Chapter Text
“Wanna do it again?” Hikaru had asked, a Cheshire grin adorning his face, and how could Yoshiki say no?
So they’re back in an abandoned classroom, door locked, dim sunlight soaking into their skin through the windows. Yoshiki studies the thing pretending to be Hikaru. The golden halo of light softly settled around his white hair contrasts chillingly with what Yoshiki knows lies below.
“Well? What are ya waiting for?” Leaning with his back against a desk, Hikaru tilts his head coyly, and again Yoshiki slips this image next to the one in his memories of the real Hikaru. And once again he finds no distinction. He lets out a light scoff.
“Aren’t you eager,” he takes a breath, clutching his fist in his other hand, “just give me a second.”
“Seriously dude, is it that weird?” The other asks.
“I mean, yeah, sort of,” He drops his hands, stepping forward, “remember last time?”
“I swear I won’t touch you back this time! I didn’t think you’d freak out so much,” he chuckles, and then an unusually serious note tinges his tone, “I’d never want to hurt you, I promise.” He holds out his pinky in a childish gesture of reassurance, another smile quickly painted onto his bright face.
They both ignore what goes unsaid—never on purpose.
Yoshiki shakes his head, and maybe a smile tugs at the corners of his mouth “alright.” Instead of accepting Hikaru's pinky with his own, he covers his hand with his, pushing it down to his side. Hikaru’s eyes widen slightly, but he remains quiet.
Avoiding eye contact, he lets go and lifts his hand towards Hikaru's unbuttoned shirt, towards the gap between where his ribs should reside—a disconcertingly dark slash splitting a pale canvas of skin.
His fingers prod at the entrance, and soon Hikaru's substance is slipping between the digits as he sinks his hand past where there should’ve been a diaphragm.
“Agh,” he jolts a bit at the feeling, squeezing his eyes shut. It makes his skin crawl, it’s so wrong, it’s gross. He shudders and pushes his hand deeper.
“Still not used to it?” His best friend's voice drifts into his head, and he shivers for a different reason. His eyelids lift involuntarily, a mistake, because now Hikaru's desaturated eyes can stare into his with that terribly teasing glint.
“S-shut up,” Yoshiki lowers his gaze, and after a second of getting used to the unsettling cold enveloping his forearm, he starts moving his arm higher, just like the first time they did this. The skin of Hikaru’s chest parts like a fabric unraveling at the seams, making way for Yoshiki.
“Yoshiki…” Hikaru gasps, and Yoshiki can't help but glance up, overcome by a strange urge to see how the other's face is reacting. He experimentally lifts his arm again, and his eyes widen when Hikaru practically moans. “Does it really feel that good?” he asks in a hushed voice.
“Y-your so warm, Yoshiki,” Hikaru half answers, his fingers wrapping around Yoshiki's arm—now nearly up to the elbow in his chest. Amidst staring at Hikaru’s face, Yoshiki feels a prickle of frigid unease emerge in his own chest.
Yoshiki is all at once apprehended by the overwhelming urge to run. His chest tightens and a chill goes down his spine, but something holds him mercilessly in place. The unease swirling in his stomach, is it that, or something else entirely? Maybe there's no real difference. He makes himself sit in the feeling, attempting to make sense of it. He tries not to dwell on the fact that he’s starting to not hate it.
The silence has gone on barely too long, but Yoshiki manages to compose himself enough. “And you’re very cold.” He responds.
This is the longest he's been inside of him, and the longer his arm lives with Hikaru’s insides the more that sense of danger hesitantly retreats. Is this really okay? He wonders. He watches from outside of his body as Hikaru sighs and gasps, fingers making dents in the skin of Yoshiki’s arm. He imagines his arm fusing with the frigid substance inside of this replica, would that make it more real? If he burrowed himself into this cold embrace would he find something—or someone, perhaps—that he’d been looking for?
He unconsciously wiggles his fingers around, flinching when Hikaru suddenly exclaims, “Yoshiki!”
Yoshiki quickly yanks his arm out, heart racing from the suddenness. “W-what? What is it?”
Hikaru slumps against the desk, breathing shallowly. “Jeez…” he rubs his hand over his face like he’s suddenly exhausted.
