not taking requests

Satoru was your longtime friend. One of those ones you met in high school and brought into adulthood, in spite of all odds. You were a shy, keep-to-yourself kind of girl. You wanted to be alone, to get through the rest of high school without incident. He hadn’t cared. He latched himself on and never let go, and you were thankful every day.

Some more rifling through a box rang out in your relatively quiet bedroom.

“Okay, what about this one?” he asked.

You turned your head and hummed. “That’s just a rope, Satoru.”

He hooked a thumb under his blindfold to reveal a dazzling eye. It sparkled with mischief. “You’re the world’s most creative sex toy creator. I find it hard to believe this is ‘just a rope.’”

That was factually inaccurate — you were not the most creative anything. You were merely a mildly successful sex toy designer at a popular, well-established company. But Satoru never listened when you tried to correct him on that matter.

Returning to your sketches, you replied, “It’s made from a synthetic material that’s meant to adjust to the skin’s temperature. It warms up and is supposed to feel close to burning, without, y’know, burning. The legal team vetoed it, though. They said it was too dangerous and could catch on fire. Liabilities and all that. I don’t know. I wasn’t really listening.”

“Boooo,” Satoru said, sitting down on your bed behind you. “Suits always ruin the fun.”

You snorted in agreement.

A moment of silence passed, and you thought perhaps he had gotten bored, that he had gone on his phone and was sending memes to his poor students, who were off doing his missions for him. He soon opened his mouth again, however, and said something that had your hand, which was clasping your pencil, stilling:

“Wanna try it out?”

“…what?”

Satoru nudged your chair around with one of his long legs. You spun to face him. Blindfoldless suddenly, he had his legs spread and the long, blue rope dangling between his pale hands. “Let’s try it out. I always get sad when I look at your failed inventions. There’s usually never anything wrong with them, just legal stuff that gets in the way of fun and creativity. I feel for you, little inventor.”

Bullshit, you wanted to say. Instead, you fixed him a look and said, “No, Satoru. We can’t do this again. We promised.”

He groaned with an eye roll. “Oh, come on. Don’t be so serious. I’m curious, and you always get inspired after we try things out. It’s a mutually beneficial situation.”

“Don’t act like you’re doing this for me. You just want to get off, don’t try to manipulate me. I’m not in the mood to be tied up by a reminder of my failures, thanks.”

That should have been the end of that, you thought as you stood to take the rope away.

He snatched it from your hand before you could take it. You frowned. Satoru grinned. “Who said you were the one getting tied up?”

You blinked.

Satoru wanted to be tied up?

The thought of the blue rope digging into his fair, flawless skin, with redness blooming where the rope touched, had your knees weak. Would it be so bad to see him all tied up and at your mercy, you wondered. Were you even into that? Was he?

Cautiously, you reminded him, “You could break out of the restraints at any time you wanted, though.”

One of his hands crept around your thigh, tugging you forward and encouraging you to step between his legs. His hand was warm. He peered up at you with a smile. “I won’t. Not unless you tell me to.”

“...you’ll listen to me?”

“Yep,” he says, pressing a hand to his heart. “Scout’s honour.”

A shaky exhale leaves you.

Just like that, he knew he had you.

“Fine.”

And that’s how you end up straddling his hips with him leaning back against your headboard, arms tied behind his back, and blue rope running across his bare torso. He’s just in his boxers — you didn’t want to cross the line…again. Or rather, you didn’t want to cross the line too far. 

The rope frames him, tracing the natural planes of his body: the broadness of his shoulders, the unsubtle definition of his chest, the slutty dip at his waist. His skin appears almost luminous against the deep colour. Where the rope pressed in, it leaves a gorgeous flush, a blooming warmth that made the contrast all the more striking — dark blue against divinely-carved marble. 

His head rests back, just slightly tilted, exposing the long line of his throat. There’s no blindfold now. His eyes watched you from beneath half-lowered lashes, amusement curling lazily at the edges.

Waiting.

Satoru has never looked more delicate and powerful at the same time.

“You’re totally thinking I’m the most beautiful person you’ve ever seen, right?” he asks though it doesn’t sound like a question at all. His brows dance. 

Naturally, you want to scoff and say something humbling, but truthfully, he’s not too far off.

Still, you don’t want to contribute to his huge ego, so you casually say, “Eh, you’re alright.”

You’ve tried out the rope on mannequins before so you’re somewhat experienced in the knots and rules, like making sure you leave it loose enough for two fingers to slip under and not knotting it so complicatedly that you can’t easily unravel it in case of emergencies. 

But it’s different when you do it on an actual person. His skin is soft and plush, unlike hard plastic. It’s warm and smooth, and reacts at your touch. Veins pop. Muscles flex. Breaths come out low and sudden. 

For the most part, Satoru was quiet. So were you. He allowed you to bend his arms however you pleased. It was a balanced exchange with how much he was staring at you. It made you self-conscious. Perhaps you should have worn something cuter when he came, you thought. Maybe brushed your hair and tidied up. In your defence, however, how were you supposed to know a simple visit to catch up after a long day of working was going to turn into lines blurring?

“Would it kill you to give me a compliment or two?” he grumbles petulantly. 

Swallowing a tense ball, you run your fingers down his chest, bumping up and down the thick rope. He shudders. “You look good, Toru. Blue’s totally your colour.”

One corner of his lips curls up. “Well, duh.”

“Is it too tight?” you ask, brows furrowed. You aren’t in this position very often at all, and you want to be sure you’re not breaking humanity’s only hope against curses. “Does it hurt?”

Satoru tries to stretch his limbs out, to no avail. He shrugs as best he can. “Been in tighter situations.”

“And do you like it?”

“Eh, it’s fine,” he replies.

A glance down at his crotch reveals a hardness too familiar and at the same time too foreign. And is that a wet spot?

“Seems like you like it too much,” you say absentmindedly. “Is being tied up actually turning you on?”

When he finally processes the weight of your gaze settling on his hard cock, his hips jolt up ever so slightly. The rope creaks with the flexing of his thick biceps. A challenge glints in his eyes. “You’re leaving a snail trail on my thigh with all the humping you’re doing,” he points out blankly. “If we wanna address my boner, we’ll have to address your clit pulsing in morse code, ‘suck me, Toru! suck me ngh!””

Cheeks flushed, you smack his chest. “Ugh, shut up.”

You were humping his thigh without realising it. Now that he’s made you aware, you can’t stop noticing how your wetness has soaked through your panties and shorts. Every shift and shuffle has the faintest squeelchhh reaching your ears. He must hear it too because he can’t stop smiling.

Fuck, you’re too worked up at the sight of his pretty skin contrasting with the rough rope. 

Breathlessly, you ask, “How does it feel, Toru?”

Long lashes flutter as he reflects for a second. “It’s good… The rope’s definitely warmer than I expected. I didn’t think I was into temperature play, but it’s better than I thought it would be. You did good, babe.”

“Yeah?”

Without really thinking about it, you shuffle forward. His face is buried in between your clothed breasts for the briefest moment before you sit back down on his lap. More specifically, right on his cock. 

Satoru sucks in a sharp breath. He throbs. “W-what’re you doing?”

“I don’t know,” you answer honestly. Your hips seem to have a mind of their own as you begin grinding on his boner. The pulsing in your clit has you unable to think. All you know is that every time you feel his cock pushing against the small bundle of nerves through all the layers you cream even more. 

He groans, arms starting to fight his restraints. 

“Don’t,” you say. “You promised.”

“Yeah, but that was before I knew you were going to be riding me like your pillow.”

“Ugh, that was one time, and I told you that in confidence,” you complain. “Stop bringing it up.”

He makes a tortured noise. “Then stop rubbing your pussy on my dick.”

Slowly, you remove your shirt. His eyes fall on your tits immediately. He stops resisting. 

“Do you actually want me to stop, Satoru?” you whisper, all shy. 

“Fuck no,” he replies without missing a beat. He looks downright mesmerised. Entranced. Positively bewitched. “Rub your pussy on me forever, baby. My hands, my thighs, dick, face, everywhere.”

Tempting…

A giggle escapes you. “You look like you’ve wandered into a sweet shop. Stop drooling.”

“I will as soon as you pop a nip into my mouth,” he retorts. Satoru darts forward, chasing a breast. You pull away all while you press a hand to his shoulder to keep him back. 

“Uh uh uh. You seem to be forgetting you’re not in control here anymore, Satoru Gojo. You’re all tied up and I’m on top. I hold all the cards, and you just have to sit back and do as I say.”

His cock throbs again under you. You moan, head thrown back. Satoru groans, “Oh, fuck. I love when you get all bossy.” He reaches forward despite your words and flicks his tongue against your hardened nipple. You clench around nothing. “Our friends don’t understand why you quit being a sorcerer to have a normal 9 to 5, but I get it. This suits you. They don’t see this part of you. Only I do, right?”

Threading your fingers through his hair, you guide his face to a breast and finally let him suckle on a nipple. The pleasure is instant. He sucks with no need for further instruction. So desperate. So eager. His satisfied moans vibrate through the sensitive bud, running through your veins, and pooling in your panties. The way he suckles, flicks his tongue, rolls it between his teeth — it’s obvious he’s doing this for his pleasure more than yours, and it’s getting you more hot and bothered than if he had been trying to make you feel good.

“You’re the only one who wants to get it, Toru,” you mutter. “You’re the most curious out of everyone because you know you get something out of it.”

Who can count how many times he’s taken one of your creations for himself? 

You’ve never asked questions about what exactly he does with the vibrators, the splitting bars, the freebie aphrodisiacs, or the costumes you win at company parties. Sometimes, you think he wants you to. But he never offers up the information himself.

Satoru’s words come out muffled because he doesn’t want to let go of your breast: “who doesn’t like orgasms and free things?”

Scoffing, you tell him, “You’re rich; everything’s basically free for you. And you can get orgasms from anywhere and anyone.”

He releases your tit with a pop! 

A long string of spit stretches until it breaks. Satoru nonchalantly mutters, “I only want orgasms from you.”

Then he latches onto the other one, sucking so hard your chest arches forward with the intensity of it. It’s almost as if he’s searching for milk, as if he thinks the reason you’re not leaking into his mouth is because he’s not trying hard enough. 

Meanwhile, your hips haven’t stopped gyrating on his cock. Chest to chest, you feel the rope rubbing your skin. The heat of the rope and his body keep you warm. Tingles from within erupt wherever you touch. It’s exhilarating and addictive all at once. 

You dig your nails where there’s no rope. He’s taken his Infinity down, or maybe he’s extended it to include you. It hardly matters. You’ve always been able to touch him.

“Satoru,” you moan, arms wrapping around his back. 

“I know,” he rasps. “Me too.”

Your hips work together. Faster and faster. With no rhythm. No rhyme. Just chasing bliss. 

His lips move from your tits, which he’s left slippery and sore. He kisses your neck, licking a drop of sweat from the curve that meets your shoulder. Satoru can’t touch you. He can’t break out of the rope— No, he can. He won’t. 

You both know he can easily rip the ropes to shreds. It wouldn’t even take anything from him. It’d be the easiest thing he could do, but he’d never want to disappoint you. 

“Dig your nails in,” he pleads, eyes rolling back. “Wanna feel it, wanna feel you.”

You only hesitate the most miniscule of seconds. Then, you’re digging your nails into his perfect skin, dragging it up his chiseled back. It feels wrong, like damaging David, even if Michaelangelo himself asked. But when his back arches and he hisses and his hips rut up into you at the same time, you can’t imagine this is anything but right.

The bed creaks. The headboard bangs against the wall. Pillows slip off the edge. The covers have disappeared. There’s only you and him and the ropes and the mixed juices you’re rubbing on each other.

Together, your bodies spasm with the force of your orgasms.

“Fuck!”

The air between you grows humid with your heavy breathing. Your hard nipples scrape his chest, his abs pressing to your belly, his cock and your clit pulsing in time with each other. 

Satoru calls your name out, eyes flashing. Objects around the room vibrate. They rattle. The walls creak, and in the haze of your bliss you almost see cracks forming along the surface, but a blink of the eyes washes all of that away. 

A loud snap! echoes.

The rope falls dully to the bed, completely loose, and totally damaged. Satoru’s broken free. He didn’t mean to. It just happened. His hands don’t grab onto you. He doesn’t flip you over and takes what he wants. He merely slumps onto you, panting into your neck, and clasping his hands together behind his back so tightly you’re scared he’ll break his own bones. 

Red lines criss cross around his torso. When your fingers graze the sensitive skin, he ruts up into you with a lewd moan. 

“Oh fuck, that was good,” Satoru eventually breathes out. 

“And never happening again,” you say, thoroughly disappointed in yourself. Again. Why do you keep falling for his games? Why do you keep cumming at his whim? Why do you want to do it again so soon? 

The allure of seeing a good looking man in something you designed was too much for you to resist. Now that post nut clarity is clearing your mind, you can only kick yourself mentally.

Pulling away, you throw your shirt back on, smacking the hands that reach for your tits away. There’s an uncomfortable wetness between your legs. He, on the other hand, doesn’t seem to mind the wetness on his own boxers. He’s always been more unbothered by the whole ‘doing things we shouldn’t scheme.

Satoru throws himself onto your bed, staring up at the ceiling and testing the marks on his wrists. He marvels at them. He’s not used to being marked up. With a happy little whistle, he pats his belly and replies, “Uhuh.”

“No,” you enunciate. “No ‘uhuh.’ It’s not going to happen ever again. You’re banned from touching any of my designs again.”

“Okay,” he says, looking at you with a faux innocent look. “You can touch your designs. I’ll just touch you. Good thinking!”

You give him a deadpan face.

And unfortunately when he winks at you, you know you’re both thinking the same thing:

It’s going to happen again.

So much is familiar, and of course it is — things don’t change that much, even if it has been years since you graduated. The same oak tree everyone used to fight over in the summer stands tall. Same hedges, same brick walls, and cobblestones. Same mascots and crests plastered on banners and plaques. 

But, as you’d expected, things are different too. New faces, naturally. A wing was added to the Psychology building after the department received greater funding for their contribution to mental health research. The old noticeboards have gone digital, glowing screens cycling through events you can’t decipher. You don’t see many older professors; you wouldn’t be able to tell who’s a professor and who’s not anymore when professors and students have grown closer in age.

“Time really does fly, huh?” 

In spite of any changes, however, you still feel right at home here. The steps you took from building to building are embedded in the soil. The phantom of your laughter echo in the halls, overlapping with generations before and after you. Even if you graduated a while back, you’ll always be a child of academia.

Although you’re elated to be back, you can’t help but feel melancholy.

A trip down memory lane doesn’t feel right without one of the people that took prime real estate, after all. 

It just isn’t the same. 

“Stop ignoring me.”

Shuddering, you sigh wistfully. “It’s like I can still hear him.”

“You can kill me in your mind all you like,” the voice begins, dryly, “it doesn’t change the fact that you know I’m right; Kindles cannot ever be superior to a good, old, physical book.”

You scowl, and turn to look back at the man trailing behind you. “They say wisdom comes with age but you’re proving them all wrong, aren’t you, babe?”

Kento’s rubbing his glasses clean from the slight fog that’s made the lenses difficult to see through. His cheeks are ever so slightly pink from the cold, and they’re the only markers that he’s bothered by the weather. Unlike you, who’s missing the warmth of Malaysia. He barely even tanned.

He reminds you, “We’re the same age, my love.”

“Yeah, well, I wear it better,” you respond haughtily. 

Sliding his glasses back on, he blinks a couple times before hastening his steps to reach your side. He holds your hand in his and tucks it into his pocket, where a handwarmer lies waiting. A thumb rubs your knuckles. Kento smiles to himself. “I’m inclined to agree on that front.”

“Okay, so you can also agree with me about how Kindles are a fine alternative to physical books. I really don’t know why you look down on them so much — they’re so practical. You can have multiple books all in one place, they’re smaller and more portable than a book, they weigh much less, and you can adjust the font and page colours. They’re more accessible, Ken. You need to get with the times.”

He nods. “I see your points, and I’m not saying Kindles are to be scoffed at. I simply mean that, if given the choice and you have no accessibility needs, one ought to choose physical copies, and support the ever-dying paper industry.”

“You mean the paper industry that’s killing trees?”

Kento glances down at you. “Are you arguing that the manufacturing of Kindles has zero environmental impact?”

It’s a trap, you recognise it. He’s trying to bait you. It’s not going to work.

Squeezing his hand, you tug him to the direction you want to take him: down the scenic route as opposed to the shorter path to your destination. He doesn’t put up a fight. 

Casually, you say, “No, of course not. Everything has a carbon footprint. But it’s all about minimising your impact, and decreasing the number of books, and pages, that have to be printed in favour of having them digitally available, supports that. I don’t think you can argue against the point that Kindles are more environmentally friendly than physical copies.”

