully, as he got himself and Yukina each a can of sweet tea from the refrigerator. Kisa read the new card in his hand and saw his uke host taught at M University.

"What's your book about, Kamijou-san?" Yukina asked taking his can from Nowaki.

"It's a discourse of the proliferation of male same-sex literary traditions and social constructions in historical samurai culture."

"Very cool." Yukina smiled before taking a sip of his tea. Kisa on the other hand had felt his eyes begin to glaze halfway through the professor's sentence. Hiroki didn't mind this, however, it was the more typical response he received from non-academics.

Hiroki lowered his voice conspiratorially and said to Kisa. "Don't tell Nowaki, Kisa-san, but I have read parts of his manga collection and I have say, based on my limited experience, that you seem like a really proficient editor."

Kisa's eyes widened at the unexpected praise from a near-stranger and blushed. "I do okay, I guess," he said softly.

From the kitchen Yukina called, "Kisa's books have a certain sensitivity don't you think, Kamijou-san?" Hiroki's head shot up at the tall seme's comment.

"Um, Yes, that's a good way to describe it, Yukina-san." Hiroki exhaled slowly; he could tell by the look on Nowaki's face that he had heard him as well and he knew now that he'd never hear the end of it.

"When did your hearing get so goddamn sharp, Nowaki?" Hiroki muttered under his breath.

"It's my seme senses. Sorry, Hiro-san," Nowaki answered from the kitchen .

"Seme senses?" Kisa asked.

"Yeah," Yukina piped in. "I've just been learning about it myself, Kisa-san… I guess when you a yaoi couple and another seme gather in the same place, the coupled seme's senses get heightened in anticipation of needing to protect his uke." Kisa's baby smooth brow creased at this new information from his boyfriend.

"Sounds a lot like animal planet."

"Exactly," Hiroki growled.

Kisa was looking at Nowaki now, as Yukina's comments had turned into the two giants conversation into a "So You've Discovered You're Yaoi: What to Expect," question and answer mentoring session.

"So what does Kusama-san do?" Kisa was now feeling far more at ease.

"He's a doctor, pediatric surgeon, actually. He just finished his residency." Hiroki offered this with just the slightest bit of pride creeping into his voice.

"So, Kamijou-san, you're older?"

"Four years. And you and Yukina-san, Kisa-san?"

"Well, as was said, Yukina is still in University. There's about nine years difference between us," Kisa supplied.

"I don't think age matters that much in some ways." Hiroki grunted, thinking about the couples he knew. Seeing Kisa's brow raise he clarified. "I think most semes get psychologically/sexually arrested somewhere around the age of fourteen. So no matter how old they are they're all really pretty much the same."

"Overgrown kids," Kisa agreed, finishing the last of his beer.

A knock at the door sounded, causing both ukes to look up from their conversation.

"Speaking of which," Hiroki muttered, pushing himself up off the couch to go answer the door. "We've got another one joining this party."

Kisa's eyes shifted from Hiroki's departing back to the glowing semuke goodness in the kitchen. He found himself hoping this new semuke wasn't quite so luminous. Otherwise he imagined he'd find himself needing to get a pair of sunglasses.

New AN:Finally a moment to be a good author and thank people for their feedback.

Imagine I, I am long overdue in thanking you for your extraordinary effort in reviewing so many chapters. Your thoughtful comments were very much appreciated.

Kristen xx, sweetheart, thank you. Your words mean the world to me. I hope you're well.

Janice P, Thank you for the review. I'll take it happily whenever you feel like dropping on. Glad you enjoy my spin on the characters and my crazy stories. Excellent guess and I agree, though I have come across a few.

Heytheretia, I appreciate so much you leaving a review after alerting and favorting. It's always disappointing as an author when a reader feels strong enough to check all four boxes but is not moved to drop a note. Glad you liked Neko Hiro too! Hope to hear more from you. And I am delighted you know your semukes!

Ashley Tangerine, I have missed you and am glad you're back! Though you haven't missed much. And yes, that is going to be a hell of an event.

Kaorixa, gracias por las amables palabras. Estás en lo cierto! Estoy feliz de ver que conozca sus seumukes! Espero saber más de usted pronto.

Lionfish 13, you are indeed correct. Thank you for the wonderful drabbles this week. Thay brightened my day and I hope to review soon.

FujoshiNinjaNumber6, what are you doing up so late? I agree, they are the SIH Egoists. Hope you enjoyed this chapter at an earlier hour.

SpellboundWallflower, my lovely red panda, you are just too cute, from nose to tail, wiggles, twitches and all.

TBF 101, I hope by now you know how much you words mean to your cyber-seme, not just the content, which is marvelous, but that you take the time to write... Your dog couldn't be any happier.

Gothpandaotaku, Thank you for your faithfulness and so glad you like Aki. I am not really much of one for little kids, so writing him is a bit of a challenge actually.

X, my sweet faithful one, I am so happy to have you along on this re-post and I can't wait to get to new chapter territory.

Hiyokocchi, This story was written in part to challenge what had previously been the very rigid roles in yaoi. In this Au the tradition that one is either an uke or seme exclusively is being challenged by the more real world versatility of gay men. Hiroki occasionally penetrates Nowaki in this story but Nowaki is still the "dominant" partner of the pairing. In my mind Hiroki in the canon has not always been the bottom either. He says in that coffee shop scene, where he's stalking Nowaki, that he sets his pride aside and takes the bottom role. Indicating to me that he's not always done this and that it is his choice. I feel to help balance the power in their relationship.

SilentStare, I promise I will do my best to stay alive and finish my stories. Just so you know, however, because I have had health issues, I do have my accounts listed in my directives. My stories willed to someone and a request that my readers be notified. So until you hear otherwise, even when I am quiet, please assume I am alive and kicking and will eventually return.

Kisses to all my wonderful readers and hope to hear from more of you as this dinner party kicks into full gear!

Sincerely,

Cerberus

OLD AN:

spmuca08, soulfighters-17, Miyuki1393- thank you for the alerts and the favorites!

XMoiMoi- No but terrorist will be coming up1

MissMysty- Good call. As usual you are a true Yaoi expert

SilverKnightham- Glad you found that funny, it was supposed to be.

Revolnievol- You're a clever one, my dear.

BF101"big homemaker apron lovely dovey 50s pregnant gay sexy male dinner party squee fest!" Can I copy that and use it in my story summary? That's like one of the most wonderful descriptions I've ever read. You slay me BF.

X- as always lovely to hear from you. And I know how you love Nowaki in outfits…even if it's just a plain black apron.

EFG- Amazing review as always. Hope you like the crossover dinner party, because it's going to continue a bit!

Hinatagirl18- Another yaoi expert… Thanks for chiming in and I'm glad you're enjoying the cameos!

Puppyfacetwo- so did you guess right?

Tuff Cookie 1877- So great to see you here. I will PM you later, this last week before Thanksgiving break kicked my ass. So no Tyrant here, but can I entice you by saying that couple will be attending the same birthing classes as the egoists?

Kristin form Italy- glad you liked it. Kisses my terse princess.

Asdfghjklove so glad you're enjoying the maturing relationship and Hiroki's growth. Personally that line about the jeans is one of my favorites in the chapter (yeah, I'm a pervert). Also… I hadn't thought of them… but now you know they'll be showing up in here somewhere along the way.

Friend from CR- Glad you're enjoying the story!