i only want what i can't have
by. Poisoned Scarlett

He only wants sympathy in the form of her crawling into bed with him.

Wes would definitely sit him down for one of his talks if he knew; he would definitely tell him that he needs to stop these meetings. It's self-destructive, it's not right; they'll both come out very hurt from this. He'd tell him that what he needs the most is to distance himself from Maka in order to numb his feelings for her enough to move on. He'd tell him to do it slowly, to keep it lukewarm—let it cool off, let it become cold, let it become ice but Soul cannot do that to Maka.

Maka is too important to him and he isn't unusually cruel. Maka has been let down, ignored, and left behind too many times for him to willingly leave her. He doesn't want to end up as another crossed out name in her heart. He just wants her to be happy because she was the one who helped him be happy, who forced him to look at his ugly jealousy and inferiority complex—to take a good, long look—and realize how he is so much better than that, so wonderful in his own way. She made him realize his fears were just smoke hiding behind a brass-knobbed door. A door he could have opened at any time, a door he hadn't the courage to open until she stood beside him and helped him through it. She was the one who did that. She was the one who took the time to help him when no one else would. She was everything to him and he just wants to return the favour but—

Maybe he is unusually cruel and that's why he's sleeping with her.

What am I doing? This…isn't how it's supposed to be.

Soul shifts until he's lying sideways on the couch and glances down at her. She's cross-legged in front of her television, in a t-shirt and some faded crosshatch pajama pants. Her apartment isn't that big. It's furnished decently and it reminds him of her so much, in everything; in the old cherry wood that gives her home an antique feel, in the cream colored carpet, in the threadbare couch, even in the flowery and dusty aroma, the comforting stack of well-worn books pushed against every empty space of wall. He'd say it's a decent place for one person, perhaps a little too big for her.

He wonders how lonely a person can be in an empty house.

He's lonely in a full house, but he forces those thoughts away to concentrate on the television.

"Soul?"

"Hn?"

"Is everything alright?"

He flicks his eyes down to her and finds her turned towards him, big doe eyes fixed on him with concern. He looks back to the TV before he answers, "Yeah, why?"

"You were acting a little weird at Black Star's party yesterday," Maka says tentatively, putting down her National Geographic magazine. "You hardly hung out with him, even when he asked you to. I was just wondering if you and Black Star had another fight or something." It was rare the times Soul and Black Star fought, but they were not unheard of. If they were annoyed at each other, it just took getting them together for a little while to fix it.

"No. S'cool, just had a stomach ache from eating too much cake," Soul lies and clenches his jaw when Maka doesn't look away from him. Before he can cave under her perceptive gaze, she looks back at the TV. Soul would tell anyone else that Maka would drop it there except he knows her too well to hope for such an outcome. That's why he's not surprised when Black Star ends up barging into his room the next morning with loud declarations of basketball and then some pizza and beer at his place.

"Black Star," Soul growls, slamming his pillow over his head. "Get out! I'm not in the mood!"

"You? Not in the mood for pizza and beer? Dude, you've been hanging out with Maka waaaaay too much! I'm sorry for leaving you with her like that, bro, but when you're done cleaning out your pocket protector, meet me outside, yeah?"

Soul snarls and throws his pillow at Black Star, who catches it with a look of surprise. "Black Star, get the hell out! I'm serious, I'm not in the mood for fuckin' beer and pizza! Maybe next week!" He lies back on his side, glowering at the wall, and it's silent for a second.

"…Hey," Black Star begins, not shouting for once. "I've only seen you this pissed off three times and one of those times had to do with Maka."

"This has nothing to do with her."

"My ass it doesn't."

Soul does not deign to respond.

"What'd she do? Did she finally decide to get herself a boyfriend because you were too slow?" Black Star waits for him to take the bait but he does not rise to it. Maka wasn't kidding when she told him Soul had been off recently. After a second, he sighs and kicks the door closed behind him. "Dude?"

Silence.

"Dude, seriously?"

Soul rolls his own eyes but stays silent.

"Are we seriously gonna' do this?"

Soul snorts derisively.

"Fuck."

Black Star's brow twitches but, before he could lose his temper, he takes a huge breath and says, "Alright, you wanna' know something? I've known Maka since were kids. She's practically my sister—hell, she pounds on me like one. I mean, she's a total nerd and she was a pain in my ass when we were younger, but she never gave up on me. She and Tsubaki. Maka always got on my ass about graduating high school and Tsubaki always calmed me down enough to think things through," Black Star takes seat at the edge of Soul's bed. Soul doesn't move a muscle, staring at his sheets now. "Thing is, Maka doesn't know when to give up. She's worse than me when it comes to losing. S'why we get along—she's tough, like me. She'd do whatever she can to succeed because failure? Man, that shit kills her. You know how broken up she was when Crona got sent to the loony bin?"

"Yeah," Soul finally replies, heaving a sigh. He sits up, ruffling his hair tiredly. He reclines against his headboard. "She was miserable for a while after that."

"Bet you one hundred she still messes herself up inside over it. Thinking like 'if I had done this' or 'if I had only not let her walk home that day'. You know why she hasn't gone over the deep end? Coz you're there to tell her she's screwing up. She doesn't let herself get too far coz if she does, that means leaving you."

"Maka doesn't need me, Black Star. You said it yourself: she's tough," he says, scornfully.

"No, no, you don't get me. You—you, dude, man, Tsubaki explained this better yesterday," Black Star curses. He can't remember her reasoning word for word but he knows it made total sense, he promises. "Arghh! Dammit!" Black Star admits he's not thoughtful enough for any of these deep conversations. The only reason he was attempting was because Tsubaki had pleaded he try with those big blue eyes of hers. Else, he would have totally just left the instant Soul threw his pillow at him. Pep talks were not his thing; fists and a few violent words were. "What the hell does this have'ta do with me?"

