The air outside the arcade was cooler than I remembered—cool in that hushed, electric way that came only after laughter had faded and the scent of grease still clung to your sleeves. A siren wailed somewhere deep in the city's gut, but it didn't reach us. We were outside of time again. A pocket folded just for two.
Kiss-shot walked beside me. Still holding the bag, still flushed—but not from the game.
It wasn't competition that made her glow like that.
It was indulgence.
Her tongue brushed across her bottom lip like she could still taste me.
Maybe she could.
I didn't speak.
Didn't need to.
She was quieter now. Not passive. Not obedient. Just… brimming. Like if she exhaled too hard, she might spill over.
"So," I said eventually, casually, like I wasn't watching the way her eyes flicked toward the donut bag then away. "That's two encounters tonight."
"With them?" she asked.
I nodded.
"Strange," she murmured. "They feel like something that should only happen once."
"They're recurring," I said. "Like dreams you almost forget—but then keep having."
She tilted her head. "Like us?"
My grin was slow. "No. We're the dream someone else wakes up screaming from."
She laughed under her breath—soft, short.
And then fell silent again.
The blush hadn't faded.
It had settled.
Turned into warmth.
Turned into hunger.
She held the bag like it was shielding her from the memory of the bathroom stall, her lips still red from where I'd kissed her too hard. Her knees didn't tremble anymore. But every so often, I'd catch the slight hitch in her step—the residual echo of being bent just enough to break, and choosing not to resist.
I liked that echo.
I wasn't ready to let it fade.
"Hungry again?" I asked.
She blinked. "You mean for food?"
"Sure," I said. "Let's say that."
Her blush returned instantly.
And this time, she looked at me sideways—knowing, open, and just a little wicked.
"I could eat."
I stepped closer. Not enough to touch.
Just enough for her to feel it.
The weight.
The permission.
The promise.
"Then let's find something sweeter," I murmured. "Something we haven't ruined yet."
We walked. The night followed.
And far behind us, the arcade lights buzzed once more.
But none of them looked as alive as she did.
--------------------------
The streets thinned as we walked, not of people—there hadn't been many to begin with—but of sound. The kind of hush that came not from quiet, but from a city holding its breath. We weren't far from the river now. The air tasted different here. Sharper. Touched by rust and runoff and things better left unnamed.
Kiss-shot stayed close. Not clinging. Not needy.
Just tethered.
Her steps synced with mine in that unconscious rhythm that only ever happened after you'd seen someone undone—and still wanted to be near them after.
The bag of donuts swung slightly at her side. Her fingers curled tighter around it every time I glanced down.
I didn't tell her to let go.
I didn't have to.
She was holding onto something else entirely.
We passed under a flickering underpass where the only light came from vending machines that hummed like dying insects. Old posters peeled on the walls—flyers for shows that never happened, lost cats that were never found. The kind of forgotten ephemera the world produced when it didn't know what else to do with itself.
I stopped in front of a bench.
Not because it was clean.
Not because it was comfortable.
But because it was ours now.
I sat.
She followed.
And for a while, we just watched the ripple of the river catching distant neon. The kind of light that didn't come from the stars.
Eventually, she spoke.
"Why are we still out here?"
"Because it's better than pretending to be asleep."
Her mouth twitched.
Not a smile.
But close.
A few moments passed. Then, her voice again—soft, deliberate.
"They'll show up again."
I didn't need to ask who.
Kou and Nazuna. The twilight creatures. The ones who mirrored us just enough to make it uncomfortable.
"I know."
"They're drawn to us."
"Most people are," I said, shrugging.
She looked at me. Really looked. The kind of gaze that felt like fingertips inside your ribcage.
"That's not what I meant."
I didn't respond.
Because she was right.
We attracted them. The nightwalkers. The half-dead. The in-betweeners. Those too broken for the daylight but too curious to stay buried.
Nazuna with her playful cruelty and curious tilt of the head.
Kou with his quiet aching need to matter.
They would find us again.
But they wouldn't win.
Kiss-shot pulled the bag into her lap and opened it. The scent of sugar and oil filled the air again, clinging thick to the breath between us.
She pulled out a donut—plain, glazed. Took a bite.
And then, slowly, deliberately, she turned to me and offered the next one.
Not like she was sharing.
Like she was feeding something.
Her fingers brushed my mouth as I leaned in. Her eyes didn't break contact.
"You're not going to make me lick your fingers again?" I murmured.