“So being environmentally conscious and friendly is the goal. That’s your main point? It’s the underlying reason for any decision you make regarding what you read and in what medium you read it in?” 

Without waiting for a response, Kento continues, “Would you say owning three Kindles, two more than you really need, is environmentally friendly? And if so, what would your response be to me pointing out that since you bought your first Kindle, barring the fact that you bought two more, the rate at which you purchase physical copies hasn’t decreased.”

In a flash, you yank him inside a random building. It’s in the process of renovation. The alumni newsletter said it’s going to be a ‘Wellness Centre’, whatever that means. 

There’s no one here. The lights aren’t even on. Only the natural light from the gloomy sky lights the hall full of caution tapes and unemptied boxes. 

You shove Kento against the wall and kiss him.

His hands fall upon your waist reflexively. 

Lips move together so easily, so comfortably that you grow dizzy already. There’s nothing careful about the way he kisses you. No measured distance, no polite hesitation. Just heat, and the sharp edge of something that could be likened to deep satisfaction.

Kento exhales against you, fingers tightening at your waist to anchor himself. Your hands curl into his coat, tugging him closer and closer still, until there’s no space left between you at all.

Every breath, every shift, every small sound echoes back at you.

A thigh of his parts yours. The apex of yours meets it unhesitatingly. You’re wearing jeans, and despite the layers between you, you can feel the hardness of his muscular thigh. Your hips grind down on him with a gasp. 

“Distracting me with your body?” he breathes out. “This must be an admittance of defeat.”

Your hand finds the bulge you knew would be there. When you grip him, he sucks in a sharp breath and throws his head. A light thud resounds. “You wish, Kennypie,” you whisper, rubbing his already-hard clothed cock in time with how you rub your clothed clit on his leg. 

Truth is, you believe physical copies are superior to digital. Always. You were a Classical Lit student, and forever a snob, you’ll happily admit. 

What you won’t ever admit is that Kento is right.

You’ll take any camp opposite his just to feel the thrill of debate.

Faster than you had snatched him to the dark, he spins the both of you around and pins you to the wall. He sucks your bottom lip, then your neck where your pulse is. Kento untangles your scarf, pulls down the zip of your coat along with his descent, and comes to kneel before you. 

“No, darling,” he exhales. Your thighs squeeze together. “My wish is to taste you.”

Threading your fingers through his hair, you let him unbutton your jeans and pull them down. Goosebumps rise. He soothes warmth into your skin with his palms. With a giggle, you ask, “Again? You just ate me out this morning, Ken.”

Rare mornings where you could sleep in are usually spent with him settled between your thighs, or you between his. Why wouldn’t they be?

As he guides one foot out of the jeans, he nuzzles your thigh. The tip of his nose grazes the frilly hem of your panties. “Who said I’m limited to only once per day?”

The both of you really shouldn’t be doing this. If you get caught, you won’t be expelled; that’s not the punishment non-students face. It’s jail time. But there’s no one here, and there are no cameras. The campus is near empty because of the gloomy weather, and the way he’s started mouthing at your pussy through your panties feels too good to stop. 

“Fine, but be quick, okay?” you tell him. “Our friends’ll be waiting, and after we scolded Sho for being late at the last dinner party, it’ll be a bad look if we’re late now.”

Kento hooks his finger on the gusset and pulls it aside. He makes a dreamy sigh at the sight of your puffy lips, glistening with your juices. A thumb of his parts the lips so he can see your clit and press a kiss to it. 

You jolt.

“I’ll be quick,” he mutters, sounding wholly unconvincing. “She’ll get over it if we’re late just this once.”

Then, he’s licking a stripe up your slit, collecting your wetness on his tongue. “So sweet,” he says. “Always so sweet for me, for Kento, aren’t you, sweetheart?”He’s burying his face deeper between your thighs, desperate to get as close to you as possible.

 You squirm against the wall, panting. “We’re not going to be late,” you insist. 

The end of your scarf tickles his forehead. You move it away, wanting to have an unobstructed view of his face as his tongue flicks the sensitive bundle of nerves over and over again. 

Nodding absentmindedly, he agrees, “No, we won’t be late…but it won’t be so bad if we are.”

Groaning, both in frustration and in pleasure, you repeat, “We’re not going to be late, Kento. I swear to God, you better not mess around.”

Two fingers worm their way inside your entrance, stretching the tight ring of muscle out. You feel the long digits reaching deep. They force your gummy walls to expand around them. You’re flushed, pulse racing. If anyone were to catch you now, there’d be no explaining your way out of this. 

His glasses have fogged up again. It irritates him. He takes the thing off with a hasty hand and pockets it. You like him with his glasses, but you like him with his eyes drinking you up more.

Kento curls his fingers over that spot he knows well. You moan, hips stuttering onto his face. His words come out muffled when he says, “That’s up to you, sweetheart. Admit I’m right, and you’ll get your orgasm and your high horse.”

Tempting, you think. 

He knows you so well. 

But not well enough.

Throwing your leg over his shoulder, you fully commit to getting your orgasm one way or the other. “I would rather be late to every event we have for the rest of our lives than admit you’re right in any capacity, Kento,” you announce resolutely. 

He chuckles. “Of course you would. My stubborn, stubborn girl.”

That’s the last you hear from him before he’s wrapping his lips around your clit and sucking hard. The pressure inside builds and builds. You can’t deny his skilled tongue and years of knowing your body in and out, perhaps even better than he knows his own. 

You cum with a slap of your palm over your mouth, stifling the scream. “Fuck, Ken,” you groan.

Through it, he keeps sucking and curling his fingers. He’s elongating your pleasure, making sure you can ride your high, and his tongue, to your heart’s desire. 

And just when it starts to get too much, you shove him away from your pussy. He doesn’t let you create too much distance — greedy hands grip your hips. He presses himself close, covering your body with his body heat. 

Movement heavy with the remnants of your orgasm, you fight to release his cock from the tight confines of his tailored pants. It lands heavy in your palm, tip flushed and leaking. You feel the rush of his blood, the way it makes the length pulse and his veins prominent. You stroke him a couple times just to hear him murmur your name in that slutty voice of his. 

“Oh, sweetheart,” he rasps. His hips are rutting into your hold. 

“Are you gonna fuck me, Ken?” you purr. “Are you going to christen this building before it’s even been built?”

Kento nods. He kisses you, as though unable to bear being apart from you for too long. The taste of you lingers on his tongue, and you don’t mind it. He pulls away enough to reply, “Yes, darling. I want to feel you, want to make you feel good.”

You kiss him again, smiling. “You always do, Kento. Go on, I permit you to put it inside.”

He lets out a low laugh. “How kind.”

Kento hikes your leg up on his hip, allowing his cock glide through your swollen, slick lips first. He coats the length with your juices. Lewd noises squelch, and upon the initial contact, you both gasp into each other’s mouths. 

Soon, he can’t wait any longer, and the fat cockhead is prodding your pussy as though knocking politely. It enters you slowly. Inch by inch. Being careful of the fact that he hasn’t been able to give you as much foreplay as he would have wanted. 

The stretch is so familiar, so good that your back arches off the wall. “Oh, fuck, Ken.”

“I know, my love,” he murmurs. “Me too.”

Under the layers, you sweat. You’re aware of the fibres of his sweater you borrowed brushing your skin, of the hairs sticking to the back of your neck, of how his clothes and yours makes the closeness feel dull. It’s not like being in the comforts of your own home, of being naked and in bed, and feeling skin on skin. 

Restless, you whine, “Ken, put it all in.”

A kiss to your forehead and he’s doing as you asked. 

The two of you moan when his pelvis meets yours. You’re flushed together, and it’s glorious. There’s a slight sting but nothing that doesn’t make your eyes roll back.

Kento croaks, “You feel so warm, so tight, so -hngh- soft. God, sweetheart, you’re perfect. So, so perfect.”

Your hips rock together. It’s not like the purposeful, drawn out lovemaking you do at home. You’re not teasing, playing games, or rutting against each other knowing there’ll be more rounds after this. 

This is quick. It’s fast, it’s uninhibited, it’s animalistic. You’re merely racing towards your peaks, humping each other like dogs, and grunting and moaning like so. There’s nothing sophisticated or elegant about the slapping of skin, about the clash of lips with teeth, or of the way your fingers dig in whatever body parts you can latch onto. 

“Is it nice to be back, Ken?”

Panting, he flexes his jaw as he tries to ground himself enough to think. “Y-yes, darling. It’s nice to see what’s changed and what hasn't.”

In between kisses, you respond, “Right? I mean, things have changed, but being here makes me feel like I’m a student running late for class. It’s lovely.”

He grinds his pelvis into yours, rubbing your clit till you’re almost drooling. “Yes. It is. It reminds me of the old times with you, and our -ah fuck- friends. It gets h-harder and harder to see them every year.”

“I know,” you say, hips working down on his cock. “Thank you for arranging this reunion, Ken. It’s so desperately needed after all the travelling.”

Kento cups a tit through your clothes. He kneads the fat and you jut your chest out for him. “They’d all been wanting to see you after all your success, sweetheart. It was pretty easy to organise when they want to see the award winning star in our circle.”

You grin and clench down on him. He hisses. “Oh, stop you. It’s not like you’re hiding in my shadows.”

“Someone h-has to keep these big-ego writers in place,” he responds playfully.

“My place is sitting on your face or riding your -ngh! keep going- c-cock, right, Ken?” you ask, batting your lashes up at him.

He kisses your forehead. “Whatever you say, my love.”

Something about the fact that he’s more dressed than you are has your eyes rolling to the back of your head. It’s the way he looks composed, but you know better: his cock pulses every time your walls clench down on him, and he throws his head back, Adam’s apple bobbing. It’s how you lick up the sweat beading on his neck when he does, and he grips you harder. 

The rate at which he’s fucking inside you is increasing. You’re being jostled against the wall, feeling every bump and grind as if your senses are heightened. You no longer feel cold or conscious of being caught. All you can think and feel and taste and hear and see is him.

“I’m close,” you grit out. “I’m so close, Ken!”

“I’ve got you, my love,” he promises. He grabs the back of your other thigh. You’re held up in the air by his hands, boots dangling and jeans dragging on the floor. Like this, he reaches even deeper.

Your tits bounce with every rutting, and you wish he could be sucking on one. You wish you could rub yourself all over him. You wish there weren’t layers keeping you from him. That you could be as loud and wild as you want. 

Combing your fingers through his hair, you yank his head back and command, “Yield, Kento. Submit to the -hah- love of your life and tell her she wins.”

His eyes narrow. “Or what?”

You grin. “Or I won’t cum.”

And he knows you mean it — you’re far too stubborn to succumb to pleasure, especially when there’s victory on the line. So he shakes out of your grip and rushes to dive his face forward. “You’re right,” he whispers to your ear, breathing warmth to the heated skin. “You’re always right. Kento’s wrong, about whatever we were arguing about this time, about everything.”

A breathless laugh carries into the humid air. “Damn right.”

One particularly perfect thrust against your g-spot has your vision spotting, your legs shaking, and toes curling. You cum with a silent moan. Kento groans into your neck, grip bruising as your clenching milks him to his own orgasm. 

This will be somewhere between your sixth and eight orgasm of the day and it’s just as strong as the first. 

Sex with Kento — wherever, however, whenever — is always mindblowing and mindmelting, a fact you rejoice in after concerns of age getting in the way. Of course neither of you are objectively old; your backs and joints are just fine. But you’ve been together for years now, and people often talk about how the chemistry fizzles. 

Thankfully that has yet to happen.

“Oh, s-sweetheart,” he murmurs.

“Mm, Ken,” you say when the pleasure begins to subside. “We didn’t wear a condom again. Now your cum’s gonna be dripping out of me and onto my panties.”

He throbs. You laugh again. 

“I’ll clean you up, darling,” he replies. 

Kento presses a kiss to your cheek and pulls out. The shift is abrupt enough that you both suck in a breath, the cold air rushing back in where there had only been heat a second ago. An emptiness fills you. Your cunt clenches around nothing.

You land a little unsteadily when he sets you back on your feet. 

He’s about to get onto his knees. You stop him. “No, Ken, we’re going to be late.”

He looks conflicted for a second before he checks his wristwatch and reluctantly nods. “Yes, you’re right. Again.”

“Naturally.”

Like trained criminals, you quickly fix your clothes back up and get rid of any evidence. He tugs your jeans back up, giving you some time to replace your panties with a wince at the coldness. His hands zip your coat back up, then tucks your scarf inside. He fixes your hair, and you his. Kento slides his glasses back onto his nosebridge and blinks furiously to adjust his sight.

With last checks, you two give the other satisfied nods and head on out, though not without him sneaking a kiss and you smacking his ass.

“I can’t believe we’ve been on campus not even half an hour and we’ve already desecrated a building. We haven’t matured at all,” Kento mutters under his breath when you get back on the right path and near your destination. 

Looping an arm through his, you reply, “I know. Isn’t it great?”

Amused, he glances down at you and holds your hand. He brings it up to his lips and presses a kiss on your knuckles. “The greatest.”

You laugh. 

Then stop.

Up ahead stands a woman you could never forget. And when Kento stills too, you know he’s thinking the same thing. 

Mrs. Collins doesn’t look like she’s aged a day — there’s sprinklings of colour in a head of greys, in spite of the wrinkles she bears her skin is still tight, and there’s a sharpness in her eyes that hasn’t faded away. 

She’s wrapping her scarf around herself. Without needing to ask, you know where she just came from. It oddly brings you some peace to know she hasn’t left.

You don’t know if she remembers; it’s been some years and you only worked for her for a couple months. Or if she does remember, would she say anything? Would she pretend she doesn’t know you, never did anything, and you’re just another passing figure?

“Well, hello, my dears.”

So she does.

It’s impossible to tell if that brings you comfort or not. 

“Hi, Mrs. Collins,” you say. Nanami cuts you a look but you give him a reassuring squeeze. “It’s been a while.”

“Has it?” she asks, not sarcastically, but rather genuinely, as though she finds it hard to keep time and it was just this morning that she stepped inside the library with the intent of setting you up, and she’d now stepped outside. 

A part of you is surprised she’s talking to you, that she’s entertaining this conversation, when she could walk away and go about her day. There’s no obligation to talk to you at all. You’re no longer students, no longer employed by her, no longer young and naive.

Her eyes slide over to Kento. “Mr. Nanami, are you not going to greet me?”

You’ve never spoken to him about her since before you graduated; neither of you bring it up. And you never found that fact odd — there were almost much more interesting and pressing things to talk about. 

“Good afternoon. We don’t wish to keep you. Please don’t mind us,” he replies, coldly. Well, it would seem warm enough to anyone who didn’t know him well. To you, however, you might as well be standing next to a glacier. 

She hums. “Still haven’t forgiven me, I take it.”

No, Kento doesn’t seem to have; he’s as rigid as can be, as distant as possible, and paler than ever. You squeeze his hand. He doesn’t squeeze back.  

It must haunt him more than it haunts you.

You don’t think about her and what happened very much, to be frank. You’re too busy to do so. It would be a lie, though, to say you don’t sporadically recall how you were used. Sometimes when you’re staring out the window and drinking coffee. Sometimes when you’re getting in a car. You’ve thought about what you would do and say if you saw her again, if she would ask for an apology, if you would cuss her out, blackmail her. 

Right now, when the opportunity has risen and there’s no better time, you can’t seem to do any of that.

Because the person you see in front of you isn’t this cruel, callous monster of cosmic proportions who deserves to be dragged by the hair. She isn’t going to turn you to stone or tip your boat over. She’s not the devil, the mother of all demons, the shadow under your bed.

She’s just a woman who loves books. 

And you’d do anything for the things and people you love too.

“I forgive you,” you tell her suddenly. The words leave your lips without you realising it.

Mrs. Collins purses her lips. If she’s surprised by your words, she doesn’t show it. “I never asked for forgiveness for what I did.”

“I know,” you say. “I know, and I forgive you. What you did, what happened, didn’t stunt my growth, didn’t stop me from graduating, from entering the real world with pride and confidence, and didn’t stop me and Kento from being together. What you did made me stronger. I forgive you.”

Maybe you were never even really mad at her. Maybe you’d forgiven her a long time ago, around the same time that Kento asked you to be his girlfriend and you never looked back.

The older lady processes your words for a second or two. She even looks you up and down. Then she looks at Kento, and asks, “And you?”

“I can’t.” 

Does disappointment flicker in her eyes or mere acknowledgement? Does either in yours?

Whatever the case may be, that’s all there is left to be said here. At least that’s what you think until she opens her mouth again as though the act is an afterthought.

“I read your book, dear. It’s a rather popular stock in the library.”

“Thank you,” you say automatically, a reflex you’d picked up on the book tour. 

“It’s not a compliment,” she replies. “It’s just a fact.”

It lands like a compliment, and you take it as such.

