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Shikamaru tapped his fingers on his knees, eyes at half mast as he awaited Neji’s decision.
“Gai sensei signed us up for border control -”
“Mmmhmm.”
Neji looked so nice , right now. Eyes glowing in the lowlight of Shikamaru’s bedroom, broad shoulders concealed under white robes, hair cascading over the curve of his neck and into the space his hands folded over his crossed legs. He sat with his arms loosely folded in the cradle between his knees, and his lily eyes were settled on the shogi board passively, caught up in his own train of thought.
Neji let out a small huff, indignation emanating from every syllable. “We’re not even technically under his umbrella of authority anymore and yet he had the nerve to volunteer Lee, Ten, and myself? I don’t care how short handed we may be, there are more important things to attend to than making laps around the walls.”
Too bad Neji had been taking too long on his turn. Twenty seconds in and making no move was basically an admittance to defeat, that Shikamaru had gotten the best of him in yet another small-scale battle on the shogi board.
“Go easy on him for once,” Shikamaru shrugged, rolling his shoulders as he tried to watch Neji, tried to be patient as he assessed his defenses. He was not winning the battle with his patience, but he figured, since Neji wasn’t winning the battle with him , it might have been an even trade. “He probably has an itch to see you since you’ve been overscheduled with solos.”
“Yes, but borders ? I’m not a watchdog -”
“Watch it, I might tell a certain Inuzuka you said that.”
“I’d gladly tell him myself.”
“Mmmhmm. You gonna move, or?”
And, as if he realized he’d taken a whole forty-five seconds to talk, rather than play, Neji sighed. His shoulders slumped ever so slightly, bent in time with the way a less than thrilled expression came to match on his features. Shikamaru had no idea whether or not it was relaxation, or simple resignation, but, finally —
He reached out toward the middle of the board and moved his piece. “My mistake.”
Shikamaru’s parents were out for the night, and he was certain he’d be able to find some way to put that to good use that could cure some boredom, as well as stress. And sure, he felt like such a kid, banking on the excitement of having the house all to himself, but it was true. It meant having Neji over didn’t come with any weird pleasantries to be exchanged that still put Shikamaru on edge, no matter how embarrassing, or not, they were.
(Though they were mostly embarrassing.)
Shikamaru placed his piece down immediately, the click of the wood on wood loud in the chamber of his room. The lights were light enough to not strain the eye, but still dulled enough to cast half shadows across the hefty board, the floor that they both sat on.
“Troublesome... so distracted.”
It’s not his fault, nor was it a bad thing, that his parents liked Neji so much, but tonight, he’d rather it just be them. It had been weeks of missed opportunities, of rare kisses and lost time, torn between the role of duty and the role of family, where neither would yield enough to give the role of partners any daylight.
“I didn’t think it would be over a shogi match that I’d witness you lose your patience, Shikamaru. However, I am not distracted, I’m just —”
The only exception to it all: this evening.
“You’re losing focus, Neji.”
And god knows, that didn’t require parents . It required just them, with no one to barge in at inopportune moments, no one to ask Neji about his thoughts on dinner, and Neji —
Ah, so troublesome —
His thinly-veiled jabs and faux-irritation made up for a lack of so much more and, with that, he accidentally revealed himself and his own lack of focus. He sighed at his own stupid priorities before deciding that he simply didn’t care, choosing to act on them. Shikamaru leaned forward slowly, intentionally, kissing Neji from across the Shogi board with the most amount of grace he could manage, given the awkwardness of the board and the odd angle. He’d been holding it back for a respectable amount of time over the evening, and damn it if he wasn’t going to enjoy the time they got in the fullest way he could.
It was always searing, kissing Neji — a gentle fire he’d always let consume him.
And Neji often got the best of him, in ways that would have been embarrassing if it weren’t for the fact that it was Neji . Would have been, if not for the fact that Neji had done the same in the past, had lost his own cool, over simple intimacies. Would have been, if they weren’t the crack in each other’s defenses.
Neji didn’t seem to mind, either. His hair pooled into the space over the Shogi board as he pulled forward into their kiss, and Shikamaru hummed against his lips as he adjusted his hold on the board beneath him. He rolled his tongue against Neji’s, pulled a deep breath in through his nose, and pulled back with a racing heart and full lungs.
Neji’s eyes were closed, eyelashes soft on his cheeks, until a few seconds of patient waiting later. Half hooded eyes, cheeks flushed slightly — Neji laughed quietly. “What was that for?”
“I don’t know — do I need a reason?”
“Maybe not, but I thought you might have one. It appears that you seem to be the one who is losing focus.”
