Touya's Pride, Part 9 of 11 (NC-17, fic)
Jan. 4th, 2009 05:10 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ravenna_c_tanTitle: Touya's Pride (Part 9 of 11)
Author: Ravenna C. Tan
Fandom: Hikaru no Go
Pairing: Hikaru/Akira eventually, Akira/others, sort of (you'll see)
Rating: NC-17
Disclaimer: Non-commercial fanfic.
Summary: Touya Akira loses a match and suffers a crisis of faith. Could wily old Kuwabara-sensei have the answer? Or is the answer to be found in Touya's eternal rival, Shindou Hikaru?
Warnings: This is not a fluffy Aki/Hika fic. There is what could be termed cross-gen/chan, and also psychological manipulation as part of the plot. The sexuality is graphic, but not gratuitous. Touya is 16. Spoilers for the series, also.
A/N: I posted an "intro" to Hikaru no Go for those who want to read the fic without watching or reading the whole series, on LJ and IJ.
Part One is here: LJ and IJ
Part Two: LJ and IJ
Part Three: LJ and IJ
Part Four: LJ and IJ
Part Five: LJ and IJ
Part Six: LJ and IJ
Part Seven: LJ and IJ
Part Eight: LJ and IJ
Part Nine
The taxi driver turned out to be a huge fan of Go and asked us both to autograph a piece of paper for him, then chattered away to us the entire drive to my house about all manner of things, Kurata-san's latest match, news of the formation of a new Go title in Taiwan, and so on. He'd been reading the Go news on the Internet and in the papers more diligently than I had, it seemed.
He also seemed to be rooting for me to beat Ogata-san.
So was Shindou. As we went into the house, he asked me if I'd been studying Ogata's games in preparation for the match. I told him yes, of course, though I didn't mention Kuwabara-sensei.
We got ready to go to sleep then. It was getting late, after all. I got into my pajamas and used the battery-powered toothbrush. Shindou joked that he ought to just keep his own toothbrush there, he'd stayed with me so often. He stripped down to the white T-shirt he'd worn under his dress shirt and his shorts, a look I'd seen him in already before.
I locked myself in to take the plug out, sighing as it came free. Already the incident with Ogata-san seemed surreal, like a dream. Where had he gotten the idea that I desired him?
I sat up suddenly. What had Kuwabara-sensei said to him?
And why?
Could Kuwabara-sensei have played on Ogata-san's interest in me, making him think I would return those feelings, and spurring him to make a mistaken move like... like barging in on me in the restroom of the Palace Hotel?
I felt cold suddenly. Which of us was Kuwabara-sensei trying to help? The match was in two days. All his tutoring of me had been extremely valuable. I don't mean all the business with the humiliation, I mean the analysis of Ogata's Go. It seemed to me Kuwabara-sensei was definitely on my side.
But was that because he wanted to see Ogata-san lose? Revenge for taking the title away from him? Maybe even preparation for taking the title back? I had told Kuwabara-sensei nearly as much about Ogata's Go as he had told me.
I put my hand over my mouth as I realized what I had said to Ogata-san in the car. That I'd start calling him "Seiji" if I won. Would that give me the psychological edge in the match? Would he subconsciously accept a loss that he normally wouldn't?
I hugged my knees to my chest. Ogata-san had always, always been straightforward with me, and as one of my father's fellow proteges, I'd always been the same with him.
Well, except that he'd been hiding his interest in me. But of course he had to. He was a dozen years older than me, and my father...
My father could never know any of this. That much was clear.
A knock startled me out of my reverie. "You okay in there?"
"Yes. One moment." I hid the plug in the cabinet and opened the door. "Sorry."
His hand was on my cheek before I could slip past him. "Touya? You don't look well."
"I... I'm getting nervous about Thursday's match," I said, closing my eyes. That wasn't very far from the truth, after all.
"You? Nervous before a match?"
I nodded. The loss in the Meijin preliminaries still stung, didn't it? "I don't want to lose that badly again."
The next moment wasn't at all what I expected. I expected him to scoff, to raise his voice and call me an idiot. To shake some sense into me.
Instead, he drew me into a hug. I let out a shaking breath, suddenly wondering if Shindou knew my scent as well as I knew his. "Shindou..."
