Chapter 1
""Konan-"
tell me-
-Do I touch you the way he would touch you? Do I make you feel the way he made you feel?
Nagato can’t help but wonder, even now. Could she ever feel for him the same way she’d felt for Yahiko? Is he just a consolation prize, a distraction from the grief that threatens to swallow both of them whole?
Konan clings to him tightly, carving imprints of her fingernails into his skin. If he's a consolation prize, he must not be a bad one.
(the skin that used to be his dearest friend. And her lover.)
Did he ever see you like this? Did you ever moan like this for him?
(Of course not. They were too busy struggling to live another day, nevermind being intimate.)
Nagato can’t stay his guilt. This nagging feeling that he’s a thief. Stealing from a dead man.
(a dead boy.)
It’s ridiculous, he knows. Konan is a human being, and willingly taking each other to bed isn’t stealing from anyone. But the thought still eats away at him, like rats inside his skull.
Her skin is so soft. So warm. Her hair is like silk between his fingers, her smell like a faint but irresistible flower.
Burying his face in the crook of her neck, he dearly wishes he could stay like this forever.
On top of her. Inside her. Holding her close, listening to those intoxicating sounds she’s making, soaking up the warmth surrounding him, chasing away the cold-
How shameless. How decadent.
“Don’t stop-”
Konan mewls desperately, pressing their bodies together as though they could get any closer.
“More,” she pleads, grabbing fistfuls of his short ginger hair. “I need-”
Nagato doesn’t hear what it is she needs, far too eager to kiss her to wait for her to finish.
A tooth brushes against the piercing in her bottom lip, but that doesn’t slow them down.
Guilty, sure. But no amount of guilt could hope to mask how wonderful it feels.
Would Yahiko want this for them, he wonders? Would he be happy to know they’ve found solace in each other?
Or would he be hurt that they’d gone on like this without him?
What would you think of us now?
God, she’s so wet and hot inside, he feels like he might melt. He braces himself against the ebony headboard, gritting his teeth to stifle a groan.
(somehow, such a lewd sound feels like a betrayal)
Konan’s hands shake so badly as she reaches up to caress his face.
She never says his name. Nagato never has the nerve to ask her why, too fearful of the answer.
She’s crying again- like she always does after they've done this together.
What would he have done to comfort you? Tell me-
He’s always been terrible with words. So all he can do is hold her, and try not to let the melancholy swallow him up as well.
"...Konan-"
Tell me-
-Will I ever be good enough to stand in his place?