Confused, Yoshiki tries to read the others' eyes through the bangs in front of his own. “Uh, are you alright?”
Hikaru's eyes snap up to his, the grey irises hugging burning ember pupils, “it’s not really fair, ya know.” He says.
Something’s different about him, his gaze is intense, piercing as always, but different. It’s not like those other times. The times when he knows Hikaru fell victim to his hunger, for the burning inside of Yoshiki—his light. No, this is not like that at all. Even so, Yoshiki takes a hesitant step back. “What do you mean?”
Hikaru chews the inside of his cheek, like he’s contemplating something troublesome. “I don’t think you know how good that really feels to me, Yoshiki. It’s not really fair.” He considers the dark haired boy, “I want you to feel good too.” He says this last part with a slight frown, adjacent to a pout.
Those words do nothing to calm Yoshiki’s speeding heart. “I— it’s fine Hikaru, really.” He shuts his eyes against the feeling of a match being lit in his stomach. It’s not like Hikaru even knows what he’s saying. He’s not like that. He’s just—
Yoshiki’s breath catches when a hand comes to rest on the center of his chest. “Too bad ya don’t have a weird chest opening like me, huh? That’d be convenient.” Hikaru laughs lightly, then quiets after a moment. Yoshiki doesn't move, he doesn’t let himself breathe.
“Your heart’s beating super fast, dude.” Hikaru points out, “are you scared?”
Of me?
That makes Yoshiki open his eyes. Through his bangs he makes out the melancholic expression worn on his friend's face. “No.” He denies without hesitation.
They both know he's a liar.
Hikaru smiles.
“Y’know, I read a manga recently that I was wondering about.”
The subject change has Yoshiki raising a brow for Hikaru to go on. It’s lost behind his hair but the boy continues anyway.
“The main character, he was thinking about this girl he liked. I didn’t really understand what happened, but he started using his hands to do something to himself. I think it felt good, and I thought maybe it was similar to how you make me feel…”
Fuck. Yoshiki feels close to hyperventilating. He doesn’t know what he’s saying. He doesn’t know what he’s saying. “H-Hikaru… hold on. I really don’t think it’s the same thing.” He was right, this is dangerous. The white haired boy is too close, his grey eyes too intense, his hand pressed against his chest—the point of contact burning in the most disgustingly lovely way.
“Even if it’s not, wouldn’t it still feel good?” The fact that Hikaru is asking genuinely, unaware of the implications of these words and their cruel effect, makes Yoshiki feel an onslaught of frustration. He feels a prick of tears in his eyes as the culmination of too many suppressed emotions clogs his throat.
Those words coming out of that mouth. His best friend's eyes, that exact same quirk of a smile. Hand pressed against him, shirt still open. It’s cruel, it’s so cruel. But this Hikaru doesn’t understand. How could he? He’s only imitating what he thinks is human, what he thinks is real. He doesn’t know what he’s asking and it kills something in Yoshiki.
No. Say no. Stop this. It’s so wrong. It’s so cruel. So cruel. So, so—
“It would.”
Those eyes blink—too innocent for how devastating they are to Yoshiki—and he smiles. Of course he does.
“So, do ya wanna try it out?” Yoshiki fixes onto that gleaming smile. He should stop this, it’s gone too far already.
Too far?
A thin hair of a thread snaps inside of Yoshiki, and some part of him laughs meanly at himself. Any line that had existed had already been crossed tenfold the moment he accepted this not-Hikaru into his life. It had been crossed when he figured out this thing wasn’t the real Hikaru, and he kept on pretending. His entire world is filled with insanity. Oozing minds, long-necked creatures, a strange being inhabiting the abandoned body of his best friend. What's one more ounce of insanity—just to top it off? What's one more line crossed?
With a fizzling sinking in his gut, he tries to get his vocal cords to function, “are you sure, Hikaru?” He reaches out to grasp Hikaru's white school shirt, his hand trembles, a drop of sweat runs down his forehead. His mind has been in a constant battle with his body, and it’s far too exhausted to keep it up any longer.
“You’re totally freaking out dude. Why not?”
Why not why not why not.