"What?"

"C'mon, something happened between you two and I'm involved somehow. Maka said you were pissed at me except we haven't talked in like three weeks coz I was busy so what'd I do now?"

"It's not you."

"Then?! Coz if we don't get out of here like bros, Maka is gonna' beat me up! I have to take my passport photo tomorrow! I can't go with a black eye!"

Soul sighs loudly, looking over at him. He sighs again, even louder this time, and scrubs his face with his hands. He can feel stubble; he hasn't shaved in two days. It won't be long before he's growing out a beard and everyone starts getting on his ass with the grandpa jokes. "I'm sleeping with Maka."

Black Star's eyes widen with glee. "SCORE!" He raises his hand for a high five but his grin falters at Soul's dark look. "She dump you?"

"No, you idiot, I mean, I'm sleeping with Maka and we're not together!"

"…Ohh." He pauses and then looks up at Soul in a new light, jaw tight and eyes dark. "Soul, what are you tryin' to say? That you're playing with her?" He immediately stands up, back rigid. "Soul, you're my best bro and all, but if you're playing her, there won't be shit left when I'm done with you—!"

"No, I'm not playing her! Jesus—we're—she asked me to!" Soul groans at his skeptical look. "I mean, it was supposed to be a stress reliever, alright? She was really stressed lately and wasn't talking to me. She was staying inside all the time, she felt depressed, she sorta'—!"

"Set everyone to the side," Black Star fills in. Yeah, he had been wondering about that slump Maka had fallen into all those months ago. She bounced back, so he hadn't thought much of it, but he didn't think the reason she had bounced back was because of this.

Soul blows out a flat breath. "I was going to talk to her about it when I overheard Liz telling Maka that if she—had sex, it might help a lot. She threw around a lot of health sites, statistics and how the endorphin rush could get rid of her stress. It sounded like a last-resort kinda' thing. Apparently, Maka was in over her head with that law program and she was cracking. She didn't tell me about it, she didn't wanna' burden me with it," Soul adds, reluctantly.

"So Liz said she should sleep with you!" Black Star brightens.

"No," Soul deadpans, sending him a look. "Liz told her hooking up with someone could help and she was joking when she said me or—you or someone else but Maka didn't like the idea at first. I thought she would make Liz drop it, except she kept asking questions—like how to ask for that, the risks, if Liz had done it before, that sort of thing. Long story short, before she could….ask someone else, I mentioned that I'd do anything to help her."

"Sooo anything meaning she asked you if you could sleep with her?" Black Star asks, mind blown. "I didn't think she'd have the balls to ask for that. She always got so squeamish whenever we cracked dirty jokes."

"Black Star, we both know Maka's got bigger balls than either of us," Soul snorts, able to recall at least three instances where Maka's courage outlasted any of their friends. Maka was amazing in more ways than one.

Black Star nods sagely in agreement.

"But it didn't start off that way when we decided on this. We just agreed to…" Soul hesitates here, cocking his head down meaningfully.

Black Star grins wolfishly. "Heh. Eater gets a new meaning, eh?"

"Shut up. It was supposed to stay that way. Except it didn't."

"Okay, so now you're sleeping with Maka, which is pretty sweet for both of you since you've had it out for each other since we were, like, fifteen. But what does this has to do with me?"

"I told you, it doesn't," Sou hunches over, bitter. "It has to do with what Maka'll do after she decides she's done with me coz I can't keep my feelings outta' it."

To his surprise and bitterness, Black Star guffaws. He literally bends over and muffles his cackling in his knuckles, ignoring Soul's steadily mounting ire. "Are you serious—this is what has you in such a bad mood? Oh, man, and here I thought I was a dumbass," Black Star sucks in air, face red from laughter. "Soul, bro, man, amigo," he slings an arm over Soul's shoulder, grinning ear to ear. "Lemme' let you in on a little secret. Maka's like my sister—she basically is. Y'know what older brothers do to little sisters? They nose around their shit and guess who came upon her hiding spot for her diary—or should I say, her poetry books?" He grins wickedly at Soul's wide eyes. His friend had hit jackpot; Soul hasn't seen a trace of her books since they were sixteen or so. "She's got three whole notebooks this thick," he holds out two fingers sizably wide, "full of sappy love poems. Shitty ones, super corny ones, but they've gotten better since high school. They're still kinda' emo but a lot better. One time, I used one of 'em on Tsubaki except she found out it was Maka's and said she'd tell if I didn't stop reading through 'em," he mutters, sourly. "Lame…"

"Black Star," Soul interrupts, swallowing. His stomach is all in knots; it was obnoxious and totally uncool, the hope he felt well up inside of him. He remembers when he first found one of her notebooks, how she'd flushed so red and screeched at him to unhand it immediately; how he'd teased that, what, was she writing sappy poems about him? and she'd whacked him with her book-bag before he could really get a look at her panicked eyes. "What do Maka's poetry books have to do with me?"

Black Star's grin is positively feline. "Coz all her poems? They're about you. All three notebooks worth."

It was really, truly uncool how it felt as if a weight had been lifted off his chest.

"Are you done yet?"

"I just opened the book, Soul!"

"I'm bored," he whines and when he reaches over to grab her waist, Maka pokes her finger to his forehead to hold him back. Her green eyes catch his and they glimmer for a second, Soul wants to say they glimmer with affection, before she's knocking him onto his side.

"Later, I have to finish six chapters of this by tonight."

