thenearshore | /man in black lyrics

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/man in black lyrics

Who: Gojyo and anyone who wants to stop by!
What: Hanging out, having adventures, engaging in healthy coping habits
When: Any time of any day from May 12-15ish
Where: chez Dinosaur
Warnings: Homo-antagonistic language in the Niles thread.

He's never going to sleep again. Which is fine -- he knows from experience that he can go weeks on end with only a few hours of sleep snatched here and there between youkai attacks. It won't kill him. He doesn't even feel all that tired, not really. He more feels like he's asleep and dreaming than anything else -- everything is at a bit of a distance and his reactions are slowed, like the air's gone thicker or something. Like he's a little drunk, even though he hasn't touched a drop since his return. It's weird and unsettling, but he's sure it'll wear off. And even if it doesn't, it's not something to bother anybody with. He's been enough of a bother already.

So during the day, he sticks close to Hakkai -- he's worried the other man enough already by vanishing, so it's the least he can do to stay near (and if that means running errands or sitting quietly in the back of the classroom while school is in session, he supposes that he can manage). And at night, when he wakes after only an hour or two of sleep, he tracks down Asshole and drags the half-man out to the porch with him, for company while he smokes pack after pack and watches the moon.

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It's in the usual spot. Usual color, slightly bigger than he'd expect, but then again, since when did Hakkai do anything by halves?

"It's big," he murmurs, tracing just beyond the edge of the discoloration, his touch light but still checking for any signs of a wince or twitch. It doesn't hurt, does it? "This is just from right now?"

It doesn't hurt. It doesn't feel any different from the rest of his skin at all, in fact: Gojyo's fingers brushing lightly across the nape of his neck and down onto his shoulder feels like nothing more than Gojyo's fingers on his neck and shoulder. It's a startlingly intimate gesture.

He manages to hold still for a few seconds for the touch -- stubbornly refusing to twitch -- before a shiver he can't repress jolts down his spine, and he pulls firmly away to hide it, letting his hair fall back over the blight.

"It should be," he says, crossing his arms as he turns back to Gojyo, and managing a dry tone. "I hope you weren't actually touching it?"

That sure didn't seem to be a cringe of pain. Good. When the blight gets bad, it hurts, and that's the only indicator Gojyo knows of to tell when it's getting too bad to cure with holy water.

He returns Hakkai's dry comment with a dry look of his own, raising his unblighted fingers and waggling them at eye level. But his deadpan annoyance doesn't last more than a few seconds -- he's not stupid, okay, he's not gonna stick his hand into blight, but even if he did he could just wash it off, and besides, isn't it his job as Hakkai's god to make sure Hakkai doesn't get blighted, so maybe contaminating himself will help Hakkai remember not to do stupid shit to get blighted in the first place?

Okay, there, better.

"Are we gonna have this conversation every time you get blighted?" He tries to smirk, but it doesn't quite make it up to his eyes -- this shit is scary, okay? And he hates feeling so useless. "Is this the part where I tell you to take your shirt off?"

"Are you going to try to touch it every time?" There's too much worry in Gojyo's eyes for his smirk to be convincing; Hakkai adds, in a gentler tone, "I'm fine."

It doesn't even hurt, after all. It's other people he hurts when he gets careless about his thoughts or feelings, and he can't even allow himself to regret it without compounding the problem.

He raises his eyebrows at Gojyo, and adds, pointedly, "Then it's where I tell you to take yours off, too." The last time they'd had this conversation, he'd been almost a stranger to Hakkai: a compelling stranger from the beginning, but a stranger nonetheless, and one Hakkai hadn't felt himself willing to order around.

As Gojyo's shinki, on the other hand, it's very nearly his place.

Was that a challenge? It sounded like a challenge.

His smirk gets a lot more real as he reaches one arm back, grabbing his shirt between his shoulder blades and yanking it up and over his head. Bare-chested, he holds out his arms for inspection.

"See? No blight." Well, none that can be seen, anyway. He waggles his eyebrows and adds: "You'll have to trust me about the rest of it."

"I don't have to," Hakkai mutters, in a tone that's much closer to mild annoyance than the flirtation the words suggest. If he's stung Gojyo, there's blight somewhere on him from it. He doesn't know if it's usually on the back on gods; it'd been on Elsa's arm, once, but Gojyo's arms and chest are free of any purple blotches.

He's not about to demand Gojyo take off any more clothing, though. He sighs, and steps out the back door, holding it open for Gojyo to follow.

The fountain burbles pleasantly a few paces away from the back door. As soon as Gojyo's not actually going to be hit by the door (perhaps a second sooner; he can dodge) he heads for the fountain, stripping off his own shirt with punctilious gestures.

What? ...Hey! He's just trying to lighten the mood! Gojyo catches the door with a somewhat hurt frown just before it hits him, and trails after Hakkai into the courtyard, keeping his distance.

"What's the problem?" Okay, so, maybe it wasn't the best choice to be flirty after just telling Hakkai that he wants to put their flirting on hold. "Why are you...?" But it's his default, Hakkai should know th--

...right, Hakkai doesn't know that. Hakkai doesn't remember Gojyo's quirks because Hakkai doesn't remember Gojyo. Fuck.

He leans against one of the columns, not quite facing Hakkai (and so giving the other man his privacy, if that's what he wants), and rubs a weary hand over his face. "I say flirty shit when I don't know what else to say,"he apologizes. "I didn't mean anything by it."

