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[illusioning]

Yo, can't get to the phone right now.
Leave a message after the beep.

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[usedlaserbeam]

[There's a moment, as those two simple words drift away through the chill winter air, when Yagyuu almost lets himself wonder if maybe there's a chance.

At what, he's not precisely sure, but maybe it's whatever they were stumbling toward the last time they were together, or maybe it's at something similar but new, or maybe it's something different entirely. He doesn't know, isn't sure, but he thinks vaguely that it's something he wants, and the relationship between them has always been colored and defined with overtones of desires. Niou wanted to see his walls come down, wanted to watch him cut loose, wanted to see what lurked beneath the face he showed the world. Yagyuu wanted to taste the freedom that came with being someone else, wanted to be someone else, wanted to be himself as he really is in a way that no repercussions could attach. They want things, and they make them happen. That's who they are.

The words that set off that first reckless kiss were anything you want.

But he's learned, now, not to be reckless. Maybe it's making him overly cautious, swinging too far to the other extreme, but mistakes were made and flaws dug in like needles and it isn't often that people get second chances like this, to fix what went wrong by never choosing that option in the first place. He wants to push but he doesn't, because pushing is how inertia builds, and he doesn't know yet if it will cut a new path away from those past mistakes, or fall back into the groove that led right to them.

And yet his arm fits so well around Niou, gathering him in close—and come to think of it, when did that happen?

It's so instinctive to want him close, like they're two halves of the same whole fighting to get back together again.]

Do you want me to?

[He thinks he means, do you want me to tell you, but on second thought, maybe he's really asking something completely different.]

[illusioning]

[He's not entirely sure when it happened either, but the hand that had been holding onto Yagyuu's shoulder ends up sliding up to rest at the back of his neck anyway - more for ease as he is pulled closer. It's natural though, in a way that's possibly unnatural. Everything does bleed together in ways, when it's like this. Even if they had been in the same house, the same rooms, it didn't exactly feel like they ever were up until this point either. The closest he'd sat had been when Yagyuu had been sick.

He thinks over the question now that he can. He knows he's relaxing more than he should, because he doesn't know what any of this means, he just does it. But that question almost throws him off, because he can hear the possible double meanings to it, but he doesn't know if he's just hearing it because he wants to hear that either.]

Whenever you're ready.

[It might seem like a simple answer to it, but it caters for the either/or there as well. What is it that you want? The question in the back of his own mind asks whether he ever will be though.]

[usedlaserbeam]

He's really gone.

[He puts his head down, breathes, caught up in thoughts and memories that he can't beat back and suppress no matter how fervently he tries. He pins down one and another escapes, bouncing back to prick incessantly at the back of his mind, nagging and taunting. So many of them have gone. So few of them are left.

Akaya was the first familiar face he met in person after he was dragged in here, himself.

But it's not easier to think about the fresh wounds of Akaya's departure in lieu of the older, scarred ones of Niou's. It all stings the same. There's too much to think about and he can't clear his mind, and it's colored all over with the lingering, wrenching urge to steal a kiss from his partner's mouth just to make himself forget for a little while.

But he won't, because Niou has seen through him again; he's not ready, not yet, because that urge is a reckless one and he already succumbed to recklessness once, and sometimes it feels exquisite to let himself be swept away by the undertow but not here, not now, not with this.

He's been fortunate enough, beyond all expectation, to be given a second chance. He's not about to press his luck and hope he might still have the safety net of a third.]

You'll know, when I am.

[But this is all right, for right now. They're too close and too wrapped up in each other for the boundaries of friends or teammates, but that's never stopped them before. They're partners. It means something. It makes this all right, no matter what feelings lurk behind it.]

[illusioning]

Mm. [It's hummed out more than anything, just an agreement.] It doesn't mean he won't be back either though.

[Maybe he shouldn't be offering that at this point. Maybe he shouldn't be commenting on it any further when there is so much that is rocky and hard to touch upon already. He hasn't been there long enough this time to notice what it really feels like to get used to this territory with someone else for it all to be washed away.

It's different, somehow.

Either way, at this point he knows and understands more than Yagyuu tries to let on. He knows that while he may not be clued in on things, that he isn't all that ready to discuss whatever it is he's struggling with. All he can do is be there whenever that time comes.]

I always do.

[There's another small hint of a smile on his face even as he says that - even if it's a little painful to hold on to this uncomfortable feeling for a little longer. To keep questioning everything. If he thinks about it though, he can assume it's like another mind game they have to play until the final result is released. That makes it a little easier, as does the hold they have right now - close, but not quite touching upon how close they are.]