Adult-FanFiction.org : YuYu Hakusho

Stepfather
By : Artemick
Category: Yuyu Hakusho > Yaoi - Male/Male
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Disclaimer: I make no money. I own no YYH.
Chapter List
- 1
- 2
I knew my mother. I didn’t know this man and I didn’t know his child. I was polite and most of the mistake lies in that. His first mistake was commenting on my face. The second was the threat to my mother that he imposed.

“You’re not dating anyone?” Hatanaka asked at the table. “A handsome kid like you?”
I was not comfortable answering him.
After dinner he offered to help me wash the dishes. It was a human thing: sinking teeth into meaningless argument, blind to complication and cost. I must have been exhausted, or trusting, or playing to indulge in it.
“I don’t like any of the women that I’m around enough to become involved,” I said. “Especially considering the energy my studies take.”
“I can see this isn’t the ideal time for a relationship, but a man has needs.”
“A man has a body, and a mind to control it. No one has needs that require abusing human beings.”
“Some women don’t mind a little ruffling.”
“No one wants to be treated inconsiderately.” I wanted to remind Hatanaka that he was dating my mother.
“So buy her something to compensate. Take her to a movie.”
“It’s not a game I want to play now.”
I would have thought my tone made it clear that I was done talking about this.
“I could loan you the money.”
“Thank you, but I have a job as a lab assistant at school. I don’t need money.”
“Are you gay?”
“Refusing to pay for sex does not make one gay.”
“You said you didn’t like women.”
“Well, at 16, they’re – we’re all a bit warped. Desperate. It’s unappealing.”
“You think you're warped now? Wait till you get to be my age,” he said with a forced laugh.
I cleared my throat and told him, “If you have time to fuck someone, you have time to take care of them.”
“You think women want to hook a man into marriage before giving it up?"
I turned to him, a dish raised in my hand. He was too dull, however, to see the insults he’d just raised towards my mother. “I did not say women weren’t trustworthy. But finding someone to trust is a long road. Distracting yourself with bodies is an inefficient and ridiculous pastime.”
“Most men have someone on the side, at least.”
I felt like I was having another conversation entirely. “I would never mock myself or another person by pretending that they were important to me if they were only a sideline pursuit.”
“Are you in love? You’re acting like your girl’s watching you, raising her skirt an inch for each whipped answer.”
“I’m not in love, no.” I smirked, collared my anger into passive amusement. “Are you?”
“Strange son I’ve gained.”
I put the dish down and fished a glass out of the foamy water, tugging my sleeve tight over my elbow to keep my rolled cuff dry. “I'm no one's first choice.”
He watched my hands intently for a moment, finding something to observe in my gestures.
I finished wiping the glass and turned to put it away, asking him, “Your Shuichi, he isn’t interested in women yet, is he?”
“I told him from a child on up that women were the true center of a man’s life.”
“Really?”
“Yes, finding love is the first goal of a man. Neither self nor wealth can come before.”
“But when you say love, you mean intercourse.”
“What is the first thing a man buys when he becomes wealthy?”
“A suit?”
“A prostitute.”
And what was my mother then, to him? I decided not to trust myself with the carving knife at this point and picked up the serving spoon to towel off. “Sexual relations should not be reduced to that.”
“It’s economics. There is more demand for sex than women are willing to provide.”
“There is a greater lack of educated male lovers.” If not logic, go for shock. “Men expect far more diligent treatment than they offer. They buy into a cocktail of lies cooked up by pornography organizations. They have little experience befriending women and less pleasing one.” I tossed the spoon into the drawer with a clang. “It’s no wonder there is such despair among woman.”
“What do you know, when you’ve never even brought a woman to bed?”
“I’ve lived with a single, dating woman for the last decade. We’re on quite good terms, so I suppose I’ve heard enough about it to write an encyclopedia of commitment issues and delusions.”
He slid his hand along mine in the murky water. “Good terms, huh?”
I jerked my hands out.
He did not take his eyes off the soapy water. "Hit something?"
I decided after a moment that his strange touch was an accident. I could feel where his skin slipped along mine, the aftershock. But it was an accident; he didn’t seem to even notice.
“What’s going in this dating encyclopedia then, since you’re the expert?”
“In love, one should put the other’s interests before one’s own.”
“Huh, Confucius.” He pulled the carving knife out, slapped the damp rag over it and pricked the tip with his thumb. “Could be sharper.”
I curbed a sigh, longing to add: So could you.

The day after he touched my hand while we washed dishes, I slumped against the wall at school, tapping the day’s newspaper along concrete bricks as I waited for Maya.
“Hey!” She gave me a light slap on the small of my back. “You’re late.”
I answered honestly, “I got lost.”
“Walking to the bus? It’s like thirty yards from your front door.”
“Lost or distracted. I just looked up and it was already 8:30.” I folded the paper and turned to hand it to her. “Did you see this yet?”