A pause.
Then, calmly—without any theatrics—she sucked the sugar from her own thumb.
Just once.
Just long enough to remember what we'd done in the bathroom.
Then: "No," she said softly. "Next time, I want your fingers deeper."
The donut between us sagged slightly in her grip.
I took it.
Bit down.
Swallowed.
The taste didn't matter.
Her voice still lingered in my mouth.
And somewhere in the night, something shifted.
Not fate.
Not threat.
Just inevitability.
Because the night wasn't done with us.
And neither were they.
--------------
From across the river, the arcade's neon still bled into the sky—dimmed by distance, but alive. The kind of light that didn't invite. It dared.
She licked the sugar from her lips absently, as if still tasting the afterimage of something that had never truly left her tongue.
I rose without a word. She followed.
We moved like something rehearsed.
Not out of routine.
Out of certainty.
The streets tilted again toward that undercurrent of static—something familiar woven into the dark. Not danger. Not comfort. Just presence.
And sure enough—
I saw them before she did.
Two shadows silhouetted by the sick glow of an old crane game machine, half-broken, eternally cycling. One slouched like boredom had grown roots in his bones. The other perched atop a bench like gravity had given up on her.
Kou.
Nazuna.
Still here.
Still watching.
Still pulled by the thread we never asked them to hold.
Nazuna noticed us first. She grinned. The kind of grin people wear before saying something sharp on purpose.
"Well, well," she drawled. "You two look like you've been up to absolutely nothing innocent."
Kou's eyes tracked us, quiet. Measuring. That same too-old awareness still hiding in the crease of his mouth.
"You were right," he said simply. "They'd show up again."
Nazuna rolled her shoulders, cracked her neck with a soft pop. "Figures. You can always tell when the air gets heavier."
I stepped closer. Not hostile. Just deliberate.
"You following us?" I asked.
Nazuna tilted her head, mock offense. "Stalking's such a harsh word."
"Wasn't a no."
Kiss-shot said nothing. Her gaze flicked to Kou, then to Nazuna. She didn't bare teeth. Didn't posture.
But she shifted closer to me. Barely.
Enough.
Nazuna's eyes caught the motion.
And her grin deepened.
"Protective, huh?" she mused. "I like that. I mean, if I'd just gotten thoroughly—"
"Don't," Kou said flatly, cutting her off.
Nazuna pouted, but didn't press.
Instead, she leaned over and tapped the side of the crane machine.
"You play?" she asked me.
"No."
She smirked. "Bet she does."
Kiss-shot didn't answer.
She just stepped forward, eyes glinting under the arcade lights, and picked up a token from the tray. Slid it into the slot without ceremony. The machine buzzed to life. Its claw jerked with mechanical fatigue.
And then she reached for the joystick.
Her fingers were steady.
Her expression, clinical.
One move.
One drop.
A soft thunk.
She pulled the plush from the slot—some faded mascot with stitched fangs and uneven eyes.
Turned.
Walked back to me.
And held it out.
I took it.
She didn't blush this time.
But her hand lingered against mine a moment longer than necessary.
Nazuna whistled. "Okay. That's hot."
Kou sighed. "You think everything's hot."
"Not everything," she said, and gave Kiss-shot a look too long to be casual.
Kiss-shot ignored it. Or didn't need to respond.
Instead, she asked, "Why are you really here?"
Nazuna tilted her head. "Same reason as you, probably."
"And what reason is that?"
Nazuna's grin faded. Just slightly.
"To see what the night makes of us."
A beat.
Then Kiss-shot looked at me.
I didn't speak.
I didn't need to.
Because the answer was already written across the concrete between us, in the shadows, in the sugar dust still clinging to her lips.
Whatever the night made of us…
It had already begun.
-----
Nazuna rocked back on her heels, the lights of the claw machine casting her face in flickering red and green. She was still grinning—but it had softened. Lost its edge.
"Y'know," she said, nudging Kou with her shoulder, "we never did settle who could win in a proper game."
Kou looked at her, then at us. His eyes flicked to the plush in my hand. His brow furrowed just slightly—like he couldn't decide if it was a metaphor or a threat.
"Another round, then?" he asked. Not to Nazuna.
To me.
I tossed the plush into Kiss-shot's hands. She caught it without looking, fingers curling around it like it was something fragile.
"You want to lose again that badly?" I said.
Nazuna snorted. "Careful. That sounds like flirting."
