Author's Notes: Today is my boyfriend's birthday. Our TV, dishwasher and perhaps even our dryer has broken on us. An engineer was scheduled to come out to our apartment between 9am and 1pm to fix our electricity meter and it is now 1:40 pm.
I am not a happy bunny today.
On top of that, St Patrick's Day is coming up. I absolutely loathe St Patrick's Day. Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that I am always working on that day so I know the sort of reckless, drunken indecency that happens without fail.
Perhaps it has more to do with feeling of total helplessness and isolation of being stuck on this tiny island on the end of Europe. Hmmm...
Regardless, here is the new chapter.
Yukari slept through four alarms and she knew she was mega late when Aigis was knocking at perfectly timed 2 second intervals and saying in her metallic voice, "Yukari-chan, you have 10 minutes and 39 seconds before the first bell. Should you fail to vacate the premises immediately you are sure to be late for school, resulting in severe reprimand by the Gekoukan faculty."
"I'm up," she called from beneath her sheets, "thanks Aigis."
"Yukari-chan," the knocking continued, "by the pronounced muffle of your voice, I have deduced you are still in bed. Should you fail to vacate the premises immediately you are sure to be late for school, resulting in-"
"Yes, Aigis, I get it!" Yukari howled, flinging the blankets off the bed and making a show of stomping about in her bare feet, "See, I'm out of bed now so will you please stop knocking on the door!?"
There was a long, uncomfortable silence, Yukari was breathing like a wounded beast, her bare feet stinging on the cold floorboards.
There was a dejected sounding "Understood..." from behind the door and the heavy clicking and grinding of gears as Aigis walked away. Guiltily, Yukari sighed and rubbed her face, not particularly caring if she was late for school or not...
She picked up the shirt she was wearing from the night before and held it up to her face, breathing in the smell. School could totally wait, she was floating around on cloud nine and not even Aigis' wake-up call or a detention for being late could take her down. His smell was all over the shoulders of her shirt, and while she was seriously tempted to wear it to school again, she knew wearing the same shirt so many days in a row was more than a little disgusting.
Still... she was reluctant to put it with her laundry...
Settling to hang it on the back of her chair at her desk, Yukari turned to face her mirror, brushing back her messy bed-head with a comb. Her face was pink, her skin flushed and glowing in the sunlight poking through her window; she looked amazing, she felt amazing, and she could feel her eyelids droop and her heart race as the memories of the previous night came rushing back in a wave.
Strong, warm hands grasping her waist, or gently cradling her face, the taste of his tongue in her mouth, the sound of his soft moans, the feeling of his skin under her lips, touch and taste and sound and power...
Yukari was shuddering; watching her reflection in the mirror she noted her sooty expression, the darkness in her eyes and the wet glossiness on her lips and the strain of her breasts against the fabric of her tank-top. She felt incredibly sexy, and it was a power she didn't think she ever really felt.
Though she was aware that she was good-looking and that a fair amount of boys in the school were vying for her attention, she didn't feel nearly as hot and bothered as she did knowing it was Akihiko who wanted her attention now.
And it wasn't just the longing and wanting pounding under her skin. He... made her feel really special last night. It was more than romantic, it was incredibly intimate and she couldn't think of any other way she would have wanted the night to go. Yukari couldn't quite describe the feeling other than the warmth in her chest and the broad, beaming smile across her face. She couldn't seem to stop, even as she put on her clothes and checked her bag and gave herself one final look in the mirror, the huge smile was still there.
She still couldn't believe she actually had the courage to kiss him, and even more than that, that he actually kissed her back. And it was hot; he was so intense that she started losing control of herself and all she wanted to do was get his clothes off and touch as much of him as possible.
That thought – of his skin, his naked skin – sent a flare of heat into her belly and face that she nearly toppled over.
And his smile. Quiet, unassuming, but so gentle and kind and open and welcoming, and he was such a perfect gentleman for the whole time; only ever thinking of her while she was thinking of him... it was a rapport that she didn't think just happened with everybody.
It was like dream. Please, please don't let it be a dream, she wished with every fibre of her body, clenching her fists and shutting her eyes tight, please don't let it just be a dream.
Aigis knocked on the door again just as she pulled the straps of her bag over her shoulders, though it sounded much more tentative, "... Yukari-chan... the first bell has rung..."
Flinging the door open and reaching out to pull the android into a crushing hug, Yukari didn't care when the metal body refused to yield to the embrace and settled to just arch awkwardly into it. She let Aigis go; the robot staring blankly at her with nothing to say. She didn't have much expression, but Yukari swore blind that a flicker of a smile ghosted over her mouth.
She and Aigis ran to the station and then to school, the android was still silent for the entire trip.
Akihiko could not stop his left leg from shaking at the knee. It started in first period when he was trying to listen in Arithmetic, and continued on well into his other classes with a vengeance. At first he tried holding it down with his hand, then he tried willing it to stop (which took such an extreme amount of concentration that when prompted to answer a question in History he admitted he wasn't listening and landed himself with double homework), then he just settled to ignore the bouncing of his foot and knee until he could get to the gym, find a punching bag and rip it to pieces with his bare hands.
He was so ill at ease, and it wasn't any wonder why.
Admittedly it wasn't just just his leg that was distracting him in class, he was zoning out in most of his lectures, even though he had the best, most restful sleep of his life the night previous.