She had asked for an eye-catching article to bring to class, and she whistled. It was a story about a basketball star refusing to eat shark fin soup in response to overharvesting. There was a graphic of the live body of a shark, holes where its tail and fins were cut just gory lines, being dumped thrashing and bleeding back into a boat’s salt wake.
“That’s fucked up enough. Thanks though; this suits me perfectly. You Chinese always come through.”
“I’m not Chinese.”
“Past life,” She joked, scanning the photo. “You know too much about China."
“I know too much about tsuga canadensis and you don’t accuse me of being a beetle.”
“You even wrote the citation for me!” She cooed. “Thanks. Are you coming to my game? It’ll only be an hour and we could use a pretty cheerleader. We’re playing Merino High. Ultimate rival.”
“I’ve got peer reviews to correct.” I shoved off the wall into the thinning flow of students.
She called after me. “Will you take me out for an ice cream if we lose and I’m devastated?’
“No thanks. I hate to see girls cry.”
“Just the lift I need,” she muttered. She turned off towards the gym.
I called back, “I will if you win.”
“Okay!” She shouted back, spinning see me step briefly out of the crowd to smile, my palm open in a wave.
I shut my eyes and saw her thin uniform flapping, stretching over her athletic body. It was like a blind man’s hand reading a face – one bathed in a wild grin. Maya was a child by comparison to me, but I was adaptable. We would be fine lovers if she were interested.
And they say kids don’t listen to their parents.

She held an icepack with her right hand to press to her forehead, which excused her from the humiliation of shaking hands with the leaping winners.
At least baseball has a decent massacre rule to keep an awful game short.
“What a battle,” I said. She’d been fouled during up a lay up, charged into, and had fallen badly. Faces bleed the worst.
“I kind of hoped to show off.”
“It was interesting.”
“The nurse said the cut was shallow and common. I was hoping for pensive and unique.”
“I assure you, the blood made it quite a spectacle.”
“I didn’t feel it; I just saw the weird looks.”
“You're a mess.”
She turned over the icepack. “Guess you can go home now. I didn’t hold up my end of the deal.”
I shouldered her gym bag. “I make exceptions for particularly stunning injuries.”

In the Rei Kai, Botan was slamming her hands down on Koenma’s desk. “Wake up! You know nap time is over at four. We have an emergency.”
The prince snorted, jerking up. “I was resting my eyes!”
“Rest them on this,” she dropped an energy grid readout before him.
Koenma moaned and picked the corners of his eyes. “Botan. I hire people like you so that I don’t have to interpret graphs like that after naptime.”
“Well, you’ve seen that signature before.”
“This is the rift we were monitoring?”
Botan tapped her finger on the data. “Look at the coordinates.”
“Um…longtitude 36, and…130s…is Japan?”
Botan groaned and snapped, “Sir, it’s the Minamino's house.”

I put my hair up while Maya showered. When she came out, she gave me a skeptical look. “Where's my classmate? You look silly.”
“I wanted to try a makeover as well. Since your facial reconstruction turned out so flattering.”
She had two cotton bandages taped to her head where she’d cut herself. “Yeah, I know, I have brothers: flattering because it hides my face.”
“Because it gives you a blind spot, so I can offer you an arm.” I put my arm out, movie style, but with my hand upturned and open. She actually needed the help. “Bandages don’t make great contact lenses.”
Maya shook her head. “Thanks, but I can feel the clouds of rumor gathering.”
“Last week they said the Russian military plagiarized my research paper. I think the students are becoming immune to stories about me. Time for a new target.”
“Me?”
“You’re injured. That’s Darwin for you.”

“I’m not accusing him. Kurama’s under the normal surveillance he consented to. Nothing’s out of the ordinary – except a few really odd daydreaming fits when he’s out walking.”
“Foxes are unpredictable.” Koenma leaned on his arm, scowling in thought. “No. You think it’s connected to that rift?”
“Not likely…but this energy signature within his home is huge. And you recognize the disruption grain?”
He banged a hand on the table. “What in our relationship has ever indicated that I might be able to understand these squiggles and numbers?”
Botan lay a photograph down slowly, with great respect. “I just thought you might remember him.”
Koenma stared.
“Sir?”
“You think he’s behind this?”
“He might be checking up on the team. Setting some trap.”
“You think that signature is big enough to catch a fox? Even one that wasn’t Kurama?”
“It’s still a strange coincidence.”
“Pockets of random activity are springing up all over. Anomalies happen, Botan. If it doesn’t heal on its own, we’ll put the detective on it.”
Botan put her fist on her hip. “You think it’s unconnected?”
“The Makai gets attracted to its own kind, and barrier is already thin at that house because Kurama bent it when he escaped there. It’s bulging to meet him in a place he weakened.” Koenma shoved the photograph away. “And until you have concrete proof that he’s even alive, I don’t want to hear that name or see that photograph. Nothing, understand?”

