My Honey in Retrograde
rated e / 17k words / aomine x akashi
tags/warnings: minor aomine/kagami, implied gom/gom, future fic, hurt/comfort, aomine in the NBA, rimming, power play, asphyxiation, bottom akashi, top aomine (technically)
The silence stretched but it wasn't empty. Being near Akashi was like playing with static. He's pulled or frayed no matter how he moved. He didn't falter. Neither did Akashi. That was a given. "At any rate," Akashi said, "I've cleared my schedule for two weeks." He faltered. "Huh." "We leave for Kyushu in three. Get packed. I've already booked for an overnight train and several ryokan outside the tour. The itinerary seems pleasant enough, however I prefer—" "Hold the fuck on."
During summer break, Aomine packs his bags, takes a one-way flight to Tokyo and visits an old friend.
(AO3)
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My body is a ruin, but my mind is as full of longing as it was when I was twenty. Diary of a Mad Old Man: Junichiro Tanizaki
He'd been expecting it when Akashi walked into his own apartment and completely bypassed him. Hanged his coat, made his way to the kitchen. Didn't even spare a look. It was a Friday, which ensured he was home an hour earlier, sometimes two. The summer meant Aomine could witness him sun-drenched, even in the early evening. Right now a shard of lazy sunlight streaked down the side of Akashi's face, shifting the red hue of his eye to amber and blanching his hair a little. Aomine kind of wanted to raise his hand to the window and block the stream.
"I'd ask if you'd like a coffee but it seems you've already helped yourself." Akashi said, tugging his tie loose. "You're a long way from Ohio."
Aomine scratched his exposed stomach and watched, half-lidded, the wrinkles of Akashi's white bespoke shirt tucked into belted, slate-grey trousers pulling as he worked the coffee machine.
"Your ass looks nice in that," Aomine said.
"I should hope so. It required several fittings." Had it been anyone but Akashi, he would be drowned out by the low hum of the grinder. As it were, his voice was sharp even while mild, melodic where neutral. It allowed him to take control of many things. "But I asked a question."
Aomine didn't point out: you didn't, though. "You really gonna keep acting like you're surprised to see me?"
Akashi turned. The scrutiny fared longer than two sips of coffee, the cup obscuring everything but Akashi's penetrative eyes for a long, sadistic moment. This annoying quality of his that reduced all within his crosshair to prey. Whatever. He's had years to build an immunity.
"It's two weeks into the off-season." Akashi said, leaning back, "You were benched longer than necessary. Still, your coach isn't wholly incompetent where it matters… Satsuki cancelled her weekly dinner with Tetsuya, so I'd assumed she was the one to leave."
He rolled his eyes. "Must've missed her on the way. Whoops."
"I see. She'll be wanting a flight back."
"Nahhh, let her be. Alex or Taiga will treat her, she'll like that. Taiga got traded so he's got time, money and a guardian angel." Aomine scratched the shell of his ear with his pinky finger, his teeth bared in a smirk, "Your omniscient future-predicting shit is kinda waning, huh? If you haven't figured out that much. I'm surprised you didn't have a driver pick me up from the airport or something."
Akashi tapped on the rim of his cup twice before setting it down. Aomine moved instinctively, his back pressing against the back rest as Akashi came to a stop between his legs, staring his nose down at him.
"Stand up."
It took a trying moment. He stood with an annoyed sigh. Icy fingers traced skin at the back of his knee. He couldn't help but tense as they travelled up under the fabric of his shorts, though the pressure was gentle. At first.
"…Alright, alright, ease up." He grimaced. "I get it."
Akashi shot a look at him, comprehensive. Amused, Aomine guessed, but his face was impassive. He was always looking like that, since middle school. Always looking a little apathetic on one end of a shogi board, and then always, somehow, despite all his self-assurance, a little lost without it. It was all in the eyes; all in the intensity and the absence of it. Habit meant Aomine always met them and every other absolute facet was a distraction.
"Your left hamstring is strained."
Spot on. Like he'd expected any different, though. "Yeah."
Akashi stared at him.
"Grade one," Aomine scoffed, "4 weeks. Tops."
Akashi withdrew his cold fingers. "Where's your compression sleeve?"
"Don't need one. Figured I'm just gonna be sitting around all day anyway."
"And I don't suppose you're going to tell me where you intend to do this."
"The hell's the spare key for then, if you're gonna be like that?" Aomine tsk'ed, smoothing the back of his neck, "Tetsu's 'busy'. Kise's annoying. I step one foot in a konbini, my ass is the top story on NTV, and I really don't feel like being harassed right now. " He said dryly. "That leaves here. Surprise." He sank back into the couch and stretched his body out like a lazy cat, fighting down the yawn. "So do I need to suck you off, or what?"
Akashi paused. Levelled Aomine with a vague look that reprimanded his vulgarity when it suited him, or extended the foreplay when it suited him. It wasn't always directly proportionate to whether he was having a good day or not; nobody knew the parameters for where (and how) Akashi got his kicks. Whatever it was, Aomine never held his breath. The only predictability of Akashi was unpredictability.
Akashi turned, nimble fingers working buttons free as he strode through the floor.
"Later." Akashi said, before closing the bedroom door behind him. Aomine watched the door, briefly stunned.
"That all the greeting I'm going to get?" He asked sourly.
The silence that denoted Akashi changing clothes or sorting notes or arranging appointments or whatever the hell else a high-strung Todai valedictorian heir-apparent of a leading industrial conglomerate did to shove his company on the back foot, the silence Akashi so particularly preferred over the labour of raising his voice, even to greet an old friend-acquaintance-teammate he hadn't seen in like two and a half years—
"You played well." Akashi said, loud enough.
Aomine smirked.
When Akashi came out in trousers and cashmere sweater instead of the usual yukata, Aomine wondered if he'd missed something. He lowered the volume of the TV as Akashi came to a stop behind the couch. Godzilla continued to rampage in muted tones.
"I wonder why is it that I never fully account for your shamelessness." Akashi said. There was that natural lilt to his voice that Aomine sort of missed in a somatic way. "It's fascinating."
Aomine craned his neck, catching Akashi's gaze in his periphery. "Taking that as a compliment."
Slow and relaxed, Akashi peered down at Aomine with a narrow-eyed smile and cocked his head. "Of course you are."
Aomine leaned into the space, his grin becoming jagged as his breath brushed close. "So, is it?"
The silence stretched but it wasn't empty. Being near Akashi was like playing with static. He's pulled or frayed no matter how he moved. He didn't falter. Neither did Akashi. That was a given.
"At any rate," Akashi said, "I've cleared my schedule for two weeks."
He faltered. "Huh."
"We leave for Kyushu in three. Get packed. I've already booked for an overnight train and several ryokan outside the tour. The itinerary seems pleasant enough, however I prefer—"
"Hold the fuck on."
Akashi carried on, undeterred, "As I was saying: I prefer flexibility. As do you. So we'll leave halfway into the tour to explore other options, and decide what's best on the day — do not interrupt me again. You knew what you were getting when you turned to me." He said, matter-of-factly. "If this is unacceptable, go back to Ryouta or wait for Satsuki."
"Huh? I just landed today! Also, the hell, Kyushu? You gotta be kidding me, I'm already fuckin' boiling here."
"Come, or don't. It makes no difference to me."
Indignant, his eyes followed Akashi across the room as he rearranged his suitcase. He settled his jaw, which had dropped open, back into place and scoffed. "Oi, Akashi. What's all this hurry? What are we running away from, hmm?"
"Aren't you talkative today." Akashi said with a tiny smirk.
"Yeah, and?" Aomine raised his brows, slinging an arm over the couch. It's not in him usually to directly nettle Akashi. Tetsu or Taiga, sure, but pushing against Akashi was like pushing against a precipice, or taking a swing at a beehive. It's something people generally did not do.
Though it was almost a relief to run his mouth off in Japanese, string through seamless curses, because his English was semi-decent now but still annoying and never nearly as tonally accurate with the scorn he wanted to express. He'd take trash talk from college basketball courts in LA, thinking how annoying it was that he couldn't cuss them out in the way he wanted — or how much sharper they'd cut in keigo on Tetsu's tongue. Better yet, Akashi's, because the man wouldn't even intend to hurt and that was double the injury. He wanted to witness it again. The innocuous cruelty rarely contested and which Aomine, for the most part, respected and was absolved by.
It's the distance, maybe. He'd grown accustomed to life without Akashi's barbs.
"Pack your things." Akashi said. "You are exerting the limits of my goodwill."
"Oh yeah? And what if I don't feel like it?"
He sort of liked it, he realised. He liked reanimating the Akashi that lived in his head, the one he knew. Simultaneously enjoyed and loathed the way Akashi's face flattened as a result, the ultimate expression of horrific disapproval or even worse, disinterest. The logistics and the machinations of Akashi clearing his plate to accommodate him was a secondary thing.
If it weren't the natural order of things, he'd be annoyed by how easily he still got spooked.
The flight was two hours long but Akashi placed them in premium anyway, and Aomine made full use of the extended recliner. Stretched his legs out as far as they could go before his hamstring protested, shoved both hands behind his neck. He didn't reach for the headphones and opted, instead, for the faint sounds of Akashi typing on his laptop to fill the ambience.
The travel from Ohio to Tokyo was thirteen hours. And he assumed Akashi was busier than he was. He always was, even when Aomine's actively on court. Texting had never historically been their thing, though Aomine was shit at it in general. As it stood, time passed them by, sharing nothing but the trivial texts in the group chat typically sent by Kise or Tetsu, and the miles of ocean between them, effectively replaced the chasm that levelled during the Winter Cup about a decade ago.
That's probably what made him roll onto his side, shove the pillow under his neck. In the darkness of their cabin, only Akashi's light was on. Rather than disrupting other passengers, it erased them. Aomine's eyelids drooped until the sliver that was Akashi blurred slightly. He had reading glasses on, which reflected the blue light of the screen, rows upon rows of text and tables that Aomine's brain smudged out. Akashi's features were accented though; light blue down the contours of his face, high on the planes of his cheeks, down the straight slope of his nose and catching on the protrusion of his lips.
He knew that Akashi knew he was watching. His propensity to not care with these types of things set him aside from most, among infinite other things. He was used to it. They both were.
"I don't want the cameras following me around." Aomine said, trying to stay vile. He'd been tempered by Akashi's indifference, the pillow beneath his head and the vibratory hum of the plane, though. And the complementary peanuts.
"Not to worry. I'm quite adept at being discreet."
"You gonna tell me when you planned all this?"
Akashi's eyes flicked to his briefly, before they darted back to the screen. It's another minute or two of tapping before Akashi took a sip of his lukewarm tea. Two weeks. Two weeks out of Akashi's hectic schedule, for which he was already on constraints due to the quarter year. Plus, it was Akashi. Overachiever workaholic Akashi; not a single second to waste.
