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gutsby · 19 days ago

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Father Figure

Pairing: dbf!Joel x Reader

Summary: Parents’ Weekend looks a little different this year with Joel showing up in the place of your father.

Warnings: 18+. Unprotected piv. Dad[dy] kink. Age gap. Oral (m!receiving). Premature ejaculation (Joel cums in his pants while he’s kissing you AS REAL LOVERS DO). Drinking and drug use. Gratuitous dad rock references.

Note: We all saw that video. This was begging to be written.

Another note: For a more immersive read of the pregame, listen to my freshman year Kegs & Eggs playlist (yes, it sucks).

Word count: 19.0k

Freud would’ve had a field day with this shit.

Really, there was no sane explanation for the obsession that seized you and your friends come Parents’ Weekend every year. But there it went. Again. Like clockwork, all the forty- to fifty-something fathers arrived for their first meal on campus. Like the cock-starved coed she was, your roommate bumped your shoulder as you walked and nodded to the first set of families approaching the dining hall. Out of the pack, you spotted four grey heads.

“Would, would, would, and would,” Aly observed, almost clinically. Her strides were long and resolved in their path

“That one could get it.” Her brother shrugged on your other side. He tipped his chin up, then added: “Look.”

And look you did. The batch of men, women, and all their college-aged children struck you as little more fun to ogle than your average wall of paint waiting to dry. Though the moms and dads were, admittedly, the kind of attractive you rarely saw outside an L.L. Bean magazine—as were all the rest of the kempt and polished crowd that populated your school—you were hungry as fuck. You’d agreed to join your roommate’s family for the kickoff banquet of the weekend, and you needed food. On top of that, you’d sworn off middle-aged men forever.

Aly and her brother didn’t know that, though, so you played the game and trudged ahead. When a handsome blue-eyed man born in 1970-something stood back and held the door open for your trio going in, you had to fight back a smirk at the look Aly gave him after thanking him.

“Oh, he wanted me bad,” she hissed once safely inside.

“Looks a bit like Rob Lowe,” you offered noncommittally.

“What about your dad? Is he gonna be here tonight?”

That last fragment of conversation had come from Aly’s brother, and the curiosity in it was sincere. Then he’d wiggled two dark brows your way and said he bet your dad was a silver fox like no other, and you’d had to roll your eyes before strolling into the wide open dining area. You were late; the food, evidently, was all already served.

“My dad’s at home with a broken femur, so…no,” you answered slowly. Starting to weave your way through a sea of round tables and following Aly’s lead as you did, “Probably not your type. Just old. Very embarrassing.”

You stuck your index in your mouth and pantomimed gagging, and the sophomore beside you just laughed.

“Yeah? Desperate, too?” he challenged.

“Pathetic, really,” you replied.

For a second, you felt a pang of guilt at the way you were describing your father. Surely he couldn’t deserve being characterized like that. Then you recalled how he’d boned your mom’s best friend while he was married, had never really made amends after the fact, and was still fucking said mistress’s brains out on the reg to this day.

You’d done plenty of wrong behind his back, to be sure, but that kind of took the cake for fucked up betrayals. He could stand for a little bit of ribbing every now and then.

Presently, Aly was paving the way straight toward a pair of bright and beaming faces at a table near the back.

“Our parents named us after a goddamn Grateful Dead song and the city they first saw the band in concert. Nobody does pathetic better than Scott and Michelle.” She waved her arm in a wide arc and grinned over there.

And you would’ve gladly countered that no, that actually makes them very fucking funny and cool, but the chance to do that was gone in a moment—the next had you approaching their table and meeting with big hugs.

Even for you, who had never seen these people before in your life, there was a warm welcome. You got long, suffocating embraces and cheery greetings of, ‘Oh, you must be Aly’s roommate!’ and ‘We’re sorry you got stuck with our shithead kid’ before you had a grin plastered on again and were being ushered to sit down.

You took note of the little placards opposite each chair, counted four, five, six of them altogether, with an empty spot beside your own, per usual, and you took your seat.

“Dallas, honey, I love you,” the woman across the table, Michelle, said with all the restraint she could conjure up, “I love you to pieces, but what the hell are you wearing?”

That steered the conversation in a decidedly light, playful direction from the start, with Aly’s brother defending his decision to be decked out in full school-sponsored athleisure tooth and nail. He’d been recruited to play lacrosse, so naturally, wearing the far-too-tight crimson lycra was all part of the deal. Aly insisted that he just wanted to show off the biceps he didn’t have, Scott hypothesized it was the crisp, wintry Boston air that had made his son dress like a total douche, and Dallas tried bringing the inquisition to a speedy end by lifting one middle finger up and flipping his napkin into his lap.

“Fuck you guys, I’m hungry,” he declared, emphatic. Fighting the urge to laugh along then grabbing a fork.

Just as fast as he’d picked it up to dig in, though, his mom was slapping the silver utensil out of his hand.

“Not yet,” she chided.

“Why? We’re all here,” Dallas groaned.

“Because,” his father returned, scrubbing at the stubble on his chin before casting a quick look around him, “We’re still waiting on one more to join us. See?”

With that, Scott nodded toward the card next to you, and immediately, your cheeks warmed. You shook your head, mouth working a little less fluidly than you would’ve liked as you piped up and told them—assured them all, rather:

“My dad’s not coming. He got a little, uh…hurt at work.”

And you were certain that would be the end of it. You’d just moved to grab a fork yourself, eyeing the plate full of food in front of you then, when another hand stopped you on the spot. It was Aly beside you, grip insistent as she gave your wrist a little shake, and in your periphery, you could see her tilt her head the opposite direction.

She was staring, silent—totally unlike herself.

Normally when something crossed her path nearby to make her twist her whole fucking neck to get a glimpse, it was followed by a dry remark. A comment, a compliment, or a lewd invitation to fuck me, please.

While the last of the three clearly wasn’t an option to use around her parents, you at least would’ve expected to hear something. When nothing came, you turned your head too, having just snagged a bite of roast beef on your fork and shoveled it in before looking that way.

You followed her gaze and nearly inhaled the food.

With a startled gasp and a ‘Christ!’, your eyes widened to find a man who wasn’t your father at all—just his best friend and your ex-fuckbuddy, Joel Miller, walking over.

It was a sight you weren’t prepared to see in a million years. What the everliving fuck this man was doing two thousand miles from Austin, Texas, on your college campus, striding into the very first meal of Parents’ Weekend, looking like that, was so far beyond your comprehension you couldn’t speak. You just stared and sucked in the sharpest, strangled breath, fought back a cough, and tried not to die swallowing a cube of meat.

From the way that man was approaching you now, asphyxiation might not be the worst, you thought idly.

Joel’s here.

Joel’s here, and he’s wearing slacks and a button-up.

Joel’s wearing business casual, and he’s walking over.

Who the fuck does this man even think he’s trying to—

“Sorry I’m late,” Joel cut in, smile bright and easy on his face. Then, stepping behind your chair, leaning down:

“Hey, sweetie. How are ya?”

He kissed the top of your head.

The tone sealed his fate completely.

Joel was pretending to be your father.

This wasn’t his brightest idea.

Call him sick, insane, selfish, besotted, or rotten straight down to his core, Joel Miller was no longer one to care. He had a goal in his head. Less than a week ago, you’d left him high and dry in Austin after having told him you loved him—in the middle of climax, but aloud, no less—and the month before that, you’d left him again. Back to college, where you could happily pretend he didn’t exist.

Tonight, he wasn’t letting that happen. This weekend, Parents’ Weekend, was of course reserved for families, but Joel knew your father wasn’t coming. He knew you wouldn’t be expecting your dad or anyone else to be there, and since you’d taken to the usual course of ignoring all his calls and texts, he felt he’d had no choice.

You couldn’t stay closed off like this forever.

Eventually, you’d both have to reckon with what this was and how to move forward, or the mess of the last month would never change. You would never believe he saw you any differently from a one-off hookup or a taboo outlet of pleasure. And if that was all you saw him as, so be it. But he had to get the truth of it out now, one way or another.

Even if he had to roleplay the father figure and play the most fucked up game of paternal charades known to man, he’d get the answers he needed this weekend.

You were good at games. Unfortunately, Joel was better.

He’d take this fake-out to the max and be the best faux father you’d never asked for. Maybe you’d hate him for it.

As he’d squeezed your shoulder and sat down beside you at the table, felt your gaze heavy and stunned on his, he also couldn’t help but hope you might still love him after.

“Scott Ingram. Pleasure to meet you.” The broad hand had been extended his way before he was even fully seated. The face across from him was kind. Intrigued. Tinged with a faint trace of curiosity, “So you’re dad?”

“Stepdad, yeah.” Joel had had to leave a bit more room for plausibility before he’d made his formal introduction.

Then he’d met Michelle. Aly. Dallas. The latter two more piqued with interest than the first, as though unsure of what they’d just been told, but willing to go on anyway.

“Old and pathetic my ass,” Dallas had murmured your way, low enough for Joel to know those words were meant for only you to hear. You stiffened in response.

“So glad you could make it up! Is your leg doing better?”

Aly had smiled warmly over at him, and Joel had only hesitated a second. Then he remembered his friend.

“Oh, my— yeah. Just…peachy. Yeah. All healed up.”

He didn’t flit a look to you; he could feel the searing imprint of your gaze and the way you hadn’t bothered to hide your frown when he’d referenced the leg he’d never broken. The way you could’ve pulverized the napkin in your lap to dust from how hard you were squeezing it in your fist—you didn’t like to admit it, but that was your nervous tic, and Joel knew it well. He propped his elbows on the table and didn’t miss the way a head turned his way from a neighboring group. Then another. He hated every starch white button-up he owned with a burning passion, but he couldn’t deny this one was eye-catching.

Not that it mattered, really, because the only glossy gaze he cared to snag was presently nailing him with daggers in its path. Still, it was a comfort to know he’d make a good-looking corpse if that look of yours ever did kill him

“Oh, my, my, oh hell YES—”

The sing-song trill of a baritone beside him roused him from his trance. He looked over and saw Scott grinning.

“—honey put on that pa-a-a-a-a-arty dress!”

It was Michelle that finished the line for him, while they both bobbed their heads along to the Tom Petty song blasting overhead. Evidently, dad rock would be alive and well all weekend. Joel wasn’t mad to see that happen.

“You a Tom Petty fan?” Scott jerked his chin up to him.

Before he could answer, though, Michelle interjected:

“I’d say he’s more of a Simon & Garfunkel guy.”

Whatever the hell that meant. Joel smiled.

“Mom, Dad. Please stop,” Aly moaned.

“Seriously.” Dallas’s mouth was full.

And, just as he fought to swallow the heaping glob of food he’d just crammed in, his dad snapped his fingers.

“No, I know it! You’re a Billy Joel man, Joel. No doubt.”

Joel blanched as white as the shirt on his back. You coughed. He hadn’t even noticed you’d chanced a bite of food beside him, but now you were sputtering—choking on a morsel of beef or mashed potatoes or something—and he didn’t think twice. He pivoted right to you and dropped a hand on your back in the space between your shoulder blades. He patted you twice, eyes a little wider.

“Hey, you OK?”

Fleeting memories of a night not too long ago flashed through his mind: driving town by town, state after state, blaring Billy Joel extra loud in his Bronco with you riding shotgun. It had been something special between you then. Now, your gaze was on him like you despised him.

“I’m fine,” you answered, tone clipped.

You shrugged his touch away. Joel blinked back to Scott.

He wasn’t entirely sure what he said, thoughts occupied by you all the while, but he reckoned it was something his neighbor had wanted to hear, because he saw a satisfied little smile cross his lips, ‘I told you, Michelle.’

“Everybody likes Billy Joel, dad.” Aly rolled her eyes.

And Joel would’ve liked to look your way again. Maybe dropped the fatherly moue for half a second and flashed an apologetic look shared just between you and him. But then the conversation shifted; the whole table began to eat, more pleasantries and questions about home life and backgrounds followed, and all the talk from there converged on where they were planning to go out after dinner—how they’d make the very most of Parents’ Weekend. You sat back and ate in silence, mostly. You wouldn’t meet his gaze for even a moment, and when you rose from your seat to get another drink, Joel felt himself stand too, as if out of habit. He hadn’t meant to.

It hadn’t been his intention to follow you out of the dining area, strides swift to try and keep up, but he did.

It hadn’t been his goal to corner you by the soda dispenser, either. Away from the eyes of everyone else, or at least in a private enough space not to be seen by too many people, Joel felt a little more at liberty to talk. He lowered his voice and drew even closer then to speak.

“Sweetheart—”

You’d filled a cup halfway with water. As soon as he’d said that word, ‘sweetheart,’ you turned and chucked its contents directly in his face. Liquid splashed up at him, and for a second, Joel had only to stand there with his eyes closed and his body completely frozen in place.

Water dripped in silence before he wiped at his chin.

At the same time, you were tossing your cup aside.

“Don’t you dare fuckin’ call me that,” you growled.

Then, shortly: “What the fuck is your problem?!”

Honestly, he didn’t know. He opened his eyes.

And, just as he raised both hands in a semi-conciliatory kind of gesture, you scowled and backed away from him.

“You’re sick, Joel. Pretending to be my goddamn da—”

“I know. I know,” Joel winced as he spoke, wrinkles no doubt creasing even deeper along his face as he saw yours fall. You weren’t happy to see him in the slightest. “I know it’s fucked up. I just…needed to talk to you, hon.”

“About what?!”

He could feel the heat rising to your cheeks. He wanted to cup them in his hands, or else kiss the frown off your lips in a way that would be totally inappropriate for a stepdad to do, but already, he sensed his resolve was eroding. It didn’t matter, anyway, because you weren’t letting him get within an inch of you, based off your look.

��Darlin’,” Joel sighed, “There’s just so much—”

Of course, the next moment was punctured by a voice. His words were cut short; you were both forced to turn.

“It’s all settled now,” Aly declared with cheery conviction. She snagged a cup and started filling it up with Sprite, “Pregame at Dallas’. Seven Oaks after. Lucky’s after that. Maybe a brief intermission at The Alley, if you’re up for it. Afters at A.J.’s, probably. Depends what the vibe is like.”

Joel had barely processed half of what was said, and it still sounded like a lot from where he stood. He blinked.

Then Aly’s eyes fell to his collar, and she lifted a brow.

“You got a little…drinking problem there, Joel?”

He glanced down at the mess on his shirt and tried to smile with her. It was hard to fight the color jumping to his cheeks simultaneously. He scrambled for the words.

“Oh, uh—”

“Dad’s real smooth with it,” you cut in, suddenly, like the paternal moniker was nothing at all. You didn’t look back, “I’m fine drinking wherever. Your parents coming, too?”

Aly’s grin stretched even wider. It looked devious.

“They wouldn’t miss this bingefest for the world.”

At just the intonation of those words, Joel’s pulse sped up. He saw a knowing look pass between you and your roommate, and in a second, he sensed he was fucked.

He really shouldn’t be drinking tonight.

A hundred shots probably wouldn’t have been enough to kill it—this ringing in your head hurt like a motherfucker.

Joel wanted to talk.

Of course he wanted to talk.

Just on his terms, on his time, with your closest friends and their family members all assuming he was your dad.

Because that made a lot of fucking sense.

You’d meant to split from Joel the second you showed up. Dallas’ off-campus house was many things, but small and quiet were not among those descriptors, and you planned to use all of its space to your advantage tonight.

Simply put, the place was a glorified playground for college degenerates. Afforded the distinct honor of housing eight members of the Pi Kappa Alpha fraternity in 2,700 square feet for over fifty years, the Craftsman home was no small wonder to anyone who saw it standing today: the house was shit. Dallas loved it.

You’d enjoyed it, too, for at least the first year or two of college. Then you’d wisened up to the antics of a few too many numb-skulled Pikes, got tired of listening to the same ten tracks being blasted in your ears every other weekend, and decided you’d just stick to the bar scene, where at least patrons were prohibited from standing on elevated surfaces and breaking bottles over their heads.

When Dallas rushed, and eventually joined the fold last year, you’d been hesitant to go back. Then, when he’d promptly decked the first guy who tried dragging you up onto a table with him, you figured you could safely visit again and not have to worry while your friend was there. The kid did a pretty good job of weeding out assholes.

“My lady.” He stood and bowed before presenting you with a fifth of Pink Whitney like it was the finest wine.

The bottle was half empty. You’d been passing it back and forth for the last hour in between rounds of pong.

“Been sayin’ shit like that ever since he saw Gladiator II.” His housemate Cory called from closeby. He flicked his wrist once and sank his shot in the second to last cup.

