Disclaimer: Don't own Saiyuki, or else there'd be a lot more lovin' goin' on between these boys.
A/N: A huge thanks to Befanini, who won me over to the magnificence of this deviant couple, and who beta'd this fic for me. This fic's for you, babe!
Intimacy
"Listen, dude, if you've got nothin' left to ante, I'm gonna split. A lot of ladies are gonna be cryin' if I don't get my beauty sleep."
"Hold yer horses," the guy across the table slurred drunkenly, going through all his pockets over and over, as if expecting money to magically appear in one of them, "I'll ante, I'll ante, I'll . . ." and promptly fell onto the table, snoring uproariously.
"Sorry, dude. Write it off as a loss and go home," He grinned, scooping the money into his wallet, pushed the guy's deck back toward his drooling face, and whistled his way out the bar and into the hotel's main lobby. He quieted and looked up the long staircase, a smirk growing on his face. 'The ladies might cry if I don't get some sleep,' he thought to himself, 'But there's a certain hage bouzu that's gonna be pissed as hell that I made him wait this long.' Gojyo made his velvet-footed way up the stairs, in the way that only one practiced in the way of sneaking up dark, secret stairways can do. Only usually it was the boyfriend's/husband's/big brother's/dad's shotgun he was avoiding; this time, it was the shotgun of the "fair maiden" himself that kept him quiet.
He passed a room that seemed almost alive with the reverberation of snores—that would be Goku's room. One silent as a tomb—that would be his own. He walked past it and the next—a soft "kyu" denoted that room as Hakkai's—until he came to the next door, silent as his own room had been. This room belonged to "his holiness" Genjyo Sanzo.
Gojyo produced a key from his pocket, easily charmed away from the little thing at the front desk, and quietly, oh so quietly, turned it in the lock. The quiet click seemed to echo down the empty hallway, as even the smallest sound seemed to do at this time of night, but Gojyo knew no one would notice it. He let himself in, closing the door quietly, oh so quietly, behind him. He looked into the room, his eyes greedily grasping at whatever vision awaited him.
Genjyo Sanzo never even looked away from his contemplation of the street below—he didn't flinch at the small sound of the latch fitting itself into the doorjamb. He didn't stir from his place on the window seat, his robes undone to the waist, one leg hanging into the room, a bare foot brushing the floor, the other leg bent to allow a heart-breakingly pale arm rest on its knee, a half-gone cigarette dangling from his disinterested fingers. Again, without looking away from whatever still object had caught his attention, he brought the ever-present cancer stick to his lips and breathed deep, exhaling the smoke to form a twisted sort of halo around him.
Gojyo knew the game, but he also knew that he had to be incredibly careful with this one. Try any of the usual moves with Sanzo, and all you were going to get was a bullet flying past your head, a smack with the harisen, and an immediate dismissal. Gojyo slid off his shoes, knowing full well that Sanzo saw him, and started padding predatorily toward his target on the window seat.
Sanzo simply took another long drag on his cigarette. Normally, Gojyo would have been frustrated by this supposed lack of attention, but he knew this was part of the game he played with Sanzo, the game that made Sanzo invariably more interesting than whatever girl—or, on rare occasions, guy—he could have picked up at the bar. Even getting into his room was a challenge. Sanzo would never give him a key, much less a spoken invitation, but Gojyo knew the priest would be pissed as hell if he didn't show up. It was Gojyo's job to find a key for himself. Any sort of flirtation outside this room was bound to earn him a kick under the table, a smack with the harisen, or a bullet flying past his head. If Sanzo so much as caught Gojyo looking at him, it would be met with punishment, 'And not the good kind, either,' thought Gojyo, working to keep the thought from showing on his face.
He reached the window seat and did not pause—hesitation was a weakness, and weakness would not be tolerated—before he leaned down, propping one hand on the wall beside Sanzo, his lips descending to a place just below the blond's ear. Just a soft touch, but, though Sanzo had not actually moved, Gojyo felt the skin under him jump, and as he kissed his way down, felt the blood racing underneath it. 'Moonlight,' Gojyo thought, when the turtleneck impeded his progress and he had to work his way back up to Sanzo's jaw, 'Goku calls him the sun, but his skin is like moonlight.' If he weren't beginning to feel that need growing and coiling inside him, he would have laughed aloud at his own thoughts.
During this onslaught, Sanzo kept completely still, not a gasp, not a sound, not a twitch or even the closing of his eyes. He kept completely still, his eyes still trained on some indefinable thing below them. Gojyo didn't let this stop him from brushing his golden hair aside and placing a soft kiss on his temple. But, instead of the response which Gojyo fully expected—though slow as usual in its coming—he only got a few words, in a voice that still managed to stay calm, cool, and untouched.