The place was small, with red vinyl booths and tired old neon. A dead jukebox limped on three legs between the bathroom door and the ordering window. Posters of that blond woman in the white dress and the movie with the car race and the dance contest were held in plastic frames.
“Weird, eh?” Maya ordered for both of us. “Trust me. A cactus slide and a sweet corn with strawberries.”
“Maya…I like vanilla,” I pleaded.
“I’m not that kind of girl. Ha, get it?”
I pulled my hand off her suddenly. She didn't get it and I had to explain, “Cactus kind of girl. Get it? Prickly. Spines.”
“That was complex. Thanks for the road map.” She sat down. “Kenji keeps telling me to loosen up. Did you eavesdrop on him in class like I asked?”
“He didn’t admit to stealing your underwear. His friend talks about you as though you were a dartboard. He’s planning to get further when he invites you over to see a movie on Saturday.” I put my hand up.
“Yeah?”
“Editorial comment: you should be studying this weekend. We have an essay due Monday.”
“Thanks for your concern.” She turned away, screwing her face up. She crossed her arms and dug her nails into her skin.
The sever held out two cones. Maya took the pale green one, which had pretzel sticks coming out. I took the sweet corn, which actually had a sprinkle of shiny corn kernels and two strawberries stuck in like ears. “This is…bizarre.”
“Don’t look so forlorn, pretty-boy science.”
I picked off a kernal and put it on my napkin. “I’d rather eat raw rabbit.”
Maya took my wrist, leaned the cone over and slurped the corn off. “There. Now it’s safe.”
I groaned. “If I could see this under a microscope.”
"No worries. I'm gram-negative."
"That...doesn't mean clean. That's actually my concern."
“Focus, Einstein. Tell me stuff. For the exam.”
I sighed and shook my notebook out of my bag. Maya warned me about the cone dripping; I twisted my tongue around it. “Happy?”
“Very.”
“Let’s start with climate forcing, pervert.”
“Fifty percent extinction. Ocean rises. More frequent and increased storms.”
“You left out main anthropogenic causes and the Four Horsemen.”
“I’m a cone half full kind of girl.”

A few minutes later, I put my head down. “I don’t want to go home.”
“What’s happening at home?”
“My mother’s dating again. Hatanaka-san.”
“He should sell used cars.”
I lay out my thoughts carefully. “I don’t like seeing Mother married to such a child. But I’m not sure if there is any other human who is better. There must be. And he doesn’t like me. But it is against nature to raise a child that is not your own.”
“It isn’t your fault. Any parent would be glad to have you as a kid, trust me.”
"They're really not," I moaned, rubbing my temples.
"You're perfect! Come on."
“You too.”
“Shut up, liar. I got a head wound, not a lobotomy. Go on.”
“Mother allows him run of the house. He takes advantage of her; all he wants is reliable orgasm and she is not asking him to sacrifice hardly anything. Except to eat dinner as a family. And I’d rather not.”
“Eat?”
“No. I have to sit there and treat him civilly as he eats. He’s buying us food as though she’s a consort. I have no place in the relationship. I’m not his son and I’m nearly taller than he is. He doesn’t know what to make of me. I look like a half; he thinks she cheated on my father and said as much.”
“No way? Rude.”
“And to see them retire to the same room with him catching my eye like a frat brother. It’s an insult. To her and to me because I cannot protect her.”
“Oh, Kurama. What a bastard.”
“And he wants me to be like him, some sloppy seed-sower, a lecherous skirt-chasing wolf. A drunk. He gets too close. He’s always got his hand on my back or my arm.” I drummed my fingers on the table, silenced by fury. And the unspoken. Hatanaka disturbed me. “The way he acts towards me is not that of a father.”
She muttered, “That’s not unreasonable—what you’re thinking.”
“Hm?”
“I…you’re saying you hate him for a lot of little reasons, right?” She counted them off. “He urges you to be sexually impulsive and undiscerning, he indulges in taboo excess, and then he touches you. Is that what you’re saying?”
“What?”
“It’s just—if it were me, I’d be on the lookout. You’re reacting to real clues your subconscious picks up. There are psychos out there. Guys who would date a woman to be near her teenage daughter. Or maybe an extraordinarily attractive son. Someone who is everything he is not and perfect.” She crossed my arms and looked at her stomach.
It was an awkward thing to think, much less say out loud.
“I didn’t think you’d believe me if I said it like that, but yes.” I said. “I’m glad I’m not the only one who has that paranoia.”
“It’s not paranoia. I can’t believe you haven’t been kidnapped and sold with that distrust-my-instincts attitude.”
“Oh. That’s me. No instincts.”
“Mr. Rational.”
“Really, I usually have rather good instincts. I brought it up, didn’t I?”