The annoyance in the set of Hakkai's shoulders ebbs out on his exhale, which just barely misses being a sigh. He folds his shirt and sets it on the edge of the fountain, sitting down as he fishes for the metal cup on its chain.

It's obnoxious to be flirted with right after being gently put off as though he doesn't know his own mind. It's worse, the way that the apology makes it clear he doesn't know his own mind -- or, at least, he doesn't know Gojyo. Not the way he once had. All he remembers is a single moment, devoid of context, when he had been in love.

Gojyo's right, he admits bitterly to himself: Gojyo is absolutely correct. Hakkai doesn't even understand him well enough to distinguish meaningless space-filling flirting from a genuine overture.

"It's fine," he says, and leans forward, brushing his hair off the back of his neck. "I'm sorry." The water is startlingly cold on his skin, running down to drip off his chin. He refills the cup and empties it over his neck again for good measure.

Hakkai's really annoyed with him. He can see it out of the corner of his eye in the way he's holding himself, hear it in the tightly controlled way he's breathing that means that he's thinking way too hard about something that's making him pissy. But really, Gojyo doesn't need to be reading Hakkai to know any of this. He fucked up, and they both know it.

"Yeah." And the evening had started off so well, too. "Yeah, me too." He risks a glance in Hakkai's direction, to confirm if the other man has gotten all the blight off his neck. The water looks cold; he should have brought a towel. In the morning, he thinks, he'll bring a couple of the big fluffy towels down here from one of the bathrooms. Are there any in the bathroom down the hall? Yeah, there's got to be.

"I'll be right back."

"...Ah?" Hakkai sits back up, wiping a trickle of water away from his neck with his hand (and surreptitiously glancing at his hand to check for blight: no, it's clean. His neck must be, then, too.) "Where are you--"

The door's already falling shut behind Gojyo as he heads inside. Hakkai does sigh, this time, and blots a little of the water with the edge of his folded T-shirt before he pulls it back on. It's knit, it'll dry, and the water in Gojyo's fountain is clear.

It's quiet in the garden, the particular silence of a place without the living world's bats or night-singing birds, or traffic, or buzzing streetlights. It's annoyingly devoid of distractions from the bald realization that he's the one who's made a mistake: he'd misread Gojyo, forced the subject. All while Gojyo's still barely able to sleep a few hours at a time after the trauma of his imprisonment. Hakkai knows how badly he's hurt by having been forgotten. Letting himself ignore that, because he wants so badly to be himself again on a few scraps of memory that he's trying to use their intimacy as the glue, is cruel. Also selfish, and, worst of all, stupid.

If Sanzo's memories are any indication, his own will return, in time. He can learn a little patience, in the meantime, and possibly even a hint of concern for someone else's feelings.

He glances again at the door. It's only been a few seconds, but he's tempted to follow Gojyo regardless. He'd sounded as hopeless as a dog waiting to be kicked with that me too, but he'd said he'd be right back, and Hakkai's already pushed too far past where he's wanted tonight. He keeps the sting of guilt off with a promise to himself to apologize, and half-raises his hand to rub his right temple against the strain gathered there. The sudden memory of the scent of flowers and Gojyo's hands on the back of his neck makes him put it hastily back on his knee.

He really is just gone a minute! Down the hall, duck into the first bathroom, grab the hand towel off the rack, and back to the atrium before Hakkai even notices. At least, that was the plan.

But apparently a minute is too long, because Hakkai's already dressed by the time Gojyo reemerges, purple and gold-trimmed towel hanging uselessly in one hand. He stops, just inside the doorway, a litany of useless! running through his brain. Not for the first time, he's grateful that stinging only goes one way.

"I, uh. Keep meaning to put a towel out here." Not that there's really anywhere to hang it, except maybe on one of the flimsy branches of the little olive tree. Useless! He twists the towel unconsciously, and takes a step back toward the hall. "I'll do that in the morning." With a clean towel. It should be a clean towel, if Hakkai's going to be rubbing it on his neck and hair. One of the extra-fluffy ones from the upstairs bathroom, maybe. "You get it all off?"

Oh. He was getting a towel; of course. Hakkai gets to his feet, heading over to join him in the doorway.

The towel's straining with the force of Gojyo's hands twisting it. He reaches out to tug it gently from his hand; the back of his neck is still a bit damp, and maybe it'll help make this all less awkward to accept his offer.

"I think I did," he says, and ducks his head, brushing his hair off his neck to make it look a little less like a bow. "I can't see it, though. Did I?"

Hakkai's apologizing.

Hakkai's totally apologizing, why is...?

...no, okay, no, know what? Doesn't matter. It doesn't fucking matter. "Yeah, you're clean," he confirms after a moment. He keeps his hands at his sides because he's not completely stupid, but he can't help adding, "Your hair's still kinda wet, though. You're gonna make the sheets all damp."

"Luckily, you brought a towel." Hakkai straightens up and drapes the little purple-and-gold hand towel around his neck with a lopsided smile. It dampens at once, wicking water out of the ends of his hair.

You'll make the sheets damp sounds like let's go back to bed, you're not mad at me, right? Hakkai considers the offer. He is a little angry, he thinks, but that's his pride; he also knows Gojyo doesn't deserve it (this time.) And he hasn't been sleeping well, but Hakkai thinks -- maybe -- they both sleep better for knowing the other is at least there.

Not here enough, but at least less damaged than Gojyo's other shinki. He'll go back to his own room when Gojyo's sleeping through the night again and it feels a little less like he's flouncing off in a snit, he decides, and reaches up to towel his hair briskly.

"Shall we go back to bed?"

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/man in black lyrics

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