Down the Drain

I felt my shoulders being pushed into the mattress of a soft, queen-size bed and a warmth against my thighs; Kyo moved against me fluidly, breathing hard. We pulsated in unison before, finally, he sighed heavily and collapsed on top of me; my hands fell on his arms, slick with sweat. He waited a few minutes before drawing back, peeling off the rubber and discarding it in his bathroom trashcan.

I sat up and began to dress myself, pulling a slightly-too-loose shirt over my head and borrowing a pair of Kyos boxers due to the unclean state of my own. I heard the faucet running; I caught sight of him as he shrugged a tight, expensive shirt on.

The taste from what he had me doing earlier lingered. I joined him in the bathroom, grabbed his bottle of Listerine, swished, and spat. He rubbed his eyes and turned to me.

"It's getting late."

I turned to him incredulously, "It's nine o'clock!"

He looked away from me, wandering back to his room, "You should probably head home."

"Well, we..." I faltered and accidentally stumbled over the threshold as I followed him to his room. "We could just hang out, I don't really have to leave right now, do I?" Silence. Kyo always felt awkward after after sex. I cleared my throat; he failed to turn around. I decided to make small talk. "Is it ok if I borrow these?" I gestured to his boxers as I climbed into my pants; he nodded mutely.

Neither of us spoke for a while; I delighted in hearing the harsh pounding of rain on the smooth glass of his bay window. It had been raining the day we met as well.

When I had met him, we were in a movie theater. My friends brought him there to introduce us; he shook my hand, and at that moment I felt electricity running through our fingers. He had such a beautiful smile. It was the first thing I noticed about him.

I turned away from the window, and the weather. "Wanna watch a movie?"

He shook his head. "That's okay."

"Well we... Last Friday we didn't get a chance to see The Notebook, do you want to-"

He turned around and glared at me; how could those eyes be so frightening? "I do't want to watch that!"

Yes, I had brought that movie over three days beforehand...It was Valentine's Day. He didn't want to watch it, but he let me suck him off. Before I left, I had tried to sneak chocolate into his hand, and he had hit me shouting "We are NOT in a relationship!"

And we most certainly weren't. He would call me when he was horny, but never just to say hi. He would touch my hand because he wanted it down his pants, but never because he felt butterflies in his stomach. As much as I wanted to deny it, I knew that I was his
toy; I could not say no to him, to anything he said. It was a one-sided relationship. He wouldn't admit he liked guys.

"I'll see you in school tomorrow," he said, clearly asking me to leave; my attention snapped away from the floor as I looked at him.

He was not smiling, his tone was not friendly. I broke eye contact and replied okay as I moved out of his door, into the wide upstairs hallway.

He was courteous enough to walk me to the top of the stairs at least; I felt a wave of heat push through my lungs as we accidentally made eye contact again. "So, um, I'll...see you later. I'll call you," I added hastily.

"That's okay, I'll call you." He blinked and then replied.

"Okay," I looked at him, "Bye."

A moment of silence passed between us; I stepped down one step on the staircase, then turned around. On a whim, I decided that I wanted to give him a goodbye kiss. His lips were always so soft; I wanted to taste them with my clothes on- to have a heart pounding, sweet kiss like in stupid Hollywood movies.

I touched his little finger, and brought our faces together; I could feel his breath on my lips, when suddenly my shoulders were thrown back. He had pushed me away. I hovered for a moment in the air, like a leaf from an autumn tree.

~I didn't just want sex~

Then my back collided with the hard treads of his stairs and I began my descent.

~I wanted a two hour phone conversation with you~

I writhed in pain as I landed with my full weight on my arm, crushing it; I felt the bone give way and snap.

~I wanted to hold your hand...And watch the stars with you~

I could hear the sound of my fragile body crashing against the stairs like a percussion ensemble. The end of the stairs neared; my head pitched forward.

~I wanted to love you~

The crown of my head crashed onto the oak floor at the bottom of his grand staircase; my neck arched horribly, sending my chin, then my nose, to greet my chest. And before I could even feel the pain my neck snapped cleanly, and my body lay atop my face; my arms and legs twitched involuntarily for a few seconds, and then my body died.

I suddenly found myself inside some kind of a tight passageway; pressing against the sides, I found they were elastic. I moved my nails against it, and it parted easily; I stretched the hole wide and climbed out, realizing that I had just escaped from my body
through my back.

I stood quietly, elegantly, and looked to the top of the stairs; Kyo was growing pale. His eyes were moving from the contorted body lying at the foot of his stairway to the splashes of blood spotting his staircase and his walls. His hands shook as he touched his eyes.

A few moments later, he produced an expensive cell phone from his pocket and dialed three numbers. I didn't wait to hear his call; it was raining outside, and I wanted to take a walk.

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I didn't know how long I waited outside his house; all I know is that it never stopped raining. I watched mutely as a few men ran to collect my body, then as his parents came home and greeted him. I watched him depart from school a few times; looking inside, I
could see that he jumped over the stairwell whenever he went down those stairs. And when he was going up, he did so very slowly, holding the handrail as if it were a lifeline.

Kyo did not seem to see me. A few dozen times I felt like calling his name, but refrained. Finally, after seeing him enter his house for what seemed the thousandth time, I laid my head back against the glass of his door window and dozed.

I was awoken by distant voices; when I raised my head I realized that I had not left Kyo's doorstep. However, the weather was now sunny, and looking in I saw that Kyo had grown a bit. His hair was longer.

I stepped in through the glass window beside the door and quietly observed the changes in his home; the paint on the wall by the stairs was blue now, apparently the old green paint had been damaged while my blood was being scrubbed off.