“I’ll be looking forward to the sequel,” she says. With a final, acknowledging nod, she turns. Mrs. Collins doesn’t strut off immediately though; she pauses and adds casually, “Best of luck, Mr. Nanami.” Then she goes and disappears around the corner, leaving behind a mist of warm air. 

For a moment, the two of you just stand there under the dark clouds. As far as interactions with someone you once knew and who fucked you over goes, that wasn’t so bad, right?

You rub Kento’s arm and lean your head on his shoulder. “Are you okay, Ken?”

“I’m sorry.” You look up at him. His shoulders are still tense. His gaze fixed ahead. “I know it’s unfair to resent her, especially when you’ve graciously forgiven her and I have no right to hold any moral high ground, but I just can’t. I’m sorry.”

You figured as much — he can’t forgive himself, and so he can’t forgive her, because forgiving her means forgiving himself. It’s too soon and he’s as stubborn as you so your reassurances will only go in one ear and out the other.

“No, Ken. It’s okay. Really. Process things however you need to.”

Kento replies with some heaviness, “I’ll forever be grateful you forgave me, when you shouldn’t have.”

Sighing, you grab his face and force him to meet your eyes. “Kento, it was so long ago. You’ve apologised a millions times back then, and couldn’t even get it up for the first month or so when we started dating out of guilt, remember? I know you’re sorry, hon, and I know you’d never do anything like that again. We’re not going to spiral over something that happened eons ago.”

He leans into your touch and sighs too. “You’re right, sweetheart. I’m sorry. I don’t mean to bring down the mood.”

“Better now than later, at lunch,” you say, shrugging. “Remember not to let Shoko’s teasing yet the best of you, ‘kay, Kenny Benny Bear.”

At the old nickname, he grimaces but otherwise says nothing. 

Looping your arm back through his and marching on, you add, “Plus, I can’t say I didn’t deserve it even just a little bit. Remember when I swapped your copy of The Iliad before the exam and your average went down by a couple points?”

Kento smiles at the memory. “You only did that because I changed the time zone on your laptop in the study room when you weren’t looking and made you late for the guest lecture with Phicshonal Lehjendaree Dyrektore.” 

You throw your head back and chortle. “Oh my god, yeah! I was so mad. I’d been looking forward to that for weeks.”

“It was a good lecture too,” he notes fondly. “You really missed out.”

A smack on his chest does nothing but make him smile harder. 

“Ugh, whatever, asshole,” you say though you’re smiling too. “We were both stupidly childish, weren’t we?”

“Very,” he agrees.

The two of you cuddle close together, one could say for warmth or for comfort. In spite of the weather, of the dip in the mood, you walk on feeling light. Campus is really quite beautiful in Autumn, with the vibrant reds and oranges and browns of the leaves, and the emptiness of the streets between buildings.

It’s a good day to be with friends, you think. 

Soon, the library comes into view. 

Whereas many buildings have had some tweaks done to them, the library remains just as you remember it. Marble pillars, tall doors, golden lettering, stone stairs, and a welcoming glow to it that you’re sure only you and other nerds can see.

You were a little surprised that the meet up point would be here, especially when Kento was in charge of making the plans, but now that you’re at the foot of the stairs, you’re glad it’s here. Now it really feels like coming home.

A ping alerts you both. Kento checks his phone, and clears his throat. He stiffens again. “We’re going to be late. Let’s head inside.”

You nod and follow him up. He grips your hand tight to make sure you don’t slip on the stairs.

The doors open with a soft push.

For a second, you don’t understand what you’re looking at.

Then— faces.

Familiar ones. 

Needa and Frend, grinning too wide. Shoko beside them wriggling her brows at you as Haibara jumps excitedly behind her. Your parents, his, family and friends scattered in little clusters, all turned toward you with that same unmistakable look. Expectant. Bright. Soft in a way that makes your chest tighten before your mind can catch up.

You blink.

The library — the same one you spent years in, arguing and studying and fighting — has been transformed. The harsh overhead lights are gone, replaced by a gentler glow. Lamps lit up. The dreary, old curtains have been swapped for lush velvet. There are no students. No quiet shuffling, no turning pages, no whispered conversations.

Just melodic music.

A string quartet is tucked near the far end where the reading tables used to be. Bows glide over strings, slow and aching and beautiful threading through the air and tickling your skin, which is growing warmer from both the attention, the shock, and the protective temperature of the indoors.

There’s bouquets of flowers on mahogany tables. Petals littering the floor, thickest where you come to stand in the centre of the huddle under a chandelier of twinkling lights. Soft whites, pale pinks, a few deeper hues woven in. They curl around the ends of shelves, rest along tables, and climb just slightly where they shouldn’t.

Your heart starts to pound, hard enough that it drowns out everything for a moment. 

Slowly, you turn.

Kento is there.

On one knee.

The music, the light, the people — everything fades at the edges until it’s just him, steady and sure despite the way his hands shake just slightly around the small box. 

The ring catches the light. 

Your breath leaves you in a quiet, startled exhale.

“I’d ask if you would do me the honour of making me the happiest man in the world,” he starts, staring only at you, “but you already have, so I suppose the better question is…”

Tears well up in your eyes and you already have the answer at the tip of your tongue pleading to be screamed. 

“Do you hate me enough to marry me?”

9am lectures always carry a sense of death to them. Something about waking up before the sun’s risen kills a person’s soul and leads them down quiet corridors with dark shadows under their eyes, life saving coffee cups in their hands.

Most students don’t like 9am lectures. Most students want to sleep in. You’re no exception. 

Drained as you are though, there is a restlessness in you. A thing that itches to move its legs, to stretch, to run up and down the hallway screaming. Perhaps a ball of tension looking for release, perhaps some unresolved trauma from childhood, or maybe, much less interestingly, you’re just bored. 

Boredom is a human experience. 

It is a painful experience. 

One that could be likened to pushing a boulder up a hill or walking in a field for eternity. It is an experience shared by all, an experience as natural as breathing. It is an experience you’ve never felt in a lecture before. Because, yes you are one of those people that others look at weirdly when you excitedly riff with other students or with the professor, who's done the further readings, who always has something to add, who leaves the hall buzzing. One of those people that can’t have friends in the course because you’re considered too much at any hour of the day.

Today, however, people seem to tolerate you just fine; someone to your right even asked how your weekend was and what your plans for the week are!

You’re not sure if it’s a good or bad change.

Professor Aldmahn continues, “In this sense, Tiresias is exceptional. He alone retains the ability to speak coherently and offer guidance. The other shades, in comparison, lack agency. They require blood to speak, and even then, what they offer is fragmented. Tiresias stands apart as a stable source of knowledge.”

If the professor’s deterred by the soulless faces that stare back at him, he doesn’t show it. 

There’s a small shift to your left.

A few heads turn.

You don’t look.

“But that stability is questionable,” he says, calm as ever, voice carrying without effort. “Tiresias doesn’t provide a full account. He gives Odysseus what he needs to return home, nothing more. I think his wisdom is overstated.”

Professor Aldmahn tilts his head slightly. “Interesting. So you argue Tiresias’ usefulness is exaggerated? Is that a limitation imposed by the narrative, or by Tiresias himself?”

“Both, I believe,” he replies. “The information is selective. It’s shaped by what the poem needs Odysseus to know at that point.”

“And what do you think?” Professor Aldmahn’s voice redirects. His gaze settles on you. “You’ve been quiet today.”

A beat.

The room shifts with it.

You feel it. The familiar shape of an argument forming, precise and sharp. You could dismantle that. You know you could. It’s too neat, too contained. There’s a gap there, something unaddressed, something—

Your pen lowers to the page.

Some people sigh, as though aware that another miserable thing is going to make them regret turning up to this lecture. And for once, you’re on their side, and not on the other. 

Lifting your head, you meet the Professor’s gaze easily. “I think the selectivity is the point; the underworld isn’t meant to be a place of full revelation. It’s a place of suffering, of punishment. The underworld offers partial knowledge, and only under strict conditions. To find any hint of stability and aid is already a miracle in and of itself. Narratively, the characters cannot rely too much on Tiresias — knowledge is supposed to be limited, restricted.”

There’s a small murmur. Approval, maybe. Or irritation. Certainly some grumbles of ‘Am I even in the right class?’

Professor Aldmahn nods slowly, smiling and revealing deep wrinkles in his eyes. “Controlled by whom?”

“The poem,” he cuts in. “Or by the structure of the nostos. Everything in that scene is oriented toward getting Odysseus home. Even the dead only matter insofar as they contribute to that.”

“Do you concur?” the professor asks you.

There it is.

The opening.

It’s almost instinctive: the way your mind turns, the counterargument rising sharp and immediate. You could push back, point out the inconsistency, pull at the thread until it…

You don’t.

Instead, you nod. Once. Politely. No more than that. “Sure,” you say. 

Eyes bore a searing hole into the side of your head, challenging. You pretend you don’t feel it.

Professor Aldmahn’s pen stills in his hand. “…I see,” he says after a moment, though he doesn’t sound entirely convinced of anything at all. If anything, he seems confused and cautious in one breath.  “Well, those were good thoughts, you two. Glad to see some people are paying attention.”

People whisper. Some glances between the two of you, waiting, expecting the familiar escalation, the relentless, eye-rolling back-and-forth that usually follows. It doesn’t come. Judging by the look on people’s faces, one would think the world was ending and trumpets were singing. 

And when Professor Aldmahn clears his throat and resumes the lecture, there’s a faint, unspoken sense that something has gone slightly, inexplicably off course.

Is it really that big of a deal that you didn’t continue debating, you wonder to yourself, with a little self-consciousness dragging you deeper into your seat to avoid the looks people are throwing at you.

After the lecture, you pack up your things and head straight for the door. A presence appears at your side. Blue sweater, blond hair, long legs, and a tight frown. 

“You don’t agree with me,” he says. It could come off as a question to someone else, perhaps an accusation or a reminder. To you, it comes with a tone of surprise, a hint of betrayal that almost makes you scoff. 

Still walking, you hike your bag up your shoulder and reply, “No, I do not.”

“So why didn’t you say?”

Usually, daring to dispute the other’s point so publicly, or even at all, would warrant a long back and forth battle that didn’t resemble a debate at all, more like turn-based lashings. The two of you would glare at each other, scoffing, turning your noses up. You’d point out how he has bed hair and he’d say your lips are crusty, or something of the sort. People would roll their eyes around you but no one would step in. Not professors. Not campus security. Not your friends. 

It could go on for hours. 

Today, you don’t have it in you.

You sigh and, for the first time in about a week, you meet his eyes. He looks the same as usual, albeit more tired. It’s hard to tell if that pleases you or not. Seriously, you ask, “What do you want? To gloat? Or maybe you want me to get on my knees and blow you?” 

He flinches like you struck him. Pink tinges his pale skin. A visceral reaction to the emotionless voice that pierces him. “No,” he says firmly, blinking hard. “No, of course not.”

“So? Is there something I can do for you?”

“A chance to talk, perhaps?” Nanami says, running a hand through his hair. 

Coldly, you remind him, “You had that, remember?”

Nanami freezes. He blanches. Pales like a ghost. You know he knows exactly what you’re referring to. Is he actually surprised you brought it up? Did he think you were just never going to say anything? Did he think you’d roll over and carry on as usual? 

“I did what you would have done,” he says quietly, almost to himself. 

You grip your bag tighter. “Is that what you tell yourself? Is that how you justify setting me up to yourself, to your friends, to whatever higher power you answer to? All for an assistant job you’ll have for only a month, maybe some time into summer too if you’re hanging around, before you go off and have an actual, graduate job?”

Nanami frowns. “She would have asked you if I had said no. She would have offered it to you, and you would have said yes.”

“Maybe,” you admit, the words tasting bitter on your tongue. “Maybe, but guess we’ll never know because you eagerly took the offer, didn’t you?”

To that, he has nothing to say.

Nanami Kento…

Finally rendered speechless.

The sight doesn’t offer you much satisfaction. Another sigh, and you’re telling him, “Don’t be a pussy. You did what you did and you’re better off for it. Stand on all ten toes and keep your chin up. You got what you wanted from me — orgasms, momentary companionship, a job, the ultimate sense of superiority. You won. You won. There’s nothing else left you could take from me. It’s over. Don’t you get it? It’s done. We’re done. You won, Nanami, and it better fucking feel good, because it sure doesn’t feel like it on my end.”

Each syllable you utter leaves a deeper indent on the crease between his brows. He blinks through the words, tries to process them as he would a text written in Latin or a Shakespearean puzzle. His hands flex. His shoulders roll back. He takes every hit with slight winces. And for once, he doesn’t argue with you. 

Today just doesn’t seem to be a day for debates.

You glance at your phone screen, and nod. “I gotta get to class.” 

You look up at him. He’s not looking at you. He’s looking at the space between you. There’s no telling what he’s thinking, and at this moment, you can’t bring yourself to care.

From your position, he doesn’t look as tall or as blond as you remember. “Congratulations, Nanami.”

Your legs don’t stop moving. You let yourself be carried forward with the crowd, down the hall, where the lights flicker and the sun doesn’t reach. 

Behind you, he remains standing, following you with his eyes and pleading for you to look back once.

You don’t.

.

.

.

Nanami Kento has known loss. 

He knew loss at 6 years old, when he was passed for class representative in favour of a badly behaved boy who couldn’t even tie his laces on his own, simply because he was louder. He faced loss the two times he placed second in exams as a pre-teen — both times having been because he was ill the days of the exams, so he hardly counted those as reflections of his performance. And lost too many times to count in high school. 

Oh, and how could he ever forget the horror that was the obnoxious loudmouths in his school, who always roped him into their shenanigans? The same horrors that followed him into university and became his closest friends.

Loss, he learnt from a young age, is a part of life. It builds character. Motivates one to work even harder, to reflect upon their mistakes, and grow. 

Loss is natural. 

Inevitable.

Loss…

Loss is good. 

He knows that.

So why is losing to you so hard to swallow?

From the very beginning, from the very first day, you were a pain in the ass. 

He remembers Induction Day so clearly — he had already memorised every single fact about the university and the course before arriving, so he thought the whole day was nonsense, but his parents had forced him to go. They wanted him to be more outgoing, to get out of his shell. To please them, he went. 

“Does anyone know where our campus library ranks in terms of collection size in the country?” the student tour guide droned. 

She was clearly tired. Fatigued. Bored of herself. Whatever pay she was getting for this little gig, it wasn’t enough. Perhaps that’s what contributed to the drained mood he was in; they were putting out the energy they were getting themselves, leading to an endless cycle of misery that not even a bullet to the temple would end.

“Yeah, it’s the second largest library in the UK,” a voice said brightly to the group, turning back with a smile that was a little too pleased with itself.

He recalls the wide eyes and bushy-tailed quality of that person, the sincerity in the smile, and the twinkle in those eyes that spoke of excitement and profound interest. They stood out in a crowd of anxious, pimply-faced, shy individuals whose faces and names he could never remember even if he was held at gunpoint. 

That person on the other hand struck him as being someone who everyone’s gaze would naturally gravitate towards in a hall of people. 

That person was you.

Of course, he had no way of knowing exactly who you would become in his life — a rival, a pain in the ass, a colleague, a… lover, and a reflection of all of his worst qualities. He did, however, know in that very second he looked at you that you would be a face he’d always notice on campus.

“First,” Nanami corrected, without looking up from the pamphlet in his hands. It slipped out. He hadn’t even planned to say anything, to make his presence known to the group of people he was sure he wouldn’t remember meeting after the day. Yet, he did. 

And whether he regrets it to this day, it remains unclear.

There was a beat. 

Nanami looked up then, feeling the weight of many eyes upon him. Most distinctly, yours. There was a challenge in your gaze. A spark of a flame that was being stifled by the lack of enthusiasm the tour guide was showing. 

You wore an off-the-shoulder top he never saw again. It was somewhat out of fashion, a fact he only knew from seeing what the other students were wearing, both prospective and existing. Your Converse, however, were already worn in and you never could bring yourself to part with them, no matter how dirty or busted they became through the years. 

The two of you cocked a brow at each other.

At the same time as he was sizing you up, he knew you were doing the same. He was sure you were looking at his shiny Oxfords, his ironed trousers, the structured blue sweater over his white button up, his smudgeless glasses, and combed back hair, and came to the conclusion that he was a complete and utter nerd. 

He’s certainly heard the words come out of your mouth often enough. 

Tilting your head, you said, “It was second, as of last year. They updated the figures.”

“Your source?” he coldly asked. 

You smiled wider. Like you had been waiting for him to ask. Like he shouldn’t have. Like he was going to regret that. “Current.”

“Yes,” the tour guide drawled. “It’s second now. But second isn’t bad.”

The both of you thought otherwise. That was why you looked so smug, and he was fighting the physical urge to show his devastation. How could he have outdated data? How could he so casually humiliate himself like that, especially in front of a pretty girl?

Yes, in the very distant past, Nanami had once, quite briefly, considered you an attractive young woman. But something about you was off-putting — maybe your arrogant smile, your refusal to raise your hand to answer questions, your loud talking, your too-shiny lipgloss?