"Sparknote it."

"Soul!" Maka squawks, appalled.

Soul rolls his eyes. "Maka, c'mon, it's not the end of the world if you sparknote a few chapters."

"My professor would know instantly if I did," Maka sniffs, giving him an affronted look. "There's just some things sparknotes can't give you!"

He gives her a sly look instead. "So you have thought about it."

Maka sputters and he snorts, rolling onto his back and yawning widely for show.

"Amateur," Soul jeers.

"Humph. Slacker," she mumbles before returning to her textbook.

He's comfortable just lying in the same bed as her—he's comfortable anywhere she is, now that he thinks about it. This was a bad idea, Soul thinks as he gazes at the ceiling. He wants to help her; of course he did. He wants her to be happy first and foremost. But he also wants to know how it felt to have her, like this, so close, skin-to-skin with her sobbing his name in his ear as she came, with the knowledge that they were together; an item, a couple, a pair, partners, he didn't care for the term, he just wanted to be able to say it and have her smile when he did. It was both selfish and selfless. Soul stops thinking about it before he can twist it around and guilt himself into cutting this off.

Black Star's words don't help, either.

She's always written those sappy poems, though. Therapeutic or whatever she called it. S'not like it's a secret. I always teased her about 'em when we were younger, Soul thinks, glancing over at Maka. She flips through another page in her book. She had a pencil case and some highlighters out by her hand and every so often, she'd pick a color and highlight something in the text. I didn't think anything about them—I didn't even know she still wrote them. But if she still wrote poetry and her major theme was him, he was very interested in seeing how she saw him.

He wonders if it's the same way he sees her.

Soul watches her take notes in her book for the next two hours while in and out of sleepy thoughts, of wonders as to what she would do if he ran his palm over the curve of her panty-clad ass, if he asked her about her poem book, if he told her he's written some songs about her for class with no one being any wiser. Other times he dozes off beside her, on his side, his boxers hanging low on his hips from their earlier fooling around.

"Is your brother coming home tonight?" Maka asks when he's half-asleep.

"Yeah—'round ten," Soul answers sleepily.

"Why so late?"

"Meeting or somethin'."

"How is he doing? I haven't seen him in a while."

"S'alright," Soul blinks away sleep, glancing over at her. "He's always bringing his work home with him, but it doesn't look like it bugs him. He's the same as you last saw him: annoying and grossly polite."

"Hmmm…still, it must be tough being appointed VP straight out of college," Maka muses.

Soul closes his eyes. "He doesn't mind—Wes'll do anything dad asks."

Maka's eyes are soft and sympathetic.

Soul doesn't want to look at them so he stares at the ceiling again.

"What does your dad think about you majoring in music?"

"Usual," Soul bites back. This was a topic they didn't breach often, but when they did, Maka always got him to talk a little more than last time. "Waste of money. Waste of time. Says I should've gotten into business and my brother shoulda' gotten into music. 'It's all backwards'," Soul mocks his father. "'You can't even read a fuckin' sheet without messing up'."

"You're passing all your classes with high marks, right?" Maka frowns, feeling her heart weigh for him. She always made sure Soul kept up with his grades, always encouraged him when he felt like dropping everything. Despite what he always said, Maka knew Soul valued his father's opinion and it doesn't help that, despite Soul's success, his father remained tight-lipped about everything. "What else does he want? You've already proved yourself!"

"Wes to graduate with the music major, get a record deal like he did when he was twenty three, sell millions, then share the money with the family so we can all retire in Kent," Soul sneers, words drenched in sarcasm. He rolls over, back to her. "Finish your homework. I'ma nap."

"…I'm done!"

He cracks an eye open, brows furrowed. "What—!" He wheezes when she jumps on him unexpectedly, digging her bony knee into his lower back. "Ouch—fuck, Maka, what the hell—Makaaaaa," he whines when she giggles, sitting on his back as he sends her a flat look from beneath his bangs. "You're not done, you liar, don't go putting shit off coz of this. Look, it doesn't matter what he thinks—hasn't, for a while," Soul sighs, gently nudging her off. She refuses to budge and he gives up.

"It's not right," she tells him, stubbornly. Her hands massage his neck gently and he closes his eyes. "You're passing all of your classes and your—all of your professors always tell me how they like your music! They really think you're going to make it somewhere, Soul, they're always so excited!"

Soul perks up at this. "They are?"

"Especially Professor Buttataki!"

"What? No way," Soul frowns. "He's never given me a compliment and the highest grade I've gotten from him is a B."

Maka grins down at him. "He tells me he likes how you're cooperating with others—he might have told me he's thinking about including you in the recital at the end of the semester…if you keep working with them, that is!" Maka squeals when Soul suddenly shoots up, grabbing her around her waist to keep her steady.

"Hey, don't joke about that, the winners get scholarships for grad school and a chance to have our music tried at my uncle's label," Soul warns her. His uncle had expressed interest in his music, but Soul had never dared to show him any of his work. He doesn't want his family pulling some strings to get him signed in; he wants to be signed in because he's actually good.

"I'm not joking! Your professors like talking to me," she pouts. Maka sometimes hung around the music department to wait for Soul after classes and they all knew her by name, somehow. They all had this gleam in their eyes, this quiet smile as they spoke to Soul about her—as they told her she was a good friend for him, they made a good team; she kept his morale up when things got hard, that sort of thing.

Good partners.

"The hell for—professor Buttataki hasn't even seen me with you!"