Aomine rolled his eyes when Akashi didn't bother to answer and shifted onto his back again.
"You wanted this to happen." Aomine said.
"And why did you come to me, Daiki?" Was the smooth reply. "Had you asked, I would've given you a villa from any prefecture you wished, where you could have remained undisturbed."
Aomine clicked his tongue. The problem was Akashi was known to hate pretence as much as he did, but the man loved to play these annoying little games. It was likely he'd already known the answer quicker and more profoundly than Aomine ever would. Fine; he could be imperial all he wanted so long as Aomine benefited from it.
"What," It rumbled through his chest, deep and almost pointed, "I can't drop by my Godfather's place once in a while?"
"Ah," Akashi said with a gleam to his eye, "so you've acquired taste during your time abroad. Good to know."
He's pleased, probably.
The humidity of Fukuoka's July suffocated him in somewhat of a nostalgic, oppressive blanket, which made Akashi's first choice of action even more absurd. First, Akashi dragged him to some boutique whose tailor knew Akashi by name but not face, and stumbled at the sight of it. Aomine watched with increasing annoyance. He sweltered, his nape damp and flushed, hands shoved in his pockets as Akashi trailed patient fingers through silks and wool.
"Hey." He barked out in obvious annoyance, and found satisfaction in the way both men and the desk girl froze, alerted by his brashness in the presence of Akashi, "What is this? The hell are you buying me a suit for. I thought we were going to resorts and onsens and shit."
"This one." Akashi said, ignoring him, trailing a hand down a dark, silk blazer. The tailor immediately pulled out of his stupor and nodded and fussed about in enthusiastic thrall. The cadence of the room resumed as per Akashi's command, and multiple pieces on mannequins were subsequently marked.
Aomine rapped at the wall once with his knuckle.
"Oi."
Akashi swivelled in his step. Stopped inches before Aomine. "I am not buying you a suit. I'm buying you three. Sit down."
"I have suits." He said, offended.
"Not adequate ones."
"Yeah, you haven't changed." Aomine placed a hand on the side of the door frame near Akashi's head. "Cut the crap already, it's too damn hot. My ass hurts from the plane. What the fuck are we doing here?"
Akashi's eyes, which had immediately focused on the hand above his head, narrowed as though all that met the trajectory of his stare will soon burn, now met his. There, a distinct message passed between them, something of a childhood-long reminder; that there was no sense in arguing with a man of great imperviousness. As that gaze bore into him, he realised he barely remembered the times it wasn't intense or derisive or just ultimately absolute.
He withdrew his hand, scowling.
Akashi continued. "The Season Tip-Off Gala is mid-October, followed by the Cup in Vegas, and then the Cavs' charity dinner in December. All call for formal attire, Daiki. I need you looking your best; you are representative of us, after all." Akashi thumbed through an array of blazers, before picking one up and holding it up to Aomine's chest. "As I thought. You're good in black, but only the best should dress you. Still, it would behove you to remember: stay away from off-the-rack colours. Understand? Look for midnight ink, navy or charcoal, if needed. Try this on. Don't argue."
"You little… I have a PA, you know. Pretty sure I also have a stylist, and it's not you."
Akashi narrowed his eyes.
Aomine snatched the blazer from him.
Akashi stood behind him, stoic and insufferably smug, like he was appraising a prize pony. The blazer cut a sleek silhouette. The deep black complemented his skin tone but with movement, its sheen hinted blues and violets — which he could hate just a bit more. The fact that it fell comfortably on his shoulders where most would pull or bunch up, reached the base of his thumbs relaxed and not his wrist, and hadn't a single crease while buttoned was also a testament to Akashi's annoying foresight. He tugged it slightly; still no lines.
Ok, fine. Akashi was right. Not that he'd ever admit it.
"You like it." Akashi met his eyes through the mirror.
He huffed. "You know way too much about suits."
"Yes. Obviously." Akashi outstretched his hand and Aomine shrugged the blazer off, handing it to him. The attendant collected it from Akashi seamlessly. "I'll have them shipped off tonight. They were supposed to arrive a week prior initially, I just wanted to see it first. Ah, not that one, thank you. We'll take that with us."
The suits required a couple more tweaks but Aomine lost the drive to complain when he kicked his feet up on the seat and the attendant looked scandalised but Akashi ignored it. He was perfectly content to receive nothing but a single look of reproach. Instead, Akashi turned to the attendant and said, "Hot, isn't it?", which made her blast the aircon with a speed rivalling Aomine’s. They waited another half hour for finishing touches, where time and heat were suddenly non-factors lounging on the edge of Akashi's peripheral. He almost dozed off again.
When they left the boutique, finally, Aomine slung a suit in its protective cover over his shoulder and had to walk in long, decisive strides to stay by Akashi's side.
He remarked, "I should put a leash on you."
"Keep running that mouth and you'll be muzzled sooner."
Aomine's eyed him sidelong, chin tilting up ever so slightly. "Go ahead and try."
"Can you manage as far as the end of the block? Give that to me."
Aomine shot him a dry look. "I can carry a damn suit — why're we bringing it anyway?"
"The train has a dress code. Stop slouching, it's not good for your leg."
"You're not good for my leg. What kind of train has a dress code?"
Akashi finally came to a stop by the sidewalk, raising a hand. Aomine slowed beside him, frowning. It wasn't long before a sleek black sedan glided to the curb, windows tinted. Akashi smiled. "The best of the best."
The overnight Seven Stars train was as lavish as one with Akashi's stature promised. Exclusive. Private. Since Aomine's time in America, he'd been granted many luxuries that were extravagant to even his prospecting NBA-obsessed child self, but he'd long accepted most facets of Akashi's will always be alien.
As soon as they entered their suite on the train, their luggage already stored by staff, Aomine was engulfed in old world luxury; all dark oak, gold trim and shoji screens. Like stepping onto a Victorian-Meiji fusion set. It was a car of an active train and yet the space was mockingly equivalent to his single apartment in Ohio, topped with its own corridor. There was also a full antique writing desk, twin beds partitioned off by Kumiko screens, a plush couch and mini dining table. With seats. The scent of rosewood followed them all the way from the first car to their suite at the rear, laced with fresh linen and Akashi's light musk cologne.
"You are shitting me." Aomine said, dumbfounded as he slid the door open. "Why the hell is the shower bigger than mine?"
"So it is."
"There's a bedroom? There's a fucking bedroom! There's a bedroom and a bathroom and we're on a train. Jesus. I don't even wanna know how much this costs."
"Then don't ask."
Aomine paused. Akashi had already made himself comfortable on the twin bed, legs crossed, bracing his weight on his palms behind him. He stopped in front of Akashi, his shadow covering him completely, and only then did Akashi's gaze travel from the ceiling down to Aomine.
"Yes?"
"You know I've got money now, right?"
"I do."
"Fine, how much?"
Akashi hummed curiously. "You said you didn't want to know."
"Yeah, well, now I do."
There was a pause. "About six."
"Million?" When Akashi only stared at him, he clicked his tongue, "y'know what, never mind."
Aomine threw himself onto the other twin bed as Akashi closed the window by the bedside. The rear window of their suite, which would grant them the entire undeterred view of the scenery as the train's backside left it, was also shuttered for now, leaving the only source of light the overhead lamp. They could still hear the bustle of station around them, but it felt like they were encapsulated in a private cavity of time and space.
"So why are you Gatsby'ing me, anyway?" Aomine asked, suspicious, watching Akashi for a moment before lying flat, hands cushioning his neck. At Akashi's quizzical stare, Aomine shrugged a shoulder. "Watched it on the plane to Tokyo."
"What a crude question. Though if you must know: you're a man of habit, Daiki, not one of novelty. I thought you'd appreciate the change of pace."
"Bullshit."
"We haven't seen each other in a while. Is it really surprising that I'd arrange for something nice in your moment of recuperation?" Akashi raised an eyebrow. "Though I suppose it's worth noting: if you didn't have such a nature, you wouldn't be here right now."
Aomine let out a short, jagged laugh. "Like you can talk. Still doesn't explain why you tricked me into a romantic getaway."
"I see."
"You see what?"
"You've been away too long and the States have deteriorated what little sense of decorum you once had." Akashi noted, his pointer finger lingering on his phone. "You're not listening to what I'm saying, as per usual. That's fine; I didn't bring you here to think."
"I'm listening, you ass." Aomine scratched his stomach. "I just don't believe it."
"And what am I supposed to do about that?"
"Touché." Aomine's eyes were already closing though, curiosity quelled, and it was in that peaceful quiet that the train slowly came to life, like waking groggily in July in Setagaya. On school break, humid, his mother setting a plate of watermelon slices on the engawa. A faint rumble vibrated the floor, and then a screech, before the concrete of the station left the view of their high window and was soon replaced by the white of a muggy sky, a soft drizzle of rain pattering on the roof of the train.
For a long moment, they listened to the overture of the city and surroundings outside, unbroken by even by the wall of texts that Aomine's phone kept buzzing with. He reached out and switched the phone to mute with minimal movements, not even bothering to open his eyes. Even Akashi stopped typing as they were enveloped by the faint sound of rain, the tranquillising hum of the air conditioning and the soft creaks and protests of train tracks.
"Daiki," Akashi said, and the sound blended effortlessly into the atmosphere. Aomine hummed. "How many people know you're back?"
"Ugh… how many I told? Or how many just know because I got a bunch of stalker friends?"
Akashi smiled. "The former."
"Zero." Aomine crossed an ankle over his knee. "Serves those bastards right."
"And your teammate — Williams. Has he contacted you?"
"…No." Irritation surged quicker than he could get his bearings, coupled by the exhaustion of the whole ordeal and the hour of vague agony as doctors fussed over him before giving the all clear. "I don't wanna talk about Francis. He's just a piece of— he's just a fuckwit. Don't make me think about it; I'm on holiday."
"Fair enough." Akashi said smoothly.
It's not like he'd planned ahead; he always kinda did shit retroactively. Perhaps he knew, subconsciously, that Akashi would piece things together before they'd even make contact, sparing him the labour of explaining anything. Knowing him, he'd probably inherit a disgust greater than Aomine's — history dictated his partiality against morons crippling the whole team. He was visited, briefly, by the memory of an Akashi who had yet to introduce himself; chubby-cheeked and almost petite, but he'd been watching Aomine with unabashed, unafraid curiosity, his reticent demeanour not yet polished. He'd kept his eyes on him throughout the entire team trial and was the first to introduce himself.
"Hey." Aomine snapped, sour where where Akashi was placid. "Leave it. My PA's got it handled. No one's tracking me down."
His phone vibrated three times in quick succession.
"Mostly."
When Akashi motioned for the phone, Aomine scowled a moment longer. Then he slid the phone across the surface of the bed into Akashi's awaiting hand.
"It's a burner."