Or, maybe, he simply recognised a deeper evil inside you. 

One that prompts you to fold the corners of pages, to crack spines, to eat as you read and leave greasy residue on book covers, that encourages you to rate books as you read, to chew on your pen lids, to mutter under your breath as you read passages, to clench down on him when you knew he was trying not to orga—

“…I see,” Nanami said at last.

You hummed. “Yes, I hope you do.”

“Your course?”

“Classical Lit.”

“Me too.”

“Hmm.”

And just like that, it was understood: you were going to be seeing a lot more of each other.

It’s silly, really. To be so caught up in petty rivalry to the point that you become infamous around the department, that admin staff have to separate you as much as possible. Even sillier that it would keep Nanami up at night. 

Oh, he’s pondered how to destroy you so many times. 

After every exchange, he’d be left seething, grinding his teeth, bouncing his knee, plotting how to best you at the next opportune. Sometimes he’s successful, sometimes he’s not. The latter mattered most. He could win 999 times, but that one time he doesn’t never fails to have him tossing and turning in bed, replaying your smug smile, your repulsive laughter, cutting words, and the way you spitefully strut away. 

Nanami would love nothing more than to wipe your smile away, to smother your laughter, to dull your words into something resembling admittance of defeat, and to drag you back so he can continue his scathing monologue about the superiority of his own points.

He did all that but the last when it mattered most, and again when you gave him the opportunity to talk; he had nothing to say for himself.

What does it matter?

He won. 

He got you to admit defeat. He got the job, got to have the last real word in the lecture, got to see you at your lowest. And he’ll have so much more beyond you after graduation. 

So why can’t he focus on shelving the damn books? Why can’t he feel a sense of pride at the grateful smiles patrons give him after he helped? Why can’t he sleep satisfied and knowing he won’t have to be at the top of his game come the next day because you won’t challenge him anymore?

Why can’t he stop thinking about you?

“Any other symptoms?” Shoko drawls.

Nanami jolts. 

“What?” he asks, straightening up with a small frown. 

Shoko’s brow rises but ultimately says nothing about whatever trance he was just in. Instead, she continues stirring the olive in her dirty martini with the toothpick. “You were asking what that ‘painful squeezing’ in your chest was, remember? Like, I’m the Doctor of everything. I’m not even a doctor of anything,” she grumbles.

Right…

They’re at a bar. 

The campus bar. 

He’d invited her out for a long overdue drink, since he’s been so busy at the library for weeks. It’s a catch-up between cynical friends. Also an excuse to get an informal check up without the hassle of making a doctor’s appointment and trekking across the city to find out that he’s merely overworked and underpaid. 

Adjusting his glasses, he says, “Yes. It’s been persisting for about a week now. Eight days exactly. It’s nonstop. Although, the intensity comes in waves. It’s distracting. Even debilitating. I also experience a shortness of breath — a panting, of sorts — that renders me unable to think, to see clearly, to remain standing. It happened last night.” 

She leans closer. “Oh?”

“I was at my desk, studying. The pain was dull then. Forgettable. Out of nowhere, a notification from my bank came through — a deposit from my assistant librarian job, if I recall correctly. That’s when it happened. I suddenly felt like the room was spinning,” Nanami continues, fingers drumming on the sticky bar table. “I couldn’t process where I was or what was happening. I ended up…”

“Ended up…”

“Huddling in the corner of my room, clutching my body,” he admits. There’s a hint of a blush on his cheeks, yet he persists. “Does any of that sound familiar? Perhaps something you covered?”

Shoko blinks at him from across the table. 

Then she laughs. 

It’s loud enough to attract the attention of people around. She doesn’t care. Nanami does. Very much. But he knows he can’t do anything about the chortling she’s letting out. 

All he can do is mutter, “What an overly-insensitive response to your dear friend’s admittance of medical concerns,” beneath her unrestricted laughter.

Five whole minutes must pass before she could get herself together. She’s wiping the tears from her eyes and clutching her side as she recovers. “Are you kidding me?” she asks. “Nanami, you big, tall idiot. You had a panic attack. You had a panic attack because you were reminded of your day job. I’m no psychologist but I’d say you’re feeling guilty. How can someone who reads and knows so much not know that?”

“Is that what Freud’s diagnosis would be?” he dryly responds, feeling foolish for having thought she would be able to offer any real help. 

She snorts. “Freud would say you’re overwhelmed with a sexual urge to mount your mother, so I really wouldn’t listen to him.” 

Left with no choice, Nanami contemplates the concept a little longer.

Did he have a panic attack?

The hyperventilating, the rocking oneself back and forth, the feeling like the world was going to end—

Yes.

Yes, he did have a panic attack, didn’t he?

He releases a long, heavy sigh. Resigned, he drags a hand down his face and asks, “And the chest thing? Why does my chest clench so tightly? Why is my chest so painful I almost can’t walk?”

Shrugging, Shoko responds, “Dunno. Could be something serious. I really wouldn’t rely on Med students for official diagnosis. Like, at all. Go to the doctors.”

“I know, and I will, if it continues on like this. But I wanted to talk to you first.”

“You’re not coming to me for medical advice,” Shoko points out. She leans back onto the wrinkled faux-leather booth and pops the olive in her mouth. “You came to me as a friend. You want my personal opinion.”

Nanami swallows a ball in his throat. 

Her words ring true. Shoko may be a lot of things — mischievous, rebellious, a delinquent — but she is neither stupid nor a liar. Which begs the question: why did he not realise these things about himself? When did he stop being so sure of his character, of his thoughts, of his own body? And why doesn’t he know what to do?

He’s always known the right path for him. He’s always known the rational course of action. He never hesitates when it comes to helping someone pick their fallen items up from the floor, never doubts his judgment regarding someone’s intentions, never worries about anything other than his future. 

So what the hell is happening?

“Guilt, you say?” Nanami murmurs, finding the word particularly bitter. “Yes, I suppose that’s possible. After all, I did do something unethical to get ahead; I should have never resorted to underhanded tactics.”

Shoko rolls her eyes. “You’re telling the wrong person, babes. Look, you’re a friend of mine so I’m always going to have your back even when you do dumb shit. You really don’t need to justify yourself to me. Talk to her. Explain all of this to her. Be honest, to her and yourself.”

“Her?”

He hadn’t mentioned a ‘her’ to anyone. He’d been quite vague about his time at the library, and how he came to be the last one standing. 

She takes a sip of her drink, as though needing something to dull the frustration of dealing with clueless men. “Her. The her. The only her that matters to you. The one you jilted. The one you can’t stop thinking about. The one that’s literally causing your body to shut down, that’s breaking your heart into little pieces. Her.”

That gets the man rolling his eyes. “A girl can’t possibly be the reason for my symptoms. You’re being ridiculous.”

“Yet you knew exactly who I was talking about,” she points out. He opens his mouth to retort, but she cuts him off immediately. “I’ll leave that for you to figure out. Here’s my professional diagnosis: you are burdened with a great sense of guilt over what you did, or whatever. To relieve yourself of your pain, you should address your guilt. In other words, apologise to her. Talk to her and reach a settlement. And maybe by doing so, you’ll finally realise something.”

Then she smiles to herself. “Hey, that sounded Doctor-like, right? God, I’m awesome.”

Brows furrowing, he asks, “‘Realise something?’ Realise what?”

She groans. “Oh my god, Nanami, I can’t do everything for you. Go do something to get her attention. Do something to force her to listen to you. Just talk to her. Confront her and all the things you don’t want to process, don’t want to admit to yourself. Just do something!”

A barrage of kicks under the table lands on his shins. Nanami shuffles out of the booth soon after. “Alright, alright. I understand. Right my wrongs, confront my source of malady, and relieve my psychological torment. Got it.”

Shoko watches him pull out his phone as he hurriedly strolls out of the bar. She rests her head on his hand and thinks, he don’t got a clue in the whole wide world.

Outside, Nanami sends a text to his friend:

Do you happen to know either of the numbers of Needa and Frend?

.

.

.

“Where are you guys?” you murmur as you text the words out to the group chat.

They’d texted you this afternoon, asking to meet up at the library before going to get coffee, which in and of itself isn’t odd — you meet up at the library often, being the diligent students that you are — but something about the location had your spine growing rigid.

You arrived on time, and had been waiting for about five minutes before they asked you to come inside. That was going to be a problem, you thought. You didn’t want to go inside. You haven’t been inside the library in over a week. 

Mrs. Collins was in there. He was in there. 

You didn’t want to run into either. 

But you need to see your friends, and they won’t reply to your messages about waiting outside. Were they doing an intervention on you? Were they fed up with the depressed mood you’d bring back to the apartment after every class? Were they forcing exposure therapy upon you?

Or maybe, they really do just need you to come in as they pack their things up. Ugh, why is this so hard for you? Why can’t you be nonchalant and pretend none of what happened bothers you? 

It’s a big library, you tell yourself. What are the chances you’ll see them?

Though, as you finally walk in, chanting those things in your head over and over again, you know you don’t quite believe in them. 

The first thing you notice is that not much has changed. It’s the same library. Same polished floors, same tall shelves stretching endlessly, same muted hum of turning pages and quiet footsteps. The smell hits you too — paper and dust and something faintly woody. Usually, it settles you. Grounds you.

Not today.

Today, it feels suffocating.

The air is thicker. Every sound is sharper. The space itself is watching you, waiting.

You slow your steps.

You’ve always loved it here. Loved the quiet corners, the weight of books in your hands, the feeling of getting lost between aisles and emerging hours later with something new tucked under your arm. It used to feel like a sanctuary, like a slice of heaven.

Now it feels like a place you’ve overstayed your welcome in.

Familiar spines, familiar sections, all arranged how you would have done it. Then, something new catches your eye. A display near the front, freshly arranged. Hardcovers, crisp and untouched, their jackets gleaming under the overhead lights.

New arrivals.

Your fingers hover over one of the books, tracing the sharp edge of its spine. Untouched. Unclaimed. No creases, no history yet. For a moment, something in your chest loosens.

You almost reach for it.

“They came in just today.”

His voice.

Right behind you.

“We’ve been having more and more new arrivals recently. More so than before,” he says, matter-of-factly.

Hand dropping, you reply, “How interesting.” 

Nanami says, “It is. It’s really quite interesting how Mrs. Collins had been able to acquire an increase in funding during a time of budget cuts, don’t you think?” 

See?

This is exactly what you were afraid of.

“I suppose that was her plan all along when she purposely hired two people she knew hated each other — she waited for us to cause trouble, to make a mess of things, so she could go cry to the board about needing more support.”

With a sigh, you turn to him. 

He’s standing at the end of the aisle, watching you. He’s exhausted, you can tell — dark shadows under his eyes, a slight stubbling on his jaw, a crease in his pant legs, his Oxfords not as shiny as they usually are, and his shirt untucked under his sweater all tell a story. 

You’ve never seen him look more like a mess. Not even when it was in the heart of exam and application season.

Bitterly, you ask “Is this the part where we bond over how we were both used? Because the way I see things, it isn’t an us versus her set up. It’s me against you, like it’s always been.”

Nanami ignores you. 

He strolls over to where you are. His chest meets your back, arms caging you in between the shelves. The familiar warmth, the woody scent over his soap, the slotting of bodies, it hits you all at once. You remain still. Very still. Wondering what he’d do. 

Behind you, he lets out a shaky breath, nose skimming your hair. “We were too good at our jobs. We took too long to mess up. And one ripped page from a random book, when we were… She couldn’t prove it was us, and it wouldn’t be enough to convince the board what the library needed: one, protection from the budget cuts; and two, an increase in funding. So she got her hands dirty. She staged a crime scene, so to speak, inspired by what we reported to her.”

“I don’t care,” you tell him, unable to shove him away and get some air.

Shaking his head, he continues, “Now, she’s received special money to increase security and pity money to order more new additions. That, and she gets to go on holiday more often this year. It’s sickening, and we can gather evidence of it.”

“Stop ignoring me.” You spin around, glaring at him. “I. Don’t. Care.” 

He frowns. “I thought you would want to do something about this. Call her out, report her—”

“Are you not hearing me?” you snap. 

Stunned into silence, he blinks rapidly, as though reeling from your failure to meet his expectation — he expected that you’d care about justice, about vindication, about being right. He expected you to stand up for yourself, to fight, to win. What he didn’t expect is for your eyes to turn glossy and for a flicker of pain to flash in them, all while you stare up at him like he’d kick you in the stomach after petting you.

“I care that you called me unreliable, emotional, and not cut out for the job.”

“That was in the interviews,” he defends. “When she asked me why I was a better fit. That was before..”

You don’t hear his words; blood is rushing in your ears. “I care that you ignored me for a week. I care about being blindsided. I care about the reason why you would…” you stammer out, blinking back tears that were rising, “...after everything we did, everything we said to each other… How could you not warn me what she was planning? How could you stand there and do nothing? How. Could. You.”

“You…you would have done the same thing,” he repeats like it’s the one tether he has and he’ll grasp it till it frays and snaps. “I didn’t want to be the one left behind. I-I thought that was your intention from the start, with all our little games, the ones we knew we shouldn’t play. I thought you were fattening me up for the kill. I thought you would have done the same thing when given the chance.”

Perhaps disappointed, you laugh to yourself. It’s cutting, both yourself and him.

So that’s what all of that was to him: a complex plot to sabotage him. 

You straighten up, tears drying and the towering walls you’d erected returning. He can feel the chilling gust breeze through him. He’s losing you. Again.

“Yeah, sure. You’re right. Maybe if she’d come to me first, I would have agreed to set you up. Maybe I would be raking in a bonus for my help. And maybe I wouldn’t even be chasing you to explain myself, to try and backtrack, to apologise. Maybe we’d just part ways understanding that in some ways — in ways that matter most — we lost to each other.”

You’d already figured out that, somehow, he’d gotten your friends to agree to help him set this up, so he can have an opportunity to talk to you. It’s likely that they thought it’d help you. It’s also as likely that Nanami had smooth-talked his way into weakening their defences with some promises or the other. 

They’re not here, but they will be at home, and you’re going to give them an earful when you get back. Then you’ll lean on their shoulders and get the suffocating waves of sobs threatening to rise up and out of your mouth out of your system once and for all. 

Nanami reaches for your arm, fingers grazing the material of your sweater. “No, it doesn’t matter,” he decides right here and now. “I don’t care if you would have.”

“Stop trying to talk to me. I have nothing more to say to you. Just leave me alone,” you say, snatching your arm away. 

“I can’t!”

You draw back. 

He…

Nanami had raised his voice for the first time since you’d known him. 

People passing by stop. They’re staring at him, at the assistant librarian they recognise. They eye you too, but you pay them no mind. You’re far too shocked by how crazed he looks — hair a mess from the frequent running of his hands through them, face flushed, chest heaving, and stoic face crumbling into a look of total panic. He starts pacing back and forth between the shelves. 

“Fuck,” he swears under his breath, and outside of sex, it’s so jarring to hear him say something so uncouth. He resembles nothing like the Nanami you know. The Nanami everyone knows. “I’m doing this all wrong,” he mutters to himself. “I prepared a speech. I ran through this scenario hundreds of times in my head. I anticipated your insults, your revenge, physical attacks, and I was ready for it. Any of it. All of it.”

Those piercing eyes look at you, insisting, as though begging for you to understand. 

“Yell at me. Hit me. Right here,” he says, grabbing your hand with his own. He presses it to his chest, over his heart. “Hit me. Please.”

You try to tug your hand away out of his grip. He doesn’t let you. A little disoriented by the manic tremble of his voice, you carefully say, “Nanami, I’m not going to hit you.”

“Please,” he breathes out. Nanami keeps your palm flat against his chest. You can feel the thundering of his heart. It’s so strong you fear it might leap out of his ribs. “Please, hit me. Hurt me. Do something other than ignore me. I-I don’t know what to do when you don’t look at me, when you don’t argue with me, don’t shove your opinions down my throat, don’t gloat, don’t put me in my place, when you’re indifferent to me.”

The word came out like it’d been barbed. 

He draws closer, unwilling to let you go. “I can take your constant chattering, your glares, your grating laughter, your differing opinions — wrong as they are.” That almost gave you enough strength to pull away with a deadpan face, but his soft gaze keeps you glued to the spot. “I can take your hate. Because it means you feel something for me, because it makes me special. It gives me a role, a goal, a fucking purpose. So hit me, hurt me, hate me. Anything but writing me out of your life.”

Your heart’s pounding in your chest now too. It’s beating with an intensity that nearly has your vision spotting. 

Nanami was right, a thing he often is; you had been ignoring him. 

It hurt too much to look at him, to listen to his voice, to know his eyes were on you instead of the lecturer. You couldn’t understand why he was so insistent on getting your attention, on talking to you, when he had been the one to cut you off. 