Maka grins, triumphantly. "Even your professors think I'm the one making you finish your homework! And Kilik may have told them about me," she adds, sheepishly, giggling when Soul growls playfully and pushes her against his bed. This is a perfect chance to crush his lips to hers, slide his tongue between pink lips to swallow her cute mews with his own. Instead, breathing hard, heart swelling with love for her, he lowers his lips down her soft neck in quiet appreciation, shifting so she's propped up on her side and he's leaning over her, pushing her hair out of her face with every open-mouthed kiss he plants on her neck.

He pulls up and sticks his tongue out at her. "You taste like sweat," and chortles when Maka flushes red and screams furiously at him. He's laughing loudly when she pounces on him and they both roll off his bed. "Maka, I was kidding, it's not that bad!"

"You jerk! I took a shower this morning!"

He leers down at her. "Can't tell."

"SOUL!"

"Let's take a shower right now," Soul suggests, abruptly. He can't take it back; it's out there now. He hides his reddening cheeks by sniffing his armpits "I smell—I haven't showered since last night," he grins when she groans about his hygiene. "At least I'm not like Black Star. He goes days without a shower sometimes."

Maka makes a face. "Boys are gross."

"Yeah, yeah." Soul pulls himself up before helping Maka up. He's tugging off his shirt in that boy way of his, lifting it by the sides, up and over his head, when he pauses by the bathroom door. He glances over his shoulder, Maka is standing right where he left her, awkwardly. He cocks his head. "You coming?"

"Y-you really want me to shower with you?" Maka squeaks out.

"Yeah—not like we haven't seen each other naked before, right?" Soul reasons. "I don't see anything wrong with it."

"But, I don't have any spare clothes…"

"You can wear your skirt again and I can loan you a shirt of mine," Soul shrugs. "Or….you can spend the night," he adds coolly, but she catches the way his Adams apple bobs in his throat nervously. She had spent the night over many times though most of those she'd slept in the guest bedroom. Recently, he'd been sharing his bed with her, considering they usually had sex before actually sleeping.

But it was still a weird thought, to be invited to spend the night…so calmly, like this, not just because Maka was too exhausted to leave at night.

"A…alright."

His shoulders relax and he tosses her one of his charming lopsided smiles before turning to his bathroom.

Maka manages to unlock her frozen limbs and tries to push down the urge to smile. "Right. It's just a shower," Maka repeats, more to herself than him. "Just a shower," she gulps, staring at the door he walked through not five seconds ago.

He's already in the stall by the time she undresses and when she closes the bathroom door behind her, the water is running hot and steam pours from the cracked shower door. Maka takes a breath, calming her pounding heart, and slides the glass door open.

Soul's hair looks differently wet—it's longer, falls straight down in a gray sheet. Maka has a hard time looking away from the stream of water running down his strong back, his legs. His shoulders look broader under this foggy light; the sight makes her throat tighter, her chest tight with anxiety and something else—something she dimly recalls as affection, but deeper. By the time she's toeing the water, Soul slicks his hair back and grins mischievously at her.

"What're you waiting for?"

"W-wait—Soul, NO, DON'T YOU DARE!" Maka screeches when he drags her under the shower, her body sliding over his in a desperate attempt to turn up the cold water. She slips and he grips her tightly, laughing into the stream as she roars: "IT'S HOT—HOW CAN YOU SHOWER WITH HOT WATER, SOUL, IT'S PRACTICALLY BOILING!" She reaches for the knob and turns up the cold water, sighing in relief when the water cools but now Soul is clutching her to him in a different way, shivering.

"Fuck, its freezing!"

"No, it's warm!"

"It's freezing, Maka, turn it up!"

"No—ew, get away, all your sweat is rubbing on me!"

Soul makes a grab for the knob, ignoring her protests, and turns up the hot water just a little.

"It's too hot!" Maka grouses, hiding behind him. Soul just rolls his eyes and grins when she jabs her finger into his side.

They come to a compromise after much bickering—slightly warmer than Maka likes, but not scalding—and Soul quiets her grumbles when he squeezes a glob of shampoo into his palm and lathers her hair, ignoring her kitten growls. She takes over soon after and tells him to clean up, too, before they waste any more water. Then it's really just a shower—with her scrubbing herself clean while he brushes his teeth idly, Maka conditioning her hair as Soul scrubs himself clean, Maka shaving her legs while Soul soaks up the warm water.

"You can get out if you're done," Maka tells him, sitting on the tile while he sticks his face under the stream. "I still need my other leg."

"I'm good," is all he says, rubbing his face now.

Her eyes fall down his lean chest, stomach, then down to his limp member—not hard, different than how she usually sees it, and then looks back up at his face. There's a faint smile clinging to his lips and suddenly she's hit with such a strong surge of affection for him that she has to catch her breath. She swallows down her feelings, ignores her pounding heart, and tells herself that she'll dump her fondness for him in her poetry book—just like all the other times, all the other years. She'll write out her feelings and, for a bit, she'll be fine and she can ignore the heartache that comes with being in love with your best friend.

She finishes shaving her second leg and rubs the residue soap off with the light pool of water beneath her. When she tries to get up, a hand appears in front of her. Soul helps her up and presses her closely to him and Maka doesn't have to ask what he wants when he slides an arm around her, fingers clutching her hip, his leg slipping between hers as he leans back against the shower door. His eyes are dark, familiar and heated, and Maka leans against him with a curling smile.

"They're really smooth," he comments idly. She presses her cheek against his chest and lets her freshly shaven legs slide over his a few times. She's sure Soul doesn't shave his chest, but he doesn't have much hair to begin with. He's never really grown out much facial hair, now that she thinks about it, and when she reaches up to touch his cheek, there is only a hint of stubble there—unseen by the eye, unnoticeable unless she touches him or—

Maka doesn't dare move. The shower stream runs behind them, the air thick in her lungs; welcomed, because this is how she feels every time she's with him. Like her lungs can't gasp in enough air. When he gently pulls her hand down to his neck, Maka tenses when he replaces it with her cheek and suddenly she can feel his stubble just as intimately as she can feel his breath in her ear.

