Ask Not the Same Day of Birth

01. Blossom
Dogs, that's what they were. Goddamned dogs.

A younger Yamamoto would have laughed, said, "How cynical!" and slapped Gokudera on the back. But this older Yamamoto, though still loyal and good-hearted, knew how to scavenge. And the blood and the need on Gokudera's body filled him like breath pressing against starving ribs.

That's how it was: bloody, rough, sudden. Like a good raid. No blossoming flowers. No rays of sunshine or revelatory glances. Just the ripping and tearing of clothes from skin like flesh from bone. Just teeth and claws and strangled cries in the humid night air.


02. Sweat
Sweat and blood mingled on Yamamoto's brow, on his fine black jacket. Still, despite the countless gashes, the bruised ribs, he laughed when Gokudera swabbed the mess from his skin. It tickled; Gokudera rolled his eyes.

"Hold still."

Yamamoto grinned, tugged Gokudera onto his lap. "But it's a good day. We're that much closer to the Millefiore," he said, "hahaha, ow."

"You're an idiot." His voice sounded annoyed, but he shifted to straddle Yamamoto's legs.

"Yeah," he said, rolled his hips. Gokudera groaned.

"Later." A length of fresh bandages, some salve.

"Uh-uh." A hand under Gokudera's shirt. "Now."


03. Gaze
Yamamoto can barely hold back his grin. Gokudera is draped over his shoulders like a worn quilt, his hot, quick breath pulsing against his ear.

Yamamoto strokes his chin, fingering lightly over the deep scar there, and his gaze joins Gokudera's: the T.V.

Squalo is battling on the screen; his long hair whips, following the skilled, quick movement of his hips, his feet, his blade. Gokudera's fingers trail down Yamamoto's chest.

In the dark, Yamamoto smirks. "This gets you hard, doesn't it?"

A younger Gokudera would have made a scene. This older one just breathes a faint, "Idiot," and Yamamoto feels the cushions behind him shift as Gokudera rubs himself off on the couch.


04. Tongue
He's called Yamamoto a freak, an idiot, a comrade, a lover. Always with a flushed face: anger, resignation, embarrassment.

He's told him to go away, to shut up, to "dodge it, please," to "god, move faster. More." He says it in indignation, in shouts, in an exotic patchwork of the languages he knows and some that Yamamoto would swear he's made up.

And Yamamoto just takes it. He takes it in stride, sometimes takes it to heart. Because, when they're this close, sweat-slicked, anything is beautiful on Gokudera's tongue.


05. Sweet
"The stupid cow just keeps poofing back here with that stupid bazooka 'cause you spoil him with stupid candy," Gokudera said, loosening his tie, unbuttoning his shirt.

Yamamoto laughed, stepping out of his shoes, his pants. "Such a dangerous toy."

Gokudera snorted. "Could at least send him back with useful information."

Unclothed, Yamamoto settled into bed. "Yeah, about the rings or something."

"Nah." Gokudera slid in next to him. "Were were just kids then."

"Yeah."

Gokudera's head disappeared beneath the covers. "Maybe a note telling the idiot teenager I was to hurry up and fuck you."

"Such language," Yamamoto said, moaned, agreed.


06. Give
It's not that it wasn't...nice. (It kind of was.) And it's not that he didn't want it (exactly). It just felt a bit like losing. So instead of feeling really turned on (ignore the throbbing boner in his pants), he was really pissed off instead.

So he growled and he bucked and he threatened to do things with his dynamite that were nearly sacreligious. He spat insults and warnings and fluid foreign words and even something that sounded suspiciously like "please."

Until Yamamoto laughed and said, "Okay, okay," and rolled them, and let Gokudera slide neatly between his legs.


07. Hand
Gokudera's got these broad, rough hands; has pretty pianist fingers.

Yamamoto first notices them gripped around sticks of dynamite. Can't remember who Gokudera was threatening at the time; just knows it was kind of scary and pretty cool.

Next time: They're in a physical scuffle.

Gokudera: One knee on Yamamoto's hip, and one broad, flat hand holding down his chest. Yamamoto: Thinks they're fun, these fighting I-hate-you games.

Again: Even more fun. Those sharp eyes, those long fingers darting past his belt, the other hand that pulls his tie until they are flush against each other. Breathless.


08. Compromise
If you look at Gokudera's strange hair, his eyes that are just a little "off," and ask what exactly he is, he'll scowl and scoff and say, "Made in Italy."