He rejected your invitation to come up to your apartment. He kept his distance the last week before Mrs. Collins, the old hag, had made her decision. He accepted her offer. He stood by and allowed you to take the fall, because it benefited him, because he expected the worst from you. 

And yes, you kept agreeing that you would have done the same thing. The truth is, however, you really don’t think you would have. 

Values aside, because sabotage truly wasn’t below you, you’d grown to consider him a…friend. He was an ally on long days, a person to glance at when an older man asks where a copy of Lolita can be found for the third time in a week, a person who’d let you drink from his thermos when you’d ran late and couldn’t grab a cup of coffee, a person who brushed your hair into place after rendezvouses. 

The line between you had been crossed and blurred; it was impossible to define your relationship. But an alliance was there. A loyalty you’d come to expect. An understanding you would have gone above and beyond to protect. He didn’t feel the same. 

That was fine. 

It was fine when that ache in your chest thrummed so hard you couldn’t sleep, when you’d spend classes and lectures with an empty notebook spread and a blank document. It was fine when you would find yourself standing in the shower for what felt like five minutes, but was actually an hour, just staring off into space. It was fine when you saw him talking to girls who he hadn’t betrayed, hadn’t sold out for a job, and it had your knees weak and your breathing staggered. 

It was fine because it defined what you were to him. 

Him grasping your hand like it was the only thing keeping him on the ground, like you’re about to disappear at any given moment and it would kill him, however?

Not fucking fine. 

“Nanami,” you exhale out, scared, “that…that sounds an awful lot like a confession…of love.” The last syllable has your wide eyes meeting, equally as frightened by the word. “Is it?”

He lets your hand drop. You step back. No, stumble back. Nanami follows. His breathing is growing ragged, more so than before, and you can see a tempest spiralling inside. 

“You tell me,” he says, laughing a little. “No, seriously. Tell me. Because all I know is I can’t stop thinking about you. I can’t focus on any of my work. I can’t breathe when you’re not looking at me. I feel like I cease to exist if you’re not perceiving me, ever the proverbial fucking tree in the forest.”

Every step you take back, he counters with a step forward. He maintains the short distance between you, keeping you in arm’s reach. 

Nanami continues, sounding angry, whether at himself or at you, you can’t tell: “I do things I shouldn’t do, that I wouldn’t do if it weren’t for you, like damage priceless books because I think your body’s more precious than historical artefacts. I steal manuscripts because I want to make you smile and annoyed in equal measure with the fact that I’ve gone ahead and written my thoughts all over it, left my mark, my soul, on something I desperately and pathetically hope you’ll go on and cherish.”

How did he get his hands on the manuscript? 

The look on your face has him laughing mirthlessly. 

“Of course you didn’t open it,” he says to himself. “You must have been too mad to, right? I ruined a beloved author of yours? Forever tainted your reading experience?”

No, you hadn’t read it; you couldn’t bring yourself to. You tucked the heavy thing under your bed, and, once it started to feel like it was burning a mark under your back when you slept, you hid it in Frend’s room, along with all other copies you have of the authors’ works. 

Did she give it to him? 

Now that you know he’d written things inside it, you realise you should have burnt it — you’ll never be able to fight the curiosity otherwise. You’ll forever be haunted with the need to know what he’d written, what he said, what he thought. 

“Want to know something?” Nanami wonders. He doesn’t wait for you to respond, though you’d already started to shake your head. “I’m beyond happy to know I’ve made my mark on you, that every time you hear that authors’ name, you’ll think of me.”

Voice hoarse, you can’t help but ask, “What did you write?”

His lips quirk up at the corner. “Nothing you’d agree with, I’m sure.”

“You were insulting one of my favourite writers?” 

“Critiquing,” he corrects, taking another step forward right as you step back. “I wrote down my thoughts, and anticipated your counters during my breaks at my internship, every time I was thinking of you and wondering what you were doing. If you were stocking, shelving, dusting, offering recommendations, cursing me out. I argued with my imagination in those pages, because I’d clearly gone insane.”

He certainly looks it, you think. 

Especially when your back meets the wall in a corner of the library no one ever goes to and he cages you with his body, shielding you from locking eyes with anyone but him. 

“That’s where I’m at now,” Nanami says, resigned to the fact. “I pleasure you with my body where we could be caught, and I don’t think about how terrible it would be to be seen in an intimate position, to get into trouble, to lose everything I’ve built. I think about how devastated I’d be if someone else were to see you in a way only I should. But then it eats me up that I think that way about you, that I dare lay claim to your body, when no part of you is mine. And I so badly want to have a part of you. Any part — your body momentarily, your pleasure, your laughter, your smile.”

You’re panting as hard as he is. 

Your head is reeling. 

You’re dizzy with every confession, every brush of his breath against your cheek, every graze of your heaving chest against his, every inch of skin his eyes touch. “Nanami…”

Bending down, he presses his forehead to yours. At the same time, your eyes flutter shut. All you can feel is him. A pained noise escapes him the moment skin touches skin. He sounds accusing, betrayed, when he whispers, “You’ve taken all of that away now.” 

He’s everywhere, a shade from the depths of hell, that spirit that follows you and you cannot, under any circumstances, look back at. 

His head falls to your shoulder, and you’re so still you could be a statue carved by Bernini himself. “And fine, I deserve it. I’m the worst. I’m a monster. And I finally understand why you’d prefer to talk over me in our debates — I cannot stand the sound of my own voice either.”

Lips slide up the curve of your neck. 

You gasp.

It’s light. Barely there. Yet, it lights up a path under your skin, your jaw, your cheek, temple. 

“But please, please, do not take your hatred of me away,” Nanami pleads at your hairline, unable to face you. “It is all I have left, all I know, and I don’t know how to function without it. So yes, tell me. Is this love?”

“Let me go,” you murmur. 

He says your name in response like a prayer. 

You push him away, and this time he lets you. “No, Nanami. I don’t know. I don’t know anything anymore.” Wrapping your arms around yourself at the sudden chill in the air, you continue, “I need time to think. I need time to process all of this, a-and we’ve got exams, and graduation to worry about. I don’t know if I should even forgive you.”

“Don’t,” he says resolutely, licking his lips. “Don’t forgive me. I want to be kept in your heart and your mind, even if it is for all the wrong reasons. If resentment is all you can give me, then I’ll take it.”

God, when did the most cynical, pragmatic man you know become such a romantic?

With a nod, you back away as he stays where he stands, watching. 

“Alright,” you agree. “Time and space. That’s all I need.”

Nanami tries to give you a reassuring smile, but his heart isn’t quite in it. He says, “Whatever you need.”

Like your feet are on fire, you start walking away, confused and adrift in a sea of thoughts and voices. 

The last one you hear says, “I’ll wait for you.”

.

.

.

“Smile, sweetheart.”

Groaning, you force yet another smile on your face as your mother takes the millionth picture of the day. 

“Just one more,” she insists, again. She tilts the phone, steps back, then forward, then back again. One would think she’s directing a full photoshoot instead of capturing you in an oversized gown and a cap that won’t sit straight. 

“It’s been ‘one more’ for the past twenty minutes,” you mutter. 

Behind her, your father fixes you a look that says, ‘make my wife happy or you won’t get your graduation gift.’ You smile even wider.

The campus is buzzing — families calling out names, bursts of laughter, the sharp pop of champagne somewhere in the distance. Caps are already being tossed, hugging circles forming and dissolving just as quickly. All around, mothers are fussing over their no-longer-children children, fathers patting their sons on the back, and friends are crying in huddles. 

“Hold your certificate higher,” she says. You do, barely adjusting your grip. It still feels a little unreal in your hands; it feels like it belongs to someone else, someone more put-together, more certain of what comes next. “Perfect,” she says softly this time, snapping the photo.

With a plea in your eyes, you groan, “Please, mom, that’s enough. My feet hurt and I’m hungry. That ceremony took forever.”

“Okay, okay. Come here,” your mother says, pulling you into a hug before you can say anything. It’s tighter than usual. “I’m proud of you,” she murmurs into your hair. 

Your dad steps forward, pressing a smile to your forehead with a kiss. “I’m proud of you too, honey. You worked hard, and I know you’ll do great, all that cheesy stuff fathers are supposed to say without crying.”

Something in you loosens at that.

When they pull away, eyes a little glassy, you have to clear your throat and pretend you don’t want to bawl up and cry. “Stop, you’re going to ruin my makeup.”

“Go ahead, dear. I brought your makeup bag,” your mother teases. “After all, it’s not everyday my baby graduates.”

Graduation…

The day you’ve been waiting for for years. It’s the culmination of all of the work you put in every day of your life. When you missed plans with friends to study, when you pulled all-nighters to make sure you’ve memorised your essay plans, when you’ve missed mealtimes, when you beat yourself up for losing easy marks. 

All of it was for this day. 

And it’s pretty bittersweet.

For as long as you can remember, there was always a next step laid out — another year, another exam, another goal to chase. School, college, university…it had been a constant, something steady to measure yourself against.

Now it just… ends.

A strange quiet sits beneath all the noise around you. Beneath the laughter and the congratulations and the endless pictures, there’s this soft, unfamiliar feeling, like standing at the edge of something vast without quite seeing what’s on the other side. Yeah, graduating has clearly been having a cheesy effect on you. You’re contemplative, poetic, melancholy, already nostalgic. 

You think of your friends, scattered somewhere in the crowd. The ones who knew your worst habits, who sat beside you in lectures, who shared notes and snacks and stress in equal measure. It’s so easy to pretend nothing will change, that you’ll still see each other all the time, but you know better. Life has a way of pulling people in different directions.

That part aches.

But there’s something else too. Something lighter.

A thought that, for the first time, nothing is decided for you. No timetables, no deadlines, no predetermined path. Just space, wide and open and yours.

You exhale slowly, shoulders easing.

Maybe it’s okay not to know yet.

Maybe that’s the point.

Maybe you’re allowed to take a leap and just follow your heart, not your brain now. Maybe it’s time to give logic and reason a break. 

“Come on,” your mum nudges, already reaching for your hand again, eyes bright despite the tears she’s pretending aren’t there. “We’re going to be late for our reservation.”

“Hold on. I have something to do.”

You push through the crowd, leaving them there for a moment. You bundle your dress up with a fist and hold your cap down with the other. Through the gaps between bodies and crowds, you move. You meander, searching. 

Where is he?

Where is he?

Where is he?

Then, a flash of blond.

“Nanami!”

He turns at the sound of your voice over the din. He’s dressed just like you — cap in hand, gown with the Literature department’s colours, in his best clothes under it. His family surrounds him. 

For a second, he just looks at you, surprised. Then something in his expression softens. Hope, maybe. Or caution; he doesn’t want to assume. He doesn’t want to get ahead of himself. 

You slow to a stop in front of him, suddenly aware of your heartbeat, of everything you meant to say slipping just out of reach. “Hi,” you manage, a little breathless. “Um, congratulations.”

He lets out a small huff of a laugh, almost disbelieving. “Hi.” Nanami steps forward, away from his family, who are sharing glances with interest and mischief. You feel his eyes take all of you in. “Congratulations to you too.”

Up close, he looks the same, and not. Still composed, still steady, but there’s a looseness to him now, something less guarded than before. He’s matured, you realise. He was so stiff when you first met him, so rigid. He’d grown more lax in the years, but especially in the last couple months. Nanami doesn’t look like the nerdy, condescending boy you corrected on Induction Day; he looks like a man about to take on the world.

“I, um…I saw you,” you say, gesturing vaguely, wincing at how inadequate it sounds. “I thought I should come over. Just to—” You trail off. Just to what? “Say hi?”

He tilts his head slightly, watching you in that quiet, attentive way of his. If he finds your sudden weirdness off-putting, he gives no indication of it. On the contrary, he just looks happy. “I’m glad you did,” he says simply. 

And he means it. You can hear it in the way his voice dips. 

Your chest tightens.

A month ago, you’d asked for time. Space to think, to feel, to figure out what his apology, and his confession, meant to you. You hadn’t reached out. Hadn’t known how. Part of you had wondered if that silence had already said everything. And you know, by how surprised he was to see you approach him, he was thinking the same thing.

Nanami’s gentle gaze skims your features. His voice is a mere whisper in the air when he admits, “I wanted to say hi too. At the very least, congratulate you. Thank you for giving me the opportunity.”

He’s being so meek, so shy. It doesn’t suit him. And it doesn’t suit you either. So you admit something too: “I didn’t know if you’d want to see me.”

“I always want to.”

This whole time, you’d been wondering if you left it too late to respond. If by the time you came up with an answer, he’d look at you strangely and ask, ‘what are you talking about?’, and you thought about how much more that would hurt than whatever he did wrong to begin with. But Nanami’s not leaving much room for doubt now that you’re standing in front of him.

“I read the manuscript.”

He blinks. “Oh.” He recovers. “The courteous thing to do is ask what you thought of it, but I’m not certain I’d like to know.”

“Your notes in the first section, where she traces the history of the word, were irritating as hell,” you tell him anyway. “You kept trying to ground everything in formal sources. Legal language, institutional use. That’s only one part of it. She’s looking at how the word moves in everyday use. Who says it, when, and why. That’s where the meaning shifts. You can’t ignore that just because it’s harder to pin down.”

Nanami, despite your lecture, stays standing in front of you. “I see.”

“And the part on the reclamation of the word? She’s clear about that, and its feminist roots. It depends on context. It depends on who is speaking and who is listening. You kept trying to make it consistent when it isn’t meant to be, and I didn’t appreciate you writing quotation marks around ‘empowerment — it is empowering!” 

“Sure,” he says. “Or is that another way the patriarchy keeps women down, by indoctrinating you to believe normalising degrading language against women by both women so that you will accept it when a man says it?”

“Shut up,” you counter, because he made a good point and you don’t really have the time to break that down. “Also, you kept anticipating what I would say. Some of it was right. Not all of it. You assumed I’d defend everything she wrote. I wouldn’t. Some of it is speculative, I’m smart enough to recognise that, despite my biases towards Rightur.”

He adjusts his glasses. “Of course you are. I did write some of those comments to get a reaction. Forgive me.”

“No, I knew that,” you say. Shuffling in your heels, you fiddle with the tassel on your cap. “I just wanted you to know that I read your notes, and I didn’t find it as completely irritating as I initially thought. I actually kinda enjoyed reading them, and there were times where I anticipated what you’d say, and I could imagine the faces you’d make, and that was the annoying part. I couldn’t read without thinking of you.”

Nanami’s brows knit together. 

“I don’t understand.”

Taking a deep breath, you say, “Listen, I won’t keep you; I’m sure you have plans with your family. I do too. All I wanted to say before we parted ways is that, I’m thankful for you, for the manuscript, for the games we shouldn’t have played, for our debates.”

His mouth opens, you stop him with a hand. 

“No, just let me speak,” you huff. He does. “I’m grateful for you pushing me, for you being a pain in my ass, for making these three years memorable and fun. I know that if it wasn’t for you, I wouldn’t have pushed myself as far as I did. I wouldn’t have found every achievement as gratifying and fulfilling as I did; they would have been like all my other successes: a relief.”

It’s funny how you hadn’t rehearsed any of these words and yet they flow out of you so naturally. You’d thought about how hard it’d be to face him, but as it turns out, it’s not that hard at all.

You continue, cheeks heated under the watchful and curious eyes of his family,“And most of all, I’m thankful for your honesty that day. I never stopped thinking about what you said, and all I worried about was whether I’d be able to say anything remotely as heartfelt and poetic, and that really grinded my gears, y’know?”

“That I’d be more eloquent and sophisticated with my confession than you?” Nanami fills in the gaps, cocking a brow as he does. 

Sheepishly, you nod. “Yeah. I had all this time, and all I could think to say is… I hate you.”

He falters just slightly, then recovers with a smile. “You do?”

“Yes,” you say, meeting his eyes with certainty. “I hate you. I hate you so, so much. I hate everything about you: your blondness, the fact that you sometimes make good points, that you remind me natural intelligence isn’t enough. I hate that you judge me for dog-earring my pages and cracking my spine. I hate that you read a new book every week and I read the same ones all the time. I hate that you’ve got impaired vision but you see better than me.”

His family behind him try to step up, concerned as to why their beloved Nanami is probably being bullied, but he steps closer to you, ignoring them. 

“Yeah?”

Sniffling, you mutter, “Yeah. I hate that you’ve already formed a little wrinkle between your eyebrows because you’re always so serious, and it makes me giggle to see you look so mad when you’re just writing notes or putting books away.”

Nanami smiles wider. “You hate my wrinkle? What else?”

“I hate that you’re so patient, even when people say and do the stupidest things. I hate that you match your sweaters to your mood — light blue for when you received good news, dark blue when you’re tired, and brown for when you’re meeting friends. I hate that I associate blue and yellow to you, and I can’t look up at the sky or the sea without thinking of you. I hate that you’re everywhere I look. I hate, hate, hate, that we might never see each other again.”

