I tortured myself with this, seriously. I had to check the story information and make sure I set it to angst because jeez. I'm sorry.
Soul didn't know video 3 was going to go like it did. Maybe it was that anonymity that fed him or the internalized catharsis of the first two, but while he was laying back and starting again at their early moments together he leaned forward. He was careful, still keeping his face just out of the frame, only a glimmer of his jaw because even his teeth would be a dead giveaway. As he turned to sit at the edge of the bed he lifted his shirt, throwing it to the side of the bed before going back to lounging. "I know you remember this," his voice was a low vibration as he ran two fingers over the scar that practically split him in two.
"I remember less when it happened and more the first time I saw your reaction to it. It was stupid because my first thought was that you were uncomfortable because you were seeing me shirtless. I mean, we were living together at that point but I didn't parade around the apartment half-naked like I would at home." He paused to laugh for a second, "Man, how would you handle that? At my parents' you were lucky to get me into something other than just my boxers if I was just staying around the house." Those fingers hit the bottom of the scar and switched direction. "But that's me thinking you look at me, or I guess hoping. Could you look at this and…"
A choking sound gritted against the back of his throat. "I realized it made you sad pretty quickly. I got that you had some stuff to work through about that, but I didn't regret what I'd done. Protecting you is my job but… you have to know at this point it's more than that. The idea of living without you sucks and maybe I'm stupid for thinking this is the point in the conversation where you'd be yelling at me that the idea of living without me, losing me like that terrifies you, too. Sometimes I wonder if that's what that look was."
He reached the middle of his chest and rested his palm flat, blocking the line of the scar. "Could you look at this and kiss me? Could you…" The sigh he let go filled all of him and he had to swallow the urge to let the tears come again. "Could I ever even turn you on like this? Or do you look at me and just feel guilty or worse, just feel bad for me?"
Fufilledtwo: Oooooo, sexy shirtless! You should start every video like this ;)
Lustfulstock: What the hell kind of job do you do? You can't be more than 18 and that scar, wtf.
Jealouspossession: Do you have scars on your legs, too? Maybe no pants next time…
Dejectedbreath: you live together, you almost died to protect that person, and you wonder if they love you? dude. go to therapy.
Drearywriter: dejectedbreath pretty sure this is his therapy.
Mildmedium: baby, you could totally turn me on like that. you're fucking built.
Maka watched video 3 a few times. Each viewing came with the unsteady decision of whether she was going to blush or cry. Maybe it was just a helpless mix of both.
They had just come back from a mission and Soul was halfway to sleep as soon as he collapsed on the bed but he angled the phone on his bedside table and started video 4. "I'm fucking tired but I can't get this out of my head, so I better let it out or maybe I still won't sleep." He slid his hand over the open space on the bed next to him as if he was still expecting the warmth there. "Last night, you slept next to me and I… spent most of the night thinking about how close I was to you rather than actually catching up on the sleep we both so desperately need."
"Is it pathetic that I can probably list each time we shared a bed?" He let a bitter laugh punctuate that. "'Course it is. Like the first time, in London, after that bullshit on the bridge. I wrapped up your hands the best I could and you spent the whole time setting the ground rules for the single bed we'd ended up with at the hotel. I always wondered why you didn't just room with Tsu- the other girl. Leave me with my best bro," that added a little life to his second laugh. "Honestly, at the time, I didn't care. I just wanted to sleep. That whole fight was exhausting and I was totally done arguing with you that day."
"It was the morning after that really hit me. I woke up to your face and, well, shit. How do I describe it? Say I use that stupid stereotypical bullshit for a second: you looked like a fucking angel, even if you were snoring." He broke off into chuckles that easily drifted into a contented sigh. "You made it worse when you woke up and got all self-conscious, giving me that regular line of 'what are you looking at?' and while I told you that you had drool on your face what would you have done if I told you the truth? I was used to seeing you be badass and for just a second all you were was vulnerable and all of that together was fucking beautiful. I guess I learned at that point that I liked every piece of you."
He pressed to his chest to try to soothe the run of his heart. "You should know that is what I think every time now. It's every last piece of you that I need, I want, I like, I… Do you know how badly I wanted to risk wrapping my arms around you last night? You were so close that I know I was breathing on your neck because, fuck, there were goosebumps on your skin. Why were those there? Did you like that? Was it just fucking weird and you lived with it because it's me, and I'm weird? It's shit like that… I feel like I can barely control myself."
"Because I'll start with holding you and maybe that'll be OK, not breaking any rules, just like the hand holding or when I put an arm around your shoulder, but then…" There was a frantic quality to his voice now, that fright that he usually kept buried so deeply behind the mask taking hold. "Kissing you is going to be wrong, touching you-" The groan from his lips was quick and the curses came even more swiftly. "Oh, fuck, fuck me. I can't even fucking think about it." It looked less like him turning off the recording and more like throwing the phone.