“In a roundabout sort of way.”
“Well. I have one more complaint and then I’ll let you move on to problem solving.”
She groaned and rolled her head on the seat behind her. “I never knew what to do when my mom was dating. But vent.”
“Hatanaka ignores his own son except to compare him to me, so the boy has some kind of resentful adoration. And on top of it all, Hatanaka came home drunk last weekend and threw a glass at his boy’s door.”
“Did you call the cops?”
I scoffed, imagining standing at the door, lights flashing outside while Hatanaka glared from the corner. “He knows all the cops. I think they drink together.”
“Open a case file so that there’s documented precedent of abuse if it happens again.”
“It'd be really awkward at home.”
“Isn’t it already?”
“Of course not. He’s been an alcoholic a long time. He knows how to bargain and cheer his way back into dominance. He fools me, he really does. He's charming. Even with all I know and feel, he can walk into the kitchen the next morning, grinning and chatting and harmless, and the room just feels warmer.”
“That’s because your house is becoming a portal to hell on earth.”
“Matter of opinion. Sometimes it’s like having a father again. Not Father. But…like something one sees in other people’s houses. Like a Christmas advertisement that you know isn't true.”
“Call the cops next time. Alcoholics don’t improve; neither do child molesters.”
“I’m not a child.”
“Maybe not. But that’s the role you’re in, at home.”
I couldn’t say it, but I also wanted to tell her how I kept getting distracted at home. Like I was losing my mind. I would blank out for minutes. At first the fits were days apart, then only hours. I was worried. I thought I might have a brain tumor, but then I wondered it could be psychological, because it only happened in the house or nearby.
I hated being home.
“One last thing,” I said, finishing my weekly rant to her. “I think I’m narcoleptic.”
She snorted with laughter. “You fuck dead people?”
I shut my eyes, grinning. “No. I keep falling asleep.”
“Me too,” she gushed. “Every night, like clockwork.”
“I hate you.”
“Alright, enough. I’m listening.”
“I walked to my house from the bus, blinked, and was back at the stop. Except I think it was actually later.” I got very quiet, then shook it off with a laugh. “It sounds stupid out loud.”
“That is such a lame dream.”
“Dream,” I muttered, considering. “Maybe.”
“Yeah, dreaming your way through the exact memory home? Now if you were seeing the future, at least that’d be useful. You could see the test and bring me back some tips.”
I rubbed my hands and pressed the fingertips together. “Why would I do that?”
“To help me pass.”
“No. Why dream?”

Hatanaka’s car wasn’t in the driveway yet. I hitched my bag up on my shoulder and grinned. The front door was unlocked, so Mother was home. It’d be good to have some time to ourselves.
I took my shoes off in the dark foyer and called, “I’m back.” There was no smell of cooking, so I went to the kitchen to start some rice.
I was thinking of the recipe for kunachi when I came in.
A man’s guttural tone: “Hi, Ku-chan.”
He was there, standing behind Mother, who sat straight and unsmiling like an old portrait. But there was a knife, a knife, and it was on her neck, and on her neck there was a thin suggestion of red and a drizzle down her throat. I had the odd feeling it was only a bit of loose red thread. I wanted to pluck it away with my fingers.
Inside, I reached for power. I had none. I looked for a barrier, a shield, but there was nothing. It was just as if I had only ever been human, weak in this soul-sheath.
I put my hands up. “Hatanaka, what’s…” I had to breathe, to act, to think. “What’s going on?”
“What’s going on?”
The portrait was broken. He waved his arm and his body swung out, though the blade remained as if it were grown into her. She cringed and I stretched out my arms, pleading quietly.
“Hatanaka-san. Please let her go.”
“What’s the hurry? We’ve got all night, and you certainly took your time coming home.” He was drunk, he must be. His voice was heavy and loud in the small room as a dog’s bellow.
“I…I’m sorry, Hatanaka-san, otosan. I should have called you.” What did this maniac want? My God -- I made the most formal modern apology I knew, though it killed me to take my eyes off my mother.
There was silence.
I tried again. “Please forgive your wretched son. I’m not worthy to enter your house, my honored father. I apologize…” I stuttered, looking for words. “For my—my lateness, for my ingratitude, my inconsiderate actions. Please do not blame my mother for all the ways I have failed you.”
“Shut up, you treacherous whore.”
I turned my palms towards him again, silently. Adrenaline soaked my lungs in heat; my heart shook my ribs, bruising itself on the bones; my hands shook.
“You think you’re so fucking superior,” he drawled, yelled.
What was the man thinking?
I shook my head, flinching away when he continued, “You do, you do!” and I insisted, “But I’m not, I’m just afraid…I’m not, I’m worthless…”
“You are!”
“You’re right, sir.” I nodded, my voice hissing to pacify him. “You’re right.”