"I figured." Akashi scanned through the texts, speed-reading, then switched the phone fully off. "I went ahead and alerted Satsuki, Tetsuya, Taiga and Ryouta. As well as Alex." Then added, before Aomine could complain, "They won't bother you."
Now that they know you're with me went unsaid but Aomine caught the tail-end of it anyway. All protests died on his tongue.
The phone landed somewhere beside his head and a gradual warmth situated between his knees. He peered one eye open, caught Akashi's expectant gaze and the way the light possessed his face before the train entered a tunnel and their surroundings dimmed. In the darkness, the undefined, limitless thing between them reinvigorated. Aomine pushed himself up, the muscles of his stomach flexing with the movement. He reached out, fingers grazing over the lapels of Akashi's coat.
"Control yourself." Akashi said, straightening out of Aomine's reach.
"Hah? You serious right now?" He was bound to know that would only rile Aomine up further. Bastard. It was so hard to read him.
"We're to attend dinner in the dining car in ten minutes."
Aomine was fast; he hooked a finger into the belt loop of Akashi's trousers instead and tugged him closer. "I don't need ten minutes."
He heard a huff of breath from above. "Your insolence is so… nostalgic." Precise fingers traced up his throat, clawed around his jaw and tipped his chin up with a thumb. Akashi's eyes were narrowed into content, perhaps even fond, slits. "Invoking the beauty of the past is highly advertised as a key feature of the journey, I suppose. Get up. Put your suit on. If you're desperate to put your mouth around something, save your appetite. I believe it's a five-course menu curated by Fukuoka's very own Kitagawa."
"Like I give a shit about—" His words ended abruptly. Akashi had slipped a thumb into his mouth.
"I think his repertoire will suit your palate. Your manner remains nightmarish, but you've always had a… fondness for delicacy." Aomine worked his jaw around another sneer, but Akashi's thumb hooked over his bottom teeth and forced his head down by it. Aomine's eyes flicked up again in time to see Akashi cock an eyebrow, following him down with his irises. "Enough, Daiki. You'll get what you need in due time."
Aomine's eyes flashed with with fire, letting his jaw slacken as Akashi's thumb ran over his teeth once more before releasing him. A scoff escaped him, the taste of Akashi's skin in his mouth, followed by a sardonic chuckle. "You gonna keep that promise?"
Akashi gave him a look that confirmed the uselessness of such a question.
They could've been on a bullet train going two hundred miles per hour without a single bump to jostle them. Instead their ride meant they felt the disharmony of rumbles and vibrations underneath their feet, the narrowness of the walkways a safeguard. The restaurant was on the opposite end of the train, doors opened by enthusiastic staff. Chandelier-lit, browned and warm, with a whole fucking piano to boot.
As soon as they'd exited the suite, Aomine regained the ability to bite down, so he did. Hard. It wasn't fair that designer brand suits were invented with the intention of waiting for Akashi's existence, either. Pinstripe, complementing the set he chose for Aomine. It was always thrilling to witness Akashi in in greys and blacks and darker blues, anything other than his pristine white. It upended that majestic air of his, to be crude like that, but the fact that his features were well-suited for it seemed a rebellion of himself too. Like some kind of nudity, some erotic taboo, despite being fully-dressed. Trust Akashi.
The other guests were also dressed to the nines, but Akashi's bright red hair ensured anyone else was made dull in comparison and they'd accumulated more than a few wandering eyes as the staff led them to a private booth. Case in point: a woman preceded by her vulture eyes tracked Akashi's back as they passed. It was an unapologetic greed that Aomine respected, might've even indulged had he been alone, but as it stood, triggered something more territorial in him instead. He let Akashi walk in first, then afforded her a smirk and a wink behind his back.
She averted her eyes immediately.
He slid into his seat with a grin, and Akashi immediately appraising him.
"What?"
"What are you doing?"
"Nothing." Akashi's eyes narrowed, just slightly. Aomine laughed out his nose in a puff of air. It's not like he'd forgotten Akashi had eyes behind his head, however he'd grown used to Akashi granting him exclusive leeway. "I took care of her before you did. So what, is that a problem?"
"Ahh." Akashi stretched the word out, humouring, and crossed a leg over the other. "Perhaps you're expecting me to thank you for your service."
"Go ahead. I did a favour sparing these bozos a scene."
Apparently Akashi was feeling particularly indulgent tonight, because all he did was smile. "And here I thought you were being sentimental."
"Sentimental? Me?" Aomine gestured to himself with a slow leer. "Don't get your panties in a twist. It's just funny pissing off your friends."
"My… friends."
"You know. Assholes who eat babies and caviar."
"Not friends." It sounded cruelly amused and almost regretful. "Tourists. I'll allow it, but keep your head down. It's the sycophants you have to worry about. You're very recognisable, after all." Akashi let his back touch the seat. His eyes travelled up and down Aomine's visage with a curious but pleased curl to his lips. There was an intensity there that was open for once, and Aomine felt a certain kinship with it. It was vague but gratifyingly raw. Possessive. It excited him. He returned the gaze, lazily content. The moment, settling with a kind of quietude, smoothened with the low tunes of the trumpet emerging from the piano solo.
"This is nice. Whatever's playing," Aomine said.
Akashi nodded. "Miles Davis." Then he smiled, like finding something funny, "Blue in Green."
"Oh yeah?" It almost drowned in the soft chatter, the piano and the tinkering of plates around them. He picked an edamame bean up with chopsticks only for it to slip, jostled by the train's vibrations. "Oh, come on. How do they expect us to eat like this? This is stupid."
"Keep your voice down."
He raised his brows. Then, enunciating more with his lips than his voice, switched languages: "this is stupid."
"You are little wiser than a basketball to think the people here don't at least have an elementary understanding of English." Akashi took a sip of his glass, and Aomine flopped back on his chair, crossing his arms. Akashi's tone and cadence were silk, even in English. "Don't tell me this is how I learn you've forgotten how to use chopsticks. I'll take that as a failure so profound it may very well be my own for allowing you to leave the country."
He rolled his eyes. "You're not my mother."
"Yes, and thank the heavens for that. Now, eat. It's in poor taste to let the main course wait for you."
Aomine made a face. "I should've stayed in Ohio."
"Be practical. Regulating your discipline from here would be a hassle, certainly, but not unfeasible."
Aomine rolled his eyes again, this time slower and more pointedly and made all the more futile with the smirk pulling at his lips. Piano keys tinkled in like crystallised drops of wine, light and delicate. This time the edamame didn't fall from his grasp. Without asking, he picked the pickled ginger from Akashi's bowl as well. Akashi watched it happen with unblinking eyes before focusing on him with something like amusement, but not quite.
Some kind of brulee and amakaze later, he pointed out, as though he'd held onto some dumb need to reassure Akashi, "I'm not double-fisting burgers everyday like an oaf. Or, that oaf." He pointed at Akashi with his spoon, tried to retain the usual conviction despite the food melting him into amicability and the absurdity of his words embarrassing him as they came. "I'm here, aren't I? You know me. You know what I… like, you get me. More than the others, sometimes."
Akashi said nothing but tapped the corner of his mouth with a smile, prompting Aomine to wipe his own with the back of his hand.
Akashi had already made himself comfortable when Aomine walked in. He was lying stomach-down in his navy blue yukata, chest elevated by a pillow and nose deep into a book that Aomine quirked an eyebrow at. Decked in only the guest robe and sweats, he fiddled with the suite key in his hand, weaving its neck through his fingers. "What are you reading?"
Akashi turned a page. "Tanizaki. Not that I expect you to recall, but it is a household name. Tetsuya handed it off to me when I was in town last week."
"He's always doing that shit. What did he say this time? Can't imagine him saying he's worried about you becoming 'actually illiterate.'"
"No." Akashi paused. "He said it might hurt me."
Aomine barked out a laugh that was almost involuntary. "He's a mean little shit sometimes." A quick peak of the book cover granted him a portrait of an elderly man with a haunted, exaggerated expression, like a kabuki mask. He didn't recognise it. He didn't know why he'd bothered. "It's probably because he knows you don't read. It's fucked up, he never does this shit with Taiga."
"That's because he knows Taiga always ends up doing whatever he tells him to." Akashi said, and then after a pause, "I read." It was the closest to petulant Akashi would ever get because Akashi didn't do petulance, and it made Aomine snort.
"Nah, you don't."
"Yes," Akashi said, "I do."
"Ok yeah, like… manuals. Law books. Business shit. Weekly shogi, basketball magazines." Aomine waved a dismissive hand. "If you 'read' then so do I, technically."
There was a slight pause. "And what else have you observed about me?"
"Huh? I dunno. Like I'm supposed to keep track?" He said, but thought about it for a moment. Teiko flashed behind his eyelids, as was its tendency. He tossed the key up and caught it. "I guess you don't like listening to music. You freak. Respectfully." It was another thing he had found so strange or downright unsettling about Akashi, which was why he remembered it. Middle school Akashi — later middle school Akashi, rather, was remembered, always, inside this invisible vat of silence and suspension, as though his compulsion for the quiet neutralised noise no one else was hearing. He didn't like loud music. Didn't like the unherded bustle. Didn't like voices outside them. Still, he had more tact than just stating you're weird as hell, to his credit.
Akashi looked nonplussed, which Aomine took as a win. "Did I not identify the song for you earlier?"
"It's different."
"Your opinions are inane, as always. Respectfully."
"I said you don't like listening to music."
"I know what you meant; I simply disagree."
"Studying is not the same as enjoying!"
"How complex your mind is."
"Whatever."
"Ah, good. Since we're finished with that, shall I also enlighten you on things you supposedly don't enjoy?"
"No thanks." He said drily, "I'm bored now."
Akashi hummed. "I will admit, I am also quite," he paused, scanning the next passage with heavy-lidded eyes, "…understimulated."
"Heh. Hey, no basketball court on a train. Wasn't this your idea?"
"You are currently barred from playing. If you think I'd allow—"
"Yeah, yeah, I know. Jeez. What's the deal with this all, seriously."
Akashi looked at him then at his book, then back up, as though humouring him came at a whim. "It's been a while since I've blocked out time for myself. In light of recent events, Shintaro seems to believe this has given him some kind of foothold over me. Claims I've lost my appreciation for solitary longevity, which — and I quote — renders me incapable of honest self-reflection. It was a very… special thing to hear from him."
"Okay," he said slowly, brows knitting, "and why the fuck are you listening to the one guy weirder than you?" The grimace he couldn't help, as natural as breathing. It's what happened whenever he ran into those rare commonalities between Akashi and himself. He'd spent probably quadruple the amount of time being idle than Akashi has in his life but he's had his fair share of others scrutinising it under the guise of concern rather than self-important anxiety.
Akashi glanced at him sidelong. "Now that's interesting. You think Shintaro's vein of neuroticism outranks mine?"
