Tenipuri - See the Light (Tachibu, R)

[soracia]

Title: See the Light
Author: Kagemihari flamesword
Rating: R
Pairing: TachibanaxIbu
Summary: A sequel of sorts to Can You See, which was meant to stand alone (and does) but this part won't make much sense if you haven't read that. Birthday fic for lethanon, only a day late this year. ♥ Umm... sex on the beach and other random things. x-posted to fudo_courts and tenipuri_yaoi.


Part Two - See The Light

I knew that it would be this way. Just the way I saw it. A moment of clarity, a moment of truth, an inevitable conclusion. That single flawless point in time, something inside me saying yes, this is it. This is what I've been waiting for... for I had been waiting, waiting a long time, without ever quite knowing why.

I move forward, drawn to you, drawn irresistibly by the look in your eyes, the smile that says, I want. Leaning closer, transfixed by your gaze, I don't even know which of us moved, or maybe if we both did. It's natural and necessary as breathing, the way your lips meet mine, the way your eyes slide shut, slowly, like gravity taking over the way you lean forward--giving, wanting, and I can't take my eyes off you, the way you look right now.

That moment, that single, shining moment seems to last an eternity, things I never knew were missing falling into place, like fate. Like it was meant to be. Something as irreversible and inescapable as the law of gravity.

I pull back at last, feeling dizzy from not breathing; or maybe just from that dazed, blissful look in your eyes.

"Can we stay here tonight?" you ask, sounding wistful; but something tells me that you know I would never say no. Still, it will be cold again after dark, and I hesitate, looking around. Not a comfortable place to sleep--but then, we both know that if we stay, it is not very likely we will sleep much, if at all.

You laugh softly and stretch, and tumble out of the hammock, padding over to where you left your bag with our change of clothing. A sly smile crosses your face as you open it, taking out a blanket, and I stare and shake my head.

"Came prepared, did you?" I ask wryly, wondering just how much of this you had had in mind.

"Always, buchou," you smirk, and there is no way it should be that sexy. You throw the blanket in my direction, and it unfolds as I catch the edge of it, falling down to drag light tracks on the sand as I walk over to a smooth place above the tide line, and shake it out.

You are snickering, still pleased with yourself, when you come over to join me, and I catch you as you walk by and kiss you like I mean it. I find it hard to believe this is happening, so fast, so right, so real, but I know beyond a doubt that this is not a dream...not this time. It's true.

It's too fast, and yet not fast enough... I want more, everything, now. I want you. Your skin is smooth and subtly warm beneath my hands, not heated, not yet, and still it burns me where I touch you. Or maybe that is only my hands, burning with the thrill of finally touching you the way I've always wanted to.

I tumble you down on the blanket and stretch out beside you, half on top of you, listening to your laughter--have I ever heard that sound before?--and enjoying the feeling of skin against skin. Neither of us is wearing anything but swim trunks yet, and it is so nearly exactly what I want that it leaves me aching, wanting just that little bit more, pressing against you and twining our legs together as I kiss you again, hard and hungry and fierce. You know how much I want you now, or maybe you always did, but it doesn't matter anymore when you figured it out. All that matters is you know, and you want this too. You want me.

I shudder lightly as your fingertips trace lines of silver fire on my skin--across my shoulders, down my back and up again to tangle in my hair. It feels so good, your fingers in my hair, and I wish briefly that it was longer, still, that you had more to play with.

You are gasping when I release your mouth, struggling to breathe again, but your eyes are shining.

"Are you hungry?" you ask, breathless but teasing now, and I growl the obvious answer.

"Yes."

You snicker softly again and kiss the corner of my mouth, lightly, not enough to satisfy this need I have to feel and taste and explore. "Not that," you say, rolling your eyes, as if you hadn't known that I would think that. "We have food, you know. And it's getting late, but it's not dark yet, so we should eat something before it gets too late."

I roll off you and sit up, reluctantly, muttering, and you are smirking again when I give you a dark look. I could care less about food right now, but I suppose that you are right. I think, however, that you are just enjoying teasing me, and whether or not you actually want to eat is far beside the point.

Still, I humor you, going over with you to find the remains of the food we brought, not at all surprised now to see that you brought more than I would have thought we needed. You planned this very, very well, and I watch with resigned amusement as you busy yourself finding sandwiches and drinks and snacks.