“You are not General Acacius, brother,” Cory’s teammate Pete chimed in. With a lucky throw of his own, he hit the final Red Solo cup and shook his head like it was nothing.

You were all on the third floor, away from the noise downstairs. While the so-called ‘pregame’ surged ahead on first, in the basement, and outdoors, you’d managed to find relative quiet among eight or nine friends and acquaintances, plus a guy railing lines off a frisbee in the corner. Nobody knew where the fuck he’d gotten it from.

“I like to pretend,” Dallas said with a shrug. Then, once you’d taken a swig of the pink drink and handed it back: “My parents play next. Gavin, put the coke away, please.”

Gavin sniffed the air at least four times like he had a cold. Then he tucked his credit card back in his wallet, put the wallet in his pocket, and knocked the frisbee on the floor.

‘Yessir’ was all you heard before he was leaning back contentedly. The girls Cory and Pete had just played seemed equally indifferent as they sauntered off—likely looking to get their hands on whatever the hell else the redhead had in his jeans and quick to forget about the game. Blow was way too easy to spread at these parties, and clearly, no one gave a shit about redemption round.

“Gavin.” Dallas’ tone was a warning.

At the same time, his housemate had just snagged an ID where it was left on the table and held it up to the light.

“Hang on, it looks like this guy, uh…” Cory squinted to read the text on an apparently too-old driver’s license. “Looks like he called dibs on next round…Joel Miller.”

Your grip tightened on the spot. You said nothing. Cory was just then starting to remark that this dude’s the spittin’ fuckin’ image of that one guy from Game of Thrones, Dallas, come look, when the door to the room swung open, and in walked the man of the hour himself.

Joel was joined by Scott, Michelle, and a horde of others.

Well, maybe five in total. They were all freshmen girls.

Giggling, grinning freshmen girls who were quite literally hanging off his body on either side, or else trailing behind him, admiring him like he was the single greatest thing.

Where were all their fathers? That was your fake dad.

Christ, that sounded bad, and you hadn’t even said it.

When Dallas offered you the bottle again, you declined. You were more than just buzzed. And Joel was drunk.

Apparently.

And was he—well shit, were they trying to strip him?

One of the bubbliest girls from the group was tugging on Joel’s shirt. Three buttons were already undone, and a smooth, tanned patch of flesh glistened through the ‘V’ in the fabric. He’d been working up a sweat downstairs.

A sea of black-and-grey hairs peeking out through the trough of cotton was the last thing you saw before you had to look away. It was too familiar. And there you saw some girl fresh out of high school, feeling him, teasing at the material while she bounced on the balls of her feet.

“You are so lying!” she slurred, voice pitchy and shrill.

What was worse, you couldn’t even fault the girl for it. That had been you just a few short years ago, hadn’t it?

Beside her, her friend snagged his sleeve: “Show ussss!”

Scott and Michelle had approached the table where Dallas was setting up the cups for the next round and you were trying not to stare. You reckoned you were failing pretty miserably at the task when the next thing Mrs. Ingram did was lean in closer to you and whisper.

“Real hot commodity with the girls, isn’t he?” It was soft.

She was right.

You forced your gaze to your feet, pretending to assess the wet and sticky mess underneath them. You hummed.

“Yup. Real ladies’ man,” you answered quietly. Strained.

“They’re convinced he’s got some ink hidden under his shirt. That’s a creative way to get a man topless if I’ve ever seen one.” Scott chuckled next to you, tone teasing.

Something twisted in your chest, though you couldn’t quite place what it was. It hardly felt like jealousy at all—but that was worse, somehow. Joel was your stepfather in every other mind but yours and his, and here he was, soaking in all this attention that you couldn’t give to him.

Maybe that was for the best.

Joel deserved a woman he didn’t have to love in secret.

“OK, who’s up—Joel or mom and dad?” Dallas asked.

“I’m out. Joel can take my place. And don’t we—”

Pete snapped his fingers, then pointed at Cory.

“We forgot to grab the other keg, didn’t we?”

“Fuck me.”

“Let’s go.”

They were gone in a second. That left Joel, Scott, Michelle, plus one open spot. Dallas set the last cup.

“Who’s gonna be Joel’s partn—”

“ME!”

That had to have come from three girls, at least. One on the couch and two more on either side of Joel, along with a slew of hopeful looks from others in his orbit.

They’d dispersed some, thankfully. Though not physically clinging to your pseudo-stepfather and begging him to peel off his shirt, they stayed close.

One of them giggled and nudged her friend: “Maya can!”

The girl who’d just been playing tug-of-war with the front of Joel’s button up waved her hand in mock indignation.

“I suck at pong. You go, Claire,” she crooned.

It was clear from the sideways glance the first girl had flashed that she wanted Joel to protest. Maybe insist that she play anyway, if you had to guess. It was all so confusing—what with how this group was flirting, and fighting, and insisting simultaneously that they couldn’t possibly play, even though they’d like to, but maybe…

Your skull started ringing again.

You were just about to turn to leave, when Dallas cut in:

“Sorry, ladies. Gonna be a Daddy-Daughter duo tonight.”

Then he gestured to you, beckoned to Joel, and grinned. Your stomach could’ve plunged to that floor you’d just been pretending to study. You quickly jerked your head.

Even Joel, for all his calm and unaffected dealings, the pretty damp mop of hair hanging in ringlets against the sides of his face, and the way he kept pretending not to be concerned by the flock of girls, had to pause a beat. You saw his throat work. Before you could try and decipher the look that was crawling up his face, you made the split-second decision to interject yourself.

“No, Dallas. I’m not playing again.”

You tried to avoid grinding your molars.

This time, the tone he heard wasn’t one of a thinly veiled acceptance—something begging to be disputed when it tried to decline the offer—but instead an emphatic ‘no.’

No way were you playing another game with this man.

Joel already had your head fucked ten ways to Sunday by being here at all, and now you had to pretend to be platonic, his goddamn beer pong partner, while a gaggle of freshmen girls sat frothing at the mouth for his dick?

Yeah, but no.

Hard fucking pass.

You didn’t care what it looked like. You shot Dallas a look, grabbed a stray Solo off the table, and made your way to the door, calling something over your shoulder about being too tired to play, and offering your spot to Maya.

That should make your old man happy enough.

It wasn’t like he could do anything here with you.

And then you left. Before you did, though, you passed Gavin and the mysterious white bag he was starting to fish out of his pants, and without thinking, you grabbed his hand. You didn’t like doing coke, had never seen the point in taking your level of intoxication that far out on an ordinary night, but, all things considered, this evening was anything but normal. You deserved some relief. If that couldn’t come in the form of Joel packing all his shit and leaving, then so be it. But you weren’t about to hang around and play the nice and polite stepdaughter when all you wanted to do was scratch your fucking eyes out.

A few lines wouldn’t be the worst way to start the night.

Joel wasn’t drunk.

He wasn’t tipsy, either.

And even if he had been, he wouldn’t have appreciated the way this hazel-eyed firecracker had nearly crushed his toes from how hard she’d jumped up and down at hearing you abdicate your position. Maya had shrieked, and Scott and Michelle hadn’t been able to fight back smiles, and trying not to wince too hard, Joel had politely excused himself. He’d claimed that he needed some air.

The oxygen he found down the hallway a few minutes later was stale as shit, but he couldn’t exactly complain.

He’d asked for this, after all: the thumping bass, shaking floors, passageways that reeked of weed and cheap perfume, and girls that refused to let go of his neck.

Well. He hadn’t asked for that last thing.

Thirty years ago, he might’ve found it cute—what Maya and Claire and every other glossy-gazed Phi Mu seemed to be offering with every bat of their lashes. Now, if the arms latched around his throat weren’t yours, the idea just made him sick. He cleared his throat and walked.

And before long, his feet had carried him to the end of the hallway. Where in the hell had you gotten off to?

Would you be back soon?

And why had you taken that kid with you?

Joel’s palms were sweaty by his sides. He didn’t like being kept in the dark—didn’t think traveling some 2,000 miles to be closer to you would still leave him wondering like a fucking idiot if he would see you again.

Then he reached for the nearest door. A bathroom.

The door was just cracked, allowing a sliver of light to shine through and a peek at a sea of tile flooring to greet him. Joel pushed on the knob without thinking to knock.

When he stepped inside, he had to stop.

It was too much to process and walk at once.

For the first time in his life, he felt shell-shocked.

You were on your knees in front of that red-haired fucker. Stabilizing one hand on a denim-clad leg in front of you, patting his thigh, having him murmur something back—probably words of encouragement for how nice your mouth felt around him—and then tilting your head up.

Joel could only see you from behind. His vision was red.

“What the fuck are you DOING?!” he bellowed out.

The two of you leapt apart, your head jerking back.

He wasn’t thinking. Joel blew straight past you and went for him, the little pencil-dicked Pike who’d just had his dick down his stepdaughter’s throat, presumably, and he grabbed him by the shirt. He shoved him hard against the bathtub on the wall, watched him flail a few steps, and then, before the kid could recover his balance, Joel shoved him again. He might’ve tripped further back and fallen into the tub, had the older man not reached for him again—and reared back to punch him square in the face.

That blow never landed.

In the next instant, a smaller body was forcing itself in between him and the kid, and the only other thing Joel could see through his own blinding rage were your two eyes—wide and panicked and horror-stricken, clearly.

“JOEL.”

Still not prepared to retreat, Joel reached out again.

Your hand knocked his down in a blink. Hard.

“J— Dad. Dad. Stop. Please don’t hit him.”

Suddenly, that tone was approaching a plea. You must’ve caught a glimpse of the rage pulsing through his veins and sensed it might’ve been too much for him to control—but of course, Joel knew better. He could always stop.

He stepped off and turned to you at once, teeth bared.

“How the fuck could you even—” he started again.

“I’m sorry, dad,” you broke in, words sounding like a sob, “It’s not his fault. Really. I— I didn’t mean for you to see.”

Sucking some other guy’s cock. Yeah, of course not.

Joel’s face flared with an anger unlike anything he’d felt in years, and if it weren’t for the skittish sack of shit stumbling away, and the warning that was starting to radiate off your skin, he would’ve liked to knock him out.

He might’ve, if the kid hadn’t run out of the room.

If you hadn’t turned slightly, he might’ve yelled again.

And then he saw it, from where you’d pivoted—the toilet.

Sitting on the smooth white porcelain lid in three thick stripes, the sight greeted him like a punch in the gut.

He wasn’t sure what it meant for an excruciating second. He stared. Then he processed what that substance was.

You’d been crouched over the toilet doing a line of coke.

He wanted to feel relief. For a moment, maybe, he did.

When your eyes narrowed on his and you shook your head in a scowl, it didn’t feel like he should be happy. Or ready to celebrate this latest discovery. Instead, realizing that you hadn’t been blowing a guy in this bathroom but were simply doing drugs in front of him, Joel felt bile jump up his throat. It was like a knot the size of his fist, and he wasn’t sure how to react, but he couldn’t stand that look on your face. You were just as angry as him.

“What the hell was that all about, Joel?!” you snapped.

He opened his mouth to speak, but you cut back in:

“Sorry, sorry—I mean ‘dad.’ You fucking asshole.”

“And this is why you up and left?” Joel hissed.

“I just—”

“Do you realize how dangerous that is?”

“I didn’t—”

“What that could’ve been laced with?”

He pointed to the cocaine on the lid of the toilet—apparently there hadn’t been enough space on the skinny porcelain sink to set up your lines—and at the same time, to Joel’s amazement, you sank to your knees.

“Well, I don’t know, dad, why don’t we test some out?”

And then you swiped a casual touch through a line and lifted your index to your mouth. With your other hand, you pulled at your bottom lip a little, and were evidently about to test your drugs the old fashioned way: by rubbing the powder against your gums to see if it made them numb. Joel swatted at your wrist before you did.

“Don’t,” he growled. Without even realizing it, he reached and grabbed your chin. His fingers engulfed half your face in an authoritative, upward-tilting grip. “Put that stuff anywhere near your mouth, and you will regret it.”

That didn’t seem to stir you, but your hand stayed put.

Joel stepped away just as quickly. He went to the door.

He shut it.

And when he returned, you hadn’t moved from where you’d been knelt. He was glad. Something quiet and dull throbbed between his ears, though he wasn’t recovered enough from the shock of the last few minutes to really investigate that. He just stood back over you, frowning.

His voice was lower when he spoke again:

“What am I gonna do with you, honey?”

It was a question as much for himself as it was for you, and your lips twitched at the end of it. You shrugged, and you sank back onto your heels, peering up as you did.

“You thought—” you started, soft.

“I thought you were in here blowin’ that little shit.”

Your smile split into a grin. Your eyes glistened.

“Is that so?”

Joel didn’t have the strength or the presence of mind to answer, so instead, he just nodded. His scowl deepened.

“You and me,” he resumed, having just exhaled a breath, “We’re gonna have ourselves a little chat later. Got that?”

And he meant it. Not just about drugs and other men and the dangers of accepting cocaine from strangers. He had more to tell you tonight than his overwrought mind was likely capable of sharing right now, but he’d say it.

Soon.

Eventually.

Once he got this bulge in his slacks sorted out.

With you, it was never a conscious decision, and it rarely ever occurred at times it was appropriate to happen. Like when your friends and their family and half of the Pike fraternity weren’t all milling about around this house. When he hadn’t almost decked a kid for giving you coke.

When you weren’t shuffling on your knees to greet the growing erection in his pants with a grin on your face.

“Will this ‘chat’ come before or after you fuck Maya?”

That was it.

Joel seized hold of your head again—this time, from the back. One palm rounded the base of your skull and yanked your face forward, mushing your nose and your lips against the fabric of his pants in an obscene sort of kiss. He made you rub your face against the hardened tent there, and he groaned when you whimpered. The reverberations of it traveled from his groin to his brain in two milliseconds flat and made him think insane things.

Like having your mouth right now.

Taking from you here what he thought he’d almost lost.

The sight of your head hovering anywhere near another man’s crotch made it crystal-clear to him, though he’d known it well before: he wanted you. He needed to have you. How you could even crack the joke about a shred of his attention being elsewhere had him tightening his hand in a fist in your hair. He didn’t care if it felt wrong.

“You know what girls like Maya can do for me?” he said.

He tilted your head back so your gaze could find his. He didn’t let you answer, but he let you stare for a second, and then he worked your pretty parted lips over the front of his slacks again. He let the taut grey fabric tease the cusp of that opening, tasting a bit, before drawing back.

“That’s right,” Joel went on as if you’d just responded, “Nothing. Absolutely fuckin’ nothing. Open your mouth.”

And you did. Wider. From the look of it, there was spit pooling inside, and your tongue hovered just within it when your lips met the front of his pants. You cupped your mouth around his clothed erection and kissed it.

Your eyes were locked on his as you did. The sight felt extra obscene—Joel couldn’t ignore the fact that he was dressed in near-formal attire, and you had on jeans and a tight cropped tank. He looked polished and professional; you were a beaming pretty thing making space between his legs to kneel. You felt like a dream with your lips over his swollen, aching cock; Joel felt old. Paternal, almost.

Was it wrong to think you needed to be taught a lesson?

Of course it was. He wasn’t your dad. He didn’t do that.

But when you smiled up at him with your lips still brushing his straining bulge, Joel couldn’t resist the smallest impulse to wonder—what if he showed you?

What if he let you know exactly what he wanted, how he needed it done, and that he only ever craved it from you? If he couldn’t say it outright in words, he could guide you.

Teach you.

Your tongue traced the seam of his zip, and he groaned.

“Damn near gave your old man a stroke, y’know that?”

“I know,” you said softly. Kindly, “I’m sorry, daddy.”

His cock throbbed at that last affectionate word.

His hands couldn’t help themselves: one stayed planted on the back of your head, and the other made its way to his belt. He undid his buckle, button, and zip in a blink.

“And what was that prick’s name?” Joel grumbled.

“Gavin.”

Your mind seemed two million miles away from any shit-brained fratboy at the moment as your gaze fixed itself on the length he was working out of his pants just then.

When it bobbed out and got within an inch of your rapt expression, your lips parted on instinct; you leaned in.

Swiftly, Joel’s hand on your head halted the movement.

“Gavin, huh,” he returned, tone treading on patronizing. He knew you were salivating for that little pearl on his tip. He gripped your hair hard. “This what you’d do for him?”

You whimpered.

“No, daddy. No, just— just you.”