He hushed me and just stroked my hair. My next breath was calmer, the one after that calmer still.
And then it caught, as my cock twitched, responding on its own to the warm body against mine. "Touya..." he breathed, and his lips ran up and down my neck. My cock jumped to attention as if it were what he caressed, not the tendon behind my ear. I whimpered. He slid one hand down my back, pulling our groins together and I gasped. "Touya," he whispered again, "do you want to?"
Want to what? Be specific. I want to know just what I'm getting myself into. Those were my thoughts. What I actually said, though, was, "Yes."
And then his mouth met mine, and I forgot all about things like toothbrushes and taxis and even Go. He pressed me against the frame of the door, and as I opened my mouth to let his tongue brush against mine, I could feel his hardness against my thigh. My hand found his hip, pulling him close, too, until he was grinding against me.
Tongue against tongue, lips against lips, I have no idea how long we kissed like that. When he broke the kiss for something silly like breathing, I hadn't come close to having enough. I pulled his head toward mine for more, but he broke away again a few moments later, panting. "I'll... We..."
I'll never know what he was going to say then, because at that moment, as he pulled back just a little from me, my hand slipped down to his cock and found the slick spot in his shorts where his cock tip had leaked through the fabric. I rubbed it with my fingers and he made a sound that wasn't made up of words.
Then he dragged me to the bedroom, where the two futons were already lying side by side, and in no time at all I was on my back and his hands were searching my skin under my pajama shirt and making me pant all the more.
I cried out softly as his fingers brushed over my nipples.
"Sore?" he asked, puzzled.
I nodded. "Um, my shirt was rough," I said, hoping that was explanation enough.
He didn't argue, just unbuttoned the shirt and slipped me out of it, then set to soothing one nipple with gentle licks of his tongue. "Ayyyy, Shindou--!"
"Good?" he asked, raising his head to look at me.
"Yes." And then he did the other one, while I thrust my hips shamelessly into the air. Then I was pulling his shirt off and pushing him onto his back so I could try the same on him. I licked, then sucked at his nipples and was pleased at the reaction I got.
Then I was helping ease him out of his briefs, and looking at the glistening tip of his cock and feeling my mouth water. I didn't think I could bring myself to do what Ogata-san had done, but surely a little taste...?
I licked around the shiny head and found it salty and good. Shindou made wonderful, incoherent noises. I held the base of his cock in my hand then, and licked and sucked until I figured out that him pulling at my hair was him trying to get me to stop. "Too soon, too soon," he said, and it took me a moment to figure out that he was trying to tell me he was about to come. "Your turn for a while."
"All right." But I froze, not knowing what he wanted me to do. He pushed me onto my back and took down my pajama bottoms, tossing them aside, and then reaching down to pet my cock gently. I propped myself up on my elbows and looked down at it while he ran his fingers up and down it, examining it like he was trying to memorize its shape.
"What do you like?" he asked then, his gaze moving from my cock to my face.
"I don't know. I haven't... I haven't done this before."
He looked surprised. "Not with anyone? Not even a girl?"
I shook my head.
"Not even..." he paused, as if considering whether or not to ask.
"Not even Ogata-san, if that's what you're thinking about," I said, thrusting into his hand. "We had a bit of a miscommunication, him and I."
He looked skeptical at my explanation and I wondered again how much he'd heard of what had gone on at the Palace. But he went on. "Okay. Well, then, what do you want to try, if you don't know what you like?"
And now the blush that had stayed mostly down while we'd touched each other suddenly rose on my cheeks as the fantasies I'd had of him all week came rushing to the fore. "I..." I couldn't meet his eyes.
He kissed my mouth gently. "It's all right. I just... I just want to make it good for you."
I found my arms around him, pulling him close, his weight atop me. "What about you?" I said into his ear, my eyes clenched tight. "What do you like?"
His hands stroked my hair, my ribs. "I, well, I've never done this either. Not really."
"Not really?" My voice was far too high.
"No need to get jealous," he teased, nibbling at my ear and encouraging me to not squeeze him quite so tight. "I've watched some porn movies. That's really about the extent of it. Now, how about it. What do you want me to do?"
I knew what I wanted. I had known from the moment his cock had rutted against my thigh when we'd been standing in the doorway to the bathroom. But I didn't think I could say it. I reached between us and ran my fingers along his length. "Is it okay?" I asked. "I want... this."