"Dessert of sorts," you say, a faint gleam of something in your eyes that makes me wary--there, packed in ice to keep them cold, popsicles...just the thing for summer and the beach, and yet. I stare at you, not without admiration, and decide that you have the most evil mind ever created, because I know you did that on purpose.

I sit there and try not to watch you licking it, your tongue flicking out to catch melting bits and it gradually stains your mouth red. You look faintly amused when you catch me trying and failing not to look, and I wryly turn my attention to my own, which is now dripping on my hand. I smirk, just a little bit--two can play this game.

I lick my hand slowly, tracing the drip up the side of my popsicle to the tip, and pretend I am not watching you out of the corner of my eye for your reaction. Your eyes widen and then you stare openly as I take another broad lick up the side. Yeah, like that.

You catch me smirking then and your eyes narrow, then take on that familiar glint of challenge. What amazes me the most is how little time it takes you. Lick, suck, swirl, up and down and around, your tongue curling lasciviously and turning bright red and I try to keep up with you at first, licking and sucking and swallowing deep around cold ice which is somehow impossibly hot, but I soon slow and eventually forget about it as you keep your eyes fixed on me, growing darker and lids drooping as you turn that amazing concentration on giving your popsicle a blow job in less than three minutes flat.

I'm not smirking at all any more, just watching hungrily as your tongue darts and flickers and curls, teasingly, and when I start to growl your eyes gleam wickedly as you swallow the whole thing once again, deep and sucking hard and a minute later you pull the stick free and start licking it clean and oh, jesus, that is hot. You are unbelievably hot like this, seductive and knowing and my skin is burning, body aching with need and want and hard, so impossibly hard, afraid even to touch myself because I've wanted this too badly for too long and I don't want to come without even touching you.

You drop the naked stick, letting it fall from the carelessly sexy curve of your fingers and smile at me, a slow, dark curl of your lips as you move closer and reach for my hand, dripping bright red from the forgotten melting ice I am holding. You bring it to your mouth as I watch, entranced and unable to move, for the moment, breathless and needing for some reason to see what you will do next.

You wrap your lips around it and suck it down slowly, bright red stained lips closing around the cold shaft of half melted slush and slurp, sucking until a shiver ripples up my arm and then you smile, white teeth flashing as you pull back and bite down, taking the soft top clean off and that in no way should be hot, but it is.

Then you pull the sticky mess out of my hand and toss it away, and I don't even think to protest because you are leaning down again, licking my hand this time--licking it clean and I moan quietly as your tongue swipes down and across my palm and up between my fingers, sucking each one clean. I hold my breath with the effort of keeping still as you move on, broad swipe over the back of my hand and down and around my wrist--and then you let go, sitting back and smirking like hell.

I move suddenly then, lunging forward and tackling you back onto the suddenly incongruous softness of the blanket, but the sand is still firm and hard beneath it and I press you down into it, my mouth on yours hard and desperate and hungry because you made me want this and you know it.

I kiss my way down your throat in a hurried, wet trail of sloppy kisses, sucking briefly but not hard until I reach the point where your shoulder begins and sink my teeth in, sucking fiercely until I am rewarded with a low, throaty moan and the beginnings of a bruise. I lick the mark that is forming, not apologetic but tasting, owning you and you are still giving me that dark, satisfied smile which makes me suddenly almost angry; but it is the bright, sharp, almost joyful anger that I usually associate with a damn good game of tennis, the edge that means I have found a challenge and intend to conquer it.

"What are you waiting for?" Your voice against my ear, soft and dark and mysterious like the rest of you and I can't think clearly enough to answer, can't think of anything but that I want in, want to take you and learn you and know you by heart, to pierce that dark mystery and make you burn for me the way I burn for you. Judging by your hardness rubbing against my own as I grind against you, pressing you deeper into the sand, that isn't really going to be a problem.

The growl that has been building, rumbling in my chest breaks free and I turn my head to capture your mouth again, a searing hot kiss that swallows me whole as your body moves against me, sheathing me in fire that takes me over the edge with one more quick thrust against you, and I don't even have time to be disappointed that we didn't make it all the way because you are coming too, gasping into my mouth what might be my name if I didn't still have my tongue down your throat.