"What're you thinking about?" he asks, huskily.

"I—just wondered, how you've never had that much facial hair," Maka swallows when he lets out a puff of laughter. She reddens. "You never have, right? Even now, I didn't notice until I touched your face!"

Only Maka could caress his cheek like that for something as simple as testing out how much stubble he had. Soul's fondness deepens and he cups her ass, heaving her up a little. She can feel his hardening cock slide up her tummy and Maka's loins throb at the sensation, her arms coming up to wrap around his neck. Her leg hooks around his thigh and she shivers, Soul bringing them under the warmth of the stream again.

It's blurry when it happens—trails of water have her blinking often.

He's breathing hard when it happens—the thick, damp air between them makes his breathing shallow, then heavy and loud in his ears.

She tastes the water on his lips first and only hesitates for a second before she stands on her toes and presses her mouth more firmly against his. She has her eyes shut tightly and she's quakes for a different reason, her flushed chest heaving against his, hard nipples rubbing against his chest enough to send a jolt of warmth down to her womb.

His mouth his warm and pliant beneath her lips and it moves against hers gently at first, before they come together harder, faster, and then he's prying her mouth with his tongue and she's eagerly opening it, welcoming him, letting her soft moan vibrate into his chest as he reciprocates and knees her throbbing core.

Maka rocks against his knee, moves an arm down to his lower back to press him closer against her—so that his hard cock slides between them every time she slides against his knee. She feels him twitch and she whispers his name, raking her nails down his back in impatience. He kisses her one last time before he lets her go and her breaths are deep, gasping ones—like she hasn't breathed in hours, like she's drowning. She trembles when he whispers her name against her ear because it's more intimate than what she's used to.

Everything they are doing suddenly seems much too private, sensual in a different way. She trembles when he strokes the hair down her back with an tenderness not usually expressed. Her heart is a knot in her throat, her mouth full of words she can't tell him yet, building, building, and building in her throat until she swallows. She stands on her toes and molds her mouth against his again and hopes for the best.

He takes it—all of her, swallowing the words that have become moans and answering in heady groans of her name that make her toes curl. Maka pulls back suddenly and buries her nose under his chin, eyes wide, blood draining when she realizes they're crossing a different line now—this one is definitely bad, Maka panicks, this was the last line they weren't supposed to cross and yet—

Soul groans her name and nudges down, capturing her mouth with his again.

"W—wait," Maka muffles out, gripping his sides. "Soul!"

"Why?" He murmurs against her lips and she feels the flush reach her chest.

"It's not right," she manages without stuttering and then regrets it when he flinches away from her as if burned. No, that wasn't what I meant! She curses and tightens her arms around him before he can completely let her go. "No—I meant—this complicates things."

"Complicates things how?" His arms remain by his sides.

"We're just friends!" Maka states and it echoes through Soul's spacious bathroom like an omen. Maka hates it. She lets her forehead hit his chest in frustration. She needs to get the words out or else they will never get anywhere and, as much as she's terrified of ruining their friendship, she knows this can't go on—not when she's treating him like her boyfriend, always so eager to drop by his house, to drag him to hers, to sit by him just because they can. She hasn't been treating him like a friend for a long time, even before they initiated this thing between them.

"It's not fair for you," she declares, forlornly. "It hasn't been fair for you for a long time. I'm sorry."

"Wha—what are you talking about, Maka?" Soul finds his voice, utterly confused. "What hasn't been fair?"

"ME—this entire thing!" Maka sighs sharply. "Soul, it hasn't been fair to you since high school! Everyone thought we were dating back then when we weren't!"

"They did?" Soul coughs, looking somewhat guilty because he had an idea of why. He never outright heard those rumors. He just knew that everyone believed there was something going on between them, which there clearly was on his end and it must have showed—even back then. He doesn't want to think about now.

"Yes, and I didn't do anything to stop it," Maka admits, ashamed. Soul's brows scrunch together. "I just encouraged it because I liked being with you but it wasn't fair to you because there were a lot of really nice girls who wanted to be with you but I—if you dated any then you wouldn't hang out with me anymore so…" she looks at the tile guiltily. "I didn't stop it. Even when there were rumors about you…sleeping with some girls, I just made you spend more time with me," she bites her lip, hiding her bitter eyes by pressing her cheek against his collarbone. She might have even hit him more often because of that, Maka thinks with a wince.

"…You were jealous."

"NO, I WASN'T!" Maka immediately defends.

"Ah," he suddenly says, eyes widening a fraction. "I get it." He's gazing at the ceiling tile in wonderment and her face darkens two shades.

"I wasn't j-jealous, I was just…irritated," she defends and he raises his brows in that incredulous manner of his—the one that told her are you serious, Maka, just listen to yourself and Maka glares up at him in challenge, kicking his shin until he got rid of that expression. "I was."

"That's still not being unfair."

"It is. I was being selfish," Maka concludes, dropping her eyes away from him.

"We had choices—both of us," he adds, meaningfully.

Her words feel raw, bitter, like nettles being dug into the tender flesh of her throat when she says, "We should break this off."

"No."

"But—!"

"I don't want to break it off for something as dumb as this," Soul interrupts, holding her again now. He presses their slick bodies together tightly enough that she can feel every time he inhales. "If you were being unfair, then I was being unfair, too. There were a lot of guys who wanted to date you in high school," he tells her with a shrug, eyes decidedly blank. "Even for a huge dork like you, when you joined the drill team, guys started to notice you. They always asked me if I was going out with you since we were always together," Soul looks at her finally. "I never said yes, but I never said no, either."