"It's okay," he said, and kissed me again, and I hoped he understood what I meant.
I was sure that he did when he slipped a finger into me and I cried out in ecstasy. "Yes!"
He moved it in and out several times, then drew it free. I opened my eyes to see a puzzled look on his face.
"Something wrong?" I asked, sitting partway up.
"No, no," he said. "It's just... more slippery than... I mean, hey, do you happen to have any lube?"
"Er, well, actually, yes," I said. "It's in the bottom drawer of my desk. No, wait! I'll get it!" The assortment of plugs was in there, too, and I wasn't ready for anyone to see them, much less Shindou. I climbed across him and pulled out the bottle, slamming the drawer shut.
He took it without hesitation, and shooed me back onto the futon. I crawled away from him and then stayed on all fours. I looked back at him. "Like this?"
He groaned as if just the sight were enough to nearly make him come. But he shook his head. "Turn over so I can see your face."
I lay back against the pillows then and spread my legs, biting my lip in anticipation.
"We'll go slow," he said, as he settled to one side of me, slipping his slick fingers between my cheeks. He pushed a finger into me, but it moved so easily, he went right to two, adding more lube as he went.
I couldn't tell him why I was not virginally tight. Not right this minute anyway.
Nor could I tell him how it felt, the lube cold, his fingers hot and hard, the sparks I saw before my eyes each time he moved in a certain way. All I could say was "Good, oh, so good... yes..."
"From what I hear, this should feel even better," he said, settling between my legs and rubbing his cock against my hole. I bent my knees all the way, pushing against him.
"You're sure?" he asked, one last time, a mischievous glint in his eye.
I just growled and pulled at him until he pushed his way inside me.
"Shindou!"
He held still, both of us shaking, not from pain, but from the sudden intensity of him inside me. His cock felt so different from a plug. The head was bulbous and had taken a fair bit of push to get through, but the shaft was narrowed and now it felt like my hole was pulsing around it.
So warm. So alive.
I pulled at him again and he moved, driving deeper. The friction was absolutely delicious. I made incoherent sounds of my own.
Soon he joined me making animal noises, as he began a steady rhythm. That rush of warmth and pleasure I usually felt while a plug went in or came out was suddenly no longer momentary, but building and building, moment by moment. I lost my sense of myself completely.
It returned only gradually after we had both come--him inside me, me all over my stomach--and then collapsed in a heap, limbs tangled, more or less side by side. As my breathing slowed, my memory of Ogata-san and Kuwabara-sensei came back to me. I wiped up the spunk with my shirt and then threw it across the room, near the laundry, and settled into Shindou's arms to stay warm.
Shindou's. Hikaru's? I wasn't really sure how much this changed about us. I supposed if I waited to see, I might find out, though.
Or maybe I should just ask. But the silence was nice, not nerve-wracking, just his breathing and mine, and the occasional satisfied hum from one or the other of us. I'd ask in a minute, I thought. One more minute.
When I opened my mouth some time later to ask a question though, what came out was, "Did you talk to Kuwabara-sensei at the hotel at all?"
"Um, a little. That time when you went to the restroom when I was sitting there with the magnetic Go set? He came over and, um, chatted for a bit."
"Oh?" This was curious, not only because if Shindou was busy talking, he might not have heard what went on between me and Ogata-san.
"Yeah. He, um, he was reminiscing about how when he went pro, there weren't many others his age at the time, so no one really knew what he was going through. He was a teenager, he said. And, er, well, he meant puberty and adolescence, um, you know..."
I chuckled. "I know how Kuwabara-sensei talks, if that's what you mean. So he complained about it?"
"Well, not complained exactly. He gave me some advice though."
"Advice?"
"His advice was not to, well, not to allow sexual frustration to ruin my Go."
"Oh." I felt like my heart was sinking. Not only did it seem that Kuwabara-sensei's agenda was much deeper and more multi-layered than I could have guessed, I wasn't sure how to feel about the fact that... that Shindou Hikaru had just fucked me to play better Go.
And I had thought I felt humiliated when Kuwabara-sensei had made me play in the nude. That was nothing compared to this. Maybe because this wasn't just humiliation. There was a pain in my chest like my heart had turned to stone.