He was quiet for a moment, then pointed the knife at me and held Mother by the neck. “I don’t have the money for this dump anymore. I go out, looking for work. Every fucking day, nothing. Then my buddy sees you. He saw you and your ugly bitch, the one you told me you didn’t have…talking. About me. About calling the cops on ME.”
I shook my head, “No, that’s not what we said, we weren’t—“
“Don’t lie to me!” He screamed. “Your fancy lab job, your whore, buying her ice cream and lingere.”
“No,” I whispered--this was a nightmare. How had this gotten so bad, so fast? “Let me tell you the truth?”
Hatanaka was quiet, and I thanked God and kept going. “Maya is a classmate. I tutor her. I lost a bet – a bet on a basketball game, and that was what she wanted, ice cream. The job is nothing, it’s volunteering. I didn’t want to take your money, so I said—“
“What’s wrong with my money?”
“It belongs to you. You have so many expenses already, supporting your family, your wife, your son, and me. For me to ask is disrespectful. What needs do I have? You’ve already provided for my home, my school fees, my uniform and meals. We’d be on the street without you.”
“Why were you going to call the cops?”
“Your friend heard us wrong. We were only gossiping about a teacher, that’s all.”
“You’re calling the cops on your teacher?”
“No, no. It was only a joke. She said we should, but we were kidding.”
He pulled away from Mother. Stabbing the knife in the table, he lurched into the seat next to her. He said suddenly, with great tenderness, “Make your mother something to eat. She’s hungry and tired from working.”
“Shuichi doesn’t have to…” Mother gasped, putting her hand over her neck. “He has schoolwork. Go upstairs, Shuichi, please.”
If I could get out of the room, I could call the police. But if I left, he could kill her.
“Do it, boy.”
I dropped my bag and moved quickly. I took everything from the fridge at once, made a quick sauce, fried tofu together with broken vegetables while the rice was steaming up, and had it all together in less than a half hour. I kept forgetting to breathe.
He sat there in silence the whole time. Once, he ordered Mother to get him whiskey. She said we had none in the house. He had her get it from the back of the cabinet, where he’d hidden it. She put it in a glass with ice. He drank, dumped the ice, and refilled it.
“Mother wouldn’t mind getting you some sake,” I offered, bringing over two plates. He put his hand on the knife as I came and moved it to his lap. He was quick with it in his hand. The plates clicked so loudly on the table as I set them down that I flinched. “There is a store nearby.”
“This is enough.” He watched me closely.
I turned to Mother and put my hand on her shoulder. “Would you like water?”
“Yes, dear.” Our eyes met and she squeezed my hand. I tightened my fingers a moment longer than was natural; I didn’t care if he saw. Oh Mother, how to get out of all this -
“Sit down and eat.” He said.
I obeyed, making myself a small plate.
“Eat more.”
“Thank you, Father. This is plenty for me; it would be a waste.”
He let me say that; I had filled my voice with gratitude, respect. He ate nothing. I finished and when Mother put her fork down, I began to clear the plates.
“Leave them.”
“You didn’t like it?”
“No meat.”
“I—I’m sorry, we don’t usually eat—I could get you some.”
“At the store? Past the pay phone?” He watched me and turned to my mother. “You look tired. Go on to bed.”
She looked at me and I nodded. Had I planned all my life only to face loss of the one thing left I felt love for, in a dingy modern human kitchen, with my body weak and thin as a stalk of grass?
“Go, Mother.”
I would handle this.
I reached inside myself, for the billionth time in an hour, and felt how much power I did not have.
Mother went into the bedroom. There was no back door there and certainly no phone.
Hatanaka stood. He was following her.
How dare he think about laying hands on her! After what he’d done, how dare he try to take his emotion out on that precious woman--
“Hatanaka-san! Please, wait. I need your advice.” When he paused, I looked ashamed and rubbed my arms. “In private, please. It is about…what we spoke about. Before.”
“Tell me now.”
“No—you were completely right about what we spoke about the other night…I need to talk to another man.”
“Oh, that…” He pulled my mother to him and kissed her mouth. Her hands stayed in fists on her chest. “Go to bed, woman. I’ll deal with your son.”
He shut the door behind her and came towards me. I sat, because if I did not, I would have run away.
Hatanaka would be in many opinions an ideal Japanese man. He was tall, had thick hair, and wasn’t putting on too much weight for forty-some. Tonight, however, he was a wolf with twisted sinew, a broken machine with parts that hung wrong.
His hand smoothed heavily over my shoulders. I felt I could count the lines of his fingerprint through the thin fabric of my dress shirt. Then he moved his forearm to pin my chest to the chair, leaning forward until his jaw knocked against my ear, and the loose fingers in his other hand dragged along my neck.
“What do you need a man to talk about?”