"You—then the reason everyone thought we were dating was because you were giving everything that idea—!" Maka gasps, emerald eyes rounding.

Soul barely looks repentant. "…Yeah. Oops."

Maka purses her lips, pinching his back.

"Ow—dammit, if you dated any one of those guys, we…you wouldn't have time for my anymore, too! You barely had time with your homework and drill rehearsals," he grouses. "And remembering to eat and all those competitions and then you joined the goddamn Academic Decathlon so I joined when you asked coz we barely hung out anymore... If you had a boyfriend, it'd make it impossible for me to ever talk to you," he argues. "So, we were both being unfair."

"At the same time?"

"Seems like it," Soul shrugs. "Though I would have let you date whoever you wanted in any case. Just…not that easily." He pushes his wet hair back. His neck is warm—pink, she notices, and when she looks up, it's because his face is warm, too. "I just want you to be happy."

There's a flash of guilt on her face after he says that and it's not what he wants—he doesn't want her to turn this on herself, to confuse selflessness with his love for her, but he only manages to say her name before there's a knock on his bathroom door.

"Hey, Soul," Wes shouts, "Stop singing about Maka and tell me what topping you want on the pizza! And if you want hot wings or not!"

"I'm not SINGING," Soul snaps.

"What toppings?"

"Uh, pepperoni and, crap what's that called…Maka? The green things?" He whispers, looking down at her expectantly.

"Green peppers," Maka deadpans. Really, where would he be without her? She thinks, ruefully.

"And green peppers!" Soul echoes. "And two orders of hot wings!"

"Alright—hurry up, would you, I wanted to discuss some vacation options. Mother wants to go on another family excursion—you can probably bring Maka if you ask nicely, I know how sad you get when she's not with you for more than a week," Wes chuckles and Soul wants to strangle his idiot brother. This is not the time to bring her up, not when he has her naked body hugged to him and her inquisitive green eyes boring holes into him.

"I'm gonna' punch you, Wes, just go!" Soul growls and only when his bedroom door shuts does Soul slump against the shower door, scowling as he reminds himself to punch his brother before the night is over. "Ma—!"

"Let's get dressed," Maka says instead. He lets her go and regrets not ignoring his brother. He really hopes this doesn't mess up what they were on the brink of. "You know how Wes is. He'll come back if we take long."

He opens his mouth, but instead sighs.

Soul lets her use his towel and he peeks out of the bathroom before walking to his closet for a spare. Maka stays in the bathroom while he towels off outside and by the time Maka comes out, towel wrapped tightly around her slim body, Soul is already in boxer briefs and is tugging a black t-shirt over his head. He hesitates when she sits on the edge of his bed.

"Uh…are you staying or…"

Maka stiffens. "Maybe I should go," she mumbles. "It sounds like your brother needs to talk to you for a while. I can go out the back if you want."

But he doesn't want that. He doesn't want her to sneak out of his house like a dirty secret. He wants her to walk down the stairwell beside him, for his brother to greet her with that model smile of his before saying something uncalled for—for her to giggle and he to growl and Wes to smile as if nothing were wrong. He wants her to be part of his family, not excluded, and the only way to do that is to bring it all back again.

"Quit blaming yourself, you didn't do anything wrong," Soul tells her, holding her gaze when she looks up.

"You're my best friend and I've basically kept you all to myself!" Maka insists, like that's a bad thing.

"Maka, we both had choices," he repeats, placidly. "I wanted to be with you. Do you seriously think I would have stayed if I didn't want to?"

She parts her lips, then closes them. He's right; he's never really been keen on bending his back for others, much less people he didn't care for. If he really didn't want to be with her, she knows he would have made it known very clearly.

"Y'know better than anyone that if I don't want to be there, I won't." His eyes are light and it makes her heart pound. They read her mind in that way he does sometimes. "I like being with you and you can't be unfair to someone who likes being with you."

He's right again. He does like being with her, but—Maka's eyes widen.

"Do you know why I like being with you so much?" Soul asks, softly.

Maka looks up, doe-eyed. "B…because I'm your best friend?" The look on her face tells him that she knows better. He reaches for one of his softer sleep shirts before he answers:

"Black Star's my best friend, too."

"I'm your real best friend," she clarifies and he grins a little.

"Don't let him hear that." He walks over and hands her his shirt. Maka takes it, fisting it in her hands. "Do you?" He asks again.

Maka nods rapidly instead and smothers his shirt over her mouth when he bends over, leveling their eyes. His lips quirk into a smile and when he draws closer, Maka grumbles his name in warning and her hairline is red. Soul grins and he grabs her wrist, tugging it down, but she just mushes her face against his shirt to hide her huge, dumb—

"You're smiling," Soul teases, pressing their foreheads together and pulling both her arms down from her face. She growls his name. He slips a hand under her chin. Her growl isn't very convincing, not when her voice wavers like that, and once he manages to pull his shirt from her face, his cold cheek cools her red one and then his lips are on hers and she's muffling his name out between them.

Their kisses are chaste but her cheeks remain red. He smiles, kneeling in front of her and pulling her down to meet his lips properly. He's massaging the space under her breast when the door opens.

"Soul, are—!" Wes stares and Maka screams, kicking Soul away and tightening the towel around her body protectively.

"Dammit, Wes, WHY CAN'T YOU KNOCK?" Soul snarls, sending Wes a vicious glare that does nothing to diminish his brother's bright smile.