Joel hummed his approval but didn’t let you move. He watched you eye the head of his cock like there was no single sight more appetizing in the world, and then he saw you lick your lips. You’d get positive reinforcement.

He would take things slow, and by the end of it all, he hoped to have made it clear that this was what he wanted: you, and only you. That he didn’t want you doing this with anyone else other than him. Here, now, or ever.

The last was a lot to say, so he fed you an inch instead.

He let his cock slide between your lips and stretch them.

You breathed something soft and sweet at the first intrusion of his tip; your mouth cushioned that inch, and his head was immediately enveloped in warmth. Your tongue darted out to greet him in a gentle lick. Joel groaned again, and his fingers constricted in your hair.

“That’s it, honey,” he told you, “Suck on daddy.”

His hips hadn’t meant to jump, but the pleasure from just the cusp of your mouth was too much for him not to flinch a little. He stabbed another couple inches in that pliant ‘o’ and felt you work your jaw open to take him whole. You looked so obedient. You were doing so good.

You bobbed your head gently, and his hand didn’t need to coax you at all. You were hungry, mouth sliding up and down his thick, throbbing dick and leaving trails of spit in its wake. You wanted to please him now; he could feel it.

You had no idea what you did to him. All he wanted now. It was like trying to explain a color in words, and all the man could do was just hold your head in place and watch you take him. When your back straightened and one palm braced itself up against his thigh, the other about to curl around the base of his length, he shook his head.

He brushed that hand away and made it rest on his other leg, so you were left with just your mouth around him.

You peered up, confused. Joel was, too.

He wasn’t sure exactly what he wanted to do, but he knew he had to lead the way. Make you see what he wanted you to by guiding your motions and filling your mouth the way he needed. He tried as much by shifting his left hand to meet the right at the back of your head. Gently, he pushed your face forward to suck more in.

“Breathe through your nose, baby. Wanna feel you.”

Feel you deeper, he should’ve said. Either way, it made for a slow and painstaking slide down your tongue—sensing you flatten it and inhale a shallow breath as he worked his way in—and at the stretch, you gagged a bit.

Joel eased up, just enough to let you flit your gaze to his.

“You wanna feel me, too, sweetheart?” he asked gently.

You nodded, mouth still full of cock. Your eyes glistened in a way that said you might’ve guessed there was more to it, but you weren’t exactly in a position to ask just what. You let the fingers of both his big hands splay against the back of your head, and your jaw slackened more. Your gaze stayed on his as his cock slid deeper.

In that, there was wordless, tranquil reprieve. The sight of his spit-soaked length stuffing your mouth, skin all shiny and wet, and the way he kept going further and further and further, until your soft pert nose grazed the hairs of his belly, made Joel’s member swell harder still. There was scarcely an inch in between your lips and his heft of stomach. Your eyes were still fixed on him, and as the seconds ticked by, there was moisture welling at the corners. Joel moved his hands to thumb at those tears.

“Good girl. You’re doin’ so good for daddy,” he praised.

And something stirred in the depths of his body when he felt you try to nod again, like you were thrilled to be giving him pleasure and wanted to show it in some way.

Joel could’ve stayed like that for hours if his dick would only have let him. As it was, though, he felt the stir in his stomach accompanied by something else—a familiar pinch, and a warning jolt of pleasure. He cursed quietly.

You’d just started. He’d barely got an inch down your—

“Fuck,” he cursed again, when he sensed you swallow around his dick. The head of himself was breaching somewhere deep within your throat, and he felt it.

This wasn’t what he’d planned. You’d taken him deep before—at your father’s birthday bash last month, actually—but then you’d been blowing him under a table. He couldn’t hold your gaze or watch your throat open around him, couldn’t see the minuscule wince in your eyes or try to brush that discomfited look aside with his thumbs in the way he could now. He felt it in the pit of his gut, though: he would burst if he didn’t slow down.

With that one grounding thought, Joel tried pulling out.

Your body below him responded in sharp protest.

‘Daddy, no’ seemed almost to jump off your tongue, though it was presently weighted down by his cock. Your nails worked deeper into the fabric of his pants, like the tight, possessive grip was all you could manage to let your intentions be known to him. Then the look flared in your irises, too. They were begging him to stay in place.

Joel obeyed. Though it was you on your knees for him, lips, tongue, and throat pulsing and sucking to give him the utmost pleasure, he felt pangs of powerlessness, too.

He couldn’t help it when your lips stretched more, when your mouth opened wider, and your throat took him in all the way. He was fucked. He let out a sharp, hoarse grunt to let you know as much, and he cursed out loud again.

And then, completely axing his every well-laid plan, Joel felt the first rope of cum unload from his throbbing tip. Then another. And another. And another hot flurry of pleasure cropped up from that place your mouth was presently attached to him, and this time, the wave was too much to be overcome. The whole thing flooded him.

Without a hope of beating out that primal instinct, Joel just cupped your face in his palms and let his climax fill your throat. He couldn’t think, and while you seemed a tad surprised at how early it came, you didn’t fight it, either. You simply sat back, peered up, and let him fuck your mouth in the gentlest, most desperate thrusts, mind likely eager to feel his spend paint your open throat.

You hardly had to swallow at all—hardly could swallow, with how deep he’d gone. His cum jetted in milky strings through your plush, wet channel, and Joel could feel it gliding down with just a moment’s hitch of resistance.

Impaled as you were, you gagged once, and he withdrew in the next instant. He didn’t wait for you to catch your breath or for his cum to get down inside you. He felt too much to be troubled now; he yanked you to your feet and drew you into him. He pushed you back against the sink.

Your legs latched around the backs of his, and your body was thrust against the mirror. It was tender, somehow. Joel didn’t fight to claim your lips or invade your mouth with stifling kisses; he just pressed you to the reflective glass and hedged you in under him. He kissed you gently.

In between movements against your body, he mumbled:

“I’m sick of missin’ you all the damn time, sweet pea.”

He wasn’t sure where it came from. It just came.

Much like he had, except the stringy ropes of cum that had spurted from his dick seemed far less of a mess than whatever the fuck was coming out of his mouth right now. He felt exposed as soon as he’d spoken it you.

Then he saw your lips twitch. You kissed him back.

Someplace within where your mouth slotted over his, you were able to get out a couple murmured words yourself.

“I wish you didn’t have to,” you returned in a whisper.

You snaked your arms around the back of his neck and kept kissing him, over and over again, like your body was just starting to melt, and the heat was making you dizzy.

Joel could relate. Every time you touched him, he felt it.

He gripped your legs where they were still curled around his sides, and he held you tighter to him. He pressed his torso to yours until he was half-sure he was hampering your breaths, and then he pulled back. Briefly. Panting.

When he opened his mouth to speak, you cut in for him:

“I wish you could…be here. I wish we didn’t have to…”

Hide.

Your mouth seemed to have your mind and your usual reservations beat by a mile. It was moving fast, like his. Before you could stop yourself, your thighs constricted around his hips, you pulled him in closer, and just as you were about to finish that last quick, splintered thought—

“We’re leeeeeeeeav—OH! Shit!”

Aly Ingram’s sing-song tone was shortly supplanted by a shriek. She’d thrown open the door, unannounced, and when she saw the two of you collapsed against the sink, Joel’s undone pants hanging precariously over his hips and your mouths scarcely two inches apart, she jolted.

Or jumped, really.

She almost leapt through her skin, it seemed, and before she could even begin to recover, she just slapped her hands over her eyes and stumbled back. She was drunk.

“I didn’t see that! I did not seeee—”

“Aly!” you half-hissed, half-groaned.

“I literally didn’t see shit. You’re all g—”

Before either you or Joel could utter another sound, or attempt to split apart, Aly let out a second shrill yelp. This time, it was because she’d just tripped over a trash can backing out. She’d only very narrowly regained her bearings, had grabbed hold of the doorknob and was dragging the door shut, when the girl all but sang again:

“Have fun, be safe! Don’t make babies!!”

Joel scarcely knew how to react to that.

As it turned out, your roommate was open-minded.

Ply her with four or five shots of tequila and a couple High Noons, and she’d probably believe the moon was made of cheese if you told her in a serious enough tone.

But your goal tonight hadn’t been to convince her of a lie—it was to get a big, ugly truth off your chest that you’d been hoping to keep under wraps this entire weekend.

Now, after getting caught with your fake stepfather’s jizz drying in your throat, you had had to come clean about this thing. It wasn’t a story you’d wanted to tell, but it was one that needed sharing given the circumstances.

Aly had laughed her ass off when you told her everything.

Blame it on the strobe lights, the thumping music, or the thick, fetid air of the bar you’d just arrived at, but Aly had laughed a lot. She’d squeezed her eyes shut and slapped the tabletop beside her, like that was the single most insane thing she’d ever heard, and why don’t you write her a How-To? She’d love some tips on boning old men.

“He’s not that old!” you’d protested over your beverage.

She’d bought the drink. She said news like this was cause for celebration, and you couldn’t deny that. Smiling as you spoke, you figured this was good.

In fact, you thought getting caught by your closest friend was one of the best things that could’ve happened, all things considered, because now you knew at least one person was supportive and in your corner regarding Joel. On top of that, you had someone to help cover your ass—if a touch or a look between you two was too suspect, she’d tell you. From the second your group had Ubered to the bar, she’d been keen to see you close…though not too close. Presently, she grinned and squeezed your leg.

“I think you two would make a damn cute couple.”

“Huh?” You had to shout over the music to be heard.

“A cute couple!”

“Come again?”

You were really trying your best, but the blare of Bon Jovi overhead was a bit too much. You leaned in closer to her.

“YOU AND JOEL WOULD MAKE A CUTE COUPLE!”

And, as if on cue, Joel and Aly’s father reappeared at the table, holding the drinks they’d left to buy. Thankfully, the volume in the room was near-deafening, and neither seemed to have heard a word of hers. Scott was nursing some bottom shelf whiskey concoction while Joel double-fisted two shitty beers beside him. You had to admit, the latter looked good from where you sat: one more button was popped on his icy white shirt and a smile was plastered on his face, eyes straying to you more often than they should. The moment after that, you were doubly grateful for the blast of ‘You Give Love a Bad Name’ in this bar—the next thing you knew, Joel was dropping his head casually and murmuring in your ear,

“Aly sure likes to stare, doesn’t she?”

Followed shortly by:

“Wanna give her somethin’ to watch?”

He was clearly joking. Your cheeks warmed anyway. Then, when he started to lift his head, he left a quick, parting kiss to your temple that could’ve been construed as a paternal gesture. To anyone else but you, him, and Aly, it likely was. Your gaze slid from Joel’s face to his forearms, where the sleeves of his shirt were rolled up. He smelled like pine, sweat, and Natty Light, and you were just about to tell him that somehow that combo worked for him, when Scott interposed, loud as hell.

“You ask her yet?!” he bellowed.

He knocked shoulders with Joel in a playful way, and the pair nearly stumbled sideways. Scott elbowed his ribs.

“He’s drunk as shit,” Dallas observed idly.

“Well, what’s he—” you began to say.

Before you’d even finished the question, your answer came in the form of Joel nodding, visibly pretty buzzed himself, as he waved his friend off with a shove and a laugh. Scott just grinned bigger as Bon Jovi gave way to Steely Dan over the speakers. Joel leaned back to you.

“Scott invited us to go skiing out in Jackson, Wyoming.”

“He loves planning trips drunk,” Michelle added.

“Like they’re best friends,” Dallas chuckled.

You ignored Aly’s half-concealed smirk on hearing that; you were too stuck on the look Joel was giving you. Like he was drunk, but dead serious—like he’d agreed to this.

Something set for a future date, however nebulous and far-fetched and stupid the idea may have been, made your insides stir a little all the same. You tried tamping it down with another sip of your drink, but you still shared a glance with Joel. He was watching you more intently.

“Is that something you’d wanna do, hon?” he asked.

You might’ve liked to warn him that he was drawing too close—that his breaths were too warm on your cheek and Aly was straightening in her chair, blinking harder—but anything even approaching a remonstrance was evidently never meant to leave your mouth, as the next second had you nudged off your barstool, taken by the hand, and dragged toward the bustling crowd at the center of the room. Scott had suggested dancing; his son had readily agreed and was now leading you out to the crowd himself. You snagged one fleeting look at Joel.

Mr. Ingram had been dying to get out there, apparently. Behind you, the man spun his wife the best he could through the jam-packed dance floor of students and parents bumping their way through the very best of the ‘70s and ‘80s. He took a few graceless turns himself; while Bob Seger, Bruce Springsteen, and AC/DC reigned supreme over the wide open space, he pulled some mildly impressive moves. More importantly, though, he didn’t give a shit how he looked. This encouraged your group to let loose a little, too, and you somehow found yourself burrowing even further into the sea of people.

Your arms were compressed on either side of you. Your shoulders were bumped, and nudged, and given little more than a quarter of an inch for your chest to expand in the shallowest of breaths. Every pull of your lungs was an effort, and still, you couldn’t help but smile as you ran a quick look over the heads of everyone around. This was fun. Private, even. With dozens of nameless, faceless bodies gyrating in time with the music, you could blend right in. You could pretend that everything was normal.

Even with the press of a familiar form at your back, you could pretend it was just the crowd forcing him there—that Joel had just sauntered in behind you by accident.

It was risky, to be sure. The lights above flashed in bright white bursts, undulating with every pulse of the song being played, and it wasn’t too far from you that Aly and all the rest of them were strewn throughout the crowd.

But Joel hadn’t seemed to have noticed. Beneath the myriad limbs of the bargoers around you and him, he moved a hand to your waist. It hovered precariously for half a second, then tightened. It drew you closer to him.

You tried to push it away on instinct, heart jumping in your throat: what if Scott or Michelle or anyone else turned their heads at that moment and found him touching you there? What if the grasp their eyes caught wasn’t the wholesome, blameless kind that was meant to be shared between stepfather and stepdaughter? Who the hell was supposed to do the explaining to them then?

Clearly Joel wasn’t all that concerned about it; he slid his palm back up your side and gripped your hip hard after you’d nudged him off. He took a daring step forward, and you could feel him shake his head behind you. Smiling.

“And if I made a joke about father-daughter dances—”

“I would kill you with my two bare hands, Miller.”

Your backside glanced off his front. It wasn’t so much a deliberate move on your part but a byproduct of the rhythm. Some soft rock song was coming to an end, and your body rolled gently with his. The friction was minimal. This kind of proximity was easy to be explained away, if Dallas ever happened to look in your direction—

“Joel!”

Something hard pushed into your ass. You had to steel yourself quick, eyes darting furtively about to make sure no one had seen what you’d just felt between your legs. Then you tried wriggling away, off of him, and were rewarded with another hand on your side. It gripped the flesh just above your hipbone with a tender conviction.

Joel’s lips grazed your cheek briefly. His grip loosened.

“See what you do to me?” he murmured, and the fingers that he’d eased around your waist were turning you back.

Facing him now, away from your group. More bodies filled in between you and them, and the force of that influx pushed you closer to Joel. It shoved you together. It almost couldn’t be helped—that was what you kept telling yourself, anyway—when your frame melded to his, and his hands lowered to your hips, and one finger worked its way through your taut, denim belt loop in a manner completely unbecoming of a normal stepfather.

That callused finger held you firm to him with your jeans. It didn’t give an inch, and his eyes on yours did the same.

You were drifting further out. This didn’t matter as much. Anyone who saw you now would just have to guess that you were Joel’s, and Joel’s was yours—if only for now.

Your lips and his were gravitating closer then, too. You were just about to part yours to speak, when one soft, opening sequence broke out in the air, and you groaned.

No fucking way.

An all-too-familiar mid-tempo tune flooded the room and coursed in and out of your skull with a low, rhythmic tick.

It was eerie. Dreamy. Nearly haunting in the way it rang out right here, right now, with Joel’s hold on your sides tightening more and more with every passing second.

You hoped like hell he didn’t know this song, though you were half-certain this was a big hit from back in his day.

When Joel tipped his head back and fell right in step with the swaying cadence, you weren’t left guessing for long. Of course this slick bastard liked George Michael.

Of course he did.

What more of an appropriate song to be dancing to now, other than fucking ‘Father Figure’ of all the throwbacks?

Joel lifted both arms in a half-shimmy, half-slide and flashed a shit-eating grin down at you. It was smug.

‘For one moment, to be warm and naked at my side.’

Joel raised his brows with it, as if hearing the lyrics for the first time and being shocked. He wasn’t, clearly, as he rolled his shoulders in a stupid and seductive way, and dragged you closer to meet his body’s movements.

‘Sometimes I think that you’ll never understand me.’