Jealouspossession: I appreciate just the boxers this time. Perfect view when you pitched a tent at the end.
Drearywriter: that's some serious feelings when you get turned on just from thinking about kissing her.
Mildmedium: drearywriter probably a virgin, first love. it's so fucking hot. he's such a tease tho. do something about it next time instead of turning off the camera.
Adoringbebe: anyone else getting the feeling like this girl doesn't exist?
Pitifulmail: don't get so upset with yourself for not being able to control your body. you feel what you feel, it's not embarrassing.
Maka had to scroll down to the comments on video 4 since the way it ended just seemed to confuse her. What she wasn't ready for were the euphemisms, the weird mix of teasing and sexual need. She closed the browser before the idea to corroborate their claims hit her mind. There had been a few mutually embarrassing occasions where Soul, well, to borrow that disgusting term pitched a tent in Maka's presence but he was a teenage boy. They were living together. She explained it in the same way that he did her period and all that came along with that, by completely ignoring it. Bodily functions, that's what they were.
And he had a bodily function when touching me crossed his mind.
This was probably one of the few places Maka would admit that girls had it a thousand times easier. Being turned on came with that tingle, the undulation under your stomach, but the entirety of it was completely unseen. That time in the bed, with his breath against her neck, the goosebumps were the only sign of it but between her legs… that was totally something she wouldn't want to be exhibited in a video and while she didn't exactly think he needed to be angry at himself she was completely relieved that it ended there.
Because he could have touched himself, right? He would be allowed to. He was in the privacy of his room. Who knows if she was home or not but even then, it's a closed door and she would never enter his room without knocking so… But it would be to the thought of me. Does that matter? Maka rolled over and pressed her face into the pillow to catch something that was between a sigh and a groan. If he thinks kissing me is wrong, touching me is wrong, then wouldn't that be, too? At least to him…
Maka tried to slip into his shoes, first letting her mind drift back to that night that he was so close, apparently yearning to touch her and all that easily brought her body back to the same place. Next, it was to create a memory that wasn't entirely alien in her daydreams, the way his lips would feel if she just rolled over and used her courage like she should. She always imagined him gentle because even knowing that he was needy, that he worried about losing control, Maka always had that faith in him to stay in check. If he could keep the madness at bay she could easily imagine him keeping his lust restrained.
Just the idea of it, even the chastest of kisses tightened that knot and Maka started the dissection of consent. Am I stealing it from him if I…? She squeezed a hand between her and the bed, letting her fingers just rest between her legs. Tilting her hips released the weight on her wrist but encouraged a dangerous brush of her fingers and now Maka was beyond the video moment, aware that she was toeing a line. But do I feel guilty like him? Do I feel like I shouldn't, can't do this with him on my mind?
That answer was about as confusing as the end of the video.
The knock was almost so quiet that Soul didn't surface from sleep and was somewhere in the grey in between when he grumbled, "Yeah." There were really only two options for who it could be as his eyes finally focused on the clock reading 3 AM. When he turned his eyes back to the door it was Maka instead of an oddly polite robber and he pressed up on his elbows. "Something happen?"
"No," she murmured as her feet shuffled at the doorway.
Soul sighed and rubbed a hand over his face. "Then?"
"Can I sleep… in here?"
There was a small prayer of thanks in his mind for her not saying 'with you' because that just touched a little too close to a couple of dreams he'd had. Fuck you, don't think of those as she's climbing into bed or you're in fucking trouble because now it's a fight for control. "Yeah."
He realized her pillow was already in her arms, albeit shoved behind her back as if to hide her intent. That meant in a second she was sliding in next to him, positioning her pillow next to his. There wasn't a wink of sleep in her eyes and it was draining the last from his. Something's off, for the past week since that stupid fight with Black Star something's been off with her and I wish she'd just tell me. He settled his head back on the pillow, turning to face her. "Can't sleep?"
"No," her voice was soft while her eyes bore into him, eyebrows furrowing in the darkness.
"What?" Soul rubbed his hand over his face again. "If I have drool or something on my face it's not my fucking fault, I was asleep."
She didn't laugh at his joke and there wasn't even a glimmer of humor in her eyes. "Can I ask you something?"
"Depends."
"On?"
"Well, it's 3 AM and Ms. Perfect Attendance gets me up in three hours and I'd really like to sleep for at least half of that, so how long is this going to take?" He offered her a smirk but all of it fell flat, leaving a chill creeping in his gut.
"Just one question," she replied without an ounce of playfulness, not even biting at his usual name-calling.
His eyebrows matched hers. "As long as I get one after."
Maka sighed helplessly, "I thought you wanted to sleep."
"Take the deal or leave it," Soul grumbled back.