"Makaaaa!" he greets, absolutely delighted. "You're—!" Wes looks her over quickly. That was most definitely his brother's towel and her hair was most definitely wet. So Soul had not, after all, been talking to himself in the shower. "—not decent. I'll leave." He slams the door shut and Soul buries his face in his palms because now his brother will truly, really, never let him live this down. He got enough crap about his obnoxious mustard yellow shoes and varsity jacket from middle school.

Wes doesn't know how to let his teenage self live down awful fashion choices.

"Soul?" Maka prods his foot with her toe and when he looks up flatly, she's slipped on his shirt and was tugging it down her thighs to no avail. It keeps scrunching back up. Her breasts peak clearly and he glances over the pile of clothes at the corner of his bed. But first, pants.

"You can use these," Soul crawls back a little and digs around one of his lower cubbies for some of his looser boxer shorts. He decides on some dark gray ones and Maka slips them on as she's walking towards him, holding out her hand like he did to her in the shower.

"Are you still staying?" he asks, hesitantly. He keeps his distance even though he'd rather be holding her.

"Yeah!" and she smiles timidly when Soul grins down at her. He pokes her breast teasingly, murmuring against her temple, "I don't mind, but Wes expected us downstairs a minute ago," and she slaps his hand away with a huff before grabbing her bra.

"SOUL! MAKA! PIZZA'S HERE!" comes Wes' voices from, blessedly, downstairs.

He looks over his shoulder expectantly and Maka hurries over, pausing only to grab his wrist in order to lead him along. The door slams a little louder than necessary and if he muffled his dumb grin in the back of her shoulder, no one is any wiser as they walk downstairs and find Wes placing the final cup on the dining table.

"Good evening, Maka," Wes greets her, same as always. There isn't anything that tells her he had walked in on his brother and his best friend locking lips. "Soul—ahah, haven't eaten yet, huh?" He grins when Soul immediately grabs four slices in one go.

"Not since noon," he manages around a mouthful of pizza.

Wes sighs. "Another habit you must curb. Eat properly, Soul, it's good for your health!"

Soul doesn't reply, only eats more.

"Also, mother can't know about the pizza—she wants us to cut back on calories, so that means you better finish all of it!" Wes warns, handing Maka two slices. He just smiles blithely at her embarrassed thanks. "I haven't seen you in a while. How are your classes going, Maka?"

"Good," Maka answers, too quickly. She takes a breath and adds in a calmer tone, "If I pass my midterms, I can't fail any of my classes, basically. The midterm is graded higher than the final."

"I'm sure you did great."

"I bet a B," Soul quips and dodges her kick.

"If we're placing bets then I bet you got a C for Buttataki," Wes smirks.

Soul sends his brother a sour look. "Uncool, I'd be lucky if I get a B. He needs to loosen up."

"It's university—he's setting a standard," Maka argues.

"Too high," Soul grumps, pushing his cup of soda to Maka while Wes fills another. "Thanks."

Wes just smiles crookedly. It's when Maka's shoulders lose their tension and Soul is on his fifth hot wing that Wes drops the bomb: "So how long have you two been dating? I had no idea. Literally no idea," he accuses in that dangerous, cheerful way of his.

"Er—!" Soul swallows thickly, side-glancing Maka hastily. "We…about that—!"

"We're not dating," Maka answers for him. Her ears feel warm; Wes' curious cock of his head isn't helping.

"I'm quite certain that was you in the shower with him—that doesn't happen overnight," Wes presses, right again. Maka's sputtering doesn't convince otherwise and Soul is glowering at him in that dangerous way of his. "I'm just curious because, while I have noticed that you have been coming over more frequently than usual, there was nothing else to signal any sort of change between you two!" He sighs dramatically. "Unless you're not dating and you're just fooling around behind our backs like teenagers. In which case, I heavily disapprove…"

Maka's hangs her head guiltily.

"…because Soul, Maka's the perfect addition to our family, why would you take such a roundabout way of introducing her to Mother and Father as your girlfriend?" Wes finishes, pretending not notice Maka's sharp intake of breath and Soul's long-suffering groan of his name. "Mother loves her already! How could you do that to her? All she wants is for one of us to tie the knot—do it, Soul, ask Maka right now!" Wes demands mock-serious, taking the box of pizza out of Soul's reach. "Ask her so I can tell Mother and she can leave me alone for another year!"

"You bastard," Soul's brow twitches, catching onto his prank fairly quick. "You just wanna' get out of getting hitched! Again!"

Wes only smirks. "I'm not ready for that type of commitment. You, on the other hand, have been for a while," he steals a glance at Maka, his smile widening when he finds her gazing up at her brother with wondrous eyes. His face becomes a little more serious. "But will you? This isn't short-term, is it? You've been friends for…quite a long time."

Soul tenses, wanting to say no but not wanting to put words in Maka's mouth. He looks down at her unsurely. "We haven't talked about it. Can we do this later?" Soul decides abruptly, not about to deal with his brother acting as a mediator again. Wes should have gone into therapy than business.

Thankfully, his brother isn't entirely cruel and takes a hint. "Oh, sure. I was just saying because you two have known each other a while and, well, you look good together. You work well together," he smiles at them both genuinely. "I really like Maka, and so does Mother."

"Yeah…" Soul trails off into a mumble, grabbing more pizza so he didn't have to talk. Maka feels closer than usual by his side and, when Wes is fiddling on his phone, he risks a glance at her. Her green eyes meet his instantly and he looks away, face hot, and feels her inch a little closer to him. Despite his racing heart, her proximity eases him.