Right. You would likely never understand Joel Miller.

‘But something tells me together we’d be happy.’

Well…as long as your father didn’t kill him first.

Emboldened by the pre-chorus beat and the ever-increasing swell of people around him, Joel snaked an arm around your waist. He let your body fall in line with his, rolling in gentle sorts of motions until he could find what kind suited you two the best, and he led the way.

When his head dipped to yours, you could feel it coming.

‘I will be your father figure. Put your tiny hand in mine.’

This time Joel was singing along, grin wide on his face. As if to mirror the lyrics, he took your hand and squeezed it. You might’ve rolled your eyes or pulled away when the man leaned down and slid his touch to your wrist. He kissed your palm. Then he kissed it again, sponging his lips to the skin in time with the rhythm of the song. It was both innocent and lewd. Wholesome and sensual.

Something trapped between perverted and polite, like Joel was testing the waters while trying not to make it seem that way at all. You kept moving in time together.

Joel’s other hand held you to him. His fingers flexed.

“You can’t…”

When his grip slid to your ass, you shook your head.

As much as you would’ve liked to indulge the urge that was currently flooding your system, the timing was off. The choice to give in now was wrong, and risky to make.

Your roommate and her family were no more than fifteen feet away. No matter how many strangers stood between you and them, Joel was toeing a dangerous line with his hand lowered to where it was. With his face only inches away and a sly grin spreading on his lips, it was clear he knew better than this. But he was eager to talk.

“You feel that, sweetheart?” he asked softly.

Where that single term of endearment had once made you bristle, you now sensed it warming your insides.

You nodded but were quick to add: “Joel, we can’t.”

“Why’s that?”

“Because…”

You found yourself trailing off again, just as you felt Joel’s erection grind into your front, somewhere close to the space between your legs. It rubbed right where you needed him. While another stream of airy, dreamlike notes floated out and a tenor’s voice crooned if you ever hunger, hunger for me, you peered up to find Joel deep in contemplation. He didn’t blink when you met his gaze.

Instead, he nudged you sideways. You inhaled a breath, and not long after that, you felt your back pressed to one of the lone barstools sitting at the outskirts of the room. You’d strayed far. And now, away from all the people that you’d come here with, you had two big hands sliding up the sides of your body. Cupping your face. Guiding your mouth to meet a warmer, more desperate set of lips than you’d ever been expecting to find. Joel’s kiss was rough.

It was open and aching—a wound not willing to be soothed by anything other than your tongue on his. Swiftly, he coaxed your jaw open and slid in. He licked in. He practically panted into your mouth, fingertips carving crescents in your cheeks from just how hard he was holding your face. He didn’t let up, and that hunger bled from his lips to yours. You felt a heady wave wash over your brain, and at the same time, your thighs tensed.

You pulled away.

Your lips were bitten numb. Your cunt was throbbing.

While your pulse thundered through your ears like a fucking kickdrum, your grip loosened on the front of Joel’s shirt, and you started to turn yourself from him.

What you needed to do was leave. What you couldn’t stand was getting caught again, and risk it being someone who wouldn’t take to it as kindly as Aly had.

But even as you walked, you felt a pulsing in your skull.

Between your legs, the feeling was worse, like there was something thrumming a frantic beat in that precious and defenseless place that you knew was needing him most. You were weak. You swiped a hand over your mouth like that would do anything, and you kept walking, knowing how closely Joel would be following you all the way out.

On such a clear, frigid night, the air outside should’ve been a relief. Instead, your pulse hammered and swelled. Your cheeks burned. You could’ve ground your teeth so hard that you cracked enamel, and it still wouldn’t have been enough to bite back the words inside your throat.

You turned to Joel wanting to tell him no. The expression that met yours said he was expecting as much—and was preparing to object—when you swiftly cut him off again.

It should end there. Nothing good ever came of you shedding your inhibitions or clothes with Joel Miller.

He reached out; you winced. You shouldn’t say it.

“Let’s go home, Joel.”

You were running again.

You’d nearly knocked him to the floor the second he’d turned the key in the door of his dingy little motel room, lips frantic over his and hands making fists in his shirt. It was exactly what he’d been hoping to see—part of why he’d booked this place and made the drive that weekend, to have you cradled in his arms again—but as he crossed the threshold with you all over him, Joel grew unsettled.

He couldn’t quite place the feeling, but something told him that you were only here to escape an unsavory urge. Like he was a bad habit to be flooded from your system.

You seemed to say it with every motion of your hands: skating down his front, clawing at the buttons, busying themselves with quickly trying to rid him of the fabric while your eyes stayed trained anywhere but on his face. It stung. Normally Joel wasn’t the type to ruminate on the reasons why a girl might be tearing his clothes off, but tonight, with you, this wasn’t what he usually did.

The ache unfurling in his chest wasn’t the kind to be imparted by just anyone, he kept reminding himself.

Which was why he took hold of both your wrists. Tightly. Just as you were about to try and peel his shirt from his shoulders and expose the whole naked expanse of his chest, he stopped you. He swallowed as you groaned.

“Joel.”

“You didn’t want me kissin’ you at all back there.”

In the bar, outside the building, in the car ride over here. You’d scarcely let him hold you for half a minute before begging to be taken home, and now that you were inside this room, alone, now you wanted to be touched by him.

Joel tried not to feel stupid saying it aloud, but hell, he felt pretty fucking pathetic peering down at you then.

You shook your head. Took a small step back from him.

“Yeah. Trying not to get us caught again, remember?”

And when you backed off, you stayed off, if only to start unfastening the little straps of your top and kick your shoes off your feet. You made your way over to the king-sized bed at the center of the room and sat down. Joel took off his own shoes but didn’t follow, opting instead to rest his weight on the old TV stand across from you.

He planted his hands on the hardwood surface on either side of him, watched you shuffle to the edge of the bed, and had to steel himself when the next pieces of clothing came sliding off your body. You were lifting your shirt over your head, then dragging your jeans down your legs.

Before you were stripped bare, Joel cleared his throat.

“I said we were gonna have a little chat later, too.”

He sounded like a dad. This really had to stop.

Instead of following his lead, you only kicked your pants off at your feet and leaned back. Joel approached the bed, and you greeted him with a coquettish look, like you already knew where this was going. But you couldn’t.

Joel made sure that you wouldn’t when he cupped your chin in his hand and made you tilt your face up to him.

“Honey,” he started, stern, while you reached for his belt.

You’d almost succeeded in threading your fingers through the leather and tugging it loose when Joel’s grip drew tighter. He jerked your chin up in a pinch, ignoring the roll of your eyes, and for yet another beat, he felt that obscure urge to discipline you again. Like you needed it.

If he could just control himself and play things right…

“Listen, I’m not trying to be your father.”

Wait. No. That came out wrong.

Your eyes widened some.

“Oh, really, daddy?”

Well, shit.

Joel straightened where he stood and tried not to puff out his chest like an old father-type might do, but the effort was useless—everything the man said and did was like the fucking calling card of a patriarch. He scrubbed a hand over his face and pretended not to see you grin up at him, your gaze bright and fiery as the Fourth of July.

He could hold important conversations and still not try to jump your bones immediately. He could control himself. He could slap on a semi-austere look and just tell you.

“I love you, you know that, right?” he blurted out.

Your eyes widened again, this time in alarm.

“Christ, Joel.”

You were sliding back on the bed. Shaking your head and pursing your lips in a grimace like this wasn’t happening.

“We’re not doing this again,” you added in a grave voice.

Joel was already making his way up after you—again, like a fucking moron, he felt—crawling on hands and knees across the moth-eaten, coral-colored bedspread and trying not to panic and failing miserably, per usual.

“‘S’alright if you don’t wanna say it back, I just—”

“I didn’t mean to say it in the first place, Joel!”

But there was a strain in your words. Denial.

You were working in earnest not to expose that sliver of self that wanted him, too. Joel could feel it. He planted his knees on the mattress and met you closer to the headboard, where your breaths were coming in faster. You shook your head, but you also didn’t stop him when he drew in even closer and lowered his body to yours.

He was hovering, almost.

Just as he’d been poised above your soft, beaming face all those weeks back in some little podunk town—at Balmaceda’s Mountain Lodge, where you’d been stuck together, only to fuck each other for the first time that night—he pressed a touch to your side. He rubbed his thumb just over your hipbone, where the panties you had on still clung to your skin, and he watched you tense up.

It was like before, only worse: now you knew his touch, and he knew yours, but there was a dread in your eyes.

As if you couldn’t stand to be under him, you slid back.

“Joel, please…don’t,” you murmured hoarsely.

“Don’t what?” His stomach dropped.

“Don’t ever say that again.”

That he loved you?

Joel never thought one string of words could hurt him so much, but there it was. While his heart unwound and his ego met with a swift and unceremonious death, he felt something like agitation twist inside him, too. Cruelly.

This was what he’d come this whole way to tell you.

The man could handle rejection; that wasn’t the problem. What bothered him now was how unflinchingly committed you seemed to misunderstand his intentions. Something surged in his chest again, and this time, it wasn’t all hurt—it was anger, too. Why you refused to accept that someone might love you was beyond him.

He didn’t reach for you again or crowd you further, but he raked a hand through his hair and heaved a hard sigh.

“Why won’t you believe me?” This time pleading.

“It’s not that I won’t—I just can’t, Joel. I can’t.”

“Why can’t you?”

You started to speak, but then that balloon of rage swelled bigger in his chest, and it wasn’t meant to be directed at you—it was only meant for himself, why wasn’t he enough—and he spit the words like venom.

“Haven’t I shown you that I mean it? That I— I— I care? I’m here. I came to see you. I’m telling you that I love you. How else am I supposed to show the woman I love that I care when you won’t let me in an inch, except when—”

“Except when you’re seven deep in me?” you scoffed.

It was bitter and derisive, and you slid farther back.

“For Christ’s sake,” Joel gritted through his teeth.

He didn’t even wait for you to interject, as he came back: “Is that all you think of me? Is that what I am to you?”

His voice was loud, and he hadn’t meant for it to be.

He was pushing off the bed, watching you sit back.

“I just think it’s real convenient,” you snapped again, “Betraying my trust by not telling me about dad’s affair, finding me in a weak moment, letting me believe you feel the same so you don’t have to deal with this…this…guilt.”

Joel couldn’t believe what he was hearing.

“You think I did all of this out of pity?”

“I think you’re trying to be a—”

“That I would lie about it?”

His heart rate was spiking. He felt his pulse thudding in his ears as he stalked around the footboard and scowled.

“Joel, I—”

“No.” He shook his head hard. He was sincerely trying not to fit the bill for ‘hot-headed, explosively angry father,’ but the efforts he made seemed all in vain. Joel could hardly talk now without raising his voice to a shout.

“I have—” he started, only to stop himself, swallowing.

His throat ached, and he almost choked on his words.

“I have been in love with you this whole fuckin’ time!”

His eyes burned. The sound came out angry, hoarse. Maybe he was; he just couldn’t contain it anymore. Silence filled the open space, and time distended.

He couldn’t stand the way you wouldn’t believe him, even now, as you straightened and shook your head.

“No, you haven’t.”

“I have.”

“You don’t mean—”

“You don’t get to tell me what I mean!”

He stared back and watched your gaze erupt in ire. Indignation. Lips drawing tight and teeth baring and hands gripping the bedspread beside you, as if enraged.

“I do. I can. You’re— you’re full of shit.”

Your words made him want to hurl something at a wall.

“Am I?!” he bellowed.

“Yes!” you spat.

“How can you say that?!”

And, without meaning to, Joel’s knee hit the side of the nightstand while he turned abruptly from you. The whole thing shook; the lamp nearly toppled, and the man immediately reached for it, then out to you. The gesture was a reflexive apology, but you responded by shoving his hands off. An angry sound racked through your body as you moved from him—“You—you don’t mean it, Joel.”

“I do. I mean it. Believe me, I do.”

That sound from his chest could’ve been half a sob.

He reached for you again, knees sinking with the springs of the mattress beneath him, and you shuffled further back. Your movements slowed. Suddenly, Joel’s stopped.

He couldn’t see it without a wince—your hands shaking. Your fingers tried making fists but failed, and in an effort to conceal the fear they held, you seized the comforter.

His throat ached, and that pain only soared in a second.

“You can’t…you can’t mean it if I’m just a secret to you.” Your tone was a rasp. The lips that spoke it were curled, revealing teeth still gritted. Eyes filling with more tears, “You can’t say you love me if…if you’re just gonna leave.”

By the end of it, your words were ground to a murmur. Your voice was hushed and slow and begging to be spared notice, as though every syllable hurt to say.

Your bottom lip was quivering too. He knew you were kicking yourself for it—could see the embarrassment etched into your gaze as you blinked back nothing, then one, then two, then a barrage of slow, hot tears—but no matter what you did to fight it off, your body trembled.

The whole thing was practically vibrating with hurt. Humiliation and anger had evidently joined the mix, and before he could even think to speak, you mumbled again:

“You’re gonna leave me, Joel.”

The hurt wouldn’t stop.

“You don’t love me.”

Your voice cracked to continue, pain clinched with a sob.

“You can’t.”

In the look that met his, he saw a wall of warring fears. It wasn’t all for him, either. There were wounds that were the work of years beneath the surface of your skin, ones entrenched in flesh since long before he’d ever known you or laid a finger on that part himself. It started young.

Your lashes battled to keep the tears at bay, but the floodgates had opened. Your secret was gone. There was no sense in feigning indifference when the truth was laid bare—that you didn’t deem yourself worthy of love, and likely never had. Regardless, you worked hard not to cry. You scrunched your nose, mashed your lips together, and stared anywhere but him, and the tears kept flowing. Gently, but without slowing, they streaked down in turn.

“No, sweet pea, I love you. I love you. I ain’t leavin’.”

It was all Joel could do to keep his own vision clear.

He already knew you wouldn’t believe him, but that didn’t stop him from saying the words all the same.

“I— I said it first,” he went on, words tumbling out.

You turned wet, sad eyes to him in utter silence, and that made him want to ramble on forever. As long as it took.

“At the fair, a month before you ever said it, I was trying to tell you I loved you then. You ran off before I could.”

That was the truth.

If Joel had any hope of regaining your trust, it would need to start there. And out of one truth came another.

“I already knew I loved you before that. I would’ve said it, except it just felt wrong, with all that…that stuff I knew.”

He meant knowing about his best friend, your father, and his little rekindled romance with his former mistress. It wasn’t right, keeping you in the dark about something like that, but he also hadn’t wanted to hurt you. There was more to the story that complicated things further, and frankly, Joel had been too swept up in the novelty of this thing you two had had to choose the smarter path.

That didn’t excuse what he did. Hell, it only hurt him worse seeing your eyes gloss over and stay fixed on his.

Knowing you’d trusted him not to hurt you—and he had.

If you didn’t accept what he told you now, he wouldn’t fault you for it. All he could do was slide off the bed and pull you to a perch on the edge, while he planted himself on the carpeted floor and kneeled in between your legs.

Cupping your tear-stained face in his hands, pleading:

“Baby.”

You blinked back at him but ventured nothing.

“Sweet pea, I am not keeping you a secret.”

A beat.

“I’m not leavin’. I want more—need more.”

And for some reason, that felt like a weightier admission than he’d even thought possible. He wasn’t good at this.

He wasn’t quite cut of a cloth to know just how to soothe you and make things right, but he did know that holding you felt right to him. So he did. He rubbed his thumbs in little circles over your warm, wet, puffy cheeks, and he pulled your face closer to his. He held your gaze and watched an internal war wage somewhere far behind your eyes as you tried to contend with this new feeling—that of being wanted and needed and loved as you were.

You sniffled between his two broad palms.

“I want you to stay,” you said softly.

Joel’s heart hammered at that.

He couldn’t hope to leave out the rest. He let go of your face then and felt an irresistible urge to go on, even if it was much too soon and he had meant to show you later. As stupid as the idea had been, he’d already made it, and there was no going back anyhow. He would tell you here.

He reached in his pocket for his wallet. He broke your gaze momentarily to take it out, flip it open, and then card his fingers through the bills a few aching moments before pulling it out—the thing he’d wanted to show you.

When he held it up, a set, he flitted a quick look to what he’d lifted between you and him, as if the sight might give him answers on what to say. Sadly, nothing came.

Joel was totally on his own in explaining what this was. Lucky for him, though, you didn’t seem keen to judge.

“They’re…they’re tickets,” he started. Stupid.