“What? Me, distracted? Impossible, Neji — I was simply just thinking of,” and he kissed him again, just for good measure. Just to hear him sigh, to see his shoulders drop just a bit more until he was comfortable — also, maybe, proving Neji’s point in the process.
Neji laughed again, leaning back into a comfortable sitting position once more while Shikamaru retreated to his spot. Neji quickly set down his piece, and Shikamaru played his piece quickly, already knowing how he was going to win and that it would be just six moves till a check-mate. Six moves into a lax game, with no serious intent to win on either side —
Clearly.
“As I was saying before you interrupted me, now Gai wants —”
“Fine, I’ll never do it again, since it bugs ya so much.”
“— did I say that? ”
“Didn’t have to.”
He blistered so easily. “You seem so intent on forgoing this conversation, Shikamaru.”
“It’s your move,” Shikamaru shrugged. Neji could pretend to be bothered until the early hours of morning, but Shikamaru knew better than to think he was truly upset. “Attempting to distract me with patrol stories isn’t going to work, either. Just so you know.”
“Shikamaru, I swear —”
He couldn’t help prodding him every once and a while.
“Swear what, that you’ll play the game? Promise?”
Neji rolled his eyes before moving his piece, saying nothing.
Shikamaru just smiled at him — warmth rising from his heart at the way Neji’s eyes veered off to the side in a mildly annoyed expression, only made funnier by the way he crossed his arms in front of him — the extent of the control and vulnerability given up in such few and subtle mannerisms of an otherwise controlled person was enough to make Shikamaru’s heart beat unevenly. Who else was privy to such actions?
No one.
Shikamaru looked at the scuffed, aged board, at its battlefield of equally scuffed and aged pieces, and decided to extend the six-move checkmate into a ten-move. They had time, after all. He placed a piece down, noting Neji’s slightly raised eyebrows at the move. Obviously, he shouldn’t have placed it there , not when his win was quite certain if he’d practiced a more offensive, strategic move elsewhere.
Neji put down another piece in silence, not a second spared between the two of them
“So, wanna tell me why I’m getting the silent treatment?”
“Well, you clearly aren’t interested in a conversation, so I decided to make this easier on both of us.”
Ah, the most dramatic person I know…
Shikamaru uncrossed his legs, just to recross them the other way. To look at Neji, try to pull his eyes from his side of the board. Sure, he was mildly annoyed —
“For kami’s sake, Shikamaru — put down your piece, and stop throwing the game. This could have been over by now if you hadn’t made such a questionable set of moves.”
“If you look at me first, maybe I’ll consider it.”
Shikamaru gratefully accepted the reluctant, annoyed gaze as it was brought up to meet his own. Lilac eyes, deliberate and pressed lips, and the ever-perfect posture of one who carries himself with dignity and pride; and he sat there comfortably, without the headband he rarely ever failed to wear, the green mark of his family’s burden bared fully.
Another thump in Shikamaru’s chest, rising like the heavy beat of rain on tent tarps, because —
It was months before Neji actually felt comfortable without his hitai-ate — the marks a sore spot of shame, of avoidance, of skittish eyes and vague answers that rarely amounted to true conversation besides that which would move the topic elsewhere. He’d rarely been without some form of concealment, and it was only recently that those barriers fell in the presence of even Shikamaru. Shikamaru appreciated the trust, but he knew better to keep his pride in Neji’s actions tucked deep under a listless smile and the silent promise to himself to never speak it out loud.
No need to prod tender things, right?
Shikamaru started out their game with a light feeling in his chest, anticipating more than just the game to play out. It happened more than a few times before it became apparent that it was just their pattern, their easy way of slotting together that made things like daily, mundane, or repetitious things feel impossible not to cherish forever. But it wasn’t just that that made Shikamaru do and say nothing when Neji finally looked up— and he did nothing but admire the person in front of him when they locked gazes.
Yes, he was beautiful, that much was apparent to anyone with eyes. It wasn’t that , even if his gaze traced the graceful lines of his neck, the dip of his collar bone, the strength of the shoulders and arms concealed within white robes. It was simply just him —
It was Neji .
Someone who made evenings pleasant in their own right, who understood the language he spoke and spoke it back with fluency he’d thought he’d never find. Someone who understood and put up with his teasing, his prodding, and did so back because to do so was to feel the other’s adoration without ever having to say it. He’d sit with him, a shogi board between them, as though they were at odds, and he’d put up with everything Shikamaru threw at him. Not because it wasn’t incessant or annoying, not because it didn’t get under his skin, but because he loved him. He —
“Shikamaru?”
The annoyance was gone now, and Shikamaru almost felt embarrassed at side-tracking himself. Of letting his thoughts override his intent, because now his intent shifted —
Shikamaru chuckled at himself, closing his eyes a mere moment, just enough to reset. He idly made a move, no longer concerned with game plans or making dozens of calculations. The game could be a draw or he could lose, for all he cared.
