Chapter 4

Shinra had lied. Izaya knew this the instant he saw Shizu-chan walking though that front door, but he didn't know what to do with this information, at first. Shinra had lied to Izaya about Shizu-chan's work hours, or else the idiot was coming in on his off-day, for some reason. Izaya had prepared for this, somewhat. He'd given Tom his real name, just in case the guy found out Izaya was connected to Shizuo somehow. In a way, Shizu-chan showing up had made the risk worth it, but the moron had acted completely as expected the very second he walked in, making sure to spread his annoyingly accurate suspicions of Izaya to the man with whom he had just spent two hours trying to convince of his legitimacy.

Izaya was looking for a girl. A runaway, whose father owed over a thousand dollars to Karma Financial. Incidentally, the father was missing too, and so Izaya had made the trek over to the company itself just to see what he could dig up. It was a weak lead, but he left no stone unturned, as a rule, and who knows? Maybe he could turn this stone into a goldmine.

But because of Shizuo, Izaya could see his work crumbling before his very eyes.

So, Izaya lied too. He played his part of the concerned friend, roping Shizuo into this stupid scheme instead of letting him get tied up in Izaya's actual work. And who knows? Celty was a pretty girl. Maybe he could get Shizuo to like her and get some revenge on Shinra too.

Or well, so he thought.

"This is fucking ridiculous." Izaya wrapped his arms around himself as a breeze ripped through his T-shirt and shorts. "How the hell do you forget the name of the hotel you're staying at?"

"Shut up," Shizuo said, glaring. "It's around here somewhere."

"Oh great. Is it that hotel we passed by half an hour ago?"

"I said shut up!"

Izaya seethed, shivering. This was just fucking wonderful. It had been almost a month since the start of their "scheme", but it had been all downhill from the start. Shizuo seemed to have zero interest in Celty. Well, that wasn't exactly true. They got along well, whenever the four of them were together, but Shizuo seemed to be eerily efficient at finding ways to separate the two of them from Celty and Shinra, whether it was bathroom breaks, getting lost in the crowd, or eating at two different tables because the restaurant was too full. Shizuo could think of them all in spite of his dumb as bricks brain, although he was never very subtle.

And now, they were supposedly on a beach trip. Izaya had been forced to come later due to a meeting he wanted to eavesdrop on between some residents in the local university hospital and some questionable-looking business partners. Or well, because of work, which was all they ever needed to know.

Shinra had arranged it all. Izaya had offered to help, of course, but Shinra wasn't naive enough to think that Izaya's sudden willingness to take interest in his love life was genuine. He probably didn't even think Izaya and Shizuo were actually going out, which was smart on his part, but still annoying. Shinra went so far as to even refuse to tell Izaya where they were staying. Izaya had met them on the beach, his luggage in tow, and Shinra had said he'd hand over the keys at the end of the day. When Izaya said that no, he was going to drop off his stuff now, Shizuo suddenly draped himself over Izaya's shoulders.

"What, can't go five minutes without wifi, Izaya-kun?"

Izaya flinched, half-ready to stab the shirtless man on his back. The brute would sometimes surprise him like this, as if he thought he was being cute. Or as if he knew just how annoying Izaya thought it was. And he had taken to calling Izaya by his first name, since they were "dating," but now that Izaya couldn't use it to annoy Shizuo, the brute had been using it to annoy Izaya.

"I just don't want to get sand in my things, Shizu-chan," he said. "Anyway, get off! You're getting my clothes wet."

Shizuo leaned down, right next to Izaya's ear. "You're right," he said, chuckling softly. "You're wet all over 'cause of me."

Izaya clenched his hands, growing warm despite himself. This idiot. He didn't look it, but Shizu-chan knew how to talk and act like a boyfriend, and Shinra and Celty, who were standing close enough to hear, ate it all up.