Kyo was entertaining a few guests. They were happy, classy people laughing at a joke to which I didn't pay attention; a beam of sunlight reflected in Kyo's eyes as I passed him and rubbed my hands up his biceps and onto his shoulders. He didn't feel me when I kissed his cheek gently.

I moved away from him, then stood between two of his guests, passing smoothly through their business suits. Pointing squarely at the floor, I announced "There was a death in this house two years ago."

No one directly responded to what I had said, but their polite conversation halted; Kyo's frame shook slightly, and he said something indistinguishable, showing his guests to the door. I sat down on the bottom step, folding my hands quaintly and resting my chin upon them. Kyo locked the door, then chained it. He turned around and looked from the top of the stairs to the bottom.

He didn't see me. But when his eyes passed over me he cried out, uttering an anguished shout and shuddering so violently that he fell to the floor. I moved up the stairs, humming to myself as I half-danced my way away from him; a path of light streamed from
the window like water. I reveled in it.

I turned and passed his bathroom door, entering his room for once without tripping over his high threshold. He failed to take care of it the past few weeks, I could tell; there were clothes in wrinkled heaps on the floor rather than neatly in his closet, as I had
remembered them. His old digital camera lay on the floor, mysteriously smashed. The blinds were hung at an angle.

I walked into the larger part of the room, I saw his parents had bought him a new television. His DVD player was still on; I pressed the eject button and was shocked to see 'The Notebook' present itself out of its mouth.

I couldn't respond for a few seconds; then I felt anger. Unimaginable anger. How DARE he watch this with someone else, didn't he remember the boy who had died right in this house, who craved Kyo's love, but recieved only sex and occasional abuse? It made me sick. I couldn't bear it.

I heard Kyo breathing, so I turned around. He gripped the wall, eyes darting from side to side; finally, he slumped to the floor, and I began to crawl towards him. He inched backwards, looking through me, whimpering.

I approached him and touched his cheek with my fingers. He was backed up against a wall; as I pressed against him, he screamed. A terrified scream. I reveled in the attention as he put his hands in front of his face, his legs twitching slightly. He could feel me.

I brought our faces closer together and I whispered "Hi."

Kyo moved desperately to the right; he ran into the bathroom, threw the toilet seat up, and emptied his stomach into the bowl. He grabbed the Listerine from its new position on the floor, swished, and then spat into the shower; he pulled the handle to flush the
toilet.

He left the washroom. I had dropped 'The Notebook' on the floor beside the DVD player; he looked at it. Then he looked at me, directly at me.

I was about to speak when I realized one of his friends was directly behind me; I moved before he crashed into me. He was taller than me, with wider shoulders; I winced as he kissed Kyo's lips quickly, then asked "Are you okay? I heard you screaming."

Kyo moved away slightly. "How did you get in?"

"Sorry, I let myself in," the tall boy replied, moving black hair from his brow and dropping his hand to rest on Kyo's full rear end. "I wanted to surprise you."

"You-!" Kyo punched him, much to my surprise. "Just leave, I don't want you here today."

The tall boy said something in which it was distinguishable that he had called Kyo "baby". Kyo screamed again, clutching the sides of his head. "Get out! Get out!"

The tall boy gripped Kyo's wrists, pinning him down onto the floor's dark blue carpeting. Kyo stopped protesting as the other guy bit Kyo's jeans' zipper and pulled it down with his teeth.

I dazed again. I saw a sort of fast motion blur of Kyo and his new sex buddy's activities, then the older boy left and Kyo began to clean up his room; growing bored, I wandered to his futon and made myself comfortable. Kyo darted out of the room.

I sat silently; the afternoon sun gave way to darkness.Kyo must have opted to spend the night downstairs. After what must have been a few hours I crawled the feet to his DVD player and inserted the disk on the floor.

I had never seen this movie before. I never had the chance to. But still, after all this time, I wasn't paying attention.

I felt empty. I began to cry.

Kyo appeared in the doorway with a shotgun; I looked at him meekly, and he dropped his weapon. He wasn't even breathing.

He sat down on the futon next to me. Somehow I got the feeling he could see me...

His eyes followed the characters on the screen...He moved his arm and rested it around my shoulders. I let my head fall onto his chest, and he tangled his fingers in my two-toned hair.

Silence.

He began to shudder slightly; I whispered "Shh", but he couldn't hear me. This was the first time I had ever seen him cry. Why was he crying? Was it the movie?

I got up-I felt bitter. He had no right to watch this. He should have watched it with me when I was alive. I swung his closet door open and began to look for something to give him a sign, to haunt him, but when I looked back into his room, I saw he was no
longer on the futon. I heard his bathroom door close; there was a trail of clothes leading out of his room.

The water started running; I began to pace, rubbing my forehead. I found the remote control lying next to his coffee table and paused the movie. Finally my eyes settled on the shotgun, and I grasped it in one hand, and with the other, wrenched open the
bathroom door.

And there he was, under a stream of hot water, crying his eyes out; but it wasn't until I got a bit closer that I could see why. His arms were cut wide open.

I dropped the gun and sat down next to the tub. That-He-Wait..

There was blood running down the drain. This couldn't be happening.

Then he looked directly at me and he said "Haru."

Oh shit. You're dead. "You're dead."

"Yeah."

I was at a loss for words. "Why did you-"

He cut me off. "I'm so sorry."

"I forgive you" I lied, simply. I climbed into the tub; he kissed my lips gently.

"I like that movie" he admitted. "I watch it on Saturdays..."

We didn't speak for a while, and I saw Kyo free himself from his body eventually; he waited a moment, then tangled our fingers together and crushed his lips onto mine. The world stopped; his tongue entered my mouth and slid against mine, and he opened his eyes. He had such pretty eyes.

I remained there a moment, not letting go of his hand; then I began to climb out of the shower with him. Together we went to finish watching the movie.