The rest of their dinner is spent like all other dinners between the brothers and Maka: Wes aggravates Soul to the point of retaliation and then it's a game of chicken that neither back down from—at least until Soul brings up Wes' encounter with an actual chicken when they were younger, wherein Wes instantly folds and give him a chilling smile that has Soul smirking but wisely quiet.

"I'm going to stay up a little longer," Wes yawns a while later, taking an empty hot wings and pizza box with him. "I'll be in the office if either of you need me. Maka's staying the night, right?" Not that he needs to ask: by the way she's dressed, it's obvious.

"Yeah—she's staying with me," is all Soul says, handing him the second empty box of hot wings. He's finishing the last wing when Wes walks back into the dining room, having gotten rid of all pizza-related evidence.

"Soul, if you hear the phone ring, don't answer it," Wes tells him with a weary look. "It's Father."

Soul makes a face. "What's he want so late?"

"The results of my first committee meeting," Wes exhales. "It went better than I expected, but I'm sure Father will be disappointed by the results. I still haven't finished crafting an excuse."

Soul shrugs.

"Not like Soul will hear it, anyway, he sleeps like the dead," Maka rolls her eyes, patting his shoulder as she heads towards the lobby, Soul in tow.

"But if he does…"

"Don't answer," Soul yawns. "Got it."

"Excellent! Good night you two!" Wes waves, taking the stairs by two and disappearing down the hall by the time they make it to the second flight. Soul runs ahead to his room to take the bathroom first, not about to commit the same mistake he did when Maka first stayed over. She took forever in the bathroom and it was only because she took her sweet time. He has his teeth brushed and mouth washed when Maka barely grabs the tube of toothpaste, done with whatever else had been occupying her.

And it's normal—it's so usual. They fall back into a familiar pattern, comfort, and when Soul is lying on his back, his bed doesn't feel as big as before. His room doesn't feel like a field, cold and empty and silent. It feels right, fitting, and every other word he can think of to mean home and by the time Maka shuffles out of the bathroom, he decides he's not going to let this slip from his grasp—not like before, not when things look like they're going to go right for him for once.

"I'll take this!"

Soul watches her snatch his pillow, probably because it was the softest. He lets out a small puff of laughter at her childishness before he turns his head back forward. He can't think of a way to really ask her? He's not sure how to go about it, he has never been very good with words. He's better with music and he can think of sixteen songs in that instant that would convey how much he can't picture himself without her, can think of all those pages where he has written her into his music without her knowing.

And then he knows how—knows how to ask her, the perfect way to ask her. It's been a thought that has floated around his mind for a while now, never quite taking off, but always there. And what better way, he wonders, than to take that step with her?

"Hey," he rasps, clearing his throat.

"Yeah?" Maka pauses, hand poised to flick off the light.

"I've been thinking about moving outta' here," he says, not giving her time to reply. "A friend of my mom told me he'd rent me a one-bedroom five minutes from U of D and I was thinking about working part-time at that jazz café down the block...""

There's a beat of silence.

"Wanna' room with me?"

The lights flick off and Soul is left staring at darkness—and for a split second panic envelops him and he's thinking of all the ways he could have asked her to be with him without it sounding so permanent, so scary, so downright idiotic—but then he feels her fingers touch for him hesitantly, then more confidently, and then she's crawling over him and resting her cheek against his chest and hooking her ankle under his knee as she cuddles into him like she's done this a thousand times.

"I'll pay half the rent," Maka says, suddenly. Soul's breathing stutters. "And we split the chores evenly, so one week you do laundry, another week I do laundry. Same with dishes, cleaning, cooking and everything—and, no, you can't invite Black Star to play video games with you unless Tsubaki is there to control him because if he breaks anything, I'll punch him and you!"

Soul grins widely and he's suddenly very, very relieved for the darkness. "If it's gonna' be like that, then your dad's not allowed twenty feet of the apartment, he'll fucking gut me when he finds out."

Maka muffles a laugh in his chest and he can feel her nose nuzzling down his collarbone and then she crawls forward a little more and he can feel her lips on his chin and he wraps his arms tightly around her back, hitching her forward so their lips meet properly—deeply, then deeper still until Soul is rubbing his palm up the arch of her back and Maka anchors her ankles under his legs, her hips grinding against him until he's a panting, whimpering, mess.

She grabs his shirt, pulls him up so he's resting on is elbows, and kisses him again, soundly, unlike she has ever done before, and before he can lose himself in Maka's heady, wet kiss—she pulls back just enough to shakily exhale his name, and only then is he aware that she's just as nervous about this proposition as he is.

"Can we be together?" He asks, sucking in a breath when she bucks her hips particularly hard against his. He pulls her down closer to him, groaning into the hollow of her neck. He wonders if this entire thing counts as a proposal—and figures no, it doesn't, not really, because Maka doesn't like the idea of marriage and he doesn't care a single bit about it. He decides he's just being honest.

"I thought we already were, idiot." He feels her hot cheeks against his shoulder and the way she holds him tells him she heard him loud and clear. "We can work out the details about the apartment tomorrow. Go to sleep, it's what your brother will least expect."

He smirks. "Ten bucks he'll barge in in half an hour because he suddenly 'remembered' something."

"One hour," she bets and he settles on his side with Maka curled comfortably against him and the quiet relief that they were lucky enough to be the ones to only need each other for happiness.

A/N: All these other resbang fics have all this intricate plot and I just sorta' have this slice-of-life PWP fic to offer you guys! I hope you all liked it either way! Considering this fic was submitted for Resbang 2014, you can find naughty, naughty art for this fic by orangeblossomtea and calinyh on Tumblr! Check it out if you have some time, they're amazing artists!

Til next time!

Scar.