"What are you doing?"
Gojyo rolled his eyes, "What do you think? Or do you really need to explain the mechanics of it? Would you," Gojyo let his hand drift down in a way that made Sanzo's skin dance under his fingertips, " . . .like me to tell you?"
Sanzo calmly put out his cigarette in an ashtray that he'd been sensible enough to place on the windowsill. "Get out."
Gojyo started. That was unexpected. Granted, most of the things that Sanzo did were unexpected, that was the trait that had attracted Gojyo here in the first place, but that didn't mean he always catered to Sanzo's every whim. "Why?"
Sanzo still hadn't looked at him, "Because you're an idiot."
Gojyo made a disbelieving noise in his throat, "And why exactly am I an idiot, oh great Genjyo Sanzo?"
"Because you're afraid."
"What, of you?" Gojyo didn't care about risking the gun right now; he wasn't going to put up with this kind of abuse, "Why the hell would I be afraid of a cantankerous old baldy monk?"
Sanzo didn't even bother to address the insult; he just firmly, harshly, pushed Gojyo away and finally, finally, turned his head to face the angry redhead. "You push physical intimacy on people because you can't stand," his violet eyes bored into the crimson ones just a few feet away, "the thought of real intimacy."
Gojyo was in complete shock, not just at the words, which had yet to sink in, but at the look Sanzo was giving him. He had never, never, been looked at that way. It was a look that put the most lust-filled gaze and the most furious glare to shame. Gojyo couldn't even say what kind of look it was, only that it felt like it was burning him from the inside out. He felt like a piece of paper in a fireplace, like he was going to burn until only the lightest, frailest shell would be left, thin as a shed snake-skin, blowing away in the wind. And yet the stare was so intense that he could not think of trying to break away.
'This is him. This is what he's like all the time. How can he stand it? How can he keep from burning himself up?' Gojyo managed to think.
It was Sanzo who finally turned the gaze away; the burning light put away, his eyes turned back to blank contemplation of the street below. Gojyo realized that he had stopped breathing and quickly refilled his lungs with air. He had to do so a few times before the full meaning of Sanzo's words hit him.
"Like you're any better, you emotionally-constipated libido-phobe!"
"Ch," Sanzo pulled his other leg up onto the windowsill with the first, tucking his right foot behind his left heel. "At least when I don't want to be close to people I have the sense to stay away."
Anger thudded in Gojyo's ears, "Then why didn't you just tell me to go the first night?"
Silence reigned in the room for a good thirty seconds. Sanzo simply answered the same way he had before, "Get out."
"No. No, I don't think so," Gojyo stormed back to Sanzo—quietly of course—grabbing his chin roughly and making him look at him again, a move that he would not have dared five minutes before. "You want intimacy?"
"I want you out," Sanzo answered, pulling the banishing gun out of his robes and pointing it at Gojyo's forehead.
"Oh, you're gonna shoot me now? Go ahead, Sanzo. Shoot me," Gojyo taunted. Because he'd just figured something out. As much as Sanzo hated to be out of control, or to feel inferior to anyone, he would never agree to associate with someone that he thought was weaker than himself. As much as he worked to be someone that no one would trifle with, he couldn't stand to be around people that were too frightened to trifle with him. Well, okay, he hadn't really figured that out; but right now he was just too pissed to worry about getting shot.
They stayed frozen in that attitude for a long time, Gojyo leaning over Sanzo, the monk's chin held in one hand, Sanzo sitting on the window seat, Smith 'N Wesson cocked and pointed at Gojyo's forehead, poised to give him a chakra of his own. Gojyo looked down at Sanzo's face, and saw those violet eyes burning with a fury that would have frightened him off, had he not seen what those eyes were really capable of just moments before. They got a different reaction from him now.
He kissed him.
The tip of the gun pressed dangerously against his forehead for a moment, but soon the safety clicked back on and the gun fell to the cushioned window seat. One of Sanzo's hands came up to the back of Gojyo's head, pulling him closer. The hand that had been holding Sanzo's chin moved back and traced obscure designs, words of a universally understood language, across one cheek and down the blond's neck. When his fingers brushed the edge of the turtleneck, he pulled it down impatiently, his lips following, his tongue leaving his mouth and sliding down where his lips could not reach. Sanzo growled impatiently and pulled Gojyo roughly back to his own mouth, his tongue demanding entrance. Gojyo allowed it, much slower than Sanzo would have liked, and when Sanzo tried to push the kiss hard and fast, Gojyo refused to meet his pace.
"What the hell—?" Sanzo broke off.
