Chapter Text
"What happened between Kusunoki and Kijima?" Kyoko asked Ren while they were hidden safely under his comforter. Cuddling had become her coping mechanism as of late -- the pressure and heat of Ren's body pushed a slider in her brain that drowned out her shrill thoughts. A cynical fraction of those thoughts warned that using the shortcut too often could dull it's effects, even render them useless in years to come, but Ren would normally find a knot in her back or a tightness in her shoulders that would make even that thought go away.
It started off as them just laying in bed, but even having her head exposed felt like too much at times, so she started yanking the cover over both of them. Ren's complaints of it being too stuffy necessitated tucking the top of the comforter behind the headboard, making a sort of canopy. State of dress was of little relevance inside that space, so she was in her panties and he was in a white t-shirt and silk boxers. His expression grew amused. "Kusunoki and Kijima were starring in a mini-series together, and their agents chose to enhance it's press by having them date for a time. Interview quotes got muddled, and essentially Kijima implied that he was a fan of Kana during her more... adult career. That got twisted into him being a deviant of a sort which took a good six months of charity work and libel suits to straighten out."
Kyoko slammed a hand over her laughter. It wasn't nice, and as a matter of fact she should feel terrible for Kijima because she herself was finding out just how hard it was to maintain a reputation in this industry. But it just seemed such a ridiculus situation (a phenomenon she was fairly familiar with) that she couldn't help it. Celebrity gossip that wasn't related to her? Such an excellent distraction. "Oh no. Did he ever forgive her?"
Ren's eyes waffled back and forth. "Yes, but... well, he did have somewhat of a crush on her for a time, because he didn't know that her interests lie elsewhere, so it did add salt to the wound. But please, unless she brings up either her personal interests or her side of the situation, don't discuss it. I'd hate her to think I'd told you only to gossip."
Kyoko mimed zipping her lips shut. She placed the knowledge inside herself, in a place that would require extreme torture or extortion to pry out of her. But it's also where other information lived. She flopped onto her back, Ren's hand sliding across her waste and draping over it, and said to the curtain of filtered white light she said. "I'm going to do it. Donate to my mother, if I match."
She felt Ren's arm tense against her waist. "She's not entitled to that. She doesn't even want it, because she didn't ask herself."
She continued to stare at the comforter, looking at the stitching that contained the stuffing. "Despite how much she didn't want to, she gave me life. This is the only opportunity I may ever have to balance the scales on a way that's meaningful." She took a deep breath -- in, out, the weight of his arm ever-present -- and continued, "I don't have to see her. I don't even have to say her name. Todoh said he would schedule everything on my behalf. But I can make sure that the weight of her no longer presses on me. I can not break Todoh's heart."
Ren's fingers dug into her side. She closed her eyes, ready for a fight, ready for him to argue that she was not obligated because she didn't choose them. She waited, waited, but it didn't come. In a starkly contrasting limpness, he said, "I'll drive you to the appointment."
She opened her eyes and turned to him. His expression was forced neutrality and her next comment would nudge it toward the negative. "If the test doesn't conflict with your schedule. "
Accordingly, his mouth opened, ready for the argument, but this one was an easy one to refute. "I may not even be a match, so one appointment isn't worth disrupting your schedule. But, if I am... I'll upend it entirely. I'll demand your bedside manner during and after the procedure. I will be the bane of whatever directors have you under contract's existence."
That made his expression lighten. "Good. I'll make them seem like bastards in the press if they want to try and screw me over for taking care of you."
The sentiment warmed her from the inside out. She cupped his cheek and stroked his jaw with her thumb. "You're too sweet. I'm too lucky to have you." It was why she had to do it, really. Because regardless of it all, she was here, and not a kid barely out of high school, desperately competing for her lawyer-mother's attention against people more desperate than her. And, perhaps, it was hot competition for the people around her's attention, but she could get it, and once they'd were focused, they did not get distracted. Even when she was distracted herself.
"It's not luck. You're just persistent." He tugged on her side. "Flip over."
