( Another window, another torrent that rushes in from the outdoor rain, and he inhales a little harshly, a little unsteady, trying to make sense of the things Ginger says and the things Ginger feels (and, far less importantly, the way Mika feels), and find some average in between.
It aches like a fresh wound; it hurts to deny himself, and to deny Yuu. Ginger's right. But he would split himself at the seams as if ripping flesh from bone if it kept Ginger from feeling this way, from twisting his expression so. Mika presses his face into Ginger's cheek, his hands falling, and one gently taking hold of Ginger's wrist so close to Mika's face. )
... How can I make this better?
( Ginger says these beautiful and kind and loving things about Yuu, about Mika, and Mika loves him for it, but Ginger disregards himself. All this boils down to is just - saying to leave Ginger be, but how can he? How can he when he's hurting?
If there's no cure, there must at least be treatment. There can't be nothing. He can't accept that. )
I would change... if you wanted. I would let you change me, without a thought. But you want to preserve this thing that I am. ( The worst thing he's done is gotten Ginger attached to him - now he's too sentimental to change him, even if it'd be for the better. ) So just...
( He falters, again, struggling; frustrated, that knowing - how Ginger feels, doesn't mean he knows how to address it. )
... How can I convince you... that I won't leave you? ( Not just that he doesn't want to trade him in for Yuu, but that he won't. ) How can I make it hurt less? Please.
( Take Ginger's hands gently from himself and hold them away, not able to stop how he feels about it, but help him hurt himself a little less. )
[ He shakes his head. How does he show Mika the enormity of what he means to Ginger; how much Ginger loves him, more and more with every moment? Cut open his chest and he’d bleed love for Mika. Dissect his dreams and his hopes and there would be a million and one shades of Mika there, reflected in every freckle of light.
He leans up or pulls Mika down - he’s not sure - he just knows he needs to kiss him, right now, sweetly - so sweetly. Peppered kisses that mean love you, love you, mine; love you, yours.
… Oh - but he’s also Mika’s. Oh. How he feels now about Mika making himself nothing to make Ginger something, he’s - doing the same.
He huffs a short sound, a wet laugh, against Mika’s lips. Angry at himself. ]
I’m sorry. I’m hurting you. You help, you make everything better. Ah, we’re a mess now, really.
[ He’s so dumb. They’re both so - he’s happy they’re like this, fumbling in the same ways, stumbling in the same direction and thinking they’re lost from each other; he’s happy they’re alike. Look at them, how anxious and panicked they are to make the other feel better - when they’re both chosen each other in so many ways. Stupid, silly pair. He… likes that. He likes them.
The bad things, the bad thoughts - they don’t go away, but they quiet down. They’re not as loud. Mika says please and even those thoughts know they should listen. ]
And thank you for saying all that even when it hurt you, too… If you change, I want to change, too. To be… better for you. Maybe that means I should… learn to like myself a little because it hurts you when I don’t. But if we change together, in tandem, I could do it.
It doesn’t… it doesn’t have to be now, does it? We’re still learning each other.
[ He has doubts if that’s possible because he can never help these thoughts, but he thinks of how he’d be willing to do anything for Mika - and he thinks yeah, this, too. He doesn’t want to be the one to hurt Mika, and he is, he just did - so much, he’s sorry. He’ll change. ]
( He welcomes every kiss from Ginger, as he always does and he knows he always would. But it punctuates Ginger's expression, that sad repetition of what Mika had said about himself, and he understands - this hurts Ginger, too.
Ah, right; hadn't he hurt Ginger in this same way, some weeks back? When he'd offered to let Ginger set him down? And Mika had done it again; and Ginger has done the same, here, to him. It's so easy to forget they'd met in the manner one meets the eyes of their reflection in the mirror when he spends so much of his time fixing Ginger up on a pedestal, hoping to set him closer to the sun, shower him in attention and affection like he deserves.
He wants to protest - you could never hurt me; nothing you could ever do to me would ever be hurt. And this much is plain on his face. And Mika would mean it, in a way that would not always be good for him. But he, for once, holds his tongue, understanding that is not the right answer. At least, not right now.
Maybe listening is, for once. They're both so bad at hearing each other sometimes, instead of hearing the anxious voice in their heads. )
... I've never...
( ... learned, how to like himself, he wants to say. This is not untrue. But - there was a time, right? A brief time, when he was young and with the orphanage, that he was happy, and he thinks he only hated himself a little bit. Still saw himself without worth; still feared he'd be scrapped and abandoned, but. A time where he thinks that maybe one day, he could have... become better.
(In an ideal world, where their orphanage was truly an orphanage, and not a testing ground.)