We collapse afterward, breathing hard and heedless of the mess for the moment, arms wrapped tightly around each other and legs intertwined, and I think distantly that if I had known it was going to be like this, this good, even better than I imagined, better than all my fantasies and daydreams, I could never have waited this long.

"God, you're so hot," I whisper at last, my voice rough and husky as if I've been screaming, or having sex, or possibly both and the enormity of it hits me suddenly--we just had sex, and I am never letting you even think of doing this with anyone else, ever, because you are mine, and only mine. I have to kiss you again, slower but deep and possessive and just as hot.

"Mine," I tell you, just to make sure you've got it, and your lips are still red but not at all cold anymore, swollen from kissing and you are breathless but you roll your eyes at me anyway.

"Of course," you say, as if that should be obvious, and it is, but it's still amazing and incredible and for a minute I just lay there with you in my arms, looking down and you and I can't believe it, here and now and mine and I have everything I ever wanted and it's more than I ever could have dreamed of.

You kiss my jaw, a soft, brief touch like reassurance, which I think dumbly that I shouldn't need, but apparently maybe I do, because something eases inside of me, uncurling and relaxing into the knowledge that yes, this is real and you're mine and it doesn't matter that it was over so fast and so heatedly because we have all night, and many nights after. Always. I sigh, a slight release of tension, and settle over you, laying my head on your shoulder, which you allow for about thirty seconds before you are pushing at me, rolling me over and off of you with an affectionate hand.

"Get off," you mumble, "you're heavy and that's nice and I really like it but you just made a mess, and right after I cleaned you off too, now I'll have to do it again..." and you sit up, making my limp cock twitch with interest in spite of itself at the idea of you 'cleaning me off' the way you did to my hand, but you are moving over to your bag again and finding napkins. It is weirdly mundane at this stage but also amusingly normal, and I let you clean us both off and stow the dirty napkins away in a plastic bag that you pulled out from somewhere, content because you come back immediately and lie next to me, settling back into the curve of my arm and pressing yourself against me where you fit so incredibly, perfectly right.

"Mmm," you murmur, a soft, wordless sound of happiness as you lick briefly at my throat and nestle your head there, and I am caught by a flash of ridiculous gladness that I did that, put that sound in your voice and that soft, happy, sated look in your eyes. God, you're beautiful and amazing and fucking glowing at me; I hold you close and kiss your hair and swallow past the sudden tightness in my throat, aware of the opposite but equally powerful side of my feelings for you, the intense need to hold and protect and keep you close and safe and always, always happy like that.

We lay there until the sun is really disappearing from the sky, it's truly dusk and going to start getting cooler, and I stir and look around and wonder if there is enough driftwood for a fire. There is, and we have fun seeing who can find the best pieces soonest, wandering around the small beach still naked, picking up bits and pieces of wood and bringing them back to pile in the sand between the blanket and the sea, but not too close to the water line.

It's another contest, another game and you win easily because you know this place, it's part of you and beautiful the way you are, and because I keep stopping to watch you bend and move, graceful here with your armful of driftwood as you are on a tennis court with a racket. I am never going to be able to watch you play tennis again without getting turned on--not that that is much different from the last few months, anyway--but now I have vivid sense memories of exactly how you look and feel and I have a feeling that it's going to be rather more difficult than it was before.

I don't mind, and I keep watching you, not even answering your smirk when we are done except to drag you into my arms and kiss you firmly, thrilling with the way you melt into me and kiss back as if you are as hungry for it as I am. I'm never going to get tired of this, tasting the hot sweetness of your mouth and knowing that you belong to me, that I can do this anytime I want to, which I am sure is going to be rather often.

We settle on the blanket in front of the small fire, more or less entangled as I sprawl, leaning on one elbow and you drape yourself across me, leaning on my side. It's comfortable and the air is still warm, especially by the fire, so the blanket for now stays flat beneath us. We spend more time looking at each other than at the fire or the world around us in the last shadowed bits of dusk, talking quietly but not a lot; as usual, it is more like you talk and I listen, but even your voice is a slow and intermittent drawl, mumbled scraps of conversation as things come to your mind.