Kiss-shot said nothing. But she stepped closer to me—just half a pace. She didn't lean. She didn't cling.
She simply stood there, watching them, the edge of her shoulder brushing mine.
Nazuna noticed. Of course she did.
She tilted her head. "How long have you two been like this?"
I raised an eyebrow. "Like what?"
Nazuna's eyes flicked between us—my still posture, Kiss-shot's subtle proximity, the silence curling in her throat like a ribbon waiting to be pulled.
"Like you've already decided how this ends."
Kou moved then. Slow, deliberate. He walked to one of the retro cabinets, slid in a coin, and hit start. The screen flared to life—Blazing Circuit. An old fighter, pixelated and twitchy, with soundtrack glitches no one ever patched.
He didn't say a word.
Just nodded once at me.
A challenge.
Kiss-shot brushed past me, placed the plush gently on a nearby bench, and stepped to the side of the cabinet.
I moved forward. Took the second player slot.
Nazuna circled behind Kiss-shot, lounging against the machine like a cat with nowhere better to be.
The countdown ticked down.
3… 2… 1…
We played.
Not to win.
Not really.
Kou was fast—methodical. The kind of player who memorized frame data, edge spacing, the psychology of fake-outs.
I was worse.
But I didn't care.
Because I wasn't playing him.
I was watching Kiss-shot.
She stood just behind me, close enough that her breath tickled my neck when she leaned in to watch. Close enough that I felt the heat rising off her skin. Her hand brushed the back of my arm once—barely a touch. A pressure. Like she was reminding herself I was real.
And when my character lost—KO'd in a final blaze of pixels—she made a small sound.
Not disappointment.
Something else.
Satisfaction.
Nazuna leaned in, eyes glinting. "So? What'd we learn?"
Kou wiped his hands on his jeans, looking at the cabinet. "Nothing new."
Nazuna looked at Kiss-shot. "And you?"
Kiss-shot looked at me.
Then she smiled.
It was small. Crooked. Private.
But it was real.
"I like watching him lose," she said.
Nazuna laughed.
Kou blinked.
And I—
—I let her have it.
Because control didn't mean never yielding.
It meant knowing exactly when to.
I picked up the plush, dropped it in her hands again.
"You win this one," I said.
She stared at it like it meant something more than it should've.
Maybe it did.
Maybe everything did.
Nazuna stretched, cracking her back. "Alright, weirdos. We're bouncing. Find us if you ever want to play something less pixelated."
"And more illegal," Kou added under his breath.
I nodded once. Kiss-shot did not.
But her eyes followed them as they left, lingered until the arcade doors swung shut behind them.
When she turned back to me, she didn't speak.
She didn't need to.
I held out my hand.
She took it.
No hesitation.
No blush this time.
But her fingers tightened just enough to say mine.
And I let them.
Because she was.
And the night still had hours left to burn.
--------------
We stepped back into the city like slipping between chapters—same night, new tone.
The air had cooled just slightly, that post-midnight chill that wrapped itself around your collarbones and whispered that morning was only pretending not to exist. Neon had dulled to embers. Streetlights blinked without urgency. The arcade's noise faded behind us like laughter you weren't invited to share.
Kiss-shot still held the plush in one hand, her other wrapped around mine. Not tight. Not desperate.
Just present.
The kind of touch that didn't ask to be acknowledged because it already was.
"You let him win," she said, after a block and a half of silence.
"Did I?"
She glanced at me. Her lips twitched, just enough to betray amusement.
"I think you like losing," she murmured.
I stopped. Turned.
Tilted her chin up with two fingers.
"And what does that make you?" I asked. "The prize?"
She didn't blink. Her lashes dipped low, gold eyes gleaming in the dark like they hadn't fully cooled since the bathhouse.
"No," she whispered. "The consequence."
I laughed, low in my throat, and kissed her before she could turn that line into something more dangerous.
Not rough. Not demanding.
Just... possessive.
The kind of kiss that said you were right, but that doesn't mean you get to say it again.
When I pulled back, her lips were parted. She didn't smile.
But she didn't look away either.
"I'm hungry again," she said softly.
"For donuts?"
Her gaze dropped—pointedly—to my mouth.
Then back up.
"…Not exactly."
I exhaled slowly. Tension curled around the back of my neck, warm and electric.
She stepped in, leaned close, and whispered:
"There's a hotel down the street."
Of course there was.
Of course she knew.
I didn't answer right away.