Celty blushed. Shinra told them to "get a room" and sent them off to get some shaved ice. Laughing – a little too forcibly – Izaya pushed Shizuo away and slid off his jacket so it dried while he was gone. He was about to take his main phone out with him, at least, when Shizuo grabbed his wrist, saying, "Come on, hurry up."

The stupid shaved ice took forever to find since they got lost along the way – Izaya getting distracted as he argued with Shizu-chan – and when they finally got back, Shinra, Celty, and Izaya's luggage were all gone.

Apparently, Shizuo had forgotten where he'd been staying for the past two days and his phone was dead. Izaya had left everything in his jacket.

"I seriously don't believe you," Izaya muttered. "You've been going in and out of this place for two days, how can you not remember where it is?"

Shizuo sighed, his hands in his shorts, but clearly balled into fists. "I've never been to Okinawa before," he said.

"What does that have to do with anything? You should have been here long enough to at least remember the name of your hotel."

"Shinra's the one who took care of everything. I just followed him and Celty, sorry if I wasn't paying attention," he said. He scratched the back of his head, and Izaya saw his eye twitch. "But I don't need to explain myself to you, flea."

"I guess you don't. I already knew you were a fucking moron."

"What?!" Shizuo growled. "You know, this is all your fault anyway!"

Izaya stopped walking. "My fault?" he said. "How the hell is this my fault?"

"Because this was your plan!"

"Oh, of course. Remember last week, when I said I wanted to get lost in Okinawa with no one but you for company?"

Shizuo towered over Izaya. He looked up coolly. "You know what I mean," Shizuo said. "This was all your idea to start with. We wouldn't be here if it wasn't for you!"

Izaya scoffed. "Do you even hear yourself?"

"Izaya – !"

"Anyway," Izaya said. He turned around and started walking again, ignoring the hands that seemed to be itching for his throat. "Since you are clearly no closer to remembering the hotel as you were two hours ago, let's start doing this my way."

"What?" Shizuo said. "Don't tell me you actually know where – ?!"

"Of course not," Izaya said, rolling his eyes. "Not yet, anyway. First, let's go back to where we were at the beach. I can probably predict which hotel Shinra chose from there..."

Shizuo glanced at Izaya, everything on his face screaming distrust. "It's getting dark," he said. "Let's just book a room somewhere and try again in the morning."

"Nice try, but I'm not sleeping in the same room as you."

"Would you rather freeze your ass off looking for the hotel all night?" Shizuo said, through what sounded like clenched teeth. "Don't be a brat."

"So I've been demoted from evil mastermind to brat. Who's the one that threw a tantrum just now because he couldn't get his way?"

"That's still you."

"It's like talking to a wall," Izaya muttered. He sighed, holding back another shiver from the cold.

"Come on, you're already cold," Shizuo said. Izaya glared. "I don't have enough money for two rooms, alright? We're sharing a room at the hotel anyway."

"You're joking," he said.

Shizuo shook his head, grimacing. "I wish I was."

Izaya groaned. "God, I'm going to kill Shinra."

To his surprise, Shizuo laughed. That scowling face softened somehow, transforming as he chuckled into the pink and purple sky. "Don't blow our cover, dumbass," he said.

Izaya blinked. "Well," he said, looking away. "Rest assured, I'd have to find him first, which doesn't seem like is going to happen anytime soon."

"Really? I thought you had it all figured out."

Izaya's fingers twitched, longing for the knife in his back pocket. "I'll figure it out in the morning," he snapped. "I'm too tired to think right now."

"So, we're checking into a hotel?"

"Yeah," Izaya said. He glanced at Shizuo, who was looking down at him, smirking. "Guess you'll get to sleep with me after all, Shizu-chan."

Shizuo lathered cheap soap in his hair, sighing into the steaming, hot water. It took forever to find a hotel that Shizuo could actually afford, and then even longer to find one that Izaya approved of. They finally chose this one because someone had come out to complain about their bickering – Shizuo had refused to go in because of all places, Izaya had to choose a freaking love hotel – and even though he had felt like punching the stranger out instead of calming down, Izaya had just went in, forcing Shizuo to follow after him.

