Title: Treat Him Right
Author: Rana
Eros
Rating: Still
with the inexplicitness.
Word count: 670
Summary: Tatsumi's
behavior changes. Hisoka adjusts.
Author's Notes: For the
prompt, "Yami no Matsuei, Tatsumi/Hisoka: Preferential treatment (showing
a soft side only to them) - 'Tell me u don't want me to stop.'" Betaed by Eliza, who did her best to beat the regionalisms out of
it.
Treat Him Right
It's not that
Tatsumi's nice to him, precisely, though Tatsumi's
always been courteous. That, he's certain, is the result of his own courtesy,
and his work ethic; it hasn't changed. What has is the way Tatsumi holds his
eyes when complimenting his teamwork with Tsuzuki, places a hand on his
shoulder when speaking of the dangers of an assignment, asks if he'd like a
refill of his tea when going to the breakroom. They're small things, but
Tatsumi doesn't do them for anyone else, and that makes them loom large to
Hisoka.
Others in the division
notice. Hisoka can feel their speculation. Over half of them decide Tatsumi's
bribing him to stay Tsuzuki's partner. Only Wakaba, Watari, and Tsuzuki himself
guess at the real reason, and their various forms of excitement are
headache-inducing.
It's that which
makes Hisoka step into Tatsumi's office one afternoon and shut the door firmly.
Tatsumi blinks up at him from over one of the ledgers, then straightens and
beckons him forward.
"Is everything
all right, Kurosaki-kun?"
By mutual, unspoken
agreement, they've kept their arrangement out of the office. Except now
Tatsumi's brought it in with his preferential treatment, and Hisoka's not quite
sure how to address it.
He decides courtesy
will serve him, as it always has with Tatsumi. "Tatsumi-san, forgive me,
but I've found your behavior of late concerning."
"How--please
sit down, Kurosaki-kun."
Hisoka takes a seat
across the desk from Tatsumi, and immediately feels the muffling effect of
Tatsumi's disciplined emotional state ease the pain behind his eyes. He lets
out a small sigh, and Tatsumi frowns, setting his pen down.
"Are you well,
Hisoka?"
That makes Hisoka
frown, the tension creeping back. "You don't call me that at work,
Tatsumi-san."
"I don't, or
you'd rather I didn't?"
"I...never
expected you'd want to," Hisoka admits, a little at a loss. Tatsumi leans
forward, his eyes very blue under his desklamp.
"It would
please me, Hisoka, but I'll only do so privately, if it makes you
uncomfortable."
"And the rest
of it?" Which is both abrupt and discourteous, but Hisoka's certain
Tatsumi will forgive him. That's part of the problem, after all.
Tatsumi only looks
at him for a moment, then pushes back from the desk and stands. Hisoka starts
to rise as well, but Tatsumi holds up a hand. "No, don't get up. I just
feel we should be...closer, for this conversation."
Hisoka waits
warily, and he can't help closing his eyes as Tatsumi passes behind him toward
the seat on his other side, thinking of night and shadows and the solidity of
Tatsumi at his back in a bed not his own. Tatsumi turns the other chair to face
him, and sits down. If Hisoka were to turn, he thinks their knees would touch.
He turns only his head.
"I apologize
if I've overstepped any boundaries by treating you differently at the office,
Hisoka," Tatsumi says, his voice low and intimate, incongruent in his
daylit office. "However, I wonder if you might consider allowing me to
continue."
Hisoka blinks,
thrown despite Tatsumi's behavior thus far. "What?"
"I don't want
to stop." Tatsumi leans forward once more, until there's less than a
finger's width of space between his mouth and Hisoka's, but he doesn't touch.
"Do you want me to stop?"
Hisoka swallows,
and Tatsumi's disciplined, but Hisoka can still feel his desire when they're
this close. It always draws out his own. He swallows again, manages to whisper,
"Why don't you want to stop?"
Tatsumi smiles.
"I like to know I can be like this, and I like the way you respond to me
after I've been like this."
Hisoka draws breath
to ask what he means, but thinks better of it. He knows; because Tatsumi
doesn't do it to anyone else, he finds it flattering. That makes him wonder.
"What if I were to treat you like that too, Seiichirou?"
Now Tatsumi
touches, one hand on Hisoka's thigh just before Hisoka kisses him. "Then I
would respond."
END