(But he believed he could be better, one day. And that belief he had then is more than he has now. And doesn't Ginger make him at least just as happy as he was then? All that warmth spread across every orphan, delivered from Ginger alone. No wonder his love felt so sweltering.)
...
He kisses him - presses his lips in against Ginger's frustrated own, and only barely parts. )
... We have forever to figure it out. Right? ( Forever, five minutes at a time. ) ... I do want you to... like yourself too. But, until you can... until we figure it all out— I'm... it's not a burden for me to like you for you. However we change... I'd be happy with however we turn out, so long as it's together.
( ...
And then he falls quiet for a moment, and he pulls himself back - just a little bit. Gazing at Ginger, and hesitating - the words caught at the back of his throat, until, finally, he thinks maybe this is right: )
... When you figure out how to propose... ( Not for marriage— what Ginger had meant the first time: for Mika to stay with him, forever. The thousands of do-overs, with no fixed end. ) ... Maybe we can make it a promise. If that's how we feel... If that's what feels right, for us... when you do.
( And he says this not because it's binding - but because it's selfish. And maybe - maybe - them trying to give up pieces of themselves to add to the other... isn't want they want.
Maybe they both want to hold fast and let go, and maybe they're wrong for trying to... deny it. Maybe, maybe, maybe. But he won't know until he asks Ginger, instead of deciding it all for himself. )
[ Maybe he’s put Mika on a pedestal, too - but it feels more like Mika is a fixed point where he’s built the shape of his future around, and gladly reshaped his hopes and dreams to fit. And everything had been easy, so easy, because loving Mika is the easiest thing in this world, his world, any world. Some days breathing is harder than that. ]
Forever, and whatever we end up as - we’ll be happy. I’m sure.
[ He hadn’t questioned it as a child until the other children poked where it hurt, for something he couldn’t change. But he hadn’t questioned - he hadn’t asked if something like him could make Rum happy, if he deserved to be by Rum’s side. Deserving wasn’t a question; he didn’t know it once.
If they can’t come to like themselves, they’ll at least have a better understanding of why - why they’re loved anyway, why it’s okay, why doubt lacks a physical form to compete with the warmth of each other. And maybe then, doubt can question things less because they’ll be used to warmth and a mutual love that’ll grow and grow until it overwhelms all else.
And…
Ginger thinks if he can’t like himself, he can like the way he makes Mika happy. The way he loves him, even if it is utterly selfish - but that encourages Mika to be a little selfish, too. And he… definitely… likes that. So: ]
Yes. Yes. Yes. [ He breathes it into the next kiss, his hunger for Mika reawakened on this one selfish idea. ]
Hey, Mika… Want to do something a little… naughty? [ He pushes up from the pillows, straightens his back. His eyes invite, implore Mika to watch him and only him. ] Let’s make love - right here - with the windows open, so the spirits can hear how much we love each other.
[ So the next time he casts a spell on Mika, there’s no chance it’ll slide away. ]
And then after - [ When he’s still in Mika, when they’ve come down somewhat from the high of pleasure; when it would be utterly silly for Mika to think Ginger could possibly look at him with anything but love for hearing all the bad bits - when they’re still one being - Can Mika glimpse these images? ] - share more of your past with me?
( Can he be happy? Can they? Some greater part of him still wonders— but, when Ginger says it, he feels that much more sure. Mika has always been someone so easily colored by his company. And maybe they're both troubled because they both look to each other for steady, and neither of them are; they're too alike, they're fumbling, but these things - they can understand, and find comfort in, once they recognize their mirror.
He feels his chest boil with the familiar sensation of Ginger's heat, his love, in the echo of his hungry answer, and this is a warmth that lingers in him, thrilled - how badly Ginger wants to be bound to him, because Mika wants this, too. So firmly interwoven - like thread - they can't be detangled again.
So please don't go back for Rum, or your friends, or your parents— (but, if you do, please take me with you, and please choose me, even then).
His gaze follows Ginger up, fixed longingly on him for even the few centimetres of distance between them. He doesn't expect - what he suggests next with such boyish excitement; it's something that draws a deep flush to his cheeks, the scandal of it more than what he'd have ever imagined on his own. The memory of the inn - all of it - comes rushing back to him in tandem, and that does not help how the heat in his chest refracts with the heat radiating off his cheeks - not one bit.
But Ginger wants to be closer. He wants to know him and his past - ugly a sight as Mika is - and he wants to declare him and Mika as a set to everything there is, and embarrassing as that is, as if the strongest sort of PDA (to the spirits?) there is, it... appeals to him, so wrapped up in the moment, so consumed by how terribly he loves Ginger. )
... Yeah.