Akihiko wondered, when taking down the complex diagram of the cycle of a mitochondria in Biology... what is Yukari-chan doing right now?
Is she thinking about me...?
He was a strange mix of unrelenting happiness and gut-wrenching nervousness. The happiness was obvious, but the nervousness... he didn't know what to make of it. Thinking of last night made him happy, but thinking of Yukari made him breathless and his palms would start to sweat and his godamn leg wouldn't stop shaking!
"You okay man?" One of his classmates clapped him on the shoulder on his way to lunch, "You look a little on edge."
Akihiko just shrugged, "I'm okay... I just have a lot on my mind."
The guy left him alone after that, quickly darting out of the way when Mitsuru made her way towards him (she had that effect on a lot of people). They chatted briefly about the plan for the night; Arisato seemed to have contracted a stomach virus and Shinji was playing nursemaid, so Mitsuru felt wary of going to Tartarus. She brushed him off when he voiced his immense disappointment. He was more than willing to start beating a few shadows around and now that the chance was taken away his anxiousness doubled in size.
Shoving his hands into his pockets and kicking the ground on his way to the cafeteria, he couldn't seem to calm down or stop the constantly chopping and changing mood swings-
Until, in the crowd, he could see Yukari making her way in the opposite direction on the other side of the corridor. She mostly had her head down until they drew nearer (and he realized with a jolt he was staring at her), she looked up at him with sparkling brown eyes and smiled warmly, he caught the barely perceptible wink she gave him before they passed each other completely and he was craning his head to watch her as she left, a pleased feeling warming his chest and face.
Not being able to help the tugging at the corners of his mouth he allowed himself an embarrassed smile, looking down at the floor as all apprehension he felt went away.
He was terrified she wouldn't be the same or feel the same as she did the night before, terrified it was just some sort of crazy attraction brought on by the fact that he beat up a guy who tried to hurt her, but it seemed that wasn't the case.
When he woke up that morning, his coat was draped over his face and her smell was still a subtle lingering scent. His whole body was hot and achy and he was ferociously hard, even for the morning. He wasn't the kind of guy who pleasured himself regularly but it was so unbearable when he woke up he knew a cold shower just wouldn't cut it. With a mind filled with images of her, he distinctly remembered the feeling of her lips on his, of the weight of holding her against him tightly, or the way she kissed his neck-
He came hard. Twice.
And it didn't get rid of the tension in him at all.
At first it felt wrong to think of her like that, but when it heightened the pleasure to a place he didn't think possible, Akihiko quickly stopped worrying about right and wrong.
It was so strange, like all the feelings he was supposed to have when he was younger just sort of hit him all at once. But it wasn't just the sexual nature of what they did... it was the intimacy of it all. They weren't just two horny teenagers making out in an alleyway, they were friends and confidants and then... lovers.
That's what it felt like, at least.
It was more than just a thrill, it was like a revelation. This girl, this incredible healer and accurate archer was a fiery young woman with a fierce temper and a sweet smile and so many layers and thoughts and words to say and opinions to own that he felt a little... special to know her like that. And he wished with every bit of himself that she was feeling something similar.
He was still bursting with energy when school ended for the day and he knew that there was no way he would be able to sit in the dorm and do nothing. When he went to the gym on campus, he stayed for four hours and barely stopped, punching away at a sandbag until it burst and he was eventually thrown out by the caretaker.
Aigis informed him that Yukari took an early night, noting how she was late for school and probably needed rest. Akihiko, drenched in sweat, went to the fourth floor to take a shower.
The spray of the hot water did wonders on his muscles – he really pushed himself too hard, he would probably be sore in the morning. And still, his body was tense and aching, missing something. Briefly he wondered if it was all in his head; four relentless hours in a gym would have been enough to make him pass out in the doorway to the dorm, but instead he was still...
Still wanting Yukari.
She's amazing, he thought, holding his face under the spray, his mouth tingling at the thoughts of kissing her again. The previous night was beyond what he imagined a real kiss to be like. He had himself so convinced that girls and romance and kissing and sex just didn't really appetize him like training or boxing did.
But it was a whole other kind of appetite.
Bracing his hand against the cool shower tiles, he let out a deep sigh when he felt his body start to stir and he was impossibly hard again, aching, strained and heavy. Why does this feel wrong? He wondered.
Why do I feel like... I'm doing her a disservice?
It wouldn't go down, he couldn't will it away and it was at a painful point so that even the water from the shower was making his legs go wobbly. He knew why he felt wrong. He was no better than those assholes talking about her in the locker-room, making her the obsession of their fantasies, thinking about her all day and picturing her in a twisted, overly-sexual representation of who she really was.
He was perving on her.
And if that didn't get rid of the hardness in his cock, he was sure nothing would. Sighing in relief as it went down, even though he didn't picture her in an overly-sexual way, he was still being a total pervert and it had to stop. It wasn't fair on her to be made into an object in his mind; he liked her for the person she was and focusing on the surety in her kiss and the aggression in her body-
Quickly stopping the train of thought as the familiar stir rose again, Akihiko steeled himself. He told himself it was natural to feel the way he was, after going so long without knowing what a real kiss was like or how a girl felt in his arms... his first truly sexual experience involving another person wasn't just something he could brush off his shoulders and pretend didn't happen.
But no matter what way he looked at it, he still felt guilty.
Author's Notes: I am trying to hard to stay positive for my boyfriend's birthday. So. Hard. But the rage.
How it builds.