"The hell? There's no rank there, you're both—" he made a vague gesture with his hand that didn't quite involve his head, "equally. Or, I dunno, you're easier to deal with, that's for sure. Let's put it at that."
"Why, thank you. This, coming from the poster child of emotional stability himself."
"Ok. Never said I was perfect."
"Let me put it this way, then: I cannot allow Shintaro to condescend me like that."
Aomine's eye twitched. "Why am I being dragged into this?"
"Because you are currently proving him right. Entertain yourself."
He clicked his tongue, flicking the key neatly into the little bowl by the side table. "You're so damn annoying, the both of you. Why can't you just kiss and make up?"
Akashi gave him a brief look of complete apathy, and that was it.
Now underwhelmed by the extravagant furnishings of the room and the way the rear end of their suite bore a floor-to-ceiling glass view of the redundant train tracks and forestry, his eyes roamed, naturally, to Akashi. Unlike most things, he never faded into the mundane. It was intriguing how his back had always carried the same regal quality even since middle school when his muscles were only just starting to fill. The fabric of Akashi's yukata bunched at the small of his back before stretching out over firm flesh.
He's had a hard time entertaining himself lately, in all fairness.
His usual appetite, which had been diminishing, meant his eyes roamed towards softer lines and lipstick and more dramatic curves but Akashi—
"If you think you can leer at me with the eyes you use for your usual late-night company," Akashi didn't even look away from his book, "Think again."
—Akashi came with its coding. All of them did in a way, Akashi was just the most absolute remainder. The crux of the past, or the crown of the past on his head. An eternal, immovable empire. Of whom he was definitely checking out.
Aomine looked away with a tsk, "You're a real piece of work, you know. I forgot how much you liked giving mixed signals."
"I told you to entertain yourself."
"That's what I'm doing! What did you expect?"
"At least you have the insight, if all else."
"Oi, let's just say it out loud, yeah? I'm good at sex and that's why I'm here."
"I'm rescinding the invite."
"Just now?" Aomine smirked. "We getting sentimental or?"
The turn of a page and a hum. "You look good in a suit. That absolves most things of you, for about two… hours."
"Wanna see me out of it?"
"One."
Aomine knew better than to touch first. But it was a talent of his to push his luck. He slid by Akashi's side, careful to not graze him, but his weight caused an indent on the bed that shifted Akashi a little closer. He's assaulted by alluring warmth, santal and fresh linen, all of which danced just out of reach, a guarded nexus. Even without doing anything, Akashi's magnetism dominated and Aomine barely refrained from leaning into it.
He placed a palm flat on the bed by Akashi's waist, his fingers flexing over the duvet.
Akashi turned another page. "Do not expect me to reciprocate."
A crooked grin streaked Aomine's face. "Keep reading."
He leaned over Akashi, his fingers finding the knot tucked by Akashi's hip. A single tug loosened the tie and he released the sash from beneath Akashi, and was discarded on the floor. Heat prickled under his fingers as he placed them on Akashi's ankle first, then slid them upwards, bunching the fabric up to the small of his back. The panels of the yukata fanned across the sheets and bared the line of his legs and the curve of his ass. He'd always had a great ass. Even more familiar was the regal slope of Akashi's back, his characteristic indifference, the subtle but distinctly masculine musk mixing with soap and santal. He wouldn't mind further sightseeing; he remembered how the ridges of Akashi's spine looked under lighting — though something told him Akashi would.
The bed was long enough for him slide to down between Akashi's legs, so he rested on his stomach and palmed at Akashi's ass, an exciting weight in his hands. He squeezed, admiring the shape and feel of Akashi, placed a kiss on a firm cheek before spreading them with his thumbs. To this day, Akashi still shaved. It would've been too much had it been anyone but him, but because it was, it seemed a necessary precursor to worships other than of his own. So Aomine admired: his skin was unblemished and even, disrupted only by the darker pigment of his rim.
Muscle memory slowed him.
Akashi hardly needed easing, and usually Aomine barely got his cock out of his jeans before he was inside someone, or he was guiding someone on top of him, nothing but primal heat and zero patience. But that was Akashi's expectation. Usually. He splayed the fingers of his right hand across Akashi's slim waist, parted him with other, and kissed his hole, soft and intentional, it struck him. Like kissing lips, like lips to a ring, like cupping a hand over a lighter.
Akashi was completely still, other than the single turn of a page.
It was an understatement to say Aomine didn't mind. He'd been waiting for this since he boarded the plane home.
He traced down Akashi's crack with his thumb, stopping at his perineum where he pressed softly, spreading his spit. He lapped at Akashi slow and deep at first, licking over his hole, breathing in musk and warmth. Akashi didn't budge. Didn't even twitch. And yet it's easy to get lost in him anyway; pinned down by his intensity. He laved at the soft expanse, soaking him with spit, passing the bud over and over with a flat and heavy tongue.
"Missed this," he said huskily against skin. "Missed how you feel. How you smell."
The only response was a muted intake of breath which he barely waited for, more focused on how Akashi's tight little entrance gave a bit more on every stroke up. The physicality of him was exhilarating.
He plunged his tongue inside him and relished the tightness. Akashi's body pulsed around him. Akashi tasted sterile-clean, having showered before this, but there was the faintest edge of cloying sweat and essence, so intimate it sent jolts straight to his brain and down his cock. He moaned, settling in his place; the backs Akashi's thighs pressed against either side of his chest, bracketing him in. His fingers dug into Akashi's hips, holding him down and steady while his jaw worked, his entire body in servitude. He's out of practice, sure, but despite his nature, he'd always been good at picking up where he left off.
He could hear Akashi's breath intentionally cut short, like he'd tensed. Like an acknowledgement of him.
He increased the pace, the sheer want maddening, increasing, licking up the cleft with a hunger that possessed, and which turned into hard stripes against Akashi's hole as his own hips rocked futilely against the bed. Akashi was so hot. So tight. He pressed so deep he hardly remembered to breathe, so he groaned instead, muffled and pitiful, as he feasted.
He almost — almost wished that Akashi was sitting on his face instead, have him call the shots. Flip the switch on Akashi's covert control so breaking it down was more visible. A next time thing for sure.
The slow steady hum of the aircon and the train engine were the backdrop to the rapid, slicks fucks of Aomine's tongue inside, burying his face between pale cheeks. He stretched the puckered skin wider with a thumb, sharpened his tongue and dove into him again, hearing Akashi hiss, felt him clench around him. His own hips bucked forward uncontrollably, rusty with the pace. Akashi was pulsating around him, strong and heady.
He lapped at the tight muscle, pursing his lips and sucking slightly, squeezing his firm ass. The ring tensed gloriously under the claw-like grip of his fingers, Akashi's breathing becoming sharp and audible. Another pulse of his tongue, dipping as deep as he could, and Akashi sighed, small spasms in the strong, warm thighs under Aomine's grasp.
Oh, yeah. That was it. He should've left Ohio ages ago.
Aomine encouraged those thighs to spread further with his grip, and ducked his head, tasting Akashi so thoroughly that other senses drowned out. The room was filled with nothing now but the sounds of wet, suctioning kisses and frantic slurping, giving way to Akashi's occasional exhalations, sometimes a weak, glorious little grunt. Aomine's moans were muffled against Akashi.
He could have gone at it the whole day. In fact, he didn't know how long he was down there. Minutes, hours. All he knew was he could've stayed down there for the entirety of the train ride, engulfed in Akashi, his own hips rocking in slight, erratic thrusts against the sheets because they had no where else to go. Sweat accumulated at his collar and beneath his palms, heat searing his throat down to his belly like a lightning strike. Then he felt fingers smooth the hair at the back of his head; the faintest wisp of pressure that left the finer hairs of his nape standing on end. His hair was gripped hard and he moaned, static shooting straight up his skull.
He allowed Akashi to move his head by the fistful, relaxing his neck and tensing his tongue, letting Akashi drive him in, slip him out. Shove him in, hold him there, grind against him. Aomine kissed, licked, sucked, wherever Akashi put him, he stayed, and ignored the ache of his jaw. It made him chuckle, all throaty and triumphant. It was barely a noise, barely even a scratch of the throat, but it seemed to incense Akashi enough that he dug his nails in, hard. The sheer force of Akashi's grip glazed the edges of his vision.
He could hear Akashi panting now. He's so hard it ached.
Then Akashi was ripping him away from the heat.
"Fuck," he gasped, eyes blown out, "What,"
His lips were numb and drenched, wet to his neck, where a chord flexed to accommodate the lethal pull of his hair. Akashi was leering at him over his shoulder, flushed down to his neck and looking so alive, like he was back on the basketball court. Aomine's hit with a second, more violent wind knowing he had caused that.
"That's enough." Akashi said half-lidded. It sounded devastatingly final.
He twisted his body slowly on the bed, the yukata falling back over his legs. His breathing, shallow and obvious just moments before, seemed to slip back under his control, levelling out faster than what Aomine thought was fair. There was a vein in Akashi's arm protruding for how hard he was holding Aomine.
"Let go then," Aomine snarled. The grip went lax and then left him completely. Aomine rubbed the back of his head with wincing, and let out an incensed, disbelieving laugh, "You goddamn viper."
Akashi had dipped his head to press the side of his face against an arm, his one yellow iris visible, the picture of regal lethality and relaxation. "Off."
"Really? You sure?" Aomine leaned in instead, his smirk exposing a sliver of slicked teeth. "It sounded pretty good. You're close, aren't you? Otherwise you wouldn't have stopped me."
Akashi reached out and if Aomine were a lesser man, he would have flinched, but a single finger traced down his jawline, a thumb swiping delicately over the wet mess of his chin. There was a cool smile on Akashi's lips, which did make Aomine reconsider the ease of confidence.
"You've honed your craft. Certainly. But we already know you to excel exceptionally at two things." Aomine was shushed before he could get one in. "Be patient. You're too comfortable with the state of things, but that's not enough. I told you: I will not accept this version of you. The one who's grown lazy with a roster of subpar companions. The one who's forgotten."
"God, Akashi. I haven't forgotten shit."
"Prove it."
Aomine growled, "I could just leave, you know."
"Then leave."
A pause. Aomine scoffed before shaking Akashi's hand off with a jerk of his chin, the bed creaking as he slipped off it. "You keep me this wound up, I'll snap eventually."
"That's the point. Clean yourself up, and brush your teeth. You may relieve yourself in the shower."
"I'm already soft." Aomine rolled his eyes as he headed for the bathroom, hands in the pockets of his uncomfortably tight trousers.
"Oh," Aomine said as soon as he stepped out of the bathroom, skin flushed from the warmth of the shower and bodily gratification. "You're different now."
Akashi cocked his head from his seat at the compact but luxurious dining table, the slim neck of a wine glass between his fingers. On the table was the bottle of wine in a chiller and an unattended glass of his own. He didn't address the accusation, only filled the empty cup. He looked — not soft, but momentarily drained of venom.