Eventually we do look around as it gets darker and the stars come out, and we can trace the constellations, marking out our favorites--mine, the hunter, Orion, and yours, practically all of them. You don't have a favorite, you insist, they're all your favorites, and I am wryly amused. I should have known that you would love them all. We find and name all the ones we can remember, and then make up a few of our own. It does not surprise me to learn that you are quite good at this, inventive and creative with the pictures you draw in points of light.

After a while the moon rises, full and white, and you fall silent as your gaze is drawn there, meditative, but whether or not it is the moon you see, I don't know. I am content not to ask, merely watching the slowly changing expression on your face, the light reflected in your eyes. It suits you, making me ache suddenly with the image of you, still and perfect and washed in moonlight, with that distant expression that makes you seem sometimes not of this world. Beautiful. An ache not of loss or even of longing, but sheer wonder at the beauty of you in your element, evoking feelings too big for me to contain.

You hear my breath catch, perhaps, or you've simply come to the end of your thoughts, but you turn then and smile faintly, meeting my eyes again and you are suddenly here again and solid and real, mine.

"It's pretty, isn't it?" you say, and for a single disoriented moment I forget that you are not talking about yourself, the image that I have just seen and marveled at. You mean the quiet night, the moonlit sea, or the moon itself most likely, and I nod, agreeing with you. I feel a bit silly, talking about this, daring to admit aloud the fanciful thoughts in my head, but it's you, and if anyone, you will understand, so after a moment's silence, I answer in a quiet undertone that sound like I am sharing a secret, and perhaps I am.

"It's you," I tell you, and you look briefly puzzled, as I look up and follow your gaze to the moon. It's you. You're like the moon, the full moon large and bright, filling up the night, the darkness with silver radiance, blazing white. Incandescent light. That's what you are to me.

There's a moment's silence and then you laugh, soft laughter that flutters featherlike on my skin. "Am I?" you murmur, shaking your head, but you look oddly pleased and I think you are blushing, though it is hard to tell. You sit up with a half smile lingering on your face, and grab one of the leftover sticks of driftwood, leaning over to poke at the fire with it.

I watch you for maybe half a minute, the slight smile fading into a look of oddly endearing concentration as you rearrange the fire to your satisfaction, shadows of flames flickering on your face in the darkness. Before long, though, I can't remain where I am, just watching when I can touch, and I move to lean up behind you, resting my chin on your shoulder and slipping an arm around your waist. You make a soft pleased sound in your throat and lean back against me, tilting your head back to brush a kiss on my temple.

"That's you," you whisper in my ear, the light touch of your lips making me shiver. It distracts me from asking what you mean or giving you a questioning look of my own. I can feel you smiling, though I couldn't say how, and I know exactly what that look of dark amusement in your eyes would look like if I could see it. You kiss my cheek briefly and settle back against me with a quiet noise of satisfaction. "Fire in the night," you murmur, as if to yourself, and I hide my smile in your hair, kissing your bare shoulder. Ah, I should have known.

Different kinds of darkness lit with different kinds of light. The same, and yet not, but perfect for each other.

We sit like that in silence for what seems like a long time, your head on my shoulder and my arm around you as we both watch the dancing red-orange light snapping and cracking against the night. It's warm, a strangely sensual feeling of heat radiating onto bare skin from where we sit. The silence is warm too, peaceful and comforting, as if the things which need to be said have been said, and other things simply don't need saying.

We have all the time in the world.

This feeling of peace, restfulness, of pure and quiet fullness is amazing and yet, not at all a surprise. It's always been like this with you, or at least, I have always known that it would be. The sense that we just fit, a silent, perfect melting into you that began the moment I saw you.

I pull you closer, wrapping strong arms more tightly around you, pulling you into my lap as if I could surround you. You allow this, unresisting, for about half a minute before you decide that it's too awkward, tilting your face up for a kiss that you can't quite reach. Impatiently you struggle free, pushing at my hands and turning, straddling me and putting your arms around my neck, pulling me down and I have to agree that kissing is much easier this way.

So...much...better... I start to forget where I am again, getting lost in the concentrated heat of your mouth when you draw back, looking smug, and I have just time enough to wonder if that gleam in your eye means you are up to something when you shift closer, rubbing against me and making me catch my breath with sudden spiking desire tightening inside me.