He sat up. "What's with that face? Did I say something wrong?"
I buried my face against his side, trying to fight down the feeling.
I've underestimated him before. I did again just then. Shindou can make sudden leaps forward in his deductive capabilities, after all. "Touya... Akira... I didn't mean it that way. You don't seriously think the only reason I'm here is to play better Go?"
I dared a glance up. "Some people would," I said in a small voice.
He snorted. "I've wanted to... I've been..." He didn't seem to know how to say what he was trying to say. He pushed me onto my back, his eyes level with mine, his bangs hanging down around his face. "You remember what I was saying that time, about the God of Go being lonely?"
"Yes." I'd just recalled it myself to him a few days ago.
"I was thinking at the time that I was grateful to have you." His voice held the irritated edge I'd come to recognise in our many, many arguments over the Goban. "As a rival, yes, but I was thinking if that was all we ever were to each other, well, I'd settle for that. But that I... really hoped for more." He leaned down and kissed me, then. "Baka. This wasn't all my idea, was it?"
Now it was my turn to blush again. "No," I admitted. "I've been thinking about you... this way for a while now." Ever since Kuwabara-sensei woke up my lustful side, anyway.
Strange to think of. Kuwabara-sensei didn't even know that Shindou and I were so close, and yet he'd ended up playing matchmaker. Or did he know more than he let on?
I let out a sigh. He always plays a very deep game, Kuwabara-sensei does, where moves that seem like empty breaths later come to be crucial, and seemingly important moves later turn out to be mere feints. This one, I might never quite fathom.
Meanwhile, I was to play my father in the morning, and face Ogata-san the day after that. I reached up and pulled Shindou down. "So should I call you Hikaru, now?"
"You can call me whatever you want, so long as I can keep touching you," he said.
"Hikkun," I said, nicknaming him just for me. "But only in here, only when we're alone."
He grinned. "We'll still have to play each other sometimes."
I nodded. "Shindou and Touya will play each other as always, once a week at the Go salon," I said. "But only Hikkun kisses Akira, touches Akira."
"Akira," he breathed in my ear, and it sent a shiver all the way to my toes.
* * * Go on to Part Ten * * *
Author: Ravenna C. Tan
Fandom: Hikaru no Go
Pairing: Hikaru/Akira eventually, Akira/others, sort of (you'll see)
Rating: NC-17
Disclaimer: Non-commercial fanfic.
Summary: Touya Akira loses a match and suffers a crisis of faith. Could wily old Kuwabara-sensei have the answer? Or is the answer to be found in Touya's eternal rival, Shindou Hikaru?
Warnings: This is not a fluffy Aki/Hika fic. There is what could be termed cross-gen/chan, and also psychological manipulation as part of the plot. The sexuality is graphic, but not gratuitous. Touya is 16. Spoilers for the series, also.
A/N: I posted an "intro" to Hikaru no Go for those who want to read the fic without watching or reading the whole series, on LJ and IJ.
Part One is here: LJ and IJ
Part Two: LJ and IJ
Part Three: LJ and IJ
Part Four: LJ and IJ
Part Five: LJ and IJ
Part Six: LJ and IJ
Part Seven: LJ and IJ
Part Eight: LJ and IJ
Part Nine
The taxi driver turned out to be a huge fan of Go and asked us both to autograph a piece of paper for him, then chattered away to us the entire drive to my house about all manner of things, Kurata-san's latest match, news of the formation of a new Go title in Taiwan, and so on. He'd been reading the Go news on the Internet and in the papers more diligently than I had, it seemed.
He also seemed to be rooting for me to beat Ogata-san.
So was Shindou. As we went into the house, he asked me if I'd been studying Ogata's games in preparation for the match. I told him yes, of course, though I didn't mention Kuwabara-sensei.
We got ready to go to sleep then. It was getting late, after all. I got into my pajamas and used the battery-powered toothbrush. Shindou joked that he ought to just keep his own toothbrush there, he'd stayed with me so often. He stripped down to the white T-shirt he'd worn under his dress shirt and his shorts, a look I'd seen him in already before.
I locked myself in to take the plug out, sighing as it came free. Already the incident with Ogata-san seemed surreal, like a dream. Where had he gotten the idea that I desired him?