You raised a brow, trying to read, and he forged ahead. Just as the words first appeared to register in your mind, and the faintest look of shock took shape, he hurried out:

“Billy Joel’s got a show comin’ up in Austin this June. I…I thought— well, I hoped, I guess, that maybe we could…”

Spit it out, Miller.

Spit. It. Out.

He frowned.

“I’m no good at this. Sorry. I wanted us to go…together.”

And then…

“And I want your dad to know about us before then.”

There it is.

The last lynchpin in the man’s resolve was gone. He’d said it. There was no turning back from what he’d offered, or what it required, and now you knew he wanted things to be real and committed. Serious.

Terrifying.

Your eyes remained fixed on his. For a second, that look, and your whole upper half, appeared so still Joel thought you might’ve stopped breathing altogether. You blinked. Glancing down at the tickets in his hand and batting your lashes again, as if you weren’t quite sure how to answer.

Then, at last, he heard a sharp inhale—Or was it an exhale? He couldn’t tell—and before he could blink back or wonder so much as a thought, the breath was battered out of his own chest. You rushed him.

You’d moved so fast, hugged him so quick, Joel scarcely knew what was what until he felt your arms snake around his neck. You joined him on the filthy, soiled floor and dropped your knees on either side of his body in a kind of straddling hug. It was as swift as it was unexpected, and it took him a second to adjust. But no longer than that.

Joel was relieved to feel your warmth. Squeezing him. Choking him, almost. He didn’t think you’d ever held him that hard in his life, so he did all he could to soak it in.

It was only when he heard another sob that he paused.

“You…you want to?” Your voice was tiny against him.

“‘Course I do, darlin’,” Joel answered in a breath he hadn’t realized he was holding. He cupped the back of your head to him and held you tighter, “Of course I do.”

Then, because the impulse struck again: “I love you.”

He didn’t need you to say it back; a look was enough. When you drew back and met his gaze, eyes still doused with tears but smiling faintly at him, Joel was content to see your acceptance. Allowing love in in some small way.

And when your lips succeeded that look, meeting his in a soft kiss, and your body shifted up toward the bed, he didn’t protest. He kissed you back. Joel didn’t have to have love spelled out in words for him to feel what you meant. You said it gently, but somehow with even more force than when you’d stumbled into this room together, touch beckoning him in as you laid back on the mattress.

Admittedly, every inch of this place was seedy. On such short notice Joel hadn’t had much of a pick among his choice of accommodations, and the shortage showed. Still, when you slid up that old, worn bed and stretched yourself in wordless welcome, he couldn’t have asked for more. He only wished that he could give you more, but for right now, at least, that was out of the question. He leaned in and found your lips like second nature, slotting between your thighs and kissing you harder. The concert tickets had shortly been cast aside on the night stand.

“I love you.”

It slipped out again, and Joel didn’t care. His tongue chanced past the seam of your lips and, once inside, explored every contour, ridge, and crevice it could find.

While he did, a touch palmed your breasts over your bra. Your skin was warm; gaze soft, the last he’d seen of it. The scent of you rose to greet him like a mist of some wild intoxicant: citrus, mint, a tinge of sweat, and a liter of your favorite fruity drink, if he’d had to guess. You flooded his senses. It wasn’t enough for him simply to hold flesh in his hands and explore your body with his lips and tongue; Joel wanted to consume something more, though he hardly had the words to articulate it.

You unclasped your bra just as his mouth slid down to your neck. There was a beat—your sharp intake of breath when his teeth met skin and marked it with the tenderest bite—and then your arms reached out. You discarded your bra and bared yourself to him, and when Joel tilted his head to take in the view, he had to groan your name.

There was no other logical route for him to go.

You’d just begun to wind your fingers through his hair when he slid down to greet that newly-exposed place.

“I love you,” he repeated against your skin before drawing one nipple between his lips. He kissed it.

Your grip grew tighter.

“Joel, please.”

His teeth had only reappeared a second to tug the pebbled flesh between them, tongue hungry and wet and laving gently across that hardened peak, when your legs wound around him too. You pulled his body into you.

Joel was helpless to the inducement. His torso fell more heavily to yours and his lips suckled with a vigor that betrayed sheer desperation. He felt it strain in his pants. When he moved from one breast to the other, he heard a wet pop, and the whimper when he re-attached himself was enough to make the bulge he felt swell even bigger. His tongue caressed in laving, measured motions along the curve, and he tried not to grow overly eager from it.

Don’t get too excited. You need time. Lots and lots of—

“Joel,” you exhaled on a particularly harsh press of his mouth. Your ribs heaved with it. “Come— come here.”

He was clambering back up in an instant. The ministrations of his lips that had practically engulfed your skin and smeared it with his saliva were swapped in a blink with them returning to your chin, jaw, and cheeks, planting kisses in between the words he murmured next.

“Yeah? Every—” To the side of your mouth. “Everything OK, sweet pea?” Feeling guilty but also simply needing to calm himself down. “Too fast?” Another to your cheek.

It wasn’t like the two of you hadn’t gone too far, too soon before. In fact, it was a pretty regular occurrence with the sex you had. Joel just needed a reset—had to make sure this was alright, and that he could cool down if needed.

He felt a pinch in his groin but ignored it.

Suddenly, your gaze was on his again.

Fingers carded through the sweat-damp, striated tufts of black and silver hair at the sides of his head, and you leaned in closer until your nose and his were touching.

“Here,” you pressed him, low. Need crept into those words, and your grasp constricted. “Stay here, please.”

It was clear you were inviting him back to your lips, to kiss them, so Joel did just that. He bracketed his arms on either side of your head and let his mouth explore as it had before. Where he resumed at equal force, you met him with still more warmth and wanting and open fervor, tongue curling around his in some soft and wordless plea

Below the belt, Joel was throbbing. He didn’t need to reflect long at all to know what that meant. Then your lips parted wider, your ankles dug deeper in the backs of his calves, and your hips started grinding against him.

Dry humping.

Whining at the friction.

“Feels…feels so good, Joel,” you told him breathlessly.

“You like that?” His lower half mimicked the motions.

Need blossomed across your face as the ridge of his cock rubbed in just the right way through his slacks. Something harder than he meant—a thrust, like he was fucking you into the bed—shook your frame, as well as the mattress underneath it. Springs creaked. Metal groaned. Warmth spread, from the pit of his stomach to where your body met his. The movements kept going.

You were slick beneath him. You must have been. Your whines had heightened to punctured gasps and your hips were so desperate, rubbing your barely-clothed core to the front of his pants and brows pinching as if—

You were already expecting this to end.

You didn’t think that he would stay.

“Baby,” Joel panted again.

By now, desire consumed him, but the urge to smooth that tiny crease of worry was coursing just as powerfully. He swallowed, gripped the linens beside your head in one hand a little harder, and opened his mouth to speak.

Another flick of your hips. Another sigh. Another whine.

Another pinch somewhere deep within him, and a groan.

Suddenly, your hands were on his shoulders, sliding up and toward his neck. Your fingers clawed for his hair.

“Joel,” you panted back.

Joel had tried to slow the motions of his lower half to talk, but yours had only sped up to grind yourself against him. He could feel the heat bleeding from you now. Wetness formed and expanded in a patch through your pink cotton panties and likely stained his front, or would.

His cock was swollen stiff and throbbing. Precum pearled at the tip of him, no doubt, and with every jerk of your body, he could feel it smearing and aching to slip in.

He wanted to be inside you. His balls twitched, his stomach ached, and his senses were suffused with you, a white-hot desire to paint your mouth, your skin, or your insides with his cum nearly as strong. But he had to stop.

Then you kissed him.

Joel’s lips were still parted when your mouth found his, kissing him sweetly and without reserve. Your fingers that had threaded through his hair pulled taut. Hard.

Your center slid up the length of his fully clothed cock, and with one more press of your legs, Joel felt you.

He’d never wanted anything more in his life, and still, he fought to speak—to reassure you that he wasn’t leaving.

“Joel—”

“I know, I know. Baby, I—fuck.” His breath hitched in his throat when his bulge pulsated again. His head swam.

With what meager resolve the man still possessed, he ventured another kiss, then drew back. His eyes dropped and searched your expression, half-crazed, and just when the words were taking shape again, you parted your lips and brought them to his. You rolled your hips, balled your fingers into fists through his hair, and with your mouth and his a quarter-inch apart in puckered, pretty ‘O’s, panting with every thrust that shook the bed:

“I love you, Joel.”

It was a breath, and the taste had never felt sweeter.

One more jerk of his hips and you were drawing in once again, panting in his mouth as if to make sure he heard.

“I— I love you. I love you so much,” you murmured, low.

His cum unloaded in thick, hot ropes. He couldn’t stop it.

Joel Miller, at the age, maturity, and level of experience he could boast, had never cum virtually untouched and in his own fucking pants since…he couldn’t remember when. But he was. His spend pulsed out from the head of his cock in dizzying bursts, and his stomach clenched. He gripped the bedspread and let out a guttural groan while he soaked the front of his boxers from inside them.

His dick throbbed and leaked, and his breathing slowed. He mumbled something back, quietly—‘I love you, too.’

Then he pushed up and off of you, out of the bed.

Seconds stretched; he didn’t feel it. Stars burst behind his eyes with every step, and he staggered that path to the bathroom like his life or his pride might depend on it.

As a matter of fact, the damage was already done. He’d jizzed in his pants like an overeager teen getting his dick touched or sucked for the very first time. What was worse, you hadn’t been doing either when he came; you’d told him you loved him, and that was enough.

Enough to make him look like a goddamn idiot, Joel thought without blinking. He kicked the door shut behind him and reached for the zip of his pants.

Sticky. Wet. A whole fucking shitshow below the belt.

He ran the tap. He had his undone slacks and boxers pulled down past his hips, and he was facing the sink in seconds, assessing the extent of the damage. Then his face flushed red at the sight of the sticky, milky mess swarming his groin and he could’ve kicked himself. He settled for yanking a towel out from one of the cubbies beneath the counter and running it under the water. He daubed quick and without much precision, gaze darting to find dozens more clumps of his spend strewn about than he thought possible. He’d cum an absurd amount.

Before he chastised himself, though, he had to pause.

“Joel?”

Your voice was soft. Sometime since he’d unzipped and started scrubbing his crotch in vicious circles, you’d appeared at the door, head peeking around curiously.

You must not have been standing there for long, because you actually drew closer to join him. Feeling comfortable enough in roughly thirty square feet of space, you shut the door again and leaned your hip against the counter.

If Joel didn’t know you better, and he wasn’t already occupied with wiping cum off of his cock and balls, he might’ve searched your face for a smile. A smirk, maybe.

It wasn’t like teasing each other was suddenly off-limits now that Joel was brimming with embarrassment. Half your communication was giving the other shit for little mishaps and quirks, and he expected that his last accident in the bedroom would be no different.

He flinched when you reached out instead.

Hooking your fingers under the waistband of his pants and his plaid boxers, you shuffled in closer to him and let out a breath. You tugged once, twice—gently, so as not to further disrupt the mess or make him wince—and then coaxed the fabric down his legs, lower and lower.

When you peered up at him, Joel couldn’t find so much as a trace of amusement in your eyes or on your lips. You just nudged his slacks to the tiled floor and hummed.

“It’ll be easier if we wash it off in there.”

You nodded to the shower behind him.

Joel turned slightly, as if considering or trying to get a glimpse of the freestanding shower with its wide-open, mildewed curtain seeming to beckon him in, then stopped. He turned back and chucked his towel.

“Alright,” he said while kicking his pants off at the ankles. Talking softly and not meeting your gaze, “That’s fine.”

He pivoted once more to peel his shirt off and make toward the shower by himself, and you surprised him, again, when you bypassed his much larger frame and hopped in first. You slid your panties off and tossed them into the pile of clothes by the sink, and you twisted the knob on the wall. You sidestepped the first stuttered sprays and drew the curtain back in wordless invitation.

Joel hovered, eyes scanning the cramped space.

“I don’t think we’re both gonna fit in here.”

Then, as though to emphasize his point:

“I can wash off by myself. It’s…fine.”

He hadn’t meant it to sound so stilted, but that was just how he felt: stiff and awkward and raw with feelings of recent embarrassment. He tilted his head to the side.

Your head tipped right back, and you raised a brow.

“Just get in, Miller. Freezin’ my fuckin’ ass off.”

And there was a smile: the first one. Faint.

Not mocking, snide, or condescending. Just the kind to usher him in and drag the curtain behind his hulking body, wipe a slick, wet hand over your mouth and grin—‘You do know I’ve seen you naked before, right?’—and that set his mind at ease. He almost smiled himself.

“So you remember that I’m a grower, not a shower.”

Joel cupped his hands over his softening length in faux protective fashion, as if you hadn’t seen the thing dozens of times by now. When he sidled up and cornered you between the soap tray and the shower stream, he found the edges of his lips kicking up a little, unable to help it.

You’d seen him hard, soft, and everything in between—mostly hard when near you. Maybe it wasn’t the worst thing that you were getting to experience him like this.

That made him lean in closer. Chance another joke.

“Looks like your old man’s stamina has taken a hit, too.”

Joel had meant it to sound playful. Suggestive, even. Instead, it came out dismal and gruff, like he was trying to overcompensate for something he was sorely lacking.

He might’ve wanted to kick himself again, were it not for the next move you pulled on him, which was enough to pluck his thoughts—and his breath—out of his body.

Without wasting a second to pretense or teasing, you simply brushed your hand down his front and touched him, gently. He was softer, smaller, and almost wholly spent from his last exertion; still, you reached and wrapped your fingers around his length with care.

Sparks ignited from the place where you trailed. Joel had to swallow a groan, oversensitive and fairly stunned, and his palm came to rest on the wall behind your head. His chin dipped toward his chest while his gaze dropped too.

He watched you stroke him once, rub your thumb along the tender skin, then bring your left hand to join the mix, carrying a bar of soap with it. You started from the base.

“Baby,” Joel rasped. The muscles of his stomach clenched while you drew circles to spread the soap.

“My old man,” you repeated affectionately.

It was artless and kind. Friendly and gentle. Most every other time he’d been touched where you had him, the hands had meant to arouse, and seek something else. Here, you were trying to help. Clean him sweetly and without concern for yourself while also drawing him in, like you always did. It made his chest hurt—and not in a way totally unconcerning for a man his age. Nonetheless, he leaned into that feeling and shifted his body to yours.

His head and your head were now doused with water, his hovering above so close that little droplets streaked from his chin down your slightly upturned face. Joel could feel you watching him. He flicked his own gaze back to meet yours, and as he did, your palm stroked him from root to tip. His hips jerked involuntarily; he swelled in your grip.

His cock stiffened but still remained far from fully erect. Joel swallowed, anchored his hand harder on the wall, and wished himself a decade or three younger, at least.

“You alright with this?” he muttered.

“With what?” you mumbled back.

Joel sucked in a breath just as your hand, and the soap, slid back down his length, and rubbed casually around it. You assumed a leisurely pace and scrubbed his tummy.

“My body ain’t what it was—”

“And it’s more than enough.”

Suddenly, your eyes weren’t just resting on his but pressing. Piercing. The circles working to clean his skin increased in pace and force, and you set the soap aside. You nudged him closer to the water, but all Joel felt was the urge to draw you with him. The shower stream pelted his chest, his belly, his freshly soaped lower half, and past the suds, a gradually hardening cock. Gradually.

You had him in your hand; you were rinsing him clean. Joel should’ve extended some murmured thanks, a calm and uncalculating touch coming to rest on one of your shoulders while you did him this innocent favor. Your lips twitched. His cock hardened. Then your back was flat on the shower wall, and Joel was hovering over your drenched and naked frame again, only his touch was descending to your hip instead. He held it firmly.

“You could have your pick of any guy—”

“Good thing I only want you.”

Your grip tightened too. Now that you’d scrubbed him clean, you seemed ready to let go in the next second, but old habits died hard. Joel leaned in to nose your cheek.

“That so?” His hand moved from your hip to what he knew would be a scorching heat between your thighs.

Two thick fingers glided through your folds and forced a whimper out of your throat. You were soaking wet, and not just from the shower’s spray. Joel rubbed that slick, delicate seam with all the self-control he could muster in the moment, and he kissed your cheek. Every inch he could feel of you was brimming with warmth and need.

You tilted your chin and caught his lips. You parted your legs and held his almost-fully erect length in your grasp.

“I— I mean it, Joel,” you answered him, surprisingly soft then. You kissed the sides of his mouth while you continued to stroke up and down. “I want you.”