“Sometimes I tease too much, don’t I?”
Neji’s eyes widened. Softened, because the annoyance that was just there wasn’t really enough to stay put. It drained from his face as quickly as it came. “I — suppose? Is this you trying to apologize?”
Shikamaru rolled his eyes, only to focus them back on Neji’s — his intent truly had changed if the disarmed look on Neji’s delicate features showed him anything. “You’d tell me if it’s too much, right?”
Neji opened his mouth, but a second passed before any sounds came out. Maybe he was confused, maybe he wondered why the tone shifted, but he nodded even still. “Of course —”
“Good,” and Shikamaru left it at that, moving to kneel, using the large board between them as leverage with both hands. Neji shifted his gaze to follow Shikamaru, neither moving or yielding but clearly letting his confusion sink into his expression. And Shikamaru liked it, because how often do you get to surprise a genius?
He moved the pieces off the board in a lazy push, enough to clear the space for himself in the most haste-less way he could manage. He sat on the board the second later, propping his legs around Neji in the least committal frame he could possibly create around the others body. His heels propped up against the tatami mat of his bedroom floor, and his shadow obscured Neji as he sat comfortably in front of him, elevated just a few inches by the height of the board. The board wasn’t more than five inches thick, but it lent him that much leverage over the other.
Shikamaru smiled at the way Neji took a sharp breath in.
Shikamaru brought Neji’s jaw back into his hold with the loose hold of his hand, long fingers caressing him, tilting up just enough — rubbing his thumb over the curve of his ear while the other hand mirrored the same gesture.
“There’s a bed not six steps away, and you do this to our game?”
How often did one get to fluster a genius? Shikamaru smiled at the comment and thought he had the pleasure of being the only one to be able to do this.
“Our game was a bust.”
“That’s because you decided to make it that way — and if you’d given me —”
“I was clearly winning — I’d think you’d be happy we called it before you had to accept that fact.”
“That’s not the point —”
Shikamaru pressed his lips to Neji’s, swallowing down the contrived conversation. He knew what it was, after all. Neji liked to talk, liked to get competitive wherever he could - liked to shift the attention to avoid the fact that he wanted attention —
“How about we play a game,” Shikamaru insisted. He’d had this thought before, but it was never more than a thought. But now, with Neji beneath him — with his hitai-ate off and and his vulnerabilities tested to the farthest reaches they’d been since the start of their relationship…
Their lips were a breath apart, the thought, the appreciation, the trust — it quickly turned into more. Turned into memories of their first time together, of the way Neji grew alongside Shikamaru in their boldness and acceptance of each other —
Turned into noted memories of Neji’s aversion to his eyes — during the most intimate of moments. To the way honesty about himself turned into playful words, into banter, into cockiness and self assuredness, enough to flip their positions so that Neji could be there to supply the give for Shikamaru’s take —
Not that Shikamaru didn’t give, but when Neji was on his knees, eyes closed but byakugan in full use, it was easy for Shikamaru to see the barriers still left in Neji that didn’t quite go away, though their time together as partners was still, relatively, new .
Six months, seven, eight — it was still fresh, in some ways.
“We were playing a perfectly fine game, Nara —”
“Ooh, it’s been a while since I’ve heard my family name, Neji,” and he kissed him again. Loud in the silent and still air of his room, and Shikamaru was even more thankful for his empty house. “How about, instead of pretending to care about the way our match was panning out, we try something else?”
Neji never backed down, even if he’d lost his self-righteous air like he did at that moment, when he lifted his hands to Shikamaru’s, still curved to the shape of his face. He held Shikamaru’s gaze, but his words didn’t bite, didn’t come quickly, like they normally did. “Can you stop trying to be elusive and mysterious and just tell me what you’re planning?”
“Planning? Who says there’s a plan.”
There wasn’t one. Not really .
“You always have a plan.”
Neji was hard, acting like he wasn’t.
“Nah, not always. Sometimes I like to see what will happen, you know? Just let things run their own course. Play a different type of game.”
“Shikamaru…”
“Hmm?”
“I — don’t know what you’re trying to achieve, here…”
“You make it sound so clinical when all I want is to touch you.”
Neji finally looked down— as much as he could before Shikamaru’s hands reguided his attention back to him. “Hey,” he whispered, pressing his lips to Neji’s forehead. Neji gasped, and Shikamaru wondered how worked up he already was —
How much he was testing that stretch of trust between them, already at its limits...
Or, maybe it was more appropriate to wonder how uncertain he was — how he had a thousand thoughts and ideas and requests floating behind his painfully defiant and sealed lips —
How he always held back.