He draws closer till you’re craning your neck to look up at him. He’s smiling really hard now. Grinning ear to ear. Hands cradle your cheeks and you let him feel how heated they are, let him brush his thumbs over them. 

“Oh, you poor thing,” he drawls. “You must be overwhelmed with hate.”

You scrunch your nose, even as you lean into his touch. “Yeah, but it comes naturally to me. You drive me insane, you see.”

“Mm,” he hums, thumbs still brushing gently over your cheeks, like he’s committing the shape of you to memory, like he thought he’d never get the chance to touch you again. Not a hint of embarrassment at the fact that his family’s watching shows on his face. He might have forgotten they’re there at all. “Sounds terminal.”

“It is,” you murmur, though your voice wobbles. “I don’t think I’ll recover.”

“That’s unfortunate,” he says. “I think I caught the same thing. Must have gotten it from me. Forgive me.”

The two of you share light laughter. And it’s so easy. It’s as easy as arguing, as reading, as wishing the worst for someone who made you the best. You could spend hours like this. But your parents are waiting, and so are his.

Your hands come up, almost without thinking, settling over his wrists. “I was serious about the not seeing you again thing. I want to see you after this. I don’t—” you shake your head, searching for the words, “—I don’t want that to be how this ends. I don’t want you to just become…a person I used to know.”

“Neither do I,” he says, sure.

“So,” you say, forcing a steadiness you don’t quite feel, “can we try again? Not necessarily to fix everything right now and pretend nothing happened, but just…to meet? Talk properly?”

His answer comes too quickly to be anything but honest: “Yes. Yes, please.”

It almost makes you laugh, how immediate it is. “Okay,” you say, a little breathless. “Okay, good. Then, when are you free?”

That’s when he hesitates. It’s subtle, yet you catch it instantly. He glances back briefly, like he just remembered they existed. “My family’s going on a trip, to celebrate. We’ve got more relatives to visit around the country, and it was planned weeks ago.”

Nanami’s explaining as though he needs to justify any of it, but all you’re thinking is, of course it was. Of course the timing would be like this. Of course you’re too late. 

“Oh,” you repeat, softer this time.

Something in your face must give you away, because his hands tighten slightly against your cheeks. “I’ll come back,” he says, firm now.

You blink. “What?”

“I’ll drive back as soon as I can,” he continues, as though he’s already decided it, as though it’s the most obvious solution in the world. “We won’t leave it like this again. I won’t.”

“Nanami—”

“I mean it,” he insists, quieter but no less intense. “If this is…if this is you giving me a chance, I’m not going to miss it. I’ll come back. We’ll talk. Properly.”

There’s something almost desperate in the way he says it; he’s already mapped it out in his head, already prepared to bend whatever he has to just to make it happen, already rushing through conversations and parties with relatives he’s not even very close to.

You stare at him for a moment, a little stunned. “…You’d do that?”

“Yes.”

No hesitation. None.

A small, disbelieving laugh escapes you. “God, I hate that you’re like this.”

“I know.”

You shake your head, but you’re smiling now, really smiling. “Okay,” you say. “Then… go. Do your family thing.”

“I will,” he says, though he doesn’t move. Not yet.

“And come back,” you add.

“I will.”

A beat.

“…Where are you even going?” you ask, suddenly realising you don’t actually know, realising that if you’re going to do this — whatever this is — you have to ask questions. It’s what girlfriends do, or whatever you are or will be to him. 

For the first time since you started speaking, something unreadable flickers across his face. It’s gone almost as quickly as it appears, smoothed over into something fine.

But not quite as warm.

“Shibuya.”

“Shibuya,” you repeat. “Sounds fun.”

Nanami peers into your eyes before he draws back. Crowds reappear in your peripheral. The noise sets in again, almost deafening. He’s smiling, and so are you. Whatever you wear on your face, he reflects threefold. 

You back away too, back the way you went, back to where your parents are waiting. 

The wind blows between you, carrying petals with them, which swirl around your bodies. 

“I’ll come back,” he promises one last time.

“I’ll see you.”

The house isn’t silent — there’s the faint ticking of a clock somewhere deeper in the house, harmonising with the low hum of appliances in the background — but it’s not full of life, as one would expect from a family with many children. 

Sons. 

Immediately putting to use your training, you try to feel for any otherworldly presence, for something dark, something insidious. 

Nothing.

But that doesn’t necessarily mean this is another false case of paranoia. 

Demons can be tricky. They can obscure themselves from the senses very well, to the point where exorcists even more experienced than you wouldn’t be able to notice them at all. They can hide in plain sight, tricking those around them with a facade of passive harmlessness. 

“Please take me to him.”

They jolt at the command, as though they hadn’t expected you, a woman much younger than them, to be so forward, so commanding. Still, they nod faithfully. 

The two of them lead you down the hallway. Closer to the pictures hanging on the walls now, you see the children mentioned in the file: most of them are older than the Afflicted (or should you say, ‘potentially’ Afflicted’), certainly past living at home. The youngest is a toddler. He must be at school at this hour, or with relatives. 

The Afflicted, on the other hand, is around your age. He should be college aged. Yet, the file states that he lives at home, has no friends, no hobbies, no reason to be out and about. Which is why his parents were so concerned; they cannot fathom where he could have come into contact with a demon. 

That’s not always how it works, you wanted to tell them in your letter correspondence; demons can come to you. But the less they know the better. It wouldn’t help anyway. Not when they’d already made their minds up about what was going on with their son.

Soon, you come face to face with a door. It’s weighed down by thirteen locks. You cock a brow at that. Clinging rings out as the husband fumbles with a busy keychain. With a glance back at you to double-check that you’re really there or to make sure that you’re sure about this, he unlocks each padlock after your confirmatory nod, undos every chain, and loosens all the bindings. 

The door swings open slowly, creaking.

“Please be careful, Sister,” the wife warns, hand reaching out to clutch your elbow. “Forgive me for saying this, but you are small compared to t-that thing. It may overpower you.”

Reassuringly, you place your hand over hers and give her a small smile. “He, Mrs. Kamo.” She blinks. You clarify, “Not ‘thing.’ Not ‘it.’ Your son is still here. It will help to fight off evil forces, if any lingers, if you remember a pure, innocent soul remains, waiting to be saved.”

She nods frantically, pale with guilt or shame or another thing entirely. Her husband places a hand on the small of her back, just as disturbed by all of this. 

You lead the way down the stairs. 

It seems they’ve kept the ‘Afflicted’ in the cellar. If he is indeed possessed, that would have been a good decision — having a vessel freely walking about, when there is a child around, is dangerous. If he is not…

Well.

The bulb above you flickers, buzzing. 

Only when your feet touch the floor do you finally see him. 

A man lying on the bed, fully clothed, with his limbs spread and bound to the bed posts. Lazily, his eyes drag to the staircase, expecting his parents, but not you. He stiffens. 

“A nun?” he says, frowning. “You brought a nun?”

Mr. Kamo snaps, “You do not speak to us, demon!”

The metal restraints clink and clang as he tries to sit up, to no avail. He just groans, banging his head against the pillows and staring up at the ceiling in disbelief. “For the last time, I’m not possessed.”

“That is for me to ascertain,” you say, looking around. “Choso, yes?”

He huffs an affirmative. “Look, Sister, I’m sorry my parents made you come all the way here, but you’re wasting your time. I’m not possessed. I’m fine. Truly.”

You smile at him when your gazes meet. Something flashes in his eyes before he looks away, clearing his throat. Sweetly, you reply, “Even if you aren’t possessed, it is clear you need help. And as a son of our Heavenly Father and a member of our Church, it is my duty to see to it that you get everything you need to continue living a life of faith.”

Your words make him grimace. 

It seems the files are accurate, at least pertaining to one thing: he is not a believer.

The cellar smells faintly of damp concrete and something sharper beneath it. Sweat, maybe, or nerves left too long to settle. The space itself is sparse. A large bed which he lies on, a small table pushed to the side, a bare bulb overhead casting uneven light that leaves corners in shadow, and a thin blanket that covers most of his body.

Setting your bag down on the table, you move with practiced efficiency. 

One by one, you take out what you need — candles placed at intervals, a small vial of holy water, a worn book whose spine has seen years of use. A match strikes. Flame flickers to life. Then another. Warm light begins to bloom across the room, softening its harsh edges. 

A sweet, herbal scent wafts into the air. It overtakes the damp smell. 

“I’m not possessed,” Choso reminds you, frowning harder. He’s watching your every move.

“Silence, demon!” his mother snaps. She turns to you. “Please, can you do something? His evil influence is spreading to his brother; no longer wants to go to church or pray. Soon they’ll take control of the household!”

The file mentioned those symptoms: refusal to partake in prayer, reluctance to attend mass, marking his face and violating God’s temple, disrespect shown to mother and father e.g. talking back and questioning their orders. 

It’s obvious from the file alone that he’s simply being rebellious. Thinking for himself, and choosing to disassociate from a religion, a community, that’s never brought him joy. From their witness reports, it seems like he hadn’t even done any harm. Not harm commonly associated with demonic activity anyway. 

Choso merely displeased them.

You know what kind of people his parents are. Judgmental, controlling, misusing the word of God to spread fear, to subjugate, and showing no kindness in their actions. You see them every day. They come in different shapes, yet their spirit remains the same; damned. 

To have lived under their roof all of his life, to have felt the suffocation, the misery…

It must have been Hell on Earth.

Telling them he is not possessed would not suffice. They already made their minds up. In many ways, you were invited for them, not for their son. But you came for him. And, under your guidance, he will come for you. 

That is what it means to be a servant of God.

“Let us see, shall we?” you say. You open the lid to the vial and spray his body. Most land on his face. 

He hisses.

“See!” both parents yell, hugging each other tightly and backing away from the bed. “Demon!”

Choso grumbles, “It was cold.” 

Biting back a smile, you turn to the two and inform them, “You are right. He is possessed. It appears to be a Grade B demon. Nothing I cannot handle, but certainly not something you can face. So I urge you to leave the house. Go to a neighbour’s. Pray. I will call for you when I am done.”

Their son makes a noise. “What? No. I’m not possessed!”

His voice cracks with indignation, cheeks flushed deep with embarrassment, eyes darting between you and his parents as though searching for someone — anyone — to side with him.

“He lies,” you confirm, urging them out of the room. Then, making a show of praying, you look up and say, “Forgive him, Father. He is not himself.”

Mrs. Kamo nods enthusiastically, shoulders dropping in relief at being proven right as she lets you usher them both out. “Yes, thank you, Sister. Please, save our son. Bring him back to us.”

“Oh, don’t worry. I’ll take very good care of him.”

Your word is law; they cannot and will not argue with a Divine Servant. Their footsteps fade gradually, the front door creaking open and then shutting with a dull thud, followed by the faint murmur of their voices as they retreat further away, leaving the house steeped in a burdensome, expectant quiet.

Finally alone, you return to the cellar and face Choso, who looks less than pleased with you. 

“I’m not possessed,” he repeats, huffing in frustration. “I’m not possessed and you know it.”

Choso Kamo is a handsome young man in a way not many in this town are — lean yet not gangly, tall, exuding a darker energy to him what his brooding exterior and unimpressed eyes. Most of the men his age are pimply, clumsy, arrogant. He’s calmer and simultaneously clearly with a penchant for getting carried away and too excited. 

This’ll be a fun one, you think to yourself.

You come to sit on the bed, right by his hip. He stills and grows even more so, if it was possible, when you pull the blanket off his body. “No, Choso, you’re not possessed. But you’re also not well. A powerful force has taken over you, blinded you, taken you deeper into the dark. But I’m here now. I will save you.”

“There’s nothing wrong with me,” he grits out, growing more and more tired by the constant need to repeat the truth.

Tenderly, you say, “Then explain why you’ve permanently marked your face.”

“It’s a form of self-expression. My body is my own,” he answers haughtily. “No one owns me. That might offend you, Sister, and for that I’m sorry. But I refuse to conform to religious conservatism. And neither should my brothers, especially Yuji.”

You smile. “That doesn’t offend me at all; I’m a firm believer in self-expression.”

Choso rattles his chains as he adjusts on the bed. “I find that hard to believe when you’re wearing a uniform.”

“Oh? You like?” 

The candles you lit waft a sugary scent in the air. It makes your mouth water. Warmer down here now, you shrug your top layer off: a shawl. It reveals your habit. Black, ironed fabric covers most of you. It’s tight around the chest and waist, falling to your ankles, with slits up your both thighs. You feel the heat of his eyes on your breasts. They zero in on the imprint of your hardened nipples. 

“See? A pure soul would not be salivating at the sight of a Sister’s breasts.”

He blanches. Then flushes. Hard. “I-uh-I wasn’t…” he stammers out. 

You hum. “It’s alright.”

Choso’s brows knit together. “It is?”

“Yes. The starved energy inside craves flesh. It craves the softness of a woman’s tits.” 

He flinches, like you’d struck him — he’s never heard anyone be so vulgar, and a nun at that. It must be befuddling him to no end.

“Yes, tits, Choso. It’s not blasphemous to say, and so I can.” Cupping your breasts, you show him how they recoil in your hold, how they pudge when you squeeze. Choso’s mouth falls open, entranced. “It is normal for you to want a woman, for you to desire my body, my tits. Natural and expected, even.”

He can’t take his eyes away from the movement of your own hands, how they dig into your own ample chest, how your nipples poke out even more and he can faintly see the shape of your areola through the thin material, and how you gasp when you graze against the buds by accident, or on purpose. 

“You don’t wear bras?” he wonders aloud, breathless. But then he shakes his head, as though he had heard how dreamy his voice sounded and it was nothing short of humiliating. “N-no. No. I’m fine. There’s no ‘dark energy.’ You’re not needed here if you won’t believe me and convince my parents to let me out of here.” It’s almost like he’s trying to convince himself. He sounds so troubled too. 

Bless his heart.

“If you’re fine and free from any ailments, then explain to me why you’re pitching a tent with your cock.”

Panicked and horrified, Choso’s eyes flit down to his pants. Just as you had said, there’s a noticeable, undeniable bump at his groin. Chains rattle louder when he reflexively pulls his legs up to cover himself. He can’t. He can only lay down helplessly, vulnerable to your judging eyes. 

“I, um…I—Fuck!” he curses, beyond flushed now. He exhales through his nose. “Sorry. Please ignore it. It…It keeps happening. Ever since I stopped taking this tea my mother would give me, that keeps happening to me. It’s not a demon. I looked it up in the library. It’s puberty. It’s hormones. Urges. Biological urges.”

A hand placed on his thigh has him staring at you suspiciously. The muscles under your touch flex. You can tell he really wants to snatch his leg from you, if only because he’s unsure of what your intentions are and what the touch means. Maybe also because no woman has ever touched him there, and it’s frightening.

You nod, smiling. “Yes, you’re right. What you have is an erection. Science explains it as biological urges, yes. But we, at the Church, know it can also be caused by malignant energies.”

“It’s not anything,” he yells. Gritting his teeth, he glares up at the ceiling. “I thought you’d be different. I thought you’d see reason, despite your beliefs. I thought you would actually help me. Even just for a second, I actually believed someone would be on my side, would understand — I’m not a bad person. I’m not possessed. There’s. Nothing. Wrong. With. Me.”

Placing a hand on his chest, you firmly say, “I am on your side, Choso. I do understand. I am here to help. But we do things my way. Open your mind up. Listen and hear me out. I promise, you will soon come to see.”

He’s about to argue. You cut him off. 

Sharp nails walk up his clothed thigh, savouring their sudden tensing. His breath hitches. The moment your fingers touch his erection, his hips jerk. “W-what are you doing?”

“Cleansing you. Purifying your body. You may not be possessed, but that doesn’t mean you aren’t afflicted.”

“A-afflicted?”

The glint in your eyes has him gulping. You vaguely say, “With sin. One of the Cardinals. The worst of the worst.”

You lightly grip the chubby thing. 

“Sister!” he cries out, hips jolting and back arching. 

It’s hot. And big. One of the bigger ones you’ll be facing. Through the layers, you can feel the ridges of his cock. You palm it, watching how his eyes widen before he bites his lips. 

Oh, he must be so confused — all his life, he’s been taught pleasure is bad. Any hint of hedonism and sensuality must be condemned. Yet here you are, a representative of the Church, indulging in debauchery and convincing him it’s alright. How can he possibly tell right from left, up from down, wrong from right now?

“You were caught touching yourself, weren’t you?” you ask though it’s really not a question. “Was it your first time?”

He’s far too focused on the feeling of your hand stroking him to answer. You squeeze too tightly. Choso sucks in a sharp breath. “N-no,” he replies. “It was my, um, second. The -hah- first time, I was too scared by the sensation. I’ve never felt my…my… p-penis like this. I kept obsessing over it, and eventually tried again. I -ngh fuck!- could feel something building and building, and that’s when they caught me.”