Joel’s hips shifted involuntarily. As if moving of its own volition, his lower half stirred beneath your touch, and shortly, he had your legs spread wider and his body slotting in the gap between. His fingers pushed deeper.

And, just as his hand was all but cupping your mound and the wet heat of your cunt was pulsing against him, Joel slowed. He sucked in a breath and met your gaze.

“How do you want me, sweetheart?” he murmured.

In reply, you gripped his base and guided him closer. Flicked your thumb over the fat, leaking tip and sighed.

“Right…here.”

“Right here?”

Joel hadn’t meant to move you so quickly, but one blink and your hand was off him completely; your back was turned to him, and your ass was pressed flush with his groin. He had to hunch in the tight, wet, fog-infested enclosure with his chin jutting in over your shoulder and his palm splayed over your tummy. He spoke softly again:

“You want daddy in here, pretty girl?”

Your whine was all he needed to hear.

And perhaps it would’ve been wise to wait a beat or two. Work two fingers in and out of your aching cunt, drag his tongue through your folds, or else use his throbbing tip to ease you open for him. Before he could even think to make use of his hands, mouth, or head, though, you were reaching behind and taking him yourself. You pressed a palm to the wall and pushed up on the tips of your toes, and with impatience bleeding through your every movement, you slid back onto him. You did it quickly.

In the absence of adequate foreplay, entry wasn’t swift. Joel almost choked at the feeling of how tight you were around him—how rigid and warm and narrow you felt on that first slide. He planted a grounding hand next to your own out of sheer necessity. He held your hip in his other and swallowed a groan that seemed fit to nearly kill him.

“Sweetheart,” he panted against your neck, “Easy. Easy.”

You tried to nod your understanding but slid up just as fast. From a glimpse of your profile, Joel could make out some consternation fanning out. Your brows pinched.

The pretty, slick ‘o’ encircling his cock clenched again, and it was evident you were trying to force the motion back down against your body’s wishes. You whimpered a little and dropped your free hand between your legs.

Joel kissed your jaw. Your cheek. Your ear. Partly to remind you that he was fine to take things slow and partly to quiet his own hammering heart inside him.

It wasn’t working.

You were just so. fucking. tight.

“I— you gotta slow down, sweet pea,” he hissed through gritted teeth. Your walls pulsed again, and it nearly sent him spiraling. The second your ass met his hips and he was buried to the hilt, he stifled a groan into your neck.

“But I need you, daddy,” you whined, “Need you inside.”

Another grunt. Another moan. Another suffocating pulse.

“I’m gonna blow if we don’t slow down some, honey.”

It was mortifying, but it was the truth. Tonight, Joel just couldn’t seem to keep his cum confined to his balls like he normally could. Presently, they rested firm and heavy against the globes of your ass and were just then preparing to hit a rhythm as you rocked back and forth.

Your gaze flashed to his over your shoulder.

“That’s OK. You…you can— oh.”

Before you could finish that thought, your words were torn from your tongue and lost to a shuddering moan. His cock plunged deep within your soft and airtight channel, and your head lolled back a little more.

Out of habit, Joel pulled out and then plunged back in, feeling the wet clutch of you stretch around his cock.

“I can what, honey? What can daddy do?”

Lax as his voice made him sound, the man was coming apart at the seams; he had only to search your face for a fleeting, desperate moment, find you hungry as he was, and he thrusted even harder, absorbed the shockwaves of your pleasure while he fucked you up against the wall.

Gradually, the spatter of water on white glossy tile gave way to the sounds of your skin and his hitting again and again. Your face softened, and the once-taut walls eased to accommodate his girth. You squeezed Joel from base to tip, making the most obscene noises when he slid in and out, and from the look you gave him then, he could sense the need before it ever left your lips. He saw desire fill your pretty, glossy stare and felt compelled to sate it.

Again, it seemed you were begging him to stay.

Expression so pleading and sweet and soft.

“Daddy, I— I want you to cum inside me.”

Joel almost blew his load on the spot. His hips had to stutter in place—so taken aback by what you’d just said—but then you were bouncing back and forth again, neck craning to flash him the most winsome smile.

“Oh, honey…”

“Please.”

He’d finished in you before. It had been an accident. The night had ended with you and him hauling ass to the nearest CVS and hitting the Plan B like it owed you money. And now you were asking him to do it?

“I’m about to start my period. It’ll be fine.”

The half-starved look in your eyes said you’d been thinking about this for awhile. Maybe not with your rational brain, but certainly in earnest. Your smile said it.

Joel’s good sense was shot. He knew it was wrong. He was assured beyond a shadow of a doubt that if your dad ever learned he’d deliberately painted your insides white—or worse yet, knocked you up—his best friend would personally sever his dick and sauté it for lunch. Still, the urge to be joined with you in this brand new way was damn near debilitating. He couldn’t tell you no. So instead of doing what he should’ve done, he simply said:

“OK.”

For some reason, it felt wrong to finish in the shower. So he cut the water, toweled you both, and took you to bed. He slid under thin, sodden, wildly outdated motel sheets without letting his lips disconnect from yours once. He propped your legs around his hips and kissed you harder. He found a home within the furthest recesses of your body he could find, and his heart still throbbed for more. It was the best and worst agony, to be so delirious in the need for someone else, but each time you met him and accepted him in, his pleasure soared to new heights.

His cock dragged in and out of your heat in sloppy, shallow thrusts. He felt your wetness ease his passage and welcome him deeper, until the mouth of your cunt was stretched as taut against his base as it would go and your walls were pulsing with need. You squirmed underneath him. Your whines turned into whimpers, and the whimpers became ragged, hiccuping gasps as you clawed at his back and begged for more, more, more.

“‘M’so full. Feels so, so good, daddy,” you breathed.

“Yeah?” Joel said, and he glanced between your bodies to see you stretched and stuffed to the brim with cock. He groaned involuntarily. “I fit so nice, don’t I, baby?”

“You— you do, daddy. You do.”

“Can I fit a little more in?”

Your eyes widened.

As soon as realization dawned, you nodded your head and gripped him tighter. You hardly needed another stab of his hips, his thumb on your clit, or so much as a word spoken besides—at just the thought of being filled with his seed, your body seized in anticipation. It was you trembling, shuddering, clenching hard and reaching bliss before you even meant to get there, really. You were wholly overstimulated and clamoring for more, the pulses of your cunt milking his cock with all you had.

Joel scarcely had the presence of mind to get a syllable out, but he knew what he needed to say before his pleasure took hold. He smoothed a hand over your cheek, cupped it, and lowered his lips to yours, so only the cusp of his mouth and his stubble were grazing your open pout and the words he spoke were all yours to hear.

Sliding deeper. Meeting and holding your gaze with bare, uncontrived sincerity: “I’m yours, baby. I’m all yours.”

His balls tightened. He wanted to say more to set your mind at ease and assure you what you meant to him, but evidently, your bodies had other plans. In the next moment, he felt a familiar warmth spurt from his tip, and his hips jerked. His cock burrowed as deep within your wet, pliant walls as it could go, and he unloaded rope after rope of his cum. Joel let out a full-throated groan.

The wild hum of his pulse through his skull all but rendered him deaf to the sounds around him, but he knew he told you that he loved you; he knew you said it back. He felt you anchor your heels into the backs of his legs and accept him completely. You spent what felt like hours kissing, writhing, panting, and murmuring words of the warmest affection. In reality, this lasted seconds.

With you underneath him, in his arms, it didn’t matter.

“I love you, Joel,” you whispered again, smiling.

He grinned and kissed you, “I love you more.”

And he’d meant what he said: every inch of him was yours. Every moment you would let him have from that point forward, he’d spend showing you that he was there to stay. He didn’t care how long it would take to prove it.

For once, he didn’t care what your dad would have to say

#GETTING TO THE WORD COUNT AND REALIZING THAT THIS IS THE LENGTH OF A NOVELLA………………..I SCREAMED #LIKE DUDE SHUT UUUUUUUUPPPPP!!!! SHUT UP #joel miller smut #joel miller x reader #joel miller x you #joel miller #joel miller fanfiction #joel miller imagine #joel miller one shot #joel miller tlou #the last of us fic #dbf!joel miller #dbf!joel

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system-to-the-madness · 1 year ago

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お米 Okome - Inumaki Toge x Reader

Pairing: Inumaki Toge x Reader (can be read as any gender, no pronouns used) Genre: hurt/comfort, fluff Word Count: 4 532 Warnings: mentions of blood and injury Summary: Inumaki hates that he can’t use his voice to express his feelings towards you

Masterlist

Inumaki Toge doesn’t usually struggle with his fate. If there’s a situation he doesn’t like, he prefers action over lament and puts his mind to work to find a way to change it. Sure, there are situations he can’t change, his cursed speech for example, then he works around those things, finds a way to deal with it somehow. He talks in onigiri ingredients, occasionally uses a notebook or his phone’s note app to communicate more difficult matters. Inumaki Toge doesn’t usually struggle with his fate.

Except now he does. His eyes fall on Yuuta and you, sitting on a bench underneath the Momiji, red leaves sparkling in the autumn sun. Even from the distance where Toge just stepped out of the building across the yard, he can tell how hard you’re laughing, can tell that Yuuta has the biggest grin on his face. He stops, several different thoughts shooting through his head all at once. He loves your laugh. He wants to make you laugh too. He can’t, because of his cursed speech. He envies Yuuta for being able to tell you joke and making you laugh like that. And suddenly he remembers this thing he read in a magazine, that said that girls like boys who can make them laugh, and his stomach sinks.

Toge already knows you like Yuuta. Its’s obvious. Do you like him because he can make you laugh? Toge stops in his steps where he was about to walk over to join the two of you, his heart suddenly thrumming almost painfully in his chest. Do you like Yuuta? He watches his black-haired friend, watches as he lifts his hand and leans a little closer to you. You stop laughing and lean in too. For a terrifying moment Toge thinks he’s about to witness you, the classmate he may or may not have had the biggest crush on since your first one-on-one training session, kiss his friend. But you don’t. Instead, you listen to something Yuuta says that Toge can’t make out over the distance and burst into another fit of laughter.

Suddenly Toge feels like crying. He could never make you laugh like that. Not by whispering a few words into the narrow space between you, not by letting words roll over his tongue. He can write them down, or pantomime them, or fool around to make you laugh, but he can never whisper them.

He wants to talk to you about normal things too, about the stupid weather, or how pretty you look with that new hoodie, or how clever your answers in class were, or how annoying Gojo and this new homework is. He doesn’t want to have to use his notebook for every slightly more complicated conversation, but he can’t be sure you would understand him if he didn’t. It doesn’t stop him from wishing he could use his voice to talk to you. Ever since he really, truly understood his cursed technique, he’s realized just how powerful and yet intimate voice is.

It’s something he’ll never be able to use to communicate his feelings.

Once, not long after Yuuta had joined the school, they, together with Panda, had talked about it. Or rather Yuuta and Panda had talked about his cursed technique, and he had listened. Panda had joked that if he ever wanted someone to kiss him, he could just use his cursed technique, which Yuuta had disagreed on, saying he’d need the other person’s permission to use his technique on them, otherwise it’d be harassment. Panda, who hadn’t thought about that, had quickly agreed, and the two had joked around a bit longer about the possibilities this offered. Toge thought about their words a lot. But there was something inside him, that wholly refused to use his technique for these purposes. It just wouldn’t feel right. Even if the other person agreed, or even asked him to do it, it would be like he’d take their will from them. He’d never do that for his own pleasure.

Toge gets pulled back into the moment by your voice calling for him. He blinks and looks up, finding you and Yuuta had turned to face him, waving him over. As much as he appreciates Yuuta, and as much as he likes you, he doesn’t feel like going over. He doesn’t want to hear the way your voice probably rises in pitch when talking to the special grade sorcerer, doesn’t want to watch Yuuta subtly touch you, doesn’t want to feel like he’s intruding on this moment between you, doesn’t want to burden himself with more heartbreak than he already signed up for.

He swallows thickly before he crosses his arm like an X in front of his chest.

“Okaka,” he denies, continuing his way as if he had planned on moving towards the dojo, instead of towards his friends.

He doesn’t dare to glance over to see your reaction. Are you disappointed? If you were, he’d feel guilty. If you weren’t, he’d be disappointed. If he’s being honest, he can understand that you like Yuuta. The guy is sensitive, and quiet, a good listener, great at giving advice. He’s funny and overall great company. And he’s crazy powerful. Otherwise he wouldn’t be a special grade sorcerer. And he saved your life when Toge himself was of absolutely no help whatsoever, instead almost throwing up from the taste of his own blood.

Toge is nothing in comparison to Yuuta. Sure, he has a strong technique. A strong technique he can use two to three times before his throat is bleeding. And he can be funny, or at least he’s good at making a fool of himself. And he can listen, but he never knows what to answer, worried that whichever advice he gives, it might not actually be helpful, or only make everything worse. So, if you like Yuuta, he gets it. If he were in your place, he’d also prefer Yuuta over himself. Not that you have to choose between the two of them, you could also be interested in neither of them. But the point stands: Yuuta is the better fit for you, and as much as Toge wants you to be happy, it breaks his heart.

“What was that,” asks Yuuta, tearing his eyes away from his retreating friend and looking at you instead.

You’re still watching Inumaki leave, his posture somewhat sunken in, hands buried in his pockets. He looks defeated and somehow you want to run after him, ask him what’s wrong. But that would be too pushy, too clingy, wouldn’t it? So instead, you swallow and turn back to Yuuta.

“I don’t know,” you sigh. “He’s been… weird lately.”

Yuuta nodded. “I know, right? And ever since that last mission…”

That last mission, on which Gojo sent the three of you. That last mission where Inumaki’s voice gave out before he could finish the command, which lead to the curse injuring you. That last mission where Yuuta had been the one who had finished the short fight in just a single blow. You knew better than to assume that Inumaki was jealous of Yuuta’s power. You knew he wasn’t. But still something seemed to have dimmed his formerly good relationship with Yuuta. And with you too. He avoided you, texted you less throughout the day, reduced his already limited vocabulary to the equivalents of agreement and disagreement. You feel like you’ve made a mistake somehow, said or done something that hurt him.

“Do you think he’d talk to me about it,” you wonder, your voice small, nothing left of the breathless laughter from a moment ago.

Yuuta chews on his lip as he considers your question, and you know he’s considering a few things he officially doesn’t even know about. For example that you like Inumaki, that you make an active effort to spend time with him, have conversations with him. You’re the one who understands him the best, understands his language the best, even without the notebook.

What you don’t know, is that Yuuta also knows the other side of the story. He knows that Inumaki uses his notebook with you the most, because he wants you to understand his mind. He knows that Inumaki spends a lot of time considering each and every conversation he’s had with you. Sometimes, it’s late at night, and Yuuta gets a text from Inumaki, telling him about a conversation he’s had with you and if he should have replied something else. It’s not hard to tell that Inumaki is absolutely enamoured with you, and you with him. At least it’s not hard to tell from Yuuta’s perspective. But the way Inumaki and you never seem to understand the affection the other is harbouring, Yuuta begins to think that it’s actually very hard to tell from either of your perspectives. Or you’re both just idiots. Which, honestly, as much as he likes the two of you, is more likely.

“I’m not sure,” Yuuta eventually answers your question. There’s a lot Inumaki is bottling up, a lot he doesn’t even tell Yuuta about, stuff Yuuta can only assume. “But I think he’d probably appreciate it if you asked. Maybe he won’t tell you what’s going on, but I think he’d be glad to know you care.” This is as much as he can do to be honest without giving his friend’s secret away to you. A secret, Yuuta doesn’t even know officially.

“Don’t you think he’d get annoyed? He looked pretty upset just now,” you ask. You’re torn between wanting to show Inumaki that you cared, and scared of getting sent away or even worse, him getting angry at you.

“I mean, if you’re worried about it, you can always give him an hour or two. But I don’t think he’d mind if it were you, checking up on him.”

You don’t question Yuuta’s phrasing. Everyone knows you and Inumaki understand each other on a different level, the speed at which you sometimes communicate in single words thrown back and forth leaving the others out of their wits and completely clueless what the conversation was about.

“I’ll give him five,” you decide, leaning your back against the wooden table and glancing up at the red leaves overhead. “If he gets mad at me, it’s on you.”

Yuuta laughs, knowing you’re not serious. You’re not the kind of person who blames others for the outcome of your actions.

“He’d never get mad at you.”

“He looked pretty mad at me for getting injured on that last mission,” you disagree with Yuuta.

“He wasn’t mad at you. He was mad at himself. He blamed your injury on himself, when he couldn’t stop that curse because his voice gave out.”

