tags: suggestive content, friends with benefits?, mentions of sex, masturbation
wc: 800
♪ how bad do u want me by lady gaga
Kei is just about to take a bite of tuna when his mother asks him if he’s ever going to get married. It comes out of nowhere, and initially, he’s too shocked to dignify it with an answer. Instead he chews, swallows, then takes another bite.
When she asks a second time, he takes a sip of his tea. Maybe if he ignores her long enough, she’ll realize it’s a non-starter and give up.
“Have you ever even brought a girl home?” Akiteru chimes in. Kei shoots him a look.
“Shouldn’t you be worried about yourself? You’re five years older than me and you didn’t bring any girlfriend home with you for the weekend.”
Akiteru scoffs and rubs the back of his neck, eyes cast aside. “Hey, I go on dates sometimes. I do all right.”
Their mother steps in. “I’m just wondering if you’ve given it any thought. You’re turning 30 this year. I just want you to find a nice girl.” She’s pushing while pretending not to, a classic maternal strategy. Kei won’t let her get away with it.
“A nice girl,” he repeats sarcastically. “What does that even mean?”
In another lifetime, Kei might have said himself that he’d like a nice girl—sweet, smart, cute—but now that his family is on his back, he cringes.
“What about Yacchan? She was always so nice,” his mother muses.
Kei would be lying if he said he’s never considered it, which is why he says nothing. He spent so much time with Yachi back in high school, albeit mostly in groups. He definitely has a soft spot for her. She would have been a safe choice for a wife, but the years passed, and the vestiges of any crush he might have had on her were a distant memory.
“She’s just a friend,” he replies.
“What about work? Any cute girls there?” Akiteru prods.
Kei turns to his rice. He doesn’t mind most of the women he works with—he wouldn’t demean them by calling them ‘girls.’ Many of them are educated, cultured, some with an air of superiority, while others are as vapid as any other 20-something. One or two have caught his eye in passing, but getting involved with a coworker is messy. If it didn’t end in marriage, it was a territory war waiting to happen.
Setting down his chopsticks, Kei says, “If I ever meet someone worthy of bringing home, I will.” He wipes his mouth then carries his dishes to the kitchen. That’s the end of it.
But at night, he lies awake in bed, thinking. How else is he supposed to meet women? He isn’t downloading an app; he’s terrible at texting. He doesn’t like approaching people in bars, and he rarely goes to parties. And he isn’t about to let anybody set him up on a blind date, either. That left the remote possibility of meeting someone through a random encounter or mutual friends.
Or you.
A college friend of Yacchan’s from Tokyo, you’ve been around the fringes of his life for years. He knows you without really knowing you, though he’s been introduced multiple times by Tadashi, who keeps forgetting you’ve already met. On several occasions, you accompanied Yachi on visits home to Miyagi, where you’d end up out to dinner or drinks or karaoke with him and his oldest friends.
And then you’d end up in his bed.
Kei never asked you on a date. You aren’t dating. But any time you end up in town or he’s in Tokyo, he drifts to you. The long distance makes things tricky. It’s not worth the hassle, he’s always thought. You’re not a safe bet, not the kind of girl he ever thought he’d bring home to his mother.
But his body craves yours like a drug.
Heat tickles his stomach when he thinks about it. About you. Late nights, your dark bedroom, sweaty limbs tangled together while you pepper his neck with moans. The shade of lipstick that makes your lips look lightly bitten, the artificial shade an exact match for the natural flush of your mouth when he’s drunk on your kisses.
Kei is ashamed of how desperately he palms between his thighs, willing himself to cool down but hoping he dreams of you, your perfect body, your sarcastic, biting comments, especially the ones you fling at him after long stretches of time apart.
Would it be so bad, Kei thinks, to go to bed with you every night? To have you in his arms or riding on top of him, keening his name in passion?
You’re unpredictable, a flight risk. He doesn’t know you beyond the banter and the way your body satisfies every need of his own.
Why’s he still single? He’s been waiting for the right person, he always said.
But what if the right one is you? And how much is he willing to risk to find out?