“I see,” you hum, continuing to stroke him. “It felt good?”

Choso hesitates for a second. He’s gauging how honest he can be with you; honesty isn’t something commonly practiced in his home, obviously. But you are touching his erection through his pants so maybe you’re to be trusted. He nods. “Yes.” And despite his embarrassment, he adds, “This feels better though. You do it better. Your h-hand feels better.”

A small spot begins forming on his pants, right where his cockhead is hidden. You prod it. The chains rattle. His hips lurch.

“This is evidence of your possession,” you tell him. The glistening of the pad of your finger is all he can see after you bring it up to his face. “Taste your sin, Choso.”

Shaking his head, he tries to avoid your descending finger. “No, p-please. It’s dirty.”

“Yes, yes, it is. But if you complete this step of the ritual, then we can move on to the next, and it’ll taste so much better.”

That seems to entice him. He stops evading your finger, allowing it to rest upon his plump lips, not quite tasting just yet. Choso echoes, “Better? What tastes better?”

You grin mischievously. “Your reward.”

The slightest adjustment of your legs answers his question too — his eyes dart to the slither of skin showing, to the smoothness of your thigh. It’s a sight he’s never been allowed to see. A sight he knows instinctively he wants so badly. He knows if he ventures up your thighs, there’ll be something there waiting for him. 

It’s really a thing of wonder, how biology leads the way. 

Choso keeps staring, watching how candlelight dances on the shininess of your skin. Surrounded by boys all his life, he’s never known an adult’s skin to be so supple-looking. He only knows roughness, coarse hair, calluses, and scars. You promise so much more. 

His lips fall open, whether intentionally or absentmindedly. You dip the sullied finger inside his mouth, encouraging his tongue to reach for the droplet. 

He makes a face that can only be described as disgust when the taste registers. 

You laugh. “It’s salty, isn’t it?”

“I want my reward,” he petulantly grumbles, spitting out your finger.

Not wanting to drag it out any longer, you come to kneel on the bed.

The mattress dips beneath your weight. You cast a shadow over his body with yours. Choso observes every move you make, cautious and suspicious. He’s still not convinced that you’re on his side, that you know what you’re doing. 

Under your short guimpe, you unbutton the top part of your dress. Your breasts springs out, released from their tight constraints. 

“Oh, god,” he breathes out, shocked, appalled, and entranced in one fell swoop. 

This’ll be the first time he’s ever seen bare breasts. And up this close? 

He must be out of his mind, must have hit it on his way down as his father dragged him to the cellar.

As though something’s taken over him, his head lunges forward, attempting to latch onto a nipple. You grip his face, preventing him from making contact. “Behave. To be cleansed by a holy instrument is a blessing. A privilege. You must be patient.”

He blushes. “S-sister, forgive me. I can’t think, c-can’t seem to control myself.”

Massaging your own breasts of their aches, you moan out, “It’s alright. You simply need to give me a second to prepare my instrument.” After a couple seconds, when they’re ready, you bring a tit to his lips. “Here. Drink. My milk will begin the cleansing ritual.”

“Drink?” he repeats, surprised. He spots the opaque liquid dripping from the small holes in your areolas. “Oh, fuck. I can’t, Sister. This is too much. This is…this is bad.”

In moments of crisis, at his absolute lowest, he turns to what is familiar, even if he has never believed his parents’ teachings his entire life. He knows what his body wants, but it’s so new, so sudden, that he cannot comprehend how any of this is possible, how this could be the will of his family, of the Church, of the God you serve. 

But he needn’t worry about anything other than following your instructions. Anything beyond the confines of his cellar is none of his concern now.

Cradling his face, you coo, “I know, Choso. I know. Will you just try, for me? I made all this milk for you and it hurts. It makes my breasts ache, makes them so sore. Don’t you want to help me, to relieve me, to make me feel good?”

Choso follows the wasted droplets, which travel down the curves of your breasts and fall to the bed. He licks his lips. “Help…yes…yes, I want to help. I want to make you feel good.”

“Such a good boy, thank you.” You brush his unruly, raven hair from his face. You lean closer. A nipple’s fed to his parting lips. The moment skin touches skin, he dives forward and sucks you towards him. “Ngh! Choso!”

He’s no longer listening to you — his eyes have rolled to the back of his head, lashes fluttering against your breast. The force in which he’s suckling on your tit has milk rushing out, swirling in his mouth for only a second before they travel down his throat and sink to his stomach where warmth pools. 

Moans after moans mingle together. It feels good. Really good. A mix of relief with exhiliration from his flicking tongue. 

This may be his first time sucking on a woman’s breast in his adulthood, but he’s basically a pro. 

Your hand returns to his clothed cock. 

He grunts, the vibrations piercing your chest and whirring down to your core. 

The small damp spot has grown. Shlick! Shlick! noises resound as you stroke him again. His cock throbs in your grasp in time with the waves of milk oozing out onto his tongue.

“We need to -hngh good, such a good boy- n-need to drain the sin from you,” you tell him. “My milk will purify you from the inside, but you need to be empty. We’ll work hard together, yes, Choso?”

“Mmm,” he hums, not quite processing your words. 

Choso’s hands fight against his restraints; he yearns to touch your breasts, to knead the flesh, to squeeze out more milk, to feel even more of you. It’s driving him wild. 

Juices soak the inside of your thighs, leaving a sticky mess. 

To know that his parents are in the next house — worried sick for their son but trusting you to deliver him to salvation, none the wiser that your pussy’s fluttering in anticipation for the devious ways you were going to put their son through it — has you resisting the urge to just take him right here, right now. To hell with the proper means of purification.

This is truly the best part of your job; misusing lost, confused individuals for your own excitement. 

Your body is for pleasure. That is how you will save humanity from sin, by absorbing all of the dark energy with your cunt, by taking the brunt of their frustrations, and feeding your body the salty ploughing of cocks and pussies in dire need of your holy guidance.

There is no greater Church, no greater sisterhood, no greater cause. 

Unable to take it anymore, you pull away from Choso. 

A whine leaves his lips. “No, Sister, please!” 

Milk drips down his chin, leaving his skin and lips glistening. He cranes to take your breast back into his mouth. The chains don’t let him. He moans, head banging against his pillows. His hips are chasing your hand too, throbbing pushing the material of his pants to their limit as his cock bobs uselessly.

“Oh, Choso,” you mewl, tongue licking over your sharp teeth, “I’m gonna have so much fun with you.”

That’s all the warning he gets before his vision is completely obscured by the black of your habit and the shadow of the apex of your thighs. His surprised groans are muffled by your cunt, which you rub all over his face, smearing the wetness everywhere. 

“Sister,” he moans, tongue immediately slithering all over your pussy — through your slit, over your asshole, prodding your clit, wriggling inside your entrance. “Your smell…your taste…your warmth…I think I might pass out.”

Over his shirt, your fingers flick and pinch his nipples. His back arches. “No, Choso. It’s far too early to be tapping out. There’s still so much to do. Be a good boy and hang in there, alright?”

“Yes, yes, I’ll be good. Mm, I’ll be so good,” he mumbles. As you rock your hips against his face, giving him reprieve to breathe here and there, he desperately says, “Tell me what to do. I-I’ve never done this before. Tell me what I’m supposed to do, please!”

You play with your own tits, spreading the milk over your skin. “Drink. Drink my holy water, Choso. Allow me to cleanse your body with my pussy’s juices.”

Your body’s getting hotter and hotter by the second. His breath’s fanning over your sensitive folds, tickling you. It didn’t even take a beat for him to follow your orders so diligently; he’s sipping your juices eagerly and enthusiastically. You squeal, pleased. 

“Do it, Choso! Lick my pussy!”

His tongue swipes through your soaked, puffy folds, gathering as much of your wetness as he can before he gluttonously swallows. With animalistic ferocity, he feasts on your overflowing juices. Sloppy slurrrrrrpsss! and squeeeeelccch!! reverberate. He’s downright drowning in your taste, in the sweetness and tang, and he can’t get enough — you can see how his tied up hands reach for you, uncaring of the metal digging into his raw skin.

“Ngh! You’re so good at this,” you moan out, riding his face. “If only the others could see you like this, could see how devoted you are to serving God. They’d understand. They’d see. They’d be moved to heavenly pleasure too!”

Choso thrusts his long tongue inside you, scooping out your juices. He probably can’t breathe. He definitely doesn’t care.

Squeezing your tits and imagining it’s his, and Father Nanami’s, digging their fingers in the fat mounds, you hop on his tongue. He’s got a sinful tongue, more so than even Lucifer himself. It wriggles against your spongy walls, curling against a spot he doesn’t realise is deliriously pleasurable for you. He only knows that it’s making your juices flood his face. They flow down his neck, soaking into the sheets. 

“My clit, Choso. Suck my clit,” you beg. He pauses, unsure of what you mean. “The small button here,” you say, grinding your cunt on his nose. You tap the bundle of nerves on the tip of his nose. “Suck here, Choso.”

“More juices will come?” he asks, breathless and sounding so innocent, one would think what you were doing was simply Bible study.

With a hum, you answer, “Yes, baby. So much more juices will come.”

That’s all he needs to hear. Choso wraps his lips around your clit, sucking intently. Your eyes widen. Your back arches into an unnatural bend. Your thighs clamp around his head. “Yes!” you cry out. “Yes! So, so good! Oh, your sinful tongue is driving me insane.”

You bend forward, hurriedly ripping his pants and underwear away with your sharp nails. His long, hard cock springs out. It’s so swollen it looks like it’ll burst with the slightest brush of the wind. The cockhead is so flushed it’s purple, and covered with a sheen of pearlescent cream. 

He already came in his pants.

Yet his cock is raring to go again. 

Good, you think.

Salty, swampy air fills your nose when you press your face to it. His sweat. His cum. His musk. It all shoots straight up to your brain. Your tongue lolls out. 

It’s the prettiest, most delicious looking cock you’ve ever seen. So delectably thick and girthy. It keeps bobbing towards you, booping your nose with its slick tip and leaving a dollop of cum there. 

“W-what are you doing?” he asks again, voice muffled by your cunt. 

Always so edge.

“I’m gonna suck out all the impurities.”

Choso makes an embarrassed sound. “But it’s dirty there, Sister.”

“Then allow me to clean it up with my tongue,” you say. Planting a kiss on the bulbous head, you open your mouth as wide as you can and take as much of him into your mouth as possible. 

“Sister!” he gasps. Beneath you, Choso trembles. His body’s straining against his restraints. His reflexes urge him to grab you, to take control, to wildly thrust in your mouth. But he can’t do anything more than lie here and take whatever you want to give him.

His cock is stretching your jaw to the point of soreness. You persist.

The fullness, the taste, the challenge — you want more. Greedily, you gobble his cock down your throat, reaching the base with experienced ease. You gag, throat clenching around his length. 

“Oh, Sister! It feels so good. Your mouth is -fuck!- so heavenly! Oh, god. Fuck, fuck, fuck!”

Hot cum explodes. 

Choso cries out.

He came so quickly, not that you’re very shocked; it’s his first proper time, after all, and his cock was already so sensitive after he had his accident in his pants from eating you out. You swallow it all, every drop, every spurt. It warms your mouth and throat, settling in your chest. The saltiness stings your throat and your eyes in the very best ways. It’s years of cum that’s been stored in his heavy balls, finally released. 

Spasms wrack his body. The chains rattle so loudly, causing the wood of the bedposts to creak.

Through it all, you keep sucking on his cockhead and tugging on his cock, making sure to get every bit out. 

“What was that?” he asks, so terrified of the phenomenon he’d just experienced.

“An orgasm, Choso. You came. It’s the peak of pleasure, the height of sin, and the purpose of sex. A gift from God. Be grateful.”

At the mention of God, Choso says, sentence punctuated by a sob: “T-this is wrong,” “We shouldn’t do this. I understand now I was wrong, so please, Sister, have mercy!”

The poor thing’s crying. He’s overwhelmed with the religious guilt washing over him. It’s a lot for him to take at once. Perhaps you shouldn’t have started in this position. It’s too late for regrets, however. You simply need to distract him now. 

“Shh, Choso. It’s okay. Trust in me. You are safe.” Rubbing your cunt on his lips, you muffle his cries. The taste of you which seeps onto his tongue halts his tears. As if remembering where he is and what he’s got right in front of him, he hesitantly licks your cunt again. “Thaaaat’s it. Good Choso.”

“You’re so -hah hah- sweet, Sister,” he murmurs between gulps of your wetness. 

“As is God’s will,” you say, shaking your hips. “Just like it’s his will for you to submit to me, Choso. Be not afraid. Listen only to me and your desire. Let it flow out of you. Then and only then will you be saved.”

Desire renewed, he resumes eating your pussy. Hungrily. Like a man absolutely parched. 

Quickly, he builds a rhythm back up — furiously assaulting your cunt with his wet tongue. You moan in time with his monstrous growls. He’s relentless, driven by his need to quell years of repression. “So sweet,” he gasps out in between beastly laps of your cunt. “So, so sweet.”

He slurrrrrrppss! on your clit until your orgasm splashes onto his face. 

“Fuck, Choso!” you squeal. “Yessssssss!”

The man hardly seems to notice you’ve orgasmed. Or perhaps he doesn’t recognise what a woman’s full-body spasms and stuttering hips mean. Your cunt’s swollen and on fire. You crawl away, biting back a smile knowing that the snarl that pierces the air is because he’s not done with your pussy. 

And you’re not done with him either. 

Maneuvering yourself around, you face him. 

Hair a mess, sticking to his forehead with sweat and slick. Skin flushed under his face markings. Choso’s face is slippery with your juices. He doesn’t seem to mind. His eyes are blown out and glazed over. Despite that, he’s honed in on your tits, which heave with your panting. They’re shiny with your milk too. The two of you are positively soaked. 

“W-what’s the next step, Sister?” he asks, voice deepening to something unrecognisable. Guttural. 

You straddle his hips, lifting your habit to show him how your pussy sandwiches his pulsating length. Choso’s hips rise to meet yours, hissing. You say, “You must give in. You must accept God.”

Choso whines, hips chasing the slow grinding of your cunt on his cock. “I can’t. I don’t believe in it, in Him.”

Stabilising yourself on his chest, you hump his cock mindlessly. It’s so stiff, so hot, and rubbing against your clit perfectly with the prominent veins climbing up his length and the bulbous head. “You will,” you tell him. “If you want to -mm- feel what it’s like to be snug -hah- inside my cunt, to be c-cleansed in and out, to be rid of -ngh!- to be rid of sin and free from your parents' control, you will accept Him.”

He tries to resist. His hands grip the metal of his chains. His wrists and palms are pink — raw from his straining. “No, I can’t.”

Although as he says that, you feel him rutting up at you, stretching as high up as he can go with his legs pulled taut. Lewd, sloppy sounds reach your ears like a symphony. Pouting, you swivel your hips around his cockhead. Your clit kisses his tip, digging into the small hole. 

“MmFuck!” He arches his back, and whimpers noisily. He’s panting faster and faster, throwing his head side to side.

“You can, Choso, and you will. For me?” you whine, grinding on his dick quicker and hastier. Pulling his shirt up to see more of his glorious body, you keep it tucked under his chin. “I want to feel you inside me. I want to help you. Don’t you want to join me? Don’t you want to feel good together?”

His cock spurts more cum, a lighter load than the first couple times; his balls can’t keep up with the rate that he’s emptying them. 

Jaw clenching. Sweat darkening his shirt. Veins on his arms popping. Choso writhes, growing dizzier and dizzier with the waves of his sudden orgasm. You keep grinding and grinding as though you want him to cum again so soon.

“No, please!” he sobs, tears streaking down his cheeks. 

“Aw, without me?” You drag your nails down his chest, feeling the stickiness of his cum which has painted his pale skin, splotchy with blood thrumming under the skin. “That’s not very Love Thy Neighbour of you, Choso. I’m so disappointed. You know, maybe you’re right.”

Choso blinks rapidly, tears coating his lashes. “W-what?”

“Maybe you’re right,” you repeat, hips halting. “Maybe you’re not ready to be cleansed. Maybe you’re better off. I have other cases to see; I should probably get going now, I suppose.”

When you make a move to get off him, Choso yanks on his chains so hard the wood threatens to splinter. He stammers, “N-no! No, stay! Please. I’m sorry. I’m ready. I want to be cleansed. I want to feel you. I want you to purify me. Oh god, I want it so bad. Your pussy’s so warm. You taste so good. You’re so pretty. So, so pretty. Please, I’ll be good. I accept, I accept! Do as you please with my unworthy body.”

In spite of the fact that he’s already cummed 3 times, he’s still ready for more, ready for whatever you think he’s worthy. 

What a good puppy.

You clutch him by the base, angling him to your pulsing entrance. “Oh, I will.”

And in he goes. 

The exact second that his cockhead worms itself into your gummy walls, streeeeeeetching your snug entrance, with a loud squeeeeeelchhhhh! he cums again. 