You winced at the memory of blood trickling down from the corner of Inumaki’s mouth. He had once told you that he sometimes got sick from the taste, and after the curse was taken care of by Yuuta, it had been easier to focus on Inumaki than your own state. You remembered how awful the bright red blood had looked against his unusually pale skin.

“It wasn’t his fault, and he knows that.”

“Rationally yes,” Yuuta agreed. “But he still blames himself.”

“I’m surprised he talked to you about that,” you admit, closing your eyes in the sun. Behind your eyelids the picture of Inumaki’s bloody and scared face haunts your memory. You open your eyes again. “He never mentioned anything like that to me.”

“He didn’t, but it’s obvious,” Yuuta said.

“Is it?”

He just hummed in agreement.

“What else is obvious?”

“A lot. But that’s not mine to talk about.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean that you and Inumaki really should talk about some stuff,” Yuuta answers, “Like for example that you like him.” He almost feels bad at the way you freeze up beside him.

“I don’t,” you deny, but there is no force in your voice.

“Just saying,” Yuuta shrugs. “A lot of stuff is obvious. Just not to you and him.”

There’s a moment of silence and you have a feeling Yuuta knows what you’re about to ask, your cheeks burning with shame, but you ask anyway.

“Does he like me too?”

Yuuta turns to you then, his big eyes studying you for a moment intensely. “You don’t have to ask me that. You have to ask him.”

You exhale with a sigh a glance at your wristwatch: “Fine… maybe not today, tho.”

Yuuta chuckles, knowing that that’s going to be your response for every day to come, but he doesn’t call you out for it. He doesn’t know if he’d have the courage to confess his feelings if he were in your position either.

“Welp, his five minutes are up. I’m gonna see if he’s okay,” you declare, and stand up from the bench you had been lounging on. “Just-” you glance down at your classmate. “Just don’t tell him about this conversation, will you?”

Yuuta nods. “I can keep a secret,” he smiles, and you’re satisfied, before you head into the same direction Inumaki ran off to a few minutes prior.

He wasn’t in the dojo where you expected him to be after he had wandered off there, so left a little helpless, you began searching for him. After checking all the usual places, you finally spied him sitting hunched over on a bench next to the koi pond in one of the small, traditional gardens squeezed between the buildings. He looked lost in thought, so you made an effort to not walk too quietly as not to startle him. But when you reached the bench and he still hadn’t turned to look up you, you furrowed your brows in confusion. Was he mad at you?

“Inumaki-san,” you asked quietly, sitting down next to him with a safe distance. He wasn’t wearing his full uniform, instead of the black jacket he had pulled a warm, green vest over the white shirt sleeved shirt with the high collar that hid his curse marks. “Toge?”

At the use of his given name, he finally looked up at you.

Your breath stopped when you saw the sadness in his purple eyes. He quickly blinked it away, but you knew what you had seen, your heart hurting at the way he had seemed so lost. Maybe even worse was that he didn’t want to show his feelings to you, instead masking them up.

“What’s wrong.”

“Okaka.” Nothing. Why?

“Don’t,” you warned him, “Don’t lie to me. Please don’t.”

“Okaka, okaka!” I’m not lying! He said it with amusement in his voice, but when you failed to smile, his eyes grew serious again. “Okaka.” Nothing’s wrong.

“You know you can talk to me, right?”

“Shake, shake.” Yeah, yeah, I know.

“Do you want to talk to me?”

This time his answer took longer, and it was only quietly spoke when he answered with another “Shake.”

Instead of saying anything else, he began reaching for the notebook he always carried with him, but before his fingertips had even grazed the cover, you caught his hand.

“You can talk to me. I’ll understand you. No notebook needed.”

Toge looked up at you then, his eyes widened. What did you mean, you didn’t need the notebook? Would you really understand him?

“Tuna,” he mumbled, averting his gaze from yours, but from the corner of his eyes he saw you tilt your head. How the hell was he supposed to communicate his feelings with onigiri ingredients? He had words to agree and disagree, words to catch attention and swear, but how was he supposed to tell you his greatest wish was to talk to you without having to use this damn notebook, that he wanted to just use normal language, like everyone else? How was he supposed to tell you how much it hurt to see you liking Yuuta? “Okaka.” It won’t work.

“You can try. And if it doesn’t work, you can still write it down, okay?”

“Shake.” Okay. He reached his hand up, absentmindedly running his fingers over his curse marks peeking out from under his high collar. “Ikura.” I hate them.

He had more mumbled that to himself, but you nodded. “They don’t make life very easy, do they?”

“Shake.” No, they don’t. Toge focused on what he wanted you to know, that he wished he could talk to you without risking cursing you. “Furikake… saamon.”

Okay, this was new. Not just one, but two new ingredients. Rice spice and the other word for salmon. You furrowed your brows. “Can you say that again?”

“Furikake saamon,” Toge repeated, slowly, trying to convey his feelings through just these two words. This was never gonna work.

“You want to talk about your thoughts?”

His eyes widened at your correct interpretation of his words.

“Shake, shake!” Enthusiastically he nodded his head. “Furikake saamon! Nori nai!”

“Nori nai, nori na- you don’t want to use…”

“Nori!” He motioned to his mouth, then to the notebook in his pocket.

“Onigiri ingredients and the notebook? You don’t want to use them?”

“Shake, shake!”

He nodded again, and you could see how excited he was, his eyes shining with disbelief that he had managed to communicate something so out of context to you. Quickly he reached up and pulled the zipper of his collar down, so he could additionally use his mimic to tell you what he was thinking.

“Tarago Furikake.” His lilac eyes were widened expectantly, as he waited for you to decipher his words.

“You want to talk?”

He nodded, then pointed at you. “Tarago furikake,” he repeated, underlining his words with stabbing his finger into your direction.

“You want to talk to me?”

“Shake. Nori nai furikake tamago. Okaka.”

“I know. I know it’s difficult without the notebook,” you sighed. “But we’re managing. Right? It might take me a while to get used to it, but I we’re having a normal conversation right now, right? A bit like talking with someone in a foreign language, but not much different than that.”

Toge smiled, the sight making your breath hitch. You were used to seeing his eyes squeeze together when he smiled, but his mouth usually was covered by his collar. You couldn’t help but think that he was one of the most beautiful people you knew.

“Furikake nai, tamago, maguro, nori” he continued.

“Maguro,” you repeated the second last word, thinking what he might have meant. Quietly you mumbled the phrase he had just uttered, your eyes skipping away from his face and over the koi pond instead, as if the translation were written in the ripples on the water surface. Without talking, having to write everything down, he felt bad… like an outsider. Your eyes widened. Was this really what he had wanted to say? That he felt like an outsider? You looked back at him, seeing the shock on his face as he took in your expression.

“We’re making you feel like an outsider because you can’t talk to us? Toge-“

“Okaka, Okaka!” He quickly waved his hands around, signalling you had misunderstood. “Tamago. Maguro.” He pointed to himself.

“You feel like an outsider?”

“Shake!”

“Because you can’t talk to us?”

“Shake.” This time his voice was quieter, and he averted his gaze.

You exhaled quietly. You knew there was not much you could do to change the way he felt, nothing you weren’t doing already anyway. But to deny his feelings wouldn’t be right, even if you wanted to convince him that he wasn’t an outsider.

“I’m sorry,” you started. “I promise you, to us, you’re an integral part of the group, even if you don’t feel like you always are. Do you… do you have any ideas how we could help you feel more included?”

Toge shook his head. “Okaka,” he denied, and then pointing at himself: “Tamago.” It’s my negative feeling. “Tanaka-zuku mentaiko.” You’re doing everything right. There’s nothing you can do to change that. He hesitated for a moment before he added: “Furikake.”HHe hesitated for a moment before he added.

“Of course, we’ll keep talking to you. And you see that you can talk to us too. If I can learn to understand you, so can the others.”

Toge seriously doubted that, but he didn’t voice his thought, instead focusing back on what you had been talking about. “Tarago furikake mayo. Tuna-mayo furikake, saamon tamago, shiisamu. Takana-zuke tarago tuna-mayo shiisamu.”

You stared at him intensely, making his heart race. There was no way you had understood what he had just said. Was there? He was using words he had never used with you, or anyone at jujutsu high, before. He had sometimes used them when he had been younger, when he had talked to his toys as a little kid, finding ingredients for almost anything he could think of. That he still remembered them was a surprise. But there was no way you’d understand him like this, not even when he tried to embed the sentimental meaning of each word into his voice. Your eyes skipped over his face, as you were thinking hard, and Toge waited for the “Sorry, I don’t know what you mean, please write it down.” But it didn’t come. Instead, you answered him.

“I want you to be able to talk openly too. And I’d love to hear about the bad things you think and feel as much as about the good things. Because they’re part of you. Even when they’re hard, even when they’re painful and difficult to admit. But that’s why we have each other, right? So we’re not alone, so the difficult times aren’t quite as difficult. And you already make me laugh, you already make me feel happy. I’m always the happiest when I’m with you.”

You hadn’t used the word friend. The thought rang in Toge’s mind, and together with your last sentence it accumulated to the next words that spilled over his lips, words he had been certain he’d never actually say out loud. Words, which’s meaning he had thought he’d never communicate to you in any form or way.

“Tarago tuna-mayo furikake okome. Tarago tanaka-zuke okome.”I want to use my voice to tell you that I’m in love with you. I want you to be in love with me too.

The moment the words had left his lips, he wanted to make it all undone. What if you had understood him and didn’t feel the same way? All this time he wished you’d understand him, and now he hoped you hadn’t understood a word of what he had just uttered. The way you stared at him wide eyed was a good sign that you really hadn’t.

“Okome,” you asked, your heart beating in your throat. If you had thought rationally about the way he was listing food, you wouldn’t have had the faintest idea of what he had wanted to express, but somehow his emotions were swinging in his words, like the sounds accumulated to a meaning that wasn’t transported by words.

“Mentaiko,” he began, wanting to lift his hands to wave it off, to tell you that it wasn’t important.

But before he had completed the gesture, you caught his wrist with your dominant hand, raising the other between you, pointing at him.

“Okome,” you asked before pointing to yourself. Your voice was shaky, and you could see the moment Toge realized you had understood him.

His eyes widened and he paled a little, swallowing hard. You could see the fear in his eyes. He was afraid you’d turn him down, you realized, and your heart broke a little.

So, what did you do, when your best friend, who you had liked for far too long without acting on it, accidentally confessed his love to you? Using the word for “rice” nonetheless, the base ingredient for onigiri. Because just like one couldn’t make rice balls without rice, humans couldn’t live without love.

You repeated the gesture towards yourself, pointing at you again. “Okome,” you said, voice just as shaky as before, before pointing at Toge.

His eyes followed your finger, the way it was pointing right at his chest, where his heart was stuttering in excitement, and then doing cartwheels, as the realization began settling in.

“Okome,” he asked in disbelieve.

But you just nodded. “Okome.”

He acted quicker than you could really perceive. Your one hand was still holding onto his wrist, to stop him from gesticulating, his skin warm underneath yours, but with the other he grabbed the hand with which you had pointed between you and him. His fingers wrapped around yours tightly, pulling you towards him, pressing your hand right over his heart, while he leant in at the same time, connecting his lips to yours.

A shiver went through you, at the feeling of his warm body underneath his clothes, at his soft lips pressed to yours, at the strange tingling of cursed energy that radiated from his cursed mark. And then you abandoned all thoughts, and just acted on instinct, moving closer to him, wrapping your hand into the fabric of his vest, and kissing him like you had wanted to kiss him for such a long time already.

A sound of appreciative surprise erupted from Toge’s throat and you could feel him smile as he met your kiss with equal fervour, running the tip of his tongue over the seam of your lips. When you parted them just the smallest fraction, he didn’t hesitate to slip his tongue past them, exploring your mouth until both of you had to pull away for breath. You were breathing heavily, your mind foggy, fingers wrapped into his vest, holding on to something, otherwise it felt like the world would just slip away.

When you opened your eyes, you found he was already looking at you. His beautiful eyes were scanning over your face as if searching for any sign of discomfort, as if he expected you to scold him for kissing you. Honestly, at this point the only scolding he’d get was that he had stopped kissing you.

Unwrapping one of your hands from where you had clung to him, you brushed a strand of his bright hair out of his forehead, the curl soft against your fingertips. With a smile you leant forward, and pressed your lips to his left cheek, then the curse mark there, feeling the cursed energy sizzle through them. You moved on to his right cheek, then his forehead, the tip of his nose, his chin, peppering small kisses all over his face until he was full on laughing and took hold of your face with both of his hands, pulling you only far enough away from him to be able to look into your eyes. His were still crinkled in joy, but his voice was serious and heavy with how much he meant this single word phrase that left his lips without hesitation.

“Okome.” And then he kissed you again, slower this time, just to make sure you understood each little detail of what he felt for you. Inumaki Toge sometimes struggled with his fate, but as long as he had you to understand him, what else could he really ask for?

Tags: @nnasv @ashy-akuma @delzinrowe

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junk-story · 9 months ago

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Interview Archive 2, 5.1994 - Ongaku to Hito Special Edition

This interview is on pages 62-67 of the magazine. Footnotes can be found at the bottom of the text.

ISSAY – the aesthetic man who “continues to spin round and round in a dead end with nothing to do”, from DER ZIBET, who debuted in ‘85 as “the founders of Japan’s aesthetic-style rock revival”. Sakurai Atsushi – the aesthetic man of “complete self-deprecation, going mad in any case”, from BUCK-TICK, who debuted in ‘87 as “the first aesthetic-style rock band dominating Japan nationwide”. This will be the first interview between these two. Whether you call it visual kei, makeup kei, aesthetic kei, or Japanese-style decadence kei, this movement became dominant in Japan’s current rock scene before we knew it. Although it’s been analyzed from various perspectives, in a nutshell, I wonder if at the center of this movement is “an exceptionally large desire to escape a difficult reality”. Not liking to look at reality, they seek out a place of repose that’s “somewhere that isn’t here”, and they hide thoroughly within themselves. And while Japan is a peaceful country and they were born during this moratorium [on violence], they are “hippies”. Those who have become the beacons of this are, without a doubt, Der Zibet and BUCK-TICK. With that, a meeting of two giants who rely on each other – but it really suits these two.

Ichikawa: I’ve had pending questions for when this interview happened for a long time, since I was working at a certain other music magazine, but now that we can finally do it, somehow I’m still feeling shy.

ISSAY: Hahahahaha.

Ichikawa: First, I’ll start with the perfunctory questions.

ISSAY: The story of BUCK-TICK and DER ZIBET’s formation?

Sakurai: Hahahahaha.

Ichikawa: Hahahaha. I’m tired of hearing that sort of talk already.

ISSAY: Alright then, how we first found music? (laughs)

Ichikawa: (Ignoring him1) Sakurai, around what point did you learn of DER ZIBET?

Sakurai: Around when I was 19 or 20, wasn’t it? I’d come to Tokyo from Gunma, and during the time I was living together with a friend, I borrowed a tape from someone and listened to it.

Ichikawa: Was your first “Violetter Ball (Murasaki no Butoukai)”?

Sakurai: Yeah. I thought it seemed good and listened to it. And then, by chance, I was passing by Eggman in Shibuya...and it was written there, “DER ZIBET LIVE!”. I thought, “I wonder what sort of feel it’ll have, this is my chance” and bought my ticket for that day. That was the first place I watched them…

Ichikawa: Der Zibet are decadence at its finest, aren’t they.

ISSAY: Yeah. We’ve been told by those around us to tone it down. (laughs)

Sakurai: By the way, ISSAY-san, you were singing with a mask on.

ISSAY: Really? ...That’s not great! (laughs)

Ichikawa: (laughs) The first time you saw them it was that sort of live?

ISSAY: ...I think it wasn’t that sort of pantomime pantomiming, at the time at least.

Ichikawa: What hairstyle did he have?

Sakurai: The same as now, I think. Yeah, like that.

ISSAY: Was it black? I think maybe it was red. Red or green, one or the other.

Ichikawa: (laughs) This guy, he was giddy2, wasn’t he?

Sakurai: No...well, I thought he was cool…

ISSAY: I’m glad! (laughs)

Ichikawa: Hahaha. Did you listen to Der Zibet after that too?

Sakurai: I think after that was around the time when I had first started with BUCK-TICK, not yet as the vocalist, but as the drummer.

ISSAY: Oh?! Atsushi, you were the drummer at first?

Sakurai: Yeah.