"You don't care for wine, but I went ahead and had a bottle chilled. You'll like this one."
"I doubt it. It all tastes the same to me." Aomine dropped into the seat across Akashi. Watched the liquid in the glass glisten under the light of the overhead lamp, too light a shade to exact Akashi's mismatched iris, but close enough. He let his glass noisily tap Akashi's before he took a sip, Akashi following suit. The sweetness hit his tongue, light and suggestive.
"Shit." Aomine said, then sighed, "Yeah, it's good. Fine. What is it? Tastes like honey."
"Good catch. It's Chateau d'Yquem, also known as liquid gold. Here, it's best paired with walnuts."
They could've boarded a bullet train going three hundred kilometres per hour, easy, efficient, snapshots of light and dark through tunnels like a stream of photographs. Their ride, instead, rocked to his breathing, circling around a destination they didn't know, and shaded their skin with the blues and the oranges of the country. They're passing through a tunnel now, and white noise filtered to the single muted thrum of the train tracks, an almost gold sheen to Akashi's body under the light fixture.
Aomine took another sip, languid, feeling on all accords undone and made anew. He said, "I can't be bothered staying pissed at you."
"Then don't. I'd prefer you didn't."
Aomine held his tongue. Didn't mention the energy between them moments before, or the looks they gave one another throughout middle to high school. All mutual, all charged with inexplicable heat. The one that denoted they liked each other best when they were angry and sated in their anger. Akashi was easily most attractive when he was mad. He'd go so far as to guess Akashi returned the sentiment, going off the looks Akashi gave him during their most turbulent years. But he was too unpredictable to be certain.
"You're confusing as shit, you know," he said, instead. He slouched back and tossed a walnut into his mouth. "Hey, how much is this?"
"It's curious you say that. Do you not view yourself to be the same?"
He gave a one-shouldered shrug. "Not really."
Akashi pondered this for a brief moment. He set his glass down with a soft clink. "Two hundred fifteen thousand, I believe."
He almost choked on the walnut. "What the fuck? Why did I even ask."
"Why, indeed."
"It can't cost two hundred and ten thousand more for wine to not taste like ass."
"You just had your tongue in mine."
"Fuck yeah, I did. I'll do it again."
"And you don't think yourself confusing."
Aomine was about to retort, but Akashi's eyes were closed. It was too serene a sight to wrangle.
The aircon's breeze was gentle on the skin, the humidity of the afternoon ebbing, and through the soft, paper-like feel of the yukata, he's reunited with deeply ironic simplicity. The flow of the room mixed rosewater and santal and linen and honey-wine. It kept them both in a more languorous state of mind. Mellowed even the sharpness of their language.
Later, when they're both under the covers — although he's still annoyingly hard to read, even Aomine understood Akashi's placid turn of his head, and it's not that Aomine was completely averse to sharing a bed even if Akashi stole all the heat before he warmed, and wasn't dissimilar to a trigger-happy cobra — Aomine rolled to his side and unceremoniously hit his brow on the spine of a book. He reached for it while squinting, propping his face up with a fist. It was hard to make out anything in the dark, though.
"Don't damage it." Akashi said with his eyes closed, his voice a low vibration.
"What's it about anyway?"
Akashi opened his eyes. He looked at Aomine by his side, then raked his gaze upward, as if sifting through layers of millisecond calculations, before he rolled his neck, then shoulders, slow and limber. Aomine felt more than heard him settle into place, Akashi's shoulder pressing slightly into his chest, tufts of blaring red hair brushing under his chin. It was another movement of stillness before Akashi answered.
"A senile man with a foot fetish."
Aomine snorted. It had unnerved Akashi somehow, despite his placidity. Why or how was a mystery Aomine wouldn't partake in, but what he did understand was how difficult Tetsu got at times. He tossed the book in the general direction of the side table and found Akashi's arm. He traced the skin there absentmindedly.
"Pass. At least you got an improvement."
"I beg your pardon?"
"I'm still in my 20s. And I ain't got a foot fetish." Maybe.
Akashi stared.
"I mean, guess I like tits, but that's normal. No one calls a boob fetish a boob fetish."
The chuckle that left Akashi was a surprise. It was hardly one; a low and almost inaudible rumble of his chest that Aomine wouldn't have felt nor heard were he not pressed right up against the other, and it sent a warm shiver down his spine. It wasn't a bad sound. Still, Akashi continued like he hadn't said anything, "It's thematically suggested that bodily deterioration turned the old man delusional. Disgraceful. Like a blight to society. In his last moments, he believed this shift in priorities gave him purpose."
Aomine's brows furrowed. "Ok. So he gets a good ending, then?"
"It's surprising that this is what you take from it but how like you, I suppose."
"What's that supposed to mean? What do you take from it?"
"He's cognisant from beginning to end. His madness is derived from his ability to confront desire without constraints, of which he's exempt from because he doesn't have much time left. Thus, it becomes a discussion between clarity and delusion, powerlessness and invulnerability. He alters his reality, knowingly. Strategically." Akashi paused. "He's a truly pathetic man. In a way that is banal, not pathologic. I believe Tetsuya pities him."
"Shit, Akashi, does it matter? He's a sick old man, and if he's happy, he's happy. This is the stuff Tetsu's reading?"
"You're thinking about talking to him about this. I advise against it."
"I wasn't." His lip curled. "We have lives outside of each other, you know." Though speaking it aloud felt like saying nothing.
"I seem to remember someone saying he's holiday. Which 'life' are you taking a break from, specifically?"
"Whatever. It's just a dumb book anyway." Aomine muffled half a yawn against Akashi's hair. "It feels like I'm dreaming. Don't even need to move; the train's doing it for me."
Akashi chuckled again. "That would be the wine. Get some sleep."
It's not just the wine, he thought, then realised he hadn't spoken it aloud. Then figured he was too comfortable to open his mouth again. He hadn't known what Akashi was angling, nor did he care to interpret his silence in any way; that had never been his job. He kept Akashi by his lonesome, as Akashi did for him.
"Daiki,"
"What."
"I play the piano and violin. Mostly violin."
He laughed. "Seriously?"
"Since I was a child."
"Yeah, ok. Should've guessed that. Hey, they've probably got one at the restaurant."
"Yes. Most likely."
"You should play something."
"I will think about it."
He had tried being monogamous once. Or was it twice. Shit. In this case, it was his second month in Cleveland, and she had her eyes on him the moment he arrived, probably even before.
Being her boyfriend soft launched his introduction to the League, quadrupled his contacts and tempered the wild card image that was liable to brand him a misfit. As far as that went, he only saw positives. She was beautiful too, in the mousy kind of way. Sociable but the right amount of sheepish, a neat freak that didn't hold him to the same standard, and most importantly, just as eager to take her pants off. She also had a clear thing for "unknown culture fits", but he liked big boobs, so it worked out well enough for him.
It had been fun for the time. For a time only. The longer he stayed, the longer it killed, the easier it was to ignore her. Now it took him a bit just to remember her name. It took him a while to figure he was just never really meant to be tethered.
The week following the break up — he'd caught her in their bed with the team's new blood — Marquez got traded to the Wolves, Davis was benched indefinitely due to a torn ligament, and he turned up on Taiga's doorstep with a Henny and some Fireball, greeting his inquisitive frown with a smirk. He indulged every carnal, emotional molecule of himself that had been inhibited by three month old fidelity that night.
Taiga was the right type of sensitive idiot to not ask questions. Or questions that mattered, anyway. All he got was the odd Taiga-cocktail of innocence and ancient apathy he liked, and the head to head aggression he'd desperately needed.
"I get that Kise's in Venice, or whatever. I just don't get why you flew down here," Taiga, the ingrate, muttered while running a towel over his damp hair. "Why didn't you… I dunno, some of the guys on your team have that look. You know the one. Like, they make eyes at you— and each other, too. I just kinda assumed it's like back then? With everyone…" Kagami didn't specify who 'everyone' was. He didn't have to. "Don't give me that look, Francis is pretty cute if you like 'em like that."
"Ew. They're guys, moron."
"What the— so am I!"
Aomine sighed and inclined his head. "Is your team fucking around?"
"No! Well not really…"
"…Okay," he said slowly, arching a brow. "Look, I don't know what you want me to say. I miss your cock and balls, yours, and my heart is broken. Happy?"
"Yeah right. You would've broken things off ages ago if you weren't so damn lazy. Don't lie to me."
"Ok, I'm tired of English. And that accent. And talking in general. Also I'm not about to jump from one scandal to to the next, are you stupid?"
"You're such a dick, you know that? Why do I even let you in here?"
They're two large guys cramped up on Taiga's queen bed, all mussed sheets and drying sweat, one of Taiga's legs draped over Aomine's stomach. It got fucking cold in Illinois so it was the perfect time to enjoy Kagami being a natural furnace. He was ambushed by a kind of fleeting serendipity that allowed him his first full breath in months. It was the idea that time was hostile wherever drawn, and Kagami's bed was like it was on the court; a temporary pocket of timelessness.
Kagami, who wasn't one for silence, asked, "You good?"
"Yeah…" Aomine said, overwhelmed by the revelation. "You ever just think 'this is it'? Like, this, right now—"
"Oh. Uh, wow. Did all this shit with Gina actually get to you?"
"Fuck you."
"Wait, come back." Kagami grabbed his elbow and tugged him back down. "C'mon, I'm sorry. I'm, uh, I'm here. Tell me."
"Forget it, I'm tipsy. Don't know what I'm saying."
"Seriously, it's fine, just talk to me. What do you mean?"
And what did he mean? Why did his head, in this interim of a moment, fear a buzzer that didn't exist in Taiga's upscale apartment? That he was neck-deep in the dream he'd thought himself long disillusioned by caught in an orbit he couldn't see? The locker rooms were too loud. The rain outside fell too hard. He sat with a towel over his head at the end of a game in the corner letting all talk around him simmer to unintelligible white noise, else he clock the first busybody he saw in the jaw. You wanted this, Kise had blinked at him on his last night in Tokyo, a sneer disguised as wide-eyed prodding, didn't you?
Words had the habit of dissipating on the way from his head to his tongue, lately. The thought of trying to find a way to even begin explaining any of this to Taiga made him want to reach for the bottle again. If he tried now, he doubt Taiga would understand. Something like: the food sucks ass here or it's too fucking cold or I'm so incredibly bored.
"Forget it, I said. Too much stupid shit online."
"Huh… yeah, okay. Stop looking at that stuff, you know it gets you down."
Taiga stared back at him, a crease in his brow, gruff but genuine concern in his eyes. He gave an approximation of a smile which Aomine bored into. Taiga always fidgeted. Was always moving. Bobbing his leg, fiddling with something between his fingers. Right now it was his ring — the ring, which he weaved around them. He breathed the same pace as Aomine did, moved as he did. Never needed to slow down, kept his stride, rose to the challenge of meeting him where he was, and further, if he could help it. At the Winter Cup, in the League, with Tetsu, even. They're made of the same frequency, like brothers.