Neji closed his eyes, hands dropping to the top of Shikamaru’s thighs, bracketing them from the outside. “What.”
Shikamaru would have smirked, would have grinned, would have done something at the flat tone Neji used — the evasive type of intonation that sculpted his words into approximations of control, of denial.
“So, you wanna hear what I got in mind?”
Shikamaru pulled back a bit, taking in his flushed cheeks. Neji’s eyes opened to a slit, eying first him, then looking down to the tee-shirt pooling at the junction of Shikamaru’s thighs. Must have seen how much Shikamaru wanted him, must have seen the outline, as poorly veiled as it was, and he faltered for a minute before settling on, “ Yes. ”
Shikamaru kissed his forehead again, and Neji’s posture relaxed a bit more from it — reactive and trying so hard not to be. “So, hear me out first — listen to what I have to say, and then, if by the end of it —” He kissed his cheek, just above where his thumb caressed him. “— you don’t like it, we can just continue our game and move on. I can set the board up again, I remember how it all laid out before I decided to give you a fighting chance — we can grab some food, some sake, and we can spend the rest of the night annoying each other into poor tactical choices and move on. If that’s what you want,” he punctuated with another kiss, this time to Neji’s parted lips. “Sound good?”
Neji nodded, and violent butterflies whipped Shikamaru’s stomach into a hurricane, because it never got old, making the other so speechless. It was base, so instinctive, but Shikamaru didn’t care.
“What was that?” He insisted, eyes closed, knowing that he’d soon be pushing him, testing the boundary, that sense of vulnerability, hidden just a second too late behind fluttering lashes.
Neji swallowed, hands tightening around Shikamaru’s thighs. “Yes, Shikamaru.”
Shikamaru hummed, and gods , the way Neji said his name sent a jolt of heat traveling down his spine, pooling in his hips. He pressed their foreheads together for just a moment, rubbed his thumbs back and forth against Neji’s jaw in the most subtle of affirmations. “Good.”
Shikamaru let go of his hold on him, dropping his hands down his neck. Slowly, intentionally, lingering while he pressed his lips against his ear. “I really like how we work together, you know.”
Neji’s hands flexed. Shikamaru’s cheeks reddened a bit, but only a bit —and he was sort of embarrassed, but it was worth it to see the rise of heat in Neji. To know he was the one making such a controlled, proud person lose that thread of control that he clung to more than anything else.
Almost anything else, if the hold on Shikamaru’s legs meant anything — violently still.
“And yeah, it’s always good for me — but honestly? Getting you bothered, getting you off— it’s better than even me getting off. Now, I’m going off script here for a minute, so I know you’re not expecting to be playing this game, but, like I said: no plan.”
And he wasn’t lying, there really was no plan. Just his voice, just some inkling of a hunger he’d just realized he needed to feed, and his breath that came just a bit too fast. Shikamaru kissed his ear, rubbed his thumb across his collar bone, and Neji took a deep breath.
“It’s good when we’re fucking, but right now I just want my hand on you.”
And to emphasize his point, Shikamaru dropped his right hand, and let his lips find the tender, soft skin just beneath his ear. Neji let out the softest sigh, yet his hands remained where they were, grasping just on the right side of too tight.
Shikamaru’s hand was over the fabric covering Neji’s naval, feeling the tension pulling at the muscle underneath. “I want this —” a whisper, before another kiss, this time on his jaw. Neji was shaking, and nothing would ever feel as good as this moment. “So, here’s what you’re going to do — are you listening?”
Neji nodded when the silence demanded some sort of acknowledgement.
Shikamaru pulled back, and Neji didn’t look away when he pressed their foreheads together. One hand returned to the comfortable spot of Neji’s neck, the other tugged at the cinch of cloth that held together his shirt. It slid to the side, revealing his pale, strong chest, the dip of his naval. Eyes following his own hand, he finally arrived at the band of his pants waistline. “You’re gonna keep looking at me.”
His hand stilled, a question mark waiting for Neji’s approval.
“My movements stop when you stop.”
Neji’s eyes widened the smallest fraction, his hands flexed just a bit. “Shikamaru…”
Shikamaru hummed — waiting for him to say the word. Hoping he’d say the word.
“My hand stops when you stop, Neji —”
“All this set up, all this preamble, just so I’d look at you — ridiculous — ” And then he freed a hand so he could push Shikamaru’s down the last bit they needed before —
Ah .
He finally had his hand on him, and with little struggle and a hidden button, he pulled Neji free. He was so hard, heavy in Shikamaru’s hand and swollen to the point he knew was desperate. And Neji was staring — trying so hard to not close his eyes, eyelashes fluttering just enough to betray that fact..