Now, Shizuo was on-edge. He blinked soap out of his eyes thinking, one month was a long time to fake-date someone. They had been forced to spend a lot of time alone together for the past few weeks, and lately Shizuo had been thinking, the guy wasn't horrible.

Well, he was annoying. He also probably worked for the yakuza. And, he knew just how to get under not only Shizuo's, but anyone's skin. He even had this look, this specific smile he wore all the time, that riled Shizuo up enough to make him want to punch the man in the face.

Shizuo hummed as he put his face under the showerhead, letting the water block out everything else.

But he was kind of funny sometimes. One day, Izaya's little sisters had actually ambushed him at his apartment, and Shizuo couldn't stop laughing as they annoyed him to death, thinking for the first time that huh, so even the flea could be cute sometimes.

Like earlier, when Shizuo surprised him at the beach. He was awfully jumpy, which Shizuo liked taking advantage of, but what he liked more was seeing the light blush around Izaya's ears. Only Shizuo could see it, whenever he said something a little too explicit, a little too suddenly.

Or that time when Izaya had gone through five glasses of wine during dinner, touching little to none of his actual food. They had to be escorted out after Izaya talked to nearly everyone in the restaurant. Shizuo actually had to carry Izaya home on his back that night, listening to Celty and Shinra tease him about his "boyfriend" while Izaya, flushed but light, hummed tunelessly in his ear.

Or when he let Shizuo try on his rings that he always wore. They spent the rest of that day trying to figure out how to take them off, and Izaya fell down with a cramp in his stomach because he had laughed so hard, for so long. Near the end, actually, Shizuo had been trying to bite them off again when Izaya said, "Want me to try?"

They had been in Izaya's living room. Celty and Shinra were gone because they had wanted to search for ring-removing supplies. Shizuo looked over at Izaya. He was sitting next to him on his laptop, supposedly researching, and his smile was – no other word to describe it – pure evil.

"What, did you find something?" he said.

"No," Izaya said. "I just thought of something. Give me your finger."

Warily, Shizuo surrendered his pinky finger. After examining it for a few seconds, teasing Shizuo in other words, Izaya licked it.

Shizuo snapped his hand back. "What the fuck are you doing?" he yelled.

"We haven't tried this yet, right?" Izaya said, still smiling. "Come on, give it back. My tongue can work wonders, you know."

"No!" Shizuo said, cradling his hand to his chest. "You'll infect me with your weird Izaya-germs."

Izaya laughed. "That's what you're worried about? 'Izaya-germs'?"

"Yeah," he said. "I don't want to catch your crazy."

"Well, what if all my 'Izaya-germs' are collected in my rings?" Izaya said, putting his laptop on the table.

"I'll just chop my hands off."

"Aw, you'd go that far just because of me?"

"Yeah," Shizuo said, scoffing.

Izaya held his hand out. "Come on, just give it to me."

"No way am I letting you suck on my fingers!"

"Who said anything about sucking?" he said. He rose up on his knees.

"No – well – it's the same – !"

Suddenly, Izaya jumped on top of Shizuo, trying to get at his fingers as if he were trying to bite them off, and yelling, Shizuo accepted the challenge. By the time Shinra and Celty came back, the living room table was split into five pieces, the lamp had smashed into the TV across the room, the couch had three of Izaya's knives sticking out of it, and Izaya himself was straddling Shizuo, biting his arm hard enough to bleed.

So actually, 99% of the time, Shizuo hated being around him.

Right now, for instance. They were two guys in a love hotel, and Izaya could joke all he wanted about their fake relationship, but this was taking it a little too far.

Shizuo scrubbed soap angrily into his arm.

Sure, the place was cheap, and sure, it looked cleaner than the other hotels they were considering, but sometimes, Shizuo just had no idea what was going on through that flea's head.

