#icb them

     Shiranui Genma is about to turn sixteen when Gai shows up at his door with a bouquet of flowers easily twice the size of his head. The day is bright, and he’s just finished braiding his little sister’s hair when the knock comes-- she follows him to the door like a curious little monster and titters behind her hand when Genma gets a face full of pollen. He takes the flowers carefully, grinning at Gai over them, and nudges her back into the hallway with his foot. 

     “Rika, go tell Mai I’m gonna head out for a bit--” he tosses over his shoulder, and then reaches out and grabs Gai by the wrist to pull him inside too. “Alright, sure. Date. Let me get these in some water so they don’t die, yeah?” 

     It’s only the work of a few moments to find a vase and get the flowers sorted, and then they’re darting out the window and onto the rooftops. Genma can’t make himself stop laughing-- a date. Like either of them know what a date is. “What’d you have in mind, Gai? Gotta tell you, I think the trout are running this time of year, if you wanna watch ‘em with me?” 

“I feel like this might actually work,” Matt stated, a note of pleasant surprise in his voice as he gestured to their handiwork. “What else do we need, like, a human sacrifice? A goat? I feel like there’s always goats in satanic rituals.” @charliemaeparker​

late nights   .    /   not accepting!

“yes,” a nod coming along like a freight train  :  immediate and certain .  “it would be better .”  and the speed of agreement could make this seem like a matter of indifference  ,  another quip coming from mischief’s throat and dusted with humour  ,  but he means it    /    do you mean me? or do you mean yourself?  he would not know the answer   ,   having barreled himself behind masks and masks and shifts and changes like the bottom of the ocean keeps itself safe through waves covering every inch of it .  he is unpredictable   ,    he is a living trap for a sure thing   ,   he is the waves, the waves, the waves .  a tide has more direction than him   ,   hides less than him   ,   for its way is always the same no matter how much it can change .  but he  ,   the never-ending and shifting fox  ;   a king as flighty as the literal wings that can spring from his back.  (  if you fly  ,  do you ever think about leaving it all away?  about not hitting the ground?  )  she is the only one to wring all his layers out of him   ,    to strip him down to the necessities of his core   ,   of the man he buried so deep he sometimes forgot that part of him is still breathing and alive .  she makes him feel alive beyond the crown and the terror  ,  she makes him feel   ;   period .  and sometimes it scares him a little  ,   how readily he’d give her anything and everything  ,   she would not even need to ask!  how readily he’d lay down anything for her as well   ,   time stopping when she entered a room and rendering any other priority he could have had meaningless in an instant .  she is the sun   ,    the centre of his vision  .    she is the sun  ,   the warmth spreading through him like sugar .  and he can’t get enough of it .