You laugh again, a low intoxicating sound, and my hands spread themselves across your lower back, pressing you closer, not that you need any encouragement as you rock against me almost teasingly.

"You're a damn tease," I mutter, a half hearted grumble, and you smirk.

"No I'm not."

I blink, wondering if that means what I think it means, but apparently it does, and I let go with extreme reluctance as you pull away, getting up to retrieve something from your bag and coming back to kneel beside me. I let loose a startled breath of laughter as you hand it to me--a small tube of lubricant, and I just stare at you.

"You planned this?" I finally ask you, because I've suspected it all day, but you planned everything, even this, and it's the last thing I was expecting when we left this morning. That incredible sound of your laughter echoes again in the night, soft and seductive as I pull you back down, rolling over to pin you to the blanket. I kiss you hard, unable to put words to the feeling; I am speechless and amazed. How long have you been wanting this as much as I do?

"You're too slow," you tell me, and I give you a wry look. Obviously. I was trying to be patient, I didn't think you were ready, but apparently I shouldn't have worried.

I let go, letting myself fall into the moment, my hesitation gone as I cover you with kisses and soft, heated touches. You're mine now, really truly mine, and I can do this now, can touch you the way I've always wanted to. You are unbelievably sexy with your dark hair spilled out on the ground like a patch of midnight, firelight flickering over your pale skin. Still smirking, and I growl softly as I capture your mouth again, demanding entrance with my tongue and kissing you until you are breathless, and no longer smirking but wide-eyed and expectant.

It's the most natural thing in the world, the most right thing I've ever felt, being here with you, feeling your strong slim body underneath me, your hands brushing fire everywhere they touch. This is what I wanted, this is where I belong, this is who I belong to. Always forever you.

It's simple and easy and perfect, the way we fit together, moving together in silence and heat and darkness. Not complete silence, I can hear your breath, feel it ghosting over my skin and I shudder, my gasp mixing with soft moans and murmurs, sounds of pleasure and perfection. No need for words, for discussion or explanation or affirmation--just quiet appreciative murmurs and soft wordless cries.

We don't really need to be quiet, we're alone here and there's no one else for miles, but it seems to suit the moment. Quiet and darkness, moonlight and fire in the night. I am going up in flames, the ambient fire aiding the illusion of literally melting into you as this feeling of ecstasy overwhelms us, lifting us higher and higher until we fall together. I feel so full of you, even though I am the one inside of you, it seems like you have filled my soul with everything you are--everything I've ever wanted, and things I've never known I could want. All of it is you.

We lay quietly then, still entangled, wrapped around each other, though I have moved off of you and slightly to one side, just far enough not to crush you. I can hear your heartbeat, still too fast, sounding in my ear as I rest my head on your chest.

After a few minutes you reach a lazy hand to grab a corner of the blanket, cleaning us off and I smile slightly. You like to accuse me of being too concerned about neatness, but you are the one who insists on being clean.

Neither of us feel like moving for the moment, though, so the quiet stretches out, a peaceful lethargy, slightly drowsy, though neither of us is quite ready to sleep yet. The fire still snaps and crackles behind us, casting a warm glow over the fading heat between us. It seems a long time that we lay there, relaxing against each other, and maybe it is... I have no idea what time it is, but it must be the middle of the night by now.

You stir finally, pushing me over on my back and leaning down to kiss me, your hair falling like a curtain around us, making you look even more mysterious than usual as you pull back with a faint smile. I'm so hopelessly lost in you. You're addictive, beautiful and fascinating, dark and light in a perfect balance.

I can't help but follow when you get up, stretching in a lazy way, and take my hand, pulling me toward the sea.

"Come on," you whisper, a thread of sound in the night. "Let's swim."

It doesn't occur to me to protest, to point out that the water must be cooler now than it was earlier, that perhaps night swimming is not the best idea. Like all of your ideas, it sounds irresistible to me.

Swimming in the moonlight, which is almost as romantic as it sounds--I hardly notice how chill the water is as you splash me, smirking, and lead the way into deeper water. I follow you as if I can't help but chase your lithe form into the glittering sea, catching you finally and stealing a kiss before you laugh, that low throaty laughter that I have never heard before today, and push me under.