I sat up suddenly. What had Kuwabara-sensei said to him?
And why?
Could Kuwabara-sensei have played on Ogata-san's interest in me, making him think I would return those feelings, and spurring him to make a mistaken move like... like barging in on me in the restroom of the Palace Hotel?
I felt cold suddenly. Which of us was Kuwabara-sensei trying to help? The match was in two days. All his tutoring of me had been extremely valuable. I don't mean all the business with the humiliation, I mean the analysis of Ogata's Go. It seemed to me Kuwabara-sensei was definitely on my side.
But was that because he wanted to see Ogata-san lose? Revenge for taking the title away from him? Maybe even preparation for taking the title back? I had told Kuwabara-sensei nearly as much about Ogata's Go as he had told me.
I put my hand over my mouth as I realized what I had said to Ogata-san in the car. That I'd start calling him "Seiji" if I won. Would that give me the psychological edge in the match? Would he subconsciously accept a loss that he normally wouldn't?
I hugged my knees to my chest. Ogata-san had always, always been straightforward with me, and as one of my father's fellow proteges, I'd always been the same with him.
Well, except that he'd been hiding his interest in me. But of course he had to. He was a dozen years older than me, and my father...
My father could never know any of this. That much was clear.
A knock startled me out of my reverie. "You okay in there?"
"Yes. One moment." I hid the plug in the cabinet and opened the door. "Sorry."
His hand was on my cheek before I could slip past him. "Touya? You don't look well."
"I... I'm getting nervous about Thursday's match," I said, closing my eyes. That wasn't very far from the truth, after all.
"You? Nervous before a match?"
I nodded. The loss in the Meijin preliminaries still stung, didn't it? "I don't want to lose that badly again."
The next moment wasn't at all what I expected. I expected him to scoff, to raise his voice and call me an idiot. To shake some sense into me.
Instead, he drew me into a hug. I let out a shaking breath, suddenly wondering if Shindou knew my scent as well as I knew his. "Shindou..."
He hushed me and just stroked my hair. My next breath was calmer, the one after that calmer still.
And then it caught, as my cock twitched, responding on its own to the warm body against mine. "Touya..." he breathed, and his lips ran up and down my neck. My cock jumped to attention as if it were what he caressed, not the tendon behind my ear. I whimpered. He slid one hand down my back, pulling our groins together and I gasped. "Touya," he whispered again, "do you want to?"
Want to what? Be specific. I want to know just what I'm getting myself into. Those were my thoughts. What I actually said, though, was, "Yes."
And then his mouth met mine, and I forgot all about things like toothbrushes and taxis and even Go. He pressed me against the frame of the door, and as I opened my mouth to let his tongue brush against mine, I could feel his hardness against my thigh. My hand found his hip, pulling him close, too, until he was grinding against me.
Tongue against tongue, lips against lips, I have no idea how long we kissed like that. When he broke the kiss for something silly like breathing, I hadn't come close to having enough. I pulled his head toward mine for more, but he broke away again a few moments later, panting. "I'll... We..."
I'll never know what he was going to say then, because at that moment, as he pulled back just a little from me, my hand slipped down to his cock and found the slick spot in his shorts where his cock tip had leaked through the fabric. I rubbed it with my fingers and he made a sound that wasn't made up of words.
Then he dragged me to the bedroom, where the two futons were already lying side by side, and in no time at all I was on my back and his hands were searching my skin under my pajama shirt and making me pant all the more.
I cried out softly as his fingers brushed over my nipples.
"Sore?" he asked, puzzled.
I nodded. "Um, my shirt was rough," I said, hoping that was explanation enough.
He didn't argue, just unbuttoned the shirt and slipped me out of it, then set to soothing one nipple with gentle licks of his tongue. "Ayyyy, Shindou--!"
"Good?" he asked, raising his head to look at me.
"Yes." And then he did the other one, while I thrust my hips shamelessly into the air. Then I was pulling his shirt off and pushing him onto his back so I could try the same on him. I licked, then sucked at his nipples and was pleased at the reaction I got.
Then I was helping ease him out of his briefs, and looking at the glistening tip of his cock and feeling my mouth water. I didn't think I could bring myself to do what Ogata-san had done, but surely a little taste...?