"If, in my head, I thought about you killing Spirit-"
Soul interrupted her with a string of chuckles. "What the hell kind of question is this?"
"Just listen," she urged. "I daydream that you kill Spirit. That's something you're not supposed to do, that you would probably not do on your own, but it's all in my mind. So it's innocent, right? It doesn't hurt you and I shouldn't feel guilty about doing it."
There was no amount of blinking that could help him process that and Soul eased back on his elbow so he could emphatically squint at her without the hindrance of the pillow. "Maka, seriously, what the hell?"
"I can't make it clearer," she huffed. "Think, Soul."
"Well, I want to blame it on being in a deep sleep but this just makes no sense."
"Fine," she snapped. "What if in your head, your imagination, you made me kiss Kid."
His head jolted like it would with a slap to the face. "Why the hell would I do that?"
"I don't know," she hissed. "Just play along."
"I don't want you to kiss Kid." It sounded like a harmless complaint, the same tone as he took on weekend mornings when she tried to wake him up too early but even in the moonlight she could see his face light up.
"I'm not saying you do," she sighed even though a little bubble of euphoria popped in her chest. "Just hypothetically, if you forced dream me to kiss dream Kid, are you hurting real me and real Kid? Would you feel bad about thinking that?"
"I don't-" Want you to kiss fucking Kid, he barely cut off the strained cry that was bordering on a yell. "Just what the hell is going on with you? Weird late-night questions, crying and screaming in your pillow, spending a hell of a lot more time in your room, alone. Ditching me for dinner more than once and-"
"Just give me an answer, Soul," she groaned out as she rolled onto her back, just stopping from pumping her legs in defeat.
His frustration matched hers as it rumbled up in his chest. "What I make you do in my head-" The parallel hit him in the gut and the words crumbled on his tongue like sand. Like kiss me, or touch me, or those goddamn dreams that I can't do shit about where we're undressed and… "I feel like that hurts you if it's something that I think you wouldn't want to do, like kiss Kid."
"Why?" Maka was gripping onto every word and he swallowed the shock of her hand gripping into the front of his shirt.
"Because it's like I'm using you," Soul shrugged. "Like if I imagined you killing Spirit. I'd feel bad about that because I'm using you to get rid of that creep so I feel better in my head."
"So if it feels good to you but might feel bad to me you shouldn't do it?" Maka offered this conclusion like it was obvious but Soul still found his forehead crinkling further.
"I guess," he huffed.
"What if you knew it was something real me would do?" Maka tried again and her fingers tightened in his shirt. "Like if real Liz told you I wanted to kiss Kid?"
Soul tried to rein it in but the rage was busting from his gut as the picture flashed over his mind again. "Could we please stop using that example?"
Maka's lip quivered but the words came out oddly even. "Who do you want me to kiss?"
Me, oh, death, please, me, his mind begged as his gut clenched. And am I making it up that her hand's tugging me a little closer? That there's a look in her eyes that I don't think I've seen before? "That's your business, not mine," he barely got the words to eke off his tongue. For his own sanity, he grabbed the hand at his chest and tried in vain to untangle her fingers. "Will you answer my damn question now? What's going on with you?"
After enough of a fight, her fingers fell away, her hand dropping uselessly to her chest. "I wish you'd talk to me."
The fury was back and a growl bubbled up from his throat, "Damn it, Maka, I answered your strange question already. As far as I'm concerned it's wrong. And if you're not going to honor the fucking deal we might as well just go to bed." In a huff, he threw his back into the mattress before turning on his side, purposefully keeping himself from seeing any look that could be on her face.
There were silence and stillness and all he could hear was his own thundering heart until the bed creaked. Soul was sure she was getting up, leaving in a probably well-deserved huff but his heart hit a high note as her arm wrapped around his waist. It wasn't just stationary either, not an easy lounge over his hip but snaking up so her open palm could record each cacophonous beat.
"What I meant was…" she whispered and it was a concert in his ear because she was close enough that he felt the exhale. "I feel like I tell you everything and you support me through it all even if I'm just being an idiot and I'm not making sense, but… you don't let me do that for you. And that… I think it's one of the saddest feelings I've ever had. And see? I'm doing it again. Now you know exactly how I'm feeling but-"
"It hurts me, too," he croaked.
"What?"
"Not being able to tell you," his voice was trembling and his breathing was anything but steady. "It makes me sad, too, but that's not your fault, so let it go."
"Soul-"
"It isn't," he urged again. "It's not your fault. It's me. So, just… don't let it get you all worked up." His fingers were shaking as they planted on top of hers and while he instantly wanted to take them away, she captured them, intertwining his with hers and leaving him helpless. "Just let me be here for you and don't worry about the rest." He was lucky her arm only pulled tighter because there was so little control left in him.