It was easy with him. It was just as easy to want him. Aomine valued his freedom and he was drifting, therefore so was Kagami, conjoined to him. But Taiga defied gravity, and Aomine—…
"Don't read into this too much," Aomine drawled, "but it's nice being here. I guess."
"Heh, yeah. I like you too, ass. Don't know why the hell I do." His eyebrows knitted. "I don't need to call Kuroko, do I? Or maybe Kise…?" At Aomine's unimpressed silence, Taiga softened a little, "Alright. But hey. Don't worry about things too much. Not sure if you've seen it already, but the press is ripping Terry a new one. I don't know what's going on, I feel a little bad for him, but… eh. Your name's basically nowhere to be seen. You got a guardian angel or something."
Aomine paused. He slowed just enough to hear the rustle of their bodies and Kagami's breathing. After a moment, he sat up slowly, and Taiga followed, confused.
"What?"
"Cook me karaage before you kick me out." Aomine said, knowing he won't be back for a while. "I miss it."
"Cook it yourself! Dick."
Twenty six hours into the train ride and the need for recovery was finally getting to him. The sprain had flared, somehow, and he felt a twinge of wrongness whenever he put weight on that leg. So he'd been sleeping, mostly, the rumble of the train tracks a soothing rhythm, and rocked his body with infinitesimal vibrations.
Akashi checked in on him now and then for the next two days, seemingly unfazed by his surliness.
Akashi wasn't a stranger to injury; even less of one when managing others'. It was one of the worst parts of Teiko; their bodies constantly stretching, contorting to contain things bigger than they were. They became strangers to themselves. None of them took to recovery well enough, none of them stayed put like they were supposed to. Even now in the big leagues, Akashi tucking a heat pack behind his knee while he laid on the bed, he burned with the vitality of his recalcitrant former self.
Akashi admonished him, predictably. But Akashi did back then, too.
"How quaint that you are so bad at staying still. You were the king of lethargy and stagnation at some point."
"Fuck off. Your humour's still shit."
Akashi's gaze fixated on him immediately. He could've sworn his pupils dilated weirdly, kind of like a snake zeroing in on a rat, and Aomine held his breath, his heart racing against his will. Aomine didn't care to look repentant, however, and Akashi pulled back to refill his glass of water with poised, disquieting amusement.
"Two more days." Akashi instructed. "Your body will settle."
Aomine would've left him there in the room if he didn't have to limp to do it. As it were, he clicked his tongue and rolled his head away from Akashi.
"I am aware you're miserable. Every athlete of a certain calibre will come to this at a certain point. However, spare me the melodrama; you're behaving like you're already broken and I will not allow it."
"Won't 'allow it'?" He let out a scoff. "Like I give a fuck what you allow. I'm not behaving like anything, I'm pissed because I'm stuck sitting on my ass. Quit acting like you know what's going on in my head. You don't know shit."
A small smile touched Akashi's lips but it's the coldest thing he's seen all night. "I see. So that is how it is?"
Irritation sparked hot in his chest, heat rising up his neck. "Just drop it. It's a grade one, like I said. Not moving is getting on my nerves. That's all."
"No. I have heard enough." Akashi said, and Aomine ground his teeth. "You came to me and not the others for a reason, so look at me. Look only at me."
Aomine did, faltering under the surface of his sneer.
It's not like he hadn't thought about calling up Satsuki or Tetsu or Taiga. Or Kise. Really, the resentment of choosing Akashi was only just pouring in now. If it was the nagging that bothered him, Satsuki was easier to drown out. If it was criticism, Tetsu lacked the hard edge. Akashi didn't do platitudes like Taiga, or cushioned his thorns like Kise, in fact, his grandeur and entitlement were second to none, and slotted in perfectly with his own.
"Your recovery is a nuisance but that is not why you're flustered. You are overly emotional due to the instability of your team and that makes you susceptible to such stupid, useless things — things like wishing your injury was career-ending," Akashi was close enough now to bite it out near his ear. Aomine was stunned into silence. "…but that is enough. I will not grant you the luxury of being a coward. Not you. You will recover, and you will play."
His eyes darted away from Akashi. He's on the precipice of growling back, shifting his weight enough that it shot a sharp throb up his hamstring, but the audacious, penetrating nature of Akashi's words immobilised him.
Akashi continued, calmer but no less fierce. "I've let this error go on for long enough; you seem to believe you are playing only for yourself. You are not. In fact, you cannot be more wrong. You are playing for me. Do you understand?"
"Yeah," Aomine, when he could find his words, sliced through the gravel, "yeah, I got it. You're pissy because one of your precious tools is busted. Is that right? Really takes me back."
Akashi's next words chilled him down to the bone: "Is that truly what you believe?"
He shouldn't have said it.
In his mind, the train itself had completely halted. Akashi looked profoundly bored, and that was worse. For a moment he's possessed by the wiles of his younger self blaming Akashi for everything larger and more whole than he could ever realistically be, and for a moment it eclipsed everything else, the history, the pain, the emotions, that he thought next of putting his adult-sized fist through a wall, followed by the growing need to ask Akashi: how do you do it? He was still breathing in the cold residue of his own fumes when Akashi turned and left the suite, the door closing with a soft click behind him.
He collapsed back against the headboard with a frustrated scoff. The urge to demand Akashi come back fought with the one to dismiss him completely, and both dissipated faster than the door closing. He threw his uninjured leg out slightly and slumped further into the pillows, jaw tight. His hamstring pulsed again with the shift, a piercing-sharp type of pain, but he soothed the urgency with a harsh, self-deprecating chuckle.
He couldn't even chase after him. Not that Akashi would've let that happen. It dawned on him only now that he didn't even have to move.
Aomine fell asleep to the fiery afternoon sun and woke up at the tail-end of it; orange bleeding to blue. The sun was now blazing behind the lines of trees on the horizon. There was the sound of running water in the bathroom.
His eyes tracked up to the ceiling. It was dim, meaning Akashi had actually been generous enough to switch the lights off at some point. The heavy curtains of the rear window were drawn, though spared a sharp line of light that striped through floorboards and caught him in the eye. He twisted away from it with a groan and stretched until his spine cracked.
Akashi stepped out of the bathroom then. Aomine locked eyes with him, tongue against his front teeth. He waited for the continuation of his disdain, for Akashi to strike first. He'd take anything over the silence that ordered him to speak first, because he wouldn't, and would let his foul mood fester for it. When Satsuki got mad these days, she gave the silent treatment immediately. It was the bitter departure of the girl who had exhausted years chasing after him.
"Go shower," was the only thing Akashi said.
Whatever.
Akashi was frustratingly elusive at times. Not like Tetsu, who disappeared out of overwhelm and retroactive discipline, or Kise, who demanded a chase. Both of which also dragged him down, kicking and screaming. It was different with Akashi. Being in his inner circle meant he granted space for those to crumble under the weight of their own emotions but pulled back just enough to deny. Though others may disagree, and have seen it as such, it's not a case of passive aggression. Akashi wasn't truly vindictive. He was too absolute for that.
Akashi moved to the beat of his own rhythm. Sometimes it was infuriating, sometimes it grated on him too, sometimes it was the overture to the nonreciprocal feuds that froze the group chat for months on end, but Aomine liked it like that. It meant that in his own fucked up kind of way, Akashi understood that the fallout was only fundamental. It meant that he understood Aomine's hostility was his brand of respect. It meant that he was filed under the same necessary evil.
He drew the water enough to feel like it was scalding.
He's more than a little surprised when he hobbled out half-naked and Akashi was on his bed. He was decked out in a full-white yukata, the shade he was most recognisable in, and was reading under the low light. Aomine sauntered forward and slumped on the edge of his bed, noting the two glasses of water that Akashi had set on the table between them. He looked intensely unbothered by their last conversation, rather looked like he hadn't the capacity to care.
Akashi spoke, "I informed the staff neither of us will attend dinner. They'll bring it in later."
"…Yeah. Okay."
At the sound of his voice, Akashi delicately closed his book and arched an eyebrow at him. He took the full force of it because holding Akashi's unadulterated attention had always felt like a match; he's never known to raise or lower his eyes past Akashi's. Like Akashi, he wasn't in the habit of submitting. Perhaps like Akashi, he struggled to know how.
"Is there something you'd like to say?" Akashi asked. No special tone to it whatsoever. Pressing down on the bruise.
He looked back at Akashi sidelong and felt the pull of his face slacken just a little. Stripped from its frown, the deep-set exhaustion must have bared. Not that Akashi ever needed any pointers.
He let out a rough sigh, dragging a palm over his nape. "Look, you know I didn't mean that. Earlier."
"Daiki." Akashi said with such finality that Aomine froze. "Your guilt is useless to me. As is your perception of the past. Was that all?"
"Christ. It's not my perception and you know it. It slipped out because I'm a shithead, got it? It didn't mean anything."
Akashi raised a hand and Aomine fell quiet, frowning deeply. "You are wasting both my time and yours. You are neither a sentimental fool nor one to care about cosmetic apologies, so let me be clear: I do not need you to understand me. That would require a level of intellectual honesty outside of your capacity. Now. Since you take me for a pure pragmatist, I'll speak in a way you understand."
"I'm telling you," he growled, "I don't—" his words rushed into air as he landed flat on the bed, Akashi's palm on his chest. His immediate instinct was to rise but the press of Akashi's hand turned brutal. He narrowed his eyes, "Hey,"
"Don't move."
He opened his mouth to argue but Akashi's hand was already there, palm against his mouth, fingers digging into the hinge of his jaw, marking crescents into his skin. His grip immediately found Akashi's wrist, squeezing tight, but the ember of his ire died under Akashi's hand. Always cold. Always victorious. They stayed like this until the hostility that hardened Aomine's eyes reduced to curiosity, his grip growing loose. Once he confirmed Aomine wasn't going to rebel, Akashi slid his hand from his mouth to cover his eyes.
Aomine sighed shakily, and it was like diffusing a flare. There were faint slivers of light through the cracks of Akashi's fingers before his lids slipped shut. Then: completely black. Like this, even though his breathing almost drowned out the sound of it, there's the distinct rustle of fabric and the faint sound of a breath. His suspicions were confirmed when there was a dip on the bed, the side of Akashi's knee pressing against his hip. It sent fire straight through his system.
"Let me see," he hissed.
"No." Akashi said, slow and dangerously quiet, "Feel." To resist was only natural, but Akashi continued in the same brutal tone: "Do not risk your leg."