“I don’t know, it doesn’t sound too ridiculous to me,” he looked down to Neji’s hand on his thighs, his digits trembling. “Not if it has you shaking like this.”
He put some real grip into his hold, enough to make Neji sharply inhale — to press up against his forehead. And Neji’s hands wandered, looking for the right place, the most comfortable place to be — reaching, finally, to pull Shikamaru into an embrace, to tuck his head against his neck and —
Shikamaru stopped. “Mmm, Neji …”
He squeezed his dick, just for emphasis. Like Neji wasn’t about to collapse into his shoulder, like he’d done a thousand times before so he could shutter a messy climax into a tight embrace. No, it wasn’t the time for that —
Gods, it was so selfish — to want to watch him fall apart. To want his trust, to be trusted to see him fall apart, to watch his honesty in the most pure, most unfiltered way he could ever imagine seeing it. Fleeting eyes, pent up with every emotion and feeling and unspoken desire he’d never claimed for himself.
Neji whined. He stopped what he was doing, stopped the path his hands took that wanted to be pulled in, and simply stayed put — keeping up with the challenge and desire in Shikamaru’s eyes with a determination barely offset by the pink in his cheeks.
It was too hot, too unbearably attractive and intimate for Shikamaru to think very far ahead, but he was still proud .
Still happy, seeing Neji try. Seeing Neji do this, not as a challenge like he might make it appear, but out of the same motivation that drove him to smile at the annoying, teasing things Shikamaru would say to him.
It was Neji giving him his trust, and it was still always a shock to know that he had it at all.
Shikamaru swallowed, feelings butting up against his throat, and started moving again. “Good, good —” A kiss to his lips, and the weight of Neji’s hand loosely clasped around his shoulders, one loosely grasping the biceps of his attentive arm, they tightened — and his nails dug in even though he was trying so hard not to, but when Shikamaru pulled his thumb across the underside of his dick —
“Hm mmn ,” Neji’s eyes fluttered shut, and then he whined when Shikamaru’s hand stilled.
It was such a slow pace, but something about it —
“I stop when you stop,” Shikamaru whispered into his lips, like Neji didn’t already know. Neji was tense, skin flushed like a hot day beneath the sun. Shikamaru rubbed his neck, swiping his thumb beneath his ear, waiting for Neji’s eyes to make their decision.
He’d said he didn’t have to do this, that he could hear Shikamaru’s idea and decide if he wanted it. If he’d be able to give up that little bit of control, to be that intimate — to let Shikamaru see the ways he messed with his insides in a way that was irreplaceably Shikamaru .
Selfish, selfish…
Neji laughed, breathless and anticipating and squeezed around the strong form of Shikamaru’s biceps once more. This time, with a resolve that was palpable, felt in the way his fingers didn’t feel like lock and key, but more like a door left half closed —
“Didn’t think you’d be playing games with me ,” Neji finally yielded, breath unpent as he let it escape in a huff. He didn’t sound particularly open, or unsatisfied — just a mess of arousal and confusion, all bottled up with the curiosity of whether or not Shikamaru was going to open that half-cracked door.
Shikamaru approached it, eyes steady, filled with desire and wanting anything Neji would give him. “I’d never play games with you.”
Neji opened his eyes — quick hand raising to caress the back of Shikamaru’s head, to pull him into a kiss made of soft lips and the feeling of shaking breath — “I thought you called this a game —”
The urgency in his hands, in his quaking breath and lips, defied all the ways he held his body’s reactions and needs under rigid control.
Like you need to deny it at all —
“Fine, let me rephrase — I’d never fuck with you, I just want to fuck you —”
Neji didn’t back down, didn’t break the tenuous hold Shikamaru’s eyes had on his own. Just inhaled sharply, because —
Shikamaru’s hand started working his flesh again, and it was like Neji had forgotten he had his hand wrapped around him at all because he looked so —
A soft sound escaped him, and his breathing was already shaken, already rattling.
Shikamaru smirked — Neji really did trust him, if he’d let him pull such shaky breaths from him like this. Really did trust he’d handle him well, even if he was so adamantly cemented behind the walls he built for himself.
Shikamaru was slow, too — how much could he draw this out? How on edge could he keep the other, turning him into unshaped clay beneath his hand, and with the simplest twist of the wrist?
He’d stopped entertaining the idea, because the possibilities were too easy to indulge if he let them.
Instead, he just looked down between them, not to break eye contact, but to watch his hand work the hefty, aching mess of a dick that he was nowhere close to alleviating —
He slowed down too, a sharp smirk and sharper look in his eye returning to Neji after he made the adjustment.