So damn casual.
One more line crossed.
“Why not.” He stares down at the wood paneled floor. The sun has gotten lower, the shadows of their two bodies stretch out dramatically on the floor. They look inhuman.
He tugs Hikaru closer to him by the shirt, his knuckles turning white, “do you know what you’re doing?”
Despite what he just decided, he’s caught off guard by Hikaru's hand moving from his chest to the point of his chin. Hikaru lifts his head, and Yoshiki’s immediately captured by smoldering red pupils. He’s wearing that same intense expression from earlier. “I might’ve done some more research after reading that manga. Out of curiosity.” He grins.
Yoshiki’s not given much time to think about this revelation though, because all of a sudden Hikaru’s grabbing his shoulders and moving him so they switch places, the desk digging into Yoshiki’s lower back. The latter swallows, everything’s too real and too unreal at once, but he knows by now he’s too weak to try and stop any of it. He’ll let this insanity continue.
Hikaru's eyes practically glow in the waning light as he crowds closer to Yoshiki, each movement like a muffled gunshot. “They usually start these things by kissing, right?” Hikaru asks. Yoshiki can feel his breath ghosting over his face. He nods instead of speaking, trying to remember how to breathe simultaneously.
His qualms must be etched onto his face, because even the oblivious Hikaru notices. “Is something wrong?” Hikaru furrows his brow, “do you not want to anymore?” He starts drifting apart from Yoshiki, probably thinking he scared him again.
Something close to panic claws viciously at Yoshiki when he feels the shift. He’s suddenly desperate, clutching the front of Hikaru’s shirt and quickly yanking them back together. He needs him close, he needs this more than anything. It’s all he has.
Once they’re inches apart, Yoshiki cups the back of his head of white hair, shuts his eyes, and pulls his face towards his own.
Of course he’s scared. He’s terrified. But he's somehow more terrified of not doing this. He’s filthy, he's disgusting, and he needs more. He wants to cross every line, scratch them out of the dirt entirely, let the filth get stuck under his fingernails as a punishment. But more than anything, he wants to stop caring. He just can’t care anymore.
Their lips meet in a bruising collision. It starts out stiff, neither truly comprehending the situation. Yoshiki struggles to breathe as he holds them together like they’ll crumble into dust if they separate. Then, Hikaru slowly relaxes, letting his lips soften against Yoshiki’s.
Yoshiki slowly opens his eyes, and jolts. Hikaru pulls back in confusion.
“Why the hell were your eyes open?!” Yoshiki asks, “that’s unsettling,”
Hikaru relaxes, and he rubs the back of his head, grinning sheepishly, “oh yeah? Sorry dude. Can I try again?”
Yoshiki sighs, a hint of amusement in the sound. The interaction helped ease some of the tension in his limbs. The decision has already been made in his head now, and he refuses to keep second guessing himself, teetering on this imaginary line. “Yeah, come on then.”
Hikaru leans back in, and this time they both close their eyes as their lips seal together. It’s slower than before, Yoshiki focuses everything he has into that one point of contact. After a moment, Hikaru begins moving his lips against Yoshiki’s. The match inside Yoshiki’s abdomen sets fire to his insides as they finally share a proper kiss. Hikaru rests his hands back on his shoulders, and Yoshiki grips the edge of the desk behind him in an attempt to ground himself.
There’s no sounds aside from the occasional exhale of breath—always quickly caught by the other as they delve back into each other—and the light sounds of their lips moving together, pushing and pulling, figuring out how they fit against the other. Each brush provides friction for the growing natural disaster inside of Yoshiki. He nearly smiles with sick mirth when he realizes that he’s starting to stop caring. He's so dirty already that he may as well go all the way. He’d let himself wither into ashes just for this feeling to last. It makes no sense, but who said it had to?
His breath hitches when Hikaru’s right hand slides down from his shoulder to his chest, fingering the top button of his shirt. He pulls back and stares into Yoshiki’s dark eyes, “wanna make this even more fair?” He unbuttons the first and drags his fingers to the second down.
Yoshiki knows Hikaru can feel each shaky rise and fall of breath in his lungs. He doesn’t care, he wants to forget. “Yes.”