The intensity stunned him. Akashi positioned himself over Aomine's hips and with his vision obscured, he felt highly sensitised to the smoothness of Akashi's thigh pressing against his own, his weight pinning his body to the mattress. Solid. Firm. Akashi's always been on the slighter side, especially on the basketball court, but he was immovable when he wanted to be. Perhaps he'd stay firm there until Aomine imploded in on himself, stationed under his weight. Perhaps he was familiarising himself with the seconds between each of Aomine's breaths as he was to his. Perhaps his yukata flared open in this moment, while Aomine kept his eyes closed, naked body exposed and flawless in the only way Akashi knew how to be.
"Hey!" Aomine jolted as his sweatpants were jerked down mid-thigh, and then Akashi was straddling him again. He let out a strained hiss of a laugh, as Akashi's hand pushed up against his abs, almost experimentally, then slid down with the same firm pressure to his pelvis where fingers wrapped around Aomine's cock. Akashi's unyielding weight stopped him from bucking his hips up into that grasp.
"Not sure I wanna do this when you're angry." He taunted, even though he was already breathless with excitement.
The touch stopped. The light flooded in.
"Yes," Akashi said sharply, fingernails digging harshly into the underside of Aomine's chin, "you do." The way Akashi was looking at him — looking down at him, head tilted slightly, brows cocked in a frown dripping chilling, pitying venom — made him freeze. With the gentle upward pressure of Akashi's index finger, he tilted Aomine's head back until the ball of his throat pulled uncomfortably.
"It's too bad, Daiki," Akashi continued, quieter now. "I won't give it to you."
"Fuck— fine. Fine, whatever," Aomine hissed, but it was weak with the heat of it all. His hips twitched under Akashi, "I'll do whatever you want. Just get over here."
"Such a selfish creature." Akashi drew up on his knees and reached a hand behind himself, and Aomine shuddered with want, swore he felt his own pupils dilate. Akashi's pure white yukata was loose but artful, framing his naked collarbones and the line of his legs, then pooled ornately on the dark mattress. He was striking. His hair like burning red yolk, so bold yet refined against stark white, and he's thrust with the entirety of him: the regality, the greed, the expectations. He's assuaged by it. By the smell of the past.
Akashi didn't pant even as his shoulder rolled minutely in what Aomine could only assume was him pumping fingers into himself, annoyingly zen. They locked eyes, and Aomine groaned.
"Do you know how much you fascinate me?" Akashi was barely afflicted and Aomine's fingers dug into the bed sheet to refrain from prying him open. "You're turbulent. Proud, and irregular, yet unexpectedly pure. You need freedom like you need air, you run, you chase for the next best thing to feel alive — but you fear free-falling as much as you crave it. So you cannot let go."
"Got me all figured out, don't you," Aomine drawled, though it came out rougher than intended.
Akashi held his gaze. "Put your fingers in me. Slow."
Aomine reached between Akashi's thighs before he could take his words back, finding him perfectly wet and hot. He hissed; Akashi slicked him up in turn, his hardness pulsating in Akashi's deft hands. He slipped another finger inside Akashi, watching the slow heave of his chest and the way his expression barely flickered, his eyes never leaving their scrutiny of Aomine.
"You've been straying too far," Akashi's lids lowered slightly, the glint of his eyes filtered through eyelashes, "It's almost infuriating watching you wilfully lose yourself... again, sabotaging your potential. Outsourcing your emotions to people who do not understand their worth." The tip of his thumb drew over Aomine's swollen cockhead. "Tetsuya and Ryouta are your anchors. Satsuki is your shelter; Taiga, your catharsis and rival. Why not use them? Why avoid them?"
"Say what you want," Aomine sneered. He added a third finger faster than what was proper, he couldn't help it when Akashi was pulsating around him, "or keep beating around the bush. I don't care."
Akashi let out a rush of breath, Aomine locating him expertly, raking fingers over his prostate and spreading his fingers. He let go of Aomine's cock to place a steady palm on his shoulder. "Turbulent," Akashi reminded, voice even. "Old habits. You're scared of hurting them. Which you believe to be virtuous, and perhaps it is. Except it's a lie you tell yourself because you need a proxy to shield you from the fact that you have, and will always be, scared of yourself. And they haven't been for a while." Aomine's darted upwards in sharp accusation, before focusing back between Akashi's legs. "I don't blame you; it's the nature of all monsters. To be greater than others."
Aomine curled his fingers up spitefully and pulsed them up against the swell of Akashi's nerves. He pushed his thumb up behind his balls too, rubbing against the soft heat and pressed him from both sides. Akashi's thighs clamped hard over his hips. The pressure made him smirk. "Thought you and Tetsu weren't speaking."
"We're speaking." Akashi panted, his chin lifting slightly. "Evidently, he doesn't agree with my interference, but it's no matter. He will see, eventually." He allowed himself to rock back on Aomine's fingers, head tilting back as his breath stuttered. "He and I, ah— seem to value the same thing, after all. Even if we don't see eye to eye. Mm…"
"What did you even… never mind, I don't wanna know." He wouldn't get an answer anyway. "If all the shit you're saying is true, then what are you?"
Akashi's thumb hooked into the hollow of his collarbone, nails biting into skin and Aomine grunted. Akashi had shifted in the face again somehow, his smile becoming mocking, and Aomine knew he had said the wrong thing even before Akashi ripped Aomine's hand away from his ass and pinned his wrist to the bed, knuckles smearing lube on the sheets. Akashi's grip dealt him a glimpse into a future nursing two injuries instead of the one, so he kept his hand there long after Akashi released it.
Akashi parted his yukata, revealing strong thighs and everything in between, grasped Aomine's aching cock and positioned himself.
"Damn," Aomine breathed, tensing and relaxing all at once. No condom. That's how sure Akashi was.
"Don't," Akashi ordered, fierce and debilitating, "Move."
Akashi sank down on him and Aomine hissed, "Fuck!" he's like a vice, like his body would take to no amount of stretching or perhaps Akashi calculated it like this, perhaps he wanted it to feel like a rebranding. He's slow with it, Akashi's lids lowering as his body fought the intrusion, dropping his hips then rocking up slightly, again and again until he's seated flat on Aomine's pelvis and Aomine's head was thrown back, teeth clenched, shaking with the order to stay down.
He wanted grab Akashi by the throat, or the shoulders, or the waist. Hook his fingers into the meat of his hips, the divot of his bones, drive up into him with so much force his mismatched eyes cross. But it didn't work like that. Akashi didn't work like that. And no one was like Akashi. He thought deliriously, eyes dark and lips parted to catch his breath, hair already damp with sweat on his forehead.
Akashi smiled thinly at him like he knew.
He gathered himself up on his knees, his muscles tightly hugging the crown of Aomine's dick, and then he was tilting backwards artfully, languidly impaling himself at an angle that had him sighing, so pleased, so sated, as though locking Aomine into his rightful place. In this way, he lost nothing. Aomine ground his molars, rerouting his hands to fist the pillow under his head rhythmically, if only to keep his hands off Akashi. If only to keep Akashi around him.
"Fuck, Akashi," Aomine gasped pitifully, rolling his head back as Akashi rocked against him, "Ah… this is fuckin' impossible, goddamn, you're so fuckin' tight,"
Instead of answering, Akashi moved, still tilted back, driving Aomine further and further into the mattress with a quiet sort of ferocity that had Aomine babbling out more curses. He was taking for himself first, massaging himself with Aomine's length in rough but slow, shallow grinds. Every now and then he would seat himself right to the base and clamp hard around Aomine, making him gasp and jerk with failing restraint. It was clear that Akashi didn't care for his suffering. Ignored the bone-deep torment of keeping his hips still and his strained leg flat, ignored how he shook with the overwhelming need to plant his feet and chase the heat. His chest heaved, every muscle tensed with violent, erratic energy barely caged.
Akashi moved like a king atop him, arching with a gracefulness that was more dignified than the seduction it conspired to be. It's unfair in the intrinsic way; even impaled by a size that others treated with caution, Akashi toyed with him. His lids creased intermittently on every plunder forward, and emitted a soft, pleased breath of air every glide back. Akashi's cock stood proud, bobbing against the plane of his stomach with every shift.
"At least let me touch you," Aomine's voice was hoarse. A dark, desperate laugh bubbled up through his panting, staring at Akashi's perfect cock, "Come the fuck on, Akashi, let me touch you. Please."
"So you do have manners," Akashi murmured at a delay, or perhaps it was the heat of him that encased Aomine in a mind-numbing haze.
"Akashi," Aomine said, hoarse, and Akashi smiled.
Akashi leaned back, resting his palms over Aomine's thighs to reorient his balance as he took his length in, again and again. The friction was almost too much but Akashi made his body solid and unrelenting, his hands over Aomine's legs a direct reminder of his order. He made another sound of impatience, though it came out weak and guttural, because Akashi picked up the pace before he finished, and it became reverent. The subsequent forfeit of his own body was dizzying, like he was being pushed to madness, nothing like the fucking he'd known for the past two and a half years.
"Touch yourself," Akashi offered.
Aomine was ready to bite back but in Akashi's eyes he saw his hunger reflected in spades, and it wasn't the taunt it would've been. That gaze urged a hand free and over his own body. Akashi was too tantalising to look away from so he kept his eyes on him even as he tilted his head back and his breath hitched, smoothing a hand over his neck, down his chest. Something gave way in Akashi's eyes, because he couldn't see his reflection in them anymore.
"Play with them." Akashi commanded. Aomine let out a huff that was too breathless to be a laugh, not one to shy from a show. He flicked a finger over his own nipple just as Akashi clenched around him and he gasped. Akashi's setup left him highly sensitive indeed, and he shivered, reduced to a single connected nerve at his whim. Still, he didn't stop, tracing over the sensitive, dark bud and pulling as Akashi's hips ground him into the mattress.
"How does it feel?" Akashi asked, and the low timbre of his voice had heat pulled heat from Aomine's throat down to his abdomen. He rolled his hips, but Akashi kept him still, panting lowly.
"Fuck," He's usually more eloquent during sex. Usually, he'd be teasing, bantering with his partner, letting filth run his mouth unfiltered, but even that, Akashi humbled. "Good. good— you know it's good. Would feel better if you let me move."
"However, you look more beautiful like this. Beneath me, just taking whatever I give you. You must know it," Akashi said, his words curling like molten honey, "do you know?"
Aomine's brows knitted, eyes fluttering shut and his lips parted on a gasp as Akashi rocked forward and squeezed around him. Akashi's hand found its way to his neglected nipple and before Aomine could even brace himself, Akashi tugged and twisted, making him yell.
"Yes," Akashi hissed softly, eyes flashing in obvious delight, "I think you do."
Aomine's hands retreated to squeezing the pillow again, and Akashi placed his own over Aomine's pecs, leaning in. Akashi's spine curved to accommodate this, and at this angle, Akashi's body hugged him tighter, the next slide impossibly deep.