Instead, I raised her hand to my mouth. Kissed her knuckles, slow, one at a time.
Let her feel the leash tighten.
Then loosen.
Then tighten again.
"Show me," I said.
And this time—
—she led.
-----------
It didn't need to be.
One of those anonymous buildings slotted between vending machines and a shuttered pachinko parlor, its sign humming in kanji half-eaten by age. No concierge. No questions. Just a machine with buttons for keys and rooms behind doors that didn't bother pretending they were anything but thresholds for appetite.
She didn't hesitate.
Neither did I.
Her fingers brushed the panel—room 203 lit red beneath her touch. A click. A quiet whirr. The slot coughed up a keycard. She handed it to me.
Not as a gesture.
As a transaction.
Like passing me the fuse before striking the match.
The elevator creaked on the way up, its walls plastered in old laminate and the kind of silence that begged not to be filled with words. She stood close—closer than necessary. Not leaning, not clinging. Just there. Warm and waiting. Still carrying the plush from the arcade in one hand like it hadn't been won, just claimed.
I watched her reflection in the smudged mirror. Her hair was dry now, tangled slightly from the city's wind. Her lips were parted, barely, and a faint flush still colored the tips of her ears. She noticed me watching. Of course she did.
But she didn't look away.
Room 203 accepted us like a confession—quiet, dim, and already too warm.
She stepped in first and let the plush fall to the bed. The door clicked shut behind me.
No lock turned.
It didn't have to.
Kiss-shot turned, slow. Her eyes swept over me like the room wasn't worth seeing unless I was standing in it.
And when I reached her, I didn't rush.
I traced her cheek with the back of my knuckles. Let the moment breathe. Let her feel how thin the air got when silence stopped meaning safety and started meaning surrender.
"You led me here," I said softly.
"Yes."
Her voice didn't waver.
But her pulse did.
I pressed a kiss to the corner of her mouth—chaste, almost.
A warning, not a promise.
Then lower, her jaw. Her throat.
"I remember," I murmured, "how your mouth looked in the donut shop."
A flicker behind her eyes.
And then, softly—blushing, breathless:
"So do I."
The bed creaked behind her as I guided her backward.
And the city outside pretended not to listen.
-----------------
The mattress sighed beneath her weight.
She didn't fall onto it—she let it receive her. As if lying down was a form of surrender she'd already rehearsed. Her eyes never left mine, even as her back met the sheets, even as her legs bent slightly—inviting without speaking.
The plush doll rolled to the side, forgotten.
I stood over her for a moment, just watching.
Her breath came slow now. Too slow to be accidental. The kind of slow that knew it was being observed. Her hands rested on the comforter—fingers curling and uncurling against the sheets like they didn't know whether to hold or to beg.
She didn't ask what came next.
She already knew.
I traced a finger up her calf. Just one. A line drawn from ankle to knee, patient and purposeful. Her breath caught. Subtle, but there.
Not resistance.
Anticipation.
I said nothing. Just climbed onto the bed after her, the way shadows climb walls at dusk—slow, silent, inescapable. My weight shifted the mattress and her body responded like it remembered what we'd done and hadn't stopped trembling since.
I hovered above her, one hand at her side, the other finding her cheek.
She leaned into it. Not dramatically.
Just enough.
Enough to say, this is where I belong now.
Her lips parted—but not for words. Not this time. Just breath, caught between intention and memory.
I brought my thumb to her mouth.
Not to wipe anything away.
Just to feel it again.
She didn't flinch.
Didn't hesitate.
She looked at me—blushing, not shy—and opened her mouth.
Took it in.
Slow.
Deliberate.
Her tongue grazed the pad of my thumb like she was tasting ownership, like the act of sucking it was some small reenactment of everything I'd done to her, everything she hadn't asked to want.
And when I pulled it back?
She followed. Just an inch. Just long enough to betray the heat still simmering beneath her breath.
I kissed her then—slow, consuming, with the kind of patience that promises nothing and implies everything.
And when she moaned?
The sound wasn't loud.
But it carried.
Through the thin hotel walls.
Through the silence of a city that pretended not to hear.
Outside, the vending machine blinked.
Inside, the bed finally stopped pretending to be furniture.
And started becoming a memory.
She didn't pull away when I kissed her again.
If anything, she rose into it—shoulders lifting from the bed like breath returning to a drowned cathedral. Her hands found my waist, fingers curling into the hem of my shirt as if she could will it away just by touching it.