I shut my eyes. I made the decision to do it. Disgust was not productive and would raise suspicion. “I told you women held little interest for me, you remember?” He murmured, yes. “My friend, she was talking about calling the police on my teacher because…you have to keep this a secret!” I turned my eyes to him. “Even from my mother. She would hate me.”
“I promise,” he said into my hair. “Pretty Kurama.”
The alcohol scent was so thick I felt dizzy simply inhaling. “You…promise that you won’t hate me? Please don’t be disappointed. It was an accident. I didn’t mean to.”
“Oh, I promise.” The promise of a turgid idiot.
“My jujitsu teacher asked that I come by a classroom after school to talk about joining his class. He…we were alone in the classroom. He locked the door behind us. He made me do things.” I paused, quickening my breath and grabbing his hand firmly, rubbing my fingers along his as I shivered.
“Kurama-kun…” he groaned.
I looked down, as if I would cry, or held fear of the imagined teacher. “I…I knew it was dirty, all of it was. But he was so happy. I was proud. And, and Hatanaka-san, don’t tell—but,” I chewed my lip red and licked it, then turned to look straight into his eyes. “I liked doing it. I ached afterwards, thinking of it.”
He did nothing for a moment. I froze; what if I was wrong? Then he grabbed my head and crammed our mouths to one another. Our teeth cracked together, pinching my lip. He licked the roof of my mouth; it tingled and I wished blindly, insanely, that I had had this first teenage kiss with Maya, or Shizuru, or anyone who was not him, not a whiskey tasting married man with a knife with my mother’s blood on it in his pocket. This was it. This was going to be my first, my first everything.
How miserable.
I was so stupid. Worthless, and an idiot, and now I was truly a treacherous whore, because I knew I was none of those, but what was I still doing? A stupid seduction to buy time.
He was telling me, “It’s good to do that for your teacher, for any man who asks, who wants to. It’s what you’re for. Tell me about those bad things you did. Did you do this? Did you kiss him with that lazy mouth?”
“He…he didn’t want to kiss.” I let him hear the honesty, and I touched my lips with big eyes. “That was…this is my first…”
“Don’t pretend.”
So he did not want a virgin colt, but a broken yearling. I imagined—then came another shock.
I could not reach directly into my kitsune memory. I could use my human memory of thinking of those fox lives, but I was cut off from that experience. Still, I’d thought about sex a great deal lately, so I found the memories I was looking for.
“I don’t think it should matter,” I insisted, ignoring the discontinuity, as if I were lost in thought. “I don’t feel bad. I don’t think that was wrong. It felt so good, him inside me,” I pressed my forehead to his knuckles as I was holding his hand. “Like it was meant to.”
“That’s how you get those grades.”
I was confused a moment; he said it in a strange blurred way. I realized that was his fantasy, one of them.
“How’d you know?” I asked.
He smoothed my hair with two hands. “You’re very obedient, but dear…you’re not nearly as smart as your teachers see to think, going on and on. You’ve just mesmerized them, like you have everyone. Pretty-faced Shuichi.”
I would change my name after this if it would kill the memory of his saying it.
Did I dare? I spoke again. “He…held my head like that. He liked to have his fingers in my hair, while…”
“While?”
I let my eyes fall to his groin.
He nodded. Then he bent me over and stood at the side of the chair. “Go ahead. Undo my belt.”
“Is that necessary?”
He laughed. That tickled him. “What a street tramp you are! Not even undoing a man’s belt. You just duck down and zzzp? How do you reach anything when you’ve really got to give that top-student performance?”
I did not answer.
“Well, come on. Don’t tell me you’re shy now? Little first-in-class. Or what—my meat isn’t good enough for you?”
“No, Hatanaka-san, that’s not why. I’m just thinking if…would you like to sit?”
He nodded. I moved to the floor and readied myself. Shuichi was so petite. I was worried. I undid his belt, resting my elbows on his thighs. It was good to look at one’s partner, but I couldn’t make myself.
It was simple enough. I used my fingers firmly and hummed when I could think of nothing else. It firmed quickly in my fists. He came soon, even in consideration of the drinking.
I spat the slippery shit out into my hand and wiped it on the floor. He saw nothing, dazed, except the hanging net of my hair. He patted the top of my head.
I hated every human male in that moment. Every false father especially—every uncaring patriarch that played at advising and sheltering the weak, the powerless.
“Stand up.”
He helped me up by the elbow. I stumbled and it took a moment to get my feet under me. I hadn’t been getting a great deal of oxygen the last few minutes.
“Lean over the table.”
I pressed hard on my sternum, trying to slow my panting. “Wait. Wait…”
He did.
I made a choice again. I could not fight; running put Mother in danger; and he would not be avoided. At least when I was obedient I could ask for small compromises like this. I turned. I put my elbows down on the table and rested my sweating forehead on my hands. “Please, let me rest a moment.”
Laughing, he stood, pulling on my waist. “Up. Arms straight.”