"You wanted intimate, you're getting it," Gojyo answered, trying to keep Sanzo's hand from going back toward the gun, "We're not making this a quick fuck. Let me show you . . ." His lips began again the slow, soft kisses, "how it can be."
"Infuriating son of a—" Sanzo's explicative was cut off when Gojyo's mouth opened over his, a tongue snaking between their lips and into Sanzo's mouth. Gojyo's tongue explored the space, running his tongue over every inch he could find, his hands cradling Sanzo's face, secure now that he could feel both of Sanzo's hands on his own head, pulling him so close that he was convinced Sanzo wanted to pull Gojyo completely inside him.
Gojyo groaned and pulled Sanzo up against him, not thinking or really caring how Sanzo was going to get his balance. Indeed, they almost did fall on the floor right then, but Sanzo soon righted himself, probably more out of a stubbornness not to separate his lips from Gojyo's than anything else. His hands, which had fallen to Gojyo's shoulders to help him regain his balance, now pulled at his jacket. Gojyo dropped his hands and allowed the jacket to be pulled off his arms, but Sanzo, unsatisfied, immediately went for the hem of his shirt, running his hands up under it.
"Now who's . . ." Gojyo said against Sanzo's lips, "pushing physical intimacy?"
"I can still reach the gun, erogappa."
Gojyo immediately spun them around, "No you can't."
"Baka . . ." Sanzo growled, still tugging at Gojyo's shirt, "Get this thing off!"
Gojyo chuckled a little, but he reluctantly left Sanzo's lips long enough to pull the shirt over his head. They returned to the kiss as soon as the garment was discarded, thrown to some far corner of the room. Gojyo again left Sanzo's mouth, kissing his shoulder and taking one hand in both of his, tugging the silver ring loose and slowly pulling the glove off, bathing each new inch of skin with his lips and tongue as it was revealed. He turned to the other side and did the same, making Sanzo squirm when he used his tongue to trail the veins on his forearms, leaving gentle kisses on the inside of the elbow, on the wrist, on his lifeline, on the tip of each finger.
"Hurry, damn it!"
"What's the rush?" Gojyo purred into his ear, tracing his tongue around the outer shell
Sanzo growled and pushed himself against Gojyo, letting him feel just what the hurry was. Gojyo groaned at the contact, but didn't pick up his pace. Instead, he ducked low, grabbing the hem of Sanzo's ridiculous shirt and peeling it up, inch by inch, taking time to place kisses—loving kisses, Sanzo would have thought, had he not known better—on every bit of skin he could reach.
"What . . .are you . . .doing . . .?" Sanzo got out, gasping and splaying a hand against the back of Gojyo's head when his mouth found a pink nipple. Had he felt that teasing mouth smile? He couldn't be sure. And he should be pissed at that irritating red head for daring to laugh at him at a time like this, but ahh . . .! When he was doing that . . . 'I can be pissed at him later,' Sanzo decided.
At the moment, Gojyo was using one hand to extricate one of Sanzo's long-fingered hands from his hair, and guiding it and the attached arm out of his shirt, still using the other hand to hold up the hem of the shirt so he could keep his attentions there. After a moment, he switched to the other arm, and the other nipple, alternating between stroking with his tongue and nibbling gently with his teeth. Giving it one last lave, he pulled away, smiling inwardly at the needy sound Sanzo made in his throat at the loss of contact. He pulled the shirt off and started guiding them both toward the bed. Sanzo's knees hit the edge and he fell back, bringing Gojyo with him. The two of them shifted and crawled their way up the bed, losing their remaining clothes along the way, seemingly attached at the lips.
Gojyo felt the back of his head hit pillows—how had they gotten turned around?—and Sanzo suddenly moved, separating their lips and straddling Gojyo. His purple eyes tried to glare, despite the fact that they were dark with lust, "What are you doing?"
Gojyo tried to catch his breath, a difficult feat with Sanzo sitting where he was, "I'm trying to be intimate." He leaned up and tried to catch Sanzo's lips, but Sanzo leaned away.
"Why?"
Gojyo kneaded at Sanzo's hips and gave him the most smoldering look he knew how to give, trying to convince the stubborn man to come back where he could reach him and leave this topic of conversation alone. If it had been anyone but Sanzo, it would have worked. Then again, had it been anyone but Sanzo, they probably wouldn't have had the presence of mind to pull away in the first place.
"Why?" Sanzo repeated, rubbing himself firmly against Gojyo.
"I don't . . .I . . .damnit! I'm no good at this shit!" He reached his hands up to Sanzo entreatingly, "I don't know how to say it, just let me show you . . ."