Neji’s eyes fluttered close. “G-gods…”
Shikamaru rolled his thumb under the head, spreading the wet heat across the slit with the utmost care. “Neji… eyes up here.”
“You first.”
Touche .
A twitch in his hand just a second later, and Neji listened. His chest heaved, his cheeks the shade of rose, and his wide, moon-colored eyes shifted back and forth, unsteady and beautiful and nearly too much for Shikamaru to bear. Too easy to sink into, to feel overcome with —
Shikamaru started again, hand working, opening Neji up further, making the sounds of controlled want and desire start to spill —
A twist of the hand, eyes steady but only barely —
“You sound so good like this.” Neji’s eyes pinched, like a retreat in the making, but Shikamaru raised his brow, hand’s pace quickening, tightening. He shook his head, “Nah, let me see you —”
Neji’s lips pursed, and he swallowed — a whine escaping him. “Shikamaru — fuck — this is —”
There you are…
“Yeah, Neji?”
Neji just shook his head, blinking, using all his strength to stay in place, pressed up against Shikamaru — arms flexing, his exposed chest and heaving breaths only now gaining momentum, like he was —
Shikamaru hummed. “ Yeah, ” and then stopped the pacing he built up for just a moment, enough to lick his hand before setting it back to work again on Neji’s twitching, heavy dick. “ Yeah, Neji ? Did I find it? ”
Neji whined — a pitch in the back of his throat like a guttural growl, lips falling open just a second later —
It made Shikamaru’s own hardness leak, made his own thighs shutter in a way he was certain Neji must have felt — must have, even as shaky and breathless and uprooted as he was. And Neji wasn’t even stopping himself any more, like he knew he was capable of passing his limits, and that every sound in him, every pleasure —
It wasn’t worth holding back.
Even if his eyes wanted to avert, wanted to seek shelter from the strength of Shikamaru’s knowing, because oh was he ever intent, never yielding — didn’t even want to blink if it meant he’d miss a second of Neji falling to pieces.
And all from my hand…
“You gonna come from this? Are you gonna let me see it?”
Neji moaned again, and Shikamaru’s hand on his neck wandered. Started sloping down the back of his neck, under his hair — and Neji’s eyes didn’t clock the movement, didn’t widen or shut or do anything but hold his own vision, blinking and fluttering it may be — but if he’d known the direction of Shikamaru’s hands —
“Shika —maru fuck, fu-ck —”
And then his hand glanced over that spot.
“Fuc - ck!” Like the air had been stripped from his lungs, mined empty and concave and he clung to Shikamaru’s arms with a strength he rarely ever used, even in moments hot and tender and —
The sight, the sounds, every breathy moan, it was all too much, too delicious and it only made Shikamaru want more. He breathed in a sharp breath, eyes level with Neji’s glossy ones. He stroked his fingers over that spot, the bundle of hot nerves and chakra and desire that made Neji’s body tense in mere seconds —
“ F— gods, it’s so much — ”
His breathing, it was morse code with no message, no end game, just endless pleas and echoing sounds that translated into more and don’t stop and stop looking at me —
Shikamaru didn’t even register the words he was saying, just felt them come out of the pits of his stomach that clenched and tied and felt deliciously close to that same edge Neji was walking when , “You’re doing so good.”
Neji closed his eyes, but remembered the conditions of the hand on his dick, the attentive fingers against his blind spot, and reopened them —
“So good, Neji, so good —”
Neji’s thighs shuttered, the fold of his lotus losing form even further as he gripped the moving muscles of Shikamaru’s arms.
“ Good boy ,” and Shikamaru wished, at that moment, that he’d known what he could do with just two words.
The sharp reflex of Neji’s hips, the violent tug of his hands on Shikamaru’s working ones, was just the start of it — like discovering a secret hidden so deep that even Neji’s own surprise, own blown out eyes, spoke to a deeper truth being unrooted when—
“ Hnn —!”
The strangled sound of want and desire and shame bottled up into one explosive moment that tilted Shikamaru’s equilibrium, both of mind, and of body —
His head bumped into Neji’s and Neji, true to his word, held his eyes — before he couldn’t and he was coming and coming and fucking coming, shaking and letting go of every breath like he’d broken the fence that tried to hold the avalanche back. He moaned, low, vowels shaped into rolling tundras over his tongue, sounds that dead-ended into a high pitch breath — before collapsing like a vocal line held up by little more than threads. Dropping, a puppet with it's string stripped of everything but it’s last fiber.
Shikamaru stroked the last of his climax out of him with a wet hand, his other hand returning to its place on his neck, cradling his head against his throat with every last stroke. Heavy, long, dripping and only barely satiated —
Shikamaru kissed the side of his neck, the curve of his ear, and started up a pace again — game be damned, eyes be damned, having found something like he’d accidentally been digging for gold he never knew was there.