I licked around the shiny head and found it salty and good. Shindou made wonderful, incoherent noises. I held the base of his cock in my hand then, and licked and sucked until I figured out that him pulling at my hair was him trying to get me to stop. "Too soon, too soon," he said, and it took me a moment to figure out that he was trying to tell me he was about to come. "Your turn for a while."
"All right." But I froze, not knowing what he wanted me to do. He pushed me onto my back and took down my pajama bottoms, tossing them aside, and then reaching down to pet my cock gently. I propped myself up on my elbows and looked down at it while he ran his fingers up and down it, examining it like he was trying to memorize its shape.
"What do you like?" he asked then, his gaze moving from my cock to my face.
"I don't know. I haven't... I haven't done this before."
He looked surprised. "Not with anyone? Not even a girl?"
I shook my head.
"Not even..." he paused, as if considering whether or not to ask.
"Not even Ogata-san, if that's what you're thinking about," I said, thrusting into his hand. "We had a bit of a miscommunication, him and I."
He looked skeptical at my explanation and I wondered again how much he'd heard of what had gone on at the Palace. But he went on. "Okay. Well, then, what do you want to try, if you don't know what you like?"
And now the blush that had stayed mostly down while we'd touched each other suddenly rose on my cheeks as the fantasies I'd had of him all week came rushing to the fore. "I..." I couldn't meet his eyes.
He kissed my mouth gently. "It's all right. I just... I just want to make it good for you."
I found my arms around him, pulling him close, his weight atop me. "What about you?" I said into his ear, my eyes clenched tight. "What do you like?"
His hands stroked my hair, my ribs. "I, well, I've never done this either. Not really."
"Not really?" My voice was far too high.
"No need to get jealous," he teased, nibbling at my ear and encouraging me to not squeeze him quite so tight. "I've watched some porn movies. That's really about the extent of it. Now, how about it. What do you want me to do?"
I knew what I wanted. I had known from the moment his cock had rutted against my thigh when we'd been standing in the doorway to the bathroom. But I didn't think I could say it. I reached between us and ran my fingers along his length. "Is it okay?" I asked. "I want... this."
"It's okay," he said, and kissed me again, and I hoped he understood what I meant.
I was sure that he did when he slipped a finger into me and I cried out in ecstasy. "Yes!"
He moved it in and out several times, then drew it free. I opened my eyes to see a puzzled look on his face.
"Something wrong?" I asked, sitting partway up.
"No, no," he said. "It's just... more slippery than... I mean, hey, do you happen to have any lube?"
"Er, well, actually, yes," I said. "It's in the bottom drawer of my desk. No, wait! I'll get it!" The assortment of plugs was in there, too, and I wasn't ready for anyone to see them, much less Shindou. I climbed across him and pulled out the bottle, slamming the drawer shut.
He took it without hesitation, and shooed me back onto the futon. I crawled away from him and then stayed on all fours. I looked back at him. "Like this?"
He groaned as if just the sight were enough to nearly make him come. But he shook his head. "Turn over so I can see your face."
I lay back against the pillows then and spread my legs, biting my lip in anticipation.
"We'll go slow," he said, as he settled to one side of me, slipping his slick fingers between my cheeks. He pushed a finger into me, but it moved so easily, he went right to two, adding more lube as he went.
I couldn't tell him why I was not virginally tight. Not right this minute anyway.
Nor could I tell him how it felt, the lube cold, his fingers hot and hard, the sparks I saw before my eyes each time he moved in a certain way. All I could say was "Good, oh, so good... yes..."
"From what I hear, this should feel even better," he said, settling between my legs and rubbing his cock against my hole. I bent my knees all the way, pushing against him.
"You're sure?" he asked, one last time, a mischievous glint in his eye.
I just growled and pulled at him until he pushed his way inside me.
"Shindou!"
He held still, both of us shaking, not from pain, but from the sudden intensity of him inside me. His cock felt so different from a plug. The head was bulbous and had taken a fair bit of push to get through, but the shaft was narrowed and now it felt like my hole was pulsing around it.
So warm. So alive.
I pulled at him again and he moved, driving deeper. The friction was absolutely delicious. I made incoherent sounds of my own.