What he won't tell you is that he rather likes Japan. He likes the quiet, the way everyone acts like they live in a goddamn haiku.

Except Yamamoto. Even tucked away, alone and shirtless and breathless, he laughed, rhythmic like terza rima. When Gokudera bit his bottom lip, slid his fingers down past his belt, he moaned loud and colorful like a sonnet, and Gokudera longed for Italy.


10. Deep
They go back. Way back. Back through Family and blood and fights, laughter and scowls, bombs and smoke like memory. Way back. Back longer than the curve of Yamamoto's body arching off the floor. Longer than scratches trailing down Gokudera's sides. Longer than the litany-symphony-cacophony of noise they make that carries them through till dawn.

They go back. Back and down and deep, invading each other until no one can quite call their names separately anymore. There is no Gokudera. There is no Yamamoto. No right-hand man. Just loyal servants tangled together: a mythological beast or raindrops weaving through a stormy sky.


11. Shiver
Hiss.

Gokudera's many rings, the silver-cold bits of armor on his fingers, slide up Yamamoto's spine like ice cubes. They ride over each vertebrate, no brakes in wintertime, and the goosebumps on his skin scream out. It takes all of his strength to fight down a giggle; he's learned his lesson.

(A replay:

"Haha, that tickles!"

Whack.)

Instead, he grabs Gokudera's hand, and Gokudera's eyes go wide as he brings the fingers to his mouth. One by one, he uses his teeth to slide the rings over the sharp knuckles.

And goosebumps spread up Gokudera's arm like frost on a windowpane.


12. Melt
Gokudera lingers outside Take Sushi for an hour before the idiot notices him. By that time, he's good and frozen. Just like old times.

He knew he'd find Yamamoto there, seeing his old man one last time, two ghosts passing in a graveyard.

They go to Yamamoto's room: an old bedroll, hot cups of tea, thawing out.

"You wouldn't touch that stuff before," Yamamoto says. Looks very old, very out of place.

Gokudera shrugs. "Wouldn't touch a lot of things back then."

Cards his fingers through Yamamoto's hair; feels him lean into the touch.

"Miss him," Yamamoto says.

"I know."


13. Smooth
Gokudera doesn't know when the ritual started exactly, but lately he's been watching Yamamoto train. They watch Squalo's videos together. He watches Yamamoto sharpen his blade, watches him get soaking wet; gets soaking wet himself.

Yamamoto doesn't know when the ritual started either, but lately he's taken to drying Gokudera off once they're finished. First his shaggy hair, his face. And he's always a little surprised when Gokudera lets him unbutton his clingy shirt, pull it off.

He's even more surprised one afternoon when Gokudera growls out in frustration and yanks Yamamoto's fingers to his belt.

"The rest of me's wet, too."


14. Tingle
It's like the bat in his hands after he swings, his sword during Attaco di Squalo, his numb fingers. It's exciting and terrifying, like this scary-cool mafia game. It's like all of these things. It's like none of them at all.

The thing it's closest to -- what Yamamoto likes most about it -- is that it's like fighting side-by-side with Gokudera for the first time. Really side-by-side. Combi-play victory, back-to-back. Vibrating, electric.

Except now, it's more like chest-to-chest; breath-to-breath; fingers tangled together, in this strange gesture of affection or control, depending on which of them you asked. Yamamoto didn't really mind either way.


15. Button
Gokudera stared at his reflection and cursed the missing button on his black, tailored jacket.

They'd fucked the day it happened. Two goddamn animals, clawing and biting, gasping and jerking, long legs and arms cramped into the back of that long, black sedan.

His teeth had ripped a fissure in Yamamoto's shoulder; Yamamoto's fingers had ripped the button off his jacket.

And while they were there, snapping tension like brittle bones, the boss had gone out by himself. They together; he alone and cold and in a box and Gokudera would attend his funeral, missing a button, broken in two.


00. Blur [subtitute for "Chocolate"]
After Tsuna's funeral, things get a little hazy. Moments, instead of moving slow like cancer, speed by, time compressed, heated, ready to detonate, never enough.

But Gokudera stands out in the fog: his silence, the way his hands shake when he lights another cigarette, the way he shoves one so forcefully at Yamamoto that he doesn't dare refuse it. So he takes a deep, burning drag.

He doesn't refuse either when Gokudera grabs his hair, kisses him. And in the dark, he lets clothes give way to skin give way to cries give way to the irrational blur of forgetting.