She did, a tingle of anticipation running up her spine. He threw his leg over her, straddling her hips. He leaned over and curled his fingers into her shoulders. He squeezed and the tingle intensified, burrowing inside of her. She reached toward his thigh, seeking to return the favor, but he caught her hand and ran his along it. Then he placed it on the bed.
He dug deeper into her shoulders and she didn't know exactly when he decided to move down to massaging her rib cage, her lower back, but it might have been due to the considerably lewder moans she emitted from his attention. As if wringing the tension out of her, his hands ran along her back and sides, to the curves of her ass. She was melting into the bed, clay in his hands and she was content with being molded by his strokes. But she knew that contentment would wain soon, as the urge to envelop him was an inevitability. A twitching she felt pressed against her panties told her that the sentiment was shared.
When he wrapped her fingers around her thighs, his thumbs brushed against the fabric in between her legs. She shivered and felt herself opening -- the quietest knock being met with an enthusiastic welcome. His kneading built a different tension in her -- a focus that she would be getting what she needed, just fight the temptation to sprint ahead because then it would be over and the other parts of her mind would speak up again.
As his greedy fingers slid down her panties and tossed them aside, she sighed into the pillow. His shirt and boxers were discarded in the same unimportant region of the bed. The simple press of him against her made her wet. Then his length ran along her, a simple stroke that encouraged her to become even moreso -- and with so very little effort, he was gliding. Her hips popped backward -- it wasn't intentional, but it was effective. He slipped inside of her and stretched her deliciously. He grunted, almost surprised at how deeply he was able to reach, but it simply allowed his movements to be fluid. Gaps in the sensation were simply unacceptable.
He pulled her hips further up and held her there, his pace almost lazy as he pushed himself as deep as she went and pulled himself back from her brink again and again. He was building her up and up but it reached a maddening point -- she whimpered into the pillow because face down was never going to be enough.
He was merciful, though, and grabbed her thigh as he unsheathed himself to flip her over. She caught sight of the way his hair curtained his expression of longing without restraint or rushing. They were together and they would get where they needed to be, all in their time. He put himself back into where he needed to be and his head tilted back ever so slightly, pleased.
She was more than pleased with his closeness, how his movement stroked her clitoris as well. This was how the fire in her burned brighter, how she made him bend lower, needing to brace himself above her because he equally succumbed to her as she to him. She curled her fingers into his back, her eyes closed in blind ambition to keep climbing, just a little further, a little further, they were so close...
He thought they were so close. She squeezed against him with such ferocity that he told her she should be nearing her pinnacle, that her panting against his ear would soon slow, that she would soon uncurl into glorious bliss, but she simply wasn't. Not yet. So his pride demanded that he not, but his pride did not control his desire as well as he needed, so he stopped his feverish works to take a breath and release the cramping that threatened his legs.
Never one to let someone else do all the work, Kyoko's hips bucked into him and took over the rhythm. It threatened his control, yes, but it also allowed him to simply focus on how he felt, how his breathing steadied his desire, and how the psychological implication of her using him like this would distract him at work in the future. Soon, he couldn't even hold those three thoughts in his mind and his singular struggle was simply not to come yet. Do not succumb to the all-encompassing sensation of her wanting every aching inch of him exploring every part of her yet.
Finally, she held herself in place, curled as into him as her position allowed. Her grip was relaxing. He took that as his sign that yet had passed and one, two, three pumps in response to her was all it took for him to shutter inside of her. He collapsed on her, spent.
She chuckled and wrapped her arms around him. He was growing more sensitive by the moment. Her fingers on his spine were pleasure on an exposed nerve, so quickly edging toward pain. He was still inside of her, however, and she had not stopped pulsing against him. He didn't want to leave yet, but his pride wrote a check that his body couldn't cash. He stifled the urge to wince as he pulled out but bumped the comforter in the process. It came loose and fell around them.
His laugh morphed into a groan and he fell into the bed beside her. She giggled as the force bounced her up. And then, once again, she cuddled into him. Back to where they belonged.