Soon he joined me making animal noises, as he began a steady rhythm. That rush of warmth and pleasure I usually felt while a plug went in or came out was suddenly no longer momentary, but building and building, moment by moment. I lost my sense of myself completely.
It returned only gradually after we had both come--him inside me, me all over my stomach--and then collapsed in a heap, limbs tangled, more or less side by side. As my breathing slowed, my memory of Ogata-san and Kuwabara-sensei came back to me. I wiped up the spunk with my shirt and then threw it across the room, near the laundry, and settled into Shindou's arms to stay warm.
Shindou's. Hikaru's? I wasn't really sure how much this changed about us. I supposed if I waited to see, I might find out, though.
Or maybe I should just ask. But the silence was nice, not nerve-wracking, just his breathing and mine, and the occasional satisfied hum from one or the other of us. I'd ask in a minute, I thought. One more minute.
When I opened my mouth some time later to ask a question though, what came out was, "Did you talk to Kuwabara-sensei at the hotel at all?"
"Um, a little. That time when you went to the restroom when I was sitting there with the magnetic Go set? He came over and, um, chatted for a bit."
"Oh?" This was curious, not only because if Shindou was busy talking, he might not have heard what went on between me and Ogata-san.
"Yeah. He, um, he was reminiscing about how when he went pro, there weren't many others his age at the time, so no one really knew what he was going through. He was a teenager, he said. And, er, well, he meant puberty and adolescence, um, you know..."
I chuckled. "I know how Kuwabara-sensei talks, if that's what you mean. So he complained about it?"
"Well, not complained exactly. He gave me some advice though."
"Advice?"
"His advice was not to, well, not to allow sexual frustration to ruin my Go."
"Oh." I felt like my heart was sinking. Not only did it seem that Kuwabara-sensei's agenda was much deeper and more multi-layered than I could have guessed, I wasn't sure how to feel about the fact that... that Shindou Hikaru had just fucked me to play better Go.
And I had thought I felt humiliated when Kuwabara-sensei had made me play in the nude. That was nothing compared to this. Maybe because this wasn't just humiliation. There was a pain in my chest like my heart had turned to stone.
He sat up. "What's with that face? Did I say something wrong?"
I buried my face against his side, trying to fight down the feeling.
I've underestimated him before. I did again just then. Shindou can make sudden leaps forward in his deductive capabilities, after all. "Touya... Akira... I didn't mean it that way. You don't seriously think the only reason I'm here is to play better Go?"
I dared a glance up. "Some people would," I said in a small voice.
He snorted. "I've wanted to... I've been..." He didn't seem to know how to say what he was trying to say. He pushed me onto my back, his eyes level with mine, his bangs hanging down around his face. "You remember what I was saying that time, about the God of Go being lonely?"
"Yes." I'd just recalled it myself to him a few days ago.
"I was thinking at the time that I was grateful to have you." His voice held the irritated edge I'd come to recognise in our many, many arguments over the Goban. "As a rival, yes, but I was thinking if that was all we ever were to each other, well, I'd settle for that. But that I... really hoped for more." He leaned down and kissed me, then. "Baka. This wasn't all my idea, was it?"
Now it was my turn to blush again. "No," I admitted. "I've been thinking about you... this way for a while now." Ever since Kuwabara-sensei woke up my lustful side, anyway.
Strange to think of. Kuwabara-sensei didn't even know that Shindou and I were so close, and yet he'd ended up playing matchmaker. Or did he know more than he let on?
I let out a sigh. He always plays a very deep game, Kuwabara-sensei does, where moves that seem like empty breaths later come to be crucial, and seemingly important moves later turn out to be mere feints. This one, I might never quite fathom.
Meanwhile, I was to play my father in the morning, and face Ogata-san the day after that. I reached up and pulled Shindou down. "So should I call you Hikaru, now?"
"You can call me whatever you want, so long as I can keep touching you," he said.
"Hikkun," I said, nicknaming him just for me. "But only in here, only when we're alone."
He grinned. "We'll still have to play each other sometimes."
I nodded. "Shindou and Touya will play each other as always, once a week at the Go salon," I said. "But only Hikkun kisses Akira, touches Akira."
"Akira," he breathed in my ear, and it sent a shiver all the way to my toes.
* * * Go on to Part Ten * * *