So he was so drunk, he thought he was good for another time?
His hands came around my hips and drew along the inside of my thighs. His body fell slowly along mine, ending with his voice at my ear, head over my shoulder. There was nothing but the sound of cloth and his chuckling for a minute as he wrestled with my belt. The leather was thin and the clasp fine; he tore at it once or twice, whipping my body around. It stuck. He undid the buttoned fly and massaged inside for a few moments, thinking. Finally he just grabbed the cloth of my trousers and wrenched them down. My legs almost collapsed, as the waistband scraped over my hips.
“Hot, Shu?”
I was human. Of course I was aroused. I was humiliated, nauseous, and near tears. But what had he asked? My stiff arms trembled as I coughed a word out. “Yes.”
“Good.” Moving away, he clapped a hand across my ass. “Don’t move a muscle, or I’ll kill you.”
He said it as a joke, like a compliment to my allure. My death was a joke now. Because he believed me, that I would have sex with him just from wanting, not out of fear or defense. I was a joke.
I heard ice hitting glass and cringed. Surely he wouldn’t? The skin of the back of my thighs prickled at the thought of being touched, stinging cold lines and inevitable pain and sensitivity. I was afraid of using ice in sex, in another life. No such privilege now, as fears.
Hatanaka was only pouring himself another drink. He thought twice and cut it with water. He came back and sat in the near chair, fingering my thigh under my shirt-tail.
I realized he was only waiting.
I began to flirt, canting my hips, smiling at him from under my arm. He smiled back over the rim, eyes hooded. “You’re like a girl, Kurama.”
I took that as permission to move and struck a few campy poses. He laughed in approval and I grinned and pulled my hands up daintily over my body, drawing them past my face and lifting my hair above my head. It fell messily and I made my eyes crinkle as I smiled. He slapped his leg for applause. I put my hands on the arms of the chair, leaning over; he could see clear down my open shirt, past nipples and navel to groin in lean black cotton.
He groaned and changed positions in the chair. “You’re passionate, you redheads…such sluts.”
I might have shown hurt in my face. He took my chin and made me kiss him. It was too wet, wet enough to make my gag from the slickness.
He licked my face, groaning. I held up a finger, pulling away. His saliva, scraped over my mouth and cheeks, chilled in the air. It was an awful, sour scent.
“Kur—“
“Wait, you’ll like it.”
Kneeling, I took his wingtip shoe up in my lap and untied the wormy black laces. I peeled the expensive socks off. Shutting my eyes, I used the points of my thumb to dig into the sole of his foot, patterning a loosening of energy through my pressure.
I wondered.
I realized this man was possessed. Whoever possessed him had the power to keep me from accessing mine, but no manifest physical power—not strength or violence—and had had to resort to manipulation and a simple knife.
Fear. Nightmare. How clever and close must he be to know what I was afraid of?
I pressed the sole of his foot against my chest, over my nipple. Arching my neck away, I helped him slide his toes over my throat. I meant it to look erotic. I ran my hand up his calf.
Maya. It was her. She knew me, she knew this fear.
No, that was ridiculous, and impossible. She'd had a small psychic gift when she was young, as some humans get, but she'd lost it completely. She was a friend, but typical, plain – more to the point, compassionate. Attracted to me, but not obsessive.
This thing was either reading my mind or had overheard my conversation with Maya, and it knew both my fears and that I’d begun to notice its influence. So it made its move immediately.
Which means the demon must know me enough to know the suspect how long it would take me to understand –

There was a single animal moment of warning. I looked up and saw the edge of the world around a black shape, eclipsing my vision. Panic. Blunt pain. My head snapped back from his kick and cracked into the table. I curled like a dog.
I could see him beyond my hair and forearms. I breathed, “Chichi? Why?”
The heel stamped down again; it was a different direction and landed on the shell of my ear and skull. Hair tore when he pulled away, and there was heat, a hot feeling that meant blood on cool skin.
“Otosan…stop!”
What was he saying? I shoved myself under the table with my feet.
“You will be alone,” it sounded like.
“Otosan, please…” Why was I still calling him that? I wanted to pretend so badly that it was true, rather than fight anyone powerful enough to seal my kitsune side.
Footsteps.
“Please don’t hurt me.”
“Kurama, there on the floor. Curled into his shoulders. Legs long and slender as reeds. Round ass. Little clean white socks like a human child. Stupid little quirks. And finally, broken.”
It knew me. The knife would be next.
Was there any point in staying, begging again? I could fight, but then I would have to win and…I wasn’t sure of this fight. It smelled…it smelled like 17 years ago. My blood. My end.
I threw myself out from the other side of the table, knocking the chairs over, and ran for the door.
“I knew you’d leave her!”
The demon wanted me, not her. I ran to the phone.
The police would be massacred or find nothing.
The humans would too slow to answer before he got here; I tried Kuwabara's number.
