Yami No Matsuei Fan Fiction ❯ The List ❯ The List Ch. 4 ( Chapter 4 )

Watari had already left, having set the computer to upload, when Tatsumi swung open the office door, stepping resolutely in. He was only momentarily disoriented.

Creeping into the lab with his partner's back turned to him, he attempted to quell a surge of mischief brought on by terror, mostly succeeding. Watari was just setting down a test tube in its rack, about to turn around, when he placed his hands firmly on the shorter man's shoulders.

"Tatsumi-san?" asked Watari after a pause, tense at the touch.

"Would you like to try an experiment?" he breathed, tickling the scientist's ear.

"A..whuh?"

He traced delicate lines down from Watari's shoulders over his coat to his hands. Tatsumi moved around to face his partner, keeping Watari's hands in his own.

"Watari…san…I apologize for my abrupt departure earlier."

"Okaaaaayy…"

"Actually, I would like to spend more time with you."

"Are you ill?"

"Is it still possible that you might be free this evening…"

"Where is Tatsumi?"

By this point Watari was backing toward a wall, Tatsumi forced to follow via the forgotten grip on the scientist's hand. It was not a promising situation, he noted. Boundaries had clearly been exceeded, and he should retreat before a friendship was irreparably compromised. Tatsumi stepped back from the wide-eyed scientist, turning around and fixing his tie to hide his embarrassment.

"Watari-san, I-"

"If you're going to hit on me, at least call me by my given name, Seiichirou." Watari sounded annoyed, but the secretary could see signs of nervousness in his eyes as he again faced his partner. A pause stretched the distance between them as Tatsumi weighed whether he should admit to what he had been doing or allow things to return to normal.

"Yutaka." Watari had closed the distance between them when a bubble of some noxious mixture in one test tube chose that moment to pop audibly, startling the two men in an already heightened atmosphere. Tatsumi blurted, "Do you have any interest in-"

"Yes." Watari cut him off, threw both arms close about his neck, and kissed him hard, quickly, shock from the sudden encounter registering in their faces as they pulled apart, the brief kiss awful but…maniacally exhilarating.

"I request a retesting."

"Your request is being processed." Tatsumi returned as he pulled the blonde into an embrace of arms and mouths.

"I was…"

Propriety tried feebly to reassert itself somewhat later, arguing that the basis of a relationship should not change from staff room chatter to assistance in removing one another's clothing in the space of an afternoon.

"Hmmmmm…."

"….thinking…."

THUD.

"…we should…"

"Mmph."

"…get to know each…you're not making this easier…."

CRASH.

"…other better…"

"…mmmhmmm…"

"…over dinner tonight…take it slow…"

As the table he was pressed against rocked abruptly enough for an Erlenmeyer flask-thankfully empty-to fall off and shatter, Watari looked up with blistering indistinctness into his partner's eyes.

"Your place or mine?" he asked in a low, rough voice.

"Yutaka, I hardly…" Tatsumi began raggedly, failing utterly to project a cool aura with hair in disarray, face flushed, shirt untucked and open.

"You're a terrible liar, and we've known each other twenty-seven years." Watari breathed against his mouth, eyes closed.

Tatsumi blinked once, trying to regain clarity against the events of the afternoon. What he found was the man in his arms, breathing erratically, eyes intently unfocused upon his. He drew arms tight around Watari, one at his waist, one at his shoulder pulling him close, and as he teleported them both, lips descending once more to his partner's, he uttered one word.

"Mine."