It's a magical thing, this day outside of time, a seemingly endless sea in the seemingly endless night, and it could be minutes or hours that we play, letting the sea surround us as we enjoy the spell of night and water and light.

Perhaps it is not so long, though, for eventually we notice the chill and head back to land, swimming side by side. I take your hand as we walk back up onto the sand, linking our fingers and sighing in contentment as I lead you back to the warmth of the fire. I've never felt like this before, but I want it to last forever.

We settle onto the blanket again, and I pull it up around us, wrapping you up in my arms beneath it as we sit in front of the slowly dying fire. I feel whole for what may be the first time in my life, here with you. This is perfection.

"Do you really think I look like a mermaid?" you ask randomly, sounding curious.

I am slightly surprised by this return to an earlier topic, but I'm well used to the random way your mind works, so I answer without comment.

"Not exactly, but you could. You look like the sea." You are absolutely the only person I could say things like this to, things that are half there or half imagined, and know that you will understand.

You look like you are thinking about this, and then you say, "But you said I was the moon, so I must look like the moon too. Do you believe in unicorns?"

I stare at you for a minute before my laughter comes rumbling out, and I nuzzle your hair before I answer. "You look like the moon, too," I agree. "What have unicorns got to do with anything?"

"Unicorns are made of moonlight," you tell me seriously, looking a bit sulky at my laughter. "So if I look like the moon maybe I look like a unicorn too, only that would be weird because unicorns look like horses and I don't think I look like a horse, but I just wanted to know if you thought that."

I chuckle again and kiss your temple. "No, you don't, but you could be made of moonlight for all I know. I wouldn't be surprised."

You smile, tilting your head back against my shoulder as you look up at the moon. "So you do believe in unicorns," you insist, not quite a question.

"I believe in you," I tell you firmly, and apparently that was the right answer, because you smile again and settle back against me.

"I believe in you too," you whisper, as if it were a secret.

It leaves me silent for a moment, a sudden surge of emotion leaving me unable to reply. It's incredible, the way the words make me feel suddenly as if I can do anything. Like we make each other real, just by our believing. It's a silly, fanciful thing to think that I have to chuckle again, shaking my head, but my arms are warm and strong around you, holding you tight, and maybe it is true after all.

I know at least that I have never felt as real, as alive as I do tonight.

You are still smiling, but you look sleepy now, blinking at the fire, and after a minute you yawn, curling into my embrace.

"Tired?" I ask, and you give a slight nod, with a slow, languid blink like a cat. I look over in the darkness, but I can't quite see... "Does that hammock hold two?" I murmur in your ear, and you straighten, looking a bit surprised, as if you hadn't thought of that.

"Yes!" you assure me, tugging at my hand, and I let you pull me up, taking the blanket with us over to where the cradle of netting hangs swaying in the breeze. I spread the blanket over it and stretch out on top of it, and you crawl in after me and arrange us to your satisfaction, dragging the leftover blanket up around us.

It's surprisingly comfortable and warm, snuggled up with you and drifting with the slight wind as it rocks us in our cozy cocoon of blanket and body heat. It's amazing how easy it is to fall asleep when I am holding you, as if nothing is or can ever be wrong again.

We probably don't get more than a few hours of sleep, but the day has been worth it. The best day of my life without question, and I try to etch it in my memory, clear and perfect so that I never forget the way you looked today, the way this felt.

I wake to see the sunrise, just touching the edges of the sea. Liquid gold, and yet another kind of fire and light.

I smile and kiss the top of your head, watching as you stir and blink up at me, and then an answering sleepy smile spreads across your face.

Do you believe in forever?

I believe in us.

Comments

[moonraven-croft.livejournal.com]

*glomps*

Beautiful! I read the first part too, just have to drag my butt back there and comment. ^__^

*sighs* You paint such pretty pictures...

It is just like Tachibana to wait! *snuggles him* And Shinji! Shinji's still rambling on and even if it's toned down, it's still so cute.

And the last bits where they discussed the mermaid, the moon and the unicorn... I LOVE IT!

Do you believe in forever?
I believe in us.
- *faints*

[flamesword.livejournal.com]

*snugs* I am glad you liked it, hon.