“You know who I am?”
I backed down the hall, listening to the ring. Hatanaka's form swung out of the kitchen, gracefully, hanging by hand on the door frame. He was outlined in the yellow light. I said to buy time, “Y-yes, of course, Father. Do you know me?”
“Daddy wants to know you a lot better, little boy.”
Oh, for the Goddess. What trite shit—Kuwabara’s message recorder came on and I screamed into it. “Pick UP!”
The man made a motion so lazy that I thought he had tripped, but a glint and I threw myself to the side; a serrated dinner knife, a gift to Mother on her wedding, snicked through the phone cord.
I let the phone fall out of my hands. “Please—I’m not good enough for you.” I was babbling, hoping he would tease me longer if I acted stupid. I made behind my back the sign I used to call Hiei if he was watching.
“You idiot.” He walked toward me.
A succubus. Something with power of conception? No. The narcolepsy. I had been crossing some boundary, that was when I was dreaming, losing consciousness for brief moments.
I begged. “Can we…use a bed at least? I have condoms in my room.”
“Ha! What were you doing with those, pretty boy?”
“Nothing.” I swallowed. “It’s just safe.”
He came close so that his chest touched the top of my head. I reached out and clasped his shirt lightly in supplication. My breath became a whine as he pet me.
“It is sweet to see such a clever little animal know its place.”
“Thank you. I do. Under you. I know my place.”
We went into the back of the house, away from the broken phone. I began to lay down, thinking to seduce him, and realized that if he was with me, I may already be lying down somewhere with some monster draining me.
Or was it real? I hoped this rape was an illusion.
“I thought…you were angry with me. I ran, I…was afraid.”
“I have to tie you down now. I can’t trust you to be good anymore.”
“No. Otosan, I will be.” I sniffed, crying. He didn’t notice; it was as though any facial cue was lost on him. The alcohol or worse.
“How can I be sure? We can’t have that again, you know.”
I pretended to think, buying time. “I could promise.”
His hands closed over my wrists, and my own belt was passed about them three times. “I have a better plan.”
I tensed my muscles to test my ability to fight. My body felt light, limber enough and uninjured, not even exhausted. I felt no memory of combat though, and when I imagined attacking him, I blanked on technique and training.
This spell was sapping me dry.
I complained, “It’s too tight, I hate that.” But he grinned and jerked it harshly. I was quiet.
Was he after me, or mother? I had assumed he was simply my stepfather possessed, and perhaps initially part of the attack had been simple sublimated desires of the man. But now, the demon was against me. Perhaps it wanted a bargain?
“I’m no threat now,” I said, genuine. “Not in any way. Let’s make the deal. Is that what you want?”
“You are prey.” He stroked my nipple through the shirt with his knuckle.
“Tell the truth. I know you’re not just Hatanaka. This has to do with Yoko.”
“Give me your hands.”
“No,” I said, but what could I do? He drew his fingertips inside my palms, pinching the fleshy pads of my thumbs. It caught me by surprise and I flinched, pulling in my legs, trying to lessen the arousal. He traced the patterns further.
I just screamed as loud as I could, “Hiei!”

For one moment, Hiei running toward me, reaching for me. But it was as though he’d broken out of hell to do it. Behind him fell all the fires of the world, and monsters, two monsters and their armies, one of ice and one of steel.
I threw my arms up, screaming, as he reached me. The fires tore through my skin. I burned away, flesh melting under his touch, weak, human.
He left me.

Hiei stopped dead in the deserted street.
Kuwabara caught up and saw the demon staring in to the air. The human looked down the neighborhood street. It looked so natural, a wealthy suburb, lit in intervals with pleasant fluorescents. “What happened, shorty? You hear a mosquito?”
Hiei looked forward. He reached his arm out slowly. “Moron. Can you see anything here?”
“I don’t see anything, and I can make out even your wimpy ki if I squint. So there’s nothing there. Look, Kurama sounded pissed; stop pulling your dick and let’s go.”
“He’s in danger. He just called out to me.”
“Then I’m not waiting! He could be injured.” Kuwabara pulled off his jacket, threw it down and started forward.
“Stop. There’s a barrier.”
Kuwabara windmilled his arms and tripped off the curb. “Huh?”
Hiei scoffed, rolling his eyes. “Not high enough.”
“What?”
"I'd kill myself too, if I were you, but that curb isn’t high enough.”
“Shut up! It’s still got a few inches on you.”
Hiei bristled and barked. “Just don’t move forward. If we pass that barrier, things change.”
“Things change? Is that why you stopped?”
Hiei looked like a cat, watching ghosts. “Yes. We could hurt him.”
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Stepfather	By : Artemick Category: Yuyu Hakusho > Yaoi - Male/Male Views: 7317 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 1
Disclaimer: I make no money. I own no YYH.

Stepfather