( He reaches... and takes Ginger's hand gently, and he places it against his own cheek, mouthing the palm - his teeth running light along the palm, his lips working up along the underside of Ginger's fingers. )
... All of me is yours, from my past to my heart, and... I want... them to know that you're mine, too.
( Would that they could carve into the flesh of this world that he is Ginger's, and Ginger is his, and - to not let anything come between them. (Please, please, please.) )
... I'll tell you everything, so please... love me.
( He kisses his fingers, his lips lingering there, wet, in invitation. And the way he says it, he means make love to me, too. )
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no subject
It aches like a fresh wound; it hurts to deny himself, and to deny Yuu. Ginger's right. But he would split himself at the seams as if ripping flesh from bone if it kept Ginger from feeling this way, from twisting his expression so. Mika presses his face into Ginger's cheek, his hands falling, and one gently taking hold of Ginger's wrist so close to Mika's face. )
... How can I make this better?
( Ginger says these beautiful and kind and loving things about Yuu, about Mika, and Mika loves him for it, but Ginger disregards himself. All this boils down to is just - saying to leave Ginger be, but how can he? How can he when he's hurting?
If there's no cure, there must at least be treatment. There can't be nothing. He can't accept that. )
I would change... if you wanted. I would let you change me, without a thought. But you want to preserve this thing that I am. ( The worst thing he's done is gotten Ginger attached to him - now he's too sentimental to change him, even if it'd be for the better. ) So just...
( He falters, again, struggling; frustrated, that knowing - how Ginger feels, doesn't mean he knows how to address it. )
... How can I convince you... that I won't leave you? ( Not just that he doesn't want to trade him in for Yuu, but that he won't. ) How can I make it hurt less? Please.
( Take Ginger's hands gently from himself and hold them away, not able to stop how he feels about it, but help him hurt himself a little less. )
no subject
[ He shakes his head. How does he show Mika the enormity of what he means to Ginger; how much Ginger loves him, more and more with every moment? Cut open his chest and he’d bleed love for Mika. Dissect his dreams and his hopes and there would be a million and one shades of Mika there, reflected in every freckle of light.
He leans up or pulls Mika down - he’s not sure - he just knows he needs to kiss him, right now, sweetly - so sweetly. Peppered kisses that mean love you, love you, mine; love you, yours.
… Oh - but he’s also Mika’s. Oh. How he feels now about Mika making himself nothing to make Ginger something, he’s - doing the same.
He huffs a short sound, a wet laugh, against Mika’s lips. Angry at himself. ]
I’m sorry. I’m hurting you. You help, you make everything better. Ah, we’re a mess now, really.
[ He’s so dumb. They’re both so - he’s happy they’re like this, fumbling in the same ways, stumbling in the same direction and thinking they’re lost from each other; he’s happy they’re alike. Look at them, how anxious and panicked they are to make the other feel better - when they’re both chosen each other in so many ways. Stupid, silly pair. He… likes that. He likes them.
The bad things, the bad thoughts - they don’t go away, but they quiet down. They’re not as loud. Mika says please and even those thoughts know they should listen. ]
And thank you for saying all that even when it hurt you, too… If you change, I want to change, too. To be… better for you. Maybe that means I should… learn to like myself a little because it hurts you when I don’t. But if we change together, in tandem, I could do it.
It doesn’t… it doesn’t have to be now, does it? We’re still learning each other.
[ He has doubts if that’s possible because he can never help these thoughts, but he thinks of how he’d be willing to do anything for Mika - and he thinks yeah, this, too. He doesn’t want to be the one to hurt Mika, and he is, he just did - so much, he’s sorry. He’ll change. ]
no subject
Ah, right; hadn't he hurt Ginger in this same way, some weeks back? When he'd offered to let Ginger set him down? And Mika had done it again; and Ginger has done the same, here, to him. It's so easy to forget they'd met in the manner one meets the eyes of their reflection in the mirror when he spends so much of his time fixing Ginger up on a pedestal, hoping to set him closer to the sun, shower him in attention and affection like he deserves.
He wants to protest - you could never hurt me; nothing you could ever do to me would ever be hurt. And this much is plain on his face. And Mika would mean it, in a way that would not always be good for him. But he, for once, holds his tongue, understanding that is not the right answer. At least, not right now.
Maybe listening is, for once. They're both so bad at hearing each other sometimes, instead of hearing the anxious voice in their heads. )
... I've never...
( ... learned, how to like himself, he wants to say. This is not untrue. But - there was a time, right? A brief time, when he was young and with the orphanage, that he was happy, and he thinks he only hated himself a little bit. Still saw himself without worth; still feared he'd be scrapped and abandoned, but. A time where he thinks that maybe one day, he could have... become better.