It’s instantaneous. He doesn’t even know it’s happening until your nails are digging into his abdomen and your moans are stuttering. Meanwhile, Choso’s agonised groans are interrupted by mangled blubbering. He’s barely intelligible.

Hot cum fills your pussy. It paints your insides with magma-like drippings. Juices flood out in response, addicted to the soothing burn of his heat. So much cum. Everywhere. You can taste it in the air.

“Congratulations,” you purr, cupping your leaking tits, “you just lost your virginity to me.”

His eyes have rolled to the back of his head. He’s spasming. Shuddering. Shivering. Trembling. His body is no longer his own. It’s a toy for you to work yourself down on. You force your pussy to adjust, to take all of him, inch by inch, until its cockhead is kissing your cervix and your clit is flushed to the coarse hairs at his pelvis, which are drenched in your combined slop. 

“No, no, no, please! It’s too much. I can’t take anymore. I just c-came.”

“Oh, Choso,” you mewl. “I don’t care if you came; I want to again, and I intend to, so keep yourself hard or we’re going to have problems.”

He agrees with some incomprehensible noises. Drool slips out of his mouth. You collect the wetness and rub it on your needy clit as you start bouncing on his still-hard cock. The bed creaks beneath you, wood complaining. Your claws draw long marks on his clammy skin. Goosebumps rise where you lay your claim. 

So much is happening at once. He can’t keep track. It’s like he feels you everywhere — on his face, on his tongue, on his chest, his hands, burrowing inside of him, nestling in the pit of his stomach, clutching his heart and squeezing as tight as your cunt is around his cock.

You’ve taken a lot. He’s ready to sleep, to give in to the exhaustion.

Choso’s softening. 

You growl. “No!”

SMACK!

His eyes widen. Redness blooms on his skin. 

His cock hardens to full mast quick as lightning. You moan in satisfaction, hips grinding down to swallow the growth in his girth and length. He fills you up even better like this. Perfect, you think. He’s no good to you soft. 

“Give me all -hah- your cum,” you command, the pleats of your pussy milking his cock ruthlessly. Another harsh smack! has his hips rutting up, driving him even deeper inside you. 

“Yes,” he chokes out, cheek welting. “Take it all. It’s yours. Every-ngh!-thing!”

SMACK!

SMACK!

SMACK!

He accepts each collision of your soft palm against his face with humble gratitude. Choso’s honoured you’d dirty your hand with him, delirious with the thought that the same heat spreading across his cheek is spreading across your palm, that you’re connected in divine pain, colouring each other ephemerally. You’re a Master deigning to carve him out of flesh and blood, and it’s so wondrous he thinks he’s already died and settled in a corner in Elysium.

The speed and vigour in which you’re fucking up and down on his cock rattles his chains, rocks the bed against the cement wall, and seems to shake the very foundations of the house. 

Earthshattering delight. 

Destructive, undeserving rapture.

Carnal, gluttonous excess of all the joy in the world blossoming from your transcendental pussy. 

You’re a marvellous, mind-melting Monet. A stone-turning marble statue carved by Bernini. A most cursed painting he can’t bear to look at and away from in equal measure. 

Lewd howls and grunts and shrieks pound against all the walls, no doubt seeping through to the outside. Apart from bestial sounds he doesn’t even realise he’s making, Choso’s been driven speechless. All he can hear, see, taste, smell, and feel is you. You’re driving him to heaven and back, and it’s far too much exposure to bliss than he’s worthy. 

“God, yes! Stretch my pussy out! So good, so fucking good!”

Hours must pass. Or maybe mere minutes. 

The muscles in your thighs ache, burning with the exertion. Sweat drips down your back. Your habit sticks to your skin. Your tits bounce with your body, and he can’t seem to take his eyes off them — except for when they’re rolling so far back into his head that his eyes appear perpetually white. 

Choso has been cumming over and over. His orgasms blur into one continuous burst of ecstacy; they start from his balls, rushing through the rest of his body: his sinewy thighs, cramping calves, curling toes, and up his torso, his chest, tickling his hardened nipples from inside, zooming up his tense arms, the veins threatening to pop, to the bruised wrists trapped by shackles, and his whitened knuckles. 

“This is -hah oh god- so, so wrong, Sister,” he cries. “But I don’t care -hngh!- anymore. I’m damned. I was damned when I rebelled. When you walked in and my cock throbbed back to life, and I felt a -fuck, don’t stop- a h-hunger I have never felt before rise in me. I-I knew when you uttered my name so angelically that I would follow you anywhere. God, take me, Sister. Please.”

He feels you everywhere.

And yet it isn’t enough.

Light grows brighter and brighter. It calls for him. Beckoning. 

More. 

More. 

More.

“Sister?” a voice calls out from a distance.

His parents. 

They returned.

Choso stares up at you, distressed and teary-eyed. He doesn’t want to be seen, to be caught. He expects you to stop. But you won’t.

“I-is everything alright? It’s been a while and the noises… We’re worried,” Mrs. Kamo says, hesitant and unable to hide her fear.

Smiling down at her son, you reply, “Mm, yes. The exorcism is -hngh- going perfectly. His powerful demon’s reacting just as e-expected — it’s putting up a fight. Best not to come down —fuck, Choso, you’re doing so good,” you whisper, then shout to his mother, “Don’t come down here.”

“Are you sure?” Mr. Kamo asks. “If you need our help, please—”

“It’s dangerous,” you yell, rolling your eyes. “The Church forbids the untrained to bear witness to an exorcism. Leave now and I will not inform the Father of your mistake.”

Choso knows they can hear his savage growling and groaning, that his shaky whimpers are reaching their ears, and he can’t do a thing about it; your devious cunt’s too powerful, too demanding, too tight. And with every bounce, he cares less and less that he’s sounding like nothing more than a whore. 

His parents can keep listening for all you care. 

They can watch if they want, and they can see how splendorous it is to desire, to sin, to be wrong.

You squeeze milk out of your tit, catching the ounces in your cupped hand. Maintaining eye contact, you slurrrrp! your own milk. He pants like a puppy in summer’s heat. You lean forward, nipples scraping his chest, and it’s an added stimulation he can’t handle. Choso’s eyes cross at the changed angle. 

Lips graze each other. Choso chases them each time you pull away. “Sister, please,” he pleads. “Deem me worthy. I want to be purified with your taste. Make me reborn anew.”

If only he knew you’d deemed him worthy the moment you laid eyes on him.

In a clash of tongue and teeth, you finally allow him to drink your breastmilk from your mouth. He greedily swallows with a pornographic moan, Adam’s apple bobbing with haste. He siphons it all. Relishing the sweetness. Savouring the refreshment. Delighting in his return to a more innocent time. Still wanting more, he licks the droplets from your chin and dives forward, sucking on your tongue. 

Choso drains your tongue like it’s a cock, like you had done to his. He can’t differentiate between the taste of your milk and the taste of your saliva; it’s as delectable to him as the other.

Satisfied, you both melt into a sloppy kiss as your hips ride his restlessly. He must have cum again from that alone. So much semen is squelching out of your cunt, sliding down his length, creating a creamy ring, drenching his pulsing balls and soaking into the sheets. 

You’re both so, so wet with each other’s liquids that your chests slip and slide together. But it’s still not enough. 

He hasn’t stopped yearning to touch you, to grab onto your waist, to hold your hips and guide you up and down his cock, to explore bodily pleasure he’s never been allowed to before.

The chains…

He’s never found them more irritating than now. 

“Fuck!” he roars.

Wood splinters in half. 

Your back’s pushed down to the mattress. Suddenly, your whole vision’s obscured by broad shoulders and a hulking torso. “Choso!” you yelp, surprised by the display of inhuman strength.

Choso rips his shirt off with a frustrated growl. The useless material falls to the floor with a wet splat. His wrists are still adorned with the metal, but the chains are no longer held back by the bed posts. Sweat from his messy hair drops onto your skin; you stick your tongue out to catch as much of the salt as possible.

His cock’s popped out of your cunt. It slides through your puffy pussy lips, rubbing your swollen clit. He doesn’t know. Choso continues thrusting all the same. He’s overwhelmed with the realisation that he can touch you. Groaning, he faceplants right between your breasts. He lays wet kisses there, as though he’s making out with your lips, licking the drying milk on the curves and valley of your breasts. 

“Oh, Sister,” he whispers, breathy. “You’re an angel. A miracle. My salvation.”

Scalding liquid spurts all over your stomach; his cock’s slipped under your thin habit, urged on by the clinging material. In spite of that, he keeps rubbing his dick on your slit and your clit, unrelenting and unsoftening. He can only whine weakly from the pain of having came too many times too soon.

Ankles locking behind his ass, you guide his slippery cock back inside your hungry cunt, which pitifully clenches around nothing. Choso sucks in a sharp breath, feeling the familiar tightness and, like something has been reawakened in him, he hastily ploughs his cock forward.

You scream, back arching. 

Skin slap, fwop! fwop! Fwopping!

With the force of his thrusting, the bed moves an inch.

Mr. Kamo pounds on the cellar door. “Are you alright, Sister?”

“Yes, yes, yes,” you chant, hips working in tandem with Choso’s. “God protects me! His blessing’s filling me up!”

“Sister, purify me,” Choso mutters over and over again. He doesn’t seem to have heard his father at all. He’s tuned them out. It’s just you. 

His mouth’s sucking and kissing where you’ve bared your chest to him before they, like a moth to a flame, find a teat and suckle hard. You feel your milk pulled from your ducts, trickling into his mouth, nipples tugged almost painfully. 

The air is humid. Steamy. Made hefty by the fusing of your tangy, salty, and sweet scents. It’s an addictive concoction. 

Purring in his ear, you say, “Make me cum, Choso. Be a good boy, yes?”

He nods furiously. Straightening up, cool air enveloping you, he grips the backs of your thighs, pushing them towards your chest. Like this, he can see where you’re joined so clearly. His lips part. You know what he’s thinking — he’d only recently discovered his cock and what it can do when uninhibited, and now it’s stretching a woman’s tight pussy out so obscenely. It’s like Christmas came early. 

“I’m not -hah- hurting you, am I, Sister?” he wonders, though as he breathlessly asks that, he’s nudging his cock deeper and deeper inside. It’s clear Choso doesn’t care much for the answer. 

You grin ear to ear. “Not in a way I don’t like.”

The parents must have left; you hear no more from them. Or perhaps you’ve blocked them out. All that matters is the euphoria resonating in your core. How can anything else matter when you’re being stuffed full by a fat cock?

Choso’s ramming it inside irrhythmically. He’s clumsy, only chasing what feels good. But your pussy’s so sensitive from the orgasms you’d been having that you find it all downright blissful. 

“So tight,” he groans out. “You’re so tight. I s-shouldn’t be able to fit inside, and yet you’re sucking me in. I can’t breathe.”

“I know,” you coo, watching his abs contract, beads of sweat travelling down the hard contours of his body. “You’re doing so well for me, Choso. You’re nearly rid of sin, I can see it. Keep going.”

Panting faster and faster, Choso warns you of his next orgasm with a pained whimper. “N-not again!”

But nothing comes. No cream paints your walls. Despite that, he still shudders and digs his callused fingers into the plush of your thighs, certain to leave bruises. Apart from that, there’s no evidence he’d cummed at all. 

You’d manifestly emptied his balls out of every drizzle of cum. All of it is either coating your skin and habit or being absorbed by your spongy walls, replenishing your soul directly.

He’s still prodding that sensitive spot inside that has your chest heaving and your eyes crossing. And every thrust pushes you further and further down the bed. Your head starts to hang over. 

Blood rushes down. 

Tingles exploding behind your eyes. 

Peering up at him, you run your nails over the bump he’s poking through your stomach. He feels it; he throbs at your touch, and again when you press down. Tears are streaking down his face steadily, blurring his vision. “Sister!”

“Do you know what this position is called, Choso?” you quiz him. He shakes his head, biting his lip till it bleeds and red stains his chin. “It’s called, ‘mating press.’ Do you understand? You’re mating me, Choso. You’re fucking a baby inside. Will you take responsibility?”

Choso throws his head back, sobbing. “Yes, yes, Sister! I’ll do what you need me to. I’ll be a good father.”

“Aren’t you sweet?” you say, giggling.

As though enamoured with the thought of planting his seed in your womb, he replaces your hand and gropes his own cock through your belly. He presses down harder. You gasp. The pressure’s intense. You feel every part of him — every ridge, every vein, every pulse, every bullying of his mushroom head scraping his cum out. 

You explode with a scream and a splash!

The rapid clenching of your cunt has Choso barking a plea. 

The two of you spasm together, hips rutting and elongating your orgasm. It’s wet everywhere. Sweat, milk, cum, cream, tears, and blood from his lip and from his nose are mixing together. The heat and the exertion of every energy he had went straight to his head and burst a vessel. 

He falls on top of you, woefully spent. 

Limbs tangle together, limp and exhausted. 

For a while, neither of you moves. The room is quiet save for the slow return of breath, the soft rise and fall of his chest against yours. The frenzy has ebbed, leaving behind a stillness, warm and almost fragile in its calm.

Choso shifts just enough to ease his weight, though he doesn’t pull away. His hand finds yours without thinking, fingers loosely threading together, as if anchoring himself. You let him play with your fingers.

Down here, it’s hard to tell what time it is outside. Is it night, the next day, or has barely any time at all passed? 

Air cools the wetness all over, drying until they cake. His cock’s still inside you, softening. He doesn’t pull out. You don’t ask him to. 

“Am I,” he starts, trying to catch his breath, “cleansed now, Sister?”

Raking your fingers through his hair, you answer, “Yes, Choso. Sin has been rid. You are free.”

Choso hums. There’s a disappointed note there. “So I’ll never see you again? I’ll return to the life my family wants me to live?”

“Not necessarily. You’ve accepted God, in your own way. You can join our religious order, live as we do. You see, I started out just like you — lost, out of place, angry, and with nowhere to release my energy. It is through the Church that I have been liberated from sin, and continue to be. Sin returns, always. So you must be dutiful and ensure you regularly expel it.”

Although his arm is dense with the weight of his chain, he still lifts it and cradles your breast. He tenderly massages it, eyes fixed on the milk that drips out. He licks it. You sigh. Then he asks, “I can do this more often? With you?”

“Uhuh, and with whomever else you’d like. We all owe a duty to each other to help, of course.”

He looks up at you, smiling. “I’d like that very much. Thank you.”

You press a kiss to his forehead, both of his cheeks, and finally his lips. 

“You’re very welcome.”

.

.

.

You breathe fresh air in. 

Dawn has broken, and the world wakes. 

Birds tweet and fly overhead, a distant bell rings, chatter thrum under the wind. You feel lighter than when you arrived, younger, stronger. You always do after a case gone well.

“He’s free now? You’re sure, Sister?” Mrs. Kamo asks again, clasping a rosary in her hands. 

Looking back at the house and the couple seeing you off, you incline your head, and respond with. “Yes. The demon that’s been holding him back is gone. He’s found clarity and peace with himself.”

She smiles, relieved, as does her husband, who nods in gratitude.

Behind them, Choso stands in the doorway. Washed, composed, new. He doesn’t sulk or brood. Doesn’t roll his eyes with rejection and dismissal. He simply folds his hands, quiet and still, as though he’s finally learned where to place them. “Thank you, Sister,” he says softly. “I’ve never felt closer to God.”

The morning light catches on his face, serene, devout. Transformed.

“I’m so glad.” A knowing glint in your eyes is shared. And, like it’s an afterthought, you hand them a brochure from your bag. “The Church holds a training course to join my order, if you’d permit Choso to attend. He can follow in my footsteps and rid the world of sin. At the very least, listen to a lecture and grow even more connected with our community. I think it’d be good for him.”

“Oh,” Mrs. Kamo exhales out excitedly, “yes! Yes, that would be perfect for him. It’d give him a purpose, a calling. Oh, how wonderful!”

Mr. Kamo adds, turning to look at him, “I would be most proud to have a son who’s an active, participating member of the Church, upholding our values and protecting other families from the tragedy we faced.”

Choso smiles. Not at his father, nor his father, but at you. 

“Anything to repay my gratitude and service you,” he says coyly, “and the community, of course.”

If they notice the hidden meanings, they don’t show it. They merely look beyond pleased at the son they’ve always wanted — or rather, think they want. They have no idea that, soon, Choso will leave this house, enter the world as an adult in his own right, and fuck the sin out of the neediest, most desperate women. 

He’ll bring more and more people to the Church, but not using means they’d support. 

For the era of their puritanism is coming to an end. 

And the era of hedonism your race has sown into the world, one drained lustforce at a time, is beginning. 

“I look forward to it,” you say, still tasting his salty cum on your tongue. 

Choso’s eyes drink up your full figure through your habit, flashing red as he licks a forked tongue over his sharp row of teeth. 

“As do I, Sister.”