“What was that?”
Whispers, the uncanny sound of skin on skin in a place where the air grew heavy from sex and want and discovery —
Neji was shaking, more now than even seconds ago when Shikamaru pulled his first climax from him. Always needy, always craving, and he made a frustrated sound into his chest. Sensitive, hard — overspent and yet needing all the friction Shikamaru would give him.
“Do you like that ?” And with a quick tug, one that made Neji’s hips cant like they’d gain more friction from the mere inch the position allowed. “I didn’t know how much you needed to hear that, Neji —”
“ Don’t be — ”
“Ridiculous, yeah, I know. ”
Neji was so close again, but that obstinate spirit in him that took everything as a challenge, it was bled from him like his climax had been, strung out and pulled to its limits and leaving only raw nerves in its place, hot spots of want and acknowledgement and admittance. He just nodded, forehead tucked against Shikamaru’s neck — breath shuttering down the front of his shirt as he choked back, swallowed, down his own sounds —
Ah, fuck...
And Shikamaru didn’t stop, not by a long shot — so little could have made him still his fingers, make him drop Neji’s weight, but he did embrace him with his free hand, did pull him in until he felt like he was holding him up. He ghosted his lips across his ear, kissed it just cause he could, and whispered everything in his mind, thoughts and calculations and intimacy games be damned.
“Can you give me more? ” And his voice was husky, deep, unfamiliar. His hand found a good rhythm again, and Neji moaned against the growing speed. “ Come on, Neji, baby — ”
Neji inhaled sharply, exhaled in a shutter. And it was like he’d pulled the stray, hidden sounds in his throat with that one filling breath, because his moans were louder, stronger — “Nnnn…”
“What do you need? Tell me, I want to hear it.”
Neji groaned against his neck, lips falling open with Shikamaru’s hand on him.
I’m not gonna last if he keeps up like this...
“ Keep — keep going — keep talking —”
He was so close, it was fucking painful — Shikamaru smirked, steadied the strength behind his arms so his embrace couldn’t ever be mistaken, be doubted.
If I’d known I could do this...
“You want me to keep talking? Do you want to hear it again, about how good you —”
Neji nodded, frantically and achingly and his hands bunched in the fabric around Shikamaru’s arms, coiled up into fists and trembling muscles.
Just a couple more strokes —
“Gods, you’re doing so good for me...”
Just a few more…
“You almost there, Neji?” And when Neji nodded, he pulled them apart enough to stare him in the eye — to lock their gazes in an unsteady stream of consciousness, where Shikamaru could all but hear the shame and pride and fear and arousal permeating each second of hooked eyes.
“You’re gonna come for me?”
“ Yes ..!”
“Good boy.”
And that was it, and he was coming, eyes widening before snapping shut with a shutter. And then it was a second later before he was caving into the closeness he craved as Shikamaru took every bit of him apart again. His breath came out hitched, strung along and shaky and tense with every last stroke.
Shikamaru kept going, long fingers and strong palm determined and certain as he pulled everything he could from Neji. Sounds, trembling, lost words that he wasn’t even sure Neji knew he was saying…
He swallowed thickly, and Neji tensed up again. He dropped both his hands to Shikamaru, shaking, twitching — “It’s — give me a break — Shikamaru —”
Shikamaru chuckled, stilling his hands under the clumsy, desperate struggle of Neji’s own. He instead wiped his hand on the inside seam of his pants, retreating a few inches to bring Neji back into focus. “Sorry.”
A smile tugged at Neji’s lips as he leaned back onto one hand, a small sheen of sweat crossing his brow as he turned his head up like he was looking at the heavens. His eyes closed, he fumbled with his open shirt with his free hand, crossing his chest like he’d rediscovered modesty despite those clothes being streaked with come.
“No you’re not.”
Shikamaru laughed dryly, wiping his hand on the calf of his chinos. “Yeah, I’m not.”
Neji looked so nice, coming back to himself. He sighed, pushing off his hand and opening his eyes. They were glossy, relaxed, focused. “Are you certain you didn’t have a plan in mind? It seems to me like you’ve been thinking that for a while.”
Something like that…
“I’m always thinking of ways to take you apart, if that’s what you’re asking.”
Neji’s cheeks returned with a renewed flush. His smile was confident as he reached out to cup Shikamaru’s cheek, drawing them both forward to meet in the middle. “I suppose our minds are the same in that way.”
The way he said it, it brought everything back into focus — to the way he was still hard and leaking with want, strained against the band of his pants in a way that was more embarrassing than anything. His eyes softened at the sharp reminder, at the soft kiss he was pulled into.