ISSAY: I had no idea. (laughs)

Sakurai: After that, while we were touring around during our indies era, at Nagoya’s ELL, DER ZIBET’s video was playing. I thought again that they were cool. Then, when we came back from touring, among our few (laughs) fans, there was a kid who loved DER ZIBET, and they gave me that video. I watched it again and again in my room like I was devouring it.

ISSAY: You watched it again and again! (laughs)

Ichikawa: What parts of Der Zibet did you like? Don’t worry; just be honest.

Sakurai: Hmmm, well I’ve performed vocals as well, so that’s where my eyes go, don’t they. ISSAY-san was cool.

ISSAY: (laughs) See~?

Sakurai: It wasn’t just singing...the added value of his performance on the stage was really impressive.

ISSAY: We were trying various things at that time. Like where I’d sit on top of a stepladder and sing, or I’d have an enormous clock.

Ichikawa: Wahahaha. You’d go onto the stage holding candles.

ISSAY: Not candles! A lantern. All four of us wore black coats and appeared on stage holding lanterns.

Ichikawa: You did as much as you could underground, didn’t you.

ISSAY: When I think of it now, I wonder if was Japanese gothic. (laughs)

Sakurai: Hahahahaha.

Ichikawa: Is this guy embarrassed, I wonder?

ISSAY: No no. (laughs) Well, performing something itself isn’t really embarrassing. Just, when it’s said right to your face...that is embarrassing, a bit. (laughs) There’s a kind of embarrassment when someone says, “A long time ago, we all went to this picnic, right?” and they bring out a picture of you from your high school days, right? It’s embarrassing.

Ichikawa: So Sakurai, you felt there were some commonalities with Der Zibet, right?

Sakurai: …...Hmmm…...how can I say this – I felt like they were a young boy’s words. There’s a boy who has his own world and there is a girl who yearns for him in it, like that? Yeah, it may have a girlish perspective to it. Or it could be like a so-called father complex.

Ichikawa: Sakurai, you’ve had a complex about your lack of personal worldview as an artist, on that note.

Sakurai: Because I still can’t express myself in words, I haven’t gotten to that point yet. The person named ISSAY-san who has already achieved it is right before my eyes…

Ichikawa: Then, the heart of a young girl longs for him, and he also ends up a father figure – a person having difficulties, and you are too. (laughs)

Sakurai: (laughs) I envy him, that’s the kind of feeling I have.

Ichikawa: The first time ISSAY saw BUCK-TICK was in London in ‘88, wasn’t it. This was while Der Zibet was recording “GARDEN” and BUCK-TICK “TABOO” respectively, and you performed in a foreign country.

ISSAY: That was my first time seeing them live. However, the first time I met them was at the public TV recording of Meguro’s Rokumeikan.3

Ichikawa: That was the time that SION, Der Zibet and BUCK-TICK all were recording on the same day. When you went to the dressing room, they were there and you became acquainted?

Sakurai: (embarrassed laugh) Yes.

Ichikawa: Was that around the time BUCK-TICK debuted?

Sakurai: Yes, right around the time we debuted.

Ichikawa: When you went to the dressing room, there were these boys with their hair straight up.

ISSAY: That’s right. But they were such good kids. (laughs) Atsushi and Imai were adult-like, but the two on rhythm (Anii and Yuuta) really talked to me a lot. It was just a “We’re BUCK-TICK!”, “Oh, hello” sort of exchange, but. (laughs)

Ichikawa: Sakurai didn’t speak?

ISSAY: He said, “I’ve been to see one of your concerts once.”

Sakurai: (embarrassed laugh) Is that so?

Ichikawa: The Sakurai of that time was a guy that consistently didn’t talk. Right before their debut, when I was doing my first interview with BUCK-TICK, Sakurai and Hoshino, they were a fleet of silence, the two of them, you know? Despite their gaudy hair standing straight up. (laughs)

Sakurai: (laughs) Waah, we were useless guys.

Ichikawa: Well, you were eyewitness to BUCK-TICK’s live in London.

ISSAY: There was a message from Atsushi in my voicemail. “I heard you’re going to London to record around the same time as us, so if you can meet up, let’s meet”, something like that.

Ichikawa: Sakurai, what are you embarrassed about?

Sakurai: Nothing, nothing. (laughs)

Ichikawa: You’re blushing like a schoolgirl, you know. (laughs)

Sakurai: ……...(laughs)

ISSAY: Hahahahahahaha. So, I heard that BUCK-TICK was going to perform live there, so I went to watch them with the other members [of DZ].

Ichikawa: I think I can ask this now, but, performing live in London was tough, wasn’t it?

Sakurai: Yes, it was tough. But, well, it was just a rush of performing and coming back home. I didn’t think I could perform sober, so I don’t remember it, but. (laughs)

Ichikawa: Just drinking up like crazy before the show. (laughs)

Sakurai: Yeah.

Ichikawa: Sounds desperate. (laughs) Were Der Zibet your only Japanese audience members?

Sakurai: It looked like there were a number of exchange students as well.

Ichikawa: Wasn’t it embarrassing with Japanese people being there?

Sakurai: And they were in the front row. (laughs)

ISSAY: Right. I was thinking that they may have come all the way from Japan to see them. I thought, “Wow, BUCK-TICK is awesome.” (laughs)

Ichikawa: Bottom line, what were your impressions from the live?

ISSAY: I thought they were doing their best. (laughs) They had a lot of spirit. I think it was the ending, that was amazing. Like BOOM, BOOM.4 It was like, “ooh, they’re really doing it.” (laughs)

Sakurai: Hey, that’s something you’d say about a sports player. (laughs)

ISSAY: It felt like you guys were like, “Listen to this, you bastards!”

Sakurai: We might have seemed like nasty guys. (laughs)

ISSAY: No, not at all, there wasn’t a feeling of nastiness to it; you were greeting them with smiles and properly did the MC in English.

Ichikawa: MC!!!

ISSAY: In the middle, speaking English got troublesome so he ended up speaking Japanese, but. (laughs)

Ichikawa: Woooooow. (laughs) This guy who can’t even speak for the MC in Japan, there’s no way he could do it over there, right?

ISSAY: Hahahahahahaha.

Sakurai: Right. It was impossible.

Ichikawa: But this is a nostalgic story.

ISSAY: Yeah, nostalgic. But I remember stuff from that time.

Sakurai: Me too. And I was glad you came to our dressing room.

Ichikawa: Thinking about it, both BUCK-TICK and Der Zibet recorded internationally as a one-time thing.

ISSAY: For us, it’s because when we go there, we end up making dark stuff. Like, the dark and extremely heavy “GARDEN” that was so heavily criticized by the people invested in it, when we listened to it in London it seemed normal. You don’t think it’s dark at all.

Sakurai: That’s right. Ichikawa-san also completely disliked our “TABOO”, so. (laughs)

Ichikawa: Well, when you go to London, it suddenly ends up feeling quite frightening, doesn’t it? And artists need to have a strong sense of themselves.

ISSAY: I ended up having the constitution for it, undoubtedly. I had fun, being in London. Wasn’t that the case for you?

Sakurai: Certainly mentally speaking, it was very comfortable.

Ichikawa: But Sakurai, you’ve been on vacation to Hawaii before.5 (laughs)

Sakurai: That place is totally harder. (laughs) There’s this obsession of like, if you don’t go outside you’re missing out...(laughs)

ISSAY: Aah, I get that! (laughs) Well, did you end up going outside?

Sakurai: I did end up going out.

ISSAY: Did you swim in the ocean?

Sakurai: I did. (laughs)

ISSAY: Isn’t that nice~, that you swam in the ocean~? (laughs)

Sakurai: Hahahaha.

ISSAY: Let’s go next time, it’ll be fun. Let’s go, let’s go. (laughs) Last summer, for the first time in 15 years, I also went to the ocean, sooo (laughs)

Sakurai: What sort of fun? (laughs)

Ichikawa: Decadent people going for a swim in the ocean. (laughs)

ISSAY: After that, we’ve met in passing a number of times. Definitely, I think it was when we were coming back from touring in Nagoya or somewhere, but we were refueling our gas in the parking area off the highway and (laughs) these guys with long hair came in. I was thinking, “Huh? I’ve seen these guys before”, and there was the bassist. He went, “It’s BUCK-TICK!” (laughs) And from the back, making an extremely embarrassed looking face about it, came Atsushi. (laughs)

Ichikawa: Wahahahaha.

ISSAY: I was like, “Oh, it’s Atsushi!” (laughs) Besides that, we also met up in front of Nakano Sun Plaza when Peter Murphy had a concert there.

Sakurai: I remember that well.

Ichikawa: Because events like that are few and far between, right. You guys live withered lifestyles like retired old men. (laughs)

ISSAY: Definitely. (laughs) Events that move me are few and far between. But look, I was moved at first when I met up with Atsushi, I was like, “It’s Atsushi~!”

Sakurai: Hahahahahahahaha.

ISSAY: Atsushi, you’re a homebody too, right?

Sakurai: Going by car from a metropolitan area to a suburb is okay, but getting to the point of leaving my room is difficult.

Ichikawa: This guy would probably be happy if you came over to his room to hang out. (laughs) You would just be idling away the time, though.

Sakurai: Well, there are no enemies from the outside there. (laughs)

ISSAY: You get tired of it right, the stuff that comes with going out.

Sakurai: Yeah, it’s tiring. I wonder why that is.

ISSAY: Because people other than you are there. (laughs)

Ichikawa: Wahahahahahaha.

Sakurai: Hahahaha. 100%. (laughs)

ISSAY: Thank you very much.6 (laughs)

Sakurai: For me, even though I’m at this age, I still happen to get embarrassed and scared about it. I want to go to Toukyuu Hands7, but I can’t, things like that. (laughs)

ISSAY: I can’t go either, you know. (laughs)

Ichikawa: Sakurai, what do you want to go to Hands for?

Sakurai: My light bulbs burnt out, so to go buy more. Places like supermarkets don’t sell them, they’re a special kind. In the end, I had someone else buy them and bring them to me. (laughs)

ISSAY: Right? I do that too.

Ichikawa: That’s no good, you guys. (laughs)

ISSAY: For me, there was a time where I wanted a takoyaki set, so I sent the manager to buy it for me.

Sakurai: Ah, I bought that too. The one from Toukyuu Hands, right? (laughs)

ISSAY: Ah, really? Next time, let’s have a takoyaki party, just the two of us. (laughs)

Sakurai: We’ll do it, we’ll do it. (laughs)

ISSAY: A dark, decadent takoyaki party. (laughs)

Ichikawa: While listening to the Sisters of Mercy.

Sakurai: Hahahahahahaha.

Ichikawa: I’m coming too.

ISSAY: Please do. (laughs)

Ichikawa: So, in “Masquerade”, the song you costar on in Der Zibet’s “Shishunki II”, it became a “decadent duet between teacher and student”.

ISSAY: Weren’t you the one who planned that? (laughs) But, that really was extremely fun. (laughs) And the finished product is quite interesting.

Ichikawa: Like the way the qualities of your voices are so similar.

ISSAY: Right? (laughs) Like, there are many parts where you can’t tell if I’m singing or if Atsushi is singing, even for me.

Sakurai: That’s been said a lot.

ISSAY: I was surprised by that. So, if you listen to how Atsushi normally sings, it’s completely different from me, right? But, when we happen to be doing a part in the same artistic style...you know?

Ichikawa: By the way, ISSAY, what do you actually think about the music BUCK-TICK is performing?

ISSAY: I haven’t listened to all of it completely, so I don’t know for sure, but I think it’s interesting. It’s weird, isn’t it? There aren’t guys performing that kind of music on major labels, are there? So I’m really happy about that, and that it’s so well received. I think that’s a really good thing. From the time they came out, I’ve thought, “This went major. That’s great!” (laughs) Even though the things they perform are quite often actually grotesque.8

Ichikawa: I think the people at Victor who gave them the OK are great too. Here are these “amateurs” with incomprehensible lyrics who didn’t know the fundamentals of their instruments, so you get a lot of weird sounds. At an average record label, they would have ended up getting the boot.

ISSAY: Normally, most likely.

Sakurai: I think so too. (laughs)

Ichikawa: If I’m speaking frankly, and I’m still thinking this, but I can’t help wondering why they were sold on BUCK-TICK.

Sakurai: Fufufufu.

ISSAY: Me, I somehow understand. I suppose the melody was easy to follow and that had a lot to do with it. I don’t think it’s necessary at all to persist in that, but as an element of their work that’s easy to accept, I wonder if it wasn’t a big part of it. Although their lyrics seemed muddied, and although their hair was done like it was. I think their melodies were amazingly alive. I wonder if they really felt that.

Ichikawa: Well, if Der Zibet had also debuted four years or so later, maybe they would have sold big.

ISSAY: Hahahaha. I wonder. (laughs)

Ichikawa: But you know, on the point of how what we call aesthetic kei or visual kei’s “weird sounds” movement gained a following in Japan, I think BUCK-TICK’s contribution is huge. Especially when you think about how aesthetic kei is currently flourishing.

ISSAY: I think so. You’re great, Atsushi!

Sakurai: (laughs) Not at all, the me of today wouldn’t be here without ISSAY-san.

Ichikawa: You guys are so creepy. But lately, the number of lovable “aesthetic fools” are getting increasingly scarce, aren’t they?

Sakurai: Because fashion comes first.

Ichikawa: Stylers9 are born on after another, but it’s just the shape of one. In the amateurs, in indies, and on major labels too.

ISSAY: Hahahahahaha. Styler (laughs)

Sakurai: (laughs) What is that exactly, a styler?

Ichikawa: Hm? Someone who personifies STYLE10.

Sakurai: Hahahaha. What a great way to say it.

Ichikawa: In the middle of the ‘80s, there was an underground aesthetic music scene centered in Shinjuku, and it was nothing but fine fools, wasn’t it?

ISSAY: It was, it was. Jean Genet11 was doing well.

Ichikawa: (laughs) There were no bands that I think a major label would be willing to spend production and advertising costs on thinking like, “This will sell!”

ISSAY: That’s right. But it’s because they had power.

Ichikawa: That underground power, it comes from a scene that has a sad history where, regardless of how good they were, their values were different from the above ground, and for this reason alone they were not recognized, right?

ISSAY: But isn’t that how it ends up in the world?

Ichikawa: Der Zibet is also still the odd one out among that group – because even while ISSAY’s “aesthetic of spinning circles in a dead end” stands out, the sounds have also been properly done.

ISSAY: It was still weird though. (laughs) However, we really were criticized for it. At the time we first put music out, it was written about as “kayou rock”.12 If you had slightly melodious lyrics, you’d quickly be branded with that.

Sakurai: We were as well. (laughs)

Ichikawa: But now there are no fools. And that’s regrettable. Because as I see it, rock is pulled along by fools. It improves the expression and the like.

ISSAY: Well, but…

Ichikawa: Guys like us need to keep going, is what I’m saying.

ISSAY: That’s what you meant. (laughs)

Sakurai: Hahahahahaha.

Ichikawa: I’m asking this right at the end, but ISSAY’s solo album production project is actually now going on in secret, but of course, Sakurai Atsushi, I think you must be obligated to participate in it in any case, right?

ISSAY: Hahahahaha. Will you do it?

Sakurai: I’ll do it!

1 This is literally noted in the text, lol. 2 This could also be “restless” or “flippant”, but those fit less well to me. 3 A live house in Tokyo. The internet tells me this show was on January 17th, 1988. 4 Onomatopoeia translation hard. 5 I felt this transition was weird in English, but it’s clear in Japanese at least that he’s implying London shouldn’t have been comfortable compared to Hawaii. 6 This is basically the first time in the whole interview that ISSAY speaks formally, and it’s for exaggerated effect. Very opposite of Sakurai, who has been 100% formal. 7 Now just “Hands” – a home center store for housing and lifestyle products. 8 “Egui” means a lot of things, but it’s apt for B-T’s music: dark topics on emotional things, taboo social subjects. 9 I spent like 5 minutes trying to figure this out before reading on. He made this word up. Sakurai and Issay didn't know what he meant either. Thanks for keeping me on my toes, Ichikawa. 10 “Style” was written in English here. 11 This appears to be a reference to this playwright’s style of work more than he himself. 12 Better Japanese music historians may know more than me, but this seems like the pre-Band Boom name for this kind of music. THE ALFEE, for example, is listed as one of the founding groups of this sound on JP Wikipedia.

#buck tick #sakurai atsushi #atsushi sakurai #issay #der zibet #ongaku to hito #jrock #visual kei #quartz translates #translation

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