Because, apparently, Izaya was actually gay. Shinra told him after they "came out." He said how their first meeting had actually been some kind of double date set-up, which neither he nor Izaya thought would work out, but look how well it ended up!

Shizuo just sat there, shocked.

So, did that mean that the flea actually...liked him?

After a couple more "double dates," this seemed unlikely. But still, Shizuo wondered. When he joked, was he really joking? Did he really bring Shizuo to this love hotel because it looked nice? What if he was expecting something? What if he confessed his feelings or tried to kiss him?

Suddenly, Shizuo felt a ghost of soft lips on his, heard the imagined whisper of his name in his ears.

"Shizuo, please..."

Shizuo laughed a little at himself. Yeah right...

"...My tongue can work wonders, you know..."

Shizuo paused. His fingers absently rubbed the mark on his forearm. Izaya's mouth had been warm when he bit him, his eyes as red as Shizuo's blood. He could still feel the shadow of those lips on his skin. Shizuo put a finger to his own lips, biting down on it.

His face so close, his breaths hotter than the steam in the shower, Izaya's tongue ran against Shizuo's, moaning...

Shizuo shook his head. No. Izaya? He shouldn't. The flea was the flea, how could he...

The flea down on his knees, right there in the shower, Shizuo's back on the tiled wall as that skilled mouth took all of him in...

Orihara-san. Izaya...

"Give it to me..."

Shizuo leaned against the wall. Tentatively, he brushed his tip. He imagined his finger to be Izaya's tongue, and his breath hitched. He wrapped his whole hand around himself.

His hands ran through Izaya's hair, holding the flea in place as he thrust himself into his mouth. Izaya groaned, breaths just as heavy as Shizuo's. His tongue moved as Shizuo moved, he hummed like he did when he was drunk. He sank his nails into Shizuo's thighs, and those red-brown eyes looked up at him, pleading for more...

Shizuo quickly switched the temperature after, so that the water fell, freezing-cold, on his skin. "Fuck," he said. He shivered, gasping, from the sudden cold and release. "Fuck."

A knock came from the door.

"Shizu-chan?" Izaya said. "What the hell's taking so long? Did you drown yourself in there or something?"

Shizuo flinched. "I – I'm almost done!" he said. He threw the white glob in his hand down the drain, and then vigorously, he scrubbed his hands with the soap.

"You better be! Or I'm coming in, whether you're done or not."

Don't! Shizuo almost shouted out. Instead, Shizuo took a deep breath and turned off the running water. Izaya was standing right by the door when Shizuo came out. Crying out in surprise, Shizuo slammed into the door frame.

Izaya stared, for so long that Shizuo thought his heart would race itself into a cardiac arrest. Then, his face broke out into a smirk. "Oh, I'm sorry," he said. "Did I scare you?"

"Shut up and take a shower," Shizuo said, hoping to god that his blush looked like it was from the hot water.

Izaya laughed, giving up on teasing him in favor of finally getting into the bathroom. On the way, he passed so close to Shizuo that their shoulders touched.

Shizuo gasped. Izaya paused, this time looking over at Shizuo with narrowed eyes. Shizuo wanted to destroy something so that the whole building collapsed on them, right here, right now. God, did this stupid flea catch every single goddamn thing?

"What's with you?" Izaya said sharply. "Did you do something to the bathroom?"

Shizuo coughed. He ran a hand through his damp hair and started to shuffle out of what was rapidly beginning to feel like a claustrophobic space. "What could I do to a bathroom?" he said. "Quit asking stupid questions."

"How cute," Izaya said, as Shizuo walked away. "And here I thought you were actually starting to like me."

Shizuo scoffed. "Yeah, right."

He reached the bed – they could only afford a single, which he was really regretting right now – and plopped down.

After a few unbearable seconds, Shizuo finally heard the bathroom door shut. He groaned into a pillow.

Fuck.