"No." Sanzo refused to fall into Gojyo's arms, "You're going to tell me."
"Because . . .damn it!" Gojyo couldn't decide whether to look at Sanzo or not; if he was going to say this, Sanzo would either (a) laugh at him, or (b) go get the banishing gun and blast his brains out. And he had no intention of either happening until they finished things.
He sat up and fused his lips to Sanzo's, "Let's take care of this first," he drawled, a lazy grin lounging on his face—Sanzo could feel it against his own parted lips—"then we'll talk."
Sanzo might have tried his customary "Ch," but if he did, it somehow got lost in Gojyo's mouth, never to be heard. His hands came around to twine themselves through crimson strands. He knew Gojyo hated his hair, it was the mark of a half-breed, but Sanzo lo—lik—was attracted to it. For some strange reason. Why anything about the fucking stupid kappa should be attractive he didn't kno—
"Shit!" Sanzo's head fell back, his mouth open.
Deprived of Sanzo's mouth, Gojyo pressed his lips to Sanzo's throat hungrily as his hand worked on Sanzo's length. 'That'll show him to be thinking right now . . .' he thought, feeling the blond's pulse fluttering like a hummingbird's against his tongue. His lips moved back up, leaving a burning trail up Sanzo's neck, making his lover growl when he found that sensitive spot just below his jaw. He nibbled gently on the shell of Sanzo's ear before bringing his tongue back into play, tracing all the little whorls and folds there, finally pulling the earlobe into his hot mouth and suckling, all the while keeping his talented fingers stroking, milking, pulling on Sanzo.
Sanzo swore, "If you keep that up, baka . . ."
Gojyo interrupted him with another searing kiss, snaking his tongue into Sanzo's mouth and swallowing his pleasure-filled moans. He did, however, take the monk's advice, reversing their positions and reaching to the nightstand to retrieve the all-important lube. Swiftly slicking up his fingers, he prepared Sanzo and himself before sheathing himself in his lover.
For a few precious seconds, he managed enough control to hold himself still on trembling limbs, looking down at Sanzo's face, upturned, the gasps fluttering past those cynical lips just as harsh as the words that usually crossed them. Violet eyes fluttered open, looking hotly into crimson. "What are . . .you . . .waiting for?"
Gojyo didn't answer, except for starting a slow rhythm that forced Sanzo's eyes closed again with a groaned curse. "Stop torturing me, baka . . ."
Gojyo kissed Sanzo's eyelids, "Open your eyes."
"Baka!" Sanzo growled, eyes still closed. "Faster . . . !"
"Not unless you look at me," Gojyo threatened. He was unsure he'd be able to make his threat any good, but Sanzo didn't have to know that. After a few breathless curses, the purple eyes opened again, burning with the same indefinable look from before. Gojyo groaned and increased his pace.
. . .Afterward, Sanzo didn't start redressing himself. He didn't kick Gojyo out of the bed with the order to get back to his own damn room. He just lay there, letting his heart rate come back down, calming his breathing, praying to anything that would listen that Gojyo would forget the whole 'intimacy' thing. Apparently, no one was listening.
Gojyo was lying right beside him and actually had the audacity to touch him, throwing a possessive arm around his waist. Sanzo tried to push him off.
"Don't touch me, erogappa!"
Said erogappa raised an eyebrow. "Little late for that, don't ya think?"
Sanzo flushed, whether in anger or embarrassment he refused to investigate, but left the arm where it was. He did turn on his side, to avoid those red eyes that he swore were looking far-too-knowingly into his face. Gojyo made up for the lack of eye contact with a soft kiss on Sanzo's temple, feeling silky blond locks against his cheek.
"So . . .why intimacy?"
Sanzo growled in response.
"Oi, droopy-eyes . . ." Gojyo murmured into Sanzo's ear, "I said—"
"I heard what you said!"
"Then . . .?"
Sanzo screwed his eyes shut tight, though Gojyo couldn't see the motion. "I don't want to talk about this."
"But you were going to make me?" Gojyo leaned up on one elbow, annoyed.
"Why the hell do you care, anyway? If I'm so much trouble, go find yourself some whore down at the bar and leave me in peace, for once!"
They sat in silence for a few seconds, while Gojyo desperately tried to figure out the right thing to say. "You know . . ." he finally ventured, "I haven't gone out with anyone else in—"
"I know."
Silence reigned for another few seconds.
"I love you, you corrupt monk."
"I love you, erogappa, now go to sleep."
A/N: There is a prequel written for this story; it's called "Fooled Me." There is also a sequel currently in the works called "Aftershocks." So push the pretty purple button, review, and then check out those other stories, ne:)