His eyes squeezed shut and he felt his throat tighten, first from the well of emotion, and then the realisation that Akashi's hands were there, and have been from the start. His skin reacted strangely beneath the sudden weight of his palms, like his body knew what he'd been waiting for before he did. A burst of heat so concentrated he felt his pulse quicken as though to rupture, giving way to the rhythm of Akashi's imposition. The restriction rattled through the marrow of his chest. Saliva pooled in his mouth. His vision was a dark vignette curling at the edges of his eyes, compressing all his thoughts to a single stream: yes, yes, yes, like that, please.
"What was that?" Akashi asked, teasing, almost drowned out by the sound of his own bloodstream. The wet sounds of skin on skin faded in and out.
The world blurred into the room blurred into static blurred into nothing but himself, the adrenaline to keep his lungs functioning and everything that was Akashi, because his hands made it so, his blaring warmth constricting around Aomine's cock made it so. He gasped and kept gasping, his pulse fighting against Akashi's fingers.
When he's granted his first full breath, he sucked in greedily before he's squeezed around the neck and it suppresses the hysterical laugh that wanted to bubble out of him. Every time Akashi allowed him air, it felt like he was on the brink being denied last minute and he groaned, almost whimpering, as he fought to rein it in again — because what was the point of coming, if it wasn't during the oblivion Akashi was granting him — he secured a grip around Akashi's wrist, keeping him there.
"Okay," Akashi said, "touch me."
Aomine reached like a lifeline, his free hand cupping the underside of Akashi's ass. Akashi pressed into his hold, not losing rhythm but allowing Aomine with his weight. He braced all of the muscles in his arm and lifted Akashi, almost pulling him up and off entirely, not anticipating Akashi's slightness. Akashi seemed to like that. Even more when he dug his fingers into the meat of Akashi's round ass and slammed him down, Akashi throwing his head back with a groan of approval. Instead of loosening his grip on Aomine's neck, he squeezed harder, nails biting into his jugulars, allowing Aomine to guide the movement of their bodies, but up here was his domain.
Aomine faltered, slightly, feeling the telltale spasm of muscles around his throat until Akashi released him.
"Are you going to come?"
Aomine trembled, managing a small nod, eyes squeezed shut.
"Don't come until I do," Akashi rasped, "Not until I do, Daiki," His eyes were so intent, so focused on Aomine's that he looked wild, a god caged in flesh. One with his legs spead wide around Aomine's hips, and Aomine couldn't do anything but obey with a choked cry, every muscle of his lower body locking as he staved it off.
He gripped Akashi's waist with both hands now, fingers digging into the soft flesh so hard, driving into him with the same intensity, that he imagined the pliancy of Akashi's organs making room for his violence. It was like a baton pass, a reciprocation of Akashi's cruelty, because his hands were damp, clutching him frantically, but tender now, one over the left side of Aomine's chest, the other cupping his face. He wanted to tear his gaze away, but was caught by Akashi's grip to his jaw.
"I can't, I can't fucking—" Aomine choked out, "Shit, shit, I can't,"
"Look at me." Akashi whispered shakily. Aomine made the mistake of obeying. Once Akashi got like this, it was impossible to look away. It felt like his eyes were melting in its sockets, his soul bared and dissected, like Akashi was carving out his place in the world for him inside of him. Don't stop looking at me, was what Akashi's eyes were saying, oxygen pressurising his chest down to his navel, making him giddy and lightheaded and nauseous all the same. Never stop. Akashi jerked against him, breaking his own rhythm as his pants came louder and faster.
It was almost too much. It was almost unbearable.
Akashi made a noise, a mixture of a grunt and a cry, before he was squeezing Aomine's flanks hard with his knees and tightening around his cock to the point of pain before his body shook, and he arched as he came. His cum dribbled down Aomine's abdomen as Akashi gasped, clenching rhythmically with the aftershocks.
That was the last of Aomine's restraint; he propped his good leg up, forced Akashi closer and down, and hollowed him out. Akashi kept his eyes on him throughout the whole thing, even through the irresistible urge of his lids dipping as Aomine drove his hips up, humping his release into him with a stream of curses under his breath.
He collapsed back on the sheets, heaving. Akashi's hands were soothing, petting him over his chest and where his neck felt bruised, before more of the man's weight draped carefully over his torso. Akashi gave a soft, small moan before he shifted and Aomine slid out of him, wet and sated.
Aomine raked his eyes upwards, focusing on a spot on the ceiling, feeling on all accounts like he was descending to earth again. Slow. Soft. Akashi's hand on his face coaxed his attention again, and he focused on Akashi's eyes and bite-swollen lips, and wanted to laugh. He fought the viscous twist of his lips, because kissing Akashi only now after everything almost felt like levity, like sullying something divine.
Aomine kissed him back. Hard. His hand pressed down on the small of Akashi's back, anchoring him.
"You're too much," Aomine complained later when they're both spent and basking on the sheets. His voice was still hoarse, his neck still sore. But he felt holy. "Goddamn."
"Not for you." Akashi answered.
"Why is Tetsu pissed at you?" He asked. It was another moment of silence, a glimpse of something small and breakable in the only moment where it was allowed. The train entered another tunnel, a clear trick of the mind, but Akashi's eyes were glowing through the rapid patterns of shadows. It felt like another layer of intimacy, the light dividing skin into fragmentation.
"You already know why." Akashi said. "Taiga is closer to you this way."
"So?" Aomine asked. but as soon as it left his mouth, knew that it was a pointless question. "So he doesn't like you playing god. I get that." And because the afterglow made everything funny, he mentioned: "I'm not religious." Right now, the irony was twofold, his hand sliding down Akashi's waist to his hip. "But it's what you do."
"For whom is a question that Tetsuya is more concerned with. You would be, too, in your natural state."
Akashi was arrogant. Akashi was imperious. Akashi was also more sentimental than all of them put together. He asked, "Does it matter?"
Akashi drew him into another kiss, balefully tender.
When he's no longer limping, he joined Akashi for dinner again at the restaurant car. The piano soloist was already performing, and the food was prepared by a different chef, though lavish all the same. They're silent more often than not, but only because speaking would ruin this harmonious kind of equilibrium they've cultivated in their time here. Eventually, they finished the last course; a dessert finale aptly named 'New Year Resurrection' in the middle of July, consisting of three bite-sized cakes and bitter tea.
"You know this song?" Aomine asked.
Akashi smiled at him around the teacup between his lips. "Not this one."
"So are you gonna play something or?"
Akashi gave him the look that eclipsed his surroundings.
Later, after the staff had generously provided a violin and encouraged Akashi to play at the head of the restaurant, Aomine ambled out their private booth. He leaned against the back wall, the furthest away from the stage, but he could see the imposing length of the bow, the colour of Akashi's lashes, and the flexor of his forearm tighten. The first note rang out, low and melancholic. Followed by the next, and then the next, hauntingly beautiful.
He crossed his arms as the chatter faded; some of the guests entranced, others fading just by virtue of being near the action. There was an intentional pause, like the voice of the violin taking a deep breath, and then its back to singing; a crescendo that almost unnoticeable until it was the loudest sound in the room. Akashi played like he played basketball, like he fucked, like — he assumed — he played shogi. Drawing him out, reeling him in, a play-by-play of his ultimate design.
It was only this morning that he held Akashi in his arms. "Williams resigned today." Akashi spoke. He felt his breath on his neck. "I thought you might like to know." Aomine tensed, but Akashi's solid arms around him meant he had predicted it. The name curdled. Akashi beat him to the punch. "You don't want to talk about him. I know. Don't talk, then. In Ohio, he was your closest confidant. I can understand that. However, you've made the mistake of conflating him with Tetsuya. You assigned him an importance he never earned. The reality is, he was never meant to be your tether." In that moment, the grind of Aomine's teeth felt audible. "Your potential is unbridled. Where he flounders, you have already surpassed. You know that feeling well, don't you? You just never expected to encounter it in the NBA."
"Did you?" He shot back, lip curled.
Akashi shook his head, though it wasn't an answer. "He was a learning experience for you," he said, a fraction softer. "An indicator, rather."
"Of what."
"A reminder. One you need more often than anticipated. You fill your head with too many thoughts and most of them are not good." Akashi smiled at him then, sharp and enticing. The overture to his violin, which sliced through all thought and all noise. "Arrogant bastard," Aomine muttered now. Akashi's eyes met his across the room, cheek on the violin.
As if to bite back but was probably, in Akashi's eyes, reminiscent of a child's tantrum, he had slid a sweaty palm down Akashi's body—fitted his hand between Akashi's legs in the middle of his words. He probed and felt the evidence of last night, wet looseness at the tip of his fingers, and it excited him enough to hike Akashi's leg over his hip and continue to prod him. He pressed his mouth against Akashi's jaw, pinching the skin there between his teeth.
"Ah," Akashi said with a smirk, "so you remember, now."
He had Akashi on his back first. Akashi had met his movements reflecting his own responsiveness, the same viscous kind of hunger that made Aomine's head spin. Plunging into him over, and over again, Akashi's arms slung around his shoulders. Akashi scratching holes into his back. He had no qualms letting himself be heard then, when he was so quiet the last time, and he howled with abandon as Aomine pinned his knees to the bed and took him like that.
Perhaps the others in their carriage heard, perhaps the staff did. They didn't care. There was one more ringing note of the violin, so loud it was almost screeching, then lower and softer, and Aomine felt it in his sternum. All-encapsulating, like being snapped back into axis. He was already half-hard by the time the song came to a finish.
He waited for the applause to die down, waited for Akashi who stayed behind to chat with the musicians and staff, waited for Akashi to nod at him before they left the restaurant together. They were hardly ten steps out before Aomine grabbed his wrist and cornered him against the wall. Akashi didn't tilt his head up; his irises rolled up under his lashes to return his leer.
"Are you bored, Daiki?"
Aomine looked at him.
He pinned Akashi's wrist on the wall above his head and leaned in. "I need you," he said against Akashi's lips, teeth bared, the tip of his nose pressing against Akashi's cheek. It's almost like it's been stripped out of him. A truth behind his ribs vivisected and bared and he's left scrabbling. This is it, his mind needlessly supplied, and: it's that easy?
There was a faint sound of a click. They had a fraction of a second wherein Akashi shoved him, hand to chest, and Aomine's back thumped the wall on the opposite side. The door of the dining creaked open and a small group of guests flooded the opening. Aomine put his hands in his pockets, watched Akashi with a lazy gaze as the crowd travelled between them with excuse me's, Akashi leaning back with crossed arms and a humouring smile.
Akashi caught his eye and said, in English, "I think I'll cash in on that blowjob."
Aomine's jaw dropped, his eyes darting towards the the backs of the passengers walking past them. Regrettably, not a single one of them so much as tensed, and his gaze slid back to Akashi with a look of disbelief.
"...Yeah, okay," he said with a growing smirk, and the overarching reminder that he didn't really care for the theatrics. "Let's get off this damn train already."
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*Akashi's favourite movie is The Godfather. Aomine's is Godzilla. [x]