(In an ideal world, where their orphanage was truly an orphanage, and not a testing ground.)
(But he believed he could be better, one day. And that belief he had then is more than he has now. And doesn't Ginger make him at least just as happy as he was then? All that warmth spread across every orphan, delivered from Ginger alone. No wonder his love felt so sweltering.)
...
He kisses him - presses his lips in against Ginger's frustrated own, and only barely parts. )
... We have forever to figure it out. Right? ( Forever, five minutes at a time. ) ... I do want you to... like yourself too. But, until you can... until we figure it all out— I'm... it's not a burden for me to like you for you. However we change... I'd be happy with however we turn out, so long as it's together.
( ...
And then he falls quiet for a moment, and he pulls himself back - just a little bit. Gazing at Ginger, and hesitating - the words caught at the back of his throat, until, finally, he thinks maybe this is right: )
... When you figure out how to propose... ( Not for marriage— what Ginger had meant the first time: for Mika to stay with him, forever. The thousands of do-overs, with no fixed end. ) ... Maybe we can make it a promise. If that's how we feel... If that's what feels right, for us... when you do.
( And he says this not because it's binding - but because it's selfish. And maybe - maybe - them trying to give up pieces of themselves to add to the other... isn't want they want.
Maybe they both want to hold fast and let go, and maybe they're wrong for trying to... deny it. Maybe, maybe, maybe. But he won't know until he asks Ginger, instead of deciding it all for himself. )
no subject
Forever, and whatever we end up as - we’ll be happy. I’m sure.
[ He hadn’t questioned it as a child until the other children poked where it hurt, for something he couldn’t change. But he hadn’t questioned - he hadn’t asked if something like him could make Rum happy, if he deserved to be by Rum’s side. Deserving wasn’t a question; he didn’t know it once.
If they can’t come to like themselves, they’ll at least have a better understanding of why - why they’re loved anyway, why it’s okay, why doubt lacks a physical form to compete with the warmth of each other. And maybe then, doubt can question things less because they’ll be used to warmth and a mutual love that’ll grow and grow until it overwhelms all else.
And…
Ginger thinks if he can’t like himself, he can like the way he makes Mika happy. The way he loves him, even if it is utterly selfish - but that encourages Mika to be a little selfish, too. And he… definitely… likes that. So: ]
Yes. Yes. Yes. [ He breathes it into the next kiss, his hunger for Mika reawakened on this one selfish idea. ]
Hey, Mika… Want to do something a little… naughty? [ He pushes up from the pillows, straightens his back. His eyes invite, implore Mika to watch him and only him. ] Let’s make love - right here - with the windows open, so the spirits can hear how much we love each other.
[ So the next time he casts a spell on Mika, there’s no chance it’ll slide away. ]
And then after - [ When he’s still in Mika, when they’ve come down somewhat from the high of pleasure; when it would be utterly silly for Mika to think Ginger could possibly look at him with anything but love for hearing all the bad bits - when they’re still one being - Can Mika glimpse these images? ] - share more of your past with me?
no subject
He feels his chest boil with the familiar sensation of Ginger's heat, his love, in the echo of his hungry answer, and this is a warmth that lingers in him, thrilled - how badly Ginger wants to be bound to him, because Mika wants this, too. So firmly interwoven - like thread - they can't be detangled again.
So please don't go back for Rum, or your friends, or your parents— (but, if you do, please take me with you, and please choose me, even then).
His gaze follows Ginger up, fixed longingly on him for even the few centimetres of distance between them. He doesn't expect - what he suggests next with such boyish excitement; it's something that draws a deep flush to his cheeks, the scandal of it more than what he'd have ever imagined on his own. The memory of the inn - all of it - comes rushing back to him in tandem, and that does not help how the heat in his chest refracts with the heat radiating off his cheeks - not one bit.
But Ginger wants to be closer. He wants to know him and his past - ugly a sight as Mika is - and he wants to declare him and Mika as a set to everything there is, and embarrassing as that is, as if the strongest sort of PDA (to the spirits?) there is, it... appeals to him, so wrapped up in the moment, so consumed by how terribly he loves Ginger. )
... Yeah.
( He reaches... and takes Ginger's hand gently, and he places it against his own cheek, mouthing the palm - his teeth running light along the palm, his lips working up along the underside of Ginger's fingers. )
... All of me is yours, from my past to my heart, and... I want... them to know that you're mine, too.
( Would that they could carve into the flesh of this world that he is Ginger's, and Ginger is his, and - to not let anything come between them. (Please, please, please.) )
... I'll tell you everything, so please... love me.
( He kisses his fingers, his lips lingering there, wet, in invitation. And the way he says it, he means make love to me, too. )