Maybe she could.
I didn't help.
I let her fumble, slow, reverent. The way you might open a box that once held something sacred and now only holds something dangerous. When the cloth slipped over my head, her eyes followed it—not the way a girl watches a boy, but the way a penitent studies an altar.
She was still flushed.
Not from shame.
From remembering.
The warmth lingered along her cheekbones, across her collarbones, behind her ears—those soft, secret places where blood moved just fast enough to betray want. She knew I was watching. She didn't look away. Her chin tilted, defiant and obedient at once, like she couldn't decide whether she was a girl in heat or a goddess undone.
Maybe both.
I reached for her wrist, slow, careful, like I was reminding her that she was still mine to guide.
She let me.
Didn't just allow it—she welcomed it. The subtle shift of her shoulders told me as much. Her breath hitched again. That tiny, involuntary gasp that didn't know whether to become a whimper or a plea. I brushed my mouth against the pulse beneath her jaw and felt it thrum like something caged and reverent.
"You don't moan like that for anyone else," I murmured.
She nodded, small, dazed.
"You understand what it means when I touch you like this?"
Another nod.
But this time, a whisper followed.
"…Yours."
The way she said it—like the word tasted better than her own name—sent something cold and sweet down my spine. I traced my fingers along her throat, down to her chest, where her heartbeat betrayed the stillness of her voice.
Then—
A knock.
Sharp. Twice.
Not at our door.
Somewhere down the hall.
A burst of laughter, muffled and quick, like someone running away from their own prank. The city reasserting itself. The world trying to matter again.
But it didn't.
Not here.
Not in room 203.
She didn't flinch.
Didn't break the moment.
Just looked at me with those wide gold eyes, lips parted, breath hot. Her fingers trailed across my back like she wanted to memorize the shape of surrender from the outside in.
"Take me" she whispered.
My thumb brushed her lower lip again.
And when she leaned forward, tongue flicking out to meet it—
I didn't stop her.
The bed creaked again.
And outside?
The vending machine blinked once more.
Still pretending no one was listening.
--------------
The night didn't end.
It unraveled.
One breath at a time. One movement. One gasp. Over and over, like a ritual with no exit clause—just repetition until meaning dissolved and only instinct remained.
She took everything I gave her.
And asked for more.
Not with words. With the way her fingers gripped. The way her thighs tensed. The way she whispered my name like a confession she wanted punished.
And I gave it.
Again.
Again.
Until the hotel room forgot how clocks worked. Until the sheets stuck to skin. Until we weren't two bodies anymore, just one continuous ache strung between heartbeats and ruin.
Even vampires have limits.
We just take longer to find them.
At some point, the hum of the city faded. The vending machine outside blinked its last tired blink. The neon sign above the door stuttered and died. The walls stopped trying to matter.
And she collapsed against me—boneless, silent, breath warm on my chest.
Not broken.
Not afraid.
Just spent.
Her legs tangled with mine. Her arm draped over my ribs, fingers still twitching slightly like they hadn't finished holding me yet. Her hair spilled over my shoulder and collarbone, strands damp with sweat and something older.
I let her stay like that.
Let the weight of her press into me, full and claiming, like the only thing she trusted more than submission was gravity.
At some point—maybe minutes, maybe hours—her body stilled completely.
Sleep.
A rare thing for her. Rarer still when it was real.
I felt her shift once, just before she drifted off—nose nudging at my throat, a tiny exhale like a kitten curled against a thunderstorm.
And then—
Stillness.
Quiet.
Not silence.
Just the kind that meant nothing had to be said anymore.
I stared at the ceiling for a while, fingers ghosting along her spine. Not possessive. Just... aware. Of what she was. Of what she'd become under me. For me.
Eventually, my eyes fell closed too.
Not because I needed to rest.
But because, for once, there was nothing left to do but exist with her.
And when morning came—when that pale, dishonest light crept in through the warped blinds—she was still wrapped around me.
Naked.
Warm.
Mine.
She didn't pretend to be asleep.
But she didn't move either.
Her cheek rested over my heart, as if listening. Not for comfort. For confirmation.
And when I reached up and brushed the hair from her face, she blushed.
Faint.
Real.
Her eyes met mine.
Not proud. Not pleading.
Just soft.
Alive.
I didn't say anything.
I didn't have to.
Because this?
This was how gods slept when they forgot they were divine.
And how monsters stayed tame.
If only for a little while.