It was worth it to be a moment away from an embarrassing event, but oh god …
“If you want to be taken apart…”
Neji moved his lips in soft harmony, stroking at his cheek with the utmost care and attention he possibly could, before pulling back. His eyes were slits of focus, of acknowledgement that it nearly shook the confidence Shikamaru sat high and mighty on, just seconds before.
And then there were the raises of veins across his temples. He bumped their foreheads against each other again, decisiveness settling across his features in such a noticeable way, it made Shikamaru swallow.
Neji kept his eyes on him, steady like a snake, while a hand undid the sash holding together the slit of his pants. He even tsked at the discovery of how he wasn’t wearing underwear, and he smiled once he got a solid hold on him.
Shikamaru hummed, eyes creasing at the pressure, hands coming up uselessly to Neji’s biceps — like it was enough to keep him grounded.
This is going to be embarrassingly f—
“Keep up, Shikamaru,” Neji said, casual like he didn’t hold everything in the palm of his hand. His other hand held a trembling thigh, while he fixed his grip solid and unmoving around him.
Soft sighs gathered at the back of Shikamaru’s throat. “Don’t set your hopes too high,” he chuckled, humming when Neji finally started moving, eyes crecenting in the wake of Neji’s rolling wrist, his tightening grip.
“ Hmmnn ,” before his eyes slipped close. Neji didn’t even say anything, just stopped, before Shikamaru reluctantly peeled his eyes back, back to facing the glowing white of Neji’s and —
Oh.
Chakra, flowing heavily into him — he almost didn’t even recognize it, just felt the sudden wave of weight settling over his body like a blanket. Warm, pulsating, in tune with Neji’s intentions and touching the inner most parts of his nerves, his chakra. It vibrated all on its own, a pulsating mass he could nearly feel choking every inch of skin with a buzzing, electric feeling —
Tightening deep in the pits of his hips, pulling every muscle taut —
And in mere seconds .
“Neji — Neji!!”
Bastard —
“Eyes, Nara — give me all the confidence you showed when it was me under your hand.”
And he thought he’d last. A sharp yelp came unbidden from his throat, so suddenly it caught him off guard, and his thighs shuttered in Neji’s grip as —
“ Hnnn —”
Fuckfuckfuckfu—
He could have sworn the chakra invading his system grew, even through each shuddering pull of the wrist Neji inflicted — even when he was dry and sensitive, and Neji was still there to pull impossible amounts of sensation from him —
He didn’t know how he ended up cradled in his arms, mirroring their previous position with his head tucked into the safety of Neji’s neck. The strength and warmth of his neck, his holding arm, his fingers working around his already spent body while mumbling words into his ears like he thought he could hear them.
“Nn…”
And, a few seconds of shaking and breathing and blissful emptiness, Neji brought them to a stop. A rest, where the echoes of their panting breath lived like ghosts in the quiet walls of Shikamaru’s bedroom — coming back into focus, the room around them turning back into color, back into shapes, back into forms beyond just the two of them and the pleasure they built.
Shikamaru swallowed, tongue hot in his mouth, lips numb, mind scarily calm and clear. He scooted back just a bit, edging up against the blocky forms of the shogi pieces still left on the board.
He groaned when he straightened out his back, rolled his shoulders. “Look at you, taking my tricks.”
Neji was drying his hand on his pants, cleaning it with a self satisfied smirk on his face. “Then I take it that I shouldn’t do that again?”
So annoying .
“That’s exactly what I mean.”
“Clearly. Well, wish granted, Shikamaru, if that’s what you want. It will never happen again.”
So fucking annoying.
“Thanks for understanding.”
“Hmm.”
And then, a second of adjustment later, where the discomfort of drying come and ravished clothes finally began to set in, Neji moved to kneel, still sitting between Shikamaru’s thighs.
He kissed him, parting their lips with a languid speed, a soft edge to movements relaxed and calm. His fingers danced across his sides, pulling his legs inward, holding him still. “I love you.”
Not even a second later, “I love you too.”
“Your priorities are clearly off, though,” Neji followed up, whispering still between them. He looked down, then to the side, eying a random shogi piece. He reached out and picked it up, tumbling it between his fingers as he brought it between them. “You threw the game, quite literally,” he added, eyes casting over the rest of the scattered pieces for just a moment. “— Just for sex.”
“What would you have me do? It’s been weeks…”
Neji nodded, ever so slightly, adjusting his legs, adjusting the seam of his pants that he was only now getting to fixing. He tucked himself back in, sighing. “I know.”
“Besides, it was just a game.”
Neji rolled his eyes, faux annoyance betrayed by the smile just barely restrained. “Another phrase I never thought I’d hear come from you.”